3 weeks!! That's bad marra, still, working for a living beats rioting:wink:Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
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3 weeks!! That's bad marra, still, working for a living beats rioting:wink:Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
Evening Freckle...Quesy?
As in Linton Quesy Johnson?
Here's one from before Converse trainers were the source of trouble on the streets.
Reggae Fi Peach
by Linton Kwesi Johnson
Everywhere you go it's deh talk of the day
Everywhere you go, you hear people say
dat "Deh Special Patrol...dem a MURDER-AH, MURDER-AH"
we can't let dem get, no furder-ah
deh S.P.G. dem a MURDER-AH, MURDER-AH
we can't let dem get, no furder-ah
because dem kill Blair Peach, deh teacha
dem kill Blair Peach dem dogs 'n bleeders
Blair Peach was an ordinary man
Blair Peach him took a simple stand
'gainst deh fascists and dem wicked plan
so they beat him till him life was gone
And everywhere you go it's deh talk of the day
Everywhere you go, you hear people say
dat "Deh Special Patrol...dem a MURDER-AH, MURDER-AH"
we can't let dem get, no furder-ah
deh S.P.G. dem a MURDER-AH, MURDER-AH
we can't let dem get, no furder-ah
because dem kill Blair Peach, deh teacha
dem kill Blair Peach dem dogs 'n bleeders
Blair Peach was not an English man
Him come from New Zealand
Tho dey kill'em and 'em dead and gone
But his memory lingers on
Oh ye people of Europe
GREAT injustices are committed upon deh land
How long will we permit dem to carry on?
Is Europe becoming a fascist place?
The answer lies at your own gate
and in the answer lies your fate
__________________
better still
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otacja5LDJY
OW x
I really enjoyed that OW shame i didn't check it last night instead of getting into "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest" which was on telly, i forgot what a great film that is, nurse ratchett is so scary, it went on til nearly 2am tho ! x
2am :w00t: Way past my bed time freckle. I enjoyed the Anne Sexton poem you posted.Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
The Puzzled Game-Birds
They are not those who used to feed us
When we were young--they cannot be -
These shapes that now bereave and bleed us?
They are not those who used to feed us, -
For would they not fair terms concede us?
- If hearts can house such treachery
They are not those who used to feed us
When we were young--they cannot be!
Thomas Hardy
Excellent choice that one Hes :thumbup:Quote:
Originally Posted by Hes
The rainbow never tells me
The rainbow never tells me
That gust and storm are by,
Yet is she more convincing
Than Philosophy.
My flowers turn from Forums –
Yet eloquent declare
What Cato couldn’t prove me
Except the birds were here!
Emily Dickinson
Where it all went wrong.
The Iron Ladies gleaming statue is daily worshipped,
By the succession of Prime Ministers,
Their fraudulent fingers in the pot they remain tight lipped,
Allowing bought off peerages those sirs should be misters.
The blood of the north lies on their hands still after all these years,
Rising middle management introducing political correctness and greed,
Fathers fought their sons and neighbours emasculated by their fears,
How can a man who is dejected and disenfranchised protect his child from this demon seed.
Time moves on we are left with a generation lost no direction,
We ask why are the streets are like this the battles and riots what is it all for,
Well for nearly thirty years there has been a festering infection,
This all began when the working man was crushed in Nineteen Eighty Four.
Bipolar Boy.
Yay...a rare appearance by OW! Nice to see you.:D
Some lovely poems posted. I'm searching for one to suit my mood....
sometimes you can find a poem that is perfect for what you want to say and sometimes it remains elusive...the latter is one of those occasions! So, here is a poem that sums that feeling up! :)
The Gulf
I tried
To capture in paper
The nameless, still bird
In my garden
For you.
But
Between
What I sought to say
And what I did
The bird
Has taken to wings.
ka mohanarangan
Fantastic! Love, love, love <3
Quote:
Originally Posted by hes
Lights Out
I have come to the borders of sleep,
The unfathomable deep
Forest where all must lose
Their way, however straight,
Or winding, soon or late;
They cannot choose.
