A

 

[A]

A is for Parrot which we can plainly see

K is for its Headdress perky and fair

O are its Eyes, they stare stare blink stare

C is for Beak munching mainly seed.

S is for Flight as they curve through the trees

V is for Feathers smooth from their trip

X is for Claws front two tear, back two grip

I is for Me first, not so much as please.

 

J is for Parrot which we can plainly see

E is its Song, shrill, chattery, raucous

Q is the Hollow in the tree where they nest.

U are Incomparable (we say) of gainly speed

A for Effort, florid colourful caucus,

Y is it So you always look your best?

Images of a sulphur-crested cockatoo and King parrots, both members of the order of Psittaciformes, at Wye River. Lines 1 and 9 of this sonnet come from one of my favourite alphabet poems, ‘Alphabet’ by John Lennon, written in February 1969. 

A

A arrived unannounced. An argosy of vessels. An outpost camp as a row of tents. An avenue into a wilderness. Alphabet books, Strand London. A for effort. Longing for Avalon. A was the initial of the captain. An envelope crammed with lettering A. posted to the Admiralty. Arguments about criminals and wilderness turned into officialese. Another ship on the horizon. A was for aboriginal, small-a. Accents were addressed adroitly. Misunderstandings arose. Actually, arrogance. Alphas drew lines on A4. Called them a nullius roadmap. Aimed and fired. Maimed, misfired. Adventure, misadventure. But then signposts. Next left, Auburn. [A] for Terra Australis.

A

A, what’s the point, the absolute top

Somewhere to start, and where it falls?

J sounds like A with jealous jitters

But F expletives what an effing A.

K keeps the peace with okay whatever.

X cannot be A, keeping to itself

While Z unperturbed sleeps through the zeitgeist.

It’s uncertain if O is surprised or dismayed

While I will not relax into becoming A.

Always E goes unseen, common as everyone.

N are the names we apply to these forms.

M prefers the movie to the real thing

Even as S slips around the actual question

And Q keeps on searching for an A.

Photograph: Night time at Victoria Park station, Collingwood, Melbourne.

A (May)

Tallists complain it’s not tall enough. What about Abu Dhabi? Too square, according to Coneists, while Pyramidists get angry at slenderness. What ever happened to May 1968, ask Fiftyists, all these light shows on balustrades! Agoraphobes reject its milling concourses out of hand. Bollardists grumble there’s not enough bollards; Anti-Bollardists, too many. Where’s the art? Bollandists dismiss it as modernity. As for Macron, what’s he doing about it? Nothing. Well, what would you expect from a Diacritic? The cafés fill with whingers, but A stays unmoved upon the Champ de Mars. Its cast iron alibis magniloquently silence centuries of critics.

A (April)

A short history of A. Kindergarten drawing books: A is for Apple. A&M, childhood of non-inclusive hymns. Craven-A, nemesis of many an alpha male. So many continents start with A: Australia, Africa… Learning to grasp, or grasping to learn, the centre of modern history: A-Bomb. Exam results, here and there, A-, A, A+. A-sides of T-Rex. AIDS. The A-Team, unwatchable eighties TV. Exhibit A: the certificate that says so. Always scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh, Mr Gibbon: another ream of A4. AGM, that time of the year, again? Trickle-downs idolise their Triple-A rating. More Q’s than A’s. Ah, April again. Alleluia.

A (April)

A is for Bonnard, Marino Marini, Velásquez, the curves in the Great Ocean Road, Apollo Bay oysters, pasta con sarde, Oriental beef salad, mineral water, orange chocolate, grapes, kiwifruit, milk coffee, good news, banksias, grevilleas, roses, the smell of boronia, surf beaches, windows, justified sleep-ins, the Psalms, Marianne Moore’s long poems, Auden, any Chekhov, Shakespeare when he’s total, Bohumil Hrabal, Cabernet Sauvignon, Gallo Nero Chianti, cheese, walking, watering-cans, autumnal back gardens, civil conversation, Venetian church music, Claudio Monteverdi, Dusty Springfield, the Mersey sound, Bill Evans, Charles Lloyd, Haydn, clouds, fences, Buster Keaton, Erich Rohmer, cooking, singing, birds, my cat April.

I started this list with the simple idea of "A is.." favourite things, just "A is for Bonnard, Monteverdi..." then halfway through remembered Roland Barthes' wonderful list of favourite things, which kind of influenced the completion. Here's RB's list and a link to an article where it's talked about:

I like: salad, cinnamon, cheese, pimento, marzipan, the smell of new-cut hay (why doesn’t someone with a “nose” make such a perfume), roses, peonies, lavender, champagne, loosely held political convictions, Glenn Gould, too-cold beer, flat pillows, toast, Havana cigars, Handel, slow walks, pears, white peaches, cherries, colors, watches, all kinds of writing pens, desserts, unrefined salt, realistic novels, the piano, coffee, Pollock, Twombly, all romantic music, Sartre, Brecht, Verne, Fourier, Eisenstein, trains, Médoc wine, having change, Bouvard and Pécuchet, walking in sandals on the lanes of southwest France, the bend of the Adour seen from Doctor L.’s house, the Marx Brothers, the mountains at seven in the morning leaving Salamanca, etc.

 https://www.brainpickings.org/.../barthes-likes-and.../

A (February)

A is for Actor, emphasis on Act-Or; a-words get lost in the throat. What else to do for the rest of their life but wear a black jacket, perfect the script, and phone the agent at breakfast. Prince Rama or Ratty, Mephistopheles or his nemesis, Queen of the Night or Lady Muck, Oxford scholar or scullery maid – it’s all in the delivery. B is for Believer, up for a laugh, ready to believe anything, ready to hang Exhibit A by the suspenders, just one false move. The DVD box-set should see them through February, an unbelievable cast, some handy quotations.

A (September)

Africa, that hieroglyph of home and escape from home. Decipher how the divisions ran deep and kept dividing, stuck in the mud. Asia, that pictogram of the thing- in- itself. Observe how its calligraphy runs down where it will till it stops. America, that extent of ante-alphabets and anti-alphabets and every alphabet. Squint to read on tablets of sliding sand most words ever written. Australia, that giant insula of unwritten memory. See how the Europeans invaded with firm prints. Antarctica, that Morse code of a zillion ice crystals. September is white as March but notice how their glaciers are melting.