Reanimated Lavender Granola Switchblade Nun rides again.

Wednesday, October 12, 2022

Word Garden Word List--Ric Masten


Hello friends, and welcome to another Word Garden Word List poetry prompt. Last week I featured an old favorite, Dave Kelly, but was dismayed at how difficult it was for people to find his work on line if they wished to. I've been mulling that. This week, our featured poet is "The Poet Laureate of Carmel" Ric Masten. When I returned stateside from overseas in 1977, I passed through Carmel and picked up a copy of "Who Wavin'? (a thin body of work)" which is indeed a thin body of work because the book is much taller than it is wide! However, the words inside are anything but thin.


The late Ric Masten, who passed in 2008, was not only a unique and prolific--23 books--poet, but was also a singer/songwriter, an artist, and a few other things as well. About his art, he had this to say: "I learned from Leger that I wasn't a cubist, He spoke to me in French and I answered in English. I didn't understand what he said, and I doubt he understood what I said. We got along fine." This is a typical remark. Of his habit of writing in all lower case without punctuation, Masten said it was "because I never knew how." 

I said earlier that I'd been mulling last week's prompt. Up until now, I have avoided including our featured poets' actual poems because the aim here is to use the words on the list to write something of our own, not to imitate the featured poet. However, like Dave Kelly, Ric Masten may be difficult to find, so I am including a link to three excellent poems of his HERE and am also going to include one in this post. Here it is:

the comedian

for william

he was a funny 
funny man

but
taking me
to the airport
he paused
in his routine
and the silence
was like a hole
in the ground
deep and dark
like his eyes

see those
gray wyoming hills
lying off
to the west there
well
my lilly
went off
into them
five years ago
and killed
herself

i tell you this
so you'll know
i understood
when you spoke
of your
loneliness

and then
he was joking
and
i
was
laughing

What we do here is to use at least 3 of the 20 words on the list below in a new poem of your own. Then link up, link back, and twist the night away. 



It has been a pleasure to share with you two poets who have been lifelong favorites of mine who I first discovered back in the '70's. In that vein, I offer Neil Young singing "Journey Through The Past." And now, your list:

breakdown
cafe
Chicago
costumes
dwarf
ferry
filigree
jars
kidding
nut
quietly
riddle
scaffolding
semaphore
shatterproof
stingers
trinity
trinkets
unimportant
veranda (Masten misspells it "varanda")




8 comments:

  1. Wow he was truly a multi-talented man. I always love learning about these amazing writers Shay. I may be back, I won't promise, but I will give it my best. I always want to do it, but my muse has been on it's dead bed of late.

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  2. A fascinating list, and thanks so much for including some of the chosen subject's own work; to get a feel for where the words originated helps I think. Like Carrie, writing is not easy these days but I will be back if I can.

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    1. Well, no idea how, but something turned up. Thanks for making it happen, and for the Nell Young tune, which I haven't heard in years.

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  3. Thank you for the word list, for introducing me to a new poet.

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  4. Shay, Slipped in at the last moment, the Muse still uneasy, the landscape remains an inferno. Sigh.

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  5. I still want to share a poem here but haven't had a chance yet. Will Mr Linky still be working tomorrow or Friday? x

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    1. It will still be working! A new list goes up later today, so just say you're linking to the Ric Masten list, if you do. :-)

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