A "Foreign" Challenge

[legerdemer]

Some guesses (because I can't resist going out on a limb and falling):

#1 - Marie Celeste - I can hear this one as a song, with "Marie Celeste' serving as the refrain; that and its sprinkled Greek and Italian references make me think it may be by Pelegrino

#2 Barney in Barnet - gm? Annie? hmmm

#3 Indigo Chihuahua - gm

#4 - Ashesh, probably

#5 - Domesticity - very sweet, this one; I'll guess AlwaysHungry, who has an ear for West Indian lilts and rhythms (I can't help wondering what married-man pork tastes like)

#8 - Autochton Permaculture - gm

#9 - Small Sacrifice - GP

#10 - Pseudo Neo Nazi Paparazzi - Magnetron


That's all I got...

 

[AlwaysHungry]

Fleur fragrant blossom far beyond my reach
Romancing my senses la portails orgasmic.
Enthralled in her petals, the nectar adorn
Nearest thing to heaven. Oh ma petite
Come to me in all your naked glory, admirer
Hypnotique, lost in your beauty I quaff.

I like this one, but the "quaff" seems odd to me, and ends the poem on a strange note.

 

[AlwaysHungry]

I love what you are saying
when it is said in French.
I swoon for L' Escargot,
for petit pois I'll clench
buttocks round your Cote d'azure
and faux pas drives me wild
to take you up Champs-Élysées,
the Seine floods and I'm beguiled.

This one is charming. I'm not entirely certain that I understand it, though. It seems to be a joke about people who are aroused by hearing French expressions (shades of A Fish Called Wanda) and use them without understanding what they mean?

 

[AlwaysHungry]

Letter from Paris

What is it about her, that grande dame
with her weary smile and her je ne sais quoi,
her saucy hips of soft blond stone or her
marble décolletage enticing love birds
of all sorts to perch?

Her puddles reflect the sunlight filtered through
suspended cotton, and splash up her skirts.
Windows of antiquaires like eyes beguile,
fluttering letters signed by Cocteau, Flaubert,
Colette, and Hugo, and display Modigliani look-alikes.

I take you with me as we stroll through the Tuileries,
watching the knots of lovers or friends, and the lone wolf
—so debonair—casting his foxy eyes about for the comely waif.

I imagine your touch boiling against me as we walk,
arm-in-arm, to the clip-clop of heels on cobbles.
I muse on what might have been if we’d crossed paths before,
and how our fingers would tingle with the warmth.

Non, je ne regrette rien, though I still ponder the what ifs,
and pine sometimes that our imaginations were not more entwined,
a tighter weave over the doubts that hardly seemed to matter then.

A picture postcard with a wistful missive, enchanting and affecting. "Your touch boiling against me as we walk" -- that's a potent metaphor.

 

[greenmountaineer]

I like this one, but the "quaff" seems odd to me, and ends the poem on a strange note.

Except it's a double acrostic as UYS noted. Reading up, the last letter in the last word of each line is the same as the first word of each line reading down.

Singles are hard enough for me, so I applaud the poet's patience and skill.

I might have tried to find a way to conclude with

".....lost in your beauty. J'ai soif."

 

[greenmountaineer]

Last Call

I have 4 revisions for the 11 poems in the challenge.

I'll post poet identities tomorrow morning Easter Standard Time.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

I have 4 revisions for the 11 poems in the challenge.

I'll post poet identities tomorrow morning Easter Standard Time.

lolled at Easter, yes doesn't take much to amuse me

 

[greenmountaineer]

I have 4 revisions for the 11 poems in the challenge.

I'll post poet identities tomorrow morning Easter Standard Time.

lolled at Easter, yes doesn't take much to amuse me

Arthritic finger

 

[pelegrino]

Regarding no. 2 “Barney in Barnet”, I thought that it’s got to be authored by a Londoner very familiar with cockney rhyming lingo (like “trouble ‘n strife” = wife), and I suggested UYS cause I only associate her and Butters with London. Well… I missed miserably and I’m afraid to guess, but I’ll venture another one.
No. 6, the double acrostic, gives me a flavour of legerdemer… but, I could be wrong again


It’s nearing the time for revelation, so I give it a rest.

 

[greenmountaineer]

Poets have been ID'd and revisions have been included, beginning at post #40.

 

[legerdemer]

Poets have been ID'd and revisions have been included, beginning at post #40.

Hah, I did better than usual with my guesses this time!

I'd love to hear from GP the story behind Small Sacrifice.

And from gm the story behind Autochtonous Permaculture.



Thank you, gm, for running this challenge - it was really entertaining to try to rise to its expectations, and to read everyone else's takes on the themes. Your Indigo Chihuahua takes a prize for humorous poetry!!!

I need to go to some political march with y'all - just think of Mags' lines!

 

[UnderYourSpell]

I like this one, but the "quaff" seems odd to me, and ends the poem on a strange note.

It had to end in an F for FRENCH to read upwards on the last letters.

Except it's a double acrostic as UYS noted. Reading up, the last letter in the last word of each line is the same as the first word of each line reading down.

Singles are hard enough for me, so I applaud the poet's patience and skill.

I might have tried to find a way to conclude with

".....lost in your beauty. J'ai soif."

Thank you and your French is far superior to my schoolgirl variety Thanks too for running this unique challenge.
BTW if anyone has ideas for challenges, it doesn't have to be only one a month.

 

[AlwaysHungry]

(I can't help wondering what married-man pork tastes like)

Married-man pork is simply basil, but I know you all have dirty minds, and a dirty mind is a terrible thing to waste.

