General Chat

Is Pam Ayres considered a poet enough for this thread? I love her work and one of my very favourites is

"They should have asked my husband".

You know this world is complicated, imperfect and oppressed
And it's not hard to feel timid, apprehensive and depressed.
It seems that all around us tides of questions ebb and flow
And people want solutions but they don’t know where to go.

Opinions abound but who is wrong and who is right.
People need a prophet, a diffuser of the light.
Someone they can turn to as the crises rage and swirl.
Someone with the remedy, the wisdom, and the pearl.

Well . . . they should have asked my ‘usband, he’d have told’em then and there.
His thoughts on immigration, teenage mothers, Tony Blair,
The future of the monarchy, house prices in the south
The wait for hip replacements, BSE and foot and mouth.

Yes . . . they should have asked my husband he can sort out any mess
He can rejuvenate the railways he can cure the NHS
So any little niggle, anything you want to know
Just run it past my husband, wind him up and let him go.

Congestion on the motorways, free holidays for thugs
The damage to the ozone layer, refugees and drugs.
These may defeat the brain of any politician bloke
But present it to my husband and he’ll solve it at a stroke.

He’ll clarify the situation; he will make it crystal clear
You’ll feel the glazing of your eyeballs, and the bending of your ear.
Corruption at the top, he’s an authority on that
And the Mafia, Gadafia and Yasser Arafat.

Upon these areas he brings his intellect to shine
In a great compelling voice that’s twice as loud as yours or mine.
I often wonder what it must be like to be so strong,
Infallible, articulate, self-confident …… and wrong.

When it comes to tolerance – he hasn’t got a lot
Joyriders should be guillotined and muggers should be shot.
The sound of his own voice becomes like music to his ears
And he hasn’t got an inkling that he’s boring us to tears.

My friends don’t call so often, they have busy lives I know
But its not everyday you want to hear a windbag suck and blow.
Encyclopaedias, on them we never have to call
Why clutter up the bookshelf when my husband knows it all!


Sue
xx

Susan, your poem about the little dog angel brought a lump to my throat.Have you heard of Greyfriars Bobby in Edinbourgh? HIs master John Grey died, the little Skye terrier lived on his grave for 14 years.We all wiped away tears when seeing the statue of him.
Still on the subject of animals,does anyone remember one that started something like this:

I hear a sudden cry of pain, there is a rabbit in a snare, now I hear that cry again, but cannot tell from where....
The last lines are , Little one, oh little one I am searching everywhere. This caused a lot of tears to flow when we had to learn this at school.

What is is about animal poems.....?

Eileen x

hi really love the poem of my boy jack, did look it up on internet if i remember right jacks body was found not sure of date but belive his body was buried in england with his parents, (hope i got it right) the person who played kippling was really good, cant belive its the same person who played a right plonker in the thin blue line!

The Snare
James Stephens


I hear a sudden cry of pain!
There is a rabbit in a snare;
Now I hear the cry again,
But I cannot tell from where.

But I cannot tell from where
He is calling out for aid;
Crying on the frightened air,
Making everything afraid.

Making everything afraid,
Wrinkling up his little face,
As he cries again for aid;
And I cannot find the place!

And I cannot find the place
Where his paw is in the snare:
Little one! Oh, little one!
I am searching everywhere.

Father Boy


Oh Father Boy, Oh Father Boy
You didn’t see the signs
You didn’t hear a thing did you
Oh Father Boy, my dear
You didn’t see, you didn’t look, you didn’t listen either
You didn’t try to understand
You didn’t take the time
You weren’t a Father, Father Boy, you weren’t a Father, Father.

Oh Father Boy, Father Boy
When a Father has a Boy
To be a Father, Father see
You have to see the Boy
The Boy inside the Father
And the Father in the Boy
But Father Boy, Oh Father Boy
You just didn’t pay attention
For a Boy to be a Father, Father
He cannot be a Father Boy.

Ahhhh, thank you Belair.Reading this again has the same result as it did at school.It is so poignant.

Susan, this is a great idea of yours, it is so nice to be able to share your love of poetry with others, isn't it?

Have two more questions:Who wrote the following?

'Circling, circling, in ever widening gyres', etc.

'I am old, I am old, I am wearing the bottoms of my trousers rolled' ....

The first one was about what the Dutch call a buzzard.they have a distinctive way of flying,indeed going around in circles, without flapping their wings, relying on the thermals.Such a restful sight.

Eileen

There are a lot of lovely poems on this thread.I love reading/hearing other's favourites.

