Prize Winners

Here are the poems that took First And Second Prize in this year's NFB Writers Division Poetry Contest.

When You Were Mine

When you were mine every day was Summer
The night always overflowed with stars
Each kiss and every touch was newborn magic
Nothing blocked our way; the world was ours.

When you were mine the shadows couldn’t scare us
The future spread before us bright and clear
My light was just your smile; my music was your laughter,
Nothing else meant anything to me.

There’s nothing now except your memory
My heart is bleak as Winter but still sometimes
You call to me across the years and again
I’m with you in the sweet days when you were mine.

It Doesn't Matter Any More

The afternoon’s last sunlight lies in bars across the floor
Soon it fades and melts away as twilight falls once more.
This used to be the time of day I always loved the most,
But now it’s just the nightfall, that doesn’t matter any more.

The dawn is soft with silver mist and soon the rain appears
It blurs the edges of the day and merges with my tears.
This used to be the time of day you always held me close.
But now it’s just the morning that doesn’t matter any more.

My friends say that I should find a new love.
They tell me I’ll be happy once again.
But my heart could never part with you, Love
Where’s happiness when the world is cold and dead?

So now I watch the nights and days go spinning by.
At times I cry, but mostly I just wonder why,
Why you were taken from my arms when we finally had it all
I love you so but now, it doesn’t matter any more.

The Cave Girl

Yesterday afternoon and evening I read Edgar Rice Burroughs' The Cave Girl, a thrilling tale of how a pusillanimous ninety-pound weakling becomes a man under the influence of a good woman and the hearty outdoors life. The young lady of the title is no slouch either. 8) In fact, not only is she beautiful, athletic and spunky, she turns out to be not quite what she initially appears.

Restoring Eden

60 Minutes reports on the remarkable efforts of one engineer and the group he has formed to restore the marshlands of Iraq.

How Do I Stop Loving You?

Quiet Day

Quiet day today. The weather was gray and kind of gloomy, which I suppose I can blame for my having accomplished next to nothing.

No writing per se, but I have been working a bit on harmonizing “Should I Lie?”

Reconnected with one of my e-mail discussion groups. Tried to reconnect with another, the MusicTalk list, but the message didn’t go through. I hope that when the daily digest comes through tomorrow, the system will allow me to “reply.”

I’ve resumed doing a little gentle exercise. Hoping the key is to have modest goals. Three simple, non-strenuous exercises, starting with only a few repetitions each, surely shouldn’t be too overwhelming, and so not difficult to maintain. We’ll see. We can but hope.

I’m also going to try not to use any bad language. With as irritating and frustrating as it is dealing with my computer, that one may be pretty tough to maintain. But, it can’t hurt to try.

Nothing else really.

I had a Stouffer’s Mac and Cheese for supper, and I feel like I ate a twelve course dinner, really stuffed and sleepy. I don’t understand it. But there doesn’t seem much point in fighting. I’ll have a bit of a lie down and maybe get back to work later in the evening.

Happy New Year!

Wishing everyone all the best for the year just begun.

I got to work almost immediately upon waking with a new song, “Forgotten Promises.” The lyric is finished, the melody not quite, but it's getting there. This one has a Country feel, which is new for me.

Lots to do this year, what with songs and stories to finish. I also want to participate more regularly in my discussion lists and groups, as well as to blog here more reliably. I need to try again to join the NFB Music Division. Strangely, the couple of times I’ve e-mailed to inquire about joining, my message has gone unanswered. But, this time I’ll be more persistent. Maybe an inquiry to the musictalk list would be fruitful.

Anyway, I start 2011, as I start every year, with good intentions. Sold two poems in 2010. This year, may the momentum continue and grow!

ENGELBERT HUMPERDINCK - A NIGHT TO REMEMBER (CHRISTMAS EVE)

Baah Humbug!

Today I got a rejection from Analog.

