Secrets to a Happy Life

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Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, octave, Petrarchan sonnet, sestet

~~a Petrarchan sonnet~~

On a wide variety of topics
ranging in breadth, diversity, and scope
from hopes and dreams of a modern zygote
to climate trends in Belizean tropics;
from last year’s indie top pick biopics
to Hittite methodologies for grope
as practiced by a hundred lusty popes,
I could spew a font of vague specifics,
work us up a head of steam, but no, thanks.
These days, I spend all coming revenue
on nourishing my limbic streams with joy,
ignore the creaking politics of cranks
who think resentment somehow clears the view.
To love, to learn, these hold my full employ.

~~~

The Petrarchan sonnet, despite the name, was not created by Petrarch, but by Renaissance poets who enjoyed composing in Italian. The structure is octave and sestet: eight lines to introduce the problem or premise, and six for the solution. The rhyme scheme ABBAABBA CDECDE has a different feel from Shakespearean. I’ll need to write a few more before I can explain that difference in words.

© Elaine Stirling, 2019
Image: Lisa Bobechko

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Infinity Pool

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Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, sonnet

There’s a pool in the sea in the middle
of my ocean, punch line to a riddle
writ from turbulent emotion where I
contemplate with mer-folk the Great Big Why.

Playing fool, I might take up a fiddle
with the notion that my tara-diddle
wit will soothe like aloe lotion, or try
battering opinions like a deep fish fry.

From there, of course, I fly from the griddle
to the coals where every eager kid’ll
go until she questions: for this I die?
Nope! Joy is here, not in the by and by.

Better to bask in this infinity;
we’ve salt enough to sink no enemy.

© Elaine Stirling, 2018

The Last Articulate Man

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Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, medieval fixed verse, pantoum, triolet

~~a sequence of form poems~~

1 – Triolet

To the last articulate man standing
I have put out a call.

I am dumbstruck, appalled by what people are handing
to the last articulate man standing.

Can he not see we have slowed to a crawl?
We cower in shadows, don’t say a damn thing

to the last articulate man standing.
I have put out a call.

2 – Pantoum

What do you want?
To die of old age in your sleep,
or to live in slow-motion despair
wearing grief like a bone in your throat?

To die of old age in your sleep
is a wish you’ve no right to impose on the rest.
Wearing grief like a bone in your throat,
you’re a cock in the wind on a roof

is a wish you’ve no right to impose. On the rest,
there’s really not much you can do
but spin & complain that the view stays the same.
If only you’d learn to declare

there’s really not much you can do
or to live in slow-motion. Despair…
If only you’d learn to declare,
WHAT DO YOU WANT?

3 – Rondeau (Ringelreim)

Baloney. It’s something you ate
as a kid on white bread. It was great
until you grew older
and facts made you bolder.
You started to choose what you put on your plate.

But the flavours, of late,
make you sick. So much hate
rolling over us all like a boulder. Baloney.

Everyone feels. That’s not up for debate,
unless you fall for the poisonous bait,
the allure of the outraged, the scolder
outwitting the scolded. You both feel colder
and blame it on fate. Baloney!

4 – Triolet

Gently now, there is no rush,
no race to find the answer.

Settle in, surrender to the blush,
gently. Now, there is no rush.

Your every step and fall’s a brush
with love. Eternal, flawless dancer,

gently now, there is no rush,
no race to find the answer.

~~~

© Elaine Stirling, 2017

The Final Leg of the Journey

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Canadian, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, Malayan fixed verse, pantoum, poet

~~a pantoum~~

The final leg of the journey remains
to be seen, though I don’t know by whom.
There’s really no point in obsessing on doom
when I know, more or less, where I’m at.

To be seen, though I don’t know by whom,
and then judged as hopelessly lost
when I know, more or less, where I’m at
puts the spin on my power to choose.

And then, judged as hopelessly lost,
when we’re all free to think and to feel
puts the spin on my power to choose
whether to listen, to hole up, or cruise.

