Share your favorite poems...

Discussion in 'Books' started by HartwickFan, May 4, 2009.

  1. bboowwyy

    bboowwyy Member

    Aug 6, 2009
    Club:
    --other--
    aaron weiss from the band mewithoutYou on the song January 1979.
     
  2. Randy36

    Randy36 New Member

    May 9, 2007
    Houston
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3esjTgR2W2E"]YouTube- "The Road not Taken" by Robert Frost[/ame]
     
  3. maturin

    maturin Member

    Jun 8, 2004
    I've been into trees lately, for whatever reason, so here are a couple of my current favorites. I'm glad to have found this thread, and I'll be back with more later.

    Sonnet 73
    William Shakespeare

    That time of year thou mayst in me behold
    When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
    Upon those boughs which shake against the cold.
    Bare, ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
    In me thou see'st the dawning of such day
    As after sunset fadeth in the west,
    Which by and by black night doth take away,
    Death's second self, which seals up in rest.
    In me thou see'st the burning of such fire
    That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
    As the death-bed whereon it must expire,
    Consumed by that which it was nourished by.
    This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong
    To love that well, which thou must leave ere long.

    Loveliest of Trees
    A.E. Housman

    Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
    Is hung with bloom along the bough,
    And stands along the woodland ride,
    Wearing white for Eastertide.

    Now of my threescore years and ten,
    Twenty will not come again.
    And take from seventy springs a score,
    It only leaves me fifty more.

    And since to look at things in bloom,
    Fifty springs are little room,
    About the woodlands I will go
    To see the cherry hung with snow.
     
  4. Minnman

    Minnman Member+

    Feb 11, 2000
    Columbus, OH, USA
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    The Garden (Louise Gluck)

    I couldn’t do it again,
    I can hardly bear to look at it—

    in the garden, in light rain
    the young couple planting
    a row of peas, as though
    no one has ever done this before,
    the great difficulties have never as yet
    been faced and solved—

    They cannot see themselves,
    in fresh dirt, starting up
    without perspective,
    the hills behind them pale green,
    clouded with flowers—

    She wants to stop;
    he wants to get to the end,
    to stay with the thing—

    Look at her, touching his cheek
    to make a truce, her fingers
    cool with spring rain;
    in thin grass, bursts of purple crocus—

    even here, even at the beginning of love,
    her hand leaving his face makes
    an image of departure

    and they think
    they are free to overlook
    this sadness.
     
  5. royalstilton

    royalstilton Member

    Aug 2, 2004
    SoCal
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I just discovered this today, in a 10th grade lit book.

    Fifteen

    South of the bridge on Seventeenth
    I found back of the willows one summer
    day a motorcycle with engine running
    as it lay on its side, ticking over
    slowly in the high grass. I was fifteen.

    I admired all that pulsing gleam, the
    shiny flanks, the demure headlights
    fringed where it lay; I led it gently
    to the road, and stood with that
    companion, ready and friendly. I was fifteen.

    We could find the end of a road, meet
    the sky on out Seventeenth. I thought about
    hills, and patting the handle got back a
    confident opinion. On the bridge we indulged
    a forward feeling, a tremble. I was fifteen.

    Thinking, back farther in the grass I found
    the owner, just coming to, where he had flipped
    over the rail. He had blood on his hand, was pale-
    I helped him walk to his machine. He ran his hand
    over it, called me good man, roared away.

    I stood there, fifteen.

    ---William Stafford
     
  6. HartwickFan

    HartwickFan Member

    Jul 31, 1999
    Climax, MI
    Club:
    VfR Wormatia 08 Worms
    Nat'l Team:
    Tuvalu
    I love that Shakespeare sonnet as well. In fact, it may be my favorite of the sonnets. Just the idea of beholding a season in someone is pretty cool. :) If you're into trees lately, you may like this poem by Linda Pastan. The poetic form is a pantoum, which I think is pretty cool.

    Something About The Trees
    by Linda Pastan

    I remember what my father told me:
    There is an age when you are most yourself.
    He was just past fifty then,
    Was it something about the trees that make him speak?

    There is an age when you are most yourself.
    I know more than I did once.
    Was it something about the trees that make him speak?
    Only a single leaf had turned so far.

