Poetry and Potpourri

HANK: It’s a random post-Thanksgiving potpourri day on Jungle Red! With a little poetry at the end.  AND a giveaway! 

And here’s a photo of our turkey, straight from the oven and onto the slicing board.


First, what’s your favorite use of leftovers from the holiday meal? I am a massive fan of turkey tetrazzini, and my recipe is ambrosial. But it uses every pan in the kitchen, I mean every single one! But it is all worth it.

Nothing beats a good turkey sandwich though, have to admit. Do you put stuffing on it? Or cranberries?

(I put cranberry leftovers on oatmeal, it is fantastic.)

Read through the Red’s answers, and then I have a couple more questions.


LUCY BURDETTE: Place a generous amount of gravy in a frying pan. Dollop in mashed potatoes, mashed turnips if you have them, turkey, cornbread stuffing, maybe a couple spoonfuls of succotash. Simmer until warmed through and enjoy!


HANK: Ah….I can't picture that. Does it turn out like..soup?


JENN McKINLAY: Turkey sammich! Hot turkey, stuffing, gravy, and cranberry jelly on toasted sourdough. Yuuuuum.


HANK: TOAST! Yes, great idea. With mayo, too?

RHYS BOWEN: Turkey soup with loads of veggies.

HANK: Do you use the turkey carcass?

HALLIE EPHRON: Pie. Pie! Pie!!! Of whichever kind is left… apple or pumpkin or vanilla custard.

HANK: Cannot go wrong with that!


Okay, now Reds and Readers, another question: Black Friday? Are you out shopping?

I say: not a chance on the planet. Weigh in!

And my final question, do you have any Thanksgiving gratefulness traditions?


My family always went around the table and said something they were grateful for, but this year, my half-sister in Washington DC requested that everyone write a Thanksgiving haiku. Those celebrating in person in Washington would read them at the table, and the rest of us, scattered across the country, sent ours in. Here are a few.



Around the table

The food, the family group.

It is all gravy.




Fall sparkles today

Gathering leaves of this tree

Some leaves scattered far




It never feels like

Thanksgiving out here in Fall

But some leaves do change




Shorter days longer

Nights more time for kids to play

Home is warm inside




Wind only knows the trees

By the shape of its own dance

Gust inward and through




The timer ticks on

Enforcing the T-Day prep.

It cannot time love.





Pretty good, huh? Thanksgiving haiku anyone? Or leftover ideas? Let us know!

Oh, and there's a Goodreads Giveaway for ONE WRONG WORD! Enter here!  https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/376556-one-wrong-word

And oh, the Jungle Red winners of the arc of ONE WRONG WORD from me are Emily Catan and Alicia! Message me on the platform where you saw the post. YAAAY!! Crossing fingers you love it and will help me spread the word.

AND IF YOU DIDN'T WIN---remember the Goodreads Giveaway! https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/376556-one-wrong-word

What I'm Writing @LucyBurdette

Castle in Matsue

LUCY BURDETTE: I'm at the early, early stage of a new book. So early, that every word feels tentative. But mostly, I've been on vacation, so I haven't been writing anything. I had good intentions for making progress on that book, but the trip was too busy and all-consuming. We were so fortunate to take a tour of Japan, a place I've wanted to visit forever.

Torii for Itsukushima Shinto shrine

Each day, as I reviewed my photos, I wondered how I could ever summarize the things I'd seen and experienced to show how amazing the country is. Other folks on the trip were keeping detailed journals, which made me feel guilty, though not guilty enough to do anything about it. Then I began to scribble down a few notes, and the notes evolved into--Haiku, of course! (Thanks to the tutelage last year of our pal SJ Rozan.)

Rohuon-ji Temple

So here you have it--a quick trip through Japan in photos and Haiku...

Chieko-San

Many of the places we visited were off the beaten track. As our ship docked or sailed away, locals in costumes with bands and banners would come to celebrate our arrival or departure with dancing and gifts and singing. "That is your waving committee," our Japanese tour guide, Chieko-san would explain while laughing loudly. 









