Random Poem

In the 418 class, some of the grad students gave short lectures on different aspects of writing, such as editing, dialogue, fantasy, etc. The lecture that stuck with me the most was Jason Freeman's lecture on adaptation; although I used to think of adaptations as being books to film, we learned that adaptation can take place in any medium; drawing, music...and poetry. We had recently played with repetition in poems in this class, so I tried to write my own adaptation poem. This is based off of the book "The Looking Glass Wars" by Frank Beddor, which is actually based off of the Alice books by Lewis Carroll, and it's very rough.

"Alyss"

The cards are shuffled
Shuffled across the chessboard
Black and red
And I stand on the mirror clock, on the five
And at eleven I have to begin.

Eyes on the edges, colors waiting to be marched
She isn’t here but the Queen’s cards are shuffled.
Black oval heads, black hands, feet
Black lips
Red eyes
Red eyes on the clock where I stand
And everything is caught in my throat.

The mirror reflects blue smoke over the squares.
Shuffled across the chessboard, red eyes on the clock,
I move to eleven.


~Nicole Bartow