It was a long shot,I'd sent them "Spirits from the Vasty Deep," and like Sis said, you don't know unless you try. But, still... Poo!

Engelbert Humperdinck - Winter World Of Love

Taking A Break

Songwriting went on the back burner for a little while this week as my sister, a good friend and I took in a Chris Isaaks concert at Northampton’s Calvin Theater Tuesday night. I hadn’t been to a concert in about twenty years, so the mere idea was exciting.

But the fun didn’t only come from anticipation. The show itself was excellent. And it wasn’t just the audience who had a good time. Chris and the band were rockin’, and didn’t seem to want to stop. It was a great show and a most enjoyable evening out. Thanks, Sis!

Ridden by the Muse

For about two weeks in the middle of November, I hardly had time to catch my breath. I wrote five songs, completed one poem and made a very good start on two other poems. Indeed, during that time, I rote two songs of totally opposite mood, one bleak and one sweet, in a single twelve-hour period. Donno what was going on, but I got pretty tired. Still, the burst of creativity was exhilarating.

The burst is past now, but I still have harmonizing and arranging to do on the songs from that batch as well as more work to do on “Something Precious Remains” and “Music To My Heart.” It’s going slowly, this part of songwriting doesn’t come easily to me; but, it’s coming.

Also, I submitted “World Enough And Time” to my writers group and to another writer friend and SF enthusiast, even though it’s not quite finished. They gave me helpful comments and a lot of encouragement. It seems I’ve painted myself into a couple of tight corners. So far solutions haven’t occurred to me, but I’m not worried, yet. The best thing is to let the problem or problems stew and brew for a while. Eventually something will come, or not. If not, I’ll put the story away and forget about it.

Also trying to write the second New Year’s story for A Very Dragon Christmas, so far with little success. Again, though, I’m not terribly fussed. It will settle into place in my mind.

My main problem continues to be sleep, or rather lack thereof. One thing about insomnia, you do get a lot of reading done. I’ve lost count of the number of books I’ve read in the past month, certainly at least a dozen. Can’t concentrate on anything deep, so I’ve been reading a lot of Agatha Christie and some Edgar Rice Burroughs. They are both interesting without being too demanding.

Well, that’s about all I’ve been up to. It doesn’t seem like much when I come to write it down, but it’s been quite enough. Here’s hoping that December will also be productive.

The Sweet Smell of Success

Today I got word that Breath and Shadow has accepted "The Troubadour's Song" and "The Lady's Song," a pair of sestinas. They will probably appear in the Spring 2011 issue.

It's a long time since I sold a poem, let alone two poems at once, so I'm very pleased. The frosting on the cake is that it's an actual "sale," for money. Breath and Shadow pays $5.00-$15.00 per poem so, I'll earn something between $10.00 and $30.00. That's not a fortune, but it's respectable. As I say, though, the dollar amount is less important to me than the fact of the sale. After a string of rejections this year, the acceptance from Chris Kewl is cause for celebration.

Box Blues

amazon.com can be so annoying!

Last night I, uh... Well, I went there looking for two specific CD's, one of which, Step Into My Life, they didn't have at all, the other of which, Released, (Engelbert's latest, just out the Sixteenth of this month), they had but it seemed outrageously expensive. It was just as expensive at amazon.co.uk so, after a struggle, I decided not to get it.

But,in the course of looking, I saw a couple of other CD's and, uh, three DVD's.... Not only that, but I forgot to select Super Saver shipping and I also forgot to combine orders into as few shipments as possible.

So, I was resigned to Sis having a fit, or at least having a good laugh at me when one box came containing two Engelbert CD's and another box came, possibly the same day, containing three Engelbert DVD's. What can you do, you know? But just now I got an e-mail saying that they've shipped one CD separately. I hate that. They claim they're doing it to be helpful, to give faster service. But, whatever the items, I much prefer them to come all together in as few boxes as possible, not in a blizzard of boxes. And especially when the items are things that Sis can't quite help laughing at me about. I do feel slightly sheepish but, really. Nobody laughs all that much when, every year or so, I buy the new Glass Hammer CD, and I've always had a crush on Fred. I don't understand it, but there it is. *sigh* Sis is gonna be sniggering all next week as she opens my boxes for me.

