Person is Not a Rude Word

Whilst this blog’s ‘retro diary enquiry’ posts may reveal my Andro self, albeit lived subconsciously pre-age-of-40, then my proems writing period (1994-2004) can reveal my also-unrecognised Aspie self…

This summer I was formally diagnosed as being on the Autistic Spectrum with Asperger Syndrome: a fact that is both a blessed relief and a source of further angst-riddled self-consciousness…  It is fortunately now-recognised that Aspies can be more right-brained creatives and not-necessarily the stereotyped maths and science ‘specialists’…

On re-reading my proems (up to 19 years on), I realise the Aspergic word play: the cacophony and dissonance of constant alliterative and assonance banter dancing about my non-neurotypical brain, was channelled into for-performance writing. Currently, however, I appear to be more caught up in a chaotic choreography of over-punctuation and dis-spelling…

I proffer here one of my favourite – and possibly most Aspie – proems: ‘Verisimilitude’.  I can never remember what *’verisimilitude’ actually means; it sounds like ‘very silly mood’ which is appropriate to the content…

[* a definition of this title can be found in Part 2 of the Glossary post under said same blog Category]

This ‘foodie‘ proem was composed in a-total-of-23 minutes from a list of 70 words that I really liked the sound of and which I had spontaneously put-to-paper in 5 minutes.  (I can now only recall **52 of those words – the most obvious sound-wise – and these are alphabetically listed below the poem for my/anyone’s interest…)

[** perhaps not coincidence that 1-of-the-52 is ‘testosterone’: the andropausal medication of choice…]

Verisimilitude

The seditious plebian matriarch
of the voluminous – nay pulcritudinous – stature
was concocting a jambalaya:
a sublime recipe with a hint of vanilla
(“prevents flatulence” she would yodel onomatopaeically).
She served sassafrass to complement this dish,
and would gesticulate eruditely at her guests,
who dared not be cacophonous
nor proffer claptrap in her presence,
for she had a temper both
maniacal and diabolical,
and globular spittle would emit
from her tubular vocal regions
should any testosterone-imbalanced male
be so obstreporous as to call her cooking
“wundebar”.

Such was her pernickety nature,
garnered through antiquity and germinating
virginal maidens who had met
with disastrous liaisons to local rascals
who lured them behind iguana bushes –
with tart pomegranates or falafels –
in the dusty hectares of that region.

Our matriarch would gather
her rumbunctious crew
in the vestibule, its décor
alluding to zen and cello music,
and offer pontrifract cakes and
invite them to browse through encyclopaedic
tomes on lesser-spotted aardvaarks,
and how to perform an endoscopy,
and the initiation of the hierophants.
In short, as hospitable matron she was incandescent.

©  Luc(e) Raesmith

antiquity      aardvaarks       cacophony      cello       claptrap       concoct      decor      diabolical      disastrous      erudite        encyclopaedic       endoscopy      falafel        flatulence       gesticulate       globular      hectare       hierophant       hospitable       iguana       incandescent      initiation        jambalaya        liaisons        maniacal        matriarch       obstreperous       onomatopoeia        pernickety        plebeian        pomegranate        pontifract      proffer        pulchritudinous      rascal        rambunctious       sassafrass       seditious        spittle        sublime      tart      testosterone       tome        tubular       vanilla       verisimilitude       vestibule       virginal       voluminous       wundebar       yodel      zen

(pomegranate, falafel & vanilla images courtesy of google: artists unknown)