Rescued poems

Transient Landscape. Photo by Robert Rath from Robert's website.

Another day, another rescued poem. This one is rescued from two books by Irish poet Eavan Boland - Object Lessons and A Journey with Two Maps - in which she reflects on her experiences of becoming a poet and the nature of that journey.

As I have said before, the important distinction between my rescuing process and other process-based approaches such as 'finding' poems is that I do not select a complete phrase or sentence; after I transcribe the text I jumble it so that all the words are in random order, and then I choose words as individual building blocks. The resulting rescued poem is usually quite surprising because I take the words out of their original context and create my own stories from them.


unreliable distance

the past is a wound
windows fracture the language of a nation
there is grace in place
and power in possibility
but the poor and the young who have entered
my house on this street in this city
who have stood tall in their dispossession
who have looked far for purpose
and near for the origins of their doubt
should realise
that even this church is witness
to the weakness of some spun story
and sense
the present world drawing towards
the edge of their history

Posted by Jennifer Liston

The Matrix Unloaded. Photo by Robert Rath from Robert's website.

I've been getting quite a few spam comments on my website so I decided to 'rescue' a poem from yesterday's spam offerings (you can read about my 'rescue' process here). The poem turned out to be something of a question and answer session.

incredible stunning online benefit

Selling wonders: digital silver and gold
melodic pings fracturing the physics
familiar conversation, yet who is this
playing in my own connected world?

Us, trying to guide you: easily, more vigor,
profitable investment, free videos, connections,
weightless, simple losing, hold your searching
casino, members, see: you just got bigger!

Posted by Jennifer Liston

We bought a frying pan at IKEA yesterday and I was reminded of how much I love reading their catalogues. As a copywriter myself, I love to read good advertising copy and IKEA's ticks all the boxes for the win. I decided that I would 'rescue' a poem from the 2015 catalogue.

You can read about my 'rescue' process here.

Basically I write a poem using only the words from a limited amount of text I have transcribed – that might be a couple of pages from a novel/novels, or in this case, seven 'blurbs' from the 2015 catalogue.

The important distinction between my rescuing process and other process-based approaches such as 'finding' poems is that I do not select a complete phrase or sentence; after I transcribe the text I jumble it so that all the words are in random order, and then I choose words as individual building blocks. The resulting rescued poem is usually quite surprising, then, because I take the words out of their original context and impose my own creativity on them, combining them to give a new twist – as is the case with this little rescuee.


little people of IKEA

even the tiniest children are complicated
up and down in a million moments
these unique little freaks
play
explore
dream
lost in worry-free space
home in happy safe place
ideas become needs
become want want want
getting and giving
getting and giving
high on make-believing every day
hide in giggling sleep every night

and you think
you can stack time
in smart storage
but that's not the way
it seems to play out
and one day
the world takes these
not
so
little people
away
away

Posted by Jennifer Liston