17 December 2012

Want your poem in the bus?

| johnboy
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ArtsACT are calling for submissions of poetry to be displayed in ACTION buses in 2013:

Entrants can submit ONE poem with a maximum of 8 lines. Ten poems will be selected by an independent panel to be displayed on ACTION buses. Each winner selected will receive $500, and there will be 10 shortlisted poets who will each receive an ACTION Bus MyWay card credited with $40.

1. Entry is open to all ACT residents
2. Entries are limited to one per person
3. Entries should have a Canberra/Centenary/Birthday theme
4. Entries should be appropriate to be displayed in public spaces
5. Entries should be a MAXIMUM of 8 lines

The closing date for entries will be 5pm on Friday 15 February 2012.

Point 4 is going to be a problem for the better class of poetry.

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I made up a ‘poem about Canberra’ once, for a competition on Mark Carmody’s breakfast radio show (about 8 or 10 years ago). Next thing I knew, chunks of it had been nicked by someone as their own – in particular, I recognised my phrase ‘Brindabella’s arms’ – and it was put on a sticker on the inside of a bus!
Message to that person – if you are submitting another poem this time around, don’t steal others’ work.

LSWCHP said :

O Glorious ACTION Moguls will you let me count the ways
That I can sing thy praises, tho I’m one who never pays
For your routes and your fair structures may be studly and magnificent
And I’ve not the slightest doubt that your salary is significant
But I’ll give it to you straight, with both barrels (LOCK AND LOAD!!)
I don’t want to F*CKING wait, on a frozen Canberra road
For your bus again. So I’m driving.

Now I know that some people will be inclined to dump on me for that last line which is totally out of meter, but somehow I kinda like it. 🙂

Poetix? You da poetry boss round heah. Whatchoo think, woman?

This is truly a masterpiece of understated yet real angriness that emerges somewhat as an expression of hopelessness adrift in a sea of misunderstanding within a paradigm of desperate impossibility, yet transmogrified to give an overall sense of inconspicuous consumerism latently lying deep within a western styled subconscious that manifests itself as to some sort of wanton yet deliberate randomness in the universal sophistication that one perceives to be an integral part in the schematics of bus scheduling.

Or something like that….

That’s the most accurate, clear and concise analysis of my poetry that anyone has ever supplied. I’ve never had my poetic Schwerpunkt quite so precisely tickled (if you know what I mean), and I really believe that you’re getting where I’m coming from, bus-wise.

This is stupendous!

Madam Cholet12:20 pm 19 Dec 12

DrKoresh said :

milkman said :

Madam Cholet said :

I’m on an Action bus right now. It’s 28 degrees outside, and about 45 inside the bus. I don’t feel much like writing complimentary poetry about anything. Why the frig are these buses still in service?

It’s public tranport, not a limousine.

Atleast you can open a window on those old ones, which you can’t on the phallic looking green and white ones (the air conditioning does nothing for the humidify and the stench of 45 sweaty people), not to mention they actually have decent seats. Seriously, why didn’t you open a lumping window instead of using your smartphone to bitch on the internet?

IPad actually, but I won’t hold hat against you.

And, you numpty, all the windows were open and I was at the back to make the best use of any incoming air, but unless you are doing about 100km down the Monaro, there’s not going to be a breath of wind getting in those badly designed windows.

I’m afraid I think that I’ll never see
A bus as beautiful as the 333
That departs from Belco in the morning
To arrive in Civic as the sun it is dawning

is this in your anthology, then, thumper?

i wrote a piece some years back about the ‘half a beast, that three three three’ – yours is more succinct. [and mine is more than eight lines, so not going in here.]

has anyone else noticed the drivel that is currently ‘poetry in action’? many offerings here – unsurprisingly, with the talkent lurking! – are superior.

LSWCHP said :

O Glorious ACTION Moguls will you let me count the ways
That I can sing thy praises, tho I’m one who never pays
For your routes and your fair structures may be studly and magnificent
And I’ve not the slightest doubt that your salary is significant
But I’ll give it to you straight, with both barrels (LOCK AND LOAD!!)
I don’t want to F*CKING wait, on a frozen Canberra road
For your bus again. So I’m driving.

