descriptive

• definition: language appealing to senses
• elements:   visual, auditory, olfactory, kinesthetic images
• interest:  transportation, clear imagining
• examples:  painting, photographs
  • related words and terms: mimesis, metaphor, metonymy, concreteness, specificity, unexpectedness, particularity, vivid/rich/colorful/graphic detail, theatrical detail, realistic detail, visual imagery, auditory imagery, olfactory imagery, tactile imagery, kinesthetic imagery, gustatory imagery, “telling detail,” setting, landscape, city scape, built environment, mood, atmosphere, tone, picturesque

Charles Simic – “Fork”

This strange thing must have crept
Right out of hell.
It resembles a bird’s foot
Worn around the cannibal’s neck.

As you hold it in your hand,
As you stab with it into a piece of meat,
It is possible to imagine the rest of the bird:
Its head which like your fist
Is large, bald, beakless, and blind.

William Blake – “London”

I wander thro’ each charter’d street,
Near where the chartered Thames does flow.
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every man,
In every Infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice: in every ban,
The mind-forged manacles I hear.

How the Chimney-sweeper’s cry
Every blackning church appalls;
And the hapless Soldiers sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.

But most thro’ midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot’s curse
Blasts the new-born Infant’s tear,
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five – “The Message”

It’s like a jungle sometimes
It makes me wonder how I keep from going under

Broken glass everywhere
People pissing on the stairs, you know they just don’t care
I can’t take the smell, can’t take the noise
Got no money to move out, I guess I got no choice
Rats in the front room, roaches in the back
Junkies in the alley with a baseball bat
I tried to get away but I couldn’t get far
Cause a man with a tow truck repossessed my car

Don’t push me ‘cause I’m close to the edge
I’m trying not to lose my head
It’s like a jungle sometimes
It makes me wonder how I keep from going under

Standing on the front stoop hanging out the window
Watching all the cars go by, roaring as the breezes blow
Crazy lady, living in a bag
Eating out of garbage pails, used to be a fag hag
Said she’ll dance the tango, skip the light fandango
A Zircon princess seemed to lost her senses
Down at the peep show watching all the creeps
So she can tell her stories to the girls back home
She went to the city and got social security
She had to get a pimp, she couldn’t make it on her own

My brother’s doing bad, stole my mother’s TV
Says she watches too much, it’s just not healthy
All My Children in the daytime, Dallas at night
Can’t even see the game or the Sugar Ray fight
The bill collectors, they ring my phone
And scare my wife when I’m not home
Got a bum education, double-digit inflation
Can’t take the train to the job, there’s a strike at the station
Neon King Kong standing on my back
Can’t stop to turn around, broke my sacroiliac
A mid-range migraine, cancered membrane
Sometimes I think I’m going insane
I swear I might hijack a plane!

My son said, Daddy, I don’t wanna go to school
‘Cause the teacher’s a jerk, he must think I’m a fool
And all the kids smoke reefer, I think it’d be cheaper
If I just got a job, learned to be a street sweeper
Or dance to the beat, shuffle my feet
Wear a shirt and tie and run with the creeps
‘Cause it’s all about money, ain’t a damn thing funny
You got to have a con in this land of milk and honey
They pushed that girl in front of the train
Took her to the doctor, sewed her arm on again
Stabbed that man right in his heart
Gave him a transplant for a brand new start
I can’t walk through the park ‘cause it’s crazy after dark
Keep my hand on my gun ‘cause they got me on the run
I feel like a outlaw, broke my last glass jaw
Hear them say “You want some more?”
Living on a see-saw

