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Post by mickthecactus on Feb 24, 2015 15:07:46 GMT
Sorry you didn't like it.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 24, 2015 15:26:44 GMT
I never said I didn't like any poem on here. If you are referring to the Maya Angelou remark, it is in reference to a Tod's post about a male using it in an ad if I read her correctly. I love, love, all of Angelou's work.
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Post by mickthecactus on Feb 24, 2015 15:35:59 GMT
My apologies - I misinterpreted it as something you didn't like.
Still friends?
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Post by Deleted on Feb 24, 2015 19:48:28 GMT
Of course Mick. the last and only thing I could/would/will/ be accused of is a negative critique of a poem,. No worries there.
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sal paradise
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Post by sal paradise on Feb 24, 2015 20:27:09 GMT
My Brother at 3am is about her brother's drug addiction, I believe. You are right it is certainly peculiar, but I think eerily beautiful. I love the last stanza, her Mother seeing the hellish vision and is not the devil but actually her brother.
Thank you for sharing your own poems on here, you are very brave, and very talented.
I like odd poems
15
I want to peel off all my skin and laugh at those might who wander in and out of the raw flesh and lay their eggs inside
And as I swell with life I burn within, I writhe – and split skin blossoms spawning abundance –
yes! this seething flesh! ah, to be a flower - a flower! a quivering petal so sweet, and so cold, will grow -
No, for I am doomed to shrivel in a false grave - I am a grave - Bloom like a flower, my love, my lust! my dream, my tongue - yes! Bloom - bloom!
Shizuku Hiragi (1960)
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Post by lola on Feb 26, 2015 0:28:40 GMT
Wow. Love that one, Sal P. Thank you.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2015 15:54:06 GMT
Thank you for the derivation of the poem "My Brother...",makes total sense and in rereading it again, even moreso. Thanks also for your kind compliment. I do not at all consider my posting my poetry as any type of act of bravery. I do yes at times feel vulnerable in that some people can and do read much more into what I write than was originally intended. But, isn't what poetry does? it certainly does for me. I too, like odd, strange poems.
I found a trove of poems that I wrote while living in NYC in the 1970's. They are in my mind in re-reading them very representative of my state of mind, living free and easy, away from any constraints and the overall climate and culture I was living in.
I'll cull through them soon and post a couple of them.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 12, 2015 13:16:04 GMT
As aforementioned, I found this poem which was/is so indicative of that particular era when I was writing rather prolifically. It was while I was living in NYC on my own,a very liberating phase. I was watching a lot of Bergman films and reading a lot of Lorca and Rimbaud. I used to take the train out to the seaside village where I was born and "grew up". I preface the posting of this poem in that it is very "black and white" and the imagery graphic of my then psyche.
The Old Women of the Shore
To the grave sea come the old women with shawls knotted round them, on frail and brittle feet.
They sit themselves on the shore without changing eyes or hands without changing clouds or silence
The obscene sea breaks and scrapes, slides down trumpeting dunes shakes out its bull's beards
The unruffled women sitting as though in a glass boat look at the savaging waves
Where are they going, where have they been? They come from every corner, they come from our own life
Now they have, have the ocean the cold and burning emptiness, the solitude full of flames
They come out of all the past, from houses which were fragrant from burnt out twilights.
They watch or don't watch the sea, they scrawl marks with a stick and the sea wipes out their calligraphy.
The old women rise and go on their delicate bird's feet, while the great roistering waves roll nakedly on in the wind.
Bridgehampton, NY , 1976
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Post by tod2 on Mar 12, 2015 15:04:38 GMT
That is a lovely poem Casimira. I particularly like the last sentence "the great roistering waves roll nakedly on the wind" - wow, what a description!
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Post by Deleted on Mar 12, 2015 22:21:41 GMT
Thank you Tod. Of the batch I ran across, that particular one I have the most vivid recall of writing. It was the year of the Bicentennial and I took the train out East to see the Tall Ships pass from the beach where I spent most of my childhood. I then got to see the ships arrive into NY Harbor. It was pretty cool. (This has absolutely nothing to do with the poem, just an aside).