    I know more than I did once.
    I used to think he'd always be the surgeon.
    Only a single leaf had turned so far,
    Even his body kept its secrets.

    I used to think he'd always be the surgeon,
    My mother was the perfect surgeon's wife.
    Even his body kept its secrets.
    I thought they both would live forever.

    My mother was the perfect surgeon's wife,
    I can still see her face at thirty.
    I thought they both would live forever.
    I thought I'd always be their child.

    I can still see her face at thirty.
    When will I be most myself?
    I thought I'd always be their child.
    In my sleep it's never winter.

    When will I be most myself?
    I remember what my father told me.
    In my sleep it's never winter.
    He was just past fifty then.
     
  7. frasermc

    frasermc Take your flunky and dangle

    Celtic
    Scotland
    Jul 28, 2006
    Newcastle-Upon-Tyne
    Club:
    Celtic FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Scotland
    From Scotland's favourite bard -


    "By yon Castle wa', at the close of the day,
    I heard a man sing tho' his head it was grey;
    And as he was singing, the tears doon came,
    There'll never be peace till Jamie comes hame.

    The Church is in ruins, the State is in jars,
    Delusions, oppressions, and murderous wars:
    We dare na weel say't, but we ken wha's to blame,
    There'll never be peace till Jamie comes hame.

    My seven braw sons for Jamie drew sword,
    But now I greet round their green beds in the yerd;
    It brak the sweet heart o' my faithful auld Dame,
    There'll never be peace till Jamie comes hame.

    Now life is a burden that bows me down,
    Sin I tint my bairns, and he tint his crown;
    But till my last moments my words are the same,
    There'll never be peace till Jamie comes hame."



    The Jamie mentioned in the poem is James 1st of Scotland
     
  8. Iceblink

    Iceblink Member

    Oct 11, 1999
    Chicago
    Club:
    Ipswich Town FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I was not familiar with Linda Pastan until recently. A couple kids in my AP lit class picked out a poem by her, pretty randomly, "Pass/Fail." I wanted to show them what I saw and thought about when I saw a poem for the first time. One of the best examples of the use of enjambment I've seen. Oddly, she had another poem that pretty much looked at the world through academic terms, "Marks" so I had them write an essay discussing how she uses various poetic devices to discuss life in academic terms, thinking they could relate as they're.... umm.... students. Gee, they did greeeeaaaat.

    But I liked the poems anyway.
     
  9. HartwickFan

    HartwickFan Member

    Jul 31, 1999
    Climax, MI
    Club:
    VfR Wormatia 08 Worms
    Nat'l Team:
    Tuvalu
    Cool! I don't know those poems of hers, and I'll have to check them out. I think my favorite Linda Pastan poem is Prosody 101:

    Prosody 101
    by Linda Pastan

    When they taught me that what mattered most
    was not the strict iambic line goose-stepping
    over the page but the variations
    in that line and the tension produced
    on the ear by the surprise of difference,
    I understood yet didn't understand
    exactly, until just now, years later
    in spring, with the trees already lacy
    and camellias blowsy with middle age,
    I looked out and saw what a cold front had done
    to the garden, sweeping in like common language,
    unexpected in the sensuous
    extravagance of a Maryland spring.
    There was a dark edge around each flower
    as if it had been outlined in ink
    instead of frost, and the tension I felt
    between the expected and actual
    was like that time I came to you, ready
    to say goodbye for good, for you had been
    a cold front yourself lately, and as I walked in
    you laughed and lifted me up in your arms
    as if I too were lacy with spring
    instead of middle aged like the camellias,
    and I thought: so this is Poetry!
     
  10. bboowwyy

    bboowwyy Member

    Aug 6, 2009
    Club:
    --other--
  11. Minnman

    Minnman Member+

    Feb 11, 2000
    Columbus, OH, USA
    Club:
    Columbus Crew
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Elegy

    1.
    To be at home on its native ground
    the mind must go down below its horizon,
    descend below the lightfall
    on ridge and steep and valley floor
    to receive the lives of the dead. It must wake
    in their sleep, who wake in its dreams.

    “Who is there?” On the rock road between
    creek and woods in the fall of last year,
    I stood and listened. I heard the cries
    of little birds high in the wind.
    And then the beat of old footsteps
    came around me, and my sight was changed.

