# Writing > Personal Poetry >  Sit, Nonchalant Doggy!

## Pompey Bum

Sit, Nonchalant Doggy!
by Robert Frost (Footrest, brr!)

Refrigerated gnus' tonsils,
Adhere, thou threshold!
Holy seafarer, farewell!
Ah, loony burnouts!
Unabashed, effete, ill sots!
Finks! Renegades, too
(Nowadays dowsed), go not!
Sit, nonchalant doggy!

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## cacian

Haha an amazing array of vocabulary Pompey.
Loving this amusing charming piece very clever!!
assuming this is about your pet right?
 :Biggrin:

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## Pompey Bum

> Haha an amazing array of vocabulary Pompey.
> Loving this amusing charming piece very clever!!
> assuming this is about your pet right?


Thanks Cacian.  :Smile: 

But heavens no, it's pure gibberish! Or to be more precise, it's an anagram of a poem by the great New England poet Robert Frost. An anagram is a kind of wordplay hat rearranges the letters of something (in this case, the individual lines) to form new words. This is a fun kind of puzzle, but hard because you have to use all the letters. 

Here is Frost's original poem (more or less about innocence). I was a beast to mutilate something so beautiful. 

Nothing Gold Can Stay
by Robert Frost

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold. 
Her early leaf's a flower; 
But only so an hour. 
Then leaf subsides to leaf. 
So Eden sank to grief, 
So dawn goes down to day. 
Nothing gold can stay.

And here's my "improvement" again:

Sit, Nonchalant Doggy!
by Robert Frost (Footrest, brr!)

Refrigerated gnus' tonsils,
Adhere, thou threshold!
Holy seafarer, farewell!
Ah, loony burnouts!
Unabashed, effete, ill sots!
Finks! Renegades, too
(Nowadays dowsed), go not!
Sit, nonchalant doggy!

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## cacian

> Thanks Cacian. 
> 
> But heavens no, it's pure gibberish! Or to be more precise, it's an anagram of a poem by the great New England poet Robert Frost. An anagram is a kind of wordplay hat rearranges the letters of something (in this case, the individual lines) to form new words. This is a fun kind of puzzle, but hard because you have to use all the letters. 
> 
> Here is Frost's original poem (more or less about innocence). I was a beast to mutilate something so beautiful. 
> 
> Nothing Gold Can Stay
> by Robert Frost
> 
> ...


Interesting Pompey.
The question is:
Would one be able to recognise from looking at it that is one of Frost's poem?
At a glance or against the clock I means?

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## cacian

> Thanks Cacian. 
> 
> But heavens no, it's pure gibberish! Or to be more precise, it's an anagram of a poem by the great New England poet Robert Frost. An anagram is a kind of wordplay hat rearranges the letters of something (in this case, the individual lines) to form new words. This is a fun kind of puzzle, but hard because you have to use all the letters. 
> 
> Here is Frost's original poem (more or less about innocence). I was a beast to mutilate something so beautiful. 
> 
> Nothing Gold Can Stay
> by Robert Frost
> 
> ...


Interesting Pompey.
The question is:
Would one be able to recognise from looking at your version that it is one of Frost's poems?
At a glance or against the clock I means?

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## Pompey Bum

More of the same. Can someone really not fix this?

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## Pompey Bum

> Interesting Pompey.
> The question is:
> Would one be able to recognise from looking at it that is one of Frost's poem?
> At a glance or against the clock I means?


At the Frost version? Sure, I know it by heart. I can barely read it without crying. But at my anagram version? Lord, no. That's why I put Frost's name next to his anagram in the first post. I was hoping someone would try to guess which poem it was. But it seems they all said (except for you): "Oh well, another incipherable Pompey Bum poem--don't think I'll bother." That srruck me funny because my imagery can be bit obscure. But I appreciate your trying and thinking it was about my dog. I miss my dog.

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## cacian

> At the Frost version? Sure, I know it by heart. I can barely read it without crying. But at my anagram version? Lord, no. That's why I put Frost's name next to his anagram in the first post. I was hoping someone would try to guess which poem it was. But it seems they all said (except for you): "Oh well, another incipherable Pompey Bum poem--don't think I'll bother." That srruck me funny because my imagery can be bit obscure. But I appreciate your trying and thinking it was about my dog. I miss my dog.


