Poem: "The Walking Trees"

[ysabetwordsmith]

This poem is spillover from the June 3, 2014 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by a prompt from rosieknight. It also fills the "Mobile / Carnivorous Plants" square in my 6-1-14 card for the genprompt_bingo fest. This poem has been sponsored via the general fund, based on an audience poll. It belongs to the series Polychrome Heroics.


"The Walking Trees"


"Trees are attacking our poolhouse,"
the caller said. "Please make them stop."

Asterope and Taygeta looked at each other,
and then the twin sisters giggled.
"Easy City gets the weirdest calls,"
Asterope said.

"Don't laugh," the dispatcher said.
"I'm sending you to deal with this.
Asterope, your solar powers should
serve to dissuade them, or if necessary,
destroy them completely.
Taygeta, your super-strength and
flexibility help draw the trees
away from the threatened property."

The call had come from Naples, Florida --
the Super Power Organizational & Operational Nexus
only had a handful of bases around the nation --
so they had to get a teleporter to carry them.

The trees turned out to be red mangroves,
and they were indeed dismantling a poolhouse
one long thin board at a time.
They moved slowly compared to animals,
but quite fast for trees.

Taygeta grabbed the nearest tree
and tried to haul it towards the coast.
It creaked in protest.

"They're stronger than they look,"
she panted, muscles flexing
under her fair skin.

Asterope framed her hands into a lens
to focus the sun's power, aiming
a narrow beam of heat at the trees.
With a sizzle, smoke began to rise.

Then the nearest tree grabbed her,
its thick root wrapping around her
so that she couldn't use her arms.

Taygeta struggled to pry it loose,
but trees were powerful creatures.
By the time she succeeded,
Asterope was panting for breath.

"Maybe we should try something else,"
Taygeta said, eyeing the hostile foliage.

So Taygeta wound her elastic body
around the nearby palm trees,
using them as anchors, while she
looped around the mangroves and
pulled them away from the poolhouse.

Asterope stood back a safe distance
and sent little bolts of sunlight
zinging at the trees to make them move.

Sulkily the mangroves let go of the boards
and backed out of the caller's yard.
They were trying to get at the neighbor's garage
when someone from wildlife management
arrived to take them to the Everglades.

As they herded the trees onto the truck,
Asterope realized that there was
a blue-and-orange inflatable pool dragon
wedged high in the branches.

"Let them keep it," Taygeta said, giggling again.

* * *

Notes:

Asterope (Agatha Megalos) -- She has fair skin, hazel eyes, and long wavy golden-brown hair. She favors bold pure colors, especially red. Her heritage is Greek-American. She uses welding to create impressive metal sculptures. Her solar abilities include photosynthesis, igniting or melting things, and focusing sunlight into a cutting beam.
Origin: Unable to conceive, her mother prayed to Aphrodite and later bore twin girls. Agatha's power manifested at puberty.
Uniform: Red dexflan with a white stylized sun on the chest.
Qualities: Expert (+4) Popular, Expert (+4) Sculptor, Good (+2) Intellect
Poor (-2) Hothead
Powers: Master (+6) Sun Powers
Limitation: Her Sun Powers only work in daylight.
Motivation: To stand against the powers of darkness.

Taygeta (Tanith Megalos) -- She has fair skin, hazel eyes, and long wavy golden-brown hair. Her heritage is Greek-American. She favors hot neon colors such as fuchsia or turquoise. Tanith uses her superpowers most often for coastal rescues and repairs.
Origin: Unable to conceive, her mother prayed to Aphrodite and later bore twin girls. Tanith's power manifested at puberty.
Uniform: Fuchsia dexflan with a rounded Greek labyrinth on the front in white.
Qualities: Good (+2) Dexterity, Good (+2) Friends in the Coast Guard, Good (+2) Physics, Good (+2) Resilient, Good (+2) Water Sports
Poor (-2) Sticking With It
Powers: Expert (+4) Super-Strength, Good (+2) Elastic Form
Motivation: To bend without breaking.

* * *

Asterope and Taygeta are named after two of the Pleiades, seven sisters in Greek mythology and also a star cluster.

Easy City is a metroplex in Louisiana. It surrounds Lake Ponchartrain, spanning the cities of New Orleans, Baton Rouge, and Slidell.

Naples, Florida has some of the most expensive real estate in the country.

Mangroves, and especially red mangroves, form a vital part of the Everglades ecosystem. They also appear along much of the warm coastline, holding it in place.

This is the pool dragon carried off by the mangroves.

Comments

living in Polychrome

[dialecticdreamer]

I just wonder how the insurance companies would react to this claim if they didn't have video footage of the mangroves attacking.