Now I know that some people will be inclined to dump on me for that last line which is totally out of meter, but somehow I kinda like it. 🙂

Poetix? You da poetry boss round heah. Whatchoo think, woman?

No, no, no. Poetix, she be adoze. Noted slam poet ‘John’ can do the critickling. From now on.

O Glorious ACTION Moguls will you let me count the ways
That I can sing thy praises, tho I’m one who never pays
For your routes and your fair structures may be studly and magnificent
And I’ve not the slightest doubt that your salary is significant
But I’ll give it to you straight, with both barrels (LOCK AND LOAD!!)
I don’t want to F*CKING wait, on a frozen Canberra road
For your bus again. So I’m driving.

Now I know that some people will be inclined to dump on me for that last line which is totally out of meter, but somehow I kinda like it. 🙂

Poetix? You da poetry boss round heah. Whatchoo think, woman?

wildturkeycanoe10:32 pm 18 Dec 12

My bike is broken and after I’ve woken I see I need a new bearing,
It’s Saturday morn and I could have sworn that parts from Fyshwick will start my repairing;
The Action 905 off Osburne Drive gets me to Westfield one minute late,
Then the nine eight zero arrives like a hero after a boring one hour wait.
At Newcastle and Isa I somewhat surmise, and this isn’t just a hunch,
That after making sale quick I see my whole trip has already taken me till lunch;
Finally home in the sun around half past one, a realization fills my head,
If you haven’t got time, in the bus to read rhymes, best catch a taxi instead.

Note: I can’t believe I just stayed up till 10:30 to write this dribble on a whim…..
I need a life.

milkman said :

Madam Cholet said :

I’m on an Action bus right now. It’s 28 degrees outside, and about 45 inside the bus. I don’t feel much like writing complimentary poetry about anything. Why the frig are these buses still in service?

It’s public tranport, not a limousine.

Atleast you can open a window on those old ones, which you can’t on the phallic looking green and white ones (the air conditioning does nothing for the humidify and the stench of 45 sweaty people), not to mention they actually have decent seats. Seriously, why didn’t you open a lumping window instead of using your smartphone to bitch on the internet?

Madam Cholet said :

I’m on an Action bus right now. It’s 28 degrees outside, and about 45 inside the bus. I don’t feel much like writing complimentary poetry about anything. Why the frig are these buses still in service?

It’s public tranport, not a limousine.

In one hundred years
Will I still be here waiting
For my bus to come

Madam Cholet4:33 pm 18 Dec 12

I’m on an Action bus right now. It’s 28 degrees outside, and about 45 inside the bus. I don’t feel much like writing complimentary poetry about anything. Why the frig are these buses still in service?

Devil_n_Disquiz2:48 pm 18 Dec 12

The wheels on the bus go rou….

Never mind.

Is our Glorious Leader going to have a go?

DrKoresh said :

100 years,
is but a drop in the ocean,
compared to the time spent waiting at the bloody bus-stop.

gets my vote – even over poetix’s excellent lost haikooooo [i’d throw money; if only i had some]

100 years,
is but a drop in the ocean,
compared to the time spent waiting at the bloody bus-stop.

thebrownstreak692:04 pm 18 Dec 12

Canberra! A place that sets my heart a-throbbing
While out in fair Fyshwick girls’ heads are a-bobbing
It burns through my eyes and my ears and my brain
Like a brilliant but fictitious light-rail train
When I see public servants run in fear ’round the lake
That they’ll lose when they bargain their public-purse take
I scream as I cover my eyes and my ears
‘Cos the timetable’s changed 18 times in 4 years!

And here is my attempt at worst possible effort by a person who should know better:

Penis owl
eats every pigeon –
lost high coos

Thank you. Just throw money.

No.
I do not
want.
My poem
on the bus.
Thank you
very much.