    I passed through the lens of darkness
    as through a furrow, and the dead
    gathered to meet me. They knew me,
    but looked in wonder at the lines in my face,
    the white hairs sprinkled on my head.

    I saw a tall old man leaning
    upon a cane, his open hand
    raised in some fierce commendation,
    knowledge of long labor in his eyes;
    another, a gentler countenance,
    smiling beneath a brim of sweaty felt
    in welcome to me as before.

    I saw an old woman, a saver
    of little things, whose lonely grief
    was the first I knew; and one bent
    with age and pain, whose busy hands
    worked out a selflessness of love.

    Those were my teachers. And there were more,
    beloved of face and name, who once bore
    the substance of our common ground.
    Their eyes, having grieved all grief, were clear.

    2.
    I saw one standing aside, alone,
    weariness in his shoulders, his eyes
    bewildered yet with the newness
    of his death. In my sorrow I felt,
    as many times before, gladness
    at the sight of him. “Owen,” I said.

    He turned – lifted, tilted his hand.
    I handed him a clod of earth
    picked up in a certain well-known field.
    He kneaded it in his palm and spoke:
    “Wendell, this is not a place
    for you and me.” And then he grinned;
    we recognized his stubbornness –
    it was his principle to doubt
    all ease of satisfaction.

    “The crops are in the barn,” I said,
    “the morning frost has come to the fields,
    and I have turned back to accept,
    if I can, what none of us could prevent.”

    He stood, remembering, weighing the cost
    of the division we had come to,
    his fingers resting on the earth
    he held cupped lightly in his palm.
    It seemed to me then that he cast off
    his own confusion, and assumed
    for one last time, in one last kindness,
    the duty of the older man.

    He nodded his head. “The desire I had
    in early morning and in spring,
    I never wore it out. I had
    the desire, if I had had the strength.
    But listen – what we prepared
    to have, we have.”

    He raised his eyes.
    “Look,” he said.

    3.
    We stood on a height,
    woods above us, and below
    on the half-mowed slope we saw ourselves
    as we once were: a young man mowing,
    a boy grubbing with an axe.

    It was an old abandoned field,
    long overgrown with thorns and briars.
    We made it new in the heat haze
    of that midsummer: he, proud
    of the ground intelligence clarified,
    and I, proud in his praise.

    “I wish,” I said, “that we could be
    back in that good time again.”

    “We are back there again, today
    and always. Where else would we be?”
    He smiled, looked at me, and I knew
    it was my mind he led me through.
    He spoke of some infinitude
    of thought.

    He led me to another
    slope beside another woods,
    this lighted only by stars. Older
    now, the man and the boy lay
    on their backs in deep grass, quietly
    talking. In the distance moved
    the outcry of one deep-voiced hound.

    Other voices joined that voice;
    another place, a later time,
    a hunter’s fire among the trees,
    faces turned to the blaze, laughter
    and then silence, while in the dark
    around us lay long breaths of sleep.

    4.
    And then, one by one, he moved me
    through all the fields of our lives,
    preparations, plantings, harvests,
    crews joking at the row ends,
    the water jug passing like a kiss.

    He spoke of our history passing through us,
    the way our families’ generations
    overlap, the great teaching
    coming down by deed of companionship:
    characters of fields and times and men,
    qualities of devotion and of work –
    endless fascinations, passions
    old as mind, new as light.

    All our years around us,
    I saw him furious and narrow,
    like most men, and saw the virtue
    that made him unlike most.
    It was his passion to be true
    to the condition of the Fall –
    to live by the sweat of his face, to eat
    his bread, assured that cost was paid.

    5.
    We came then to his time of pain,
    when the early morning light showed,
    as always, the sweet world, and all
    an able, well-intentioned man
    might do by dark, and his strength failed
    before the light. His body had begun
    too soon its earthward journey,
    filling with gravity, and yet his mind
    kept its old way.

    Again, in the sun
    of his last harvest, I heard him say:
    “Do you want to take this row,
    and let me get out of your way?”
    I saw the world ahead of him then
    for the first time, and I saw it
    as he already had seen it,
    himself gone from it. It was a sight
    I could not see and not weep.
    He reached and would have touched me
    with his hand, though he could not.

