Ann's Immaterium

Mostly physical culture but also writing, gaming, and other dark procrastinations

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Poetry and Painting Helper

This has proven a busy (in a good way) past few days.  I heard back from Dragon Soul Press yesterday.  I sent them some of my poetry for their upcoming anthology, Organic Ink, Volume 2, which is currently due to come out around the end of 2019.*  

I’m pleased to say that my work is going to appear in the anthology, and they sent me this graphic.  The book, I’m told, is going to be available in both electronic and physical formats, as the picture below suggests.

I’m particularly pleased the editors decided to use the longish poem that I wrote as a retelling of the Pandora’s Box myth, The War of the Jar. The idea came, in part, from reminding myself of Hesiod’s five ages of humanity from Works and Days.  My poem was set in his third age where (as Hesiod reports), Zeus created a “race, sprung from ash trees; and it was in no way equal to the silver age, but it was terrible and strong.”

So I am thinking that I might extend things and do some other poetry for Hesiod’s other four ages too.  Although I was never a particular fan of the Pandora myth, since I first heard it as a wee one in the late 1960’s, I am a fan of Hesiod’s Five Ages, which evokes for me vibrations of Conan and the Drums of Tombalku, mixed with a little H.P. Lovecraft, various romantics, and a dash of Blake and maybe Milton.

Probably a faster painter than I am, even without thumbs!

I haven’t sallied forth onto the painting front for quite awhile, but I decided to brave the Plateau of Unpainted Models (possibly near Leng?) and pick away at a poxwalker I got about half done and then left to its own devices a few months ago.

I stepped away for a few minutes and when I came back I found I had a painting helper, who had no intention of moving from her spot.  (Maybe the plateau is in fact nearer Ulther than Leng?)

In any case, between the two of us we made some good progress on our poxwalker and hope to finish #17 this weekend.  I went to see the new Rambo movie this weekend with my husband, and afterwards bought some Plaguebearer Flesh contrast paint to experiment with on old #17.**

*  As a reader, I’m planning on checking out DSP’s story anthology, Coffins & Dragons, which as I understand features stories that have both vampires and dragons in the same tale.  At a mighty 620 pages, it is quite a hefty tome and will keep me busy for awhile, I’m sure.

**  I think poxwalkers like it when you experiment on them; at least I think they try and get into the spirit of the thing.  Still, I think it is fast approaching the time we should bring the experiment to a happy conclusion.  After all, I have been working on the wretched mob since the Dark Imperium boxed set first arrived, over two years ago now!

 

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13 responses to “Poetry and Painting Helper”

      • Thank you very much. yes, I am indeed chuffed! Funny you should say it that way — I have a British boss at work (I’m in California, USA) and also a British co-worker so while my knowledge of British English (two great nations separated by a common language!) is rudimentary, I’ve had the happy opportunity to learn words like boot, chuffed, and so on. Well, that and watching some of the BBC comedies that have made it over to us, of course. The translation is much appreciated and please do use such words, with their translations, because I’m always looking to slip more such things into my fractured lingo!

        The most recent one I learned was when my co-worker was riding with me as a passenger, showing me a new route for our bus driver job (I got started in transportation many years ago driving lorries), and she said, “You have to watch out of the sleeping policemen on this street.” So we got through and I said, “Didn’t see any cops, lucky, huh?” We went back and forth a little until I realized she was talking about the speed bumps. 🙂

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    • Thank you, Pete. I’m looking forward to the book coming out near the end of the year. In the meantime, I’ll be creating more stuff and sending it out, in addition to my Wattpad efforts. Gotta finish the tentacles on Ole Number Seventeen by this weekend though….

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  3. Kitty! :3

    That sounds like a really cool epic poem as well. I can’t find anywhere to pre-order it yet, so please do give us a link when it goes up.

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    • Heh, yeah, I love my kitties, and truth be told I like animals in general.

      As I understand it is supposed to come out at the end of the year and will be available in paperback and on Kindle through Amazon. I will certainly put up a link when it is available, and thank you for asking.

      I certainly enjoyed writing the Pandora story. It was one of those things that I approached more like a short story than a poem in that I thought in terms of plot rather than primarily image, and I tried to keep the metaphor such that it didn’t obscure the story I was trying to tell.

      If/when I write the other Ages, I’m going to try to use a similar approach I think. Hesiod goes up to an Age of Iron, which was the contemporary age at his time. I wonder if assuming that the other four Hesiod-based poems are a success if I should continue ahead and come up with an Age or two up to our time, and maybe even go beyond into the future?

      They are also going to be using a bunch of very short poems I’ve been accumulating from moments I’ve experienced as a paratransit bus driver, and also a poem I wrote back in the late 90’s, lost it to Ye Olde Hard Drive Crash of 1998, and found it again. It is funny: I had no luck at all getting that old stuff published back when I wrote it, but for some reason I’ve had a number of those older poems picked up in various places in the past couple of years. I guess they’ve seasoned perhaps, like an old stick?

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      • I’d probably do the Ages of Steel and Silicon, tho Petroleum and Electricity could also work. Ages seem to come faster as time goes by.

        It might also have nothing to do with the poems themselves, but merely that this time is more ready for them, that editors are more open to your vibe now. Sometimes things just have to wait for their time to come.

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        • Great ideas, all. You could be right about ages coming faster, though as time goes by maybe the mists of time grow thicker and what we see as discrete ages end up being mashed together, a la Dark Age of Technology? Maybe not though. 🙂

          You could be right. I’m not sure what it is that changed where I’m having an easier time getting stuff published than I did back in the 90’s. I’m not saying it is easy now because it isn’t. Maybe what it is that I’m more patient (or at least less impatient) about things than I was then? I like what you said about having “to wait for their time to come” better though.

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    • Thank you, John, I’m quite pleased about the poetry. Roxy the Painter says thank you too. She did just have a bath a few days ago, so I think (as we all do after such things) i shows her off to full advantage. 🙂

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