I observe that not only did Venetia Phair, née Venetia Burney, choose the perfect name for Pluto, she had a more than splendid name herself. Venetia Phair, Venetia Phair: how redolent of vanished aristocracies that name is! How perfectly it scans! I think of Heyer's Venetia and L'Engle's Dragons in the Waters, and I find myself almost unable to believe there existed a person with such a perfect name as Venetia Phair.
And he's the "F. Madan" of the old Summary Catalogue descriptions, which are not always complete or invariably correct but are definitely the result of so much hard work, omg. What a family.
I have not your practised gift, I fear: but a poemlet, since it is 4 am (I'm shifting to night mode for an observing run tomorrow). I think my near-sleeping mind instead drew out the cultural bedrock for which to me every one of these names is a key, rather than the poem I meant to write, the one for the people who chose those keys.
In this way come the names. The kete of knowledge, grasp them, word-woven. The stars were not spilled from them to scatter - they are taonga, treasured a sorrowed son's gift to his father the Sky.
In the spaces between the great river of the goddess of the north, cloud-shadow, counter-clear, in the south strides the Emu. Rifted, reflected - the same place holds the great waka, star-spanned and the leaping maw of hammer-headed mangopare earnest enemies of fishes.
Some names are found from the quickness of birds (all the kindness of Tane; leaf-shadow and branch-shiver, fern-frond unfolded), even in the tired patience of the frigatebird's long arc, soaring the Pacific, once seen from a small bark off the isles called Galapagos;
and some from the long slow vastnesses the patience of ice, the presence of the All-Frozen, seal-teared children of unknowing oceans.
I have not your practised gift, I fear: but a poemlet, since it is 4 am (I'm shifting to night mode for an observing run tomorrow).
Your idea of a poemlet is extraordinary. I will wait for the poem about those who choose the names proper, but this is beautiful. Please send it somewhere.
Please send it somewhere. Well, since you think it's worthy, then I'll give it a go :) I have no idea where a good place would be to send it; not sure if the references would make as much sense for the normal kinds of N. Hemisphere places?
I have no idea where a good place would be to send it; not sure if the references would make as much sense for the normal kinds of N. Hemisphere places?
Keep in mind that I'm familiar mostly with speculative markets, but I would first try places like Mythic Delirium, Goblin Fruit, Not One of Us, Strange Horizons, and Lone Star Stories, all of whom work well with combinations of mythology and astronomy. There is also a website devoted specifically to stars and poetry, which I do not know as much about, but it might be worth looking into. But if you have favorite journals or magazines already, feel free to send the poem there first!
I think my near-sleeping mind instead drew out the cultural bedrock for which to me every one of these names is a key, rather than the poem I meant to write, the one for the people who chose those keys.
I know it's literally years, but if you never sent this anywhere, then I think Stone Telling might be a good place to start. I still think of this poem occasionally.
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Yes. When I discovered she existed, I thought the same thing.
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There needs to be a poem about the names of namers.
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Will you write it?
not quite what was intended
In this way come the names. The kete of knowledge, grasp them, word-woven.
The stars were not spilled from them to scatter -
they are taonga, treasured
a sorrowed son's gift to his father the Sky.
In the spaces between the great river of the goddess of the north,
cloud-shadow, counter-clear, in the south strides the Emu.
Rifted, reflected -
the same place holds the great waka, star-spanned
and the leaping maw of hammer-headed mangopare
earnest enemies of fishes.
Some names are found from the quickness of birds
(all the kindness of Tane; leaf-shadow and branch-shiver, fern-frond unfolded),
even in the tired patience of the frigatebird's long arc, soaring the Pacific,
once seen from a small bark off the isles called Galapagos;
and some from the long slow vastnesses
the patience of ice, the presence of the All-Frozen, seal-teared
children of unknowing oceans.
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Your idea of a poemlet is extraordinary. I will wait for the poem about those who choose the names proper, but this is beautiful. Please send it somewhere.
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Please send it somewhere.
Well, since you think it's worthy, then I'll give it a go :) I have no idea where a good place would be to send it; not sure if the references would make as much sense for the normal kinds of N. Hemisphere places?
no subject
Keep in mind that I'm familiar mostly with speculative markets, but I would first try places like Mythic Delirium, Goblin Fruit, Not One of Us, Strange Horizons, and Lone Star Stories, all of whom work well with combinations of mythology and astronomy. There is also a website devoted specifically to stars and poetry, which I do not know as much about, but it might be worth looking into. But if you have favorite journals or magazines already, feel free to send the poem there first!
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I know it's literally years, but if you never sent this anywhere, then I think Stone Telling might be a good place to start. I still think of this poem occasionally.