When we’re all free to think and to feel,
there’s really no point in obsessing on doom.
Whether to listen, to hole up, or cruise,
the final leg of the journey remains.

© Elaine Stirling, 2017

It Is All Choreography, My Dear

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Canadian poet, Chant Royal, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, medieval fixed verse

~~a chant royal~~

They tore the monument of you and me
up by the roots last night, spindly sapling
when we met, the leaves threw no shade till we
each set off on bloodline paths of killing,
crisply uniformed, or maintained clan worth
by withholding a cherry, no vain birth
or independent thought condoned. The hell?
Even today, I itch sometimes to tell
originators of our tiresome fear—
more I sought to please you, the worse I fell.
It is all choreography, my dear.

The maple grew. We both found ways to free
ourselves with mind-expanding routes, thrilling
at the best of times. No disharmony
could stop us from bedding other willing
changers of the world. Supple limbs and mirth,
they were eternal, surely! Excess girth
and other swills of disappointment, well,
they couldn’t encroach while under the spell
of productive possibility. Year
by year, fruits of sweet experience fell.
It is all choreography, my dear.

Today, our tree impedes economy.
How is it that, when we weren’t looking,
the buds it threw like chopper blades, spilling
onto woodsy glades gave way to reality?
How is it that, while we aren’t looking,
fresher minds envision a different earth?
Do they not treasure memories of a dearth
of joy, the killing fields, the tolling bell?
How dare they wake each day with hope, a swell
of humantide delighted to be here?
Soon enough, their naïvete will gell.
It is all choreography, my dear.

On, the other hand, where I used to be
might matter less if death were not chilling
with her accelerating destiny,
time and sense to a cruel brew distilling.
What seems the now may be the afterbirth
that, once expelled, holds no intrinsic worth.
Much like the use of entrails to foretell,
the guts I had back then are pretty well
a done dead thing. Learning to boldly spear
new attitudes does not, at first, go well.
It is all choreography, my dear.

Wood chips lie beneath this bench, once a tree
where you carved our initials. It’s telling,
don’t you think, that generations on see
not what we instruct them. Rebelling
is the stuff of youth; constant going forth
rejuvenates, forgetting all the hurt,
denying quarter to a former hell
because I’ve only room for good. Do tell!
I do, and listen for the sap to clear
fearful residuals, let silence quell.
It is all choreography, my dear,

and life’s the dance hall. Keep up and dispel
past stumbles. I can lead or follow well
to further what is best of now. I hear
them playing your song at the new bandshell.
It is all choreography, my dear.

~~~

© Elaine Stirling, 2017
The image of dancers comes from the blog of British artist Sally McKay. You can follow her extraordinary work on Twitter @McKay_Sally.

Who Needs Hell When You Have Facebook?

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#Facebook, #WeDoWhatWeCan, Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, humorous verse, times of upheaval, triolet

~~a trio of triolets~~

begging your pardon, chatelaine, if you’ve a moment, please,
we’ve a crisis with the seating in the northern banquet hall.

the salty-tongued are wedged between the skipjack and the cheese.
begging your pardon, chatelaine, if you’ve a moment, please,

the curtains have caught fire & the cushions twitch with fleas;
the secretly entitled have engaged upon a brawl.

begging your pardon, chatelaine, if you’ve a moment, please,
we’ve a crisis with the seating in the northern banquet hall.

we have to find a way to seat the nasty with the kind;
otherwise, this realm is sure to split right down the middle.

the furious take too much space, defeated hoard the wine;
we have to find a way to seat the nasty with the kind.

the royal sanctimonious insist that we must dine
in deference to some history writ upon a holy griddle.

we have to find a way to seat the nasty with the kind;
otherwise, this realm is sure to split right down the middle.

o, servant dear, when will you learn there’s grace beyond the muddle,
and no one will be served by you exhausting your own station?

yesterday’s great deluge will become tomorrow’s puddle.
o, servant dear, when will you learn there’s grace beyond the muddle?

the beastly ones you can’t control, they hunger for a cuddle;
you’re not their ruler, nor the judge or source of their creation.

o, servant dear, when will you learn there’s grace beyond the muddle,
and no one will be served by you exhausting your own station?

