cosmoplumb

the Toilet at the end of the Universe
spews galaxies in a fountain
of fouled parsecs

the Plunger,
deployed,
sucked away in an instant
when the Black Hole
is unClogged

next time,
what to do?
move to a new 'Verse
or put up with Matter
till the last proton pops

don't go!

good is how you look, my dear
hungry for your love, I am
only one teensy problem here
underripe, you are, to suit my taste
lay down a while, for I can wait

flash fic - horror

Birthday in Hell


“Go on,” the demon said, “open it. It's your birthday present.” Hesitantly, Darrell reached for the package. This had to be a practical joke. But every moment of a practical joke was a blessed time in which he was not suffering excruciating torment. He had lucked out drawing Slapsteickkior as primary tormentor. Carefully, so as to prolong the absence of torment, he peeled back the silver-foil wrapping paper, striving to avoid tearing it. He almost had it off, but the last piece of tape stubbornly refused to yield no matter how he pried, teased, rolled, or tugged. After five minutes of this, while the demon drummed his fingers ever more loudly on the table, Darrell just ripped the last corner off. The box inside was so black he couldn't see the edges of the flaps. He found them by feel and pulled them open quickly. He was too anxious to stall any more. Plus, the demon always punished him for stalling, and the longer he stalled the more it hurt. Inside, a rolled scroll was tied with a pink ribbon sporting a frothy chrysanthemum-like bow. He slid the bow off the end of the scroll and unrolled it.

“This certificate entitles the bearer to one year off his sentence for good behavior. Happy birthday.”

He sighed, knowing that the worst part was still coming. Slapsteickkior delighted in explaining his jokes. You had to listen, because there would be a quiz at the end. If you missed any questions, well, it didn't bear thinking about.

“You see you get a whole year off, but naturally your sentence is of infinite duration; you don't get that year off until the end, and there is no end. What I'm trying to tell you is....”


The end

new SF flash

My new YA SF flash "How I spent my summer vacation at the galactic core" http://www.dailycabal.com/

I rarely write song parodies

I want a new ward (to the tune of "I want a new drug," by Huey Lewis and the News)


I want a new ward
One that won't make me weak
One that won't turn my brain to mush
Won't make my gargoyles squeak

I want a new ward
One that won't hurt my head
One that won't make my toenails rhyme
Or grow warts on my bed

One that won't make me nervous,
wondering what I see
I hope that I'm hallucinatin' this gigantic flea
Some colossal predaceous flea

I want a new ward
One that won't bind me here
one that won't sap my lifeforce much
or make my carpet feel real queer

I want a new ward
One that won't start to fray
One that keeps all the gremlins out
And holds broom salesmen at bay

One that won't make me nervous,
wondering what I see
I hope that I'm hallucinatin' this gigantic flea
Some colossal predaceous flea

I want a new ward
One that don't take much blood
One that works in a 30-year drought
One that works in a 100-year flood

I want a new ward
One that won't give me gout
My neighbors' hens better lay
No monsters when the eggs hatch out


One that won't make me nervous,
wondering what I see
I hope that I'm hallucinatin' this gigantic flea
Some colossal predaceous flea


end

something I wrote about 10 years ago

Winter’s page


Still pools glisten,
A breeze breathes ripples on a limpid sky—
Brown leaf-fingers brush my hair.
Your epitaph is writ in snow,
in wind over rock,
in the trees’ bare wings.
Spring will forget you;
The stars revolve both day and night.

RIP, Diana Wynne Jones

no poem today
for a great light's extinguished
ok just one

enough with the no-titles theme

if this poem
had a title
this would not be it

50624 - this is not a title

bright bars shine through leaves
where chlorophyll farmers run
bacterial sheep

what's in a name? Letters, for one.

Lady Banks yields
to the seven sisters
yellow petals

nothing to name here

a chair
revolves under sky
sit

science lecture in Tuscaloosa Thursday night

I hope some of you will be able to attend Doug Futuyma's lecture Thursday night!

7:30 PM, the biology building auditorium on the UA campus: "Evolution: the most important theory in biology." The lecture should be over by 8:30 PM although people usually ask questions and some stay to talk.

the lost title; ask Bo Peep

the pen aims for me
each time I come near
my desk is armed

I write you, how can I spell the ways?

nonsense verse
to the engine's thrum
year 2 of 12

I'd name it in the morning

painted girl
blinks in the sun
9 long years

if I had a title...

one of the last bees
pollinates my garden
video repeats

no title, by my pallid whiskers

.



my straw's lumen
is coated with black threads
no pipe cleaners

nature abhors a small vacuum

under the bridge
crinoids troll
motes beware

New SF flash

More about robots http://www.dailycabal.com/2011/03/the-unlucky-bot/

finding flash fic easily

All stories at www.dailycabal.com by author http://www.dailycabal.com/all-stories-by-author/

the title with which everybdy wins

the clone
updated his page again
he's just a copy

Fundraiser - Japan - Doctors without Borders

In support of humanitarian work in Japan, I will donate everything I make selling my books this week to Doctors without Borders. If you don't want my books, please donate directly to Doctors without Borders:

http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/donate/overview.cfm

But should you have a hankering for SF or fantasy fiction or poetry, these are the books. The links are eclectic & serve to inform. To make sure proceeds are donated, order the books through me: email jopnquog@gmail.com & pay using paypal to that address (or by check to me at 1300 Kicker, Tuscaloosa AL 35404 USA). Fundraiser ends midnight Friday US central time. All prices include shipping.

All copies will be signed.