Many a road and track
That, since the dawn's first crack,
Up to the forest brink,
Deceived the travellers,
Suddenly now blurs,
And in they sink.
Here love ends,
Despair, ambition ends,
All pleasure and all trouble,
Although most sweet or bitter,
Here ends in sleep that is sweeter
Than tasks most noble.
There is not any book
Or face of dearest look
That I would not turn from now
To go into the unknown
I must enter and leave alone
I know not how.
The tall forest towers;
Its cloudy foliage lowers
Ahead, shelf above shelf;
Its silence I hear and obey
That I may lose my way
And myself.
Edward Thomas
I do love Edward Thomas's poems. Thanks for posting that Alf.:)
me too, a lovely choice alf, tho i hope its doesn't mean you are on your last legs, i shall weep!Quote:
Originally Posted by Hes
still working my way through "Being Human", liked this one...
I drew a line
A line.
I drew a line:
this far and no further.
I will never cross this line.
When I crossed the line
I drew another line
and another line.
The sun was shining
and everywhere I could see people
drawing lines,
in a hurry and decidedly,
and everybody crossed them.
TOON TELLEGEN
Lovely choice Freckle. I have Being Human and it has some really great poems in it.xx
Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
This has been posted a few times before but my mum gave me a copy of this poem when I really needed it and I'd like to post it for a friend.
The Journey
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice–
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do–
determined to save
the only life you could save.
Mary Oliver
just love that poem, i hope your friend gains strength from it x
Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
Shed not a tear
for I will be here
for many a year
my dear :D
I think Edward Thomas was a fellrunner at heart
When First I Came Here
WHEN first I came here I had hope,
Hope for I knew not what. Fast beat
My heart at the sight of the tall slope
Or grass and yews, as if my feet
Only by scaling its steps of chalk
Would see something no other hill
Ever disclosed. And now I walk
Down it the last time. Never will
My heart beat so again at sight
Of any hill although as fair
And loftier. For infinite
The change, late unperceived, this year,
The twelfth, suddenly, shows me plain.
Hope now,--not health nor cheerfulness,
Since they can come and go again,
As often one brief hour witnesses,--
Just hope has gone forever. Perhaps
I may love other hills yet more
Than this: the future and the maps
Hide something I was waiting for.
One thing I know, that love with chance
And use and time and necessity
Will grow, and louder the heart's dance
At parting than at meeting be.
Edward Thomas
a dove has been spotted
dropping this poem o-er the ionian sea
to lap at the limbs
of a lesser spotted fell runner
who shall remain anonymous.....;)
--------------------------------
Love, Like Water ~ Julia Copus
Love, like water
tumbling from some far-flung cloud
into your bathroom alone, to sleeve
a toe, five toes, a metatarsal arch,
it does its best to feign indifference
to the body, but will go on creeping
up to the neck till its reading the skin
like Braille, though you’re certain it sees
under the surface of things and knows
the routes your nerves take as they branch
from the mind, which lately has been curling
in on itself like the spine of a dog
as it circles a patch of ground to sleep.
Now through the dappled window,
propped open slightly for the heat,
a light rain is composing
the lake it falls into, the way a lover’s hand
composes the body it touches - Love,
like water! How it gives and gives,
wearing the deepest of grooves in our sides
and filling them up again, ever so gently
wounding us, making us whole.
"Shed not a tear
for I will be here
for many a year
my dear :D"
aw aint that sweet! thank goodness alfster! , nice thomas choice again, you just bought a collection or something?
This Room
Imtiaz Dharker
This room is breaking out
of itself, cracking through
its own walls
in search of space, light,
empty air.
The bed is lifting out of
its nightmares.
From dark corners, chairs
are rising up to crash through clouds.
