A Villanelle for Graeme Worthy, On the Occasion of the Thirtieth Anniversary of His Birth.

A man more worthy there has never been
Than Graeme, magnificent and noble friend!
A gentleman without; a sage within.

At what superlative shall I begin?
Such majesty is hard to comprehend -
A man more worthy there has never been.

He cycles free and tall on bike tires thin
What earthly boundary does he not transcend?
A gentleman without; a sage within.

Our modern pitfalls earn his deep chagrin -
He scoffs as we fall for each TV trend.
A man more worthy there has never been.

Hemingway's whiskers live upon his chin:
A kingly countenance to apprehend.
A gentleman without; a sage within.

He plays my heartstrings like a violin,
Such affection to him do I extend.
A man more worthy there has never been.
A gentleman without; a sage within.

Hallelujah, Immanuel.

(2:21:25 PM) Sarah Gibson: i kant believe it's not butter
(2:21:52 PM) Graeme Worthy: i kant hardly wait
(2:22:02 PM) Sarah Gibson: no kantsequences
(2:22:56 PM) Graeme Worthy: a kanticle for liebowitz
(2:23:36 PM) Sarah Gibson: you dirty kant.

(2:24:20 PM) Graeme Worthy: staring vakantly at the wall
(2:25:34 PM) Sarah Gibson: chanting inkantations
(2:26:27 PM) Graeme Worthy: against lykantthropes
(2:27:04 PM) Sarah Gibson: a supplikant sinner seeking forgiveness
(2:27:39 PM) Graeme Worthy: for his misadentures with intoxikants
(2:27:47 PM) Sarah Gibson: kanter-intuitive
(2:28:13 PM) Graeme Worthy: skantily-clad
(2:29:23 PM) Sarah Gibson: kant dracula?
(2:30:08 PM) Graeme Worthy: a signifikant figure in modern myth
(2:32:00 PM) Sarah Gibson: dekanter of wine
(2:32:35 PM) Sarah Gibson: no, that one sucked -- how about, a magical world of enkantment
(2:33:49 PM) Graeme Worthy: i'm kantankerous enough to insist that you have to keep the first one and kan't just subsitute willy nilly
(2:34:30 PM) Sarah Gibson: you kant be serious.
(2:35:29 PM) Graeme Worthy: I have a penkant for keeping to the rules no matter how pekantic
(2:36:50 PM) Sarah Gibson: those were both a bit of a stretch....but i'll let it slide -- i've lost kant of how many good ones you've come up with
(2:38:08 PM) Sarah Gibson: this reminds me of the game of word-tennis in tom stoppard's rosenkant and guildenstern.
(2:38:25 PM) Graeme Worthy: it's hard to keep coming up with them sober, i need some sort of lubrikant
(2:39:09 PM) Sarah Gibson: have you kantemplated the possibility of a mid-morning beer?
(2:40:49 PM) Graeme Worthy: there's an applikant for the position of 'graeme's morning beer'
(2:40:52 PM) Graeme Worthy: in the fridge
(2:41:15 PM) Graeme Worthy: sitting next to the kantelope
(2:42:00 PM) Sarah Gibson: oooh, i kant believe you, i've been trying to work that melon into something this entire conversation!
(2:43:06 PM) Graeme Worthy: well, my rival and co-communikant, it seems i beat you to the punch.
(2:46:48 PM) Sarah Gibson: i kantgratulate you on your excellent pun skillz
(2:46:22 PM) Graeme Worthy: my stomach rumbles, i feel i must stroll to the kantina, because the aforementionned kantelope is not mine.
(2:47:10 PM) Sarah Gibson: there is a distinct possibility i will post this kantversation on my blog
(2:48:30 PM) Graeme Worthy: edited for kantinuity of course
(2:48:48 PM) Sarah Gibson: kant say for certain....
And on and on...

On Yams:

Please take a moment to consider yams.
Could there ever exist a nobler food?
A pittance will buy you five kilograms,
Yet a richer tasting snack can scarce be chewed.

A yam is unpretentious and honest:
A complex sauce would only hide its charm.
Just a simple salt- and butter-ing is best,
(Though a judicious pepper sprinkling does no harm).

What feature of yams do I love the most?
I answer you without a hesitation:
The fortifying qualities they boast!
There is no healthier food in all creation.

O yams! You delight me in every way!
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Marcel Proust on The Internets.

"The truth is that life is perpetually weaving fresh threads which link one individual and one event to another, and that these threads are crossed and recrossed, doubled and redoubled, to thicken the web, so that between any slightest point of our past and all the others a rich network of memories gives an almost infinite variety of communicating paths to choose from."

-Time Regained

WB Yeats be rollin' in his grave.

www.When You Are Old and Grey.com

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And checking your email, load up this pic,
And dream about your first shy double-click,
Your searching eyes, and their dark circles deep.

How many nights you gazed upon my face,
And reveled in my clumsy nudity,
Felt thrilled at digitally owning me
(But wished for a real woman's warm embrace).

Watching your glowing screen most tenderly,
Recall, a little sadly, how I fled,
Returned your plaintive emails all unread,
And left nothing but this grainy .jpg

The Coder's Lament

I worked until 3:30 on the user interface.
The garbage I wrote after 2 will have to be replaced.