Fun to read, but now I'm asking questions on a dozen tangents. (Thanks for posting it!0

Re: living in Polychrome

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I just wonder how the insurance companies would react to this claim if they didn't have video footage of the mangroves attacking. <<

In fact, many insurance companies won't cover super incidents, as those are classed similarly to "acts of God." (Which is stupid, because insurance was originally about defraying catastrophic events so as to avoid societal damage; but it's become more "Insurance" these days, a for-profit industry.) It does still cover thefts and other ordinary crimes committed by means of superpowers. And since the laws were written with only human soups in mind, this would presumably qualify as damage by nature, like a tree falling on a house, rather than a supervillain incident. *chuckle* Sometimes bigotry makes useful loopholes.

I touched on this in my government finance description:

"There are some state, local, and private services and funds for superpower concerns. For example, cities big enough to have a soup population often set aside money to cover damages from a superpowered battle. (Federal programs typically don't cover it, and many private insurers won't either.) Independent soups or teams find that similar funds improve public relations and acceptance. SPOON has the largest and most effective conglomeration of services and resources in this field."

In fact, some of the best blue plate special jobs are in superpower-incident cleanup. It would be more sensible and economical to have the damage covered at a federal level, consistently, without all this buck-passing bullshit. But whenever people try to arrange that, someone inevitably tries to hamstring the soups with it somehow -- pinning all the damage costs on them, or requiring all soups to have special (ruinously expensive) catastrophe insurance, or something else insane -- and the proposal gets killed off. I think the city-level response is actually the best, because it's supported by local property taxes so that it scales automatically to local costs and resources. In a top-end place like Naples, if the private insurance company balks, the city could simply fix the damage while the lawsuit is progressing. Also helpful is the handful of insurance companies that do automatically cover super incidents, or offer a rider similar to flood insurance for it. The main drawback is that, like any other rider, many of the people who need it are unable to afford it. Hence SPOON having charity funds for such things.

>> Fun to read, but now I'm asking questions on a dozen tangents. (Thanks for posting it!) <<

Yeah, I know the feeling.

[mdlbear]

My parents had a house in Naples, which they intended to use as a winter place. Sadly, a few months after they moved in Dad was diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer. They settled in full time, I think because of the hospice care, which was excellent. Dad lived for another year, which is about 4 times the average for pancreatic cancer.

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

Thanks for sharing. At least they got to enjoy the place for a little while.

Re: Thoughts

[mdlbear]

Yes, and Mom lived in it for a couple of years more before moving to a continuing care place in North Carolina.

[thnidu]

• muscles flexing / under her fair skin."
> delete close-quote after narrative clause

• fuschia
-> fuchsia
> This is the very devil to remember. It may help to be aware that the flower was named for someone surnamed Fuchs.

Fixed!

[ysabetwordsmith]

The color would be easier to spell correctly if I could see the letters consistently in the order they are written. The tendency to scramble themselves makes it harder for me to spellcheck, and the spellchecker program didn't catch it either. :/

Re: Fixed!

[thnidu]

Yeah, I guess that often comes with learning whole-word reading. And the "sch" spelling is so common that statistically-trained spellchuckers will call it correct.

Re: Fixed!

[ysabetwordsmith]

I'm actually having the same problem as the spellchecker for similar reasons: I know the sch rule. Letters and numbers scramble all the time. Numbers are impossible to catch. Letters, my linguistic knack almost always makes up for the anti-knack, but for words with a weird spelling that doesn't always work. There are a handful that I often spell wrong because the letters violate some rule that the automatic function follows.

Re: Fixed!

[johnpalmer]

Good lord, Bayesian wizards, what a scary concept.

[johnpalmer]

The 12 year old in me now notes that in addition to the visual almost-pun (not technically, more of a "ooh, it looks not entirely unlike a naughty word"), the company by that name makes lubricants. The world is a strange place.

(And I never, ever, ever would have thought to look up the spelling, nor guessed the s came after the ch - thank you.)

*laugh*

[ysabetwordsmith]

Yeah, my inner 12-year-old boy got a giggle over that too.

[helgatwb]

I live in Slidell, and the description of Easy City prompted a discussion between my husband and me about how metroplexes, and how the area around us is developing. We both grew up in southern Louisiana.

The ASL for Slidell is to make a letter 'L' with your dominant hand, put your other hand palm up, and slide the 'L' across it. Slide-ell. Though it's actually pronounced 'sly-dell', it's close enough.

Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I live in Slidell, and the description of Easy City prompted a discussion between my husband and me about how metroplexes, and how the area around us is developing. We both grew up in southern Louisiana. <<

I appreciate the feedback. Let me know if anything sounds off when I'm writing Easy City? I've visited Louisiana and New Orleans, but it's not the same as living there.

>> The ASL for Slidell is to make a letter 'L' with your dominant hand, put your other hand palm up, and slide the 'L' across it. Slide-ell. Though it's actually pronounced 'sly-dell', it's close enough. <<

*laugh* I love it.