Sorry to hear it. What happened to your dog and what was it called?
Hope you do not mind me asking.  :Smile:

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## Pompey Bum

No, I don't mind. We talked about it once before actually, although maybe I didn't go into details. His name was Conner. He was a giant greyhound, very strong but timid with everyone but me. He'd been raced and scared when he was young. One day he heard fireworks going off and panicked. He jumped his fence and just kept going. I looked for him for a day and a night before I found his body--killed by a car that apparently didn't bother stopping. This was a long time ago, but I still miss him and see him in my dreams. He's still my dog.

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## cacian

> No, I don't mind. We talked about it once before actually, although maybe I didn't go into details. His name was Conner. He was a giant greyhound, very strong but timid with everyone but me. He'd been raced and scared when he was young. One day he heard fireworks going off and panicked. He jumped his fence and just kept going. I looked for him for a day and a night before I found his body--killed by a car that apparently didn't bother stopping. This was a long time ago, but I still miss him and see him in my dreams. He's still my dog.


Oh no that must have been very hard for you.
People do tend to replace their dog. Have you not thought of getting another one?
I guess it is hard to let go of a pet hence why I never want to get a pet although I adore animals.

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## Pompey Bum

Well, the short answer is that there are things in my life that preclude it now. But it's okay. He was a great dog.

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## cacian

> Well, the short answer is that there are things in my life that preclude it now. But it's okay. He was a great dog.


One in a million as they say. It is amasing that you still see him in your dreams. Dogs are phenomenal creatures.  :Smile:

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## Pompey Bum

Yes, I see him in my nightmares. Just as things are getting bad, I will see him, or sometimes he will run up to me, and then I will think to myself--Wait a minute, Conner's dead. This can't be real. Then I will immediately wake up. We always looked out for each other, you know?  :Smile:

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## cacian

> Yes, I see him in my nightmares. Just as things are getting bad, I will see him, or sometimes he will run up to me, and then I will think to myself--Wait a minute, Conner's dead. This can't be real. Then I will immediately wake up. We always looked out for each other, you know?


I see. I did not think it was a nightmare. I have never owned a dog so I don't how one relates to one and the other way around but it does almost incredible what you said about ''looking out for each other''. It is rather special.  :Smile:

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## cacian

> Yes, I see him in my nightmares. Just as things are getting bad, I will see him, or sometimes he will run up to me, and then I will think to myself--Wait a minute, Conner's dead. This can't be real. Then I will immediately wake up. We always looked out for each other, you know?


I see. I did not think it was a nightmare. I have never owned a dog so I don't how one relates to one and the other way around but it does almost incredible what you said about ''looking out for each other''. It is rather special.  :Smile:

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## Danik 2016

Sorry about the dog, PB, even if it was years ago.

As for the poem, which is,of course, meant to be nonsensical,seems to express in its own way the feeling of the ephemerous presence of things and creatures one wants to stay with us, the tension between farewell and stay.

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## Pompey Bum

Thanks, Danik. Yes, it is nonsense. If there is any tension between "Holy seafarer, farewell!" and "Go not!", it is oracular--by which I mean that's just the way the letters went together. But I did hesitate over the contradiction. The problem was that I really _liked_ "Holy seafarer, farewell!". It seemed dignified and vaguely Homeric--so funny next to vernacular insults like "burnouts" and "finks". I don't know, maybe the narrator is bidding farewell to a worthy seafarer but telling the dumb ones who want go along with him not to bother. It's just nonsense in any case. Refrigerated gnus' tonsils indeed!  :Smile:

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## Danik 2016

Well , our postmodernity loves nonsense and hates to compromise, for what I know..So that's fine,

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## tailor STATELY

Missed this somehow on Saturday (I take Litnet off on Sundays for a personal Sabbath devotion). A wonderful homage for your dear departed dog. Delighted to see you embracing anagrammatic poetry... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anagrammatic_poetry - keep them coming !

Ta ! _(short for tarradiddle)_,
tailor STATELY

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## Pompey Bum

> A wonderful homage for your dear departed dog.


 :FRlol:  See, this is how rumors start! Thank you very kindly, tailor--but my poem has _nothing_ to do with Conner. It's just a coincidental anagram--and pure nonsense besides.  :Smile:  But I appreciate the link. I'll post my anagrams there from now on.

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## tailor STATELY

There? Where?

Ta ! _(short for tarradiddle)_,
tailor STATELY

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## Pompey Bum

> There? Where?


Oh, sorry. I thought the Wikipedia article was a LitNet link. Okay, I'll post my anagram poetry wherever I want.  :Smile:

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