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Post by Deleted on Mar 29, 2015 23:37:32 GMT
ZONE
I have struck a region wherein I am dormant or a bloom The wind breaks over me And against high sharp angles almost splits into worlds, and these are of fear and grief.
Like a ship, I have struck unexpected latitudes of the universe, in March. Through one short segment's arch of the zodiac's round I pass, Thinking, now I hear what we heard some odd eleven or so years past, and hear the wind's rude touch and it's ugly sound Equally with so much more than I have now learned to bear.
Circa 1975, NYC
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Post by Deleted on Apr 3, 2015 17:01:09 GMT
This will be my first spontaneous poem written online ever and, may be subject to edit, yet, 'tis always for me the moment this inspirstion occurs and, as I always live with chance in my everyday being, why not express it so...
Arrival of the Waxwings At 6:A.M.
I had pondered the repositioning of the bed to avoid the glare of the sun blazing on certain mornings much to my chagrin yet, depriving me of the very reason I lie here in this very position.
And then, there they were, no time scheme do they follow but their own, something I have always wished for but never happens. Well it shouldn't.
The flock of many I had not seen, although, may have been there and I missed like so many other things. It does happen.
But, memory does not fade the spectacle I can only hope to reach outside of my everything and shout silently so as not to alarm what so gently and giving placed before me.
New Orleans, Good Friday, 20115
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Post by lola on Apr 7, 2015 2:46:50 GMT
Enjoying your poems, Casimira. Thank you.
Sometimes remind myself: A poem must not mean, but be.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 9, 2015 2:01:22 GMT
Grazie dear Lola.
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Post by deyana on Apr 24, 2015 19:53:34 GMT
How the wind blows.
My only crime was loving you And that was all. I was hated for loving you So be it. Your gave away something very sacred That's okay, I'm over it. I didn't want to feel the disgust But then I did. I didn't want to feel nothing And now I do. You are free to pursue your illusions Your untruths and your phoney world Good luck to you. I feel nothing for you anymore And haven't done in a long time It's freeing, liberating to no longer have to pay for my 'crime'.
You need to move on too to that grass is greener place Ghosts don't need you now They have gone, run sway in haste The bitter winds blow for you only to feel Embrace them, for in your world that is the only thing that will ever be real.
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Post by salparadise on May 6, 2015 16:19:05 GMT
Posting two because they go together so nicely. Plath and Hughes married in 1956. Plath committed suicide in 1963.
Daddy BY SYLVIA PLATH
You do not do, you do not do Any more, black shoe In which I have lived like a foot For thirty years, poor and white, Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.
Daddy, I have had to kill you. You died before I had time—— Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, Ghastly statue with one gray toe Big as a Frisco seal
And a head in the freakish Atlantic Where it pours bean green over blue In the waters off beautiful Nauset. I used to pray to recover you. Ach, du.
In the German tongue, in the Polish town Scraped flat by the roller Of wars, wars, wars. But the name of the town is common. My Polack friend
Says there are a dozen or two. So I never could tell where you Put your foot, your root, I never could talk to you. The tongue stuck in my jaw.
It stuck in a barb wire snare. Ich, ich, ich, ich, I could hardly speak. I thought every German was you. And the language obscene
An engine, an engine Chuffing me off like a Jew. A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen. I began to talk like a Jew. I think I may well be a Jew.
The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna Are not very pure or true. With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack I may be a bit of a Jew.
I have always been scared of you, With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. And your neat mustache And your Aryan eye, bright blue. Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You——
Not God but a swastika So black no sky could squeak through. Every woman adores a Fascist, The boot in the face, the brute Brute heart of a brute like you.
You stand at the blackboard, daddy, In the picture I have of you, A cleft in your chin instead of your foot But no less a devil for that, no not Any less the black man who
Bit my pretty red heart in two. I was ten when they buried you. At twenty I tried to die And get back, back, back to you. I thought even the bones would do.
But they pulled me out of the sack, And they stuck me together with glue. And then I knew what to do. I made a model of you, A man in black with a Meinkampf look
And a love of the rack and the screw. And I said I do, I do. So daddy, I’m finally through. The black telephone’s off at the root, The voices just can’t worm through.
