Category Archives: Word of the Day Haiku

February 3, 2017

Cloudland – Friday’s Word of the Day Haiku

By Kat Myrman

cloudland.png

Hello Word Fans! You’re going to love today’s Dictionary.com Word of the Day. It is “Cloudland”. It literally means “the sky” or a region of unreality, imagination, etc.; dreamland.

“Hmmm. Okay Kat. I guess it is an oKAY word, but worthy of love? I think you might be stretching it a bit.” (I’m smiling as I play this imaginary conversation in my head.)

Well, you don’t think I would leave you with such a bland, blah, blah, blah definition without giving you some juicy rest of the story info to write home about, now…do you? That would just be mean. And besides, I guarantee you will learn to love this word! (not to mention it is February the month of LOVE! :))

Being a Gemini, an air sign, and a bit of a word nerd, I am often accused of living in Cloudland; not specifically of course, but in oh so many words. Ah but, I digress. I do that a lot, hence the Cloudland references. I do think I would love living there. In Cloudland, that is, because it is actually a real place in the upper Western corner of Georgia. You probably didn’t know that, unless of course you are a nature-loving, canyon-hiking, waterfall-scaping, spelunking, yurt enthusiast. Then you might know all about Cloudland Canyon. Here’s a LINK if you’d like to visit Cloudland one day. 🙂

Oh, but there is more! Cloudland entered the English language in the early 1800’s but it has a distant Greek cousin based on the word, Nephelokokkȳgía, which means CloudCuckooLand. Its origin is traced to Aristophanes’ 414BC comedic play, The Birds, referring to the realm which separates the gods from mankind. It’s an interesting political allegory that includes such things as building walls, religion, power struggles, the creation of self-serving laws, and ultimately, the fact that a perfect world does not exist. In fact, it is said that anyone who is naïve enough to believe in such a place is a “Cloudcuckoolander”!

In the 20th and 21st Century cloudcuckooland has been used quite liberally by various politicians and big thinkers to include: Margaret Thatcher, Newt Gingrich, Paul Krugman, Imran Khan, a Pakistani sportsman turned politician, Henry Wallace, US Secretary of Agriculture in the 1930’s, and Yuri N. Maltsev, an Austrian economist and economic historian. Read more about it HERE.

So there you have it. I must admit I wouldn’t mind being a cloudlander myself, sans the “cuckoo” part. I’ve always fancied the idea of flying like the birds. I could use a bird’s eye view these days. The view from the ground lately rather cuckoo!

Dreams of Cloudland

In my wildest dreams
I sprout magnificent wings
and take to cloudland.

~kat – 3 February 2017

Have a happy weekend. 🙂

4 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Essays, Haiku, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings, Word of the Day Haiku

January 27, 2017

Shivoo – Friday’s Word of the Day Haiku – 27 January 2017

By Kat Myrman

shivoo.png

Happy Friday and welcome to this week’s installment of Word of the Day Haiku based on dictionary.com’s word of the day. Today we have an Australian slang word to add to our growing vocabulary of obscure and unusual words…Shivoo. It means “a boisterous party or celebration” and showed up in daily discourse in the 19th century. Very little is known about its etymology (origin), which dictionary says is common for slang words and colloquialisms (by the way a colloquialism is a word that is considered colloquial or conversational, informal, referring to types of speech or to usages not on a formal level. Colloquial is often mistakenly used with a connotation of disapproval, as if it mean “vulgar” or “bad” or “incorrect” usage, whereas it is merely a familiar style used in speaking and writing.)

Of course, if you’ve been following my weekly dive into words…beautiful words… you know that I am seldom content to take one dictionary’s meaning at face value. I like to excavate other references when possible.

