Protagonists

There's a simplified schema for storytelling, in which there is a single protagonist on a mission.

And there are a lot of great stories like that.

But they don't all have to be that way. Romances, for example, whether comic or tragic, are more often of the "takes two to tango" structure. This does not prevent them from having a very strong, rather archetypal, story structure.

The hero with a thousand faces
Entangles with a heroine with superior social graces
And then it takes while
For things to reconcile.

Divergent

I haven’t a clue
So please tell me how
It can be that thou
Doesn’t rhyme with you?

Damage

"In the late 1940s, the United States experienced a “lobotomy boom” where the use of the lobotomy expanded exponentially... We argue that government provision and funding for public mental hospitals and asylums expanded and prolonged the use of the lobotomy. We support this claim by noting the lobotomy had virtually disappeared from private mental hospitals and asylums before the boom and was less used beforehand."

Somehow the guy who developed it was given a Nobel for his efforts:

"In 1949, the Portuguese neurologist António Egas Moniz received the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for his development of the prefrontal lobotomy — a procedure in which the connection is cut to a part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex in mentally ill, depressed or learning disabled people. As the procedure can send patients into a vegetative state, lobotomies are now believed to be wildly unethical."

I'd rather have a bottle in front of me
Than a frontal lobotomy.
But in the 40s, this form of doom
Enjoyed a boom.

Cryptic Critters

Wombats, for what it’s worth,
Are certainly not of this earth.
They are aliens of high IQ,
Disguised to spy on me and you.

Weatherwise

My phone says snow.
My eyes see rain.
So I don’t know
What to tell my brain.

Wachagudfer

Decades ago, someone gave me a story called Tanner, set in a struggling Western frontier village named Wachagudfer, which was a humorous reformatting of "What'cha good for". The idea was that the town had an ethos that you should only move to the town if you had something to contribute. The story was about a dwarf who was an expert tanner and leather worker, who is eventually welcomed into the town, not because of a desire for diversity, but strictly because of his talent and hard work. I'm a sucker for such stories, and found it quite heartwarming. I was the poetry editor for a little magazine named Nomos at the time, and expressed some interest in publishing the story. I was not in actual contact with the author. Someone had passed the story along to me. And they passed back the information to me that the author, one Alexander R. Smyth, didn't want to publish it quite yet.

It seems that Smyth died in a car accident in 1999. And in 2012 his widow, Linda L. Fraser, published The Wachagudfer Stories, Simply Told, Book 1.

There are 3 stories. The first one is Tanner, which is just 18 pages long, and which is just as heartwarming as I remember it. But the next 2 stories are quite a bit longer, since the book runs to 450 pages or so.

The odd thing is that there is no online record of this book. So I cannot link to it! It's amazing, since it has a nice distinctive title. I was able to find information about the author, but not about the book.

I am in shock, over this search engine fail.
For now I will proceed to the next tale.

Visit Complete

Let there be no doubt:
Childproof doorknobs work great at locking me out.

Now that the grandkids aren't in town anymore,
Who will help me get this thing off the door?

Time Distortion

Why on earth is it called a fast?
Slowly, slowly the hours go past.

CDC

Amid the scary hoopla
Of the dreaded Romaine purge,
I have ventured toward Arugula,
To satisfy my lettuce urge.

Mystery Most Fowl

This has happened twice to me: I encounter a cardboard box outdoors, in a public place, containing a big dead bird.

The first time was during the summer, and the situation was smelly. I saw the bird’s feathers were speckled, but I didn’t poke around to get a view of the head or feet. I thought it might be a pheasant.

The second time was yesterday. This time I took s better look, and it turns out the bird was a decapitated Guinea Fowl. Its feet were tied together with string.

I think it was the same kind of bird each time.

It is weird that someone would kill these birds, which are poultry, and leave them in cardboard boxes in public places.

There are some religions that kill birds of this variety. For example, voodoo. But I have the idea they usually eat the poultry they sacrifice.

This seems an offense
Against moral sense.

Thankful

May your travels
Not unravel,
May your dinner hosts
Serve up the most
Scrumptious food,
And may your mood
Be warm and mellow
With all your mealtime fellows.

While We're On The Subject Of Times To Avoid

If a time-traveler offers you a trip,
Be wary, and request an an itinerary
That's specific, not vague.
I've found it's best to skip
The Year of the Plague.

536

'Ask medieval historian Michael McCormick what year was the worst to be alive, and he's got an answer: "536." ... A mysterious fog plunged Europe, the Middle East, and parts of Asia into darkness, day and night—for 18 months.'

