Here’s a slightly mad poem from the Erdigg workshop.
Pleached Limes
On a cowless path between corsetted trees,
well-heeled ladies shade from Apollo;
you could say they are bleached,
not done to a turn, but taking a turn,
promenading far from the ha-ha
and tanning studio of the open field.
There are daguerreotypes of such antics
hanging from the walls of this jerry-built pile
with its steel ceilings, fake marble pillars
and luddite squires who had no truck with electrics,
banned wheels and telephones, even the post.
But did like stilts, and fire extinguishers.
I just love the way everyone sees things differently! ‘Corsetted trees’ – great. I’m not sure I quite understand line 2.
Oops there was a typo – I’d duplicated ‘well’ in the 2nd line..’Shade from Apollo’ means from the sun, Apollo being the sun god. Does that help? Thanks for the comment Robbie.
I’m still reading that the well-heeled ladies are shading the corseted trees from Apollo but the following lines suggest that the opposite is the case… If that’s the intention, could the ladies hide rather than shade?
Love the tanning studio!
Aha, I see now what you mean. I’ve added a comma to the end of the first line. Does that help. If not I’ll consider using hide, but I’ve used ‘hide from Apollo’ in a different poem 🙂
I like the quirkiness a lot but ‘Tanning studio’ is spatially not very close to an open field(?) The last line brings you in in a rather throwaway way. Something better?
and this “slightly mad” poem goes to show what happens when you can take something in context – if we hadn’t all been at Erddig then we would not have had a clue what it was about – I think you have more than one poem here Keith – I like the idea of the ladies in the first stanza and the references to past and present – Classical and modern – Apollos and tanning studios – Erddig was such a mixture – so for me mixing things up works well and appeals to people who might not always be attracted to poetry – and if it were me I would use the second stanza and develop a separate poem