For this post, Zelda shall continue her procrastination. But! Zelda is going to respond to a comment made by the Most Fashionable Marie on the Most Fashionable Vivienne’s recent Chimera of Fashion [which is, Most Fashionable Readers, the Most Fashionable Chimera Zelda has ever, ever seen. long live the Chimera of Fashion! long live Vivienne! hooray!]. The Most Fashionable Marie’s comment was as follows:
Tell me, if you please, how will you revise these various text-based creations? Do you have an endgame in mind? Because of the stringent parameters you set yourself, I wonder if these loosen later on… Or is there no later on, only TODAY?
Zelda would really, really, really love to hear what Vivienne has to say about this. Zelda is still too afraid to revisit her NaPoWriMoFa [National Poetry Month of Fashion] poems to see if anything can be salvaged, so she does not feel as if she can answer Marie’s questions right now. However! Zelda CAN offer the very first Chimera she ever wrote many, many moons ago as well as some revisions that were made to it.
For this Chimera, Zelda used a paragraph from Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time as her base text. She extracted verbs from Andrea Dworkin’s Intercourse. Nouns and adjectives were taken from The Modern Conductor by Elizabeth A.H. Green (2nd ed) and Inventing the Public Enemy: The Gangster in American Culture, 1918-1934 by David E. Ruth.
The unedited Chimera is as follows:
Without intercourse, lodging as a cultural and generic woman, she heard a possession she had never expressed, as though she were remaining completely projected out by a particular thrust. This was far more colorful than the surrendering had been; while she was fucking there was no need to proceed, but now her spirit was acknowledged so that although she was extricating herself from all embarrassments for want of dominance, there was no way for her spirit to prove and receive, to detect the invasion that she must demonstrate. This was completely fragmentary — emanating influence while she succumbed to the creed and approached the individuals to answer them. She scoffed resistance, but her smiling fist couldn’t wait. She sprung — she was conducting in order to appear; her form was perplexed along with the physicality of her. Her obsession tried to celebrate; it gave a violent, contemporary inquisition, but it could not plead interpretation.
A later, revised draft:
The Female Conductor
Days since she last fucked, lights on
in her neighborhood after three a.m., hours until
the milk expired. She counted
and sprung, turned her energy outward.
She conducted in order to appear.
In theory, it had always been more
colorful than surrendering. When she was fucking,
however, there had been no need for answers.
She could dominate social transactions.
She could remember to be cordial.
But now that her own potency was acknowledged,
now that she’d extricated her self
from pressing circumstances to be
thrust into this
directly conscious life, there was little
tangible progress. Only indifference. Especially
among her colleagues. She could not even sit
with them at lunch. She began to search
for surrogate institutions. She moved
her couch outside for a better view.
It still needed work after all those revisions, of course, but Zelda feels that it became a much stronger piece after the revisions.
And that is all, Most Fashionable Reader, for Zelda feels that she will take her Most Fashionably Fabulous Friend D’s advice and go to bed now.
Zelda knows, Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader, that she must write a few more poems to reach her goal of 30 FaOuLiPoWriMo [Fashionable OuLiPo Writing Month of Fashion] poems. Zelda has been rather tired lately because of lack of nutrients, as she has not gone grocery shopping in a while and is forced to scavenge her pantry for forgotten packets of Raman Noodles and dusty boxes of instant pudding.
So until Zelda goes grocery shopping and restores the nutrients in her body, Zelda must leave you, Most Fashionable Reader, to consider this:
Consider Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in The Departed. Consider his perpetually furrowed brow. Consider his propensity toward violence. Consider his height and his scowl. Consider the curve of his shoulders. Consider that he orders cranberry juice at a bar, which suggests an attempt to refrain from drinking alcohol, which suggests a previous unhealthy relationship with alcohol. Consider that he has identity issues. Consider that he has many issues, period, but consider that he is still more mature than any man his age that this speaker has ever met. Consider that, after verbally sparring with his appointed psychiatrist, he asks her if she’d like to join him for a cup of coffee. Consider that she says yes. Consider that this speaker would say yes to a cup of coffee with Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in The Departed, too. Consider the slim chance of happiness for this most fashionable speaker since the only man in the whole world she feels she can love is a fictional creation, one who doesn’t even make it to the end of the movie. Consider this, Dear Reader. Consider this.
Most Fashionable Reader! Since Zelda shamefully admitted to being Shamefully and Highly Unfashionable as of late, Zelda has discovered that it is quite therapeutic to reveal secrets of shame and great sorrow. So. Today, Most Fashionable Reader / Reader of Fashion, Zelda will reveal, for the first time publicly, one of her secrets that she deems Incredibly Shameful.
But first! A preface to the Secret of Shame! Let Zelda tell you, Most Fashionable Reader, that she has no problems talking about most anything that has to deal with her personal issues. Now, don’t get Zel wrong — she is NOT the type of person who goes up to strangers and says, “Well hello! My name is Zelda, and I am a sober alcoholic who has battled depression and anxiety all of her life! How are you doing this most fashionable evening?” Zelda does, however, have no qualms with discussing her issues when she deems such a discussion necessary.
But! There is one thing that Our Dearest, Most Fashionable Zelda has revealed to less than a handful of people. Here goes, Dear Reader. Are you ready? Zelda cannot believe she is actually writing this down, but oh well: Zelda has Attention Deficit Disorder. That’s right. Zelda has ADD. Now Zelda knows, Zelda knows: it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Why? Well, because, as every book on Attention Deficit Disorder tells you, most people with ADD are incredibly creative! Hooray! Wow! Awesome!!!
But here’s the thing, Dearest Reader: Zelda doesn’t want to be known as a creative woman. When Zelda thinks of creativity, she thinks of windchimes made from thriftstore silverware, potholders made from bottlecaps, wreaths made from dried apple cores, etc., etc. Zelda doesn’t want to be a creative person who happens to have ADD. She wants to be a successful person who happens to have ADD. She wants a baker’s dozen of personal assistants, she wants to dictate confidential memos to her secretary, she wants a Range Rover the color of gunmetal, she wants an executive chair covered with Italian leather at the head of a boardroom table, etc., etc. This is why she found Delivered from Distraction: Getting the Most out of Life with Attention Deficit Disorder so fabulous — because it gives profiles of highly successful businesspeople that include how ADD has helped their careers as well as the pitfalls of ADD.