 

[legerdemer]

Married-man pork is simply basil...

That's almost a let-down! I think I'll just go with my imagination on this one.

....and a dirty mind is a terrible thing to waste.

Too right!

 

[legerdemer]

It had to end in an F for FRENCH to read upwards on the last letters.



Thank you and your French is far superior to my schoolgirl variety Thanks too for running this unique challenge.
BTW if anyone has ideas for challenges, it doesn't have to be only one a month.

Annie, I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't notice the double acrostic, or the single for that matter, till it was pointed out. I should have expected some shenanigans, and who the author might be. LOL

 

[greenmountaineer]

Hah, I did better than usual with my guesses this time!

I'd love to hear from GP the story behind Small Sacrifice.

And from gm the story behind Autochtonous Permaculture.



Thank you, gm, for running this challenge - it was really entertaining to try to rise to its expectations, and to read everyone else's takes on the themes. Your Indigo Chihuahua takes a prize for humorous poetry!!!

I need to go to some political march with y'all - just think of Mags' lines!

"Autochthon Permaculture" was inspired by my limited understanding of the Abenakis, prevalent in my home state as well as parts of Canada and other New England states.

"Awasos" means black bear. "Namas" means fish, in this case, salmon. Hopefully, those two words were apparent in the context of the poem. "Gizos" was more of a challenge because it can refer to either the sun or the moon. "Sweet tree," although not an Abenaki word, refers to the sugar maple, "drip drip" that time year in the early spring when sap is collected and boiled to make maple syrup.

That's a good segue to a point I was trying to make in writing the poem. Language is, I think, the most prominent feature of culture. We tend to emphasize words. I'm as interested in structure, i.e., grammar, and grammar is highly functional. If you don't need dependent clauses or subjunctive mood, it doesn't come into being. Abenaki, an oral tradition, is tied into daily life with emphasis upon changing of the seasons and how to cope with its challenges.

Arguably, "Autochthon Permaculture" doesn't sound very poetic to our more complex language, but I like it because the words are crisp and, I'd like to think, the images clear.

Now as to "Indigo Chihuahua," ¿Quién sabe?"

Oh, I know:

https://youtu.be/d5TiaQeuNO0

 

[pelegrino]

I was only right on Ashesh 9 by guess , still, one is better than none I suppose.

AlwaysHungry,
regarding MARIE CELESTE, since you mentioned it, I am well aware that the continuous repetition of the same rhyme is depressive (btw, I don’t see any break in this repetition in the penultimate line, except for the insertion of the word "but"), but I have to say to its defence that the rhyme and the melodic/rhythmic elements are just about those two things: depression and repetition. In music terms it is a habanera dance in 2/4 rhythm, originally written for voice and guitar which I later orchestrated. My aim was to have the words "Marie Celeste" (a cadence in verse terms) and whatever words rhyme with it always occurring in perfect cadence in the music setting (perfect cadence being the most important and final in musical terms). So to that extend it makes musical sense in my mind, but as you perhaps imply, it needs to be a little less heavy in verse terms. To that end I used the perfect cadence in absolute symmetry to occur every 4 bars as the vocal line proceeds (excluding instrumental intros), but to derive, if I can, variety, by cadencing in some chords other than the tonic chord by using the technique of passing modulation and thus making the mood lighter. So, if I managed to succeed or not it is still up to the audience to decide.
The song is strophic in strict terms, the main tonality is Am and the symmetry of the cadential scheme throughout the song is as follows:

Stanza 1 / Perfect Cadence in: Am / Bar: 7-11-15-19-37
Stanza 1 / Perfect Cadence in: Dm / Bar: 23
Stanza 1 / Perfect Cadence in: C / Bar: 27-31

Stanza 2 / Perfect Cadence in: Am / Bar: 45-49-53-57-75
Stanza 2 / Perfect Cadence in: Dm / Bar: 61
Stanza 2 / Perfect Cadence in: C / Bar: 65-69

Stanza 3 / Perfect Cadence in: Am / Bar: 83-87-91-95-113
Stanza 3 / Perfect Cadence in: Dm / Bar: 99
Stanza 3 / Perfect Cadence in: C / Bar: 103-107

You can follow all the above aurally (without musical symbols) and/or visually (with the score) in the following youtube link, (music and voice realized by synths as usual, cause I can't afford the expense of a full professional orchestra ) :

MARIE CELESTE


Finally, big thanks to greenmountaineer for hosting this nice challenge, and to everyone that participated and/or commented. I'm still learning a lot from all of you.

 

[GuiltyPleasure]

<clip.....

I'd love to hear from GP the story behind Small Sacrifice. .....<clip>

I went through a stage of reading books about slavery and the underground railway that took the slaves to comparative safety in Canada. That and imagination are behind that poem. some experience on stage helps me with accents,

 

[legerdemer]

I went through a stage of reading books about slavery and the underground railway that took the slaves to comparative safety in Canada. That and imagination are behind that poem. some experience on stage helps me with accents,

A painfully potent inspiration. If you haven't read Toni Morrison's Beloved, I highly recommend it. And somewhat related, James Baldwin's I Am Not Your Negro, which was made into a movie. It was...raw and harsh and true.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Annie, I'm embarrassed to admit I didn't notice the double acrostic, or the single for that matter, till it was pointed out. I should have expected some shenanigans, and who the author might be. LOL

A big hint, if I've started every line with a capital letter (something I don't usually do) , try reading the letters to see if there's a word to be had. Then look the other end reading upwards