Saturday, May 16, 2009

Flarf's Guardian

Rupert Brooke was dreadfull bore
who never wanted da de da more
de da de da de da de da da and
who wrote with a rubbish hand
de da de da de da because he
could not write for effin toffee

And now here he is held up high
To us the plebs, as high as sky
Just because he could rhyme
But not do enjament ever at all
Which even a ten year old can
de da de da de da da da da and
so we have him now as the man.

~

Dear Editor of Shagma Magazine

Please accept for consideration the above piece I wrote in a workshop I attend, run by the very prestigious Daryl Mann Fluffy, who won last years Backward Prize for poetic innovation and is the Creative Literature Professor of the award winning online college and centre of excellance with ten gold stars awarded by the Society of Higher Imaginative Technology in Barnsley, the premier portal for getting on in the industry.

The poem is part of a sequence which investigates the space between desire and objectification of the contemporary symbols which alert us to the act of definition and of post-avant ironizing the ineffable force which interrogates meaning in its most specific sense - in light of something different, urgent, pressing and which I hope is self-evident in the piece.

This poem came second in last years Totley Twitter Poetry Prize, garnering praise from the likes of Martin Ashberry who lectures at Bridlington College for Excellance and who said in the commendation:

"Flarf De Da has written a seminal work, taking the notion of banality and undercutting it with a wry comedic slant which undercuts and wrongfoots the reader, forcing is to question the material itself, using all the metrical and musical tools to effect this cross-graining of the material, in lines such as:

de da de da de da de da da

the first eight syllables dancing along with a metronomic regularity, and then the stunning surprise of da da, where we are expecting a de da. A simple, effective and hugely intelligent strategy which opens up the poem to a multiplicity of mappings. Never one for the tired and predictable, Flarf De Da is a name to watch."

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Attn F D Da


Dear Mr/s Da.

It is with great interest and no little trepidation that I communicate here with you
in regard the submission which has been passed to my desk by the esteemed Editor (All hail the Great Conjugator).

The interest stirred by the extra ordinary ,and i use such an intemperate descriptor advisedly,extra ordinary quality of the paradigmatically influential resonance you have so humbly ( and the greatest service such bearing reflects upn you sir)
displayed in the submitted poem (and indeed how inapropriate the term 'submitted' becomes when applied to a work of such
power and scalpel edged balance that roars its own worth (which the esteemed Editor (AhtGC) immediately was cognisant of) has
been like no other in the collective memory of our august body. Truly.

It was immediately and patently obvious to the esteemed Editor (AhtGC) that here was a submission, the publication of which could have potentially profound and far reaching influence on the fortunes and standing of an august body such as ours.

Having grasped the magnitude of the challenge you have presented us with we wish to advise you that
we will leave no avenue unexplored in our efforts to secure for you the kind and volume of readership that such a work deseves.

we are confident you will understand that the release of such important new work takes some time and we will advise you as and when developments warrant.

In the mean time we suggest you cast your formidable cognitive net into the sea of kudosalotary parables and start work on
the awards acceptance speeches that will no doubt be a constant ceremony for you in the near future
as this extra ordinary work crashes like a tsunami on the shores of the academic and creative bastions thought the length breadth depth and timecodes of the modern world.

The esteemed Editor(AhtGC) has suggsted we consider the
'Misunderburnishment Foundation lifetime achievement award as the first possible recognition,soon to be, no doubt, on your mantelpiece.

Please do not hesitate to contact me should I be able to render you the smallst service, and I mean that with great sincerity the smallest service,,

I am Sir, your devoted and grateful servant

O Yeats

Miss Mapp said...

Excellent response anon.
Humour up and kicking on this site.High5

Anonymous said...

OhGodNotHimAgain, This poem is by a poet I came across in Amsterdam called Kees van de Brugge. Despite his name, I think he is English or sounded it to me and the subject in this poem is certainly English.


this could be Xanadu

it is whimsical to observe
an inflated plastic bag
billowing in the turbulence
created by a brute concrete tenement
the random rotation of rubbish
hooked on a rusty latch

a fish gob desperately gulping
the swollen belly of a pregnant woman
her dilating vagina ready for birth
the last gasps of a dying man
for three days it swirled
a jellyfish trapped in an eddy

a resourceful youth filled it
with solvent and his buddy’s head
every path has its detour
and every detour its distraction
games like this are escapes
that fail to escape but tighten the trap

but for the moment it was fine
as he floated above the rooftops
actually, Upton Park doesn’t look bad
from the position of a kite
high and getting higher
until the mind disperses like smoke

the sultry Indian women
discarding their dour western overcoats
reveal flame bright saris
dance down Green Street
an explosion of Roman candles
flashes of rainbow fire

the English rain hanging
strings of crystalline pearls
fracturing gray light
into random spectrums of dazzle rays
opaque solids melting
into translucent surfaces and textured fabrics

silhouetted and pressed against the sky
his arms outstretched
fragile as Icarus wings
in conflict with gravity and falling fast
tomorrow, the social workers will arrive
at dawn, the teen Gestapo

they’ll rebuild the fences, only higher
roof the compound like an aviary
meanwhile, the plastic bag yawns ever wider
inviting you into the beautiful
enter headfirst and tie it around your neck
ever tighter until the world expires

Anonymous said...

This poem is by the same bloke. I can't type anymore at the moment, I'm not that quick at typing but I might tomorrow.


the misery desire

into the black yawning gob of the tunnel
the dark mouthed kiss of the deep swallow
it is at this point I was shocked by the sunrise
catching me bolting along on the dawn stallion
Dracula retreating to his tomb


I read De Beauvoir as a form of redemption
all the time thinking of my cock and a woman’s warm insides
feminism I could understand if I closed his ears
their minds functioned with different cogs and springs
I preferred to think of her locked into coition
jigging a comic dance
the absurd locomotion of pelvises thrashing together
so I returned to Schoppenhaur

misery is more reliable than women
it’s a source of happiness
when nursed

for what is she, but desire?
She baits you with her body
then leaves

‘I have never lied about my desires.’ She said
she was desire, she knew it and used it
like a weapon

one hundred men queued outside her window
drapes, slightly parted, allowing out a little light
as she busied herself with social obligations
fussing her cats and connecting with friends
she moved coyly with decorum
with just enough whore walk to show them she might

her defence, intellectual violence
the false premise, her evidence
proving it was all the fault of men
as she bent over her library chair
demanding her new lover ride her hard

my addled brain fumbled like clumsy hands
to perceive what only light to my eye could satisfy
and roughly get to grips with the situation
but like Actionman, my will outgunned my ways
and not even a conjuror’s game of mirrors
could raise my state in this condition
not even her, wondering naked about his brain