It did not take me long to find that Shivoo is also listed in baby name books. Its origin is Gujarati, Hindu, Indian. It means “Devotee of Lord Shiva”. My curiosity was peaked now. What is the meaning of Gujarati, I wondered…or more precisely, as I discovered, Gujarati “people”? Wikipedia answered my question with the click of a mouse:

Gujarati people or Gujaratis (Gujarati: ગુજરાતી) are an Indo-Aryan ethno-linguistic group of India that traditionally speaks Gujarati, an Indo-Iranian language. Famous Gujaratis include Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallabhai Patel, Morarji Desai, Sam Bahadur, Vikram Sarabhai, Swami Dayanand Saraswati, Shyamji Krishna Varma, Muhammed Ali Jinnah, Freddie Mercury, Azim Premji, Dhirubhai Ambani, Narendra Modi and Jamsetji Tata. Gujaratis are very prominent in industry and key figures played an historic role in the introduction of the doctrine of Swaraj and the decisive victory of the 1947 Indian independence movement in British-ruled India.

…which caused me to wonder about the doctrine of Swaraj.  It is attributed to Gandhi. Here in Gandhi’s own words in 1946, the description of his vision:

“Independence begins at the bottom… A society must be built in which every village has to be self sustained and capable of managing its own affairs… It will be trained and prepared to perish in the attempt to defend itself against any onslaught from without… This does not exclude dependence on and willing help from neighbours or from the world. It will be a free and voluntary play of mutual forces… In this structure composed of innumerable villages, there will be ever widening, never ascending circles. Growth will not be a pyramid with the apex sustained by the bottom. But it will be an oceanic circle whose center will be the individual. Therefore the outermost circumference will not wield power to crush the inner circle but will give strength to all within and derive its own strength from it.”

Though Gandhi never realized this utopian model before he was assassinated, there is a reason he inspires us today. In my country we have our own “utopian” dream. It’s called “we the people”, which we too still struggle to realize in its beautiful fullness.

What was our word of the day again? Ah yes, Shivoo, which most dictionaries claim is an Australian slang word for a huge party. I am afraid I got carried away in google-land, but I hope you took away something you could use. As for me? This weekend poet and storyteller hopes for the day when the world reaches its utopian potential for peace, justice, love and compassion where everyone has a voice and everyone matters. Now that will be one amazing cause for a wild shivoo!

One more little tidbit I’d like to share with you in parting… just in case you think it slipped my attention. Did you happen to notice that Freddie Mercury is listed in the middle of the names of famous Gujaratis? I’ll give you a second to track back to the that section above. I’m not making it up! 🙂 I am suddenly transported into a rousing chorus of “We are the champions…”

And I’ll not apologize if you too are now stricken with this rousing earworm. I am a carrier of such things! 🙂

Peace my friends. ❤

Shivoo – the Haiku

Let the dreamers dream
utopia is a place
it’s one wild shivoo!

~kat – 27 January 2017

7 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Haiku, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings, Social Issues, Spirituality, Word of the Day Haiku

January 21, 2017

Asseverate – Friday’s Word Of The Day Haiku – 20 January 2016

By Kat Myrman

I missed posting my Dictionary.com word of the day Haiku yesterday, but decided to post today because the word for Friday, Asseverate, is a very good and timely word. Asseverate is a verb that means means “to declare earnestly or solemnly; affirm positively; aver”. It is Latin in origin; “from asseverat-, the stem of assevērātus, the past participle of the Latin verb assevērāre “to act or speak seriously or in earnest.” (The Latin adjective sevērus means “serious, grave”), entering English in the 18th century, replacing the earlier verb assever.”

There has been quite a cacophony of asseverating going on this week; this past year for that matter. But much of the bloviating that we have been subjected to has been opinions, strongly asseverated, but opinions none the less. Opinions are not necessarily truth.

So what is a well-intentioned, thoughtful person to do? How do we discern what is right and real and true? I have found clarity in my own search for truth and light in the words of the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Philippians: “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable–if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–think about such things.”

In these confusing times I guard my own heart by choosing to “think about such things.” All the rest is dross.

opposing voices
asseverate opinions
but what is the truth?

kat ~ 21 January 2017

7 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Essays, Haiku, Life Lessons, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings, Social Issues, Spirituality, Word of the Day Haiku

January 13, 2017

Crambo – Friday’s Word of the Day Haiku – 13 January 2017

By Kat Myrman

crambo.png

Happy Friday! Today’s Word of the Day on Dictionary.com is “Crambo”. It’s an odd little word that originated in 17th century France from the word “crambe” which means “cabbage”. The resulting “crambo” though, has little to do with cruciferous vegetables in its application. The French word “crambe” was originally blended with the Latin term  crambē repetīta which means “cabbage served up again” implying something distasteful that is repeated.