A child is born with no state of mind
Blind to the ways of mankind
God is smiling on you but he’s frowning too
Because only God knows what you’ll go through
You’ll grow in the ghetto living second-rate
And your eyes will sing a song called deep hate
The places you play and where you stay
Looks like one great big alleyway
You’ll admire all the number-book takers
Thugs, pimps and pushers and the big money-makers
Driving big cars, spending twenties and tens
And you’ll wanna grow up to be just like them, huh
Smugglers, scramblers, burglars, gamblers
Pickpocket peddlers, even panhandlers
You say “I’m cool, huh, I’m no fool”
But then you wind up dropping outta high school
Now you’re unemployed, all null and void
Walking round like you’re Pretty Boy Floyd
Turned stick-up kid, but look what you done did
Got sent up for a eight-year bid
Now your manhood is took and you’re a Maytag
Spend the next two years as a undercover fag
Being used and abused to serve like hell
Til one day, you was found hung dead in the cell
It was plain to see that your life was lost
You was cold and your body swung back and forth
But now your eyes sing the sad, sad song
Of how you lived so fast and died so young so

imitative

• definition : copying something else
• elements:  depends on what is being imitated
• interest:  satire, pleasure of recognition
• examples:  mimes, translation, sampling, jazz improvisation
  • related words and terms: mimesis, mimicry, echoing, mirroring, parallel, parroting, impression, impersonation, parody, pastiche, mockery, apery, travesty, ersatz, counterfeit, sham, simulacrum, semblance, resemblance, replica, reproduction, appropriating, expropriating, sampling, lifelike, hyperbole, litotes, hyperbolic, exaggeration, understatement.

Blackalicious – “Alphabet Aerobics” (1999)

(Now it’s time for our wrap up
Let’s give it everything we’ve got
Ready? Begin)

Artificial amateurs, aren’t at all amazing
Analytically, I assault, animate things
Broken barriers bounded by the bomb beat
Buildings are broken, basically I’m bombarding
Casually create catastrophes, casualties
Canceling cats, got they canopies collapsing
Detonate a dime of dank daily doin’ dough
Demonstrations, Don Dada on the down low
Eating other editors with each and every energetic epileptic episodeelevated etiquette
Furious, fat, fabulous, fantastic
Flurries of funk felt, feeding the fanatics
Gift got great, global goods gone glorious
Gettin’ godly in this game with the goriest
Hit em high, hella height, historical
Hey holocaust hints, hear ‘em holler at your homeboy
Imitators idolize, I intimidate
In an instant, I’ll rise in an irate state
Juiced on my jams like Jheri curls jocking joints
Justly, it’s just me, writing my journals
Kindly I’m kindling all kinds of ink on
Karate kick type Brits in my kingdom
Let me live a long life, lyrically lessons is
Learned lame louses just lose to my livery
My mind makes marvelous moves, masses
Marvel and move, many mock what I’ve mastered
Niggas nap knowing I’m nice, naturally
Knack, never lack, make noise nationally
Operation, opposition, off, not optional
Out of sight, out of mind, wide beaming opticals
Perfected poem, powerful punchlines
Pummeling petty powder puffs in my prime
Quite quaint quotes keep quiet it’s Quannum
Quarrelers ain’t got a quarter of what we got, uh
Really raw raps, risin up rapidly
Riding the rushing radioactivity
Super scientifical sound search sought
Silencing super fire saps that are soft
Tales ten times talented, too tough
Take that, challengers, get a tune up
Universal, unique, untouched
Unadulterated, the raw uncut
Verb vice lord victorious valid
Violate vibes that are vain make em vanish
Why in my world would a wise wordsmith just
Weaving up words, weeded up on my workshift
Xerox my X-radiation holes extra large
X-height letters and xylophone tones
Yellow-back, yak mouth, young ones’ yaws
Yesterday’s lawn yardsale, I yawn
Zig-Zag zombies, zooming to the zenith
Zero in, zen thoughts, overzealous rhyme ZEA-LOTS!….

(Good… can you say it faster?)

Two poems by Fatimah Ashgar:

Mona Van Duyn – “What The Motorcycle Said” (1973)

Br-r-ram-m-m, rackety-am-m, OM, Am:
All-r-r-room, r-r-ram, ala-bas-ter-
Am, the world’s my oyster.