Re: Thank you!

[helgatwb]

Weell... In real life, there are already two metroplexes developing, one north of the lake, from Slidell to Baton Rouge, and incorporating parts of Mississippi. This area is already called 'the Northshore'. *snorts* The other will incorporate everything south of the lake, and probably be called New Orleans. The thing that you can't know, if you don't live here, is just how much the lake separates southeastern Louisiana. It's a social, cultural divide. I just don't think that the people around here would stand for a city that joins the two.

I'm sorry if it seems as if I'm going on about something trivial, but it really did make it harder for me to get into the poem.

Re: Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> Weell... In real life, there are already two metroplexes developing, one north of the lake, from Slidell to Baton Rouge, and incorporating parts of Mississippi. This area is already called 'the Northshore'. <<

Okay, great. Can you give me an anchor city for the Mississippi part? In Terramagne the metroplexes are defined by the scope of their integrated mass-transit system. I'm looking for plausible boundaries. They do tend to keep the individual city names and regional names within the metroplex -- part of Onion City still includes Chicagoland and Chicago, for instance.

When I mapped out the metroplexes, I used a population dotmap. The densest population goes around Lake Ponchartrain, but it does fade a bit in the middle area.

>> The other will incorporate everything south of the lake, and probably be called New Orleans. <<

Okay.

>> The thing that you can't know, if you don't live here, is just how much the lake separates southeastern Louisiana. It's a social, cultural divide. I just don't think that the people around here would stand for a city that joins the two. <<

Hmm ... from what I recall, New Orleans alone is really like five or six cities mashed together, that already don't get along very well. It was a lovely city when I visited, but restless. An odd mix of laid back and wild. Since then, it's gotten whelmed by more than one major storm. Not to mention the language divide between standard English, Southern dialect, French Creole, and Cajun French -- which are also blocked out in particular counties and neighborhoods.

That implies something happened to make the Easy City metroplex coalesce. So what could make people knit the pieces together?

One local issue with global impact is that the Mississippi River wants to change course, and people don't want that. The Atchafalaya River the obvious shift, but another possibility is into Lake Ponchartrain. The first would cut off New Orleans and Baton Rouge entirely. The second would still be a huge pain in the ass, but not as bad. Both would improve the long-term survival chances by replenishing the delta structure which is currently being eroded. A superhero with enough Water or Earth power might manage to get a handle on the river for real, not this flimsy rig of levees and whatnot that people aren't even funding properly.

Similarly, there's the issue of major storms. Someone who could damp down on those even moderately would be very, very popular. If they lived in the "middle" area between the north and south shores, that might make the property safer there, and thus more attractive.

We can also consider economic and social options. What could make the middle area more appealing to people, or more fashionable? What draws people together? It could be a positive event, or negative, or a combination of both.

>> I'm sorry if it seems as if I'm going on about something trivial, but it really did make it harder for me to get into the poem. <<

No, that's exactly the kind of local detail that interests me. Terramagne and local-Earth are similar but not identical. I'm watching for points of divergence. If there's a split here that isn't there, then either it never was there (which strikes me as implausible) or it got spliced somehow (which makes sense because Terramagne-America has gotten rather good at fixing things). So that raises the question of why and how that happened.

Re: Thank you!

[helgatwb]

I am about to go to bed, then tomorrow night, or the next day, I will do some research on my end, and come up with some facts, figures, and opinions.

One thing is, if someone came in and fixed the levee and storm problem, they could probably dictate what they wanted, up to a point. Not sure if that point would include Easy City, but it could come close.

One advantage is that I'm a Northshore gal, and my hubby, who is very interested in this kind of speculation, is from south of the lake. So you're getting a more well-rounded view, as it were.

Re: Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I am about to go to bed, then tomorrow night, or the next day, I will do some research on my end, and come up with some facts, figures, and opinions. <<

That would be awesome.

>> One thing is, if someone came in and fixed the levee and storm problem, they could probably dictate what they wanted, up to a point. <<

That's what I suspected. The storms haven't been solved completely, but they could probably be nerfed below "level the city" caliber; the river and levees probably could be fixed for real.

>> Not sure if that point would include Easy City, but it could come close. <<

It's not like, I don't know, suggesting they move the whole damn populace to the other river mouth -- which has been proposed by others, and I can't imagine that one working at all. I think building Easy City would need a combination of little steps. Working on the river/levees would make the whole area safer, the middle zone more valuable in particular, and the relevant soup(s) very popular. I think it's likely that there would be a handful of soups already working together in New Orleans, and another on the Northshore, and those groups bickering over where the SPOON base should be so they wound up not having one. But they might be amenable to putting it somewhere else if the middle grows into a more developed place, and the soup community there starts going, "Hey, maybe we can connect at the edges here, look for things in common." Tentative at first, but gaining momentum over time. Then eventually there would come talk about joining the public transportation systems into a complete loop.

