Views and Comments for my poem "Communication"

Picture Credit - Writingismyhobby by Publishing Guru)

Yesterday I posted my new poem “Communication” on four websites at once and monitored their progress re Views etc. The four sites were “Hello Poetry”, “VoicesNet”, My Own Poetry Blog and “Poemhunter”. Here are the results:

	HELLO POETRY	VOICESNET	MY BLOG	POEMHUNTER
12\7 at 3.06 PM	11+2 Likes+1Repost	8	8	4?
3.45 PM	21	8	8	5
5.30 PM	29+4L+Trending	9	8	7?
8.25 PM	124+6L	12	9	7
11.10 PM	143+8L	14	9	8
13\7 at 10.30 PM	178+9L+2Reps	24+3 Comments	9	9
1.30 PM	182+10L	24	9	12

Any surprises to me? Well no. My own blog is not a community as such so I have to work harder for my Views etc. All these views are from Google and the like.

It is (still) disappointing that Views are so low on Poemhunter these days. However, their “league tables” show that generally viewing figures are at a low, especially compared with a few years ago. The site was badly hacked two or three years ago and I suspect that scared people away. It is a desert now.

Hello Poetry has been a big source of joy for me recently. However, the comments have dwindled: something to ponder on.

VoicesNet continues to View and Comment well and I expect Views on this poem to carry on ticking over there for a fair while.

I no longer put poems on Triond as the Views there for poetry and fiction are paltry.

My highest Viewed poem remains “Mirror, Mirror” on my poetry Blog at 7158 Views.

Paul Butters

Update 14\7\14 AM - My latest poems on "Hello Poetry" - "Ancestry" 171 Views, "Space" 214, "Communication" 219, "Force" 48 in 18 hours and should have trended by now really.

11.15 PM (14\7) - Ancestry 173, Space 216, Communication 227, Force 230. My poet friend Liz Squires (Australia) tells me "Force" started trending about this afternoon. Clearly trending counts.

Slight correction - Force started trending around 11.30 AM according to HP Notifications.

15\7 Latest for "Communication": HP 228, V 29, P 13, Blog 9.

16\7 Latest on "Hello Poetry": Anc 175, Space 221, Comms 247, Force 258, "Love Poem" (new) 224. This is pleasing because Love Poem was experimental. Nice to see the Views are rising each time I post.

23.45 - Just to say that Liz reposted my poem "Just Me" (formerly "Internet Prose Poem") recently and it shot up to my "mid-table" from 49 Views to 74. The Power of the Repost. It did not "Trend" however.

23\7 - Latest Views on ScribeSlice: "Marinia 7 Pt2" 253, "Marinia 7" 73, "Afterlife" 198, "Wormhole" 72, "Paradise Found" 59. Worth continuing.

29\7 - Liz Squires recently got me to join ScribeSlice, Wattpad and StoryStar in order to post my stories. Been interesting. Oh, and 529 Views for my "Paedophile" piece on Triond. Not even trending yet great Views. Almost NO Views on PoetFreak I see.

31\7 - Paedo Piece - 1850 Views yesterday and now on Most Popular List!

31\7 - 16.00 BST - Paedo Piece: 2,359 V today, 6,098 V Total!

Bullies now 36,393 Views (48 today). 91% American readership now. 2% UK.

1\8 - Paedo 10,168 V, 1,700 today.

8\8 - Paedo 12,269, Bullies 38,042. Total Triond Views 29\7 - 370 (typical then), 30\7 - 3116, 31\7 - 4870, 1\8 - 2426, 2\8 - 374. Average about 320 per day since then. That surge was when Paedo trended on "Healthmad".

This month - 5382 V for 23 cents on Triond. AdSense counted those as 7V, 0 Clicks, 0 Earnings.

18\8 - Let's try this - http://trifter.com/practical-travel/my-triond-viewing-records/
- link works if you persist and refresh.

World's Oldest Author and Poem

 

(Picture Credit - G Salahuddin)

 

 

The other day a lady on a poetry forum asked a good question: what is the oldest poem ever? I Googled “oldest poem” and got 14,800,000 results. This led me to some fine “contenders” and also arguably the oldest written author.

The other day I Googled “oldest poem”, with 14,800,000 results. There were indeed many websites on this. Many sites claimed that “Epic of Gilgamesh” (a Sumerian work) was the first epic poem. It was written about 2000 BC. Yep, 4000 years ago. Others, however, asserted that the Egyptian “Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor” (C 2,500 BC) came first.

