Oh buga.....not a good time for a poetry thread .... I'll be up all sodding night! Could go on forever and BTW love loads of Carol Anne Duffy, don't care if people think they're naff....A bit of Yeats:
Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
quote:Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:
This is by Benjamin Zephaniah, a rasta poet that kids love. He's a great performance poet.
Wot a Pair
I waz walking down Wyefront street
When me trousers ran away,
I waz feeling incomplete
But still me trousers would not stay,
When I found where they had gone
De pair addressed me rather blunt,
And they told me they were sick of being put on
Back to front.
I told dem I would treat dem good
And wear dem back to back,
I promised dem protection
From a friend who is a mac,
Me trousers did not believe a single word I had to say,
And me underpants were laughing
When me trousers ran away.
I like that as well.
I'm sure its not a good thing that I seem to gravitate towards childrens poets and nonsense rhymes! There is the odd deep poem that I like... I will dig them out tomorrow... they are modern, but not childish.
There was a poem I'm sure was Carol Ann Duffy that I read at school years ago about her having a miscarriage (sounds awful! Was really but the imagery was so evocative) I wish I could read it again, I don't know what it was called and haven't found it...
I'll post one tomorrow that my daughter wrote, aged 5. She wrote it at my Mums, whilst I was in hospital with her baby brother (then aged 6 weeks)... he had bronchiolitis... and whilst not life threatening, it obviously shook her to the core.
The poem is SO deep... my mum keeps it in her purse.
I'll get it and post it tomorrow.
You will not believe a child wrote it, let alone a 5 yr old!
The poem is SO deep... my mum keeps it in her purse.
I'll get it and post it tomorrow.
You will not believe a child wrote it, let alone a 5 yr old!
And another one of my favourite Patten poems:
You ask for a poem.
I offer you a blade of grass.
You say it is not good enough.
You ask for a poem.
I say this blade of grass will do.
It has dressed itself in frost,
It is more immediate
Than any image of my making.
You say it is not a poem,
It is a blade of grass and grass
Is not quite good enough.
I offer you a blade of grass.
You are indignant.
You say it is too easy to offer grass.
It is absurd.
Anyone can offer a blade of grass.
You ask for a poem.
And so I write you a tragedy about
How a blade of grass
Becomes more and more difficult to offer,
And about how as you grow older
A blade of grass
Becomes more difficult to accept.
You ask for a poem.
I offer you a blade of grass.
You say it is not good enough.
You ask for a poem.
I say this blade of grass will do.
It has dressed itself in frost,
It is more immediate
Than any image of my making.
You say it is not a poem,
It is a blade of grass and grass
Is not quite good enough.
I offer you a blade of grass.
You are indignant.
You say it is too easy to offer grass.
It is absurd.
Anyone can offer a blade of grass.
You ask for a poem.
And so I write you a tragedy about
How a blade of grass
Becomes more and more difficult to offer,
And about how as you grow older
A blade of grass
Becomes more difficult to accept.
quote:Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:quote:Originally posted by Queen of the High Teas:
Philip Larkin - This Be The Verse
They **** you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
But they were ****ed up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.
Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.
Poignant!
I do like Larkin, that is one of the most oft-quoted lines of English poetry I think: 'They f.uck you up, your Mum and Dad...'
And so much truth!!
Those Patten poems say so much about what a poem IS iyswim?
Do it Ditty! How wonderful, your daughter must have inherited your Mum's talent. I might post one of mine sometime but it'd look shit amongst this lot
Do it Ditty! How wonderful, your daughter must have inherited your Mum's talent. I might post one of mine sometime but it'd look shit amongst this lot
I have one too... about Rudolf 
I had to read it out at a school concert when I was 15! *the shame*
I will post Molly's though, hers is good!
I had to read it out at a school concert when I was 15! *the shame*
I will post Molly's though, hers is good!
By Ted Hughes, one time Poet Laureate and husband of Sylvia Plath. Bit rudey!
Bride And Groom Lie Hidden For Three Days
by Ted Hughes
She gives him his eyes, she found them
Among some rubble, among some beetles
He gives her her skin
He just seemed to pull it down out of the air and lay it over her
She weeps with fearfulness and astonishment
She has found his hands for him, and fitted them freshly at the wrists
They are amazed at themselves, they go feeling all over her
He has assembled her spine, he cleaned each piece carefully
And sets them in perfect order
A superhuman puzzle but he is inspired
She leans back twisting this way and that, using it and laughing
Incredulous
Now she has brought his feet, she is connecting them
So that his whole body lights up
And he has fashioned her new hips
With all fittings complete and with newly wound coils, all shiningly oiled
He is polishing every part, he himself can hardly believe it
They keep taking each other to the sun, they find they can easily
To test each new thing at each new step
And now she smoothes over him the plates of his skull
So that the joints are invisible
And now he connects her throat, her breasts and the pit of her stomach
With a single wire
She gives him his teeth, tying the the roots to the centrepin of his body
He sets the little circlets on her fingertips
She stiches his body here and there with steely purple silk
He oils the delicate cogs of her mouth
She inlays with deep cut scrolls the nape of his neck
He sinks into place the inside of her thighs
So, gasping with joy, with cries of wonderment
Like two gods of mud
Sprawling in the dirt, but with infinite care
They bring each other to perfection.