According the article, massive crop failures followed, resulting in a mass starvation of human beings. Some scientific researchers believe that the mystery fog was probably due to the eruption of an Icelandic volcano. This claim is based on some very high-tech ice-core studies.

When it comes to years, 536
Is apparently the roughest of picks.
I don’t remember it, but as you can probably intuit,
I did have ancestors who lived through it.

Chilly

Is it true cold showers
Give you superpowers?
Well, make no mistake,
They sure do jolt you awake.

Headquarters and Hindquarters

Alexa, will you,
Explain the HQ
Situation to me?
Of course I knew
You wanted two,
But say, can it be,
That you really need three?

Melville Cane

Speaking of dead poets suddenly coming to my attention, there's Melville Cane.

Apparently he was a lawyer as well as a poet, and was admired in both capacities by Ayn Rand, who I've spent a lot of time studying.

According to this article, "reliable speculation" has it that she was a big admirer of these lines by Cane:

She was not bound by mortal sight,
The stars were hers, at noon.
Against the malady of night
She stood, alone, immune.

It reminds me a bit of "Invictus" at first glance.

Mr. Cane, although published in his time, and award-winning in his time, seems to have zero poetry represented on the web for some reason. He died in 1980, so perhaps his estate is trying to protect his copyrights, or perhaps everything is on the New Yorker site, a step removed from easy viewing.

Meanwhile, I bet,
Few are beating down the paywall door
For a chance to explore
His poetry, just yet.

Kate Light

I was sorry to see that the poet, Kate Light, had died. I had never read much of her until recently, when I picked up a book of hers, "Open Slowly", at the local used book store. She died a couple of years ago, it turns out, at the age of 56.

Anyway, I enjoyed reading this book. My favorite poem was one I don't see anywhere on the net, so I'm going to type it in here. It seems to be part of a series of poems about a man she loved but who was emotionally distant.

Funny, As In a Man,

one man, for instance, trying
to express tenderness with no model to base
his take on it on. How this severe face
struggles to be concerned, to be clear; shying
just short of simply saying what
he wants to say (or does he not
know?) As in a poet explaining, Class,
if you know what you want to say, you
will be clear; and if you don't (sarcasm
here) nothing will help you get through,
not even a room full of anxious coaches.
Funny, as in this man, whom
it happens I feel quite tender towards,
stumbling on his attempts to put into words
kind words. Trying more direct approaches,
a drunken bull in a matador
shop, he's lurching at the spinning room;
searching, looking for a door,
to open into what - one can assume -
would be a wider field, a fuller range.
Look at him. It's kinda funny, I mean, strange.

I particularly liked the altered metaphor, the "drunken bull in a matador shop". That brought me up short. You see, you expect the bull indoors to be heedlessly wrecking things, but it turns out that the indoors location is actually dangerous for the bull.

It's not simply that the man cannot express his feelings, and so wounds his beloved by accident. It's that he believes that if he says the wrong thing he will open himself up to a skewering! I am certain that many men feel that way at times. Many women, too, I suppose!

One interesting aspect is that she seems to be a step removed from his efforts, observing him, as if she too is emotionally distant in her way. She sees him a funny and strange.

It's a bemused, ironic stance
toward her object of romance.

Urban Fauna

I was walking to the drugstore
On a busy downtown street
When I saw a furry creature
Just ahead of my own feet.

At first I thought, how darling,
What can that creature be?
But as I focused on him,
I realized I could see

A rat, a good-sized rat!
It dived right through a grate.
Nobody else had seen him
And now it was too late

To offer him a tidbit
Or maybe sage advice
About which local restaurants
Have food that's extra nice.

Armistice Day

One hundred years ago, the killing paused -
A pause too brief.
For soon enough the world faced the jaws
Of yet more grief.

Possums

Of all American mammals,
They’re our most distant cousin.
They take up less room than camels,
So I’m ordering a dozen.

Parker Solar Probe

Now that most of its travel is done,
It’s going to hang around the sun,
To catch some rays and collect a ton
Of data.

Draw One In The Dark

Finished reading Sarah Hoyt’s fantasy novel, Draw One In The Dark. The title turns out to be old fashioned diner lingo for black coffee. Years ago I knew some of this humorous lingo, although I heard it referred to as Hashhouse Greek.

Anyway, it was an interesting shapeshifter novel, pretty logical on its own brain-straining terms. There’s a softpedaled sweet romance.

Your dating options may seem atrocious and bitter
If you sometimes become a ferocious critter.

Typical Midterm Resultd

An energized electorate has selected...
Massive gridlock, just as projected.

Judgment Slips

Many "how could that happen?" puzzles are solved
Once you're informed that alcohol was involved.