Has anyone listened to 'Poetry Please' on Radio 4?

Eileen

also love i wonder lonely as a cloud, went swimming one summer and someone had wrote it on a fence with some words changed it was still good, but would love to know what their english teacher thought of it?

This was a favourite of mine when I was at school. I remember the other girls thought it was morbid, but I thought it really captured the atmosphere of the Abbey well.

On the Tombs of Westminster Abbey, by Francis Beaumont.

Mortality, behold and fear
What a change of flesh is here!
Think how many royal bones
Sleep within these heaps of stones;
Here they lie, had realms and lands,
Who now want strength to stir their hands,
Where from their pulpits seal'd with dust
They preach, "In greatness is no trust."
Here's an acre sown indeed
With the richest royallest seed
That the earth did e'er suck in
Since the first man died for sin:
Here the bones of birth have cried,
"Though gods they were, as men they died!"
Here are sands, ignoble things,
Dropt from the ruin'd sides of kings:
Here's a world of pomp and state
Buried in dust, once dead by fate.

Anyone know the poem "The Village Blacksmith"? My dad was always on about it and how great it was, can remember bits of it but not all, or who wrote it

Just googled and here it is!!


Village Blacksmith

UNDER a spreading chestnut-tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.

His hair is crisp, and black, and long,
His face is like the tan;
His brow is wet with honest sweat,
He earns whate'er he can,
And looks the whole world in the face,
For he owes not any man.

Week in, week out, from morn till night,
You can hear his bellows blow;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge,
With measured beat and slow,
Like a sexton ringing the village bell,
When the evening sun is low.

And children coming home from school
Look in at the open door;
They love to see the flaming forge,
And hear the bellows roar,
And catch the burning sparks that fly
Like chaff from a threshing-floor.

He goes on Sunday to the church,
And sits among his boys;
He hears the parson pray and preach,
He hears his daughter's voice,
Singing in the village choir,
And it makes his heart rejoice.

It sounds to him like her mother's voice,
Singing in Paradise!
He needs must think of her once more,
How in the grave she lies;
And with his hard, rough hand he wipes
A tear out of his eyes.

Toiling,---rejoicing,---sorrowing,
Onward through life he goes;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close;
Something attempted, something done,
Has earned a night's repose.

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,
For the lesson thou hast taught!
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

This is a lovely thread, have enjoyed reading it as I love poetry. Two of my favourites have already been mentioned' Warning by Jenny Joseph. and Do not go gentle into that good night by Dylan Thomas. This another that I really enjoy

A cat named Sloopy by Rod McKuen

For a while the only earth that Sloopy knew was in her sandbox
Two rooms on Fifty-fifth Street were her domain
Every night she'd sit in the window among the avocada plants
waiting for me to come home
(my arms full of canned liver and love).
We'd talk into the night then contented
but missing something.
She the earth she never knew
me the hills I ran while growing bent.
Sloopy should have been a cowboy's cat
with prairies to run not linoleum
and real-live catnip mice.
No one to depend on but herself.

I never told her but in my mind
I was a midnight cowboy even then.
Riding my imaginary horse down Forty-second Street,
going off with strangers to live an hour-long cowboy's life but always coming home to Sloopy
who loved me best.

A dozen summers we lived against the world.
An island on an island.
She'd comfort me with purring
I'd fatten her with smiles.
We grew rich on trust needing not the beach or butterflies
I had a friend named Ben
Who painted buildings like Roualt men. He went away.
My laughter tired Lillian after a time
she found a man who only smiled.
But Sloopy stayed and stayed.

Winter nineteen finfty-nine.
Old men walk their dogs
Some are walked so often
that their feet leave little pink tracks
in the soft grey snow.

Women fur on fur elegant and easy
only slightly pure
hailing cabs to take them round the block and back.
Who is not a love seeker when December comes?
Even children pray to Santa Claus.
I had my own love safe at home
and yet I stayed out all and next day too.

They must have thought me crazy screaming

Sloopy! Sloopy!

as the snow came falling down around me

I was a madman
to have stayed away one minute more than the appointed hour.
I'd like to think a golden cowboy snatched her from the windowsill
and safely saddlebagged she rode to Arizona.
She's stalking lizards in the cactus now perhaps,
bitter but free.
I'm bitter too
and not a free man anymore.

But once upon a time,
in New York's jungle in a tree,
before I went into the world
in search of other kinds of love
nobody owned me but a cat named Sloopy

Looking back she's been
the only human thing that ever gave back love to me.

