I've mentioned before on my Ink Sweat & Tears webzine that I think certain words – such as 'mote' and 'shard' – should be banned from modern poetry because they have become such a cliche that nowadays poets are the only people who use them. Having sat through a poetry competition results announcement last night, I would now like to add another word to the banned list: 'keening' Why? Because this is the 21st century and nobody keens anymore, except poets. Any poets continuing to find motes in their eyes (or anywhere else) will be broken into shards until they keen for mercy.