(to me, at least)
I am reading a book called The Body Remembers, which is helping me understand a bit more about how my memory works–both why I apparently (so they tell me) remember things so well, and why I have such a propensity to post-traumatic stress. Fascinating stuff, and I am enjoying the book and the things that are clicking and making sense to me as I read, though I am only on page 37, where I discovered this fun poem by a Danish poet, Piet Hein:
Rhyme and Reason
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe,
She had so many children, she didn’t know what to do.
But try as she would she could never detect
which was the cause and which the effect.
Piet Hein. What a fascinating guy. Not, perhaps, your ordinary poet. Fascinating enough that he wrote his poetry in several different languages. I also discovered that he:
…was a genius with many different sides. In addition to discovering the Soma cube, he created a new geometrical form, the “super-ellipse”, which is something in between the rectangle and the ellipse. The form also came in a 3D version and was then called “the super egg” or “the super-ellipsoide”. As an artist and constructor, Piet Hein in the 50’s and 60’s gave form to beautiful pieces of furniture, and he contributed to make “Scandinavian design” become an international conception. Internationally he always tried building a bridge between the “hard” technical and natural sciences and the “soft” humanistic subjects.
Here a few more of his poems, known, for some reason I haven’t looked up yet, as “Grooks”:
PROBLEMS
Problems worthy
of attack
prove their worth
by hitting back.
(I’ve got a few problems like that, which obsessively and obnoxiously seem to keep trying to prove their worth!)
This is a brilliant idea, I think:
A PSYCHOLOGICAL TIP
Whenever you’re called on to make up your mind,
and you’re hampered by not having any,
the best way to solve the dilemma, you’ll find,
is simply by spinning a penny.
No – not so that chance shall decide the affair
while you’re passively standing there moping;
but the moment the penny is up in the air,
you suddenly know what you’re hoping.
And finally, this one, which gave me a smile for how relevant an encouragement it was to me tonight:
T.T.T
Put up in a place
where it’s easy to see
the cryptic admonishment
T.T.T.
When you feel how depressingly
slowly you climb,
it’s well to remember that
Things Take Time.
I’ve heard that penny tip – you should flip a coin. Your reaction immediately before the result is revealed will tell you what you need to know.
Enola, I thought that was a great idea, and it was a totally new one to me. Funny how our brains work, isn’t it?
I like these poems. They made me think of Ogden Nash whose poems are pretty silly but often have a hint of wisdom. Here’s one (it’s a little long):
SONG FOR DITHERERS
I journey not whence nor whither,
I languish alone in a dither;
I journey not to nor fro,
And my dither to me I owe.
I could find a pleasanter name for it
Had I somebody else to blame for it,
But alas that beneath the sun
Dithers are built for one.
This is the song of the dither,
For viol, bassoon or zither,
Till the greenest simpletons wither
This is the song of the dither;
When regular troubles are wrong with you,
Others are guilty along with you;
Dithers are private trouble
Where you privately stew and bubble.
Come hither, somebody, come hither,
Would you care for a share of my dither?
I want somebody else to be mad at;
“Have at you!” to cry, and be had at.
I am tired of being angry at me,
There is room in my dither for three,
There is room in my dither for two;
We could butt at each other and moo;
We could hiss like the serpent, and slither
Through the tropical depths of my dither;
Like bees we could fight along beelines,
Or spit at each other like felines;
I care not who gaineth the laurel,
All I want is a foe and a quarrel.
Alone in my dither I pine.
For the sake of the days of lang syne,
For your white-haired old feyther and mither,
Come along, come along to my dither.
With no foe in my dither but me,
I swoon, I lay doon, and I dee.
And here’s a short one:
BIRTHDAY ON THE BEACH
At another year
I would not boggle
Except that when I jog
I joggle.
Julimae, I love those poems! Thank you for introducing me to them and to Ogden Nash. You know, I’ve heard the name, but I so did not use to enjoy poetry, so I probably tuned it all out up until a couple of years ago. I’m delighted to keep discovering such fun poets. Thanks for stopping by and sharing these.
Great little witty word-whacks … thanks for introducing us to him.