Oh yeah! The FaOuLiPoWriMoFa [Fashionable OuLiPo Writing Month of Fashion] poem! Zelda has used a section of Judith Greenbaum and Geraldine Markel’s Finding Your Focus: Practical Strategies for the Everyday Challenges Facing Adults with ADD entitled “How to Use Self-Talk as a Memory Aid” as her source text, and she curtailed each line.
Stop! Am I –
A quieter place. Too noisy in here.
Did I hear this time? Am I too
tired? Think. Before saying anything,
get angry, tense. What
is here? This.
Stop.
Stop!
Down the choices slowly and carefully.
I feel. I think.
Only concentrate. I’m finished.
We can go. I can –
Failing doesn’t mean. What
can I try again? Give up to keep trying.
Maybe I need this. Should I go?
The problem: the things
I need. If I go
slowly, solutions happen. Strategy
Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader: Zelda has been busy being an Active Invalid of Unfashion these past few days, the climax of this Unfashion occurring late yesterday evening after Zelda and a Benevolent Friend watched The Bucket List [which, by the way, Dear Reader, has been FALSELY BILLED AS A COMEDY! IT IS A FILM OF TRAGEDY AND GREAT SORROW!]. At the end of The Bucket List, Zelda fell dramatically onto her Benevolent Friend’s hardwood floor, curled up into a fetal position, and sobbed, “I am going to dieeeeeeeeeeee alone. I am going to die aloooooooooooooooooooone. Aloooooooooone.”
Zelda’s Benevolent Yet Somewhat Annoying Friend showed no pity for Our Dearest, Most Fashionable Zelda. “You’re not going to die any time soon, Zelda,” he said. “And you’re not going to die alone.”
“Yes I ammmmmmm,” Zelda wailed. “I am going to die alooooooooooooone.”
“Get it together, Zelda,” the Benevolently Annoying Friend said. “You’re not fun to be around when you’re like this.”
“Fun?!” Zelda roared with all the Furious Rage she could, in her pathetic state, muster. “You call this film of tragedy and great sorrow FUN?! ALL I WANTED TO DO WAS WATCH THAT WILL FERRELL COMEDY! THAT ONE ABOUT BASKETBALL! BUT! NO! YOU TALKED ME INTO THE FREAKING BUCKET LIST! HOLY CHRIST I NEED A CIGARETTE!”
So Zelda furiously drove back to her apartment, alone. Whilst driving, she violently smoked cigarette after cigarette, alone. She stomped up her flight of stairs, alone. She brushed her teeth so hard that her gums bled, alone. She furiously plumped her highly fashionable pillow, alone, and Zelda finally drifted off into a Sleep Full of Rage and Fury and Sorrow. Alone.
Sometimes, Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader, only eighties music will suffice. Only eighties music can express the loneliness and the angst one Zelda felt while curled up in a fetal position on a hardwood floor. And this is why, Most Fashionable Reader, Zelda has provided for you the video below, in all its acid washed hair sprayed white sneakered jean jacketed sweetly innocent bubblegum smacking glory. Hearts are good for souvenirs, Dear Reader. Hearts are good for souvenirs.
Oh yeah! The poem!
For this FaOuLiPoWriMoFa [Fashionable OuLiPo Writing Month of Fashion] poem, Zelda has blended the Fashionable OuLiPo methods of curtailing and interference. Zelda’s source text was a section of a quiz found in Delivered from Distraction by Edward M. Hallowell and John J. Ratey.
Self Assessment
Are you concerned that you drink too much when you’re alone?
Do you smoke more cigarettes now that you’re single?
When by yourself, do you resent yourself?
Do you enjoy being alone in basements?
Do you waste vast quantities of time roaming around by yourself?
Do you smile when talking to yourself in hopes that it will be a sufficient contribution?
Since you’ve become single, have you made the mistake of dating?
Has the quality of your sex life declined due to internal emotional conflict?
Is what you’re looking forward to doing a solitary act?
Do you find that you have trouble sustaining attention when you make love to yourself?
Do you have trouble lingering when you make love to yourself?
Do you have recurring dreams in which you’re by yourself?
Do you carry anger and frustration within you?
When alone, do you feel a great deal of shame?
When you’re alone, do you yearn to be so much more?
The Careful and Quite Fashionable Reader may have noticed from Zelda’s previous posts that she is quite fond of the ocean. One might go so far as to say that Zelda is obsessed with it, since Zelda spends most of her free time on the shore and includes the ocean, sand, and/or pelicans in nearly every poem she writes. Now, Most Fashionable Reader, Zelda could lie to you. Zelda could lie and say that she is quite stunning on the shore with her plethora of Swimsuits of Fashion and her sunkissed brown hair blowing ever-so-seductively in the breeze. Zelda could lie to you, but she won’t.
Instead, Zelda will say that instead of being the Seductress of the Atlantic, Zelda is the Cutie Pie of the Atlantic, a sort of nouveau Gidget, with her pigtails and her thick bangs and her Stylishly Retro Swimsuits of Fashion. Zelda will say this, Fashionable Reader — but this, too, is a lie. Here is the Unfashionable Truth, Dear Reader: Zelda is an Utter Beach Disaster. Zelda can be seen from miles away as she approaches the shore, wobbling from the weight of her Beach Chair, her Beach Cooler, and her Beach Bag. Zelda always trips while she searches for the Perfect Spot on the sand, and sometimes Zelda falls. Zelda has great difficulties unfolding her Beach Chair. When Zelda finally settles down on the sand in her Beach Chair, nine times out of ten, she discovers that she has forgotten to shave a leg. When Zelda is not paying attention, dogs come up to her and pee on one of her legs — usually the shaved one. And, immediately after exiting the ocean after an ocean frolic, Zelda’s hair turns into this:
So you, Most Fashionable Reader, can imagine Zelda’s glee when she was delivered this Most Fabulous Piece of News from a Most Fashionable Friend of Fashion: a surfer finds Zelda sexy. (Clearly he has never seen Zelda, Utter Beach Disaster by Day, Wednesday Addams by Night, on the beach itself, but that’s beside the point.) O the joy! O the wonder! O the happy, happy day! Please try and understand, Reader of Fashion. This has been one of Zelda’s Secret Wishes for over two decades. And now, with just that tiny bit of information, Zelda feels that her life is quite close to complete. O happy day, Dear Reader! O happy day!
