LJ Idol, Wheel of Chaos 2: “If It's Any Consolation"

[roina_arwen]

Author's Note: This is a Cento (a collage poem), which is a poetic form composed entirely of lines from poems by other poets. I only use one line per author and have given them credit at the bottom, in the order that their line appears here. The only change I make is to add or delete a comma or period at the end of a line where needed, to help my poem flow in the manner that I need it to. Enjoy!


If It's Any Consolation...

I was not aware of the moment when
Forever ends. Never a moment holds
before a casket with a princess motif.
Having found the water behind a thousand mirages,
A stream went voiceless by, still deadened more
In your lifetime. A rush
to come and sit on a torn old abandoned chair
and sailing in the graying zenith of woe,
where the sleepless claim the stars talk.

He pushes on with right good will,
Patting goodbye, doubtless they told the lad
those final hours she couldn't speak,
but no one really expects us to solve anything
and here there is sleeping a buxom young girl
A spirit, though with human eyes,
your daughter's likeness must now remain.
For now, for guilty, for guiltless, no matter, the world offers neither
when she offered me as consolation.


(c) LJB 2025
=-=-=-=-=-=

Stanza one credits: Rabindranath Tagore; Ishion Hutchinson; Kim Addonizio; Khaled Mattawa; John Keats; Katharine Coles; P. K.; Garrett Hongo; Chad Davidson.

Stanza two credits: Robert Louis Stevenson; Wilfred Owen; Michael Ryan; John Surowiecki; Johannes V. Jensen; George Parsons Lathrop; Richard Howard; Jeffrey Schultz; Hélder Faife.

Comments

[used_songs]

This is so cool! I've never seen this poetic form before.

[roina_arwen]

Thank you! I do one or two of this type of poem each season, because it’s lovely to spend a few hours perusing a variety of poems. I go to poets.org for inspiration.

My “trick” to doing these is to search for a key word, and to put each author’s name in parentheses after their line, in case I move the lines around during the process.

[used_songs]

I am definitely going to give this a try. Thanks for sharing your technique. I love cut up writing and other surrealist techniques and this seems akin to those.

[roina_arwen]

Happy to help inspire others! I look forward to reading your cento poetry!

[adoptedwriter]

Interesting creative process!

[roina_arwen]

Thanks!

[muchtooarrogant]

What a fascinating way to write a poem. Did you have an idea of what you wanted to say first, and then searched for lines that fit, or did you use another approach?

Dan

[roina_arwen]

My “trick” to doing these is to search for a key word—for this poem, my word was consolation—which got me about thirty or forty poems that either had that word in the title or in the poem itself. I had a very general idea of what I wanted, and chose lines that sort of struck a chord.

When I find a line that really resonates, a certain phrase or image, sometimes that leads me to choose lines from other poets with a similar theme. In this case, water led to stream which lead to sailing in the first stanza.

So I have a vague idea, and I let it blossom as I work on it.

[serpentinejacaranda]

Like a canoe ride through unsteady waters, this pulled me through landscapes and personalities almost faster than I could process, until the banks on either side gently morphed into words, phrases, rhythms, and I could feel the editorial hand pushing me steadily through. and now I must seek out more Centos!

[roina_arwen]

Wow! Thank you so much for this amazing comment! ❤️

[eeyore_grrl]

Super difficult to Frankenstein others' works together into a coherent piece. Great.

[roina_arwen]

I hadn’t really thought of it in that way before, but “Frankenstein” is a great term for it. Thank you!

[halfshellvenus]

I struggled a little with the changing POV in the second stanza-- I felt like I couldn't quite get ahold of it at the beginning.

A spirit, though with human eyes,
This is an eerie line. Which poem is it from?

[roina_arwen]

Fair enough. It did go from “I” to “he” at the beginning of the second stanza.

A spirit, though with human eyes, is from the poem “Incantation” by George Parsons Lathrop.

[rayaso]

This must have been a huge amount of work! If it is read as a non-collage poem, it is wonderful! Stitching these lines together to form a coherent poem takes a unique talent. I have read the Keats and Stevenson poems, but none of the others. I'll have to go back and read the poems. Great work!

[roina_arwen]

Thank you so much! I have the poet’s names above, in order, so you may need to search by the line to find the specific poems. I found everything on poets.org

[legalpad819]

You have such talent! I'm not sure I could string words together this way and make them cohesive, much less actually poetic.

[roina_arwen]

You’ve made my day! Thank you for such a lovely comment!

[alycewilson]

I don't think many people realize how difficult the Cento form (and other "found" poems) can be, in order to make it work as well as yours does here. Kudos!

[roina_arwen]

Aww, thank you! It’s an afternoon well spent, reading good poems and finding lines that speak to me, then finding other needed lines to fill in (or fill out) where needed.

[marjorica]

Genius!