 

WELCOME

Dragons swerve and clack
Ladies in pink kimonos
Waving committee






Everywhere we went there were gorgeous shrines, mostly Buddhist and Shinto. There doesn't seem to be much conflict between the religions--in fact people seem to turn to more than one, as needed. But the hopefulness and yearnings for guidance are heartfelt...

 



















YEARNINGS

Shrines welcome guests who
Stack stones, tie papers, rub snouts
Wishes left behind

Sea Urchins in the market

 













It turns out that I am not such a fan of Japanese food. I tried to be a good and adventurous foodie--I really did! But after a while, I had to groan when another bento box appeared at our lunch table.












LUNCH

Spiny sea creatures
Armor bristles: Stay away!
Soon to be sushi
















MORE LUNCH (by John Brady)


Bento box is served
tastes colors textures so odd
Sad so much untouched

Atomic Bomb Dome

One of the most moving stops on the trip was a visit to Hiroshima. It was absolutely pouring, which seemed appropriate for the day. The city has been completely rebuilt, as if the tragedy hadn't happened. But the memorial and the museum aroused the kind of sad and horrified feelings I had when at the Holocaust museum or the 9/11 site.

Hiroshima


Sheets of silver rain
Devastation's grim mem'ry
Smart enough to learn?





 

If you'd like to read about my lesson on making sushi or see lots of cool food pictures from the Kyoto market, visit my post at Mystery lovers kitchen. And thanks for indulging my modern day slide show! Meanwhile, I'm back to chapter one--no excuses...

Post-Haiku Hangover

LUCY BURDETTE:  The poems yesterday were so wonderful! Will Lynn Calhoun and Deb Romano email SJ with your addresses for the prizes: SJRozan at gmail dot com.

And Karen in Ohio, please email me about your copy of AUNTY LEE'S DELIGHT....lucyburdette at gmail dot com
 

And I couldn't resist taking a stab at Haiku after SJ's post yesterday--and all of yours... 

Here's one inspired by Yoda:

Lazy gray kitty
Lounging in September sun
Call me for supper













And I bought the last available gallon of peaches at the local market, hence:

Shoulder season fruit
Juice runneling down my chin
Soon to be a pie

Though actually, I didn't make a pie, I made Ina Garten's peach cake, which (in spite of all the diet talk earlier this week) when you're ready to splurge, I highly recommend. 

Happy Sunday!

On Writing Haiku by SJ Rozan

Gulls sit on pilings 

While starlings sweep, race, land, peck,  

Eating all the moss.

 SJ ROZAN: Every Saturday morning for the last ten years or so I've written three haiku.  If I'm in New York I go to the Hudson, two blocks from my apartment.  If I'm elsewhere, I try to find a body of water, or a park, a yard, someplace quiet, though I've written my Saturday haiku in planes, on trains, and in hotel rooms.

Haiku, as I'm sure you know, is a three-line, 17-syllable poetry form, in the pattern 5-7-5.  Each line is expected to be a phrase; not necessarily a full sentence, but a concept that's understandable without the next line.  If the last line can deliver a small twist, all the better, though that's not required.

Those are the English rules; the Japanese scanning rules are a little different, dealing not in syllables but in on, which are analogous but not the same.  Since I don't speak Japanese, though, and certainly don't write in it, this post will stick to English.

Haiku derives from an older form, called hokku, also of 17 on, which was written as the opening stanza of a specific type of longer work called a renga.  By the 17th C.  hokku were being written to stand alone.  The independent hokku were renamed haiku and voila! -- a form was born.

As the haiku became standardized it was generally accepted that as far as content, each poem should freeze a moment of time in the natural world.

Orange-legged mallard 

Busily grooms her feathers 

While floating backwards.

Because our surroundings are not necessarily the natural world, though, city haiku are also written.

Building skeleton
Engulfed by rising tide of
Gold insulation.

17-syllable, 5-7-5 poems that freeze a moment in human nature, not the world around us, are perfectly permissible, and called senryu.

