Oulipost #8: Beautiful Inlaw (Beau Present)

A mere human

Aha!
Hear a name:
a lean mean humane healer
Here, area men earn manual manure.
Menu: ham, real ale.

Learn, man!
Rule realm.

Harm.

Heal.
 
 
 

Sources:
Byrne, Dennis. “Are women being denied equal pay? Or not?” Chicago Tribune. 8 April 2014: 15.

Channick, Robert. “New chief at WBEZ has plans for growth”. Chicago Tribune. 8 April 2014: 4.

Egan, Timothy. “Embracing the messiness of creativity”. Chicago Tribune, digitalPLUS magazine. 8 April 2014: 6.

Greenstein, Teddy. “On the 1st day…rain’s supreme: Forecast looks better for tournament days”. Chicago Tribune. 8 April 2014: Sports, 10.

Harford, Tim. “Nudge or Fudge? Behavioral economics has become one of the hottest ideas in public policy — but a backlash has begun”. Chicago Tribune, digitalPLUS magazine. 8 April 2014: 11.

Legal Notices. Chicago Tribune. 8 April 2014: Business, 9.

Seligson, Hannah. “Grief goes public: Digital natives in their 20s and 30s are using blogs, YouTube, and social media for communal mourning”. Chicago Tribune digitalPlus magazine. 8 April 2014: 3.

Smith, Mitch. “Taking a stand on concessions: Now a stadium staple, Wrigley was first in pro baseball line with permanent fan stops for food and drink”. Chicago Tribune. 8 April 2014: 7.

Wilson, Carl. “Was Dylan’s ’80s work second-rate? New tribute album argues the singer-songwriter’s material stands test of time”. Chicago Tribune. 8 April 2014: Arts + Entertainment, 3.

The prompt:
Select a name from one of your newspaper articles, famous or not. Compose a poem using only words that can be made from the letters in that person’s name. For example, if you selected “John Travolta,” you may only use words that can be made from the letters A, J, H, L, N, O, R, T and V.

The use of web-based tools is highly encouraged to help uncover different words that can be made from your letters of choice. One tool you might consider is the Scrabble Word Finder.
http://www.foundpoetryreview.com/blog/oulipost-8-beautiful-inlaw-beau-present/

I chose the name of Chicago’s mayor, Rahm Emanuel, from today’s Chicago Tribune, then used the Scrabble Word Finder to generate a list of words from the letters in his name.  Then I searched through today’s issue of the Trib to find words that were on the SWF list to use in this poem.  If the mayor ever reads this poem, I hope he likes it, or at least as a man of culture and an aficionado of the arts (he was a professional ballet dancer), he will appreciate its artistic merits, and will not send me a dead fish.

2 thoughts on “Oulipost #8: Beautiful Inlaw (Beau Present)”

  1. :)well, i for one appreciate the artist merits of this poem. those last four lines are great. nice work!!

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