    6.
    Finally, he brought me to a hill
    overlooking the fields that once
    belonged to him, that he once
    belonged to. “Look,” he said again.
    I knew he wanted me to see
    the years of care that place wore,
    for his story lay upon it, a bloom,
    a blessing.

    The time and place so near,
    we almost were the men we watched.
    Summer’s end sang in the light.
    We spoke of death and obligation,
    the brevity of things and men.
    Words never moved to heavily
    between us, or cost us more. We hushed.
    And then the man who bore his death
    in him, and knew it, quietly said:
    “Well. It’s a fascinating world,
    after all.”

    His life so powerfully
    stood there in presence of his place
    and work and time, I could not
    realize except with grief
    that only his spirit now was with me.

    In the very hour he died, I told him,
    before I knew his death, the thought
    of years to come had moved me
    like a call. I thought of healing,
    health, friendship going on,
    the generations gathering, our good times
    reaching one best time of all.

    7.
    My mind was overborne with questions
    I could not speak. It seemed to me
    we had returned now to the dark
    valley where our journey began.
    But a brightening intelligence
    was on his face. Insight moved him
    as he once was moved by daylight.

    The best teachers teach more
    than they know. By their deaths
    they teach most. They lead us beyond
    what we know, and what they knew.
    Thus my teacher, my old friend,
    stood smiling now before me, wholly
    moved by what had moved him partly
    in the world.

    Again the host of the dead
    encircled us, as in a dance.
    And I was aware now of the unborn
    moving among them. As they turned
    I could see their bodies come to light
    and fade again in the dark throng.
    They moved as to a distant or a hovering
    song I strained for, but could not hear.

    “Our way is endless,” my teacher said.
    “The Creator is divided in Creation
    for the joys of recognition. We knew
    that Spirit in each other once;
    it brings us here. By its divisions
    and returns, the world lives.
    Both mind and earth are made
    of what its light gives and uses up.
    So joy contains, survives its cost.
    The dead abide, as grief knows.
    We are what we have lost.”

    There is a song in the Creation;
    it has always been the gift
    of every gifted voice, though none
    ever sang it. As he spoke
    I heard that song. In its changes and returns
    his life was passing into life.
    That moment, earth and song and mind,
    the living and dead, were one.

    8.
    At last, completed in his rest,
    as one who has worked and bathed, fed
    and loved and slept, he let fall
    the beloved earth that I had brought him.
    He raised his hand, turned me to my way.
    And I, inheritor of what I mourned,
    went back toward the light of day.

    - Wendell Berry
     
  12. DayGrowsOld

    DayGrowsOld Member

    Apr 1, 2010
    Gabriele D'Annunzio - La pioggia nel pineto

    Taci. Su le soglie
    del bosco non odo
    parole che dici
    umane; ma odo
    parole più nuove
    che parlano gocciole e foglie
    lontane.
    Ascolta. Piove
    dalle nuvole sparse.
    Piove su le tamerici
    salmastre ed arse,
    piove su i pini
    scagliosi ed irti,
    piove su i mirti
    divini,
    su le ginestre fulgenti
    di fiori accolti,
    su i ginepri folti
    di coccole aulenti,
    piove su i nostri volti
    silvani,
    piove su le nostre mani
    ignude,
    su i nostri vestimenti
    leggieri,
    su i freschi pensieri
    che l'anima schiude
    novella,
    su la favola bella
    che ieri
    t'illuse, che oggi m'illude,
    o Ermione.

    Odi? La pioggia cade
    su la solitaria
    verdura
    con un crepitío che dura
    e varia nell'aria
    secondo le fronde
    più rade, men rade.
    Ascolta. Risponde
    al pianto il canto
    delle cicale
    che il pianto australe
    non impaura,
    nè il ciel cinerino.
    E il pino
    ha un suono, e il mirto
    altro suono, e il ginepro
    altro ancóra, stromenti
    diversi
    sotto innumerevoli dita.
    E immersi
    noi siam nello spirto
    silvestre,
    d'arborea vita viventi;
    e il tuo volto ebro
    è molle di pioggia
    come una foglia,
    e le tue chiome
    auliscono come
    le chiare ginestre,
    o creatura terrestre
    che hai nome
    Ermione.