100 years’ of tinfoil hats
100 years’ of Sulies Creek rats
Empty coffee cup, what bin to put it in!
This is my entry, but do I win?
At least we don’t have lyssavirus bats

The world lies beyond the window.
Canberra moving around me.
People. Place. Moment.
There and gone, only to be remade in the next.
I am of the thing, yet its viewer still.
Time proceeds around me.
Why did the bus have to break down?

Classic RA Haiku:

RA reader sees Orange bus
No words on walls
Poetry flows freely

FUDGE:

Death, vile corruption and despair is everywhere around me;
while I sit here wracked by pain and suffering in silence.
Meanwhile, some lady upstairs is making up figures
to keep all those in power satisfied and happy.
I knew from the start that this was a bad idea
maybe the walk-in centre really was a better option?

DrKoresh said :

Autumn through to Autumn,
Coming changes,
Total shifts,
Inevitably lost in the waiting,
On the hope ‘Will it soon come?’…
Never.

That’s mine. It’s inspired by ACTION.

autumn follows autumn
leaving only change
shifting loss, winding down –

all stopping stopped,
commuted –

But you may prefer the original! This has the vagueness you wanted though. Is it ‘Canberra’ enough? (By the way, if you put them up here, I think they’ll be noticed!)

Keijidosha said :

5. Entries should be a MAXIMUM of 8 lines

How long is a piece of string?

Twice as long as it is from the middle to the end 🙂

Holden Caulfield5:01 pm 17 Dec 12

Some come here to sit and think,
Some come here to s*** and stink.
I just come to scratch my balls,
And read the bulls*** on the walls.

5. Entries should be a MAXIMUM of 8 lines

How long is a piece of string?

poetix said :

Point 5 is difficult for those who tend to go off a bit.

My very first RiotACT comment was a response to criticism of the poems on the bus, of which one was mine. I thought I’d only ever make the one comment. But then the rays started.

It is a real delight though to think of your poem being read by so many people. *Captive* people.

I hope that the tone doesn’t have to be celebratory, i.e. Ode to Planning or ‘Wond’rous Centenary’. Shudder.

Hail to thee, Committee!
God’s plans and thine are one,
Praise our glorious city,
For Canberra’s time has come!

Then you could go on about smiting enemies of Canberra and such, if you were so inclined.

poetix said :

Interestingly there is no requirement in the rules for the work to be previously unpublished.

Excellent, I can continue to refine them on RA then, and get feedback to boot. I was pretty happy with the last few lines of my attempt but I think the first part of the poem was mostly flowery rubbish, can I get some help workshopping it from any of you literary folk?.

My ultimate goal is to get a poem decrying ACTION onto one of the buses, but I’ll probably have to make it general and vague. But at least when I see it, I’ll know what it really means.

astrojax said :

i want to read poetix’s contribution…

mine would be surrealistic:

catch a bus on a weekend before shops open?
beware the fish.

buy a ticket
or get a fin

Sorry, that’s social realism for you.

And I’m sure you’ll get to read my poem on the bus…(-:

Interestingly there is no requirement in the rules for the work to be previously unpublished.

i want to read poetix’s contribution…

mine would be surrealistic:

catch a bus on a weekend before shops open?
beware the fish.

Point 5 is difficult for those who tend to go off a bit.

My very first RiotACT comment was a response to criticism of the poems on the bus, of which one was mine. I thought I’d only ever make the one comment. But then the rays started.

It is a real delight though to think of your poem being read by so many people. *Captive* people.

I hope that the tone doesn’t have to be celebratory, i.e. Ode to Planning or ‘Wond’rous Centenary’. Shudder.

As I sit on bus 30, feeling quite weary,
Aware of the teens while thier speakers are blaring,
I glance to my left and see a man quite sedate,
passed out on drugs, which to me is great,
because it sure beats the rest who are barging around,
the 16 year old mother with 3 brats on the ground,
or the abusive roid freak who is wearing ed hardy,
this is the last time I ride a bus through west Charny.

Autumn through to Autumn,
Coming changes,
Total shifts,
Inevitably lost in the waiting,
On the hope ‘Will it soon come?’…
Never.

That’s mine. It’s inspired by ACTION.

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