Saturday, April 2, 2022

Obscure words and poem fragments

Obscure words lifted from @Haggard Hawks

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Take the Greek word for running, 
drumos, and we are off to the races. 
The hippodrome is for horses, of course, 
not for hippos, those ill-tempered water horses.
Imagine dromedary camels or dromedary dates
racing a mirage of lost palindromes in the desert. 
A man, a plan, a canal, Suez. 

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Wielding my pen like a ski pole, 
I am torn asunder by a pain in my shoulder, 
My shoulder sundered, separated, an old wound, 
a bad spill on the last run of the last day of the ski year. 
Don’t worry, a torn rotator cuff and a separated shoulder
are enough to keep a firm grip on my imagination.  

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Quiver, to tremble,
the fletched arrows of misfortune 
in the quiver sought the essence of flight.
From cwifer, to quaver. Stop your havering, 
he said in Lowland Scots. 

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Why the silent b in thumb, 
from Old English, þūma, 
added in one’s middle ages 
to eye-rhyme with dumb. 

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Some think I am multiscious. True, that.

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I need a sneeter, or a snooze by any other name, 
my eyes are at half-mast, my chin on my chest, 
I write somnambulant words and dream of going nowhere.

4/2/22 NaPoWriMo

See TO A BULLFINCH

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