This is the time and place
to be alive:
when the daily furniture of our lives
stirs, when the improbable arrives.
Pots and pans bang together
in celebration, clang
past the crowd of garlic, onions, spices,
fly by the ceiling fan.
No one is looking for the door.
In all this excitement
I'm wondering where
I've left my feet, and why
my hands are outside, clapping
So good that you are back Freckle...you've posted some great poems.xx
aw shucks xxxQuote:
Originally Posted by Hes
For a long time I've just had my head down working but the last week or so has been a bit less intense and I've been enjoying such things as watching the fledgling swallows being fed just outside my bedroom window and today I stopped my bike ride to watch two barn owls hunting on the common:
Leisure
WHAT is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?—
No time to stand beneath the boughs,
And stare as long as sheep and cows:
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass:
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night:
No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance:
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began?
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
W. H. Davies
this poem brings back happy memories for me, my mum used to recite it to me as a child, thanks for posting hes! I'm glad you have had time to pause from the hectic pace of life, I too am holding onto the calmness I have felt after having a substantial break away from work, so far so good, mind you I have only been back one day! :w00t:Quote:
Originally Posted by Hes
well off to read a book in bed now so night all! x
Night Freckle. hope you can keep hold of that calm.xx
Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
i have just discovered julia copus...and what a wonderful feeling such a discovery is.....just like the old times.....
A Short History of Desire
Julia Copus
On a day like today, I think I can almost
begin to make sense of those chivalrous knights
who, on the whim of some titian-haired damsel,
would set off on horseback, although they were barely
out of their teens, in pursuit of some noble
improbable task, while a sun much like this one
strobed through the trees and the left-behind girl
perfected the art of the meaningful wait —
the curve of her breasts and her full lips so pleasingly
matching the line of the coiled anaconda
thickly entwined like a creeper about
her chiffon-swathed hips, the nub of its head
reclining over her naked shoulder.
As naked, that is, as the thigh of the fabled
Victorian gent (beneath the folds
of his peg-top pants) who, perched on a horsehair
chair in the parlour, would catch a glimpse
of his lady-love's finely-turned ankle and feel
the strain of his flesh at the seam of his button-up
fly; was suddenly, keenly, aware
of the fervour of light, how it filled up a room
on a day like today, how it tugged at his blood,
and glanced off the edge of her silver-plate buckle
the way in the Fifties it glanced off the fenders
of a thousand parked-up Morris Minors
under the moon when the sweetest of girls
might take off her clothes on a day like today
to the radio's chanting — alop-bam-boom —
and lie back like a leaf-bud splitting
open across someone's trembling lap as if
just then a knife had been touched to her skin.
However deep asleep you think you are,
there always will be days like this —
a light, hair-tousling breeze and a sun that streams
into the dusty parlour of your heart.
Pray when it does that your heart, out cold
for the winter, stirs in its stockpile of leaves.
Or else, that you're caught off guard by the quickening
thump of your hoof-beat heart returning
from very far off: pray then for the stoutness of heart
to ride with it headlong into a poem like this one
where some part of everything never stops moving
under the light of that big old heart, the moon;
where even the moon up there in its ocean
of sky is afloat, and trembles with longing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle
"perfected the art of the meaningful wait " :D
Yes good poem that freckle how did you discover her?
Absence. { The Black Dog Wars.}
Why do i hide from public view,
Heart pounding always in pain,
Want to talk be with all of you,
Afraid at times i'd never write again.
A year has taken its toll on me,
An abyss i've climbed out of once more,
Desperate to share to be free,
I want to feel the friendship i did once before.
Bipolar Boy.
