Poetry please

[Brendan]

That?s very good Citizen. Beautiful imagery (tu)

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

UNTIL

Until you have had the ground beneath your feet disappear.

Seen the sky turn black

and shower you with molten metal fragments.

You'll never know how precious the morning can be

for men at war.

I pray you never have to share the moment.

James Love

Falklands Veteran

Amen. Repeat posting for Remembrance Sunday

[AllforNun]

As I was walking through the grass

There was Tanya tanning her ass

P D Stringfellow

[EDOldie]

My Dad loved poetry and always recited (from memory) this when I was small. It always made me laugh. I read it at his funeral and wished i could have spoken it half as well as he would have done. I've just noticed this thread and it's very nice indeed, it's brought back lots of memories. I don't know if it's self eveident or not, but Quoodle is a dog.

THE SONG OF QUOODLE

G.K.Chesterton

They haven't got no noses,

The fallen sons of Eve;

Even the smell of roses

Is not what they supposes;

But more than mind discloses

And more than men believe.

They haven't got no noses,

They cannot even tell

When door and darkness closes

The park a Jew encloses,

Where even the law of Moses

Will let you steal a smell.

The brilliant smell of water,

The brave smell of a stone,

The smell of dew and thunder,

The old bones buried under,

Are things in which they blunder

And err, if left alone.

The wind from winter forests,

The scent of scentless flowers,

The breath of brides' adorning,

The smell of snare and warning,

The smell of Sunday morning,

God gave to us for ours

* * * * *

And Quoodle here discloses

All things that Quoodle can,

They haven't got no noses,

They haven't got no noses,

And goodness only knowses

The Noselessness of Man.

[ohiogirl]

This is a great thread.

Some more Shakespeare:

Sonnet 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;

Coral is far more red than her lips' red:

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,

But no such roses see I in her cheeks;

And in some perfumes is there more delight

Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.

I love to hear her speak,--yet well I know

That music hath a far more pleasing sound;

I grant I never saw a goddess go,

My mistress when she walks, treads on the ground;

And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare

As any she belied with false compare.

[citizenED]

At one point in my life I was well into TS Eliot. Here's why.

The Love Song of Alfred J Prufrock:

LET us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherised upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats 5

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question ? 10

Oh, do not ask, ?What is it??

Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go

Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes, 15

The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes

Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,

Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,

Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,

Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap, 20

And seeing that it was a soft October night,

Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time

For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,

Rubbing its back upon the window-panes; 25

There will be time, there will be time

To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;

There will be time to murder and create,

And time for all the works and days of hands

That lift and drop a question on your plate; 30

Time for you and time for me,

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,

And for a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go 35

Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time

To wonder, ?Do I dare?? and, ?Do I dare??

Time to turn back and descend the stair,

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair? 40

[They will say: ?How his hair is growing thin!?]

My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,

My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin?

[They will say: ?But how his arms and legs are thin!?]

Do I dare 45

Disturb the universe?

In a minute there is time

For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:?

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, 50

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all? 55

The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,

When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,

Then how should I begin

To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways? 60

And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all?

Arms that are braceleted and white and bare

[but in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]

It is perfume from a dress 65

That makes me so digress?

Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.

And should I then presume?

And how should I begin?

. . . . .

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets 70

And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes

Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows??

I should have been a pair of ragged claws

Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

. . . . .

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! 75

Smoothed by long fingers,

Asleep ? tired ? or it malingers,

Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,

Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis? 80

But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,

Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,

I am no prophet?and here?s no great matter;

I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,

And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, 85

And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,

After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,

Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,

Would it have been worth while, 90

To have bitten off the matter with a smile,

To have squeezed the universe into a ball

To roll it toward some overwhelming question,

To say: ?I am Lazarus, come from the dead,

Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all?? 95

If one, settling a pillow by her head,

Should say: ?That is not what I meant at all.

That is not it, at all.?

And would it have been worth it, after all,

Would it have been worth while, 100

After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,

After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor?

And this, and so much more??

It is impossible to say just what I mean!

But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen: 105

Would it have been worth while

If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,

And turning toward the window, should say:

?That is not it at all,

That is not what I meant, at all.?

. . . . . 110

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;

Am an attendant lord, one that will do

To swell a progress, start a scene or two,

Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,

Deferential, glad to be of use, 115

Politic, cautious, and meticulous;

Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;

At times, indeed, almost ridiculous?

Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old ? I grow old ? 120

I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me. 125

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves

Combing the white hair of the waves blown back

When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea

By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown 130

Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

[lozzyloz]

ken lee

tulibu dibu douchoo

ken leee

ken lee meju more

Powerful stuff

[Moos]

I caught this morning morning?s minion, king-

dom of daylight?s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding

Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding

High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing

In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,

As a skate?s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding

Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding

Stirred for a bird,?the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here

Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion

Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: sh?er pl?d makes plough down sillion

Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,

Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

[Robert Poste's Child]

I heard this poem again yesterday and learned it by heart so I can recite it slowly at the brandy stage of dinner parties, like Uncle Monty in Withnail. I always thought this thread should have gone on forever, BTW.

Love after love, by Derek Walcott

The time will come

when, with elation

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

[goosey-goosey]

That's a good 'un, RPC.

Here's George Peele from the sixteenth century.

What Thing Is Love

What thing is love? for sure love is a thing.