What I could really use would be insight on when those things might logically have happened. The river is at least a century overdue for moving bed; people have been messing with it a long time now. Similarly, the cultural divisions in southern Louisiana have been there pretty much since the European invasion moved in. Climate change has made the storms worse over the last 30 years or so, and especially in the last decade.

Also helpful would be anything in the way of real proposals that you think might actually work. Seems like everybody and their dog have an opinion on how to fix what's wrong with southern Louisiana, from the cultural mess to the bitchy river to the economic wreckage. Most of those ideas are stupid, but there are a few pearls buried in there too. Suppose you had a couple handfuls of people with assorted superpowers, another bunch of ordinary folks comfortable working with soups, and IF you could get the super groups to merge then you could not only make a SPOON base but gain access to more of SPOON's budget. What kinds of things would you think of trying to make the area safer, more cohesive, and better to live in?

Looking at Easy City, I think it's been connected for a while, and I doubt it got leveled as badly as our New Orleans has, although the storms have been a challenge. But I don't think it's the oldest of the metroplexes. Probably Eastbord is the oldest, then Onion City and Westbord. Easy City and the Heights are probably the later ones. Rain City likely came up from the tech boom.

>> One advantage is that I'm a Northshore gal, and my hubby, who is very interested in this kind of speculation, is from south of the lake. So you're getting a more well-rounded view, as it were. <<

That's awesome! This could be really useful.

As it happens, I've done more with Easy City recently. "The Walking Trees" is launched out of there, although the main action happens in Florida. "Snappy Action," which hasn't been sponsored and posted yet, is about how the Easy City SPOON base gets a superpowered snapping turtle for a mascot. I'm currently working on a commissioned Coast Guard story that involves one of the Easy City teleporters, and a poem set in Loyola University that introduces a few more soups there. So if you folks are interested in this area and/or how it got the way it is in current-Terramagne, those are things we could explore.

The next fishbowl will be August 5 with a theme of "Flexible Truths" if either of you want to prompt for that. It seems like a very promising theme for poems set in this general region.

Re: Thank you!

[helgatwb]

The anchor city for Mississippi would probably be Poplarville, and include Picayune, McNeil and Carriere. These are all in Pearl River County. Parts of Hancock County would be included, maybe all the way to Waveland and Bay St. Louis, but it’s looking more as if those two cities are going to merge and then merge with Gulfport/Biloxi. Gulfport/Biloxi are two cities in Mississippi that are already so integrated that that’s how they are referred to all the time. It’s rarely just Gulfport or just Biloxi; they’ve even talked about changing the name. The problem with giving a city in Hancock County is that there aren’t any until you get to Waveland, it’s just unincorporated Hancock County, but people still live there. Maybe Pearlington or Diamondhead would work.

There are a lot points to talk about, would it be better if I posted my thoughts, etc., on each point on my dreamwidth, and then sent you a link? I'm not too fond of scrolling through comments sections like this, but I don't know how you feel about it. Either way is fine with me.

Re: Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> The anchor city for Mississippi would probably be Poplarville, and include Picayune, McNeil and Carriere. These are all in Pearl River County. <<

I've added Picayune. The others seems pretty far north.

>> Parts of Hancock County would be included, maybe all the way to Waveland and Bay St. Louis, but it’s looking more as if those two cities are going to merge and then merge with Gulfport/Biloxi. Gulfport/Biloxi are two cities in Mississippi that are already so integrated that that’s how they are referred to all the time. It’s rarely just Gulfport or just Biloxi; they’ve even talked about changing the name. The problem with giving a city in Hancock County is that there aren’t any until you get to Waveland, it’s just unincorporated Hancock County, but people still live there. <<

Hmm, you're probably right about Gulfport/Biloxi merging, and they may be more inclined to hook up with Mobile. For what it's worth, the metroplexes are still growing, and mass-transit is popular so the lines get extended wherever there is population to support them.

>> Maybe Pearlington or Diamondhead would work. <<

I've added Pearlington too, so that's two Mississippi cities.

>> There are a lot points to talk about, would it be better if I posted my thoughts, etc., on each point on my dreamwidth, and then sent you a link? I'm not too fond of scrolling through comments sections like this, but I don't know how you feel about it. Either way is fine with me. <<

I'm flexible. Posts on your blog might be easier to sort out by topic, because threads in comments can get really complex. Alternatively we could do this via email.

Re: Thank you!

[helgatwb]

I'll post on my blog, so I can sort with tags and such, but it might be useful to exchange some things via email.

Picayune and Pearlington sound right to me.

Re: Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> I'll post on my blog, so I can sort with tags and such, but it might be useful to exchange some things via email. <<

Okay, great.

>> Picayune and Pearlington sound right to me. <<

Yay! Thanks for your help.