CRAFTING
LOVE POEMS, NOTES, LETTERS, AND...
Tips, Tricks, and Techniques
By Martin Kimeldorf
Author of How To Be In Love, Forever
A collection of love poems and photoart
http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/kimeldorf
Copyright.2010.Martin Kimeldorf.
Smashwords Edition
All rights reserved. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.
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For permission to excerpt, share poems in a review, or distribute poems in any form
please contact the author at kimeldorf@comcast.net
ISBN
1. Poetry. 2. Writing
INTRODUCTION
Over the last 30+ years I’ve found over 30 ways of saying, “I love you” to my soul-buddy Judy. This includes writing poems, engraving trophies, photography, and a host of other media. My YouTube movie ALTERNATIVE ROMANTIC GESTURES includes samples of these. Here are three examples:
A CD Cover with art work and a poem on the front and back for Valentines Day.
Here is a page from a scrapbook for our Tenth anniversary.
M and M candy with our pictures on it and later glued onto a card.
Ultimately, all these varied expressions begin with an emotion that becomes translated into words. And these words then find themselves transported to my love via poems, notes, cards, candy, banners, check stubs, labels on soda bottles, and the like.
In this short booklet, I have collected a series of essays that focus on finding your way with your own words. Perhaps your words can find homes in love poems, letters and notes. All the essays in this booklet are designed to encourage you to try your hand at expressing your love through words in whatever form you find agreeable.
To start off, it is important to de-mystify the whole notion of writing love poetry. It really is an every man’s and every woman’s game…if you so choose. Therefore the first essay is entitled WRITING LOVE POEMS NEED NOT BE ROCKET SCIENCE.
Once you take the plunge into word-land, I throw you a life preserver. This comes in the form of the second essay THE QUICK POWER WRITE METHOD, For Love Notes, Letters & Poems. This is a very muscular essay that begins with writing prompts about pizza and pets; and later progresses to poems, notes, and letters.
The next lifeline is strung out across the vast Internet. The title speaks for itself: ONLINE RESOURCES FOR WRITING LOVE POEMS, NOTES, CARDS. Googling and key-word searches will help you find just the right expressions. You’ll also learn about sources for rhyming and finding similar words. There are tips finding quotes as well as images.
Perhaps after you develop a few love-works you’ll want to consider a more elaborate, more cerebral approach to crafting a poem. In the essay HOW I WRITE POEMS,
I provide a detailed description on the process I use. You’ll discover my tricks and tricks for brainstorming, tapping into the intuitive side of my brain, how I harness my insomnia and my approach to revising. The essay ends with suggestions for submitting your poetry for online publication.
This is an excellent segue to the final essay POETIC JUSTICE FOR POETS AND OTHER CRAZIES. This comic-story follows the trail that ended in a book contract for my collection poems and artwork entitled How To Be In Love, Forever. It is a story full of irony, rejection, cosmic justice, humor, persistence, and more cosmic justice at the end.
All of the essays contain examples, techniques, and resources you can use right away. After trying some of these ideas, you'll enrich the quality of the word-arrows kept in Cupid's quiver. And, the next time you want to connect with the heart of someone you care about, you'll be ready, willing, and able.
Martin Kimeldorf
Tumwater, WA
WRITING LOVE POEMS NEED NOT BE ROCKET SCIENCE
Eons ago, my grammar school teacher taught me that poetry rhymed. She demanded that we memorize metered or structured forms like iambic pentameter. Often the poems we understood the least were my teacher's favorites.
That was so late-19th century thinking.
She would not have liked the world of poetry at the end of the 20th Century. The ╥genre╙ had become a huge stewpot churning with many, many different ingredients. Poetic epicures contributed sonnet truffles, academics added a pinch of symbolic and esoteric verse, my great grandma had long ago stirred limericks in the pot, hiphoppers slammed down their lyrics, cowboys tossed in their meat-and-potatoes rhymes, atop the stew bubbled frothy love poems.
