Torsade Literary Space 
Style Statements: This Week’s AI Images
Can the bot play fashion designer? Last week’s fantasy figures sported some snazzy looks, raising the question of whether the bot, as designer, could do custom orders. My first request was for a business suit, for a Supreme Court Justice, who uses a wheelchair. The bot did put faces on these […]
Magical Beings: This week’s AI images
Fairy Queens, Shamans, and maybe goddesses? I began with a request for a magical being who lives in a house made of butterflies. It doesn’t seem there’s much concept of butterfly construction for the bot to draw on, so it gave me houses adorned with butterflies. The light of the first image has […]
Keep his distance (poem)
Keep his distance He is much closer now to his condemners Manners, if good social manners would stop the driver of a van He will sit, monitor this scene through a dirty screen A wireless device at rest near his resting hand Hand that touches no lover’s knee She in the […]
Fun with Pics and Memes (a foray into AI generated images)
I decided to check out the Bing Chatbot’s image creating feature. From a request for “Pallas’s Cat fights WWI”. From a request for “Schooner manned by lizards”. The bot offers four renditions of each request, and I picked this as the best because of the […]
Refuge of Scoundrels (poem)
Refuge of Scoundrels I am fidelity locked in the shell Of a barnacle, no bounding sea shall Pry me from the pier The pier itself then topple in the tempest And there, still for the hell of me, until the bout’s end bell I clamp on like a manacle, like a […]
What Would I Do (poem)
What Would I Do I, what would I You’ve come to such a jaded heart Asking participation Modern in your diction saying Join the conversation You talk of people in their shells But watch them leave the trenches Watch them start and dart the salvo Find they’ve grown the legs of […]
Four-leaf clover (poem)
Four-leaf clover When she’s dead they’ll clothe her False to claim they’d known her In a room of duty saving hours of light Mothballs give a church scent Skirt-clad hips span bench lengths She slips indoors alive Why is it not yet over? Holdouts dare suppose her Likelier than they […]
Adverse Possession (poem)
Adverse Possession Dear cerebral cortex Hors de combat. When we received the news We were saddened and shocked There is not much in the literature One or two articles after long search Found describing therapies Not met with any great success If it won’t offend, or make you feel superstitious (For […]
King’s Rook (poem)
King’s Rook “I’m married to a freak,” she tells him. She talks, and when she talks, her story entrains to a detail that couples to another And while she was only holding a parking space so Artsy could truck some canvasses down The traffic stalls them pulling free, and Rainy talks […]