A proper princess has some things
She hasta know for sure:
To curb her horn; to fold her wings;
To keep her hoofs demure;
To nod at ev'rypony's bow
When leading a parade—
But not one princess knows just how
Equestria was made.
So while I've got you cornered here,
Nopony else around,
Unfold your each and ev'ry ear!
My secrets will astound!
Oh, Twilight, don't you give that look;
You know you want to know!
You won't find this in any book
Or moving picture show!
'Cause farming rocks is all about
The quiet, careful earth:
I've often heard it sing and shout
The story of its birth!
***
Now, in the days before the sky
Knew how to stay aloft,
When water flowed out powder-dry
And stones were squishy soft,
The ponies all got so confused,
They used to go to bed
Upset and cranky, sore, abused
And mixed up in the head.
"This isn't right!" they cried, except
It came out whispery
As circling 'round their beds they crept—
They slept while walking, see?
"We plant our veggies in the field
And watch them turn to seed!
Our hurts get worse instead of healed!
This isn't what we need!"
They raged and stormed—that is, they tried,
But all remained unswirled.
"We're done with this! Yes! Let's decide
To build a better world!"
***
What's that? No, this was way before
The pony tribes appeared.
No horns, no wings, no hoofs. What's more,
They looked, like, really weird.
Like if you took a cotton ball
The size of Fluttershy,
And mooshed it up till it was small
And round as apple pie.
Ignite each cotton blob with flames,
Unleash 'em in the air,
And give 'em voices, homes, and names
But neither hide nor hair.
Excuse me? No! It's not absurd!
It's history with quotes!
I got this story word for word
Straight from the planet's throats!
It's odd? You bet! I'd call it strange!
But true things often are.
We've always spanned the weirdness range
From close to very far!
***
Now, where was I? Oh, yeah! The day
The ponies met to plan,
Debating ev'ry which-a-way
The world and how it ran.
They gathered under clouds where trees
Grew down with dangling roots
And eating snacks of waxy cheese,
They spoke in cheers and hoots.
"This isn't right!" they said again,
Agreeing each with each—
But each complaining mentioned, then,
A diff'rent sort of breach.
"The weather!" some collectively
Insisted. "That's the worst!
The sky and air should always be
Above! Let's do that first!"
"The ground!" another group proclaimed.
"We need to get that set!
Exchanging wacky dirt for tamed
Will solve it all, we bet!"
"The ambiance!" the third group said.
"If we can so direct
The interfacing zones instead,
The nodes will all connect!"
***
And no, I can't say I've a clue
About that last complaint.
But even though those ponies knew;
Agreement there was faint.
"The ambiance?!" The first group laughed.
"The stuff designs itself!
To concentrate on that is daft!
Let's leave it on the shelf!"
The second group gave nods. "The same
With all your silly sky!
To fix the ground should be our aim!
That should solidify—"
"A lot you know!" The third group sniffed.
"Your stuff's so rough and base!
We give the ambiance a lift,
The rest falls into place!"
They argued on into the night
Which was as bright as day,
Till two of them—one dark, one light—
Stepped up and shouted, "Hey!"
***
The princesses? Oh, wow! You know,
I never thought of that!
'Cause they're the ones who took it slow
And settled in to chat.
They said, "Let's choose up teams and try
To focus each around
These diff'rent goals: to set the sky,
The ambiance, the ground.
"So those who have the expertise,
The passion and the will
For each of these, we ask you please
To gather 'round until
"You've reached consensus on at least
The basic 'whats' and 'hows.'
We'll change this world and tame this beast
As much as time allows!"
Excited, then, they settled in
To see what they could do,
And laughing, each group tried to win
While 'round them flew those Two.
***
And then— Oh, wow! You guessed it, Twi!
'Cause all those balls of light
Began to shift, transmogrify,
And change to scent and sight!
The ones who worked to make the ground
Grew mighty hoofs and legs
To make the stompy sort of sound
That makes rocks not be eggs.