I hate plastic, wear it black and slick,
hate hardhats, wear one on my head,
that’s what the motorcycle said.

Passed phonies in Fords, knocked down billboards, landed
on the other side of The Gap, and Whee,
bypassed history.

When I was born (The Past), baby knew best.
They shook when I bawled, took Freud’s path,
threw away their wrath.

R-r-rackety-am-m. Am. War, rhyme,
soap, meat, marriage, the Phantom Jet
are shit, and like that.

Hate pompousness, punishment, patience, am into Love,
hate middle-class moneymakers, live on Dad,
that’s what the motorcycle said.

Br-r-r-am-m-m. It’s Nowsville, man. Passed Oldies, Uglies,
Straighties, Honkies. I’ll never be
mean, tired, or unsexy.

Passed cigarette suckers, souses, mother-fuckers,
losers, went back to Nature and found
how to get VD, stoned.

Passed a cow, too fast to hear her moo, “I rolled
our leaves of grass into one ball.
I am the grassy All.”

Br-r-r-am-m-m, rackety-am-m, OM, Am:
All-gr-r-rin, oooohgah, gl-l-utton-
Am, the world’s my smilebutton.

Linh Dinh – “Quiz” (2005)

Invaders invariably call themselves:
a) berserkers
b) marauders
c) frankincense
d) liberators

Our enemies hate us because:
a) we’re sadists
b) we’re hypocrites
c) we shafted them
d) we value freedom

Our friends hate us because:
a) we’re bullies
b) we hate them
c) we’re hypocrites
d) we value freedom

Pushed to the ground and kicked by a gang of soldiers, about to be shot, you can save your life by brandishing:
a) an uzi
b) a crucifix
c) the Constitution
d) a poem

A poem can:
a) start a war
b) stanch a wound
c) titillate the masses
d) shame a nation

Poets are:
a) clowns
b) parasites
c) legislators
d) terrorists

A nation’s standing in the world is determined by:
a) its buying power
b) its military might
c) its cultural heritage
d) God

A country is rich because of:
a) its enlightened population
b) its political system
c) its small stick
d) its geography

A country is poor because of:
a) its ignorant population
b) its political system
c) its small stick
d) its geography

A man’s dignity is determined by:
a) his appearance (skin color, height, etc)
b) his willingness to use violence
c) his command of English
d) his blue passport

Those willing to die for their beliefs are:
a) idealists
b) terrorists
c) suckers
d) insane

Those willing to die for nothing are:
a) principled
b) patriotic
c) insane
d) cowards

Terrorists:
a) abuse language
b) hit and run
c) shock and awe
d) rely on ingenuity

Smart weapons:
a) render hopeless and dormant kinetic objects
b) kill softly
c) save lives
d) slaughter by science

Pain is:
a) payback for evil-doers
b) a common misfortune
c) compelling drama
d) suck it up!

Humiliation is:
a) the ultimate thrill for bored perverts
b) inevitable in an unequal relationship
c) a fear factor
d) sexy and cathartic

The media’s job is:
a) to seduce
b) to spread
c) to sell
d) to drug

The Internet:
a) allows us to be pure minds
b) connects us to distant bodies
c) disconnects us from the nearest minds and bodies
d) improves illiteracy

Pornography is:
a) a lie that exposes the truth
b) a needed breather from civilization
c) class warfare
d) nostalgia for the garden of Eden

Correct answers: c,d,d,b,b,a,b,a,a,c,b,b,b,c,b,d,b,d,c.
—If you scored 14-19, you’re a well adjusted person, a home-owner, with and income of at least $50,000 a year.
—If you scored 8-13, you either rent or live with your parents, never exercise, and consume at least a 6-pack a day.
—if you scored 7 or less, you’re in trouble with the FBI and/or the IRS, cut your own hair, and use public transit as your primary mode of transportation.