    Ascolta, ascolta. L'accordo
    delle aeree cicale
    a poco a poco
    più sordo
    si fa sotto il pianto
    che cresce;
    ma un canto vi si mesce
    più roco
    che di laggiù sale,
    dall'umida ombra remota.
    Più sordo e più fioco
    s'allenta, si spegne.
    Sola una nota
    ancor trema, si spegne,
    risorge, trema, si spegne.
    Non s'ode voce del mare.
    Or s'ode su tutta la fronda
    crosciare
    l'argentea pioggia
    che monda,
    il croscio che varia
    secondo la fronda
    più folta, men folta.
    Ascolta.
    La figlia dell'aria
    è muta; ma la figlia
    del limo lontana,
    la rana,
    canta nell'ombra più fonda,
    chi sa dove, chi sa dove!
    E piove su le tue ciglia,
    Ermione.

    Piove su le tue ciglia nere
    sìche par tu pianga
    ma di piacere; non bianca
    ma quasi fatta virente,
    par da scorza tu esca.
    E tutta la vita è in noi fresca
    aulente,
    il cuor nel petto è come pesca
    intatta,
    tra le pàlpebre gli occhi
    son come polle tra l'erbe,
    i denti negli alvèoli
    con come mandorle acerbe.
    E andiam di fratta in fratta,
    or congiunti or disciolti
    (e il verde vigor rude
    ci allaccia i mallèoli
    c'intrica i ginocchi)
    chi sa dove, chi sa dove!
    E piove su i nostri vólti
    silvani,
    piove su le nostre mani
    ignude,
    su i nostri vestimenti
    leggieri,
    su i freschi pensieri
    che l'anima schiude
    novella,
    su la favola bella
    che ieri
    m'illuse, che oggi t'illude,
    o Ermione.
     
  13. DayGrowsOld

    DayGrowsOld Member

    Apr 1, 2010
    They were his last words, because Maurice had disappeared thereabouts, leaving no trace of his presence except a little pile of the petals of the evening primrose, which mourned from the ground like an expiring fire. To the end of his life Clive was not sure of the exact moment of departure, and with the approach of old age he grew uncertain whether the moment had yet occurred. The Blue Room would glimmer, ferns undulate. Out of some eternal Cambridge his friend began beckoning to him, clothed in the sun, and shaking out the scents and sounds of the May Term.

    from E. M. Forster Maurice

    [​IMG]


    it's not a poem yet more beautiful than most poems, i believe.
     
  14. promanz

    promanz New Member

    May 8, 2010
    Club:
    AC Mantova
    What I Love About You

    I love the way you look at me,
    Your eyes so bright and blue.
    I love the way you kiss me,
    Your lips so soft and smooth.

    I love the way you make me so happy,
    And the ways you show you care.
    I love the way you say, "I Love You,"
    And the way you're always there.

    I love the way you touch me,
    Always sending chills down my spine.
    I love that you are with me,
    And glad that you are mine.

    - Crystal Jansen -
    _______________
    buy steroids vibrationsplatte
     
  15. tortillachip

    tortillachip New Member

    Nov 10, 2010
    Club:
    Real Madrid
    This is one of my favorites:

    Late October
    by Maya Angelou

    Carefully
    the leaves of autumn
    sprinkle down the tinny
    sound of little dyings
    and skies sated
    of ruddy sunsets
    of roseate dawns
    roil ceaselessly in
    cobweb greys and turn
    to black
    for comfort.
    Only lovers
    see the fall
    a signal end to endings
    a gruffish gesture alerting
    those who will not be alarmed
    that we begin to stop
    in order simply
    to begin​
    again.
     
  16. HartwickFan

    HartwickFan Member

    Jul 31, 1999
    Climax, MI
    Club:
    VfR Wormatia 08 Worms
    Nat'l Team:
    Tuvalu
    A saucy little villanelle by Donald Hall:

    Katie could put her feet behind her head
    Or do a grand plié, position two,
    Her suppleness magnificent in bed.

    I strained my lower back, and Katie bled,
    Only a little, doing what we could do
    When Katie tucked her feet behind her head.

    Her torso was a C-cup'd figurehead,
    Wearing below its navel a tattoo
    That writhed in suppleness upon the bed.

    As love led on to love, love's goddess said,
    "No lovers ever fucked as fucked these two!
    Katie could put her feet behind her head!"

    When Katie came she never stopped. Instead,
    She came, cried "God!," and came, this dancer who
    Brought ballerina suppleness to bed.