I can't quite recall, think it was via "Being Human", been browsing the net and nearly wept when i listened to her recital of the poem "The Backseat of my Mothers Car" which tells the tale of a daughter seperating from her father, its written in specular form, a form she developed in her first book and which involves the same lines being used front to back in a poem, worth a listen rather than just read....Quote:
Originally Posted by Alf
http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetrya...o?poemId=13532
oh...and not sure that i am good at the "meaningful wait" at all!
a heartfelt poem, i reckon a few of us have been climbing this year! its good to have you back !Quote:
Originally Posted by Leonidas
Alun Lewis who probably committed suicide in WW2 although the official line was he fell with a gun in his hand and accidentally shot himself in the head :confused: Either way we lost a fine poet http://i592.photobucket.com/albums/t...gebit/sad2.gif
Goodbye
So we must say Goodbye, my darling,
And go, as lovers go, for ever;
Tonight remains, to pack and fix on labels
And make an end of lying down together.
I put a final shilling in the gas,
And watch you slip your dress below your knees
And lie so stlil I hear your rustling comb
Modulate the autumn in the trees.
And all the countless things I shall remember
Lay mummy-cloths of silence round my head;
I fill the carafe with a drink of water;
You say 'We paid a guinea for this bed,'
And then, 'We'll leave some gas, a little warmth
For the next resident, and these dry flowers,'
And turn your face away, afraid to speak
The big word, that Eternity is ours.
Your kisses close my eyes and yet you stare
As though god struck a child with nameless fears;
Perhaps the water glitters and discloses
Time's chalice and its limpid useless tears.
Everything we renounce except our selves;
Selfishness is the last of all to go;
Our sighs are exhalations of the earth,
Our footprints leave a track across the snow.
We made the universe to be our home,
Our nostrils took the wind to be our breath,
Our hearts are massive towers of delight,
We stride across the seven seas of death.
Yet when all's done you'll keep the emerald
I placed upon your finger in the street;
And I will keep the patches that you sewed
On my old battledress tonight, my sweet.
Alun Lewis
thats a great poem alf, its hard to imagine how young couples were able to tolerate the seperation and uncertainty that the 2WW (and other wars) brought, beautifully written
Blaydon baths ain't exactly the ionian sea
but my waist sure did appreciate
30 mins of dodging and diving
through the fast lane
and the mystery
of the "*hit off a stick"
big one....
i am off to bed now with my book so night all (again!)
Alf...what a sad but lovely poem...so much loss. Leonidas, glad you have made it back up again...I agree with Freckle, I think a few people out there have had a challenging time and I hope that everyone is on the up, and those that are down know that they aren't alone. I just can't seem to find the right poems this evening and my head is full of 'stuff'.
I just found out today that a really good friend of mine is going to tie the knot again after a run of very bad luck, so pleased for her ....now its her turn to sit in the hot unbroken circle.......
Country Girl
George Mackay Brown
I make seven circles, my love
For your good breaking.
I make the gray circle of bread
And the circle of ale
And I drive the butter round in a golden ring
And I dance when you fiddle
And I turn my face with the turning sun till your
feet come in from the field.
My lamp throws a circle of light,
Then you lie for an hour in the hot unbroken
circle of my arms.
Here is an interesting perspective on fox hunting over the ages from the foxes point of view (by Rudyard Kipling).
Fox-hunting
The fox meditatesWHEN Samson set my brush afire
To spoil the Timnite's barley,
I made my point for Leicestershire
And left Philistia early.
Through Gath and Rankesborough Gorse I fled,
And took the Coplow Road, sir !
And was a gentleman in Red
When all the Quorn wore woad, sir !
When Rome lay massed on Hadrian's Wall,
And nothing much was doing,
Her bored Centurions heard my call
0' nights when I went wooing.
They raised a pack - they ran it well
(For I was there to run 'em)
From Aesica to Carter Fell,
And down North Tyne to Hunnum.
When William landed hot for blood,
And Harold's hosts were smitten,
I lay at earth in Battle Wood
While Domesday Book was written.
Whatever harm he did to man,
I owe him pure affection;
For in his righteous reign began
The first of Game Protection.