It is a prick, it is a sting,

It is a pretty, pretty thing;

It is a fire, it is a coal,

Whose flame creeps in at every hole;

And as my wit doth best devise,

Love's dwelling is in ladies' eyes,

From whence do glance love's piercing darts,

That make such holes into our hearts;

And all the world herein accord,

Love is a great and mighty lord;

And when he list to mount so high,

With Venus he in heaven doth lie,

And evermore hath been a god,

Since Mars and she played even and odd.

[rendelharris]

Villanelle for 9/11*

In that fair land where freedom?s song once rang,

The beacon for those yearning to be free

The hymns of hate swelled as the ravens sang.

The clotted darkness of harsh hate?s harangue

Choked up the rivers, flowed out to the sea

In that fair land where freedom?s song once rang.

From those dark trees where once strange fruit did hang,

Where children clapped a burning cross with glee,

The hymns of hate swelled as the ravens sang.

The brooding hatred?s hooded murd?rous gang

Have saddled up and innocence must flee

In that fair land where freedom?s song once rang.

A monstrous leader from this hatred sprang

To cry this land?s not made for you or me:

The hymns of hate swelled as the ravens sang.

And so the tolling death-knell?s hollow clang

Weighed down on souls from sea to shining sea:

In that fair land where freedom?s song once rang,

The hymns of hate swelled as the ravens sang.

*November 9th 2016, Donald Trump confirmed as US President

[TE44]

Wasn't Moab the land of the Pagans,

Where Davids great grandmother ran to the

Bethlehem barley field,

To plant the food banks of tomorrow,

The mother of all bread,

A tiny seed, no massive ordnance air blast.

Only a tiny seed laid as a mothers prayer is

whispered to the earth,

Feeding future souls.

['bout now]

The Shipping Forecast. Seamus Heaney.

Dogger, Rockall, Malin, Irish Sea:

Green, swift upsurges, North Atlantic flux

Conjured by that strong gale-warning voice,

Collapse into a sibilant penumbra.

Midnight and closedown. Sirens of the tundra,

Of eel-road, seal-road, keel-road, whale-road, raise

Their wind-compounded keen behind the baize

And drive the trawlers to the lee of Wicklow.

L?Etoile, Le Guillemot, La Belle H?l?ne

Nursed their bright names this morning in the bay

That toiled like mortar. It was marvellous

And actual, I said out loud, ?A haven,?

The word deepening, clearing, like the sky

Elsewhere on Minches, Cromarty, The Faroes.

[Springer]

☺☺

[Jah Lush]

Dead Snakes by Saira Viola

Tittle tattle

tabloids hit?

porking baby sitters

big dick pics

rolling sleaze

on a plasma screen

penny stocks

rock dollar dreams

start up tech bubble

bursts at the seams

scandal sheets

sell motor adds

insurance scams

and pension plans

film stars fight to be recognised

racist wars in black and white

good cop bad cop

on equal pay

ballers pitching

easy prey

Kierkegaard speaks through

gifs and memes

new society ?too bored to read,?

trippin? on a trivia stream

fleecing beggars and refugees

snake eyes scoring for easy lays

virgin flowers ready to slay

high five jives

and lying lips

back room trades

and lawyer?s tricks

squillionaires steal workers? lives,

yachting under Caribbean skies

stash their cash

under panama hats

leaving hopes and dreams

in the welfare line,

surfing sofas ? no place

to stay

join the army

for regular pay,

waging wars

for crooked means,

sharing bite sized scraps???

with rats and fleas,

deathly shadows

on the wall

money succubus blows??

you raw

fill your mouth with

crossing? tongues

hymn of truth

still unsung.

[Sue]

Lowbrow poem to start the thread off again:

"Build me my tomb," the Raven said,

"Within the dark yew-tree,

So in the Autumn yewberries

Sad lamps may burn for me.

Summon the haunted beetle,

From twilight bud and bloom,

To drone a gloomy dirge for me

At dusk above my tomb.

Beseech ye too the glowworm

To rear her cloudy flame,

Where the small, flickering bats resort,

Whistling in tears my name.

Let the round dew a whisper make,

Welling on twig and thorn;

And only the grey cock at night

Call through his silver horn.

And you, dear sisters, don your black

For ever and a day,

To show how true a raven

In his tomb is laid away."

[Lynne]

Lost!!

a football poem

Right, let's get in the car then...hello,here I am

Yes, there was lots to buy and I had a nice day

And it's getting near Christmas it was really good fun

Oh, and how was the match, was it OK?

No, we lost

Yes, I met Mrs. P, you know, next door but one

She was loaded with bags, you'd have laughed, what a sight

But mind you, by then I was nearly as bad

And what did you say? the match.was it alright?

No, we lost

When you think of the stuff I got, didn't take long

We'll be home in good time, we can watch the TV.

You like Strictly Come Dancing and Casualty, dear

So Saturday night you'll have plenty to see

No, we lost

Ah, the lights are on red, still we'll be back pretty soon

It's bound to be slow all those cars from the ground

It being a cup match, I remember you said

I suppose it'll mean you'll be in the next round

No, we lost

I'll just have to try on those things that I bought

And see how they look..Marks would soon take them back

And you can decide what you'd like best for tea

I bet you'll be hungry, want more than a snack

No, we lost

Adrian Worsey