Bride And Groom Lie Hidden For Three Days
by Ted Hughes
She gives him his eyes, she found them
Among some rubble, among some beetles
He gives her her skin
He just seemed to pull it down out of the air and lay it over her
She weeps with fearfulness and astonishment
She has found his hands for him, and fitted them freshly at the wrists
They are amazed at themselves, they go feeling all over her
He has assembled her spine, he cleaned each piece carefully
And sets them in perfect order
A superhuman puzzle but he is inspired
She leans back twisting this way and that, using it and laughing
Incredulous
Now she has brought his feet, she is connecting them
So that his whole body lights up
And he has fashioned her new hips
With all fittings complete and with newly wound coils, all shiningly oiled
He is polishing every part, he himself can hardly believe it
They keep taking each other to the sun, they find they can easily
To test each new thing at each new step
And now she smoothes over him the plates of his skull
So that the joints are invisible
And now he connects her throat, her breasts and the pit of her stomach
With a single wire
She gives him his teeth, tying the the roots to the centrepin of his body
He sets the little circlets on her fingertips
She stiches his body here and there with steely purple silk
He oils the delicate cogs of her mouth
She inlays with deep cut scrolls the nape of his neck
He sinks into place the inside of her thighs
So, gasping with joy, with cries of wonderment
Like two gods of mud
Sprawling in the dirt, but with infinite care
They bring each other to perfection.
*whispers* night all... am getting dragged off to bed (its my bliddy birthday fgs!!!)
(its my bliddy birthday fgs!!!) quote:Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:
There was a poem I'm sure was Carol Ann Duffy that I read at school years ago about her having a miscarriage (sounds awful! Was really but the imagery was so evocative) I wish I could read it again, I don't know what it was called and haven't found it...
Is this it Raggy?:
The no baby poem (from “Answering Back, ed. Carol Ann Duffy (2007), Faber)
There will be no ceremony
in a quiet wood for this. Today,
the sun does not matter.
You have simply not made it
into existence. All science, all alchemy
have failed from the start.
There is only this
injury, nameless and wet.
You are everything I know now
of loss, the perfect
grey weight of it, constant,
which has turned down the light
in my face.
Had just one moment
of one month been different,
you would have been born
into winter.
We would have made the drive
in the late afternoon,
past front rooms in Luddenden
yellow with warmth
a jewellery of light in each window
to see you erupt like summer
into our hands.
No-show, non-event,
we have lost you
to a world where there is no word,
even for absence.
Whatever could have made you
is irrelevant. Today,
the slightest breeze could blow me
clean away.
And on that bombshell!!!
OoH! Yes and it's almost bringing tears to my eyes. It is beautiful and tragic. Saving it, thanks so so much for finding it 
quote:Originally posted by Dirtyprettygirlthing:
I'll post one tomorrow that my daughter wrote, aged 5. She wrote it at my Mums, whilst I was in hospital with her baby brother (then aged 6 weeks)... he had bronchiolitis... and whilst not life threatening, it obviously shook her to the core.
The poem is SO deep... my mum keeps it in her purse.
I'll get it and post it tomorrow.
You will not believe a child wrote it, let alone a 5 yr old!
I've got the kingsize kleenex at the ready Ditty!
quote:Originally posted by Dirtyprettygirlthing:
*whispers* night all... am getting dragged off to bed
That Ted Hughes to Sylvia Plathhad the same effect on me LOL and it's not my birthday 'til November
and I'm home alone 
Here's one that touched me deeply.
I will not die an unlived life.
I will not live in fear
of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,
to make me less afraid,
more accessible,
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance;
to live so that which came to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom
and that which came to me as blossom,
goes on as fruit.
fully alive - dawna markova.
I will not die an unlived life.
I will not live in fear
of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,
to make me less afraid,
more accessible,
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance;
to live so that which came to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom
and that which came to me as blossom,
goes on as fruit.
fully alive - dawna markova.
quote:Originally posted by Sarum:
fully alive - dawna markova.
Go girl
quote:Originally posted by Supercalifragilistic:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:
iyswim?
??