If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two—— The vampire who said he was you And drank my blood for a year, Seven years, if you want to know. Daddy, you can lie back now.
There’s a stake in your fat black heart And the villagers never liked you. They are dancing and stamping on you. They always knew it was you. Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.
The Shot by TED HUGHES
Your worship needed a god. Where it lacked one, it found one. Ordinary jocks became gods – Deified by your infatuation That seemed to have been designed at birth for a god. It was a god-seeker. A god-finder. Your Daddy had been aiming you at God When his death touched the trigger.
In that flash
You saw your whole life. You richocheted The length of your Alpha career With the fury Of a high-velocity bullet That cannot shed one foot-pound Of kinetic energy. The elect More or less died on impact – They were too mortal to take it. They were mind-stuff, Provisional, speculative, mere auras. Sound-barrier events along your flightpath. But inside your sob-sodden Kleenex And your Saturday night panics, Under your hair done this way and that way, Behind what looked like rebounds And the cascade of cries diminuendo, You were undeflected. You were gold-jacketed, solid silver, Nickel-tipped. Trajectory perfect As through ether. Even the cheek-scar, Where you seemed to have side-swiped concrete, Served as a rifling groove To keep you true.
Till your real target Hid behind me. Your Daddy, The god with the smoking gun. For a long time Vague as mist, I did not even know I had been hit, Or that you had gone clean through me – To bury yourself at last in the heart of the god.
In my position, the right witchdoctor Might have caught you in flight with his bare hands, Tossed you, cooling, one hand to the other, Godless, happy, quieted.
I managed - A wisp of your hair, your ring, your watch, your nightgown.
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Post by Deleted on May 8, 2015 22:30:59 GMT
The Bells - Edgar Allen Poe
I. Hear the sledges with the bells-- Silver bells! What a world of merriment their melody foretells! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, In the icy air of night! While the stars that oversprinkle All the heavens, seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight; Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells-- From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
II. Hear the mellow wedding bells Golden bells! What a world of happiness their harmony foretells! Through the balmy air of night How they ring out their delight! From the molten-golden notes, And all in tune, What a liquid ditty floats To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats On the moon! Oh, from out the sounding cells, What a gush of euphony voluminously wells! How it swells! How it dwells On the Future! how it tells Of the rapture that impels To the swinging and the ringing Of the bells, bells, bells, Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells-- To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!
III. Hear the loud alarum bells-- Brazen bells! What tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells! In the startled ear of night How they scream out their affright! Too much horrified to speak, They can only shriek, shriek, Out of tune, In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire, In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire, Leaping higher, higher, higher, With a desperate desire, And a resolute endeavor Now--now to sit or never, By the side of the pale-faced moon. Oh, the bells, bells, bells! What a tale their terror tells Of Despair! How they clang, and clash, and roar! What a horror they outpour On the bosom of the palpitating air! Yet the ear, it fully knows, By the twanging, And the clanging, How the danger ebbs and flows ; Yet, the ear distinctly tells, In the jangling, And the wrangling, How the danger sinks and swells, By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells-- Of the bells-- Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells-- In the clamour and the clangour of the bells!
IV. Hear the tolling of the bells-- Iron bells! What a world of solemn thought their monody compels! In the silence of the night, How we shiver with affright At the melancholy meaning of their tone! For every sound that floats From the rust within their throats Is a groan. And the people--ah, the people-- They that dwell up in the steeple, All alone, And who, tolling, tolling, tolling, In that muffled monotone, Feel a glory in so rolling On the human heart a stone-- They are neither man nor woman-- They are neither brute nor human-- They are Ghouls:-- And their king it is who tolls ; And he rolls, rolls, rolls, rolls, Rolls A pæan from the bells! And his merry bosom swells With the pæan of the bells! And he dances, and he yells ; Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the pæan of the bells-- Of the bells : Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the throbbing of the bells-- Of the bells, bells, bells-- To the sobbing of the bells ; Keeping time, time, time, As he knells, knells, knells, In a happy Runic rhyme, To the rolling of the bells-- Of the bells, bells, bells-- To the tolling of the bells, Of the bells, bells, bells, bells-- Bells, bells, bells-- To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.