In the new century, lines of verse surround us. Yes, you can still find poems inside of valentine cards--though now they often are delivered online. Their non-traditional cousins ride the graffiti railroads. Quieter forms lay captioned beneath scrapbook snapshots, while the more public extroverts blog their feelings across the Internet. Sit in beatnik-like cafes and hear heavily intoned lines dramatically declaimed, while erotic notions are passionately murmured between the sheets.
Clearly, poetry has emerged as a popular folk art. You no longer have to master the engineering of iambic pentameter to write and enjoy poems. Certainly we expect our engineers to be technically proficient when they send up a lunar module. But when they venture into the poetics of time and space they hold no advantage over the blue collar workers. In fact, many poets have day jobs as taxicab drivers and waitresses.
And when the discussion narrows down to love poems, the gesture of putting your heart down on paper matters as much as the words you use. The gesture trumps all!
So how do we define the job of poets? Eli Khamarov, author of The Shadow Zone felt that poets are soldiers who liberate words from daily conventions. I would expand this a bit more to suggest that poets free us from the constraints of narrative writing and its oppressive grammatical conventions. And, authors of love poems free us from our useless isolation.
This rant against grammar stems from high school teachers stifling my early writing because the punctuation was imperfect. Even though I excelled at Latin, I never could avoid dangling modifiers and mixed metaphors. But, when I wrote poetry, I finally had permission to freely express my thoughts and feelings. In poetry, the commas and semi-colons be damned. Frost’s and Whitman's poems showed how thoughts did not end with periods. They varied the line lengths, giving poetry the expressive sound of the spoken word. Some would even argue that poetry is more natural than regular narrative writing. After all, poetry and the oral tradition found in mythology and folk art predates the development of written language.
[First Footnote-type-comment: When insomnia robs you from the night, try reading the definition of poetry on the related Wikipedia. Sleep will sure return after trying to wade through these technicalities.]
After leaving school, I was surprised to learn how the Bard did not follow conventions of grammar. Apparently, Shakespeare wrote before the rules of punctuation and spelling were codified. As a result, he spelled the same word in different ways. This would not have pleased my teachers.
In addition to their more liberated form of expression, I find that poets share a common mystical thread when it comes to the meaning of their works. Whether one enjoys the Middle Eastern, fatalistic sensibilities of Omar Khayyam's poetic quatrains or the ranting, socially aware, chaotic lines of Allen Ginsberg, the meaning in their lines is not always apparent in the first read. Carl Sandburg summed up the dichotomous nature of a poems meaning and feeling when he wryly admitted, ╥I've written some poetry I don't understand myself.╙ Therefore, I ambiguously conclude that while I may not understand every word in a literal sense, the poems that stick the most in my being are like great song lyrics, where I feel the meaning as much as I understand it. Certainly poems of Eros depend more on feeling than literal meaning.
[First Footnote-type-comment: At the same time, I don’t feel that poetic license is an excuse for hiding my meaning behind esoteric symbolism. In fact, if I don't feel a poem reaching me in the first few lines I generally don't finish it. ]
Should poems rhyme? Must verse have structure? Is poetry best experienced when read out loud or in a quiet wine-filled moment reading to myself? Should it have a degree of transparency or should I make the reader work a bit to own the poem? Everyone will answer these types of questions in their own way.
You will probably answer the question “What Is Poetry?” by the poems you select to read or the lyrics you repeat and out of this working-answer you can borrow lines, mimic styles on your way to finding your own lyrical voice. Launch the shoulders of your poetic heroes, and take flight into your own universe of verse, your own love poems, your own sense of living the poetic life.
All my poems start from the inspiration found in a single phrase, emotional sentence or a title possibility. Next, a beat or blues rhythm often wells up inside me and out pours the words, sometimes rhyming, many times not. I feel like I'm at a piano composing a song. Honestly, I never know where the lines come from...it's always like magic. And over time you can find your own method, your own poetry work-flow.
