Your host, Doctor Noxsious Impulsse
Builders, real estate moguls, fellow scientists, lend me your ears while we drink these beers! I propose we drain The Furthest Quagmire to create the perfect location for the new Serene Shoppers Paradise and Office Park.
Draining wetlands is like unclogging your toilet. It clears things up!
Repurposed swampland is the perfect location to construct a solid foundation because what was once wet is now dry. You could also say what was once squalid is now solid!
In this image formulated by our architects and artists, you can see how attractive and shiny the new Serenity Center will be compared to the bleak quagmire it currently is.
Listen to this audio sample to hear the pleasing sounds of chattering voices, footsteps clicking on shiny floors, and cars passing by on the motorway. Compare that with the unsettling chirps, shouts, shrieks, squeaks, and groans of who knows what, which our unpaid interns recorded on a night in The Furthest Quagmire.
Feast your schnozzes on these samples our chemists have concocted for your olfactory pleasure! From left to right, they are A Day At The Office, Clean Clothes Cologne, Eu de Multiplex, New Mall Smell, Perfume Counter, and, of course, Whiff of Food Court. Compare these pleasant wafts of joy with Stink of Swamp, and I'm sure you'll be sold.
Speaking of the Food Court, taste these superb selections our chefs have prepared for you. Cheeseburgers! Corn dogs! Giant pretzels! Fish and chips! Panda Delight Chinese-Inspired Cuisine, delightfully concocted without using a single panda! And, of course, that all-time cheesy and chewy favorite, pizza!
Conversely, you could gnaw on a blade of swamp grass. But why would you?
And now, my friends, allow me to delight your tactile senses. Feel the sumptuous pleather of our multiplex seats. Delight in the variety of textiles from our clothing outlets. Delight your digits with a new pair of gloves! Top your top with one or several of our tantalizing tops! Wrap your booty in the perfect pair of pantaloons! It's all possible at the mall!
Or, you could plunge your hand into a bowlful of swamp muck. The choice is yours. I know which one I'd pick.
Can you smell the sound of the popcorn popping? Can you hear the scent of a new perfume? Can you see musical notes? It's all possible in our Sensory Experience rooms at the Peace Well Spa.
I guarantee Donald Trump will turn from orange to green with envy when he sees this place. Trump Tower has nothing on the splendid Serenity Center and nobody drains a swamp like Storm Construction.
A swamp can be beautiful, of course, in a gross and unpleasant sort of raw and natural way.
Still, nothing compares to the glistening beauty of a trendsetting shopping/office complex.
The sooner we can clear away the spoddled* swamp and make way for the fresh gleam of commerce and industry, the better.
As overflow in the areas surrounding The Furthest Quagmire is common, surely draining the swamp will reduce the frequency of flooding in The Thundering Wilderness area.
I understand the concerns some of you have raised, but please believe me, I'm not tying a bear to you. Don't treat me with a fish in my face by making an elephant out of a fly. Have dumplings instead of flowers! Don't have mustard after lunch!
Let us not behave like puzzled butterflies of dishonesty!
Failure to approve this project makes us all as useful as dead leaves on spring trees in a young woodland ravaged by fire. The vibrant green of the vegetation in this fresh forest is dull and lifeless. The clear blue sky is a murky gray, sullied by smoke. By controlling unchecked growth, the Serenity Center reduces the pollution generated by forest fires!
Allow me to pause time to give you the chance to fully consider the brilliant proposal of Doctor Noxsious Impulsse for the glorious development of worthless wetlands into a splendid center of human comfort and commerce!
With my new Serenity Center, I will achieve glory previously unrealized by mere human innovation.
Will you allow the untidy finger of conservationists to impede productive progress?
With the Serenity Center's state-of-the-art information technology, the quantum expanse of interdimensional cyberspace facilitates the transcendental integration of hyper-dimensional algorithms, enabling the acceleration of infinite fractal potentials within the cosmic harmonics of collective consciousness.
Mónésó’táhoenôtse kosa?
Is the keyboard telling you what to do, or are you thinking for yourself?
Close your eyes and allow your mind to form a picture. A breathtaking sunset paints the sky in shades of fiery orange and soft lavender. Wisps of mauve clouds drift lazily, casting delicate shadows over a gleaming modern expanse encompassing some 59 acres. The silhouettes of tall pine trees stand stoically beside their concrete and metal masters, their dark branches reaching toward the vibrant heavens. The air is perfectly still, carrying the faint scent of cultivated wildflowers and tilled earth. As the sun sinks lower, its warm glow gradually gives way to a cool, ethereal twilight as sodium lights come on in the parking lot. Stars emerge from their hidden recesses one by one and begin to flicker, illuminating the vast canvas of the night sky above that marvel of human innovation, the Serenity Center. The moon, a radiant pearl suspended in the ebony expanse, casts a gentle glow over the architectural marvel below. The cultivated landscape seems to breathe in unison, its very essence captured in the serene stillness of forever.
