Today's poet

[HUGH JARSE]

Manners Maketh Man

A scruffy individual ambled into town
everyone avoided him - then at the Rose and Crown
he went into the public bar and ordered him a beer
the publican said loudly, we don't serve vagrants here.

‘I’m sorry sir’ the man replied ‘I've come a long long way
And all I ask from you my friend is a pint of ale today.
My appearance must be daunting and I'm sorry sir for that
but if you knew my tale of woe you'd know I'm not a rat.’

The publican was quite impressed by the stranger's voice
And so he gave the scruffy man a different sort of choice
‘Go upstairs and have a wash I'll lend you some clean clobber
I can tell the way you talk you are no thief or robber.’

The stranger did as he was asked and when he left the bar
The regulars were quite amazed they found it quite bizarre
The publican he said to them ‘I think that blokes OK.
We all might need a helping hand just like that some day.

The stranger was so polite today I think you will agree
He could have been quite angry and nasty too to me
I believe in him, I do, and I've helped him 'cos I can
For I'm a firm believer that manners maketh man.’



I found this one today after reading lots of bitchy/sniping/backbiting posts on the forum......________________

[freckle]

Oooooo its been a hive of creativity on here lately with some wonderful choices from X Runner and Alf, Hes I also loved your haiku and Hugh Jarse it was great to see you on here with another good choice. Stolly was that your own work?

Here is my selection for tonight...

Land Love
DOUGLAS DUNN

We stood here in the coupledom of us.
I showed her this — a pool with leaping trout,
Split-second saints drawn in a rippled nimbus.
We heard the night-boys in the fir trees shout.

Dusk was an insect-hovered dark water,
The calling of lost children, stars coming out.
With all the feelings of a widower
Who does not live there now, I dream my place.

I go by the soft paths, alone with her.
Dusk is a listening, a whispered grace
Voiced on a bank, a time that is all ears
For the snapped twig, the strange wind on your face.

She waits at the door of the hemisphere
In her harvest dress, in the remote
Local August that is everywhere and here.

What rustles in the leaves, if it is not
What I asked for, an opening of doors
To a half-heard religious anecdote?

Monogamous swans on the darkened mirrors
Picture the private grace of man and wife
In its white poise, its sleepy portraitures.

Night is its Dog Star, its eyelet of grief
A high, lit echo of the starry sheaves.
A puff of hedge-dust loosens in the leaves.
Such love that lingers on the fields of life!

ps....did you know that the dog star apparently has a silent friend known as the "pup"...made me think of stolly and his new companion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius

[freckle]

It's a 'Glassic' Hope your well Hes

Unfortunately I really really want a beer now Steve so if you could just pop round with one please! snecklifter of course!

[stevefoster]

Unfortunately I really really want a beer now Steve so if you could just pop round with one please! snecklifter of course!

Just got home from work and t'pubs are shut, dam these shifts!

[Alf]

Another poem from the man himself. .

Poem

And if it snowed and snow covered the drive
he took a spade and tossed it to one side.
And always tucked his daughter up at night
And slippered her the one time that she lied.

And every week he tipped up half his wage.
And what he didn't spend each week he saved.
And praised his wife for every meal she made.
And once, for laughing, punched her in the face.

And for his mum he hired a private nurse.
And every Sunday taxied her to church.
And he blubbed when she went from bad to worse.
And twice he lifted ten quid from her purse.

Here's how they rated him when they looked back:
sometimes he did this, sometimes he did that.

Simon Armitage

[Stolly]

I'd rather be a could-be if I cannot be an are
because a could-be is a maybe who is reaching for a star
I'd rather be a has-been than a might-have-been by far
for a might have-been has never been but a has was once an are



Milton Berle

[freckle]

I'd rather be a could-be if I cannot be an are
because a could-be is a maybe who is reaching for a star
I'd rather be a has-been than a might-have-been by far
for a might have-been has never been but a has was once an are




Milton Berle

This is lovely and one I will remember next time I am struggling up a fell!


sorry I haven't been on much of late, been too busy getting electrocuted by my kitchen sink! ( I kid you not!) just trying to get a sparky now to sort it out!...it could only happen to me really couldn't it?

[Alf]

This is lovely and one I will remember next time I am struggling up a fell!


sorry I haven't been on much of late, been too busy getting electrocuted by my kitchen sink! ( I kid you not!) just trying to get a sparky now to sort it out!...it could only happen to me really couldn't it?

That doesn't sound too good freckle
.
I would keep your washing up gloves on and wear your wellies round the sink till the problem is fixed.

[freckle]

Thank you Alf...astonishingly the sparky found that was no earth in my property art all! a fact somehow missed when i got my new boiler fixed recently ! .....anyhoo, after my near death experience I fancy a bit of romance...well it is friday....

Federico García Lorca

Sonnet of the Sweet Complaint
Never let me lose the marvel
of your statue-like eyes, or the accent
the solitary rose of your breath
places on my cheek at night.
I am afraid of being, on this shore,
a branchless trunk, and what I most regret
is having no flower, pulp, or clay
for the worm of my despair.
If you are my hidden treasure,
if you are my cross, my dampened pain,
if I am a dog, and you alone my master,
never let me lose what I have gained,
and adorn the branches of your river
with leaves of my estranged Autumn.

have a great evening all...

[Harry H Howgill]

I've just had a box full of Simon Armitage books delivered, so anyone coming to his do at Dufton can buy "Selected Poems" or "Shooting Stars".

I opened the box just to check I wasn't going to arrive with 17 copies of Delia Smith for him to sign.