Sorry, If You See What I Mean...which you didn't
quote:Originally posted by Sarum:
Here's one that touched me deeply.
I will not die an unlived life.
I will not live in fear
of falling or catching fire.
I choose to inhabit my days,
to allow my living to open me,
to make me less afraid,
more accessible,
to loosen my heart
until it becomes a wing,
a torch, a promise.
I choose to risk my significance;
to live so that which came to me as seed
goes to the next as blossom
and that which came to me as blossom,
goes on as fruit.
fully alive - dawna markova.
This is what I keep telling myself to try to do
quote:Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:quote:Originally posted by Supercalifragilistic:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:
iyswim?
??
Sorry, If You See What I Mean...which you didn't
Ta, I'm of that age when I know more about poetry than internet speak!
quote:Originally posted by Supercalifragilistic:
The no baby poem (from “Answering Back, ed. Carol Ann Duffy (2007), Faber)
There will be no ceremony
in a quiet wood for this. Today,
the sun does not matter.
You have simply not made it
into existence. All science, all alchemy
have failed from the start.
There is only this
injury, nameless and wet.
You are everything I know now
of loss, the perfect
grey weight of it, constant,
which has turned down the light
in my face.
Had just one moment
of one month been different,
you would have been born
into winter.
We would have made the drive
in the late afternoon,
past front rooms in Luddenden
yellow with warmth
a jewellery of light in each window
to see you erupt like summer
into our hands.
No-show, non-event,
we have lost you
to a world where there is no word,
even for absence.
Whatever could have made you
is irrelevant. Today,
the slightest breeze could blow me
clean away.
That's just too beautiful.
It is isn't it Sarum? To me the poems I enjoy most are 'difficult' truths. I remember it from one reading over 10 years ago!
Follower
My father worked with a horse plough,
His shoulders globed like a full sail strung
Between the shafts and the furrow.
The horses strained at his clicking tongue.
An expert. He would set the wing
And fit the bright-pointed sock.
The sod rolled over without breaking.
At the headrig, with a single pluck
Of reins, the sweating team turned round
And back into the land. His eye
Narrowed and angled at the ground,
Mapping the furrow exactly.
I stumbled in his hobnailed wake,
Fell sometimes on the polished sod;
Sometimes he rode me on his back
Dipping and rising to his plod.
I wanted to grow up and plough,
To close one eye, stiffen my arm.
All I ever did was follow
In his broad shadow around the farm.
I was a nuisance, tripping, falling,
Yapping always. But today
It is my father who keeps stumbling
Behind me, and will not go away.
Seamus Heaney
My father worked with a horse plough,
His shoulders globed like a full sail strung
Between the shafts and the furrow.
The horses strained at his clicking tongue.
An expert. He would set the wing
And fit the bright-pointed sock.
The sod rolled over without breaking.
At the headrig, with a single pluck
Of reins, the sweating team turned round
And back into the land. His eye
Narrowed and angled at the ground,
Mapping the furrow exactly.
I stumbled in his hobnailed wake,
Fell sometimes on the polished sod;
Sometimes he rode me on his back
Dipping and rising to his plod.
I wanted to grow up and plough,
To close one eye, stiffen my arm.
All I ever did was follow
In his broad shadow around the farm.
I was a nuisance, tripping, falling,
Yapping always. But today
It is my father who keeps stumbling
Behind me, and will not go away.
Seamus Heaney
I studied that one at school Raggy Doll, I really like Seamus Heaney. He is very real and honest with his poetry. 
Baked beans a little laugh
My friends an auto-graph
What are you eaying you (peice) of shit ?
My friends an auto-graph
What are you eaying you (peice) of shit ?
quote:Originally posted by faerykelstar:
I studied that one at school Raggy Doll, I really like Seamus Heaney. He is very real and honest with his poetry.
Yes, I did too and really enjoyed it although some people remember it as being boring! But I could see where he was coming from, wanting to escape from an insular place and loving but also pulling away from your family
quote:Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:quote:Originally posted by faerykelstar:
I studied that one at school Raggy Doll, I really like Seamus Heaney. He is very real and honest with his poetry.
Yes, I did too and really enjoyed it although some people remember it as being boring! But I could see where he was coming from, wanting to escape from an insular place and loving but also pulling away from your family
Yes, and the imagery he creates is so vivid. I'd forgotten how much I liked poetry until reading this thread. I may have a look around tomorrow for some to post.
Ooh good, Faery. Success
I'm away to my bed before baby decides to wake up
Na-night
I'm away to my bed before baby decides to wake up
Na-night
quote:Originally posted by **sossy**:
IF.....
IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
' Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!
Love this one too, it deserves to be as famous as it is. Was it a Guinness ad it was on?