When Charles, my namesake, lost his mask,
And Oliver dropped his'n,
I found those Northern Squires a task,
To keep 'em out of prison.
In boots as big as milking-pails,
With holsters on the pommel,
They chevied me across the Dales
Instead of fighting Cromwell.
When thrifty Walpole took the helm,
And hedging came in fashion,
The March of Progress gave my realm
Enclosure and Plantation.
'Twas then, to soothe their discontent,
I showed each pounded Master,
However fast the Commons went,
I went a little faster !
When Pigg and Jorrocks held the stage
And Steam had linked the Shires,
I broke the staid Victorian age
To posts, and rails, and wires.
Then fifty mile was none too far
To go by train to cover,
Till some dam' sutler pupped a car,
And decent sport was over!
When men grew shy of hunting stag,
For fear the Law might try 'em,
The Car put up an average bag
Of twenty dead per diem.
Then every road was made a rink
For Coroners to sit on;
And so began, in skid and stink,
The real blood-sport of Britain !
I think that's called syncronicity! I saw a fox tonight and its the first one I've seen since living in the countryside. I often used to see them in the town. It made me wonder how safe it was because I expect the local landowners/farmers will have a pretty rigorous fox extermination scheme in place around here...I never feared for them in Suburbia. This one was a slinky wee thing too, not like the bruisers in the cities.
Silence
There is a silence where hath been no sound,
There is a silence where no sound may be,
In the cold grave—under the deep, deep sea,
Or in wide desert where no life is found,
Which hath been mute, and still must sleep profound;
No voice is hush’d—no life treads silently,
But clouds and cloudy shadows wander free,
That never spoke, over the idle ground:
But in green ruins, in the desolate walls
Of antique palaces, where Man hath been,
Though the dun fox or wild hyæna calls,
And owls, that flit continually between,
Shriek to the echo, and the low winds moan—
There the true Silence is, self-conscious and alone.
Thomas Hood
We get a lot of foxes where I live as its next to the fields and I always worry the cat will get eaten by them but for some reason they don't seem to attack cats ?Quote:
Originally Posted by Hes
City Fox, Country Fox
The city fox envies his soft, rural kin:
They don’t have to watch out for lorries and cars.
The sleek village vixen just lazes away
In wide-open fields, underneath sparkling stars.
The city fox has to go out in the light
When rustical Reynard sleeps safe in his bed.
He only pops out in the midst of the night
To pilfer some poultry from his chickenshed.
The city fox struggles to keep himself fed;
A diet of leftovers doesn’t go far.
Whilst eking a living is all he can do,
Arcadian diets are like caviare.
The city fox scratches in bins for his food
But, out in the country, his cousin lives well
On rabbit and pheasant and other fine game
Whilst rough, tatty townie recoils from the smell.
The city fox wears his dull coat sparse and thin;
His privileged relative sports rich and red.
He sleeps in a cosy, warm, luxury earth
And not in a dingy, cramped, waterlogged bed.
The city fox hangs his tail limply and sad;
He carries an unbristled stub of a brush,
Whilst proudly his brother wags, bouffant and brash,
His tail, fully furnished with fur long and lush.
The city fox seeks for our sympathy, but
He thinks he is safer by living in town
For out in the country, they shoot and they hunt
And life can be dangerous, if you are brown.
The city fox chooses to live where he does
Away from the huntsmen so pretty in pink
As, shouting and chasing, they gallop along
With hounds in the vanguard who jostle and jink.
The city fox laughs at his lazy, fat aunts
Who, chased by the beagles, soon run out of breath
And give up the ghost and surrender at last
In terror, awaiting a violent death,
But city MPs have abolished his fun
By banishing hunting to history’s book
And so his soft sisters are safe as can be
While his life is hard; they have all the luck.
C Richard Miles
Thats a great line to finish a poem on freckle :cool:Quote:
Originally Posted by freckle