Saturday, 20 April 2013

Well, Well!

The title beneath this illustration which IGWRT's Kerry O'Connor provided a link to today, reads thus :-

Cadmus prepares to slay the pitiless reptile who had killed his poor companions.

Strike me down with a feather! Oops - no! Not Cad must prepare to slay a dragon, after all. My eyes played tricks on me. Thank goodness for that... but now I need the story...hmmm... that might take some time. I'll be back...

 Play Time

The local Am Dram players, rehearsing in a wood,
were all dressed up in togas  (my, what a load of freaks)
but their play was due to open in but a few short weeks.
It was about a dragon, that Cadmus, if he could,

had to catch, then kill (politely) and then repeat  (twice nightly)
But the props man wasn't ready. " How can I find a way
to make a dragon in that time? Let alone one you can slay!
It’s giving me a headache - I tell you all, forthrightly!”

They held a special meeting, the cast, the crew, the boss,
and put their heads together, pooled their D.I.Y ideas –
their brains were working harder than they had for many years-
“We’ll do it if it kills us, we just don’t give a toss!”

At last they had a brainwave- papier mâché, wire and string
should make a framework, all in bits; that was just the start.
They then worked out a cunning plan how it would fall apart
then be put back together! Oh, ‘twas a wondrous thing!

So my namesake, trusty Cadmus, was as happy as a king.
The play was great. The theatre was fully booked each night
 and the dragon fell and rose again – it was an awesome sight.
BUT at the last performance, the dragon it took wing …

and was never seen again. That’s MAGIC!

Friday, 12 April 2013

Brown Study

From a selection of artworks by Chelsea Bednar comes this Abstract7, which suggested to me a great sense of longing for home. So I wrote this - 

In a far country
a stranger's understanding
dispels loneliness.
Then realisation comes -
home lies within one's own heart.






I trust my attempt at a Tanka fits the request made by Margaret Bednar at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, to capture the emotion in the picture.

Saturday, 6 April 2013

Out Of Hibernation...

...I come, for a while at least, to answer the Toad Call of the great outdoors... or any other outside...  thanks to Peggy Goetz at IGWRT's. Perhaps the cold has got to me, for all I could come up with was this...

Outside is not in.
The thin
edge
of the wedge
is felt
when snows melt
and wet
is met
coming in from outside.
Occasional land slides
can mean
houses lean
towards the 'in' of the Earth.
They decrease in worth,
fast...
The last
thing a house needs
is to be inside earth like a seed.
It will not multiply,
but stultify,
possibly rumbling
while crumbling
towards impend-
ing doom. The End.