Eratosphere - Competition: Hiawatha

Competition
Wednesday, 30th June 2010
Lucy Vickery presents the latest competition
In Competition No. 2653 you were invited to submit a poem, written in the metre of Longfellow’s ‘The Song of Hiawatha’, describing Hiawatha’s experiences at his computer. Longfellow’s epic, with its readily imitated metre, has spawned countless parodies. This is from the Literary Digest in 1925: ‘Have you ever noticed verses/ Written in unrhymed trochaics/ Without thinking as you read them,/ This was swiped from “Hiawatha”?’ And in an introduction (written in trochees) to his fine contribution to the genre, ‘Hiawatha’s photographing’, Lewis Carroll made the following observation: ‘In an age of imitation, I can claim no special merit for this slight attempt at doing what is known to be so easy. Any fairly practised writer, with the slightest ear for rhythm, could compose, for hours together, in the easy running metre of “The Song of Hiawatha”.’
So this was not an especially testing assignment — technically speaking, at least. While Ann Drysdale, Martin Parker, G.M Davis and Jane Dards were impressive, those that shone most brightly content-wise are printed below and win £25 each. Basil Ransome-Davies pockets the bonus fiver.

Where the apple sheds its blossom
Where the Meikro softly splashes
At the keyboard of a laptop
In the shadow of his tepee
Howling oaths and imprecations
Not becoming to his status
As of some drink-maddened paleface
As of badly tutored children
Hiawatha spent the morning
Keen to bring to mind his password
Trying different combinations
Trying hard but always failing
Thus his face grew ever redder
Thus his eyeballs bulged like planets
Till he pulverised his laptop
Cursing still the white man’s magic
Basil Ransome-Davies

Glitchy software made him gloomy,
But his mission lay before him:
At an antiquated laptop,
On a modem that was dial-up,
To defeat the website filter
That his granny had installed there;
To mark ‘login’ box, then ‘password’
Like the pale bark of the birch-tree
With his art of picture-writing,
So his friend request could reach her —
Minnie H. from North Dakota,
Savvy owner of an iPad,
She with callused thumbs from texting.
Would she add him or ignore him?
He clicked ‘like’ for Redskins fan page
As his granny lay there snoring...
Julie Kane

Proud to own a precious laptop
From the land of Pea-Sea Warlord,
Hiawatha tapped the keyboard,
Opened window upon window,
Could not clear them, lost the cursor,
Panicked at a pop-up saying
He’d performed an act ‘illegal’.
Fearing laptop police might seize him
Hiawatha called Nokomis.
Old Nokomis could not help him,
Bid him summon Minnehaha.
Minnehaha solved the problem
Being femininely able,
‘Close the lid,’ she said, ‘and use it
Solely as a writing table!’
Alan Millard

Then the wrinkled old Nokomis
Once again forgot her password,
Sought the aid of Hiawatha,
He the fount of techy knowledge.
Straight he set his fingers clicking,
Quick as swifts at insects snapping,
Set her once again accessing
All her magic laptop’s email,
While he navigated eBay,
Checked the progress of the bidding
For his trusty bow and arrow
Which now sought a worthy owner;
One whose time was free for hunting,
One whose eyes would scan the forest,
Rather than the screen that flickered
With the wide world’s information
Gillian Ewing

At the mid-point in the bowed end
Hiawatha finds the button,
Wakes the PC from its slumber:
Inward sound the hum and whicker,
Green the flashing lights that vanish
Heralding the snatch of music,
‘Welcome’ otiosely printed,
Then the icons in their column
Ranged to face his questing arrow;
With unerring hand he aims it,
Sends it to the chosen target,
Sees the stricken icon darken —
Ah, but now, and all unbidden,
Comes the staying sandglass symbol
Taking time at its own measure
Leaving Hiawatha seething.
W.J. Webster

At the Gitche Gumee website,
ShiningBigSeaWater. com,
Hiawatha clicked an icon.
With his mouse he clicked an icon.
From the many glowing icons
Shaped like wigwams on the home page
He selected one and clicked it.
Images of blackjack dealers,
Slot machines and roulette tables
Filled the screen of Hiawatha,
pictures of his tribe’s casino.
‘This seems somehow cheap and tawdry’,
Sighed the grandson of Nokomis.
‘Still and all, without the income
Generated by this gaming,
How could I afford my laptop?’
Chris O’Carroll