Our prompt for today (again — totally optional!) is a little odd, but here goes. Recently, I read an article about the Scottish science fiction writer Iain M. Banks. His books often have spaceships in them. And those spaceships have extremely odd, poetic names. Like: Prosthetic Conscience, Irregular Apocalypse, Unfortunate Conflict of Interest, Gunboat Diplomat, Very Little Gravitas Indeed, A Series of Unlikely Explanations, Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality, Jaundiced Outlook, Frank Exchange of Views, Lightly Seared on the Reality Grill, Falling Outside the Normal Moral Constraints, Abundance of Onslaught, Refreshingly Unconcerned With the Vulgar Exigencies of Veracity, A Fine Disregard For Awkward Facts.
There’s a whole twitter account devoted to tweeting Iain-M-Banks-like names for spaceships. So your challenge for today is to write a poem with a title drawn from one of these spaceship names. Feel free to pick a genuine Banks, like the ones listed above, or to take one from the twitter. And if you think of your own Banks-like spaceship name title, feel free to use that! The poet Barbara Guest wrote an essay warning poets about starting from the title, but while I've found that a wonderful poem usually finds its right title, I've also found that the right title can easily lead to a wonderful poem!
Happy writing!
Here's my Day Four
INVINCIBLE JIM
(THE INVISIBLE MAN)
In his imagination he was invisible(THE INVISIBLE MAN)
invincible nothing was broken
tokens and toys all in the box
the box was locked and bolted
malted milk and biscuits ready
steady go up the wooden hill to bed
bedlam in his head screaming
dreaming he was invincible
invisible nobody could see him
Jim the invincible invisible man
That malted milk should help to keep his dream alive...!
ReplyDeleteYeah, thanks Stan although I was thinking a little honey might have been better.
ReplyDelete