On the other hand, it could be worse. Mum might still open my mail for me!

Music, Music, Music!

Well, I've finally finished the first draft, so to speak, of "Music to My Heart." The lyric is pretty much finished and the melody is pretty much finished. Because of some wrestling with Cakewalk, I didn't get to bed till 3:30, but I don’t regret it. Actually slept pretty well for once.

Stage 2 in the writing of a song, for me, is to sort out the note durations. I write out the melody in all quarter notes first, then in the second stage worry about what should be an eighth note, what a half note, and so forth. The third stage is adding the harmony. While stages 2 and 3 require a lot of concentration, they're not difficult per se. So, the hard part is over in this project. Yay! I was beginning to think it would never come together.

In other music-related news, I've been buying records again: The Carpenters and Engelbert, with a little spice of Dusty Springfield and Gilbert O’Sullivan. You can get a lot of vynel for the cost of one CD. And while CD's are wonderful in their way, you just can't beat real records.

On the other hand, over the weekend I installed iTunes and managed to download Engelbert’s new single, “Tell Me Where It Hurts.” Even figured out how to play it - the iTunes interface is not very disabled friendly. So, it's not as if I'm failing to keep up with the times. It's just that I like real records.

Caught an Error?

Just watched 56: Between a Yuk and a Hard Place 12/13/1988 5 - 2

The music listings on the Moonlighting Episode guide (http://dogwood.phpwebhosting.com/~tvshrine/moonlightingEG5.htm) say that the version of “Up, Up and Away” used on the episode is by The Fifth Dimension. Well, I know what the Fifth Dimension sound like, and it wasn’t them. I’m sure it was Engelbert. Now, why would they make a mistake like that? Sure, the Fifth Dimension had the major hit, but lots of other people recorded it, including Andy Williams.

It is possible that I’m wrong, I do sometimes misidentify singers. But Engelbert has a pretty distinctive voice and style. I’m going to try to track down a record of “Up, Up and Away” by him, just for my own satisfaction.

Update
Found it!

Reality Check

Well, "Music to My Heart" isn’t finished. Not even close. I got the lyric smoothed into iambic pentameter. Only, one line is tetrameter. And it feels complete – the thought is complete - only it’s missing a foot. And, it doesn’t rhyme. None of it rhymes. That’s fine for a poem, but a song needs a good, solid rhyme scheme.

The idea is sound – I’m still sure and enthusiastic about it – and I’ve said everything I want to say... Just need now to say it better, or at least more conventionally. Just! Yeah. *sigh* I know it’s good, and I know it will work if I can only kick my brain out of the rut it’s stuck in and find the right words. Break out of the box in order to be more conventional. An oxymoron, right? But that’s exactly what I need to do. And trying to do it makes me so tired! Guess I’m really out of practice.

And, of course, I really can’t do much with the melody till the lyric’s set or at least semi stable.

The thing is, Bert Bacherach and Nigel Lewis’ "Nothing in this World" keeps running through my mind, which would be fine – it’s a gorgeous song – except I really need to be able to hear the song I’m currently working on, need to be able to concentrate on it to the exclusion of all other songs. That’ clearly not going to happen for a while.

So, though I hoped to zip right through, this project clearly is going to take some time. I need to move it to the back burner and let it stew and brew a while, much as doing so irks me. On the other hand, it’s not like I have a shortage of stuff to work on. But I’m enthusiastic about this project. I want to work on this project. *sigh* Realistically, though, continuing to flog it will do more harm than good and I know it. So, it’s move on to other things for now.

Writing, and it feels so wonderful!

