Tag Archives: writing

Style Guides Stole My Brain

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then
I was certain
of semi versus colon
phrase versus clause
en versus em
stop versus pause

but now
Defence does it this way, Academia, that
and for each I must wear a uniquely styled hat
Tech sector, plain English; Marketing, spin
little wonder my head’s in the shape it’s in
and I spend my days completely confounded
debating if words should be merged or compounded
and whether it’s ‘a ton’ or ‘1 ton’ or ‘one tonne’
(get that one wrong and your career’s good as done)
if I can dash with impunity or must double-dot
and when I must…
..and when I must not
and the comma, the comma—oh, don’t get me started!
it once knew its place; now it’s upped and departed
my participally dangling brain in revolt

Oxford, Strunk and Chicago,
it’s your @:^#;$\,&*! fault

————————-

Thanks to The Laughing Housewife for her CoWA this week which cheered me up immensely after a rather gruelling morning at the dentist 😀

Weekly Photo Challenge: Hidden

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Nature hides then reveals its beauty

I took this photo at Myall Lakes last year of what appears to be a cicada that’s just emerged from its nymph shell. Unfortunately, the colour balance of the photo isn’t good even with a bit of doctoring but it gives an idea of the contrast between the packaging and its contents.

Cicada and nymph shell - Myall Lakes, NSW, Australia

And the  poem below is about the duplicitous side of human nature –  (it’s a re-post of one of my earliest on this blog).

Wicked

How witchlike a creature can I be
when the moth at a swipe digs its claws into me
and the blood in my veins cascades to the ground
and the thoughts in my head make no audible sound.

How witchlike a creature do I feel
when a table for two is a cannibals’ meal
and the eggs in the pantry go rotten inside
and the cow in the meadow eats its own hide.

How witchlike a creature do I seem
when the nightmare you chase is my sacred dream
when the pain in your heart is the pleasure in mine
when the warmth that you drink is a poisonous wine.

Everything is not what it seems
The smile on my face is the end to a means.

Special thanks to Gabrielle Bryden for guest-posting me on her blog this week  😀

Weekly Photo Challenge: Comfort

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Coffee art - Pala Pizza, NYC

I sleep in; you are gone when I wake,
but here in our kitchen,

in the egg in the pan
to be boiled,
the GF bread
already once-toasted,
Vivalto Lungo
in the Nespresso machine (eat your heart out, George),

I find you

It is this that keeps me

these minutiae of love,
all the comfort
I need

Jane Doe (with apologies to dogs, maggots and vampires everywhere)

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Bloggers come and bloggers go
and herein lies one Jane Doe
her tombstone says in Goth Shadow:
‘Just another WordPress blog below’

“Anonymity! Oh, freakin’ no!
I do decree that’s not the go!
For your complacency to grow
my power base, ALL I must know!

No faceless, nameless so-and-sos
will be allowed to stem the flow
your ID to the dogs I’ll throw
while I’m here sucking up the dough!”

Bloggers come and bloggers go
and herein lies one Jane Doe
maggot Zuckerberg, her face-off foe,
has sucked her in from head to toe

Sydney Morning Herald – Click, and Facebook revises privacy

Sydney Morning Herald – Facebook’s power should worry us all

Sydney Morning Heraled – Google launches Facebook rival ‘Google+’

Old Oaks

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Young oaks, fresh-leafed

uniformed
in naive acorn pride
stand tall in single file
guardians in memoriam
of those who died

– in Time –

gnarled with salt of tears
whorled in winds of sorrow
and furrowed with fires of rage
young grow old
in a different
age

toward the light, away from fear

with deferential bow
to a Callery Pear


Microcosmos

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Beauty at scale rarely seen
by human eye, but inbetween
lush blades of grass daily spy
a microworld of strange small fry

as this mini-jungle wakes
from dark of night, a lone ant slakes
his thirst from fresh dewdrops bright
reflecting snails in love’s delight

airfields of apian craft at ready
take flight from rouged poppies, heady
with blue jewels sparkling far and wide
on backs of bees on buzzing ride

a mighty dung beetle battles
sticks arresting rolling chattels
from onward journey, this daily testing
to construct his place of resting

inkblot-eyes of springtails watch
(in somersault) nymphs slowly hatch
themselves from deep and watery vault
and caterpillars as they moult

A miniverse that’s quite astounding,
with creatures, strange and weird, abounding

Death Cap

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iniquity, depravity
crimes against humanity

conflagration, radiation,
man made this abomination

enormity, deformity,
war’s enduring legacy

experimentation, humiliation
who needs victim’s approbation?

cessation, condemnation?
war has no such aspiration

obliteration, extermination,
then,
our final destination

Rounds in resilience

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It’s her little joke –
every round is stroke –
the way she hits that ball
you wouldn’t know she’s had two

bionic man, quadruple
by-passed, defibrillated, has me
in stitches

at 80, his game’s
got more heart
than mine

then, on the 13th,

seasoned traveller
confides myeloma’s no
handicap to chipping
away at the children’s
inheritance

golf’s putting
this stupid game
in perspective

but it ain’t no Sunday
drive

What if?

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What if
you were gifted
a second life?

Would you,

having sifted
time’s hindsight,

re-map the course
thus far taken,
and without remorse
sail dreams forsaken,

hoist new masts
on life’s oceans blue,
endeavouring to chart
a different you,

to brave life’s wild
and raging seas,
or float with mild
and soothing breeze?

What if
you were given
a second
life?

Posted for SidevieW’s Weekend Theme

(one-sided) conversations with Sir Richard

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I concur that you are a brilliant man
(not some selfish gene flash-in-the-pan)
so I’d like a rational discussion with you
re your rationale I find somewhat askew

While I’m fundamentally with your position on God
I find your fundamentalism disturbingly odd
Yes, I was importunately sermonised in my youth
but would never label it child abuse

There are many true victims of that aberration
which has little to do with attempted ‘salvation’

Rogue

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Once,

on a shimmering day,

I saw the sea fly up

Llandudno Beach

and swallow our sunwashed

detritus –

faded towels, Hang Ten slops, trashy

novels, footprints

ingested,

as we scramble-watched

it from the boulders,

churning back out to the horizon

with the indigestion

of our lives,

not looking back

to wave