Today, our governor announced our new poet laureate. I was expecting the announcement to be a Chris Strolin! Too bad! Instead it is Kevin Stein, who wants to bring poetry into all households. I heard that he has collected an anthology of poems from throughout Illinois. Any chance that some of them are yours, CJ?

"A sample of poetry from Kevin Stein's Chance Ransom:

Since selecting a favorite poem was nearly impossible, I chose the poening poem to the book as our sample because I felt it best showed Stein's use of imagery, musicality of verse, rhythm, subject matter and use of poetic tools.

In the Kingdom of Perpetual Repair
Sunday A.M. so early even FM crackles church service
for shut-ins,
fire and brimstone fricatives torqued around a tongue
as forked
as the red-one-with-tail's pitchfork, both useful tools
for snaring souls
like me who've sworn off church poew for workbench,
never mind my cursing
what I can't get right. the deck's three legged table,

for instance, its mishmash of mismatched pine
and close-out cedar
lifts in slight breeze then nosedives like a child's
Easter kite,
salsa and beer sprawled from its swept wings. This should
bring despair,
say, that of the preacher surveying his cracked flock--
styptic pencils
and clip-on ties, clown dot rouge, and pantyhose bound

around muzzy mellon bellies, the kiddies thwacked with shiny
vinyl hymnals
he splurged collection money on -- but should is not does,
despite flimflam grammar,
and Christ, we love each other less for what we are than for
what we might become.
I love it when the preacher claims to be the Lord's tool,
wrench or saw
or claw hammer in the Big Guy's hands, his vowels

sanding my soul's rusty hinges. Creak creak, a door opens.
Creak creak
the organ hums a hymn amenable to each measure and rise
of lives built
from the ground up only to be ground down like those
fresh dead
the morning sermon mourns: So-Close Joe, loser of 237
straight harness races
lungs so scarred he wheezed from paddock to gate

only to foam home last; and lonely Colonel Bohart,
retired U.S. Army,
who collapsed in bath holding Ike, his olde stuffed dog
with ruler built-in
for reasons only a man who loves equally his dog
and his tools understands.
To wit: Bohart's homemade mailbox, exact size and girth
of Ike,
designed to bark when its mouth-lid opens. Good dog.

No, good man, the more elusive creature in this church
of break
and break anew. Creak creak, the hinges need oil.
Creak creak,
my heart swings open with praise for losers we are
and those we're not
by grace of a thousand fancy chances, blessed stretch
by which we catch
Fate's hammer inches above the anvil of our head,

or failing that, still find among the cartoon stars its
blow brings forth
our own brief comet, incandescent tale we believe
is beautiful
because we've somehow made something out of nothing.
only gods do that.
We elide to nothing: ice to mist, fist to dust.
Praise this then:
that long undoing maps our single perfect act."

To be honest, I don't much like it. What do they mean by "poening"? I couldn't find it anywhere.

poening = opening ???

Oh...I bet you're right, Jerry! I always assume there is some odd new word that I haven't heard of and so I miss the obvious!

BTW, the article mentioned the pleural of "poet laureate" as being "poets laureate." Now, I know that's right, but the term "poet laureates" sounds better to me.

Every peotic "sin" in CJ's lexicon - I can't wait to here what he thinks of it.

(I quite liked it.)

Why should I let the toad work
Squat on my life ?
Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork
And drive the brute off ?
Read all about my travels around the world here.
Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog.

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Originally posted by Kalleh:

... the article mentioned the pleural of ... laureate."

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pleural?

Tinman

"pleural"? Well, he is her state's bard!

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Originally posted by BobHale:
Every peotic "sin" in CJ's lexicon - I can't wait to here what he thinks of it.

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First off, not to sound like the ol' School Marm but what has happened to everyone's proofreading (see elsewhere) lately? When B.H. spoke of "every peotic sin" I thought he was implying that flaws in this piece could be blamed on the author's recent encounter with peyote.

The sins you refer to, by the definition of "free verse," aren't sins at all since in this mildly revolting (to me, anyway) literary form, anything goes. I don't need to go off on my anti-free verse rant at this point, do I?

Regarding the piece, I more or less second B.H.'s opinion. Interesting imagery throughout and I particularly liked the part about the retired colonel. All in all, not bad. (...for free verse, that is.)


And No, sadly, to the best of my knowledge I was not even considered for the post. It's something to aspire to, though. Elect me and I'll provide Illinois with enough Double Dactyls to choke a horse! (That's either great imagery, a misused cliche, or an unfortunately mixed metaphor. No, Wait! I've got it - It's FREE VERSE!!)

Oh yeah, I'm ready!

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First off, not to sound like the ol' School Marm but what has happened to everyone's proofreading (see elsewhere) lately?