Perhaps as a result of my writing workflow, I identify more with folk poetry and blues singers than I do with most modern poets. This is why it was easy for me to identify with the main character in Jess Walter's book, The Financial Lives of the Poets.
In this humorous, modernist tale, the main character grows weary of his job as a Business Page Reporter. He decides he can jazz up the subject matter with a financial news website featuring stock tips and news written in verse.... Ironically, his notion crashes just before the market does.
Later in the story, he admits that he has never been able to understand the poetry he reads in contemporary journals. I identify with the main character when he confesses that most of the new poems feel as if they were written in another tongue...too often seemingly rooted in abstract language and having little to do with the real world.
Perhaps this is why I have felt so distant from modern poetry. I certainly and never thought much about what poetry is (or isn’t) until I began this short essay. And, as this strange little collection of words wraps up, I feel compelled to re-state my very firm belief that while poetry can range from fine art to folk art, in the end we should not be intimidated by it. Especially when writing to one you love, know that you have permission to be a poet because poetry need not be rocket science.
Don't feel you have nothing to contribute simply because your poems do not sound like the kind being read out loud in contests and cafes. And along the way, keep a healthy sense of skepticism and humor. Grin deeply as you read the satirical lines of the eighteenth century poet Alexander, who struggled to define what poetry meant to him...
Sir, I admit your general rule,
That every poet is a fool,
But you yourself may serve to show it
That every fool is not a poet
I urge you to be foolish, to be poetic whenever the mood strikes you!
Being published is not the criteria for being a poet. You define your poetry by the words you toss down on the page. Writing your own poems is all that counts, in whatever style, format or media you prefer. If you like it as a poem, then it is a poem...and you are a poet.
When it comes to love poems, love notes and romantic cards; the only publishing that counts is that single print run for the one you love.
Acknowledgments & Notes
I want to thank Sherry Weymouth for editorial inputs on the first few drafts and Bonnie Liberty for helping me to polish the final draft.
THE QUICK POWER WRITE METHOD
For Love Notes, Letters & Poems
Give a love poem to your very best friend and that gift will be treasured for a life time. But it can be a daunting task if you've never written one before. In this article, I’ll show you how to use the Power Write methods to handily create your first Love Poem. To help you get started, you may want to begin with Love Letters or Love Notes. I will ask you to start by quickly listing the first thing that comes into your mind about pizza and pets. Later we'll progress to people. Thus, your first poem may be to a pepperoni pizza or your cat.
Even if you believe you cannot write well (or at all) you will be shocked to find how easy and enjoyable writing can be when you use this layman's approach. Because the Power Writing techniques connect you with the joy of writing, you will eventually look forward to writing more poems, notes and letters in the future. At the same time, these techniques have also been used by professional authors to get their flow going after they run into a writing block.
Power Writing is a muscular approach that brooks no dawdling or distractions because you will be writing against a timer. Once you master this method, you'll rarely let doubt or confusion stop you from writing a poem, note or love letter. The basic steps and exercises are explained next. Go ahead; take them out for a spin...
Step 1--Think Of An Easy, Enjoyable Topic Like Pizza
We’ll start with a concrete, tasty topic like a favorite food; a dish with many different ways to prepare it. For me, I choose pizza but yours could be a hot fudge sundae, potato salad, hamburger, salad or sandwich. The key is to find something with many possible ingredients because you are going to create the worlds greatest Pizza/sandwich/salad etc.
Step 2--Power Write About A Concrete Subject You Enjoy
Begin by writing a title for a list of ingredients like: The World's Greatest Pizza. Second, set a timer for 1 minute.
After you start the timer, write down every ingredient that pops into your mind. There is one cardinal rule governing your scribbling: you must keep your hand moving, writing all the time.
If you get stuck after writing pepperoni and can't think of another thing, just keep repeating the last word you wrote: pepperoni, pepperoni, pepperoni ...until another ingredient pops into your mind. After the buzzer sounds stop, cross out the duplicates and count up your total ingredients. Repeat this for 2 minutes with another food and see if you can beat your previous count.