~~~

© Elaine Stirling, 2017
Image: political cartoon from 1813

With apologies to Mark Zuckerberg and all hardworking FB employees. Truth is, I love the medium, but, boy, yesterday was a killer! I can’t even imagine what it’s like from where you sit. So, for all you do, Facebook, thank you!

The Long Game

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Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, Malayan fixed verse, pantoum

~~a pantoum~~

It’s easy to be easy
to be knowing with the flow
that all is well and getting better
where I focus, there I grow.

To be knowing with the flow
that emotions smoothly navigate
where I focus, there I grow
by ignoring the unwanted, I define above, below.

That emotions smoothly navigate
hand in hand with chosen thoughts
by ignoring the unwanted, I define above, below
as a light beam of affection

hand in hand with chosen thoughts
that all is well and getting better.
As a light beam of affection,
it’s easy to be easy!

© Elaine Stirling, 2016

This Play Called Today

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Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, ringelreim, rondeau, wraparound rhyme

~~a ringelreim~~

Long live life, and live it long! Everyone stars
in this play called today. While the bars
I perceive in my role may confine, drop or raise,
I am free to define, independent of praise
or its lack. I can pickle or smash any memory that jars.

To muddy and stir up the past by reflecting on scars
reverses the fields that have healed to perpetual wars
in meadows where fresh thoughts might graze. Long live life!

On my stage, I use mirrors and mist and gold samovars
to embody delights that arrive from above and afar.
Thinking too much about right and wrong ways
of the grim-faced around me confuses and weighs.
What a drag—and what a production we are. Long live life!

~~~

Ringelreim means wrap-around rhyme in German. The form is one of many variations of a rondeau.

© Elaine Stirling, 2016
Image from http://www.favin.com

What do You Wish?

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Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, ringelrime, rondeau

~~a ringelrime~~

What do you wish to persuade me of
with your shaking fist and your tattered glove?
If, in the choice we all have to be happy or right,
I choose ease, turn away from the fright
of the critical masses who disbelieve love,

seeing things as they are, never looking above
or through, like a snivel-nosed bully will shove
me into the nearest fight. What do you wish

in your hope to be wrong? Will you prove
by your twitching that a scavenger outwits the dove
who’s indifferent to death? Are you scared of night
or the coming dawn? Confusion is blind to the bright
and ecstatic arrival of love. What do you wish?

~~~

Ringelrime is the German term for a wrap-around rondeau, in which the introductory half-line “rounds off” the poem in subsequent stanzas.

© Elaine Stirling, 2016

Homage to Think and Grow Rich

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#ThinkAndGrowRich, Canadian poet, Elaine Stirling, form poetry, Napoleon Hill, rethinking abundance, terzanelle

~~a terzanelle~~

Have you heard tell of Napoleon Hill,
inspired when young by the kind man of steel?
Make your own peace with the great dollar bill.

Societal pressure taught Nap to feel
only contempt for the opulent rich.
Inspired when young by the kind man of steel,

he sensed in our hate a suspicious glitch
that suppressed and possessed, insisting on
only contempt for the opulent rich.

Nap traveled and listened to everyone
who’d thought and grown rich, not always by sweat
that suppressed and possessed, insisting on

the unvarnished truth, their secret of get.
He discovered therein a Silent Law.
Who’d thought and grown rich, not always by sweat

found an infinite well from which to draw.
He discovered therein a Silent Law.
Have you heard tell of Napoleon Hill?
Make your own peace with the great dollar bill.

~~~

© Elaine Stirling, 2016