Today's poet

[Mossdog]

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

[Stolly]

Simon Armitage completes his final leg of the Pennine Way today, from Crowden to Edale, reaching his home tonight...I would imagine by now he is feeling very tired and emotional...here is one of the poems he read at the Dufton gig...he noted in his preamble that the dogs in this poem could be thought of as a metaphor for those things in life (or yourself) which you might seek to escape but keep returning!


Before You Cut Loose,

put dogs on the list
of difficult things to lose. Those dogs ditched
on the North York Moors or the Sussex Downs
or hurled like bags of sand from rented cars
have followed their noses to market towns
and bounced like balls into their owners' arms.
I heard one story of a dog that swam
to the English coast from the Isle of Man,
and a dog that carried eggs and bacon
and a morning paper from the village
surfaced umpteen leagues and two years later,
bacon eaten but the eggs unbroken,
newsprint dry as tinder, to the letter.
A dog might wander the width of the map
to bury its head in its owner's lap,
crawl the last mile to dab a bleeding paw
against its own front door. To die at home,
a dog might walk its four legs to the bone.
You can take off the tag and the collar
but a dog wears one coat and one colour.
A dog got rid of--that's a dog for life.
No dog howls like a dog kicked out at night.
Try looking a dog like that in the eye.

Nothing at all to do with metaphors of real things in life that I want to lose and keep coming back Frecks but, more importantly, I actually lost my dog out running on Sunday morning and your poem couldn't have been posted at a more appropriate point. We were running off the trig on Pen y Ghent in low cloud and, whereas I ran on, Harry at some point swerved off. I must have been running around and whistling for that frigging dog for 20 minutes before I finally tracked him down. But unlike your poem I wasn't trying to lose him and was very glad to have him back

[Derby Tup]

Tie Your Heart At Night To Mine, Love

Tie your heart at night to mine, love,
and both will defeat the darkness
like twin drums beating in the forest
against the heavy wall of wet leaves.

Night crossing: black coal of dream
that cuts the thread of earthly orbs
with the punctuality of a headlong train
that pulls cold stone and shadow endlessly.

Love, because of it, tie me to a purer movement,
to the grip on life that beats in your breast,
with the wings of a submerged swan,

So that our dream might reply
to the sky's questioning stars
with one key, one door closed to shadow.

Pablo Neruda

[Hes]

These are brilliant OW! I laughed out loud.
I'm way behind on the thread, life got in the way of a lot of intentions this week but Freckle, the two original verses that you posted were really wonderful. The first had real elements of sadness and I don't think it was self-pitying...you sometimes have to express these things. Some things are too large to be kept in our heads. Your second worked well in conjunction...full of love and hope! xx

The limerick

A lyrical running quartet
Out from a campsite in Dufton did set
Over Great Dunn Fell
In weather from hell
Til a wandering poet they met.


The Haiku

Did I overstep the mark?
mused Floyd, releasing
the famous one's leg

[Hes]

I'm really impressed by this! Wonderful stuff. Maybe I should write one about all the great artists that I've known or know of that have worked as postmen, librarians, in factories etc in order to survive and make their artwork.

Hello all, it's been a while. A good friend inspired this poem which was once again written in the company of an overpriced latte. Expensive lark this poetry...

'Amateurs'

Kenny's in the garden, digging up the beds
He scorched the earth on Skiddaw, now he's chopping down my hedge
Billy's on the patio, measuring the slope
He's done his round in daylight, now he's doing me a quote
Joss is in the backyard, whistling a call
He's won another trial, now he's building me a wall
Helene's in the backroom, setting up her bed
She's tamed the Dragon's Back, now she's sorting out my legs
Paula's in America with all her backroom staff
I've got a job for her but she's got little time for that...

It's not a dig at anyone, just a tip of the hat to those greats that did this as an addition to grafting for a living.

[Hes]

Some truly lovely postings lately. I would like to share this poem:

At last,
It just
Stopped
Beating,
Beaten into
Submission
By years
Of being
Open,
Unguarded,
Devoted,
Trusting,
And true.

They pronounced him
Dead. Hearing
The word,
Alive, inside
He tried
To scream,
Beg, laugh,
Whisper,
Or cry
But his
Heart stayed
Cold
And blue.

So they said
‘Work in
The world
As a
Ghost
If you like.
No-one
Will notice
Your pulse
Has gone.’
So he did,
And a prickly
Skin grew.

And a thousand
Years passed,
With words, love
Trapped in
A still heart
No current
Could revive.
The pronouncement
Seemed true.
Till
At last
He met
You.

Paul Ingram

[Hes]

Green

green, cream
cider-apple clean

curled with a kitten
(she called him mine)

cool, smoothing linen
on her drowsing young arms

black-limbed night-vision
angels scooped her, nursed her

sinking down to sleep just like
a pebble in a forest lake

plop.

she was never schooled in give and take
how to dream all night of lifelong ageing

or to dream all day
of sleep, fear and forgetting

she was too busy seeing
to care or name

whether Betelgeuse occluded Mars
or maybe vice-versa

as four new words came down for love
while eighteen words came down for lies

and stars became words, too,
showering and comet-tailing

whooshing oh so fast into the safe
soft target of her mind

some Upper-case pet-names
swallowed yours and mine

as soft apple-sweet sense
turned to harder-bitten

while words made sight
a command-decision

so if the mirror and the bed
both begin to bite back hard

and if the lake grows dimensions
like a heavy-metal glove

and if sleep stifles its own dreams
like unaffordable children

stop.

don't let the stars go out
while your eyes are still open

Paul Ingram

[Hes]

Sublime!

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

[freckle]

Nothing at all to do with metaphors of real things in life that I want to lose and keep coming back Frecks but, more importantly, I actually lost my dog out running on Sunday morning and your poem couldn't have been posted at a more appropriate point. We were running off the trig on Pen y Ghent in low cloud and, whereas I ran on, Harry at some point swerved off. I must have been running around and whistling for that frigging dog for 20 minutes before I finally tracked him down. But unlike your poem I wasn't trying to lose him and was very glad to have him back

Aw what a lovely little story, so glad you found him it would have been dreadful to loose such a cute pup and faithful companion! :-)

[freckle]

I'm really impressed by this! Wonderful stuff. Maybe I should write one about all the great artists that I've known or know of that have worked as postmen, librarians, in factories etc in order to survive and make their artwork.

I think that would be really cool !

Mossy and DT glad to see two of our old fave's back on the thread in the shape of ee cummings and neruda, lovely stuff :-)