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Druthers
I’ve never warmed to the absurd idea
That I should lean toward being what I ain’t.
I’m more inclined to move to North Korea
Than hanker to become a martyred saint.
I want to live an unencumbered life
And have some say in making my own rules;
I’ll carry on, without or with a wife,
And never fail to sharpen all my tools.
I’ll dine on steak—or beans, if it must be—
And never ask the stingy cook for more.
I’ll leave a message for my progeny:
It’s better to be rich than to be poor.
I like my whisky neat, and that’s no lie,
With water an infrequent afterthought;
I’ll be this way until the day I die,
Forgetting lofty goals I might’ve sought.
I’d rather walk on sand than tread on gravel,
And I would sooner skate than fly a kite,
So when I hear the Judge’s final gavel,
I’ll grab my hat and fade into the night.
.
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Dragonhead
—a villanelle
You want to slay a dragon, yes you do,
but you ain’t never been no Wyatt Earp,
and dissonance will tear your mind in two.
The claim that you are weak just isn’t true,
you say, and you are not a drowsy twerp.
You want to slay a dragon? Yes, you do!
But you won’t find one in your city zoo,
and it won’t take an up-and-coming herp-
etologist to tear your mind in two,
explaining why that dragon’s not for you.
You scoff at Natural Law when you’re the perp;
you want to slay a dragon, yes you do,
but sticking to your fantasies like glue
is less salubrious than drinking turp-
entine, and both will tear your mind in two.
If all your fervor flies straight up the flue,
and jurists your prerogatives usurp,
you’ll want to slay a dragon—die or do!—
and not let panic tear your mind in two.
.
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C.B. Anderson was the longtime gardener for the PBS television series, The Victory Garden. Hundreds of his poems have appeared in scores of print and electronic journals out of North America, Great Britain, Ireland, Austria, Australia and India. His collection, Mortal Soup and the Blue Yonder was published in 2013 by White Violet Press.
Ingenious handling of the villanelle form, CB, with its unsettling word about the would-be dragonslayers in our midst.
Your 1st reminds me of Walker Percy’s observations about increasing lack of groundedness and purpose, and admonisments to “live your life.”
Many persons want to be a hero, Julian, but only a few are willing to face the risks involved. If you don’t live your life, then it will live you.
C.B., I keep thinking that a map of the thought-paths in your brain must be exceedingly interesting! I’m not sure I always follow them (I’m a terrible map reader anyway), but I am fascinated by the ideas you come up with, and the connections you make with them. In any case, I am always very amused (in a good way!) with your ideas and the way you express them. I laughed out loud at idea/Korea, and at the idea that you would not forget to grab your hat at your last moment. I also admire your courage in choosing to make “Earp” one of your two rhymes for the villanelle; and even though I don’t know what dissonance has to do with slaying dragons, I thought it was great the way you made it tear a heart in two. I also hadn’t known what a herpetologist was, so thank you for the new vocabulary word (although my dictionary spells it with an e in the middle.) Salubrious is a great word, too.
Overall, I must be less insightful than Julian, who compared your writing to Walker Percy’s; my first thought was that you may be approaching Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll territory. (Maybe your next poem will be about the Jabberwock?)
Thanks for the fun read!
The paths my thoughts take is not always linear, Cynthia, which is sometimes a good thing and sometimes not so good. Here “dissonance” = “cognitive dissonance.” I misspelled “herpetologist” and neglected to check my dictionary — perhaps Evan or Mike will correct it. I do not know of Percy, and I am more likely to write a poem about the bandersnatch or the snark.
These two clever poems are creative constructs that captivate the reader by their entertaining thoughts and vocabulary. I am glad you did not forget your hat!
What I’ve lost in hair I make up for with hats, Roy.
C.B. Like Cynthia I love and enjoy reading into the twists and turns of your turned and twisted mind! Such delights as split-word rhymes and rephrased core lines in the villanelle along with the rare but measured slurping on the bean-counter’s beats. Clever and entertaining as always. I think one reason I enjoy the twists is because our minds often overlap. I have also posted a poem titled “Druthers” and the word itself is beyond awesome.
Keep ’em coming, C.B. My day is always brighter when you do.
Split-word rhymes, James, are risky and often require that lower-case letters be used to begin the lines that follow — the convention of capitals at the head of lines is dispensed with. It’s done out of necessity, and the best advice is not to try this at home. The idea of overlapping minds is a very interesting concept. I’ll keep ’em coming as long as I can draw breath … and ink.
The villanelle “Dragonhead” sounds like it’s directed against a specific person (perhaps an enemy, or an estranged friend). There’s also the possibility that it could be a harsh self-judgment, but I don’t see how it could fit Kip Anderson’s personality. The Kip Anderson I know is a sane and sensible guy.
Like James, I enjoyed the split words “herp- etologist” and “turp- entine.,” even though I myself generally avoid such divisions. But there just aren’t a lot of rhymes in that category — the only others I can think of are “burp” and “slurp” — so I guess Kip had a good reason to do it.
The quatrains of “Druthers” are those of a hard-bitten individualist, telling us not just of his preferences but what he will NOT do. In a world where we are deafened daily with calls for “what we must do” and “how we should act” and “that which is required of us,” this poem is a harsh slap in the face to those moralists, dreamers, and bureaucrats who presume to dictate our behavior.
About the word “druthers” — it is an assimilated form of the words “would rather,” turned into a plural noun. The sentence “I would rather” became “I’d ruther” in some dialects, and so “your druthers” became “those things that you would prefer.”
Just a specific type of person, Joseph. Whether I am sane or not is open to debate, and yes, it was the dearth of appropriate rhyming words that sent me down that road. As it happens, “druthers” is in the dictionary. It sounds colloquial, but most English speakers and nearly all Americans understand the word, especially in the context of “If I had my druthers …”
Perfectly-crafted and highly engaging poems, C.B. No surprise that your rhymes are about as creative and satisfying as I’ve ever seen. That you came up with all those “perp” rhymes astonishes me.
I only needed six or seven of them, Brian, and as Salemi noted, “burp” and “slurp” were left over. Is not a herpetologist someone who studies Herpes?
C.B., I love word play and I love words with unintuitive meanings and it would be great fun to compile a list of them! With your intuitively satisfying but unambiguous misdefinition of “herpetologist” you have nonetheless coined a useful heteronym. Now if we could only find a word for someone who studies harpies… As for the more traditional definition of a herpetologist as used in your poem… what a perfect usage when discussing dragons! I’m just not sure if dragons are reptiles or amphibians but I guess “herpetologist” has both covered.
Dragons are definitely squamous and therefore reptiles, but breathing fire is another matter altogether and thwarts any attempt to come up with a sensible taxonomy.
CB, thanks for these two well written pieces. I must confess the word “druthers” was unknown to me; live and learn. “Dragonhead” could be taken on several levels: I thought of all the people today who purport to be fearless fighters for justice (like the pro-Palestine mob) who are in fact useful idiots or much worse. Two enjoyable poems anyway.