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Write On

I am so.

 Much to the chagrin of neighbours who would really rather that I spent more time pruning back the invasive ivy threatening their fences and my family who fear I'll drop dead and leave 84 years of accumulated "stuff" for them to deal with.

Ha! Burn it all when I'm gone.

And here's another carton of books to add to the conflagration. I'm about to go to a printer with the text of a small (65 pages) book of poems. I have been doodling them for a few years now and I think it's time to give them a collected life. They are Glossettes. And in case you missed an earlier post on this new poetic form (https://www.derekpeach.com/blog/glosettes), here's wherefrometh cometh the title.

Waaay back in the 1960s and probably earlier, Cadburys or Lowneys Chocolates made condiments called "Glosettes" (and I'll get to the extra s in the spelling in a minute). I remember them as the item of choice at a movie theatre concession stand. You went in, bought that package of chocolate-covered raisins or peanuts and settled in to watch the cartoon, the serial Flash Gordon, the ads and eventually the double feature with Randolph Scott or Roy Rogers.

The chocolates came in cellophane packages. They were noisy little buggers to open. People around shushed you, but what were those adults doing here at a Saturday matinee anyway? So – annoying presentation; delightful savouring of candy. That was the Glosette experience. Maybe you can still have it, but I think the onscreen ads have now pushed out Flash Gordon and the cartoon.

In the Middle Ages or "Meddling Ages" given the pushing and shoving of people across Europe before they all got really civilized and made laws to govern their activities – like the Doctrine of Discovery – well, back then anyway, the folk who transcribed texts would sometimes add their own thoughts to their version of the material. Those are "glosses" and the practice continued for some years before Gutenburg and Caxton spoiled the nice handwriting of the calligraphers.

It would have been a hoot to have made a video record of those monks, copying out page after illuminated page of the sermons of Pope BigDaddy. In museums there are actual samples of those illuminated manuscripts wherein the copier wrote out the same line five or six times. He (always a "he" because whatchagonna do if those women learn to write?) probably dozed off and when he woke up his eye went back to the line he'd already copied. I've seen it happen in my own classes, but we won't go there and I've already got my pension. Back to the "Glossettes".

I have read and listened to a lot of poems and songs in my time. You have too, I know, but I want to narrow in on just the Canadian poets and songwriters. We all know a few lines from the classic Canadian canon of poetry - things like "Along the line of smokey hills / The crimson forest stands." And what is the next line anyway? Who cares? Write your own gloss as a separate poem. Do it often enough and you'll have a book like the one I'm taking to a printer tomorrow.

I wanted both qualities of the 1960's candy – the irksomeness and the chocolate. I didn't always get the latter, but you can be the judge. You'll likely have one of the books arrive in your mailbox when you least expect it because I have become my own publisher and distributor.

Those books you see on the "Books" page of this web site have been selling a few at a time for some time and I keep stashing the proceeds in a separate bank account. The price I ask is usually just enough to cover the printing cost and keep me on the fine edge of sobriety. Anything left over goes into the "writing" account. After ten years of such activity, I had enough to mail off last year's Homemade Christmas to people who had supported my earlier scribblings. Sorry if I missed anyone. Tell me.

Now, here's where you get to put in some contribution.

First, I redesigned the cover as you will have noticed if you checked the books page. My original design featured little mounds of those original glosettes. They looked like little mounds of rabbit droppings. I changed it. What do you think? Suggestions?

Second, I'm not done. Burn it all when I'm gone, Kids and Kidlettes! 

So, hit me with your best shot. Here's the appendix of poets and songwriters that were my inspiration. I know I asked after that earlier post for your suggestions of writers I may have overlooked and now I ask again. Who'd I miss and what lines of theirs do you remember - probably that "earworm" you wake up humming and can't get rid of all day?

Appendix

Contents Entry Poet Referenced      Work Referenced   

Wildfire Season WW Campbell Indian Summer

Domain Poisoning EJ Pratt Titanic

Rosary M Pickthall Père Lalament

Freefall L Cohen Bird on a Wire

Geography M Waddington Canadians

Health Care … AJM Smith The Lonely Land

Plague Time R Daniells Noah 2

Entendres … M Atwood You Fit Into Me

Passage Ways S Rogers Northwest Passage

CanadianaClutter JG McGee High Flight

Poppies in Tuscany J McCrae In Flanders Field

Furnace Time A Lampman Heat

Yukon Lost R Service Law of theYukon

Kiss Goodbye DC Scott At the Cedars

Contemptible Convoy P Johnson The Train Dogs

Illusions J Mitchell Both Sides Now

Earth Day … A Purdy Trees at the Arctic 

On Rails G Lightfoot Canadian RR Trilogy

DreamDance N Young Teach Your Children Well

Frontiers T Wayman Rural Fence

Sestina for Ottawa … "S"T Conners Bud the Spud

Bequest M Acorn Natural History Elephants

Drug Wars B Cummings Break It ToThem Gently

Whole Earth … GD Roberts Heat in the City

Admission L Cohen Anthem

Outreach W MacDonald Song of the Ski

Octegenarian B Carmen A Vagabond Song

Economics 101 R Bachman Takin' Care of Business

After Mariupol … B Cockburn Wondering Where the Lions Are

Christmas Beach R Haig-Brown Pacific Salmon

Romans D Livesay Ars Poetica

Soldiering B Ste-Marie Universal Soldier

Compression G Lee/A Lifeson Workin' Man (by Rush)

Belated Earth Day PK Page Planet Earth

Marking Time I Layton The tamed puma

Looking Back I Tyson Four Strong Winds

Papyrus Plea … R Osler Taverna

Last Words M Pickthall The Wife

Dialectics WH Drummond Wreck of the Julie Plante

Always-Ending Place E Birney David

Inventives E Birney El Greco: Espolio

Sensitivities W Hemsworth The Black Fly Song

Flying intoCalgary L Crozier All the Room You Need

Dream Times G Lightfoot If You Could Read My Mind

Age is no Reason … S Musgrave Exculpatory Lillies

Curtain Call T Bowling Morenz

Incantation for … E.J. Pratt  Erosion

Whiteout A Lampman Winter Uplands

Conscience Posters B Cockburn Lovers in a Dangerous Time

Raccoon G Bowering Musing on Some Poet

Senseless Things J Mitchell Big Yellow Taxi

After Apples L Crozier Onions

I will not go grey O Kelland Let Me Fish Off Cape St Mary

Lastly, I enjoyed this blog entry much more than the last one. There's so much crazy, cruel and ugly stuff happening in our world that I don't want to even open my email in the morning. I had to stop going to the computer first thing (even before tea for Her Ladyship) because I found myself sitting here in tears. So I got lazy with my own writing, and I pasted in that "Conspiracy Chaos" piece. Silly bit, I know.

On this topic, (and I know I use parentheses too often) I still read the articles by journalists who chronicle world events but I do it after some light, living-room calesthenics (curtains drawn, you perverts) and garden watering. We're all happier, plants especially.

Happy Holiday weekend, Canucks. And to those in other lands, pretend you're on the Eh Team and hoist a cool one with us.