Try this method for other topics that bring you joy. The topics should be concrete and not abstract nor about people. For instance, don't write about your boss, instead write about your favorite jobs. Don't write about love; write about places you'd love to visit.
When you are comfortable writing lists we'll move on, but first let me tell you why this method is so important to master.
Writer's Block is shared by professional writers and lay people alike. What kills all writing is the editor in your head. As you start to write, a little voice speaks up, asking things like:
* Why do you think you can write?
* How dare you presume to be a writer!
* Your brother-sister could do better than you.
* Do you really know this topic well or are you just parroting other's words?
* Will you be able to do this subject justice?
* Why are you doing this?
The questions, the doubts, the shaken confidence interrupts the flow, preventing you from enjoying the task at hand. You abruptly realize (or so you think) that you have nothing to say. After all, you can't think of one more ingredient for that pizza. This doubt can overcome any writer, even an advanced and well known writer.
A poet in my neck of the woods once received a very prestigious award, and was given the title of ╥poetic genius╙. But the title cast a long shadow and in an interview she confided how her writing suddenly didn't make sense to her and she shut down. To get out of that mess she went back to one of her mentors who had always felt that writer’s block is caused by setting unrealistic expectations. It was another case of the internal critic squelching the writing effort.
However, when you write against time, you have to block out the critic to complete the task. And because it is just a list, you can easily give yourself permission to play. As a result, writing returns to the fountainhead of joy.
In most writing classes the instructor might suggest that these lists are part of a pre-writing stage. It usually comes after researching or thinking deeply about your subject. The list-making process helps to release ideas from the unconsciousness, bypasses the internal critic, and build confidence in your topic. The words on the list provide starter ideas to help generate a title, a line or an entire poem.
If you find that writing against time bugs you then stop. Try writing without the timer. But if you still stall out, then you probably need to go back and keep filling the mind and heart up to the brim. To learn additional techniques for filling up your writing reservoir see the longer piece entitled How I Write Poems near the end of this booklet.
Step 3--Write About A Favorite Animal
Let's now choose to write about a subject that is more deeply felt. Again, we'll avoid abstract thoughts like justice and special people in your life. Instead, let's pick a favorite animal and later a pet.
Begin by conjuring up in your mind an image of a farm animal that intrigues you. For me it was pig. Now create a title for your farm animal list. (You may use my Pig if you like). Approach the first farm list in a very concrete way. Write about all the things you see in the image. Simply describe what it looks like. Pretend you are writing a poster or want ad for a missing pig and you need to describe your special pig to others. In fact, let’s use a beginning title like Missing Pig. Set the timer for 1 to 2 minutes. Then try a second list describing all the things the pig does or has lived through. Think of it as a My Pig's Resume.
Lastly, we'll cut a little closer to stronger feelings. This time fix your gaze upon an image of a favorite pet or animal in your life. Again, begin simply by describing what the picture shows or what the pet looks like. Then find another picture with a humorous or expressive bent like these:
Finally, we'll move our animal lists up a notch by writing more deeply about the story that lies behind the image. Here are some possible list topics:
* If my dog could talk he would say...
* My cat has taught me these things...
* If my horse were gone I'd have these feelings....
* I always enjoyed doing these with my pet....
* This is what I love most about my dog....
After all these lists, you may have discovered the secret power that results from keeping your hand moving and repeating a single word when you get stuck. First, the continual movement quiets the conscious mind. With the self-aware critic silenced, thoughts from the subconscious begin to bubble up. In essence, the momentum of the moving hand silences the internal editor and opens the gates to your inner thoughts and feelings.
Step 4--Pick A List To Convert Into A Note, Letter Or Poem
Now it’s time to pick from all the lists, one you enjoy the most. Which listing stirs up the most feelings? Which one has the most interesting words? Does one list make you laugh? Did you find a word that caused you to catch your breath? It won’t matter which one you pick, just find one that means something to you.
