Today's poet

[freckle]

I enjoyed "The Word" Mossy

"Tomorrow you may be utterly
without a clue

but today you get a telegram,
from the heart in exile"


Now nothing to do with the weather:

Frozen


I have seen a life laid to waste,
in the name of pure stubbornness,
in the absolute definition of denial.

I see my own life.
Caught up on the same rails,
charging full steam ahead,
to a tunnel where no light shines.

The gates of experience fly by.
Still frames of adventures
I have excused myself from
for reasons, for selfishness.

Vanity . . . shame.
The double yellow line,
solid and illuminated,
laughs as I attempt to find the nerve.

To dare cross.

Throwing up walls of resistance
as the hourglass bleeds
grains of sand I can't afford.

I have seen a lifetime
laid to waste,
and in its shadow,
I have seen my own.

Natasha Head

feels sad.......

[freckle]

The Sick Rose
William Blake

O Rose, thou art sick!
The invisible worm
That flies in the night,
In the howling storm,
Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy:
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.

[freckle]

Try to praise the mutilated world.
—Adam Zagajewski

Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
The nettles that methodically overgrow
the abandoned homesteads of exiles.
You must praise the mutilated world.
You watched the stylish yachts and ships;
one of them had a long trip ahead of it,
while salty oblivion awaited others.
You’ve seen the refugees heading nowhere,
you’ve heard the executioners sing joyfully.
You should praise the mutilated world.
Remember the moments when we were together
in a white room and the curtain fluttered.
Return in thought to the concert where music flared.
You gathered acorns in the park in autumn
and leaves eddied over the earth’s scars.
Praise the mutilated world
and the gray feather a thrush lost,
and the gentle light that strays and vanishes
and returns.

[freckle]

Flying at Night
by Ted Kooser
Above us, stars. Beneath us, constellations. Five billion miles away, a galaxy dies like a snowflake falling on water. Below us,some farmer, feeling the chill of that distant death, snaps on his yard light, drawing his sheds and barnback into the little system of his care. All night, the cities, like shimmering novas, tug with bright streets at lonely lights like his.

[Mossdog]

Flying at Night
by Ted Kooser
Above us, stars. Beneath us, constellations. Five billion miles away, a galaxy dies like a snowflake falling on water. Below us,some farmer, feeling the chill of that distant death, snaps on his yard light, drawing his sheds and barnback into the little system of his care. All night, the cities, like shimmering novas, tug with bright streets at lonely lights like his.

That's marvellous.

And, just to get us into the spirit (not sure what spirit that is tho!) here's...


Christmas Prelude

O little fleas
of speckled light
all dancing
like a satellite

O belly green trees
shaded vale
O shiny bobcat
winter trail

Amoebic rampage
squamous cock
a Chinese hairpiece
burly sock

A grilled banana
smashes gates
and mingeless badgers
venerate

The asses of the
winter trees
rock on fat asses
as you please

Be jumpy
or unhinged
with joy
enlightened
fry cakes
Staten hoy.

LISA JARNOT

[freckle]

that's marvellous.

And, just to get us into the spirit (not sure what spirit that is tho!) here's...


christmas prelude

o little fleas
of speckled light
all dancing
like a satellite

o belly green trees
shaded vale
o shiny bobcat
winter trail

amoebic rampage
squamous cock
a chinese hairpiece
burly sock

a grilled banana
smashes gates
and mingeless badgers
venerate

the asses of the
winter trees
rock on fat asses
as you please

be jumpy
or unhinged
with joy
enlightened
fry cakes
staten hoy.

Lisa jarnot

d-e-l-e-c-t-a-b-l-e

[freckle]

One Another’s Light

I do not know what brought me here
Away from where I’ve hardly ever been and now
Am never likely to go again.
Faces are lost, and places passed
At which I could have stopped,
And stopping, been glad enough.
Some faces left a mark,
And I on them might have wrought
Some kind of charm or spell
To make their futures work,
But it’s hard to guess
How one person on another
Works an influence.
We pass, and lit briefly by one another’s light
Hope the way we go is right.

Brian Patten

[Richard Shlong]

I wandered lonely as a cloud.

R. Shlong, 2012.

[Alf]

Try to praise the mutilated world.
—Adam Zagajewski

Remember June’s long days,
and wild strawberries, drops of wine, the dew.
The nettles that methodically overgrow
the abandoned homesteads of exiles.
You must praise the mutilated world.
You watched the stylish yachts and ships;
one of them had a long trip ahead of it,
while salty oblivion awaited others.
You’ve seen the refugees heading nowhere,
you’ve heard the executioners sing joyfully.
You should praise the mutilated world.
Remember the moments when we were together
in a white room and the curtain fluttered.
Return in thought to the concert where music flared.
You gathered acorns in the park in autumn
and leaves eddied over the earth’s scars.
Praise the mutilated world
and the gray feather a thrush lost,
and the gentle light that strays and vanishes
and returns.

I really like this one freckle Its only the bad times that make the good times so special.

[Alf]

In drear nighted December


In drear nighted December,
Too happy, happy tree,
Thy branches ne'er remember
Their green felicity—
The north cannot undo them
With a sleety whistle through them
Nor frozen thawings glue them
From budding at the prime.

In drear-nighted December,
Too happy, happy brook,
Thy bubblings ne'er remember
Apollo's summer look;
But with a sweet forgetting,
They stay their crystal fretting,
Never, never petting
About the frozen time.

Ah! would 'twere so with many
A gentle girl and boy—
But were there ever any
Writh'd not of passed joy?
The feel of not to feel it,
When there is none to heal it
Nor numbed sense to steel it,
Was never said in rhyme.

John Keats