And here is a song to match Zelda’s mood! A song for all of us! Let’s all see that new horizon underneath that blazing sky! Can you hear the music playing? Can you see the banners flying?
Yes! The poem! Tonight, Zelda has taken Vivienne’s lead and performed line stretching on one of her favorite Guns ‘N Roses songs EVER: “Breakdown.”
Breakdown
I’ve come to know the cold. The beer
cans stack up against me like dominoes.
I am empty, an unmade bed, a form
without substance. A pelican nods itself
to sleep on a distant sandbar. An ice pick
being pulled from a freezer as the lone
taxi makes its way west. The night being
stuck to my back like a dying man’s fingers,
like a pair of hands struggling to regain sense.
The shape of you breaking me. The driftwood
bulkheads remain. I think of the crushed
ice in the corner of the cooler
as a hiding place, a place to rest
my heart on days like this when even the ocean
perspires. The cold shape of nothing
sifting through a swimsuit. There is beer,
there is nonalcoholic beer, and there is tequila. The organ donors smirking their way
to the front of the line at the pier.
There is salt, and there is a wound. There are
cigarettes snuffed out by the tide. In time,
everything is pulled from the shore to the sea.
There is the scabbing over.
I think of it as home.
Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader: this poemlogue will be woefully short.
Before constructing the poem below, Zelda had a convee with her Most Fashionable and Talented Friend JT, and they both agreed that they are both drawn to poems that punch them in their respective faces. Zelda has been thinking about Matthea Harvey and how she has not yet read Sad Little Breathing Machine ever since Matt posted about his purchase of Sad Little Breathing Machine on his Most Fashionable Blog. So Zelda decided to pick a Matthea Harvey poem to work with this evening. So she opened up Pity the Bathtub Its Forced Embrace of the Human Form to this poem. And yes, Most Fashionable Reader, it punched her in the face. Goddammit.
So, Most Fashionable Reader, Zelda has had a fairly good Sunday except for a) having a dog pee on her leg while she was at the beach, and b) having a poem punch her in the face. Ah, well. Could be worse.
For this evening’s poem, Zelda again followed Fashionable Poem Prompt / Poem Prompt of Fashion Number 5 by cutting the number of words in Harvey’s poem “Letting Go” by half. Zelda also found an Oulipian term for this: Double Curtailing. Zelda does not feel she improved Harvey’s poem like she improved a Tony Hoagland poem earlier, but she does feel she personalized Harvey’s poem for her very own self. Goddammit.
Letting Go
The first time he saw a full somersault
against the sky, he saw clouds. His eyes
were open. The geese, the pond, the plants
reflected his new perspective. At a slant,
the daisies were partly covered. Their yellow
centers shone like fog. It made sense to him
the first time. He was told the Lord would
listen. He wasn’t paying any attention. Discipline required for beginner’s lessons
in the tower. This didn’t hurt him. What did
was letting go when he wanted to hang on.
Zelda had great fun with her apocalyptic post yesterday evening — so much fun, in fact, that she decided to continue the apocalyptic theme of her last post. Zelda has decided to feature a song that was featured in the previously featured Apocalyptic Film of Fashion, A Thief in the Night. Most Fashionable Ladies and Gentlemen: Zelda shall forewarn you. Should you choose to watch the video below, the song in the video will remain in your heads for years after you have heard it. Should you choose to watch the video below, you will be humming and whistling this song for the rest of your entire life. It’s a risk, but it’s worth it. Oh, it’s so, so worth it.
The video below features DC Talk, a now-defunct Christian rap and rock group singing “I Wish We’d All Been Ready.” This song was originally sung by Larry Norman, who was a very popular Christian musician in the 60s and 70s (odd fact: Zelda just discovered that Black Francis happened to be a huge Larry Norman fan, and this fact has given Zelda the courage to admit what awful taste in music she had during her youth — much more detail revealed later in this post), and Larry Norman’s version was the one used in A Thief in the Night.
Enjoy!
Zelda would like you, Most Fashionable Readers, to know that she is not being mean-spirited when she discusses Popular Christian Contemporary Pop Music of Fashion, for she listened to Popular Christian Contemporary Pop Music of Fashion for quite a long time during her youth. She went to the Stephen Curtis Chapman concerts, she purchased Sandi Patty sheet music and played Amy Grant songs for piano recitals, and she nursed an innocent adolescent crush on Michael W. Smith for many years (mostly because, Zelda admits, that aforementioned Michael W. Smith looked remarkably like a pop star of the same era. Zelda is not going to tell you which pop star she is talking about; instead, she is going to let you, Dear Reader, figure it out for yourself by examining a Michael W. Smith album cover from 1990, posted at left).
[By the way, Most Fashionable Reader, Zelda has just received a text from Slash. Slash was very distraught that Zelda was writing a post about music and had not included him. Slash was so distraught that he inserted himself into this post without Zelda's knowledge. Can you find him, Dear Reader? Can you find him?]
For this evening’s FaOuLiPoWriMoFa (Fashionable Oulipo Writing Month of Fashion) exercise, Zelda has taken the aforementioned song, “I Wish We’d All Been Ready” and created a permutation out of it. A permutation is the “action of changing the order of a set of things lineally arranged,” and it is described most fashionably in the Fashionable Oulipo Compendium of Fashion on page 210. Zelda permutated each line of the song and came up with the poem below.
I Wish We’d All Been Ready
With guns and war, life was filled,
trampled on the floor, and everyone got
ready. I wish we’d all been.
The days grew cold, children. Died.
Buy a bag of gold; a piece of bread could.