    She curled her legs around my neck, which led
    To depths unplumbed by lovers hitherto.
    Katie could tuck her feet behind her head
    And by her suppleness unmake the bed.
     
  17. Twenty26Six

    Twenty26Six Feeling Sheepish...

    Jan 2, 2004
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Good one.
     
  18. Twenty26Six

    Twenty26Six Feeling Sheepish...

    Jan 2, 2004
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    One of my favorites...

     
  19. deron

    deron New Member

    Jul 25, 2006
    Centennial, CO
    Club:
    Colorado Rapids
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Epistle to a Young Friend - Bobby Burns

    I Lang hae thought, my youthfu' friend,
    A something to have sent you,
    Tho' it should serve nae ither end
    Than just a kind memento:
    But how the subject-theme may gang,
    Let time and chance determine;
    Perhaps it may turn out a sang:
    Perhaps turn out a sermon.

    Ye'll try the world soon, my lad;
    And, Andrew dear, believe me,
    Ye'll find mankind an unco squad,
    And muckle they may grieve ye:
    For care and trouble set your thought,
    Ev'n when your end's attained;
    And a' your views may come to nought,
    Where ev'ry nerve is strained.

    I'll no say, men are villains a';
    The real, harden'd wicked,
    Wha hae nae check but human law,
    Are to a few restricked;
    But, Och! mankind are unco weak,
    An' little to be trusted;
    If self the wavering balance shake,
    It's rarely right adjusted!

    Yet they wha fa' in fortune's strife,
    Their fate we shouldna censure;
    For still, th' important end of life
    They equally may answer;
    A man may hae an honest heart,
    Tho' poortith hourly stare him;
    A man may tak a neibor's part,
    Yet hae nae cash to spare him.

    Aye free, aff-han', your story tell,
    When wi' a bosom crony;
    But still keep something to yoursel',
    Ye scarcely tell to ony:
    Conceal yoursel' as weel's ye can
    Frae critical dissection;
    But keek thro' ev'ry other man,
    Wi' sharpen'd, sly inspection.

    The sacred lowe o' weel-plac'd love,
    Luxuriantly indulge it;
    But never tempt th' illicit rove,
    Tho' naething should divulge it:
    I waive the quantum o' the sin,
    The hazard of concealing;
    But, Och! it hardens a' within,
    And petrifies the feeling!

    To catch dame Fortune's golden smile,
    Assiduous wait upon her;
    And gather gear by ev'ry wile
    That's justified by honour;
    Not for to hide it in a hedge,
    Nor for a train attendant;
    But for the glorious privilege
    Of being independent.

    The fear o' hell's a hangman's whip,
    To haud the wretch in order;
    But where ye feel your honour grip,
    Let that aye be your border;
    Its slightest touches, instant pause-
    Debar a' side-pretences;
    And resolutely keep its laws,
    Uncaring consequences.

    The great Creator to revere,
    Must sure become the creature;
    But still the preaching cant forbear,
    And ev'n the rigid feature:
    Yet ne'er with wits profane to range,
    Be complaisance extended;
    An atheist-laugh's a poor exchange
    For Deity offended!

    When ranting round in pleasure's ring,
    Religion may be blinded;
    Or if she gie a random sting,
    It may be little minded;
    But when on life we're tempest driv'n-
    A conscience but a canker-
    A correspondence fix'd wi' Heav'n,
    Is sure a noble anchor!

    Adieu, dear, amiable youth!
    Your heart can ne'er be wanting!
    May prudence, fortitude, and truth,
    Erect your brow undaunting!
    In ploughman phrase, "God send you speed,"
    Still daily to grow wiser;
    And may ye better reck the rede,
    Then ever did th' adviser!
     
  20. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire

    Olson always reminded me of baseball players like Dave Kingman back in the day... either a strike out or a 475 foot home run. Here's a poem by more of a singles hitter,

    ["Popcorn-can cover"]

    By Lorine Niedecker 1903–1970


    Popcorn-can cover
    screwed to the wall
    over a hole
    so the cold
    can’t mouse in
     
  21. Twenty26Six

    Twenty26Six Feeling Sheepish...

    Jan 2, 2004
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    See, I've never been a big fan of these. William Carlos Williams tends to be a good exception, but some of these are a bit... umm... simple.

