Holy crap, you two. I only meant my suggestion as a joke, sort of flip and sarcastic, but you two have delivered.

I've only read them quickly so far, but they both look fabulous. If I had to award the winner, I'd go with Mary for having used actual nuts and not just crazies, since that was what I had in mind when I suggested the topic. I even said a few posts later, "I did have more of a snack food or trail mix in mind." But no winner need be chosen, and you may split the prize.

Marcia, as I understand it, the noindex code is very unusual in that you do not need to put any text in between it. I believe that this is because it affects the entire thread on the page it is on, including all subsequent posts (which are obviously not between the original noindex tags), so what goes between the tags is irrelevant. I know this sounds strange, since it is unlike every other tag pair that I have ever seen, but I believe it is true unless Alex informs me that I've misunderstood his prior explanations.

Thanks Roger!

Yeah, I'd already gotten about thirty lines into it before I read that secondary comment about trail mix. Alas.

Still, I needed a good challenge, given that I've barely written anything in the past nine months or so. This was just what the doctor (or psychiatrist?) ordered.

What? I thought you said:

So, in addition to declaring the winners more than twelve hours before the posted finish line, your tie-breaking criteria is the mental telepathy of the competitors?

Wow, I wish I'd known that before I wasted an afternoon on this. (Okay, I had to kill time during yesterday's Oakland-San Diego flight anyway, but that hour and a half might have been more productively spent on...okay, come to think of it, just about anything else.)

As a matter of principle, as an assertion of poets' civil (drivel?) rights, and in accordance with my own longstanding tradition, I'm still going to wait until the very last minute to submit my entry.

Setting my alarm clock now,
Julie

Honestly Julie -- I have a feeling that Roger didn't think anyone was going to take him seriously when he came up with the challenge. Plus, I bet that Mary is in the same boat as I in thinking it was just a two-dog race. Sorry about that! Since this all sprang up rather informally, I don't think there were any firm provisions made for when we should post our poems.

I probably would have held off until tomorrow morning, but Mary was so darn quick at getting hers done, I just couldn't wait either.

I, for one, am looking forward to seeing your poem!


By the way, I'm guessing there might be interest in having more formalized versions of speed competitions here. One-hour sonnets / villanelles on a stated theme etc. Thoughts?

I have put a hold on the engraving of the trophy and have not officially certified the results. Shaun is right. I never expected anyone to try, except perhaps Shaun, but I suppose when Mary steppped up I ought to have realized that my jest had somehow tapped deep into the American psyche and that things could very well go viral. Mea culpa. This thing is bigger than the both of us.

Thanks [Roger][/Bob] for the info.

Marcia

You understood correctly, Roger -- that's how it works. Nothing needs to go in-between since it simply gets translated by the forum BBCode processor into a coded HTML directive to the search engine robot to skip indexing everything that follow the occurrence of the code on the page.

Cheers,
...Alex

I.

Sing, Erato! Hie thee hither!
Strike a note upon thy zither!
Strike a nut and leave her cracked.
Leave her faculties intact

enough that she can still complete
100 lines (400 feet);
and yet she must be cracked enough
to churn out such abysmal stuff

as metered esoterica
on mixed nuts in America…
a theme on which my expertise
seems almost daily to increase

while visiting Eratosphere.
So strike me, Muse! I volunteer!
And if I lack for inspiration,
I can simply take dictation!

II.

Diversity’s the major draw
of online workshops like Era-
tosphere: diversity of view.
Perversity? We’ve got that, too.

Assorted nutters populate
the Internet, it’s safe to state,
and poetry’s another lure
for folks whose sanity’s unsure.

It doesn’t take a sage like Venn
to diagram the junction, then:
the intersection of the two
is nuttier than squirrel poo.

Clearly, the prerequisite
for membership’s to be a bit
off-kilter. But I here attest
the same applies to be a guest.

Mixed nuts: a useful metaphor.
Let’s pass that dish around once more.
The nuts we notice most, no doubt,
are those whose oddity stands out.

And yet the bulk of any mix
is always nuts that no one picks.
The quiet bunch. The bunch that lurks.
That cohort of uncounted quirks.

One might regard such gals and guys
as well-adjusted—even wise—
never to participate
in worthless chitchat and debate.

But can it be a healthy sign
that those unnamed in “Who’s Online”
apparently are entertained
by seeing others’ pride get sprained?

Anonymous or not, we’re ALL nuts—
even on the sidelines (wall-nuts!)—
watching egos from around
the world get cracked and crushed and ground.

III.

But let’s name names. Let’s have applause
for Quinlan (Filbert) down in Oz!
Soderling (Pecanice D.)
hails from Sweden; Italy

boasts Frisardi (Cashew); and
we’ve loads of nuts from Limeyland.
Still, the nuttiest by far—
the ones who set the highest bar

of nuttiness, the nutty greats—
are those from the United States.
Exhibit A of shuck and awe:
this peanut gallery has Raw-

ger Slater, always cracking wise;
Brazilliam Lantry’s alibis;
Alder Tice; and now, avanti!
Let’s move on to Almond Conti!

Cantor (Michael—French, Michel)
jokes unshellfishly as well.
And our founder is a nutter:
Alex P. (Nut), smooth as butter.

Hold the phone. I ought to warn ya—
naming nuts from California,
Massachusetts, Minnesota,
Maryland and North Dakota,

Virginia, MO, and Loosiana,
might take long enough to span a
calendar. So in conclusion,
nutty poets in profusion

live in the US of A.
Of online poets—oh, oy vey!—
the very, very most berzerk’ll
fall within that third Venn circle:

online poets who are Yanks.
And still, you’ll find assorted cranks
within that group! Eratosphere
has made that point completely clear.

Our nuttiness is even shown
within the current thread alone.
Who brought up flying monkeys? Who?
He didn’t hail from Timbuktu!

Who set this contest’s silly rules?
What handful of poetic fools
will enter it? I’ve confidence
that only Yanks will lack such sense.

And so I end this idiotic
exercise with patriotic
pride. 400 meters, run.
U.S.! U.S.! WE’RE NUMBER ONE!

Oops, there was a typo in my earlier post. I wrote "a hundred" but I meant "two hundred." I'll leave the contest open an extra day for you to amend your entries accordingly.

Wonderful stuff! I'm surprised we didn't get a last minute ringer poet from Brazil swoop in to steal the laurels, but as it is I am hard pressed to pick a winner. You are all magicians. Which is best? I honestly can't say. Though Mary continues to be the only one who actually wrote about nuts, so she gets special props.

I wrote nothing this weekend, but I feel good in having caused 300 lines of verse to be loosed upon the world.

Both Roger and Shaun seem concerned--perhaps even a bit frightened--that I might be taking all this waaaaayyyy too seriously.

Oh, come on, you guys! Rules are made to be haggled over. Even the Golden Rule. (I.e., are masochists exempt from that?) And no, I didn't think this was actually a competition, even a friendly one--more of a "let's see how many of us show up at short notice to walk the Appalachian Trail together, just for the lark of it" thing.

(We used to propose this sort of nonsense challenge on the Drills and Amusements board all the time--or whatever it was called in the old days--but now people want a shot at real prize money for their efforts.)