Nursery Rhyme Noir, tales of death & humor in a land where nursery rhymes are news reports. $11

http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wual/arts.artsmain?action=viewArticle&sid=14&id=1470478&pid=217


The Simian Transcript, flash fiction: SF, fantasy, horror. $10

http://www.cyberwizardproductions.com/Banana_Oil_Books/The_Simian_Transcript_by_David_C_Kopaska-Merkel.html


Separate Destinations, collaborative SF & fantasy poetry. $7

http://www.dplus66.com/sd.html


Night Ship to Never, more collaborative genre poetry. $8

http://issuu.com/cyberwizard/docs/night_ship_science_fiction_fantasy_poetry_preview


Brushfires, my latest, genre poetry. $6

http://www.genremall.com/poetryr.htm

Alabama Outstanding Earth Science Teacher award

Deadline April 15th



Alabama Outstanding Earth Science Teacher Award



You’ll win cash, free earth-science resource books, automatic entry in competition at Section level!



Nominate yourself or a colleague or mentor



Outstanding Earth Science Teacher (OEST) awards (sponsored by the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, and in Alabama by the Alabama Geological Society & the Geological Survey of Alabama) are given for "exceptional contributions to the stimulation of interest in the Earth Sciences at the pre-college level." Any teacher or other K-12

educator who covers a significant amount of earth science content with his or her students is eligible.



Ten national finalists are selected, one from each NAGT regional section. Some sections also

recognize state winners (We do!). Individuals may apply themselves or nominate a colleague for the award.

The Outstanding Earth Science Teacher Awards program was adopted by NAGT in 1971. Devised to

honor pre-college teachers of earth science, the program has the following specific objectives:

• Identify excellence in teaching

• Appropriately recognize and reward excellence in teaching

• Stimulate higher levels of teaching performance

• Establish NAGT as a strong support organization for pre-college education

• Via active statewide and sectional programs, build a solid state, regional, and national liaison with

administrators of pre-college earth science education.



Sectional winner awards include:

• 10"x13" laser-engraved solid walnut plaque from NAGT

• 2 year complimentary membership in NAGT

• 3 year complimentary membership in GSA

• 3 year complimentary membership in GSA Geoscience Education Division

• $500 travel funds (winners must request this money) to a GSA meeting

• $500 classroom improvement funds (winners must request this money) from GSA

• One-year subscriptions to publications from AGI, AGU, AIPG, and NESTA

• Publications from the USGS



State-level awards are less but are also substantial. (See above)



More information is available at http://nagt.org/nagt/programs/oest.html. The nomination form is at

http://nagt.org/nagt/programs/oest-nom.html.



Deadline April 15th



Send application materials to me:



David C Kopaska-Merkel

Geological Survey of Alabama

Box 869999

Tuscaloosa AL 35486-6999

205-247-3695

www.gsa.state.al.us

fax 205-349-2861

poem by another name

butter bursts
but from the window green
buds crouch

both in my office

china girl wants
paper-mache pig mask so hard
glassy tear

gymnastics team won tonight

even though we were sleepy

[not a title]


after rain
our driveway has eloped
poised at the storm drain

these are not the ... oo, shiny!

dentist braces

himself against my chair

I compose haiku

there goes

another piece of youth

My kingdom for a tittle

For self-reference, this poem should be about typos.


he takes the chair
and she clears another place
week's mail vs cat

Oh, title, Where art thou?

ghost world swallows
Earth for days as they cross
geologists take notes

the lost titles

tube trees wave
in a migratory din
a lunge of worms

I don't name the nameless verse or, well

the broccoli forest
shouts with a single voice
plant kingdom

doggerel alert!

Oh, never laugh at a big giraffe
he'll kick you in your tiny low-slung a$$
as he eats the tree in your postage-stamp yard
he might stomp your house, it wouldn't be hard

maybe an interview about my writing

So yesterday I made a four-hour round-trip expedition to help do a 15-minute radio show about somebody else's book. And fossils. The book was "Time" by Roger Reid, and I think I have mentioned it here before. It's a good young-adult mystery set in the most important fossil site in Alabama, the Stephen C. Minkin Paleozoic Footprint Site. the geology connection was, of course, why I was invited to participate. The show is Carolyn Hutcheson's community show (I am embarrassed to admit I don't remember the exact name of the show). The show airs at noon on Troy University's public radio station, and is heard in southeast Alabama, southwestern Georgia, and western Florida. While I was there we taped a show about geology, which will probably air in May or June. We also talked about doing a show about my fiction and poetry; I don't know if that will happen. But it would be really cool. Actually, being interviewed on the radio was cool and I had never done it before. It was much easier and a lot more fun than I expected, mostly because Carolyn is a very good interviewer.

they'll eat him alive

The muffin man

the last stitch tied off
blueberry muffin armor complete
he's ready to face the world
poppyseed treat in his belly
baguette in hand
I am muffined
hear me roar

no title to see here, move along

black tooth pricks my palm
ghost shark follows scent trail

hellooo, another unannounced jewel

possibly dirt clod




male plants swell
challenge row crops to duels
femme flowers blush

reminds me of "The Puppet Masters"

But these are real, less than 1 µm across, composed of pyrite, and clinging to the surface of an opening in Devonian shale collected more than 10,000 feet below the surface of the Earth. They're pretty cool, but I'm also looking for professional opinions from any who feel qualified to make them.

maybe the title's under this rock

that wasn't a title; this isn't either


radiometer
promises a long day
yesterday's buds

titles? scifaiku don't got 'em!

to be a rose
and bloom but once a year
this dizzy whirld


not a ku, but no title just the same