Word-Wednesday for September 9, 2020

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, September 9, 2020, the 37th Wednesday of the year, the twelfth Wednesday of summer, and the 253rd day of the year, with 113 days remaining.


Wannaska Nature Update for September 9, 2020
On the move.

Old crane
by Kathleen Jamie

I went further along the road towards Ardbeg
and stopped by another crane  
paused and forgotten, arm extended
where it has lifted water from the river’s mouth,
water the slipstream from shipping lanes
spiked with rust.  

I sat with it and it unsettled me  
with its creepy sudden creaks in the northerly –
and yet that stiff reach over water, over time
suggested private beauties I couldn’t know –
the nights when that dark arm holds out a bowl of snow
or releases, once or twice a year,  
the full moon.

Then I wondered if, out of wildness,
the teenagers might go. And see. And know.


Nordhem Lunch: Closed


Earth/Moon Almanac for September 9, 2020
Sunrise: 6:53am; Sunset: 7:50pm; 3 minutes, 31 seconds less daylight today
Moonrise: 11:14pm; Moonset: 2:27pm, waning gibbous


Temperature Almanac for September 9, 2020
                Average             Record              Today
High             69                     92                     59
Low              47                      27                     41


September 9 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Teddy Bear Day
• Care Bears Share Your Care Day
• National Wiener Schnitzel Day

September 9 Word Riddle
What country is the largest source of foreign-born residents in Minnesota and Kansas?*


September 9 Pun
Erwin Schrödinger reads Hamlet: To be and not to be.


September 9 Notable Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1543 Mary Stuart, at nine months old, is crowned Queen of Scots in the central Scottish town of Stirling.
• 1836 Ralph Waldo Emerson publishes his influential essay Nature in the US, outlining his beliefs in transcendentalism.
• 1908 Orville Wright makes first one-hour airplane flight.
• 1945 First bug in a computer program discovered by Grace Hopper - a moth was removed with tweezers from a relay and taped into the log.
• 1956 Elvis Presley appears on the Ed Sullivan Show for the first time.
• Joe and Teresa's wedding anniversary.
  

September 9 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1754 William Bligh, British naval commander.
• 1828 Leo Tolstoy.
• 1941 Otis Redding.

September 9 Word Fact
hydroxyzine is the only word in the English language that contains x, y, and z in that order.

Words-I-Looked-Up-This-Week Writer's Challenge
Make a single sentence (or poem) from the following words:

• anticipital: having two heads; having two edges, such as a sword or blade of grass.
• bricole: a military engine or catapult used to fire stones or other missiles at an enemy's position, consisting of a sling attached to the extremity of a long lever that is strained into a position of tension by ropes and released suddenly.
• clinomania: an excessive desire to lie down and stay in bed.
• davit: a small crane on board a ship, especially one of a pair for suspending or lowering a lifeboat.
• gawpy: one who idly stares in silly, open-mouthed wonder; a gaping, staring simpleton.
• klieg: a powerful electric lamp used in filming.
• nudum pactum: an unenforceable agreement; /spec./ a contract which is void through lack of consideration.
• pseudologue: a compulsive liar.
• selcouth: rare, strange; uncommon or wonderful.
• xanthodont: a person with yellow teeth.

September 9, 2020 Word-Wednesday Feature
Anaphora
əˈnaf(ə)rə, noun, the use of a word referring to or replacing a word used earlier in a sentence, to avoid repetition, such as do in I like it and so do they; the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses. This is an interesting word for writers. On the one hand, all good English teachers encourage elementary, middle, and high school students to avoid repetition. "Nory was a Catholic because her mother was a Catholic, and Nory’s mother was a Catholic because her father was a Catholic, and her father was a Catholic because his mother was a Catholic, or had been." On the other hand, some of the best works in literature feature repetition as an essential artistic element.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
by Robert Frost
Whose woods these are I think I know.   
His house is in the village though;   
He will not see me stopping here   
To watch his woods fill up with snow.   

My little horse must think it queer   
To stop without a farmhouse near   
Between the woods and frozen lake   
The darkest evening of the year.   

He gives his harness bells a shake   
To ask if there is some mistake.   
The only other sound’s the sweep   
Of easy wind and downy flake.   

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   
But I have promises to keep,   
And miles to go before I sleep,   
And miles to go before I sleep.