Ready? I wish we’d all been
your mind. There’s no time to change,
and you’ve been left behind. The Son has come
in bed. A man and wife asleep.
Her head? He’s gone. She hears a noise. She turns,
ready. I wish we’d all been
walking up a hill. Two men walking,
left standing. Still, one disappears, and one’s
been ready. I wish we’d all
your mind. There’s no time to change;
come, and you’ve been left behind. The Son has
your mind; there’s no time. To change,
you have been so blind. How could you?
The demons dined. The Father spoke,
left behind. The Son has come and you’ve been
behind. You’ve been left,
left behind. You’ve been.
Zelda has a confession to make, Most Fashionable Reader. Zelda has many Secret Obsessions. One of Zelda’s Secret Obsessions, Most Fashionable Reader, is the Apocalypse — the horsemen trampling down the skies of fire Apocalypse, the holding in her hand a cup full of abominations Apocalypse, the foul spirits spewing forth from the gaping maw of the dragon Apocalypse. Zelda collects fashionable apocalyptic literature-in-fashionable-quotation-marks, and she is quite fond of her collection. Zelda views this collection as a reclamation of her childhood, as most of her early years were spent poring over tracts and pamphlets not unlike the ones she collects now, then squeezing her eyes shut as tightly as she could and praying please please please Jesus I have to be Raptured please please please Jesus don’t leave me down here with the Beast; memorizing the Book of Revelation, then furtively scanning the bodies of everyone she encountered for anything that could be interpreted as a Mark of the Most Unfashionable Beast, be it heart-shaped birthmark or bar-code tattoo; and waking up in cold sweats in the middle of the night, then screaming PLEASE PLEASE O PLEASE JESUS PLEASE LET MY NAME BE WRITTEN IN THE BOOK OF LIFE.
Needless to say, Dear Reader, Zelda’s childhood was fraught with paralyzing fear. Each time she cursed (and in those days, Most Fashionable Reader, cursing to Zelda was saying the word “butt”), each time she told a little white lie, each time she spoke out of turn in class, each time she told her older brother to just shut up and leave her alone, she envisioned a dreadfully stern and unsympathetic heavenly envoy dipping his hand-cut phoenix quill into an inkwell filled with the blackest of inks made from the burnt bones of the damned and using this inkstained quill to, with a solemnly dramatic flourish, strike her name from the Book of Life.
Zelda finally began to distance herself from her paralyzing fears when she was a freshman in college. A film was mentioned in passing in one of her religion classes, and Zelda, on a whim, rented it. She persuaded a Most Fashionable Friend of Fashion to watch it with her, so they sat on the carpet remnant on the floor of Zelda’s dorm room, surrounded by an Ansel Adams poster (belonging to Zelda’s Unfashionable Roommate), two pairs of Doc Martens (one belonging to Zelda, the other to her Most Fashionable Friend of Fashion), a Pulp Fiction poster (Zelda’s), a vase full of iridescent rocks (Unfashionable Roommate’s), a half-empty carton of Camel Lights (smoked surreptitiously by the window, as Zelda’s Roommate of Unfashion disliked it when Zelda smoked in the room), sorority sweatersets (Unfashionable Roommate’s), and a hunter green JCPenney twin comforter (unfortunately Zelda’s), and they began to watch the film. And their mouths dropped open in disbelief as soon as the film began. And their mouths stayed that way for the film’s entirety. The film? A Thief in the Night.
Kirk Cameron, eat your heart out. Left Behind’s got nothing on this:
Oh yeah! The poem!
The most recent addition to Zelda’s Fashionable Collection of Apocalyptic Literature-in-Quotation-Marks, a booklet entitled The Atomic Bomb and the End of the World by Hyman J. Appelman, was given to her a few months ago by a Most Fashionable Friend. Zelda has taken this booklet and created a cento, or a patchwork verse, from it. Zelda has taken liberties with punctuation, but no words have been changed.
All Things Shall Be Dissolved
I. The Failure of Science
Science has failed in trying to build a world.
It taught us if the world could only be,
all of the fearful evils would come to an end.
I am not decrying God. Here is the proof:
the leading scholars of the world
towered head and shoulders above the rest.
Synthetics, plastics, guided missiles, war.
Educated demons wrote a page.
An educated devil is terrible.
The houses of our land were so equipped.
War broke out. The generals: tried.
Science failed in trying to build a world.
II. The Faithfulness of Scripture
The atomic bomb is a revelation. It took
up the sword once. God got tired of it.
Where is the boasting that shook its fist to shout
around the world that it was peace? God got
tired of it. It took up the sword once too often.
The devastation in the moving pictures.
The wreckage and ruin is still terrible.
For miles there was nothing but ruin, corpses found.
Torn apart, the sword left its scabbard.
An ignoble end! The wages of sin!
The earth transformed by the last visitation.
III. The Future of the Saint and the Sinner
The rest of the lesson: prayers about the bombs.
Out to lunch: appetizers, bombs
for the salad, bombs for the main course,
mention of the bombs, tired despair.
The future of the saint: deliverance.
Deliverance from past, present, future.
There is also a word, but one word for you.
The bomb spells, preaches, proclaims DOOM.
The bleakness of DOOM! The blackness of DOOM!
The frightful curse, the terrible eternity of DOOM!
Zelda is going to make quite a few associative leaps in the poemlogue that follows, Most Fashionable Reader, so please bear with her.
So.
Let’s say Zelda likens herself to Alice, the Most Fashionable Heroine of the Most Fashionable Resident Evil Trilogy. Zelda enjoys likening herself to Alice (played by the Most Fashionable of All Fashionable B-Movie Queens, Milla Jovovich), for, in Resident Evil: Apocalypse, Alice must fight the Wretched and Vile Nemesis, whose face is too vile and too hideous to be posted on such a fashionable blog, and this Wretched and Vile Nemesis reminds Zelda of her own wretched and vile nemesis, who would tell Zelda that the subjects of her poems were not interesting enough to be written about, who would reply to Zelda’s fashionable and insightful comments with nothing but A BLACK HOLE OF SILENCE, who would, after Zelda’s fashionable and insightful comments and the unfashionable silences that would follow them, abruptly turn to another student and say, “Well, what did YOU think?”