Standing in the rain
Drinking tea, watching ducks float.
What an idiot. 
Abstraction is not welcome in either the haiku or the senryu, nor is generalizing from the particular, at least, not by the poet.  That's left to the readers.

Why do I write them?  The requirement to be specific and of the moment is of endless value to writers.  It's the meaning of "show, don't tell."  Doing haiku every week keeps me on that narrow path of specificity that's so easy to stray from.

The above haiku and senryu were all mine.   Some of them, and many more, appear in my e-book, 211 Haiku.  If you like them, here's the link. 

That's pretty much all there is to it.  If you want to try it, that's all you need to know.  Enjoy!SJ Rozan, a native New Yorker, is the author of fourteen novels, under her own name and, with a co-writer, under a new secret identity as Sam Cabot.  She's won the Edgar, Shamus, Anthony, and many other awards.  Her latest book is Sam Cabot's BLOOD OF THE LAMB. 

And there are two prizes today for folks brave enough to try their hand at a haiku. These will be chosen strictly by random drawing--no judging of merit! Simply post your poem in the comments...

On hot flashes

JAN: Most women don't think hot flashes are very funny, but Paula Munier does.

An acquisitions editor at Adams Media by day and writer by night, Paula coauthored a new humor book, Hot Flash Haiku, with Jennifer Basye Sander. And she's here with us today to share some of her wit and wisdom in perfect haiku form: (five, seven, five syllables).

Age Inappropriate

Is Just another way to

Keep This Old Broad Down

JAN: (laughing) How did you come up with the idea for this book?

PAULA: Jennifer came up to me at BEA (Book Expo America) and said, I have this idea. I want you to write it with me. It was such a funny idea, hot flash humor in seventeen syllables. I knew we'd have a great time writing it, we just needed to come up with an organizing principle.

JAN: Which was......???

PAULA: In some ways, as you age you are grieving your loss of some things. So we organized it according to the stages of grief. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. In the denial category...

If I could turn back

Time, I'd look just like Cher

Before surgery.

JAN: How did you go about writing these and how long did it take?

PAULA: We split them up. There are about 250 poems in the book. I tried to write the more funny ones, Jennifer wrote the more profound ones and we had some contributors. A lot of red wine and chocolate was consumed to put us in the mood. It took about six months

In the anger category,

A cruel magic act

Gravity Tugs, I go from

Woman to Shar Pei.

and

Whenever someone

my age gets a face lift

It pisses me off.

JAN: Was it hard to master the haiku form?

PAULA. Once you get into the groove, the trick becomes how to make them all different. To write 250 of anything without repeating yourself is a challenge. Jennifer and I brought different perspectives. I'm older than Jennifer and a grandmother. She was married once and is still married. I've been married and now I'm dating.

In the bargaining category:

If Men Think about Sex

Every seven seconds

Why can't we get laid?

JAN: So are you thinking haiku now on every date?

PAULA: Not really, but it's a little like writing a country western song, you are always thinking in a narrative. And how to make so few words tell a story.

In the depression category:

Once I was hot

But now hotter than ever

Many times a day.

JAN: Right off the top of my head, I can think of three or four women I want to buy this book for. What has the reception been like?

PAULA: People everywhere love this book. The copy editor loved the book. The people at Penn Station Borders couldn't wait to tell us how much they loved this book. It resonates with people. You've heard that women over a certain age become invisible? Well, women of my generation are not going to settle for invisible. This book celebrates that. We're not doing that. We didn't anything the way our parents did and this either.

In the acceptance category....

Men Over 50

May need viagra

So drug him.

Paula Munier is also the author of Yes, We Can, 365 Ways to Make America a Better Place, On Being Blonde and the young adult novel, Emerald's Desire. She is the co-author of 101 Things You (and John McCain) Didn't Know about Sarah Palin.

Jennifer Basye Sander is the author of The Sacramento Women's Pages, as well as the author, coauthor and ghostwriter of more than thirty books including the recent gift book hits Wear More Cashmere and The Martini Diet.