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Bob's was a tiny typo; my egregious use of "pleural" (and, my specialty is respiratory nursing!), instead of "plural" (pointed out by Tinman), is just plain embarrassing. However, it was late! After uncopywritable [sic], I thought things would get better. Sorry once again!

Yet, CJ, I doubt that anyone here is perfect. [Look for the original spelling of "orinigal."]

True enough. In fact, I even had "orinigal" in mind when I made that post, definitely including myself in the "everyone" whose proofreading skills seem to be, let's say, inconsistent. I only pointed out B.H.'s "peotic" since the reference to peyote tickled me. I know, I'm my own best audience. Stroy (sic) of my life...

I'm pretty sure we've covered this before but a spell-checker on this site would be a huge asset, maybe even to the point of attracting new Wordcrafters, maybe?

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maybe even to the point of attracting new Wordcrafters, maybe?

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Do you honestly think that new people aren't posting because of lack of a spellchecker????? Is Santa Claus coming down your chimney?

Of course no spellchecker would have picked up my most egregious error of all: "pleural" for "plural." Actually, I think that one must have been a Freudian Slip.

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I'm pretty sure we've covered this before but a spell-checker on this site would be a huge asset,

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We did look into this at one point, CJ, but we will do so again. Thanks for the suggestion.

You can type your reply in a word-processing program, such as MS Word, and use that program's spell-checker, then copy and paste it onto the Wordcraft Forum. But that won't help you in many cases. If you type your for you're, to for too or pleural for plural, spell-check won't help. (I knew you knew pleural, Kalleh. Your fingers just moved too fast. But I thought it was funny you made that particular error, since you're a nurse. Knowing that you're a respiratory nurse makes it even funnier.)

One of the nice features about the new Write 101 Forum is the preview. You can see how your message will look before you post it and, with any luck, correct your mistakes before others see them. It has an edit feature, too, in case you miss a few.

Tinman

I have found there are good and bad features of different sites. No one that I have seen is perfect. For me, a typo/spelling error here and there is not a major catastrophe, but, then, I see that not everyone agrees with that. I have posted on sites with a preview option, and I just don't see a reason for it when you have an edit feature. But, again, I may be in a minority.

1.) No, a spell-checker probably wouldn't exactly atract new people. It'd be nice, though.

2.) Type, cut, paste, transfer, etc etc etc. Too much trouble. I generally types posts, here and elsewhere, with Dictionary.com on standby.

3.) I don't want to give the impression that I'm the board hard-ass regarding typos. As they say, everyone makes misteaks (sic) and typos are no big deal. "Peotic" actually did inspire that peyote-related response, the only reason I posted it.

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I don't want to give the impression that I'm the board hard-ass regarding typos.

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There is a big difference between typos and spelling errors [for example, my "hoisery" (sic) was a spelling error!]. Then there are errors that just happen because you have too much on your mind so that you don't focus, such as my egregious error where I used "pleural" for "plural!"

Typos happen, and I don't mind them. However, I hate to make spelling errors or "plural" errors (what would that error be called?).

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Originally posted by Kalleh:
(what would that error be called?).

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A malapropism ?

Why should I let the toad work
Squat on my life ?
Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork
And drive the brute off ?
Read all about my travels around the world here.
Read even more of my travel writing and poems on my weblog.

Malapropism!

That's one for the Eponyms thread. (Not American eponyms, though.)

I suppose "plural/pleural" could be considered a malapropism, but I am going to argue against it since I have only heard malapropisms in conversations and not in writing. [However, more importantly, since Mrs. Malaprop was considered "ignorant," I am hoping for a better word! ]

No, I don't think it's a malapropism. A malapropism is the substitution of a similar-sounding word for the correct word. In this case both words are pronounced the same and you just picked the wrong one.

I don't know of a word for it, but maybe we can make one up. It would have to be a word that means "wrong homonym".

Mishomonym would fit, and the adjectives would be mishomonymous and mishomonymic, though they don't exactly flow "trippingly off the tongue". Actually, mishomonymous doesn't sound too bad. It has good cadence. And it rhymes with ominous! We could say that the person who uses the wrong homonym has used a mishom (ugly, but concise) or comitted the error of mishomonymity (rhymes with misogyonimity [Ogden Nash-type word for misogyny]).

Enough rambling. Maybe someone else will have an idea.

Tinman

Your mishomonymity is the perfect word -- with double-dactyl cadence, no less. Unless the punsters misunderstood it to mean "lesbianism."

But it strikes me that there ought to be some existing word for "picking the wrong homonym."

Oh, oh! I feel a double dactyl coming on!

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Oh, oh! I feel a double dactyl coming on! Wink

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Quick, Shufits, give her an ounce of powdered Limericks and two drops of Haiku. Repeat, prn.