i like that last line...its a a killer!Originally Posted by Alf
i like that last line...its a a killer!
I like it.
Did Floyd go boasting to all his doggy pals?
An Accomodation
Simon Armitage
___ and I both agreed that something had to change,
but I was still stunned and not a little hurt when I
staggered home one evening to find she'd draped a
net curtain slap down the middle of our home.
She said, "I'm over here and you're over there, and
from now on that's how its going to be." It was a
small house, not much more than a single room,
which made for one or two practical problems.
Like the fridge was on my side and the oven was on
hers. And she had the bed while I slept fully
clothed in the inflatable chair. Also there was a
Husker Du CD on her half of the border which I
wouldn't have minded hearing again for old times'
sake, and her winter coat stayed hanging on the
dooe in my domain. But the net was the net, and we
didn't so much pass a single word through its
sacred veil, let alone send a hand crawling beneath
it, or, God forbid, yank it aside and go marching
across the line. Some nights she'd bring men back,
deadbeats, incompatible,not fit to kiss the heel of
her shoe. But it couldn't have been easy for her
either, watching me mooch about like a ghost,
seeing me crashing around in the empty bottles and
cans. And there were good times too, sitting side by
side on the old settee, the curtain between us, the
TV in her sector but angled towards me, taking me
into account.
Over the years the moths moved in, got a taste for
the net, so it came to resemble a giant web, like a
thing made of actual holes strung together by fine,
nervous threads. But there it remained, and remains
to this day, this tattered shroud, this ravaged lace
suspended between our lives, keeping us
inseperable and betrothed.
That is fantastic freckle and timely as I'm going to hear Simon this eveningI'm going with occasional forumite and KCAC clubmate Bramble. Almost certainly the only man to quote art critic Brian Sewell on our running club web-site
Poacher turned game-keeper
Have a fab time DT, I wonder if he will read that one again? Please let us know how you and Bramble get on :-)That is fantastic freckle and timely as I'm going to hear Simon this evening
Last edited by freckle; 22-07-2010 at 10:08 AM.
Motive
If we had never left the room
the wind would be a ghost to us.
We wouldn't know to read the storm
into the havoc in the glass
but only see each bough and leaf
driven by its own blind will:
the tree, a woman mad with grief,
the bush, a panicked silver shoal.
Something hurries on its course
outside every human head
and on one knows its shape or force
but the unborn and the dead;
so for all that we are one machine
ploughing through the sea and gale
I know your impulse and design
no better than the keel the sail -
when you life your hand or tongue
what is it moves to make you move?
What hurricanes light you along,
O my fire-born, time-thrown love?
Don Paterson
Last edited by Mossdog; 22-07-2010 at 02:51 PM. Reason: spelling
Am Yisrael Chai
Poetry
In the same way that the mindless diamond keeps
one spark of the planet's early fires
trapped forever in its net of ice,
it's not love's later heat that poetry holds,
but the atom of the love that drew it forth
from the silence: so if the bright coal of his love
begins to smoulder, the poet hears his voice
suddenly forced, like a bar-room singer's -- boastful
with his own huge feeling, or drowned by violins;
but if it yields a steadier light, he knows
the pure verse, when it finally comes, will sound
like a mountain spring, anonymous and serene.
Beneath the blue oblivious sky, the water
sings of nothing, not your name, not mine.
Don Paterson
Am Yisrael Chai
Another couple of good selections Mossy
A poem about loss.
The Unprofessionals
When the worst thing happens,
That uproots the future,
That you must live for every hour of your future,
They come,
Unorganized, inarticulate, unprofessional;
They come sheepishly, sit with you, holding hands,
From tea to tea, from Anadin to Valium,
Sleeping on put-you-ups, answering the phone,
Coming in shifts, spontaneously,
Talking sometimes,
About wallflowers, and fishing, and why
Dealing with Kleenex and kettles,
Doing the washing up and the shopping,
Like civilians in a shelter, under bombardment,
Holding hands and sitting it out
Through the immortality of all the seconds,
Until the blunting of time,
U A Fanthorpe
I hope you have a good night. You must let us know how it goes.That is fantastic freckle and timely as I'm going to hear Simon this evening
Good evening all, hope you are well....
I have enjoyed the three latest poems, the two Don Paterson poems ( I really like his work so thanks Mossy) and also Alf's choice, hard going but a good thought provoking read.
Thought I 'd try a little writing tonight on the subject area of loss...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Meditation on loss
I am- getting the best Christmas present ever only to have it broken by 9:30am that very day.
I am- a two bed ground floor flat as opposed to a three bed terrace with high ceilings.
I am- the quiet after the children have stopped "acting the goat" and are sleeping.
I am- the realisation that my tits and ass are not what they were before children.
I am- a pain in my stomach that won’t let me eat.
I am- a daughter telling her mother she would rather live with her father.
I am- staying up to the wee hours on some social networking sight when everyone else is in bed, making love or dreaming.
I am- a single mum at a christening listening to the others discuss their summer holidays abroad.
I am- the 30 odd year old woman who is showing a 20 something IBM worker around my “not for long” home.
I am- the engagement ring, well not the first one, the second one, remember?
I am- the beginning and the ending,
I am -the ending and the beginning
in a very necessary way.
Last edited by freckle; 22-07-2010 at 09:37 PM.
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