Following this illogical trail, Crambo then, is defined as an “inferior rhyme” (I think the inferior part of its definition comes from a global distaste for re-stewed cabbage)  and it is also the name of a popular game that is thought to have originated with Aristotle. I also found a reference that linked the word crambo with the Greek rhyming game of krambē, but when I tried to learn more about it, I was only able to find Greek references to krambē (the actual cabbage variety), thought to be a great cure for a hangover.(wonder if that is true…might have to try it sometime…) But, I digress. 🙂

Back to modern times…or at least 17th century forward. In the game of crambo teams compete with each other to find a word that rhymes with a word or line presented by the opposing player or team. The game ends when no more rhymes can be found, thus exhausting all rhyme references for a given word or phrase.

So, what does this have to do with cabbage? The game is tied to the vegetable reference, Wikipedia says,  in that the players start with a rhyme and then “restew” it. There are other variations of the game developed in the 19th century where actual rhyming words are not used, but rather descriptions of the word. A game called Dumb Crambo is a “charades” version where players act out the word, challenging their opponents to guess the rhyming word.

As if this all isn’t crazy weird enough, considering the word’s etymology, I also discovered that there is a popular industrial tool called The Crambo touted as “one of the best machines for shredding all types of wood and green cuttings”. This has nothing to do with rhyming of course but I like to think it brings us back full circle to the origin of the word…the lowly, much maligned, smelly, gas-inducing cabbage.  While I am not a fan of crambē repetīta I do like a side of shredded cabbage, (aka “slaw”) every now and again with my bbq or fish and chips.

I suppose I best get on with the task of the day…a haiku. What a word! What a word!

Exhausting all rhyme
Crambo renders final words
completely rhymeless

kat ~ 13 January 2017

5 Comments   |  tags: , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Haiku, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings, Word of the Day Haiku

January 6, 2017

Etiolate – Friday’s Word of the Day Haiku

By Kat Myrman


Happy Friday! It has been a crazy week! Long hours at work and winter weather descending in my corner of the planet. Today’s Dictionary.com word of the day is Etoliate.

Etiolate definition is

1. to cause to become weakened or sickly; drain of color or vigor.
2. to cause (a plant) to whiten or grow pale by excluding light: to etiolate celery.
3. (of plants) to whiten or grow pale through lack of light.

It originated in 18th century France from the French verb étioler “to makepale, etiolate (plants),” probably derivative of aNorman French dialect form of standard Frenchéteule, from Old French estoble, estuble “stubble,”from Latin stipula “stalk, straw.”

Etiolate is a verb associated with biology and a plant condition called chlorosis caused by a lack of sun light resulting in low levels of chlorophyll. De-etiolation is what we call “greening”. The first pale shoots of a seed eventually break free from the ground and stretch toward the light of the sun, exposed and free of darkness where photosynthesis can happen. Where greening can happen.

Interestingly, the term etiolate is also used to describe people. Which makes sense. It is true that a lack of light can cause humankind to grow pale, fade, become depressed and lethargic. We have a name for it. It’s called SAD, an acronym for Seasonal Affective Disorder. Shorter days and long dark cold nights contribute to our etiolation.

A timely word, don’t you think? I had never heard it before, but I have witnessed and felt the affects of etiolation. Reminds me that we are all connected…animal, vegetable, mineral. That thought makes me happy, which is an apt remedy for my bout with SAD. Or maybe sometines I’m just sad…

Is it spring yet?

It’s been a long week! TGIF! In the meantime, a few Haiku. It is late and I am etiolating fast! 😉

the sum of our parts
etiolate from neglect…
use it or lose it


flowers and people
suffer etiolation
it is really SAD

kat ~ 6 January 2016

13 Comments   |  tags: , , | posted in Haiku, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings, Word of the Day Haiku