on 7/22/01 5:15 PM, domfox at [log in to unmask] wrote:
> Note: Phrases selected according to a personal canon from those generated by
> "Rambler", a useful text-mangler for the Acorn Archimedes computer. The
> soure texts are folksongs, in this case "O Waly, Waly"; "The Cat Has Just
> Been And Caught A Jacket Blue" incorporates material from a large number of
> ballads. Rebecca is my sister, and does this sort of thing to amuse
> herself. - Dom
>
> "As I lay asleep in Italy,
> a bunch of uniformed thugs burst in
> and beat the living crap out of me"
>
> - Percy "Bish" Shelley
I'm very taken with your sister's songwork, Dom--the phrasings and
rhythms especially--and would love to see more. Would also like to know more
about the "Rambler" program and how Rebecca uses it. I'm working on a
ballad-based poem sequence in which snatches of songs mingle and jostle, but
they're all ones that have grabbed me in passing: "word is to the kitchen
gone/word is to the hall" ("Mary Hamilton"), "where is the spell that once
hung on my numbers" ("Kathleen Mavourneen"), "so low in flesh, so high in
bone" ("Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye"), for example. Since that makes me the
random-text scrambler in effect, I wonder how or even if "Rambler" might
work for me. Rebecca's mixtures are anything but mechanical, though, so I
assume she combines the program with a more intuitive mode.
I've got half a dozen poems in process right now and am listening to a lot
of midi tunes as the lyrics chase each other round my brain. Here's the only
more-or-less finished one so far, with sources including several songs but
most recognizably the Connemara Cradle Song (aka "Down In The Valley") and
the two variants of "The Wind That Shakes The Barley/Corn." (We owe the
"Barley" lyrics to Trevor Joyce's ancestor, Patrick Dwyer Joyce, btw.)
Ballad Child
scrimshow through the window
on the deep roiling braes
currachs assailing over the furze
as if shad rues, the rose is blown
you never fished for flying glass
yet chad did happen nonetheless
you cannot get over the whitewater
business either--really, says the lily,
must we list to the brass
or heed the windrose?
come buy our glenglass
there go the windows!
lean your head over
the side of the bowl
bog down, bog down
Lady Isobel, take cover
if herring is silver, sour the cream
for slivers of heather do sharpen
the Tweed
so may the chains of old Ireland
bind you
no overlooked clover ever to
find you
when the wind drags the corn
by her silk from the field
and your hair smells of beer
shorn from the barley
then shall you have the story
love, as it was told to me
truly
Candice
