The Tuesday dVerse prompt this week was “flipping meanings“:
Flood moon
The round orb,
washed white by rain,
floats high in the stream.
It is a record
of what has been.
It asks a question
about what was lost.
Original:
Bushfire Moon (April 2020)
A thin crescent,
bloodied by smoke,
hangs low above the ridge.
This is not a portent
of things to come.
It is a statement,
of what is here.
Elementals III: toad
Without a murmur
the water closes behind
the mud-black blob, rising
climbing
glabrous body flopping.
A mugshot of the murk.
Original:
Elementals I: cockatoo (June 2020)
With a shriek
the sky splinters,
a dawn-white shard falls,
swoops
sulphur crest rising
like a glimpse of sun
morning commute, still
Oil slicked concrete
subtly rainbowed
has taken the place
of the fresh green
fields and hills,
spread wide, reaching up
to a clean blue sky.
Original:
Morning commute (July 2020)
Frost coated fields
in glittering white
give way
to the dull grey
of the city
huddled beneath
its brown winter cloak
There was a wonderful video of “the opposites game” with the dVaerse prompt – an animation of a narrative poem about a class of children turning a line from Emily Dickinson into its opposite word by word. Playing with this, I found that sometimes the meaning is reversed, sometimes it remains the same, because flipping “is X” to “is not Y” doesn’t change the meaning where Y is the opposite of X, and often it just doesn’t make sense if you’re too literal. You can see examples of reversal of meaning and meaning retained in my attempts above.
Interesting take, and well worked. I enjoyed very much how you played them out. 🐸
Thanks Stephen 🙂 I think it would be tricky with a ha’sonnet!
You’re welcome. Yeah, that’s not a challenge I’m going to attempt. 🙂
Really lovely images in both originals and opposites, Kate.
Flippin’ interestin’
Thanks Nick 🙂
:::applause::: You’ve nailed it, Kate. More than that, you have a wonderful knack for it!
Thanks Lisa, it was a tricky one!
Yours was brilliant – shape and rhyme! I wasn’t up to rhyme as well.
You’re welcome. I can see the work you put into it!
And thank you for your kind words ❤
Awesome. I agree with nickreeves.
thank you ❤
Well done! I attempted this and was never happy with the outcome.
It’s really tricky to balance being too literal/precisely negative with generating gibberish. I had a few false starts before deciding I just needed to be less exact – not easy for a pedantic physicist. 😀
I most especially love the two on the moon. Both are truly beautiful.
Thank you 🙂 We had bushfires 2019/2020 summer, and floods 2020/2021… but it wouldn’t have occurred to me to flip “bushfire moon” without the dVerse prompt.
The alternate universe images of the originals are amazing!
~cie from poetry of the netherworld~
Thanks Cara 🙂