Why did I smoke that midnight joint, and not just go to bed?
Now I'm stuck with labyrinthine code and pounding head.

Through some potent magic, it is running in IE.
I wonder, will this motherfucker work in Firefox 3?

Wish I could spare 10 minutes, grab a sandwich at Subway
I think I have some cheese left -- did I eat it yesterday?

Some twitchy, frantic rummaging through fridge and shelves reveals
That an iffy jar of pickles must comprise my next two meals.

There's nothing new on digg! I smell awful! I have to pee!
I haven't left my room in days! Is this the life for me?

Why does this form keep breaking? I could swear my code is sound.
Oh, here it is on line 14: the vile rogue comma, found!

I'm two hours over deadline, but they haven't emailed yet.
Fuck them, I haven't slept this week! I'm too far gone to fret.

I close my eyes and press reload. Come on, don't break, you jerk.
O, wonder of all wonders! The thing works, it works, it works!

Inspired by the Schmidt Sting Pain Index:

(edit: Backstory.)

I Bring you The Gibson Scale of Existential Angst:

1.0 Only ketchup in the fridge: hungry, impoverished, mildly amusing -- you flatter yourself with thoughts of bohemianism as you rummage for crackers.

1.8 Lying about finishing Being and Nothingness: shameful, yet cocky -- you gathered the general meaning from the first quarter of the book, anyways, and you read "Existentialism is a Humanism" twice for your intro to Philosophy class in first year. Nevertheless, you blush scarlet when the girl you brought home lingers over the "S" section of your bookshelf.

2.2 Your childhood best friend takes you to an awkward party: nostalgic, alienating -- you oscillate wildly between wishing someone would talk to you and feeling you're much smarter than the lot of them. You get too drunk too early and wonder how deeply your feelings of superiority are rooted in profound social awkwardness. You spill your drink on a girl with a navel piercing and spend the better part of the evening vomiting surreptitiously in the back yard.

3.0 Finishing your BA: tedious, humiliating, meaningless -- any sense of accomplishment is overwhelmingly deflated; people you spent the last four years scorning get all the awards for academic excellence, your mother wears a peach sweater set to the ceremony and tells your favourite professor that she's "heard all about" them. You wonder if you will be able to complete your two-month-late final papers before the grade deadline. You'll show them all what you're made of at grad school. If you get in.

3.6 The unattractive Women's Studies major you were dating out of convenience leaves you: confusing, ego crushing -- sexual frustration and anger wash over you in waves; you send her a regrettable drunken text message reading "Judith Butler is a cunt." You wonder if it was the disparaging remarks about Simone de Beauvoir, or because you cried after intercourse that time, or whether it has something to do with that fucking smooth talking professor with his fucking blazers with jeans and his fucking goddamn beard.

4.0 Chlamydia: uncomfortable, burning -- you are disgusted by the banality of the human body and long to free your intellect from its fleshy prison. You re-read A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and identify so strongly with Dedalus that you cry during the "Hellfire" sermon. You bus to a walk-in clinic an hour out of town to ensure you don't run into any colleagues on the way. A girl from your high school is working reception and you almost faint.

4+ Grad school: anxious, exhausting -- you are so overwhelmed by the meaninglessness of life that you decide to go get drunk alone and ponder the great questions of life. At the bar, you choke on your first whiskey and feel queasy after your second. Bored, agitated, and penniless, you slink home at 9:30, unenthusiastically masturbate, then call your mother. When she asks how your classes are going, you burst into tears.

A silly wedding poem for two good ones (who have long tolerated my silliness).

This went over very well with their grandparents:

"To be a Corman, or an Epp"


The path of life confounds us all --
Those of us, even, with degrees.
Each turn could bring calamity,
Such as illness, bad shoes, or bees.
Two people wandering down this path,
Uncertain where they ought to step,
Could make each step with certainty
Were they a Corman and an Epp.

We're not all fortunate enough
To be as bright as this good pair:
No man has quite young Michael's wit,
Nor woman quite Amelia's hair.
How can we begrudge their good luck?
We should rather learn from their lives
That brilliance, love, and good hair
Make for happy husbands and wives.

I'm sad to lose them to New York,
These excellent and loyal friends.
To keep them here would be selfish --
They are needed for other ends!
For these fine people are eager
To help the world out as they like.
Each place they go will come to love
Our own Amelia and Mike.

I vote that these two run for mayor,
Or take the world over somehow,
For if they were running the show,
We'd all breathe easier than now.

And all the people of the world,
Atheist, Jew, and Mormon,
Could live in blissful harmony
If they were Epp and Corman.

Heavily indebted to John Updike.

"I Missed His Code, but I Read His Name"

Though coders are a dreadful clan
To be avoided if you can,
I'd like to meet the Indian,
Seetharaman Narayanan.

I picture him a Star Trek Fan.
A game-wiz on a wireless LAN
I'd say, with admirable elan,
"O hai thair Narayanan,

I can has SeeEss3 plz, and
Mebbe we can browze CPAN?
And has you seen mah bukkit, man?"
Then my dear friend Narayanan

Would seat me on a lush divan,
And read his name, that sumptuous span
Of words equal to or greater than
"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan."

We'd be great friends on Facebook, and
Spend hours watching Wrath of Khan,
Eating pizza from a deep dish pan.
I count myself his greatest fan.

Oh how I <3 Narayanan!!