    I can make one in 5 seconds and no average person would be the wiser to which was different.

    Deer-hide leather
    in the shape of a foot
    that made a print
    which lasted
    for centuries
     
  22. StiltonFC

    StiltonFC He said to only look up -- Guster

    Mar 18, 2007
    SoCal
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Faint catchup stain
    on the kitchen counter
    reminds us how
    bad a cook Aunt Meg
    was but she could dance.
     
  23. casperwhips

    casperwhips New Member

    Aug 23, 2011
    kansas
    Club:
    Aalesunds FK
    Nat'l Team:
    Ghana
    lmao that plum one was a riot
     
  24. Naughtius Maximus

    Jul 10, 2001
    Shropshire
    Club:
    Chelsea FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    I may have posted this before... but maybe not...

    Anyway, Betjeman's 'Slough' is always worth a read.

    Slough

    Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!
    It isn't fit for humans now,
    There isn't grass to graze a cow.
    Swarm over, Death!

    Come, bombs and blow to smithereens
    Those air -conditioned, bright canteens,
    Tinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans,
    Tinned minds, tinned breath.

    Mess up the mess they call a town-
    A house for ninety-seven down
    And once a week a half a crown
    For twenty years.

    And get that man with double chin
    Who'll always cheat and always win,
    Who washes his repulsive skin
    In women's tears:

    And smash his desk of polished oak
    And smash his hands so used to stroke
    And stop his boring dirty joke
    And make him yell.

    But spare the bald young clerks who add
    The profits of the stinking cad;
    It's not their fault that they are mad,
    They've tasted Hell.

    It's not their fault they do not know
    The birdsong from the radio,
    It's not their fault they often go
    To Maidenhead

    And talk of sport and makes of cars
    In various bogus-Tudor bars
    And daren't look up and see the stars
    But belch instead.

    In labour-saving homes, with care
    Their wives frizz out peroxide hair
    And dry it in synthetic air
    And paint their nails.

    Come, friendly bombs and fall on Slough
    To get it ready for the plough.
    The cabbages are coming now;
    The earth exhales.



    And, in a rather different vein, 'Auden's Stop All The Clocks'.

    W. H. Auden


    Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
    Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
    Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
    Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

    Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
    Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
    Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
    Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

    He was my North, my South, my East and West,
    My working week and my Sunday rest,
    My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
    I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

    The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
    Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
    Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
    For nothing now can ever come to any good.
     
  25. Naughtius Maximus

    Jul 10, 2001
    Shropshire
    Club:
    Chelsea FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    Another from 'A Shropshire Lad' which I've always read as an anti-war poem, although Housman denied it.

    1887

    From Clee to heaven the beacon burns,
    The shires have seen it plain,
    From north and south the sign returns
    And beacons burn again.

    Look left, look right, the hills are bright,
    The dales are light between,
    Because 'tis fifty years to-night
    That God has saved the Queen.

    Now, when the flame they watch not towers
    About the soil they trod,
    Lads, we'll remember friends of ours
    Who shared the work with God.

    To skies that knit their heartstrings right,
    To fields that bred them brave,
    The saviours come not home tonight:
    Themselves they could not save.

    It dawns in Asia, tombstones show
    And Shropshire names are read;
    And the Nile spills his overflow
    Beside the Severn's dead.

    We pledge in peace by farm and town
    The Queen they served in war,
    And fire the beacons up and down
    The land they perished for.

    'God save the Queen' we living sing,
    From height to height 'tis heard;
    And with the rest your voices ring,
    Lads of the Fifty-third.

    Oh, God will save her, fear you not;
    Be you the men you've been,
    Get you the sons your fathers got,
    And God will save the Queen.


    I know the places in the poem very well having lived in Shropshire for 40+ years. Mind you, Housman was from Worcester, so quite what he knew about them I DON'T know. :D

    The little woman used to go UFO spotting on Wenlock Edge back in the day although I believe the consumption of cider MAY have been an attraction too... although she denies it. I can see The Wrekin, (also mentioned), out of my window but then, so can lots of people.

    Also another with a similar theme to Betjeman's Slough, above. This time from 'The Bard of Salford', John Cooper Clarke...

    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGWhjojt5dw"]John Cooper Clarke - Chickentown - YouTube[/ame]
     

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