Sunday, April 13, 2014

OULIPOST #13: EPITHALAMIUM


The prompt:
An Oulipian epithalamium, or marriage song, is one composed exclusively with the letters of the names of bride and groom (bride and bride, groom and groom, etc). Visit the engagement or wedding announcements section of your newspaper and select a couple. Write a poem using only words that can be made with the letters in their name. You may choose to use first names only if you prefer anonymity or full names if you’re desperate for more letters.

The process:
Well, The Boston Globe did not have engagement announcements published this week. That was last Sunday but never fear I persevere! I started searching other "local" newspapers and then called my mom. She said, "The Cape Cod Times." I said, "Let me Google that." And tada!! I found 1 single engagement announcement. Now my dear friend, Katy over at somethingkaty uses this source text so we might have the same set of names for today. Also, the reason I am still calling this paper local is I've grown up with this paper on the weekends when my family and I would spend time at our house on the Cape and it's still in my tiny little state so..there you have it. 

I changed my source text and I also used the Scrabble Word Finder but in all honesty I found most of the words I used in the an article or two from The Cape Cod Times. How neat is that??

The result:


The engaged couple:
Allison Thompson & Jon Nickerson


CASH-CENTRIC SELECTIONS

All the ties
Inspire men to reason
Contracts trick criminals into 
Technical teams and short poker palms

Rematch the masters
Clap for them
The site near the canal
Lost three men

Hitch into aerials
Reasons for the scene
Reports arise to see
Titles are not as they seem

A lack of heart
Conceals a problem
A major loss
Cash can’t help ‘em


Sources:
Various headlines from The Cape Cod Times. http://www.capecodonline.com/ 13 Apr 2014, Web.
http://www.scrabblefinder.com/solver/

Bragg, Mary-Ann, Orecchio-Egresitz, Haven. "Two workers die in fall when truck tumbles into ditch." The Cape Cod Times. 13 Apr 2014. Web.

Shemkus, Sarah. "How many women authors do you read?" The Cape Cod Times. 13 Apr. 2014, Web. 

4 comments:

katy said...

love it. it's actually really neat when you know the source material, know what "the site near the canal" refers to, etc.
i just bought the paper (yeah, it's after 8pm), and am going to look for Allison and Jon and then look for some different words... maybe a response to yours, Nicole \(^_^)/ could be fun. let's see if i don't fall asleep before i finish it though!

katy said...

update: cannot find Allison and Jon. going with another couple i found online. none in the printed newspaper. didn't waste the $3, though, as Rowdy has taken to lying all over the paper!

Unknown said...

Very resourceful!

Nicole said...

Thanks!! I found that couple online. It was odd how I found it. Good luck love!