I started a brand new song, donno exactly, maybe an hour ago. The lyric is shaping up nicely, and the melody for the refrain is set, and set down. Even got the last part of the coda roughed out. Only thing left is, hm,mm, what do you call that? The main melody? The bit in between, that isn’t refrain. You know what I mean. Too tired and too high to care a whole lot if I’m making sense.

I’ve worked it out, and this is the first song I’ve written in some six years. I’ve noodled around, kicked around melody ideas, but this is the first real song. For me, the lyric usually comes first, and the melody follows quickly, or at least parts of it. So it was this time. I had the rough lyric in about five minutes. As I refined it, the refrain melody slowly took shape in another layer of my mind, so to speak, until it was defined enough to start setting down. Then there was some logistical stuff with Cakewalk, the antiquated but excellent music software I use (recommended to me many years ago by none other than Fred Schendle of Glass Hammer) as t how to copy and paste just the music so I could put the refrain melody in with each occurrence of the words. And, by the time I’d sorted that out, I had the very end. As to the remaining blank spots, I’m not worried. There may be an existing fragment I can shape. If not, the bits I need will come. They usually do. And, I have a really good feeling about this song. The way it flowed felt so right, so wonderful.

I don’ know if it uses different muscles or what, but songwriting is very different from writing prose or, curiously, even poetry. The flow is different; the feel is different. I haven’t experienced the particular kind of creative expression in so long that I’d almost forgotten what it feels like. But, it’s one of those things that comes right back. And it sure feels great!

Smoother sailing

"A New Dream" is coming together. Just a little more adjustment of the final phrase, and then all that will be left is tinkering with the harmonies (Arrangement seems like rather too grand a term). As so often happens with problems, creative problems at least, this one wasn’t nearly as fearsome as it seemed. Still, I’ll be glad to get the song finished and printed.

Haven’t yet decided whether to do anything with "No One to Love." As I’ve indicated, arranging isn’t my strongest point, and the thought of starting all over from scratch is discouraging. However, we’ll see how it goes.

I don’t have any deadline, this project is just something I want to do. So, there’s no pressure, except the little I put on myself. Of course, that’s both he easiest pressure and the worst; the easiest because nobody notices and gripes when you skive off; worst because when you do skive off, you have to live with yourself.

Super Klutz

It is rare for me to be at a loss for words. It is rarer still for me to regret the paucity of my vocabulary of “strong language.” But, the situation calls for swearing fluently, and I find myself ill equipped. So, suffice it to say that I am EXTREMELY ANNOYED!

I’ve been working on "A New Dream." Everything was going swimmingly until I discovered that I’d inadvertently deleted the last two measures. Thank Heaven it wasn’t more! Still, that’s enough. There’s no autosave copy – I don’t know why. – and at first I thought I’d have to scrap everything I’ve done since Tuesday, which drove me frantic. I think now it will probably be possible to recover the material from a copy saved elsewhere on my system. That thought is a great relief. My panic response does have a hair trigger. * rueful grin * Still, none of that changes the bleak fact that I am a super klutz! ARG!

I Write the Songs

Busy, busy.

I thought of another song to polish up, while I’m at it, "No One To Love." It’s pretty good. The accompaniment track is abysmal, though, and had to be totally scrapped. I knew that, of course, but had forgotten just exactly how abysmal. And, discarding the whole thing is a pity, all that work gone to waste. But, reworking it would  have been too confusing. Much better to start fresh. Probably it’s better anyway, since the melody line still needs some tinkering. Overall, the song is promising though.

Meanwhile, "A New Dream" is coming along nicely, if slowly. It seems all the half notes at the ends of phrases have to be changed to dotted quarter notes - *shrug* whatever – and I need to do a little more tidying up. Then, of course, I need to do the whole thing again with the accompaniment track, adjusting, moving. It’s slow going and very tiring, but satisfying work, totally different from writing and editing words. That makes it, though challenging, a nice change.