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Post by Deleted on May 9, 2015 15:55:49 GMT
A classic poem to be sure. I believe it was posted earlier in this thread somewhere but nothing wrong with a repeat to have folks reread it.
My memory of this poem (also repeated when first posted was of of my high school English teacher Mrs. Hamilton reading the poem aloud and swaying her body to emulate the tolling of the bells. Most of the class giggled. I was enchanted. Likely because of people like her, my love of poetry became enhanced.
(As an aside, I had a collection of a very old set of volumes of the complete works of Edgar Allen Poe. After Hurricane Katrina I gave them to a couple that I knew who had lost all their books and much more. They were rabid Poe fans. I don't regret it but do miss them on my book shelf). Worthy sacrifices are an important part of who we are I believe.
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Post by Deleted on May 9, 2015 18:24:31 GMT
With reference to Sylvia Path's work and Ted Hughes, I have to say that for one of the very few times this has happened to me in terms of reading biographies I was jaded with regard to Ted Hughes work. Something I try to seriously avoid. Perhaps a certain simpatico with Plath? I don't know. (Not that I would or ever entertained turning on the gas).
Yet, there seemed to be a lack of compassion on Hughes part. But, at a certain point, one, intimately involved with another in such intense circumstances, can and will implode. I wasn't looking at the poetry!!! WRONG, WRONG, WRONG.
I received a copy of Hughes Birthday Letters as a birthday gift the year it was published. (And, I believe he was named Poet Laureate of the U.K.)
My resentment and truly nonobjective view of him I now realize was so juvenile and ever so lacking of my current views and appreciation for his talent. As with many artists, Picasso, case in point. If you learn only so much of an artist's character, does that diminish your view of their artistic view and work? It's difficult to distinguish. In the case of Plath/Hughes it took me a while to recognize this.
They are both incredibly gifted poets.
When it comes to poetry, of all things,how can one possibly take sides?
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Post by salparadise on May 14, 2015 20:01:15 GMT
They are both incredibly gifted poets. When it comes to poetry, of all things,how can one possibly take sides? Well said. Certainly both are wonderful poets. Birthday Letters is one of my favourite collections, as is Ariel. Hughes seems an incredibly manipulative man (to have not one, but two wives commit suicide seems far more sinister than simple coincidence) but then, often the most twisted minds create the most beautiful art. Most of my family is from Israel, so while we're on the topic of twisted minds, I thought it would be appropriate to post one of my favourite poems about the awful conflict. Jerusalem By YEHUDA AMICHAI On a roof in the Old City laundry hanging in the late afternoon sunlight: the white sheet of a woman who is my enemy, the towel of a man who is my enemy, to wipe off the sweat of his brow. In the sky of the Old City a kite. At the other end of the string, a child I can’t see because of the wall. We have put up many flags, they have put up many flags. To make us think that they’re happy. To make them think that we’re happy.
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Post by lugg on Oct 10, 2015 7:53:25 GMT
That is very simple and moving Salparadise. Thanks Casimira for posting yours - enjoyed them greatly. This was published by the National trust a couple of days ago for National Poetry Day. Punk poet John Cooper Clarke collaborated with the nation and came up with this to celebrate 50 years of the Neptune Trust- the lines of read by the contributors. www.nationaltrust.org.uk/article-1355902762772/A big fat sky and a thousand shrieks The tide arrives and the timber creaks A world away from the working week Où est la vie nautique? That’s where the sea comes in…
Dishevelled shells and shovelled sands, Architecture all unplanned A spade ‘n’ bucket wonderland A golden space, a Frisbee and The kids and dogs can run and run And not run in to anyone Way out! Real gone! That’s where the sea comes in…
Impervious to human speech, idle time and tidal reach Some memories you can’t impeach That’s where the sea comes in A nice cuppa splosh and a round of toast A cursory glance at the morning post A pointless walk along the coast That’s what floats my boat the most That’s where the sea comes in…
Now, voyager - once resigned Go forth to seek and find The hazy days you left behind Right there in the back of your mind Where lucid dreams begin With rolling dunes and rattling shale The shoreline then a swollen sail Picked out by a shimmering halo That’s where the sea comes in…
Could this be luck by chance? Eternity in a second glance A universe beyond romance That’s where the sea comes in… Yeah, that’s where the sea comes in…
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Post by mossie on Oct 11, 2015 15:58:22 GMT
I am normally not one for poetry, but that did it for me
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Post by htmb on Oct 11, 2015 17:22:22 GMT
For me, as well.