In addition to anaphora, writers can use parallelism and repetends as artistic techniques to portray and negotiate meanings, contexts, and possibilities for the agile reader's mind. Parallelism is defined as the use of successive verbal constructions in poetry (or prose) which correspond in grammatical structure, sound, meter, or meaning. Repetend is defined as a recurring word or phrase or refrain, such as the final lines in the Robert Frost example above.

Today, Word-Wednesday explores when and why repetition succeeds for writers. To counter mindless repetition in other areas of our lives, repetition in poetry can signal a narrative change while sustaining internal connection. At its best, repetition enables multiple possibilities and nuances in meaning with regard to place and to belonging. Beginning with an example of place, consider how David Whyte uses repetends in the middle of his poem and chiastically in the first and last stanzas to achieve his own unique notion of place, while clearly drawing a parallelism to Frost's poem.

Just Beyond Yourself
by David Whyte

Just beyond
yourself.

It’s where
you need
to be.

Half a step
into
self-forgetting
and the rest
restored
by what
you’ll meet.

There is a road
always beckoning.

When you see
the two sides
of it
closing together
at that far horizon
and deep in
the foundations
of your own
heart
at exactly
the same
time,
that’s how
you know
it’s the road
you
have
to follow.

That’s how
you know
it’s where
you
have
to go.

That’s how
you know
you have
to go.

That’s
how you know.

Just beyond
yourself,
it’s
where you
need to be.

Repetition can also create a wonderfully progressive movement of change such as in Seamus Heaney's brief poem to complement Frost and Whyte.

Stepping Stones
I don’t believe in stepping stones.
With every stone, I’m getting home.
In every home, I place a bed.
On every bed, I lay my head.

For fellow lovers of dialect, consider the following poem by Jackie Kay, with her recurrent use of the title throughout her poem.

Fiere
If ye went tae the tapmost hill, Fiere
Whaur we used tae clamb as girls,
Ye’d see the snow the day, Fiere,
Settling on the hills.
You’d mind o’ anither day, mibbe,
We ran doon the hill in the snow,
Sliding and singing oor way tae the foot,
Lassies laughing thegither – how braw.
The years slipping awa; oot in the weather.

And noo we’re suddenly auld, Fiere,
Oor friendship’s ne’er been weary.
We’ve aye seen the wurld differently.
Whaur would I hae been weyoot my jo,
My fiere, my fiercy, my dearie O?
Oor hair micht be silver noo,
Oor walk a wee bit doddery,
But we’ve had a whirl and a blast, girl,
Thru’ the cauld blast winter, thru spring, summer.

O’er a lifetime, my fiere, my bonnie lassie,
I’d defend you – you, me; blithe and blatter,
Here we gang doon the hill, nae matter,
Past the bracken, bothy, bonny braes, barley.
Oot by the roaring Sea, still havin a blether.
We who loved sincerely; we who loved sae fiercely.
The snow ne’er looked sae barrie,
Nor the winter trees sae pretty.
C’mon, c’mon my dearie – tak my hand, my fiere!

Now, read the poem again, out loud to feel the undulating, wavy rhythms, knowing that fiere is the Old Scots word for friend.

In honor of THE RAVEN, Wannaska's home-based, advertisement-free, magazine/journal printed and published by Palmville Press & Publishing Inc. of NW Minnesota in Roseau County, Word-Wednesday staff invite you to re-read The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe for a multitude of artful repetitions, "never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting" here.

For those interested in more repetition, Word-Wednesday will explore anadiplosis, antistasis, conduplicatio, diacope, epanalepsis, epinome, epiphora, epizeuxis, polyptoton, and symploce some Wednesday soon. 

"Words, words, words." Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2.


From A Year with Rilke, September 9 Entry
When Doubt Serves, from Letters to a Young Poet.

Doubt can serve you well, if you train it. It must become a way of knowing, a good critic. Every time doubt wants to spoil something for you, ask  /why/ it finds something ugly and demand proofs. Thus tested by you, doubt may become bewildered and embarrassed, even aggressive. But don’t give in, demand reasons and be persistent and attentive every single time, and the day will come when, instead of a destroyer, he will become on of your best servants—perhaps one of the most intelligent of those who help you build your life.

Be better than yesterday,
learn a new word today,
try to stay out of trouble - at least until tomorrow,
and write when you have the time.

*Germany.