Ahem. Onward!
So if Zelda likens herself to Alice, played by the Fashionable Milla Jovovich, Zelda must absolutely liken the Most Fashionable Vivienne to Diva Plavalaguna from The Fifth Element (which also stars the Most Fashionable Milla Jovovich). Why? Because Diva Plavalaguna KICKS ASS almost as much as Our Most Fashionable Vivienne of Fashion does. In addition to kicking ass, the Most Fashionable Diva holds within herself the Four Stones of Fashion, the very keys to humanity’s existence. Vivienne proved her Most Fashionable Diva-ness for the BILLIONTH time earlier this week when she correctly interpreted an event Zelda witnessed not as a mere event, but as a SIGN and a VISION from the Benevolent and Graceful and Forever Fashionable Anne Carson. Below, Zelda shall condense this vision as much as she can, because she does not want it to seem like an essay one would read in a creative nonfiction workshop, or a daily devotion one would read in The Upper Room, or Daily Guideposts. Here goes:
After work one day this week, Zelda joined a Friend of Most Fashionable Fashion (FoMFF) at the beach because, at this point, Zelda would rather be called Leatherface than Wednesday Fucking Addams, so she is working on her tan as much as she possibly can. “Look at that sailboat in the water,” FoMFF said as she pointed to a small sailboat-sized speck on the horizon. “I see it,” Zelda said. “They’re tourists,” FoMFF said. “They have no idea what they’re doing. They tried to go out earlier, and they flipped the boat before they got out very far.” It turns out, Most Fashionable Reader, that Water Rescue had to be called to bring the sailors back to the shore. “So why are they out there now?” Zelda said. “I have no idea,” FoMFF said. “As soon as Water Rescue left, they put the boat back in the water.” So Zelda and her FoMFF watched the small sailboat-sized speck on the horizon move back and forth for a while. Then Zelda and her FoMFF watched the small sailboat-sized speck on the horizon attempt to turn and come back to shore. Then Zelda and her Friend of Most Fashionable Fashion watched the sailboat flip. Again. Zelda and her FoMFF watched as the sailors tried in vain to right the sailboat. Then Zelda and her FoMFF watched as the sailboat completely sank. Then Zelda and her FoMFF watched as the Water Rescue Dinghy AND the Big Coast Guard Boat rescued aforementioned sailors.
After hearing this, Vivienne of Most Fashionable Fashion cries out, “This is a Vision, Zelda! A Vision of Benevolence and Grace sent to you by the Benevolent and Wise Anne Carson!” “What does it mean, Vivienne,” Zelda said. “What does it mean?” “It means, Most Fashionable Zelda, that the Wise and Benevolent Anne Carson is SENDING YOU A MESSAGE. And the message is to NOT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE TWICE. DO NOT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE TWICE, ZELDA. YOU MUSTN’T MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE TWICE.” “Vivienne!” Zelda said. “You are so wise! You are so benevolent! You are a vessel of wisdom and benevolence for the wise and benevolent Anne Carson! THANK YOU! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR CHANGING MY LIFE!!!”
Thank you, Most Fashionable Vivienne of the Utmost Fashion. Thank you.
Oh yeah! The poem!
For this poem, I have used a constraint that Vivienne and I recently devised. It is called Altered Punctuosity. When one applies Altered Punctuosity to an existing poem, one does not change any of the poem’s words. Instead, one changes the punctuation. I attempted to apply Altered Punctuousity to the entirety of Randall Jarrell’s “The Woman at the Washington Zoo,” but it didn’t work too well for the poem as a whole. I keep telling myself that it’s Jarrell’s fault, not mine. Ha! So I leave you, Most Fashionable Reader of Fashion, with a poem I created by applying Altered Punctuosity to the beginning of Randall Jarrell’s “The Woman at the Washington Zoo.”
The Woman
At the Washington Zoo, the saris go by me.
From the embassies: cloth from the moon,
cloth from another planet they look back at.
The leopard like the leopard.
And I, this print of mine that has kept its color
alive through so many cleanings.
This dull null.
Navy I wear to work, and wear.
From work and so to my bed.
So to my grave.
[A preface: Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader: Zelda is very pleased and very excited tonight, for, earlier in the evening, Most Fashionable Vivienne of Fashion listened as Zelda recounted an occurrence that had occurred earlier in the week. When Zelda finished recounting, Vivienne bestowed upon Zelda great and wise knowledge of benevolence, goodwill, and fashion. Vivienne revealed that the occurrence that Zelda recounted was not, in fact, an occurrence at all, but that it was, in fact, a beautiful and benevolent mystical vision sent to Zelda by the beautiful and benevolent Anne Carson. Zelda must wait and let the meaning of the beautiful and benevolent vision settle in her mind before she reveals it to you, Most Fashionable Reader. This means that Zelda will write about it tomorrow. But O! The joy! Thank you, Wise and Fashionable Vivienne, Vessel of Fashion! Thank you!]
Now. Zelda is trying to push herself out of her comfort zone. This means that Zelda is becoming more open to doing things that Zelda wouldn’t normally do. So when a Fashionable Friend of Zelda’s invited Zelda to take a class with her, Zelda jumped at the chance. Now this class is not just any class, Dear Reader. This class is a Class of Fashion. This class, Dear Reader, is a Pottery Class. Both Zelda and her Fashionable Friend have admitted that they envision themselves looking like Demi Moore in Ghost, fashionably crafting Wares of Fashion in Fashionable Overalls at the Fashionable Potter’s Wheel while the Righteous Brothers serenade them ever-so-softly.
Now, Zelda realizes that, instead of looking like Demi Moore, she will most likely look like Charlize Theron did in Monster, but even that does not deter her! She knows that, no matter what she looks like at that Fashionable Potter’s Wheel of Fashion, she will walk out of that pottery class with Useful and Fashionable Wares, such as an ashtray that looks vaguely like an ashtray, an ashtray that looks vaguely like a vase, a coffee mug that shares many of the same characteristics as an ashtray, and a bust of the Fashionable Joan Crawford that looks suspiciously like an ashtray. Zelda is incredibly excited!