Next, consider if you’d like to convert the list to a poem, a page long letter or a brief note. Think of the note as an in-depth caption for the picture ranging from 2 to 6 lines, while the letter may be more personal. And if you are comfortable writing a poem, start there.
You won’t use every item on your list. And some words may even combine into a single phrase. Review your list and circle your favorite words. Then pick one or two to write about.
Step 5--Give Yourself Permission To Write Crap
Oh, and before you start, add the word crap to your title. For instance, mine might look like this:
Crap Franky Might Say...
I’m the clown dog
searching for a perfect cracker
When you’re away
I’m the down dog
waiting for my faithful master.
Why use the word crap?
It's all about giving yourself permission to write a poem, letter or note. It's all about forgetting high standards and great expectations because these will kill your writing effort. If you think of this as a word-doodle, a sketch, a rough first draft and not a Pulitzer Prize winner, then you can enjoy the experience. Just get the first draft of ideas down quickly, later you can eliminate or change lines.
Oh, and don't forget to set the timer. Try a bit longer, say 4 to 8 minutes. When you write this fast, forget about spelling and grammar. Just slam those words down!! And if you get stuck, just repeat the name of your subject...and keep the hand moving!
Step 6--Change The Title
Now you are home free with a first draft. Remove the word crap from the title and at the end of the title add draft #1.
A Note To Franky The Thinker
Draft # 1
What goes on behind those schnauzer eyes?
Is it just the scent of a squirrel, a treat, old socks?
Are you just in the moment to my surprise?
You come when called, It’s all I ask...
And with that pose I too come
when called by your piercing eyes...
Let your poem-letter-note sit for a day or two before going back to revise or edit out mistakes. And if you want to go deeper into the writing process look at the other essay: How I Write A Poem
Step 7--After The Apprenticeship Write About A Special Friend, Partner, Lover
You’ve completed your apprenticeship. You are now ready to use the Power Writing techniques on a bigger topic. Create a list for someone you care about. Circle your favorite words or phrases. Then, with the timer going, keep the hand moving, and slam down that first draft...
IN CONCLUSION
Always begin simply with lists about concrete items you know well. Then progress to a person or pet for which you have deep feeling. Start by converting your list to a note. In themselves they are as powerful as poems. This is demonstrated below in the sample created by my neighbor for his wife Sherry. She wrote me the following:
This is one of the many love notes Mike has written to me. This one was written before we were married and I commuted every weekend to be with Mike. He always tucked a love note inside a packaged lunch he made for me for my trip back to Canada.
Picture of Sherry Weymouth
Love note from Mike Weymouth
It is just a short step from a note to a poem...No, correct that...I think Mike’s note is a poem in my books.
Acknowledgments
I want to thank Sherry Weymouth for editorial inputs on the first few drafts and Bonnie Liberty for input on the final drafts. The Picture and Love Note contributed by Mike Weymouth, and used with permission.
ONLINE RESOURCES FOR WRITING LOVE POEMS, NOTES, CARDS
The greatest fear for beginning writers is about getting started, while the veteran dreads stopping. In them thar venerable olden days, the newbie just gave up and the experienced author made a stereotypical visit to a bottle of cheap red wine. Today we’re all more sophisticated, as we head for the local Starbucks to sport a mask of angst. But not to worry Bucko, in the new century help is only a mouse pad away.
If you get stuck at the end of a line without a rhyme, try the online rhyming dictionary. Tired of using the same word over and over? Consult the venerable digital thesaurus and don’t limit yourself to just one because many reside online. Want to review your favorite classics for a quick pick-me-up? Emily Bronte and the Bard often visit the Google. If you have a specialized topic like Yiddish words, Italian slang, or science fiction poems you have only to stroke in a few keywords to find these more esoteric samples. And if you need images to go with a card, note or poem, the Internet is an infinite gallery of pixels.
In this article I'll provide links to my favorite writing sites and tools. One of these sites just may save you from trolling neighborhood coffee shops in search of sympathy. But know this: I'm always willing to drink with you should you become a victim of your angst.