And those who worked to prop the sky
Up where the sky should stay
Grew mighty wings to help them fly
And make the clouds obey.
And those who did that other thing,
Whatever stuff it was,
They grew the horns that let them sling
That magic spark and buzz.
And then Equestria was made!
The ponies hugged and cheered—
Until they saw the Two had stayed
Behind, had disappeared!
***
They heard their voices from that place
That wasn't anymore:
"Enjoy yourselves with truth and grace
And never be heartsore!
"But if you need us yet again,
Just call, and we'll be there!"
Their whispers turned to silence, then,
Were gone from everywhere.
And that's the story! Nifty, right?!
And true as true can be!
You're welcome! It's been my delight
To share some history!
There's lotsa secret stuff inside
The earth and sky and all,
But if you listen where they hide,
The weirdest stories fall!
But yeah, we better get on back:
The party's in full swing!
It's time to drink and game and snack,
To laugh and dance and sing!
Now how were alicorns made?
3551206
That is another story:
And shall be told another time.
Oh, wait. I already did tell that story. Never mind the "Neverending Story" reference, then!
Mike
Perfect Pinkie Poem!
Oh wow. You perfectly captured Pinkie's tone here! Reading it, I realized the whole thing seems to demand it to be set to music - polka, possibly?
Pinkie learning stories from the earth while rock farming is my new favorite thing and I want more of it.
I'm really loving these poems! This was especially great.
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Thanks!
Pinkie and epics just go together in my mind like peanut butter and whipped cream.
Mike
And Pinkie, of course, is of the original undifferentiated type, the Firstwise Ponies. She's Earth Pony only by convention.
Also: You are awesome. I know I said this before, but it didn't stop being true since then. Indeed, rather astoundingly it became more true.
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Thanks again!
I'm just having way too much fun putting these things together--next up, as a matter of fact, is an ode from the mayor with the working title of "In Civil Service."
Mike
Funnily enough, I googled "epyllion in fourteeners," and instead of getting a helpful wiki page, this poem came up as the top search.
Anyways:
—Wikipedia
This is in iambic... care to share some poetry experience/exceptions I'm missing here?
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Dactylic hexameter:
I've found, doesn't work well in English. You can't do the whole "dactyl-spondee switcheroo" thing that ancient Greek and Latin do--those languages handle stress and pitch so very differently from English that they can do quantitative meters quite nicely--and a whole six-foot line of dactyls is way too "yippety-skippety" for even the light-hearted epics that My Little Pony lends itself to.
To my ears, English calls for something stricter and qualitative--Wikipedia talks about qualitative vs. quantitative meters, if you'd like to dig some more into it--and iambs seem best for that. There's history there, too: the first translations of Homer's big fat Greek epics into English were done in iambic fourteeners. So I figured I was in good company.
Mike
Hee! Epic and absurdly tall tales from a Child of Fable! This is excellent.
Would this be the same form Lewis Carrol uses for the Jabberwocky and The Walrus & The Carpenter?
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Thanks!
It's definitely related to Carrol's stuff. "Jabberwocky," for instance, uses a quatrain where the first three lines have four iambs and the last has three while here I split it up with odd lines getting four and even lines getting three. A lot of the poems in "Jungle Books" are like this, too.
Mike
This is the Poemest pie that ever Pinkied, I'll tell you that much.
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Thanks!
I've been doing so much non-Pony writing the last couple months, the next poem has been absolutely languishing. I need to set some time aside and get back to it.
Mike
That was great. :D
PresentPerfect sent me here today!
3551206 That's how alicorns are made.
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Thanks, folks!
As I've said before around here, there aren't a lotta markets for fixed form verse these days, so I'm glad I've got a place I can post the stuff. I'm currently trying to cultivate an appreciation for blank verse--I just joined the Science Fiction Poetry Association, for instance--but it's an uphill road for me. Don Marquis is the only free-verse poet I've ever really enjoyed, but I think that's mostly because he's writing about talking animals.
Mike