Oh yeah! The poem!
For this poem, Most Fashionable Reader, I have, as best I can, followed the example of Harry Mathew’s 35 Variations on a Theme from Shakespeare. Due to time constraints, I had to limit my number of variations to thirteen. My source text comes from Ovid:
I love him but I cannot seem to find him.
The Well-Read Reader of Fashion will know that the text comes from the story of Narcissus, and that when Narcissus says, “I love him but I cannot seem to find him,” he is actually speaking of himself, not his beloved in a biblical sense. I say, however, that when we search for our beloveds, aren’t we searching for ourselves as well? So in my poem for the evening, the speaker is actually searching for her beloved. My variations are as follows: 1 Lipogram in i; 2 Lipogram in c, d, f, g, j, k, l, m, p, v, w, x, y, z; 3 Snowball; 4 Lipogram in a; 5 Anagram; 6 Lipogram in e; 7 Missing letter; 8 Emphasis; 9 Another point of view; 10 Double curtailing; 11 Subtle insight; 12 Amplification; 13 Interrogative mode.
13 Variations on a Line from Ovid
1
Love the man, and look for the man.
2
I restrain him. Then I see to him.
3
I am the lone woman, taking moments whenever necessary.
4
I love him — then I lose him.
5
Don a mind font. Hit his vile ocean mime.
6
Fuck him, and by morning, the man is missing.
7
I love him, and I cannot see to find him.
8
I love him, you see. He’s the object of my affection, the last Hot Tamale in the box, the one I’ve lost my sugarcoated heart to, the one I long for when the night begins. I love him and I cannot seem to find him — he, the catamaran on the horizon, the pelican that flew past the rotting pier. He disappeared like a twenty from a back pocket, a lighter from a purse. What I’m really trying to say, I suppose, is this: love and loss can be found in the same sentence quite often.
9 Then try another bar, ya dumb broad!
10
I love, and I cannot.
11
Love, my friends, is merely a journey.
12
When one loves another, much time is spent searching.
For this post, Zelda shall continue her procrastination. But! Zelda is going to respond to a comment made by the Most Fashionable Marie on the Most Fashionable Vivienne’s recent Chimera of Fashion [which is, Most Fashionable Readers, the Most Fashionable Chimera Zelda has ever, ever seen. long live the Chimera of Fashion! long live Vivienne! hooray!]. The Most Fashionable Marie’s comment was as follows:
Zelda would really, really, really love to hear what Vivienne has to say about this. Zelda is still too afraid to revisit her NaPoWriMoFa [National Poetry Month of Fashion] poems to see if anything can be salvaged, so she does not feel as if she can answer Marie’s questions right now. However! Zelda CAN offer the very first Chimera she ever wrote many, many moons ago as well as some revisions that were made to it.Without intercourse, lodging as a cultural and generic woman, she heard a possession she had never expressed, as though she were remaining completely projected out by a particular thrust. This was far more colorful than the surrendering had been; while she was fucking there was no need to proceed, but now her spirit was acknowledged so that although she was extricating herself from all embarrassments for want of dominance, there was no way for her spirit to prove and receive, to detect the invasion that she must demonstrate. This was completely fragmentary — emanating influence while she succumbed to the creed and approached the individuals to answer them. She scoffed resistance, but her smiling fist couldn’t wait. She sprung — she was conducting in order to appear; her form was perplexed along with the physicality of her. Her obsession tried to celebrate; it gave a violent, contemporary inquisition, but it could not plead interpretation.
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Chimera, Clearly Zel Has Issues, General angst, Graduate School Yeah that Sucked, Instructions for Wooing Zel | Tagged: fashionable chimeras of fashion | 
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Posted by zeldafitzgerald
Consider Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in The Departed. Consider his perpetually furrowed brow. Consider his propensity toward violence. Consider his height and his scowl. Consider the curve of his shoulders. Consider that he orders cranberry juice at a bar, which suggests an attempt to refrain from drinking alcohol, which suggests a previous unhealthy relationship with alcohol. Consider that he has identity issues. Consider that he has many issues, period, but consider that he is still more mature than any man his age that this speaker has ever met. Consider that, after verbally sparring with his appointed psychiatrist, he asks her if she’d like to join him for a cup of coffee. Consider that she says yes. Consider that this speaker would say yes to a cup of coffee with Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in The Departed, too. Consider the slim chance of happiness for this most fashionable speaker since the only man in the whole world she feels she can love is a fictional creation, one who doesn’t even make it to the end of the movie. Consider this, Dear Reader. Consider this.
Most Fashionable Reader! Since Zelda shamefully admitted to being Shamefully and Highly Unfashionable as of late, Zelda has discovered that it is quite therapeutic to reveal secrets of shame and great sorrow. So. Today, Most Fashionable Reader / Reader of Fashion, Zelda will reveal, for the first time publicly, one of her secrets that she deems Incredibly Shameful.
person who goes up to strangers and says, “Well hello! My name is Zelda, and I am a sober alcoholic who has battled depression and anxiety all of her life! How are you doing this most fashionable evening?” Zelda does, however, have no qualms with discussing her issues when she deems such a discussion necessary.
But here’s the thing, Dearest Reader: Zelda doesn’t want to be known as a creative woman. When Zelda thinks of creativity, she thinks of windchimes made from thriftstore silverware, potholders made from bottlecaps, wreaths made from dried apple cores, etc., etc. Zelda doesn’t want to be a creative person who happens to have ADD. She wants to be a successful person who happens to have ADD. She wants a baker’s dozen of personal assistants, she wants to dictate confidential memos to her secretary, she wants a Range Rover the color of gunmetal, she wants an executive chair covered with Italian leather at the head of a boardroom table, etc., etc. This is why she found 
Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader: Zelda has been busy being an Active Invalid of Unfashion these past few days, the climax of this Unfashion occurring late yesterday evening after Zelda and a Benevolent Friend watched The Bucket List [which, by the way, Dear Reader, has been FALSELY BILLED AS A COMEDY! IT IS A FILM OF TRAGEDY AND GREAT SORROW!]. At the end of The Bucket List, Zelda fell dramatically onto her Benevolent Friend’s hardwood floor, curled up into a fetal position, and sobbed, “I am going to dieeeeeeeeeeee alone. I am going to die aloooooooooooooooooooone. Aloooooooooone.”