This piece divides the online resources in the four groups or toolboxes: Inspiration, Finding The Right Word, Finding Images, Seeking Publication, and a postscript about copyright. The links provided herein are live and were current at the outset of 2010.
Please be warned that the forest of the net is alive with crooks, big promises and mythmaking goblins. Not all sites are what they advertise. For example, when I first looked up the keywords love poems I found that many sites required registration and were using the love poem resources as a front end to a dating site. In fact, it is rare to find a site devoted solely to love poems. Do go ahead and browse because you never know when you'll find something that works for you. Just be skeptical at all times. Check a site thoroughly before plunging in, giving up your email address and even money.
TOOL BOX #1--FINDING INSIPIRATION IN OTHER’S WORDS
Sometimes all we need is a nudge to get started. I've found the most valuable sources for inspiration come from the writings of other authors and poets. The following lists poetry sites where you can find everything from poems sorted by category, letters, cards, quotes, lyrics and the like. And don't forget that borrowing a poem or lines from a quote, or just the title of a song is the sincerest form of flattery for that artist. Just make sure you are using it only for personal use for someone you love or to practice your skills. And please respect the author and copyright law. Please do not distribute your borrowed materials without first getting permission.
123 LovePoems.com
At 123 you can view Love poems, lyrics, quotes, letters, lines or cards categorized by friendship, inspiration, wedding, birthday, humor, sadness and bereavement.
http://www.123lovepoems.com/index.php
Poets.org
This august web site is presented by the Academy of American Poets. They include both classic and contemporary poetry. Follow the linked paths from Poems-->Love & Romance and choose from Weddings, Love, Lust, Breakups, Heartache etc.
http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5860
PoemsLovers.com
This site features a large collection of contemporary and user-submitted poetry. Other interesting categories include Long Distance, I am sorry, Second Chances, and so forth. It also includes a rich treasure of friendship poems and love stories. Maybe one can be ╥yours╙.
http://www.poemslovers.com/love_letters.html
Links 2 Love.com
I like this site for its quirky Poem Generator. You complete a few check off boxes or answer a few short questions to describe your subject and it generates a poem. You'll certainly find a line or two you can use here and it will be an original. The remainder of the site seems devoted to dating and romance (how to kiss, how to flirt, etc etc). http://www.links2love.com/poem_generator.htm
LovingYou.com
This is one of the more comprehensive web sites featuring many variants on the topics of romance and love poetry (lost love, marriage, sensual love, rekindled love, long distance love, missing you, soul mates, for my wife/husband, kisses, new love etc).
http://profiles.lovingyou.com/library/poems.php
Sites With Quotations
It is quite popular to pair a quote with a photo or image, thus amplifying the message of both picture and words. There are many, many sites for quotes and lyrics; these six are ones I have used. Quoteland even includes a special category for Love Quotations. Generally, you'll have to enter a key word for the subject of love.
Quotes
http://www.quotationspage.com/
http://www.wisdomquotes.com/
http://www.quoteland.com/
Lyrics
http://www.metrolyrics.com/search.php
http://lyrics.astraweb.com/
http://www.leoslyrics.com/
Samples from Julie Wagner
I met Julie Wagner online at the Flickr photo blog. She often combines vivid images with equally exquisite captions and titles on her flickr site at:
Memories by Jules , Flickr Photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/juliewagner/
Sometimes Julie uses quotes of others, but many other times she uses another person’s quote as a starting point in developing her own language. For this article, I asked Wagner how she went about using the Internet in the development of hooking up her images with quotes. She has contributed the following sample images and descriptions of her research and writing process.
Everything I Loved
Everything I loved as a child seems small and insignificant now, except for
my parents.
Signed With Love
Do you remember the first time you signed a letter "love" with heavy heart
and hesitant hand"
I believe each photo should have a title, just like works of art. A caption also invites the viewer to stay a while and have a longer look! I have also found that when I include a title, caption and image together on my Flickr site I get more comments and reactions.
