Ship Ragged

By John Beach

John Beach's eighth collection of poetry. The 36 (mostly) terzanelle poems in this collection are reflections on difficult, transitional, and tired moments in the author's life, but there’s also fun and opportunities.

The terzanelle is a French/Italian adaptation of the terza rima to the villanelle form. Each terzanelle is meant to be 19 lines long (ten syllables each), composed of five triplets with a concluding quatrain, and are written in iambic pentamater. I don't pay much attention to where my metrical feet are stepping, but I enjoy the puzzle-like nature of this form and the subtlety of the repeating lines, the variations in meaning. I also enjoy breaking the lines and changing punctuation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: John Beach
• Release date: Oct 3, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310842870

John Beach

John describes himself now as “the evolutionary result of Paperboy to Grocery Store Worker to Professional College Student to Magazine Editor to Computer Night Operator to Jr. Database Programmer to System Administrator to Computer Consultant to College Professor to Dean of Information Technology to Retired Old Guy Who's Really Not Old Enough To Be Retired.” He’s always been around writing and has used it daily in his professional life. He's used it in his leisure time, too, often when he plotted out D&D adventures that he and his players communally craft together around the dining room table and on Zoom. John’s always loved stories, always had them forming, churning, and reshaping in his brain. It wasn’t until he began closing in on an early retirement (for health reasons) that he began to get those stories out of his head and into text documents and then released into the world through ePublishing.You can visit with John on Facebook. He’d love to hear from you regarding his written work (and your hobbies), and he would greatly appreciate it if you could write reviews for his books. Ask him for free coupons if you need them. He only puts prices on his most recent books so that people will take them more seriously. The money’s not important: his stories and poems just want to be read.

Book preview

Introduction

Ship Ragged is an eclectic collection of (mostly) terzanelle poems, a poetic form that combines elements from the terza rima and the villanelle. The terzanelle features five tercets and one concluding quatrain—19 ten-syllable lines, which, ideally use iambic pentameter, although I frequently ignore my metrical feet. The rhyming of terzanelles normally uses the end-line structure of A1BA2, bCB, cDC, dED, eFE, and fA1FA2. And only four of the poem’s 19 lines do not repeat. However, even with the 15 repeating lines, I usually cheat their punctuation to force enjambment and to help change the meaning of the echoing lines.

This book is dedicated to

my parents, students, and friends, who have all taught me different ways to survive.

~~~~

Closing Down the Professor Man

Some students came from the barrel’s bottom.

Most school systems will not reach down that far,

will build so-called safety nets above them

where they’re safe, their teachers needn’t bother

with the remedial, suicidal.

Most school systems will not reach down that far,

pretend they do. I’ve taught homicidal

hands to remain bloodless in the trenches

with the remedial, suicidal,

lazy, anti-social, nuts, and wrenches

in the works tighten, strip me, demand for

hands to remain bloodless. In the trenches,

For-Profit means careers for them, then me.

I’ve helped raise them to be among those who—

in the works—tighten, strip me, demand. For

-Profit boils broken horses into glue.

Some students came from the barrel’s bottom.

I’ve helped raise them to be among those who

will build so-called safety nets above them.

Culturing

I may believe in some things you