So Zelda furiously drove back to her apartment, alone. Whilst driving, she violently smoked cigarette after cigarette, alone. She stomped up her flight of stairs, alone. She brushed her teeth so hard that her gums bled, alone. She furiously plumped her highly fashionable pillow, alone, and Zelda finally drifted off into a Sleep Full of Rage and Fury and Sorrow. Alone.
The Careful and Quite Fashionable Reader may have noticed from Zelda’s previous posts that she is quite fond of the ocean. One might go so far as to say that Zelda is obsessed with it, since Zelda spends most of her free time on the shore and includes the ocean, sand, and/or pelicans in nearly every poem she writes. Now, Most Fashionable Reader, Zelda could lie to you. Zelda could lie and say that she is quite stunning on the shore with her plethora of Swimsuits of Fashion and her sunkissed brown hair blowing ever-so-seductively in the breeze. Zelda could lie to you, but she won’t.
Instead, Zelda will say that instead of being the Seductress of the Atlantic, Zelda is the Cutie Pie of the Atlantic, a sort of nouveau Gidget, with her pigtails and her thick bangs and her Stylishly Retro Swimsuits of Fashion. Zelda will say this, Fashionable Reader — but this, too, is a lie. Here is the Unfashionable Truth, Dear Reader: Zelda is an Utter Beach Disaster. Zelda can be seen from miles away as she approaches the shore, wobbling from the weight of her Beach Chair, her Beach Cooler, and her Beach Bag. Zelda always trips while she searches for the Perfect Spot on the sand, and sometimes Zelda falls. Zelda has great difficulties unfolding her Beach Chair. When Zelda finally settles down on the sand in her Beach Chair, nine times out of ten, she discovers that she has forgotten to shave a leg. When Zelda is not paying attention, dogs come up to her and pee on one of her legs — usually the shaved one. And, immediately after exiting the ocean after an ocean frolic, Zelda’s hair turns into this:
Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader: this poemlogue will be woefully short.
Zelda had great fun with her apocalyptic post yesterday evening — so much fun, in fact, that she decided to continue the apocalyptic theme of her last post. Zelda has decided to feature a song that was featured in the previously featured Apocalyptic Film of Fashion, A Thief in the Night. Most Fashionable Ladies and Gentlemen: Zelda shall forewarn you. Should you choose to watch the video below, the song in the video will remain in your heads for years after you have heard it. Should you choose to watch the video below, you will be humming and whistling this song for the rest of your entire life. It’s a risk, but it’s worth it. Oh, it’s so, so worth it.
The video below features DC Talk, a now-defunct Christian rap and rock group singing “I Wish We’d All Been Ready.” This song was originally sung by Larry Norman, who was a very popular Christian musician in the 60s and 70s (odd fact: Zelda just discovered that Black Francis happened to be a huge Larry Norman fan, and this fact has given Zelda the courage to admit what awful taste in music she had during her youth — much more detail revealed later in this post), and Larry Norman’s version was the one used in A Thief in the Night.
Zelda would like you, Most Fashionable Readers, to know that she is not being mean-spirited when she discusses Popular Christian Contemporary Pop Music of Fashion, for she listened to Popular Christian Contemporary Pop Music of Fashion for quite a long time during her youth. She went to the Stephen Curtis Chapman concerts, she purchased Sandi Patty sheet music and played Amy Grant songs for piano recitals, and she nursed an innocent adolescent crush on Michael W. Smith for many years (mostly because, Zelda admits, that aforementioned Michael W. Smith looked remarkably like a pop star of the same era. Zelda is not going to tell you which pop star she is talking about; instead, she is going to let you, Dear Reader, figure it out for yourself by examining a Michael W. Smith album cover from 1990, posted at left).
Zelda has a confession to make, Most Fashionable Reader. Zelda has many Secret Obsessions. One of Zelda’s Secret Obsessions, Most Fashionable Reader, is the Apocalypse — the horsemen trampling down the skies of fire Apocalypse, the holding in her hand a cup full of abominations Apocalypse, the foul spirits spewing forth from the gaping maw of the dragon Apocalypse. Zelda collects fashionable apocalyptic literature-in-fashionable-quotation-marks, and she is quite fond of her collection. Zelda views this collection as a reclamation of her childhood, as most of her early years were spent poring over tracts and pamphlets not unlike the ones she collects now, then squeezing her eyes shut as tightly as she could and praying please please please Jesus I have to be Raptured please please please Jesus don’t leave me down here with the Beast; memorizing the Book of Revelation, then furtively scanning the bodies of everyone she encountered for anything that could be interpreted as a Mark of the Most Unfashionable Beast, be it heart-shaped birthmark or bar-code tattoo; and waking up in cold sweats in the middle of the night, then screaming PLEASE PLEASE O PLEASE JESUS PLEASE LET MY NAME BE WRITTEN IN THE BOOK OF LIFE.
Needless to say, Dear Reader, Zelda’s childhood was fraught with paralyzing fear. Each time she cursed (and in those days, Most Fashionable Reader, cursing to Zelda was saying the word “butt”), each time she told a little white lie, each time she spoke out of turn in class, each time she told her older brother to just shut up and leave her alone, she envisioned a dreadfully stern and unsympathetic heavenly envoy dipping his hand-cut phoenix quill into an inkwell filled with the blackest of inks made from the burnt bones of the damned and using this inkstained quill to, with a solemnly dramatic flourish, strike her name from the Book of Life.
