036 Daylight Preserves, v2

There's a poetry contest for the food bank called "Expressions of Hunger". I haven't had time to write anything for it but I was thinking of reworking Daylight Preserves. I'm thinking that this might work for the category of "environmental hunger". I don't know.

Oh, one more thing - I'm participating in the 30 hour famine again this year - this Friday/Saturday, in fact. If I take the time to set up an online donation form, would anybody actually donate?

She kept them
on the splintered shelf
a vessel for each word
a jar for every song
and saved them for years
daylight preserves
for rainy days ahead

how careful they were
yesterday morning breaking dawn
spilling in now
from the uncurtained window
symphony and promise
when the earth is still dreaming
how she smiles in her slumber
how she smiles

so quickly they fill
capturing the overflow
she pulls down the bail closures
he seals in the light
and places them
on the splintered shelf
where she saves them for years

I leave them to dust
a vessel for each heart
a jar for every soul
forgotten

he woke up to darkness
grey-clouded and hollow
how careless they were
when they squandered their light
but still she had her morning stores
for rainy days like these

"just enough for an hour..."

and how she smiles in her slumber
how she smiles
sadly, in the uncurtained light

still not awake
when we wake up to darkness
and then we might say
"we've daylight preserves!

get the butter knife."

035 Daylight Savings

I bought two jars to hold in the light
all the music and words when I'm

not yet awake

spilling in now
from the uncurtained window
colours and shapes
oh the earth is still dreaming
how she smiles in her slumber
how she smiles

So quickly they fill
capturing the overflow to
brimming with love
and the promise of tomorrow
when you're not yet awake
you are still the horizon
there is nothing

but possibility

So I hide away the mason jars
(thank-you dear birds
and the sun in the sky
and the moon in the water)
for stores of the morning
for rainy days ahead
and oh how she smiles
in the uncurtained light

still not awake
When he wakes up to darkness
and then we can say
"we've daylight preserves!

get the butter knife."

011-013 Nails, Sonnet, Music

January 11: Fingernail art.


OK. Yeah. There's a lot of weird art out there, so this qualifies... right? Fingernails, each clipped in an entire piece. It's just something I do.

I took the photos myself. Having only two hands, the above image is actually composed of two photos. If my left hand looks a bit larger than the right, that's the reason. It's not just because I'm left-handed. ;)

The red mark on the knuckle of the middle finger of my right hand is a scar from my streetfighting days. Bare-knuckle boxing. Punching a wall? Fine, fine - I tripped on the stairs. ARE YOU HAPPY?

January 12: Petrarchan sonnet.

Her Eyes
How strange to see her eyes in novel frame!
But memories with Morpheus made new
Will yet retain the source in dreamt review:
So too her semblance shines with eyes the same.
And so he grew to love that sacred flame
That lights her eyes like Morning fills the dew -
Why must he then so seldomly pursue
The breaking dawn or heliacal claim?
'Tis fear and only fear that holds him fast;
"No more!" he says, but plying every trade
Of vision - scope and lens and pane and port -
He seeks her eyes, her light, the stars amassed,
The only constant source in shifting shade,
'Til finally he finds the sunlit court.

This poem is definitely not my best work. I decided to try something new - a Petrarchan sonnet. I've written several sonnets in the past, but mostly in the Shakespearean form. The unfamiliar rhyming scheme got to me, I think, and it didn't help that I was writing this late at night (the midnight deadline for MSCE is tough). I like my octave but I am not fond of the sestet. Might just be that I'm not a fan of the cdecde rhyme scheme of Petrarchan sonnets. The octave's abbaabba is alright.

January 13: Tone Matrix music.

Behold: the Tone Matrix! This fun little flash game lets you make very short music loops. A neat feature is that you can share creations by copying and pasting matrix coordinates (just right click on the matrix itself).

Here is my creation for today:

123650,8576,8200,1024,65760,0,78216,192,68612,8192,16612,19968,16416,19464,34306,33544

I realize that this is not the most innovative of things to do for MSCE, but it's pretty neat, kinda cool, and fairly quick to do. I'm somewhat busier than usual at the moment - it works, right? It's also fun.

Just for kicks, here are the various parts to the above loop.

Bass line:
122880,8192,8192,0,65536,0,77824,0,65536,8192,16384,16384,16384,16384,32768,32768

High notes:
2,0,8,0,0,0,8,0,4,0,4,0,32,8,2,8

Everything else:
768,384,0,1024,224,0,384,192,3072,0,224,3584,0,3072,1536,768