I thought someone may've posted the one from Four Weddings...Stop all the clocks. Too sad!
Ok, na-night
quote:Originally posted by Raggy♥Doll:
Ooh good, Faery. Success
I'm away to my bed before baby decides to wake up
Na-night
NGB Raggy- don't think I've ever posted with you before? Nice to 'meet you' x
I got 2 legs from my hips to the ground
and when I move em, they walk around,
and when I lift em they climb the stairs
and when I shave em they aint got hairs
and when I move em, they walk around,
and when I lift em they climb the stairs
and when I shave em they aint got hairs
quote:Originally posted by old hippy guy:
I got 2 legs from my hips to the ground
and when I move em, they walk around,
and when I lift em they climb the stairs
and when I shave em they aint got hairs
You just compose that yerself?quote:Originally posted by Supercalifragilistic:quote:Originally posted by old hippy guy:
I got 2 legs from my hips to the ground
and when I move em, they walk around,
and when I lift em they climb the stairs
and when I shave em they aint got hairs
NAH its an old Monty Python thing
quote:Originally posted by old hippy guy:quote:Originally posted by Supercalifragilistic:quote:Originally posted by old hippy guy:
I got 2 legs from my hips to the ground
and when I move em, they walk around,
and when I lift em they climb the stairs
and when I shave em they aint got hairs
NAH its an old Monty Python thing
Gives up on subtle humour!
The ostrich roams the great Sahara.
Its mouth is wide, its neck is narra.
It has such long and lofty legs,
I'm glad it sits to lay its eggs.
Its mouth is wide, its neck is narra.
It has such long and lofty legs,
I'm glad it sits to lay its eggs.
Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift, uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there, I did not die!
~ ~ Mary Frye (1932)
This poem has made me cry ever since I was a little girl and my grandma died, it was read out at the funeral ( I wasn't there...too young) and although I'd never heard it, I found it on a piece of paper. When my grandad died at the end of last year, the vicar read out just the last 4 lines, to try and tie the two deaths together. I had promised myself I wouldn't cry (I was being strong for my mum) but at that moment my eyes filled. Managed to contain myself though right up to the point where the vicar grabbed my hand and said "Grandad would be proud" *grumpy face*. And as if by magic it started to snow...it was so surreal walking out of the crem and all the snow swirling around, at first I was like snow machine? really?. It snowed the day my grandad was born, the day he got married, the day his first child was born and the day he was buried. I'd like to be sentimental and say he caused it, but I think the snow would have melted on its way up from hell.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you wake in the morning hush,
I am the swift, uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft starlight at night.
Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there, I do not sleep.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there, I did not die!
~ ~ Mary Frye (1932)
This poem has made me cry ever since I was a little girl and my grandma died, it was read out at the funeral ( I wasn't there...too young) and although I'd never heard it, I found it on a piece of paper. When my grandad died at the end of last year, the vicar read out just the last 4 lines, to try and tie the two deaths together. I had promised myself I wouldn't cry (I was being strong for my mum) but at that moment my eyes filled. Managed to contain myself though right up to the point where the vicar grabbed my hand and said "Grandad would be proud" *grumpy face*. And as if by magic it started to snow...it was so surreal walking out of the crem and all the snow swirling around, at first I was like snow machine? really?. It snowed the day my grandad was born, the day he got married, the day his first child was born and the day he was buried. I'd like to be sentimental and say he caused it, but I think the snow would have melted on its way up from hell.
Up again 
You too, Super
Trix that was lovely, and made me laugh at the end
Thanks for sharing Smoke, must be hard to do a reading in that circumstance. Poetry helps at times like that I think, I've been writing a lot since March...
You too, Super
Trix that was lovely, and made me laugh at the end
Thanks for sharing Smoke, must be hard to do a reading in that circumstance. Poetry helps at times like that I think, I've been writing a lot since March...
Ok...this is quite crap I 'wrote' it last night when I eventually went to bed.
I think I'll call it 'Stone me':
There is a pebble in the pit of my stomach and it is me.
All that I am, bound up in stone,
Shrunken and dwarfed by the fleshy exterior;
all show and bubbly warmth.
My self hides there, among the red, beating walls of mechanical body-
feat of engineering,
biological miracle.
Thinking to itself:
'No one can see me here, right?'
Don't nick it
I 'wrote' it last night when I eventually went to bed.I think I'll call it 'Stone me':
There is a pebble in the pit of my stomach and it is me.
All that I am, bound up in stone,
Shrunken and dwarfed by the fleshy exterior;
all show and bubbly warmth.
My self hides there, among the red, beating walls of mechanical body-
feat of engineering,
biological miracle.
Thinking to itself:
'No one can see me here, right?'
Don't nick it