Winners

The winners of the Gawler Gallery Ekphrastic Poetry competition. Left is Colleen Moyne, in the centre at the back is Alex Robertson, right is Marilyn Simpson, and in the middle front is Carolyn Cordon. All are members of the Adelaide Plains Chapter and verse group, who meet in Gawler at the Prince Albert Hotel every Thursday afternoon.

The competition was a fascinating adventure in combining two art forms and in creation. Visual arts and literature mixed well together that Saturday, that's for sure! Those competing all viewed art works hanging in the gallery and then wrote one or more poems about the art work chosen. 

It will certainly happen again, next year probably and we all hope to have even more people involved next time.

A Sonnet Story

Hi everyone! I'm having a fantabulous day today, and to top it off, a Facebook friend has written a sonnet for me, just for me! The FB friend is Phillip A Ellis, and he asked on his Facebook page who would like to read a sonnet.

I immediately said I would and that I loved sonnets, and then, this lovely little sonnet arrived on my Facebook page. Phillip gave me permission to repost the sonnet, as long as I gave him credit as the sonnet poet.

So here it is, my Sonnet, written by Phillip A Ellis:

"A Sonnet for Carolyn Cordon"

The sunlight's gone, and dipped below the earth,
and many other suns are shining, glitter
high in the dark, transparent sky. Their worth
I cannot calculate, because I dither.

I love the times of night, the hours so sweet
it seems to me the universe is glory
incarnate, and it seems to me to greet
the countless worlds within with untold stories,

but I, I am a poet only, frail
and limited in thought, and weak in rhythm,
and that I wish I were as one more hale
is still (alas) a shameful, guilty given,

but that I have no consequence is balm,
for after me I leave the cosmos calm.

I love many of these lines, and the final couplet really speaks to me!

Iambic pentameter with some some tweaks that certainly don't seem to me to take away from the sonnet. It almost makes me want to write my own sonnet. Maybe tomorrow ...

I'm not sure what prompted Phillip to do this lovely thing. perhaps he will come here and explain what this exercise is all about. Even if he doesn't do that, I'm still thrilled to have received my very own sonnet! So, thank you very much Phillip Ellis!

Group meeting this afternoon 2 May 2013

It was a smallish meeting today, with only Puss N Boots, Alex, Chris and me. We spoke of what we've been doing, read homework as appropriate and then did a writing exercise. This exercise was to write a longer piece (no poetry) using this phrase as the prompt - "Roger didn't know what was going to happen next ..."

Two of us wrote short stories and the other one began a novel. The work written was read, and there will be more work done on the pieces written, or not, as the writers wish. It was fascinating to see where the group members took these words... Feel free to have a go yourself, and bring the work to another meeting!

Puss chose not to write anything, but took an active interest in the proceedings for the afternoon.

Homework from this afternoon's meeting

We had a small group of people there today, not surprisingly, and didn't actually do any writing exercises on there, this time. We certainly talked about writing, both the subject in general, but also our own writing works.

Bruce shared an article, I spoke of my soon to be published short story, and Colleen mentioned her 'Ekphrastic' morning at the Gawler Gallery. We talked about various things, war, politics and poetry and finished up a little bit earlier than usual, but all, I think, well satisfied with the afternoon.

The most important thing we did for the afternoon was this one, and I say thank you to Bruce for the idea - our homework to present to the group next week is this - 'Write a recipe for a politician' This idea is a great one, I think, and I'm looking forward to hearing/reading what group members do with it.

You can interpret this idea as widely as you wish - you could write a recipe for required personality/character traits required to be a good politician, you could write an actual food recipe for something to help to get rid of a politician. You could write up the recipe for what happens when a politician goes wrong. Anything, it's entirely up to group members.

Have fun with the idea, and thrill us with the results next week!

Don't forget, two things are happening before we meet again on Thursday next week. The first is the Gawler Poets at the Pub is happening on Sunday, and the Poetry Workshop is on at the Gawler Community House on Monday night. I look forward to catching up at these events, if you're going.
Carolyn

First Post for Bruce: Redneck Charlie

At the risk of breaking Internet convention, I thought I'd cross-post a little poetry I'd previously posted here, just to get in the habit of contributing to the Adelaide Plains Chapter and Verse blog. 'Redneck Charlie' was originally intended for an Adelaide Plains Chapter and Verse meeting in March, so it probably, more rightly, belongs here!

***

Charlie: rusted out, four-wheel-drive, shit-bucket. Conveyor of cray pots.

I remember the late nights on Flinders highway driving home, air from the engine warming bare feet through a rusted cabin. Sand and shell grit falling away from toes and hems as they dried out.

Charlie was my first drive. Off-road. It helped that I didn’t have a road to keep on, nor that I had to dodge any trees. Charlie made short work of whatever got in the way as long as I kept him in first gear.

Mind you, the prickle bush could swipe back, so it paid to keep the windows shut –  an advantage not afforded by the tractor I once got up on two wheels.

I never knew where Charlie went. One day he was there, and the next, Dad brought home a white Ford ute, V8, cassette stereo, broken antenna and all.

Charlie probably deserved to go out with a bang, and Dad was fond of blowing things up at the time.

~ Bruce

I love creative writing exercises!

Fun things to do with words:

This is the exercise to be done for the North Eastern Writers group, with the meeting on Thursday night:
The writing task, as far as I understand it, was to write a poem with that famous story starter “It was a dark and stormy night” and then continue on, without using the letter ‘E’.

http://gardendog.wordpress.com/2013/04/16/it-feels-kinda-like-cheating/

I posted this bit on my blog post for today, with the poem I wrote in response to the exercise. It was tricky, that's for sure, but it made me think hard, and that's got to be a good thing, doesn't it? It's so difficult to write in English without using 'E', that's for sure.

Our New Member

This is Mr Boots, Puss to his friends! He joined us at our last meeting at the Prince Albert Hotel in Gawler. I'm hoping he will continue to be a friendly face at our meetings. 

If you'd like to have him in your home for a week, let me know at the meeting, and you can take him home with you. Make sure you bring him back though!

We had fun writing short stories last Thursday, using some interesting bits of writing as our story prompt. These 'bits of writing' were something I'd never heard of, that were emailed to me by a friend, Jocelyn. They're called a Paraprosdokian. Apparently Winston Churchill liked them. That may or may not tempt you to give them a try.

I was certainly inspired by the two I chose, my story flowed along very easily. I'm happy with my story, and I look forward to hearing the others again, when they're properly finished off. Another very pleasant afternoon of friends and words.