dom...you are still on your mission i see!
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Cheers!
A Bottle And Friend
There's nane that's blest of human kind,
But the cheerful and the gay, man,
Fal, la, la, &c.
Here's a bottle and an honest friend!
What wad ye wish for mair, man?
Wha kens, before his life may end,
What his share may be o' care, man?
Then catch the moments as they fly,
And use them as ye ought, man:
Believe me, happiness is shy,
And comes not aye when sought, man.
Robert Burns
Thanks Harry, and Freckle for your advice too on this one
No sign of the little one, so s/he's a day late. Feel like we're in real limbo here!
I took your advice HHH and went to Oxfam and had a poke around. I found a book of poems by Clive James called 'The Book of my Enemy', collection of poems he'd written over 45 years. I found myself both moved and laughing in the shop whilst having a browse, so bought the book. 'Bring me the Sweat of Gabriella Sabatini' being especially funny!
Looking forward to getting into that during the long nights to come
OOP
Congrats to Jo Shapcott for winning the Costa book of the year award for her poetry book :cool:
From Country House Hotel (anyone got the full poem please post)
"It’s like a comfy, undemanding club
where the guests blush when their feet ring on the floor
and where the world of Securicor and Chubb
is as rude and far off as a working whore."
Well you have wet our appetite now Oop so I will have to post it :D
Bring Me The Sweat Of Gabriela Sabatini
Bring me the sweat of Gabriela Sabatini
For I know it tastes as pure as Malvern water,
Though laced with bright bubbles like the aqua minerale
That melted the kidney stones of Michelangelo,
As sunlight the snow in spring.
Bring me the sweat of Gabriela Sabatini
In a green Lycurgus cup with a sprig of mint.
But add no sugar, the bitterness is what I want.
If I crave sweetness, I would be asking you to bring me
The tears of Annabel Croft.
So let me drink deep from the bitter cup.
Take it to her between any two points of the tie-break,
That she may shake above it her thick black hair,
A nocturne from which the droplets as they fall,
Flash like shooting stars.
And as their lustre becomes liqueur, let the full calyx
Be repeatedly carried to me.
Until I tell you to stop,
Bring me the sweat of Gabriela Sabatini.
Clive James
Oooo Alf you beat me to it! My mother informed me tonight over a cuppa !
I don't have the poem you mentioned but I do have her book "Of mutability" which won and is indeed excellent (in my humble) , i hadn't realised that she had suffered from breast cancer which makes the followng poem even more spine tingling....(I had the pleasure of hearing her read it at newcastle's lit and phil society a truly "lush" institution which merits support in this awful climate of cuts!)...
oh..and she has the most amazing voice...so try and imagine a husky voice reading this....
Stargazer
If I'm not looking at you,
forgive; if I appear
to be scanning the sky,
head thrown back, curious,
ecstatic, shy, strolling
unevenly across the floor
in front of you, my audience,
forgive, and forget what's
happening in my cells.
It's you I'm thinking of
and, voice thrown upwards,
to you I'm speaking, you.
I'm trying to keep this simple
in the time left to me:
luckily, it's a slow
and selective degeneration.
I'm hoping, mainly, to stay present
and straight up despite
the wrong urge that's taken hold,
to say everything, all
at once, to everyone, which
is what I'd like if only
I could stay beyond this moment.
you can find her voice reading "deft" here...
http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetrya...do?poetId=6473
turns out its not that husky afterall! (that's memory for you!...but a nice voice nevertheless!)