Sometimes a title doesn’t come to mind or I can’t think of nice words to write, and I search the Internet for quotes. A few of the sites I have used where I search by key words are listed next.
http://www.brainyquote.com/
http://www.quotegarden.com/
If I find a quote I like, I use it as it is or use it as a jumping off point to create my own title and caption.
With both of the photo examples however, I searched by the keyword "love" and used the quotes I found for ideas that enabled me to write my own words. In this instance, I adapted my titles from my written words.
TOOL BOX #2--FINDING JUST THE RIGHT WORD
Ah, you fired up the engine, but come to a crossing in the track. Staring down at the page you ask, "Haven't I used the word feelings too often in this poem?" On top of that you need the end of the line to rhyme. Later you want to spice up the ending with an amorous sounding French word. Everything you need to find just the right word is listed next.
Thesaurus
Once you start, you may stumble later when you find you are repeating a word too often. To find compelling alternatives, try your word processor’s thesaurus or various online versions for help with synonyms. My personal favorite links are listed next.
http://thesaurus.reference.com/
http://www.bartleby.com/62/73/E0527300.html
http://thesaurus.reference.com/
Rhyming Dictionaries
Other times, you may need more specialized resources. For instance, when I'm in a rhyming mood and I run out of words, I will tap an online Rhyming Dictionary like the two that follow.
http://www.rhymezone.com/
http://www.rhymer.com/
Specialized Word Sources
Another approach to writing outside the lines begins when you incorporate slang, ethnic words or foreign languages. I have used online Yiddish dictionaries at times when I was in a humorous mood. One Valentine's Day I wanted to write a poem about my wife's newfound interest in skiing. I began by entering "Ski Slang" in Google and started a list of slang words that interested me. Later I incorporated many in the following poem.
Ski Slang...Valentine
I may be too wide
To take me ship ahoy
Upon the snowy slopes as a Dietdewboy
I may fear the ice
And know not what is funny
But at least I hooked up with a gorgeous Ski bunny
With my scotch on bunny slope
Old injuries sing clear, and so loud
I go to hang with the Snow Buddha Crowd
Like a sly old SkiFox
I know the old ways are way cooler
Than anything ever imagined by Newschoolers
Hang-up with the lifts
Practice my hemorrhoidal buffer
As I line up me arse with the notorious Butt Stuffer
Big sky a’comin’
Big Air as blue as the eye can see
Can’t imagine you getting older than me...
No Texas Roadblock
Shadows your day-to-day
You know how to live, you know how to play....
Like this valentine for you
I ain’t no slang chump...I’m for real
You’re no Fakie...You’re for me
[Cause you really ski]
me...oh... you’re mine...
Be my snow bunny valentine
Translators
Use an online translator to find spicy sounds embedded in other languages. My two favorite translators are included next.
http://www.translate.google.com/
http://babelfish.altavista.com/tr
TOOL BOX #3--FINDING IMAGES FOR YOUR WORDS
Anyone who has read by book How To Be In Love, Forever or my other articles knows that I often seek to release the synergistic powers that flow from pairing images with words. You may be a photographer with a ready supply of images. Or it may be that the images you have don't work with your words. The remedy is to search with a key word under Google Images.
Google Images
Google is very simple. But, be aware that many of these images are copyrighted. If you want free images then try the Library of Congress. Their images are in the “Public Domain” because they were either created by the Government or their copyright has expired. Works in the Public Domain are free of copyright restrictions.
It will take awhile to familiarize yourself with what they have, but you come up with some really classy images. Imagine that you find an old wood cut illustration showing a factory worker. What words might come to mind? My answer is shown next, and it took about 15 minutes from search to card creation.
Image Sites
Images of American Political History
Mostly maps
Library of Congress American Memory site
Great for old images…choose gallery view
Good source, lots of choices, use search box for free images
The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth
Taken from space, use advanced search
This is an excellent source listing many government agencies with their own picture database. Just be sure you use the Search Images box otherwise you end up with documents mixed in with words.