Hi Eileen,
No I hadn't heard of Greyfriars Bobby, sounds heartbreaking and agree there is something about the loyalty that animals show us that really gets to your soul.
Would like to say what a fantastic response and such beautiful poetry. Honestly didn't think it would be so popular.

Sue

Hi Claddagh
Googled and found this.

T.S. Eliot 1. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock


S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.


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 Lazaru

O, my luve is like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June;
O, my luve is like a melodie
That's sweetly played in tune.
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
till a' the seas gang dry.
Adn I will luve tee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry.

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
While the sands of life shall run.
But fare thee weel, my only luve!
O, fare thee weel awhile!
And I will come agian, my luve,
Tho' 'twere ten thousand miles.
Tho' 'twere then thousand mile, my luve,
Tho' 'twere ten thousand mile,
And I will come again, my luve,
Tho 'twere ten thousand mile.
Robert Burns

DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT


Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

My maiden name so I like this ......

Tomlinson

Now Tomlinson gave up the ghost in his house in Berkeley Square,
And a Spirit came to his bedside and gripped him by the hair -
A Spirit gripped him by the hair and carried him far away,
Till he heard as the roar of a rain-fed ford the roar of the Milky Way:
Till he heard the roar of the Milky Way die down and drone and cease,
And they came to the Gate within the Wall where Peter holds the keys.
"Stand up, stand up now, Tomlinson, and answer loud and high
The good that ye did for the sake of men or ever ye came to die -
The good that ye did for the sake of men in little earth so lone!"
And the naked soul of Tomlinson grew white as a rain-washed bone.
"O I have a friend on earth," he said, "that was my priest and guide,
And well would he answer all for me if he were by my side."
"For that ye strove in neighbour-love it shall be written fair,
But now ye wait at Heaven's Gate and not in Berkeley Square:
Though we called your friend from his bed this night, he could not speak for you,
For the race is run by one and one and never by two and two."
Then Tomlinson looked up and down, and little gain was there,
For the naked stars grinned overhead, and he saw that his soul was bare:
The Wind that blows between the worlds, it cut him like a knife,
And Tomlinson took up his tale and spoke of his good in life.
"This I have read in a book," he said, "and that was told to me,
And this I have thought that another man thought of a Prince in Muscovy."
The good souls flocked like homing doves and bade him clear the path,
And Peter twirled the jangling keys in weariness and wrath.
"Ye have read, ye have heard, ye have thought," he said, "and the tale is yet to run:
By the worth of the body that once ye had, give answer - what ha' ye done?"
Then Tomlinson looked back and forth, and little good it bore,
For the Darkness stayed at his shoulder-blade and Heaven's Gate before:
"O this I have felt, and this I have guessed, and this I have heard men say,
And this they wrote that another man wrote of a carl in Norroway."
- "Ye have read, ye have felt, ye have guessed, good lack! Ye have hampered Heaven's Gate;
There's little room between the stars in idleness to prate!
O none may reach by hired speech of neighbour, priest, and kin
Through borrowed deed to God's good meed that lies so fair within;
Get hence, get hence to the Lord of Wrong, for doom has yet to run,
And...the faith that ye share with Berkeley Square uphold you, Tomlinson!"

Benjamin Zephaniah is a performance poet who has a wonderful sense of rhythm and humour as well as getting down to the nitty gritty of life. He writes as he speaks so I chose this one to share with you as it is probably a bit easier for me to type - I hope!

According to my mood.

I have poetic licence, i WriTe thE way i waNT.
i drop my full stops where i like........
MY CAPITAL LetteRs go where i like
(i do my spelling write)
Acording to My MOod.
i HAve poetic licence,
i put my commers where i like,,((())).
(((my brackets are write((
I REPEAT WHen i likE.
i can't go rong.
i look and i.c.
It's rite.
i REpeat when i liKe. i have
poetic licence!
don't question me????

IssyB, I love The Love Song by T.S Eliot, have never heard of it.His 'The Wasteland' was so long, it put me off him.B.Zephaniah sounds like how most of us must feel, good one, that.
Ann of G.G Thanks for the reminder of The Village Blacksmith, it brings back memories.
Carole, love most of Robbie Burns poetry, some of it is very funny.I used to have the one you mention on a record, it was sung by Kenneth McKeller, if that's how you spell his name.Lovely!

Eileen

Now for something completely different:

Who can tell me the 3rd line of this little ditty, it has been niggling away over the years.

I can manage my bifocals,
To my dentures I'm resigned,
-----------------------------------------?
But how I miss my mind.

Hope someone can help.

Eileen