Let’s not forget, though, that the very first poetry was purely oral: passed down from generation to generation by word of mouth. Whether any of that material reached being written, nobody knows. It had to be memorable of course, so techniques such as alliteration, assonance and rhyme were probably employed. Then the words were recited or sung, over and over again. Such words were about historical events, genealogy and laws mainly.

Finding written poetry was not too easy either. Archaeologists have spent many years discovering and interpreting various stone tablets, papyrus scrolls and seals etc. I will not bore you with all the ancient written languages that have been uncovered. Let’s not forget that the earliest writings were produced in The Bronze Age. Need I say more?

The ancient kingdom of Sumeria was a very interesting place. Some claim it was the “cradle of civilisation”, building the very first cities. There are of course counter claims from Egypt, India and China (to name a few). It is said that the Sumerians invented the 24 hour day!

By most accounts the first ever known named woman and “published” author was Sumerian: the High Priestess Enheduanna who lived in the city of Ur around 2,500 to 3,000 BC. (My spellcheck does not like her name!). She wrote many hymns which were recorded on stone tablets, two seals and some alabaster discs. Not quite E-books.

Here’s the opening of one hymn:

  “Nin-me-sharra. The exaltation of Inanna.

1-12Lady of all the divine powers, resplendent light, righteous woman clothed in radiance, beloved of An and Urac! Mistress of heaven, with the great pectoral jewels, who loves the good headdress befitting the office of en priestess, who has seized all seven of its divine powers! My lady, you are the guardian of the great divine powers! You have taken up the divine powers, you have hung the divine powers from your hand. You have gathered up the divine powers, you have clasped the divine powers to your breast. Like a dragon you have deposited venom on the foreign lands. When like Ickur you roar at the earth, no vegetation can stand up to you. As a flood descending upon (?) those foreign lands, powerful one of heaven and earth, you are their Inana.”

 

I have resisted the urge to reformat this into verses here. It is beautiful nonetheless. What more can I say?

For the record, here’s the opening of “Gilgamesh”:

“He who has seen everything, I will make known (?) to the lands.
I will teach (?) about him who experienced all things,
... alike,
Anu granted him the totality of knowledge of all.
He saw the Secret, discovered the Hidden,
he brought information of (the time) before the Flood.
He went on a distant journey, pushing himself to exhaustion,
but then was brought to peace.”

“The Tale of The Shipwrecked Sailor”:

“Speech of an excellent follower:

May your heart prosper, my master. Behold, we have reached home. The mallet having been taken, the mooring post is driven in. The bow-rope having been placed on land, thanksgiving and praise to god are given. Everyone is embracing his companions. Our crew returned safely; there was no loss to our army. We have reached the end of Wawat; we have passed Senmut.”

 

More of a play or story this one. Much shorter than Gilgamesh. Must also mention “The Vedas”, written 1700 -1200 BC, another classic. All these works probably predate “The Iliad” (1194-1184 BC by the Greek Homer).

Listverse dot com is a very interesting website. Amongst many other things it cites the very first “chat up line” as being:

“The oldest love poem in the world is only slightly younger (than Gilgamesh etc.). Written on a tablet about the size of a cell phone, the 4,000 year old Sumerian ballad also contains the oldest recorded chat-up line: “You have captivated me, let me stand trembling before you; Bridegroom, I would be taken to the bedchamber.” It seems the last several thousand years has seen the quality of propositions heading in the wrong direction.”

(This was by Shin-Rai-unninni on a tablet)

When I was doing A Levels I studied Milton’s epic, “Paradise Lost”. It was mentioned that there had been earlier epics such as “The Iliad” and “The Aeneid” (Roman Virgil 19 BC). “Paradise Lost” was first published in 1667 by English poet Milton: a relatively modern poem. Here’s a sample:

“Him the Almighty Power
Hurled headlong flaming from th' ethereal sky,
With hideous ruin and combustion, down
To bottomless perdition, there to dwell
In adamantine chains and penal fire,
Who durst defy th' Omnipotent to arms.
Nine times the space that measures day and night
To mortal men, he, with his horrid crew,
Lay vanquished, rolling in the fiery gulf,
Confounded, though immortal.”

The subject here is The Devil, who is clearly given “the treatment” by God. “Bottomless perdition” – so memorable! Indeed all these poems utilise a “higher” language than mere prose. Okay, so maybe “Tale of The Shipwrecked Sailor” is more prosaic. Yet so began that age-old debate, what is poetry? These ancient scripts are certainly poetic to me. A great source of inspiration.

 

Paul Butters