Storm Construction hopes you will vote yes on this ambitious and innovative project. We will invite you to attend the history-making moment when we begin draining The Furthest Quagmire. There will be food trucks and a carnival for the kids, followed by fireworks and a show featuring holographic performances of focus group-approved, fully sanitized pop songs. A vote for Storm Construction is a vote for progress! We hope we can count on you!
Noxsious Impulsse, PhD
Lead sciences and human relations Vanguard of Vainglory
Magna Cum Laude
Trump University 2010
notes
Let's get this out of the way first. I backdated this poem.
https://experiencewriting.com/2023/10/21/oct-21-prompts-hiding-in-the-swamp/
Today, OctPoWriMo participants were charged with writing a poem from the perspective of a mad scientist and using the Twenty Little Poetry Projects exercise created by Jim Simmerman. Oh, also the word swamp or concept of a swamp is involved somehow.
https://amzn.to/48SrKyf
I asked the Quickwrite AI to generate an image of a mad scientist in a swamp. I will provide more information about Quickwrite at the end of the post.
I decided to write about the insane and horrific idea of draining wetlands to allow for buildings to be constructed where the wetlands were. I'm writing from the perspective of a lunatic who thinks this is a good idea and is trying to convince others to agree. Let me clarify: I don't think it's a good idea at all.
Here are the steps I used to create this mess.
Begin the poem with a metaphor.
Say something specific but utterly preposterous.
Use at least one image for each of the five senses, either in succession or scattered randomly throughout the poem.
Use one example of synesthesia (mixing the senses).
Use the proper name of a person and the proper name of a place.
Contradict something you said earlier in the poem.
Change direction or digress from the last thing you said.
Use a word (slang?) you’ve never seen in a poem.
*I was today years old when I learned that spoddled is, apparently, an Australian slang term meaning broken or ruined.
Use an example of false cause-effect logic.
Use a piece of talk you’ve actually heard (preferably in dialect and/or which you don’t understand).
https://www.yourdictionary.com/articles/idiom-meanings
I didn't do that. I used a few idioms I found interesting and/or amusing.
In German, “to tie a bear to someone” means you’ve tricked them.
Also in German, “an elephant made out of a fly” means to make a big deal out of nothing.
in Italian, “to treat someone with a fish in their face” means to disrespect someone.
in Japanese, “to have dumplings instead of flowers” means you’ve chosen something useful over something decorative.
In Polish, “mustard after lunch” means it’s too late to do something.
Create a metaphor using the following construction: “The (adjective) (concrete noun) of (abstract noun) . . .”
https://randomwordgenerator.com/adjective.php
https://perchance.org/concrete-noun
https://perchance.org/abstract-noun
Use an image in such a way as to reverse its usual associative qualities.
Make the persona or character in the poem do something he or she could not do in “real life.”
https://www.bestrandoms.com/random-superpower-generator
Refer to yourself by nickname and in the third person.
Write in the future tense, such that part of the poem seems to be a prediction.
Modify a noun with an unlikely adjective.
Make a declarative assertion that sounds convincing but that finally makes no sense.
I'm going to admit that I allowed the QuickWrite AI to generate this portion. Today's little project has taken much longer than I had expected, and I am under a pressing deadline to write 6000 more words today so I can get a story draft to my editor and finished for inclusion in the forthcoming For The Love of Winter anthology from First Coast Romance Writers. This is my third try at writing a story for this anthology, so...yeah. I'm letting QuickWrite have this line.
Use a phrase from a language other than English.
Mónésó’táhoenôtse kosa?
This phrase means "Are you still riding the goat?" in Northern Cheyenne. It's a way of asking if a person has separated from his or her significant other. I'm going to assume my extremely unreliable narrator has misinterpreted it to mean "Are you still on the fence?" Also, he's probably trying to sound bigly smart for his captive audience.
https://www.fluentu.com/blog/rare-idioms-from-around-the-world/
Make a non-human object say or do something human (personification).
Close the poem with a vivid image that makes no statement, but that “echoes” an image from earlier in the poem.
Here's another helpful free resource that I use frequently to facilitate my flights of fancy.
https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/
sharing with
I miss Earthweal! I would have liked to share this piece with them.
About QuickWrite
I normally don't use as much of QuickWrite's content in my creations as I did in this piece. I use it to generate images for fun or to write placeholder scenes when I'm stuck in a story. I later replace these scenes from my own muddled mind, sometimes retaining minor elements. Also, it's helpful for book descriptions because, not to put too fine a point on it, mine tend to suck ass.
Monthly access to QuickWrite is $49.99. Lifetime access is $497. You can check it out here.