Zelda finally began to distance herself from her paralyzing fears when she was a freshman in college. A film was mentioned in passing in one of her religion classes, and Zelda, on a whim, rented it. She persuaded a Most Fashionable Friend of Fashion to watch it with her, so they sat on the carpet remnant on the floor of Zelda’s dorm room, surrounded by an Ansel Adams poster (belonging to Zelda’s Unfashionable Roommate), two pairs of Doc Martens (one belonging to Zelda, the other to her Most Fashionable Friend of Fashion), a Pulp Fiction poster (Zelda’s), a vase full of iridescent rocks (Unfashionable Roommate’s), a half-empty carton of Camel Lights (smoked surreptitiously by the window, as Zelda’s Roommate of Unfashion disliked it when Zelda smoked in the room), sorority sweatersets (Unfashionable Roommate’s), and a hunter green JCPenney twin comforter (unfortunately Zelda’s), and they began to watch the film. And their mouths dropped open in disbelief as soon as the film began. And their mouths stayed that way for the film’s entirety. The film? A Thief in the Night.
The most recent addition to Zelda’s Fashionable Collection of Apocalyptic Literature-in-Quotation-Marks, a booklet entitled The Atomic Bomb and the End of the World by Hyman J. Appelman, was given to her a few months ago by a Most Fashionable Friend. Zelda has taken this booklet and created a cento, or a patchwork verse, from it. Zelda has taken liberties with punctuation, but no words have been changed.
Zelda is going to make quite a few associative leaps in the poemlogue that follows, Most Fashionable Reader, so please bear with her.
So if Zelda likens herself to Alice, played by the Fashionable Milla Jovovich, Zelda must absolutely liken the Most Fashionable Vivienne to Diva Plavalaguna from The Fifth Element (which also stars the Most Fashionable Milla Jovovich). Why? Because Diva Plavalaguna KICKS ASS almost as much as Our Most Fashionable Vivienne of Fashion does. In addition to kicking ass, the Most Fashionable Diva holds within herself the Four Stones of Fashion, the very keys to humanity’s existence. Vivienne proved her Most Fashionable Diva-ness for the BILLIONTH time earlier this week when she correctly interpreted an event Zelda witnessed not as a mere event, but as a SIGN and a VISION from the Benevolent and Graceful and Forever Fashionable Anne Carson. Below, Zelda shall condense this vision as much as she can, because she does not want it to seem like an essay one would read in a creative nonfiction workshop, or a daily devotion one would read in The Upper Room, or Daily Guideposts. Here goes:
After work one day this week, Zelda joined a Friend of Most Fashionable Fashion (FoMFF) at the beach because, at this point, Zelda would rather be called Leatherface than Wednesday Fucking Addams, so she is working on her tan as much as she possibly can. “Look at that sailboat in the water,” FoMFF said as she pointed to a small sailboat-sized speck on the horizon. “I see it,” Zelda said. “They’re tourists,” FoMFF said. “They have no idea what they’re doing. They tried to go out earlier, and they flipped the boat before they got out very far.” It turns out, Most Fashionable Reader, that Water Rescue had to be called to bring the sailors back to the shore. “So why are they out there now?” Zelda said. “I have no idea,” FoMFF said. “As soon as Water Rescue left, they put the boat back in the water.” So Zelda and her FoMFF watched the small sailboat-sized speck on the horizon move back and forth for a while. Then Zelda and her FoMFF watched the small sailboat-sized speck on the horizon attempt to turn and come back to shore. Then Zelda and her Friend of Most Fashionable Fashion watched the sailboat flip. Again. Zelda and her FoMFF watched as the sailors tried in vain to right the sailboat. Then Zelda and her FoMFF watched as the sailboat completely sank. Then Zelda and her FoMFF watched as the Water Rescue Dinghy AND the Big Coast Guard Boat rescued aforementioned sailors.
For this poem, I have used a constraint that Vivienne and I recently devised. It is called Altered Punctuosity. When one applies Altered Punctuosity to an existing poem, one does not change any of the poem’s words. Instead, one changes the punctuation. I attempted to apply Altered Punctuousity to the entirety of Randall Jarrell’s “The Woman at the Washington Zoo,” but it didn’t work too well for the poem as a whole. I keep telling myself that it’s Jarrell’s fault, not mine. Ha! So I leave you, Most Fashionable Reader of Fashion, with a poem I created by applying Altered Punctuosity to the beginning of Randall Jarrell’s “The Woman at the Washington Zoo.”
[A preface: Dearest, Most Fashionable Reader: Zelda is very pleased and very excited tonight, for, earlier in the evening, Most Fashionable Vivienne of Fashion listened as Zelda recounted an occurrence that had occurred earlier in the week. When Zelda finished recounting, Vivienne bestowed upon Zelda great and wise knowledge of benevolence, goodwill, and fashion. Vivienne revealed that the occurrence that Zelda recounted was not, in fact, an occurrence at all, but that it was, in fact, a beautiful and benevolent mystical vision sent to Zelda by the beautiful and benevolent Anne Carson. Zelda must wait and let the meaning of the beautiful and benevolent vision settle in her mind before she reveals it to you, Most Fashionable Reader. This means that Zelda will write about it tomorrow. But O! The joy! Thank you, Wise and Fashionable Vivienne, Vessel of Fashion! Thank you!]
Now. Zelda is trying to push herself out of her comfort zone. This means that Zelda is becoming more open to doing things that Zelda wouldn’t normally do. So when a Fashionable Friend of Zelda’s invited Zelda to take a class with her, Zelda jumped at the chance. Now this class is not just any class, Dear Reader. This class is a Class of Fashion. This class, Dear Reader, is a Pottery Class. Both Zelda and her Fashionable Friend have admitted that they envision themselves looking like Demi Moore in Ghost, fashionably crafting Wares of Fashion in Fashionable Overalls at the Fashionable Potter’s Wheel while the Righteous Brothers serenade them ever-so-softly.
Now, Zelda realizes that, instead of looking like Demi Moore, she will most likely look like Charlize Theron did in Monster, but even that does not deter her! She knows that, no matter what she looks like at that Fashionable Potter’s Wheel of Fashion, she will walk out of that pottery class with Useful and Fashionable Wares, such as an ashtray that looks vaguely like an ashtray, an ashtray that looks vaguely like a vase, a coffee mug that shares many of the same characteristics as an ashtray, and a bust of the Fashionable Joan Crawford that looks suspiciously like an ashtray. Zelda is incredibly excited!