093

093

Saturday, April 12, 2014

30/30 poem 12

Number 12

Choose a word – any word. Or have someone choose one for you.

Go to Online Etymology Dictionary at http://www.etymonline.com. Place your word in the search box, and you will get a list of related words.

Use all or some of the words that appear underneath your initial word choice to create a poem draft.

obtuse (adj.) Look up obtuse at Dictionary.com
early 15c., "dull, blunted," from Middle French obtus (fem. obtuse), from Latin obtusus "blunted, dull," also used figuratively, past participle of obtundere "to beat against, make dull," fromob "against" (see ob-) + tundere "to beat," from PIE *(s)tud-e- "to beat, strike, push, thrust," from root *(s)teu- "to push, stick, knock, beat" (cognates: Latin tudes "hammer," Sanskrittudati "he thrusts"). Sense of "stupid" is first found c.1500. Related: Obtusely; obtuseness.

blunt (adj.) Look up blunt at Dictionary.com
c.1200, "dull, obtuse," perhaps from or related to Old Norse blundra (see blunder (v.)). Of tools or weapons, late 14c. Meaning "abrupt of speech or manner" is from 1580s.

obtund (v.) Look up obtund at Dictionary.com
c.1400, (transitive) "to render dead, make dull," used occasionally in English, especially in medical jargon; from Latin obtundere "to blunt, make dull, weaken, exhaust," literally "to beat against" (see obtuse). Related: Obtundation; obtunded.

contusion (n.) Look up contusion at Dictionary.com
c.1400, from Middle French contusion, from Latin contusionem (nominative contusio) "crushing, bruising," from contus-, past participle stem of contundere "to beat, break to pieces," fromcom-, intensive prefix (see com-), + tundere "to beat" (see obtuse).

stultify (v.) Look up stultify at Dictionary.com
1766, "allege to be of unsound mind" (legal term), from Late Latin stultificare "turn into foolishness," from Latin stultus "foolish" (literally "uneducated, unmovable," from PIE root *stel- "to put, stand") + root of facere "to make" (see factitious). The first element is cognate with Latin stolidus "slow, dull, obtuse" (see stolid). Meaning "cause to appear foolish or absurd" is from 1809. Hence stultiloquy "foolish talk, silly babbling" (1650s). Related: Stultified; stultifying.

pierce (v.) Look up pierce at Dictionary.com
late 13c. "make a hole in; force one's way through," from Anglo-French perser, Old French percier "pierce, transfix, drive through" (12c., Modern French percer), probably from Vulgar Latin*pertusiare, frequentative of Latin pertusus, past participle of pertundere "to thrust or bore through," from per- "through" (see per) + tundere "to beat, pound," from PIE *tund-, from root*(s)teu- "to push, strike, knock, beat, thrust" (see obtuse). Related: Pierced; piercing.

toil (n.1) Look up toil at Dictionary.com
"hard work," c.1300, originally "turmoil, contention, dispute," from Anglo-French toil (13c.), from toiler "agitate, stir up, entangle, writhe about," from Old French toeillier "drag about, make dirty" (12c.), usually said to be from Latin tudiculare "crush with a small hammer," from tudicula "mill for crushing olives, instrument for crushing," from Latin tudes "hammer," from PIE*tud-, variant of *(s)teu- "to push, stroke, knock, beat" (see obtuse). Sense of "hard work, labor" (1590s) is from the related verb (see toil (v.)).

lozenge (n.) Look up lozenge at Dictionary.com


figure having four equal sides and two acute and two obtuse angles, early 14c., from Old French losenge "windowpane, small square cake," etc., used for many flat quadrilateral things (Modern French losange). It has cognates in Spanish losanje, Catalan llosange, Italian lozanga. Probably from a pre-Roman Celtic language, perhaps Iberian *lausa or Gaulish *lausa "flat stone" (compare Provençal lausa, Spanish losa, Catalan llosa, Portuguese lousa "slab, tombstone"), from a pre-Celtic language.

Originally in English a term in heraldry; meaning "small cake or tablet (originally diamond-shaped) of medicine and sugar, etc., meant to be held in the mouth and dissolved" is from 1520s.

an excuse for a dance number

You would think that we met in a screwball comedy
the way she hit me in the chin
the blunt object shattering into an explosion of ,
what turned out to be,
real glass.
My face one big bloody purple contusion.
I laughed
trying to stultify the situation
her piercing eyes
blue enough to obtund my senses
this was not her fault
I was distracted by her grace
and I was toiling under the notion
that angels never trip
never fall
and I wanted to speak
to throw out some pick up line to soften the edges
but he arm had crushed my throat as we
tumbled to the ground
and all I could manage was
a wheezing, raspimg, sputtering, cough.
She, being a classy lady,
offered me a lozenge,
brought me tea with honey,
took my hand,
and taught me how to waltz.

1 comment:

  1. I took the challenge. The word assigned to me (by the creator/maintainer of Etymonline) was April. It yielded two full pages of "related" words, from which I used ten: April (the title), gremlin, wasteland, cocoon, profiteer, murk, sunny, summer, spring, and time.


    April

    With gremlin Winter skulking back
    To plot again, repair, cocoon,
    The sodden wasteland in his track
    Lies blinking at the bluing moon

    Though destinies of Summer lurk—
    The profiteer at wilting bloom,
    The rigid clash of glare and murk,
    The parching sunny knell of doom—

    It treasures the uncoiling Spring,
    The tender, slender slip of time
    When promise thrums in ev’rything
    And wakes again the urge to climb

    ReplyDelete