Voices Heard -- a Flash Poem

 

Voices Heard

 

old mother my dear
voices I'm to hear
 
slappeth thou my face?
to spit now they say
 
what bringeth thine ire?
ashes from the fire
 
I'm not yet a man
hot bark burned my hand
 
none to pull my hair
black with burns, a pair
 
mum to give hard hand,
voices who say, "Come"
_ _ _ _ _

This is a five way poem, 1) read it as written; 2) read either only the first lines or; 3) only the second lines only; 4) read one set of lines followed by the other set of lines, 5) either one first.

 

Photos and Poem copyright 2015,
© jimmiehov, all rights reserved
 
(I'm relinked with Sanaa Rizvi on September 25, 2018, http://withrealtoads.blogspot.com/2018/09/the-tuesday-platform_25.html ), a few of you may have read this before.

Today, June 25, 2015, I'm linked with "Words Count With Mama Zen,"  
where Mom Z is telling us something new about the English language: 
"Today, we're going to get conservative . . . with our words.  A recent study by British researchers identified 23 "ultraconserved words" that have remained relatively unchanged since the Ice Age.    All of those 23 are cognates (words that have the same meaning and sound in different languages) in at least four of the seven Eurasiatic language families.  Translation: that's the 700 languages spoken from the British Isles to western China and from the Arctic to Southern India."  
 
Her instructions were, "So, want to do a little writing in the mother tongue?  Pick a few words from the "ultraconserved words" list and write a poem of 60 words or less."
I wrote my 'poem' including the title using a total of 55 words.   If my count is correct then I used 14 (underlined for you) different words or phrases from the list.  Mother and Hand were used twice.

You can read through the poem as written.  Or you can start with the first and then skip every other line.  It also will read independently starting with the second line and skipping every other line.  I dunno.

The pictures (click on one for a larger size view) I took in 2013 during a visit to the London Science Museum.  NASA has a wonderful exhibit there.  And it's a FREE museum!!

Here's the list: 

thou
I
not
that
we
to give
who
this
what
man / male
ye
old
mother
to hear
hand
fire
to pull
black
to flow
bark
ashes
to spit
worm