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Post by mickthecactus on Oct 14, 2015 11:56:03 GMT
I really like that too.
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Post by bixaorellana on Dec 19, 2015 17:18:32 GMT
They're telling me all I need is a good handshake and someone's hand slipped through and took ahold of the heart. I've seen what happens to people who put premium on friendship their fingers crippled from shaking hands arms twisted from the wrestling matches pegs replacing parts given to each other. I would rather have everyone for enemies. I want to be high above the cries of the born high above the moans of the dead waving to everyone without them waving back like a flag on a pirate ship. Above taken from Cold Building Poems by John Stoss. Read several more of those here.
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Post by deyana on Dec 19, 2015 17:49:52 GMT
Maya Angelou said it well. For all those inflicted with bitterness and envy:
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Post by Deleted on Dec 19, 2015 22:21:20 GMT
Oh WOW Bixa!! What a find!!!! I'm going to check out this Lavender Ink publisher. I have an inking I know who it is.
Thanks!!!
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Post by bixaorellana on Oct 20, 2016 1:20:01 GMT
Probably many of us have been exposed to this poem before, but I was prompted to look it up again by Fumobici's lovely autumn thread and was transported anew. POEM IN OCTOBER Dylan Thomas
It was my thirtieth year to heaven Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood And the mussel pooled and the heron Priested shore The morning beckon With water praying and call of seagull and rook And the knock of sailing boats on the webbed wall Myself to set foot That second In the still sleeping town and set forth.
My birthday began with the water- Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name Above the farms and the white horses And I rose In a rainy autumn And walked abroad in shower of all my days High tide and the heron dived when I took the road Over the border And the gates Of the town closed as the town awoke.
A springful of larks in a rolling Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling Blackbirds and the sun of October Summery On the hill's shoulder, Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly Come in the morning where I wandered and listened To the rain wringing Wind blow cold In the wood faraway under me.
Pale rain over the dwindling harbour And over the sea wet church the size of a snail With its horns through mist and the castle Brown as owls But all the gardens Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud. There could I marvel My birthday Away but the weather turned around.
It turned away from the blithe country And down the other air and the blue altered sky Streamed again a wonder of summer With apples Pears and red currants And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother Through the parables Of sunlight And the legends of the green chapels
And the twice told fields of infancy That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine. These were the woods the river and the sea Where a boy In the listening Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide. And the mystery Sang alive Still in the water and singing birds.
And there could I marvel my birthday Away but the weather turned around. And the true Joy of the long dead child sang burning In the sun. It was my thirtieth Year to heaven stood there then in the summer noon Though the town below lay leaved with October blood. O may my heart's truth Still be sung On this high hill in a year's turning.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 25, 2016 18:01:41 GMT
I haven't rendered a decent poem in eons, worthy of completion.
Mostly musings but did finally complete this at 5 a.m.
My Circle
My circle is narrow and the ring of my thoughts goes round my all. There lies something warm at the base of all strangeness around me, like the vague scent in the lily's cup, thousands of fruits, some that hang in my garden, round and completed in themselves- my uncertain life turned out this way too, shaped, rounded, bulging and smooth and-simple. Narrow is my circle and the ring of my thoughts goes round and round.
12/25/16
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Post by mickthecactus on Nov 22, 2017 8:47:21 GMT
The Land Of Nod By Robert Louis Stevenson From breakfast on through all the day At home among my friends I stay, But every night I go abroad Afar into the land of Nod. All by myself I have to go, With none to tell me what to do– All alone beside the streams And up the mountain-sides of dreams. The strangest things are these for me, Both things to eat and things to see, And many frightening sights abroad Till morning in the land of Nod. Try as I like to find the way, I never can get back by day, Nor can remember plain and clear The curious music that I hear. Source: www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/the-land-of-nod-by-robert-louis-stevenson
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