Oooh, cool. Lots of people.

Orwn: I like your image response, very much, Orwn (Walter?)

If you PM me your image I will resize it for you. It needs to be 800x600 to work well here - or an online photo editor like pixlr is very easy to use.


Matt and Ann - Maybe we go with Matt's branching to see how it goes. although I think linear makes it clearer/easier to follow. The original was post art, with a central organiser, and we made a zine from it so it was more linear. But it's play, and experiment, so I don't think it really matters.

Oooh, and I'm using rhizome in the context of Deleuze and Guattari. I think they'd like the non-linear as a way forwards. Let's do your thing and go non-linear!

Allen - I am sorry that this has caused you concern. I honestly think it's highly unlikely you'll find your lovely space here over-run with images or hybrid poetry. I think instead it'll be a short, fun game which (hopefully) a few people join in with and which will be confined to a single thread.

Sarah-Jane

Just to muddy the waters further, you could go completely non-linear and allow anyone to post a poem in repsonse to any image that appears in the thread, or to post an image in response to any poem that appears thread. It would be easy enough to show what you were responding to (as Walter has done). Then you just seed the thread with a single poem (or image) and stand back. And the ensuing anarchy would (hopefully) be joyous!

Okay, so how about this.

The rules are:

There are no rules. If you feel like posting a poem in response to an image, post one. If you feel like posting an image in response to a poem, go for it!

If you feel like starting a dialogue by posting a poem which is looking for an image, or vice-versa, go for it, too.

The only thing I think might be helpful is if we say whose work we are responding to or whether we're starting a new conversation.

I'm nearly there with my response to Jayne. So then we'll have two images to respond to and also space for more poems.

Twisting sideways nicely.

Sarah-Jane

...and here's my visual response to Jayne's poem

http://sarah-janecrowson.com/wp-cont...atinggames.jpg

Well here's Bob Dylan's response

He moved across the mirrored room, "Set it up for everyone, " he said
Then everyone commenced to do what they were doin' before he turned their heads.
Then he walked up to a stranger and he asked him with a grin
"Could you kindly tell me, friend, what time the show begins?"
Then he moved into the corner, face down like the Jack of Hearts.

Rosemary combed her hair and took a carriage into town
She slipped in through the side door lookin' like a queen without a crown.
She fluttered her false eyelashes and whispered in his ear
"Sorry, darlin', that I'm late, " but he didn't seem to hear.
He was starin' into space over at the Jack of Hearts.

Rosemary started drinkin' hard and seein' her reflection in the knife
She was tired of the attention, tired of playin' the role of Big Jim's wife.
She had done a lot of bad things, even once tried suicide
Was lookin' to do just one good deed before she died.
She was gazin' to the future, riding on the Jack of Hearts.

During the power blackout in LA, I finicked with the response to Jayne and Jane:

A Queen of Darts

Desire exists to be denied.
rcl

This lonely Queen of Darts
juggles darts for hearts
that puncture hers, cause pain,
her monologue makes plain.

Perhaps Jacks are not civil
because voiced by the devil
back below god’s image,
pain blowing from his visage?

No wonder she’s a wreck.
No heart Jack’s in her deck!



Original

Afterr Jayne and Jane

The Lonely Queen of Darts
Juggles darts for hearts,
Each punctured and in pain
Unmated may remain—
Perhaps males aren’t civil
Because voiced by the devil
Back beneath god’s image
Pain blowing from his visage?
So one sees she’s a wreck:
No love card in her deck.

PS the devil cracked me up!

sorry, double post, unreliable connection

After Walter’s No-Man by Jack

Such a no-man all strung out
Too dull and numb to feel a clout
At least is on a certain route
US Route 666 no doubt


My little dogs should encourage the Sphere’s more subtle versifiers to indulge. (By the way, has anyone else noticed that the disgraced god, mien Trump, is selling Indulgences as did the pre-reformed Roman church? Two million each!).

A response to Sarah-Jane's picture
 

I dealt myself a hand, so as to see
what future fate might have in store for me.
Now I’m perpetually juggling these
unappetising possibilities:
leaving my heart alone, albeit rent
by bastards with impermanent intent,
getting my tits out on the Internet -
putting it out there, seeing what I get
or opting for a cop-out, on the shelf,
doing my best to satisfy myself;
a solitary jack – to half-employ
a disappointing double-ended toy.
I float alone, searching for metaphors
in endless Marienbadic corridors…

Joe - I love Bob Dylan's response. There's something about the false eyelashes that turns the image from half-real to real. I'll have to listen to that tonight.

RCL - thank-you so much for joining the game! Your poems are clever and funny. I am quite genuinely in awe of anyone who can manage to dash off witty metrical poetry so quickly. The end is brilliant -and the 'darts for hearts'. That's a whole other image in itself although I'll let someone else jump in to that one (I'm going to have a go at the Route 66 one though)

Ann - yours made me spit out my tea laughing. I love the range of unappetising possibilities, and 'bastards with impermanent intent', and the end is wonderful.

Sarah-Jane