Today's poet

[freckle]

Steady on old girl you'll be getting too hot under collar and will need to sit down for a while to recover.

I know...sorry!!!!!!! just off to make a cuppa and think about ironing to try and calm down!!!!

[Nathaniel Lee]

Freckles' Daydream.

Old Freckle is washing with soap,
Whilst dreaming of getting a grope,
She got so excited her pinny ignited,
So freckle sat down to another dream she hopes.

By Matt.


I hope you are not offended Freckle.

[freckle]

Freckles' Daydream.

Old Freckle is washing with soap,
Whilst dreaming of getting a grope,
She got so excited her pinny ignited,
So freckle sat down to another dream she hopes.

By Matt.


I hope you are not offended Freckle.

not at all...i love being both a muse and object of ridicule simultaneously!!!!!! nice one tri-mind

ps good use of the word "grope"!!!!!

[freckle]

More and More

More and more frequently the edges
of me dissolve and I become
a wish to assimilate the world, including
you, if possible through the skin
like a cool plant's tricks with oxygen
and live by a harmless green burning.

I would not consume
you or ever
finish, you would still be there
surrounding me, complete
as the air.

Unfortunately I don't have leaves.
Instead I have eyes
and teeth and other non-green
things which rule out osmosis.

So be careful, I mean it,
I give you fair warning:

This kind of hunger draws
everything into its own
space; nor can we
talk it all over, have a calm
rational discussion.

There is no reason for this, only
a starved dog's logic about bones.

Margaret Atwood

[Derby Tup]

Hot water flows
As piles of leaves grow
Hotel, restaurant or bar
But never in a car
A thimble in time
Never fails to revive
Green, tawny or black
From box, tin or sack
Visitiors all sup
From wee china cups
Appointments re-arranged
Business cards exchanged
There's little time to think
In the cycle of brew, strain and drink
At all times of day
But, just what did they say?

[freckle]

Hot water flows
As piles of leaves grow
Hotel, restaurant or bar
But never in a car
A thimble in time
Never fails to revive
Green, tawny or black
From box, tin or sack
Visitiors all sup
From wee china cups
Appointments re-arranged
Business cards exchanged
There's little time to think
In the cycle of brew, strain and drink
At all times of day
But, just what did they say?

Gosh that is so wonderful....very evocative, like the line "there's little time to think" but generally like the way it hangs together to tell a story through a series of images...great stuff!

[freckle]

Clambering Up Cold Mountain Path
Hanshan (Tang)

Clambering up the Cold Mountain path,
The Cold Mountain trail goes on and on.
The long gorge choked with scree and boulders,
The wide creek
the mist-blurred grass.
The moss is slipprey
though there's been no rain,
The pine sings
but there's no wind.
Who can leap the world's ties,
And sit with me among the white clouds?


and.....

Deep in the mountains
Ryokan 1758-1831

Deep in the mountains
all snow covered
In the evening
my heart vanishes
Or so it seems


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

from a nice little website with lots of chinese mountain inspired literature/songs
http://www.mountainsongs.net/poem.php

[Hes]

Clambering Up Cold Mountain Path
Hanshan (Tang)

Clambering up the Cold Mountain path,
The Cold Mountain trail goes on and on.
The long gorge choked with scree and boulders,
The wide creek
the mist-blurred grass.
The moss is slipprey
though there's been no rain,
The pine sings
but there's no wind.
Who can leap the world's ties,
And sit with me among the white clouds?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

from a nice little website with lots of chinese mountain inspired literature/songs
http://www.mountainsongs.net/poem.php

I like that, reckon DT will too.

[Hes]

Night Garden

Your mouth, a hand
against my mouth.
Pressed to earth, we dream
of ocean: heat-soaked, washed
with exhaustion, our mariner's sleep
haunted by smells of garden--fresh rosemary
thirty miles off Spain. Long grasses
sway the bottom of our boat.
We follow a sequence
of scents complex as music,
navigate earth places, sea places, follow
acoustics of mountains,
warbler instinct in the dark--
Siberia, Africa, and back--
phosphor runways guiding us to shore,
moonlight half eaten by the waves.

Across the lawn, a lit window floats.
Welts of lupine. You remember
an open window, Arabian music
through wet beeches. We know we're moving
at tremendous speed, that if it could be seen
the stars would be a smear
of velocity. But all is still,
pinioned. In the night garden,
light is a swallowed cry.
Naked in the middle of the city
the stars grow firm in our mouths.

Anne Michaels (my favourite)

[Hes]

Somebody (and forgive me for not trawling back through the posts, just off for dinner) posted a poem about running that was really about running away and I would like to post one that was given to me by my mum who understood that one and half years travelling was not running away but running to....

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 ~