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*Poem of the day thread

a poem that is a little different

This is an interactive poem with sound and visuals so you have to enter through the link (sorry if your computer can't manage it).

It seems a shame not to exploit the medium we are on.

The poem is aptly entitled:


After the Resurrection


Enter through the parchment and click on the skulls to move the poem along.



If you are interested, a lot more interactive internet texts can be found at this site:
Electronic Literature Directory
 
This isn't actually one i agree with but i'm offering it for obvious reasons:

the american way

he went to the masquerade as a worm.
crawling had become
a statement of belief.

Wilson Stapleton

Edit: bugger - i thought Chrissie's was from yesterday - sorry all...
 
I am printing yours out to display, butchersapron! It really tickled me. (And perhaps mine counts as the day's before because I booted up the computer then?)
 
to be read aloud

DISOBEDIENCE

disobedience-2.gif


James James
Morrison Morrison
Weatherby George Dupree
Took great
Care of his Mother,
Though he was only three.
James James
Said to his Mother,
"Mother", he said, said he;
"You must never go down to the end of the town, if you don't go down with me."

James James
Morrison's Mother
Put on a golden gown,
James James
Morrison's Mother
Drove to the end of the town.
James James
Morrison's Mother
Said to herself, said she:
"I can get right down to the end of the town and be back in time for tea"

King John
Put up a notice,
"LOST or STOLEN or STRAYED!
JAMES JAMES
MORRISON'S MOTHER
SEEMS TO HAVE BEEN MISLAID.
LAST SEEN
WANDERING VAGUELY;
QUITE OF HER OWN ACCORD,
SHE TRIED TO GET DOWN TO THE END OF THE TOWN - FORTY SHILLINGS REWARD!

James James
Morrison Morrison
(Commonly known as Jim)
Told his
Other relations
Not to go blaming _him_.
James James
Said to his Mother,
"Mother", he said, said he:
"You must never go down to the end of the town with - out consulting me."

James James
Morrison's Mother
Hasn't been heard of since.
King John
Said he was sorry,
So did the Queen and Prince.
King John
(Somebody told me)
Said to a man he knew:
"If people go down to the end of the town, well, what can anyone do?"

(Now then, very softly)

J. J.
M. M.
W. G. Du P.
Took great
C/o his M*****
Though he was only 3.
J. J.
Said to his M*****
"M*****", he said, said he:
"You-must-never-go-down-to-the-end-of-the-town-if-you-don't-go-down-with-ME!"

A. A. Milne
 
Slough by John Betjeman

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.
 
Chinamen Jump
Frank O'Hara

At night Chinamen jump
on Asia with a thump
while in our willful way
we, in secret, play

affectionate games and bruise
our knees like China's shoes.

The birds push apples through
grass the moon turns blue,

these apples roll beneath
our buttocks like a heath

full of Chinese thrushes
flushed from China's bushes.

As we love at night
birds sing out of sight,

Chinese rhythms beat
through us in our heat,

the apples and the birds
move us like soft words,

we couple in the grace
of that mysterious race.
 
As Bad as a Mile - Phillip Larkin

This is one of my favourite poems. What do people think? Too bleak? I always smile at it... however low I'm feeling it just makes me feel a bit better. I can't help thinking that it's a parody of gloomy fatalism. :)

As Bad as a Mile.


Watching the shied core
Striking the basket, skidding across the floor,
Shows less and less of luck, and more and more

Of failure spreading back up the arm
Earlier and earlier, the unraised hand calm,
The apple unbitten in the palm.


Philip Larkin
 
Lemn Sissay - Immigration RSVP

IMMIGRATION RSVP


The lemons you suck are from Spain
And the orange you drink's from South Africa.
Shoes you wear are made in Pakistan
And your oil is from Saudi Arabia.


You import your petrol from the Gulf States
And your toys are made in Taiwan.
Your coffee they send from Columbia And your cars are driven from Japan.


You've flooded yourself with foreign good
But foreigners you tell me are bad.
You say you 're afraid that they 'll over run you
But I 'm afraid they already have.

_______________________________________

i am going to post some more Lemn Sissay, simply because he is one of the best poets working in britain today, and in fact i am surprised none of his stuff has been posted before... buy the anthology he edited called "The Fire People" if u can get hold of it...
 
as noone posted any poems on the 11th, 12th or 13th, does that mean i can post another one today then? :D

a somewhat obvious choice perhaps, but still as brilliant as it ever was:

Sylvia Plath - Lady Lazarus

I have done it again.
One year in every ten
I manage it-----

A sort of walking miracle, my skin
Bright as a Nazi lampshade,
My right foot

A paperweight,
My featureless, fine
Jew linen.

Peel off the napkin
O my enemy.
Do I terrify?-------

The nose, the eye pits, the full set of teeth?
The sour breath
Will vanish in a day.

Soon, soon the flesh
The grave cave ate will be
At home on me

And I a smiling woman.
I am only thirty.
And like the cat I have nine times to die.

This is Number Three.
What a trash
To annihilate each decade.

What a million filaments.
The Peanut-crunching crowd
Shoves in to see

Them unwrap me hand in foot ------
The big strip tease.
Gentleman , ladies

These are my hands
My knees.
I may be skin and bone,

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman.
The first time it happened I was ten.
It was an accident.

The second time I meant
To last it out and not come back at all.
I rocked shut

As a seashell.
They had to call and call
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.

I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I've a call.

It's easy enough to do it in a cell.
It's easy enough to do it and stay put.
It's the theatrical

Comeback in broad day
To the same place, the same face, the same brute
Amused shout:

'A miracle!'
That knocks me out.
There is a charge

For the eyeing my scars, there is a charge
For the hearing of my heart---
It really goes.

And there is a charge, a very large charge
For a word or a touch
Or a bit of blood

Or a piece of my hair on my clothes.
So, so, Herr Doktor.
So, Herr Enemy.

I am your opus,
I am your valuable,
The pure gold baby

That melts to a shriek.
I turn and burn.
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.

Ash, ash---
You poke and stir.
Flesh, bone, there is nothing there----

A cake of soap,
A wedding ring,
A gold filling.

Herr God, Herr Lucifer
Beware
Beware.

Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.

:cool: :( :cool:
 
I am the people--the mob--the crowd--the mass.
Do you know that all the great work of the world is done through me?
I am the workingman, the inventor, the maker of the world's food and
clothes.
I am the audience that witnesses history. The Napoleons come from me
and the Lincolns. They die. And then I send forth more Napoleons
and Lincolns.
I am the seed ground. I am a prairie that will stand for much plowing.
Terrible storms pass over me. I forget. The best of me is sucked out
and wasted. I forget. Everything but Death comes to me and makes
me work and give up what I have. And I forget.
Sometimes I growl, shake myself and spatter a few red drops for history
to remember. Then--I forget.
When I, the People, learn to remember, when I, the People, use the
lessons of yesterday and no longer forget who robbed me last year,
who played me for a fool--then there will be no speaker in all the
world say the name: "The People," with any fleck of a sneer in his
voice or any far-off smile of derision.
The mob--the crowd--the mass--will arrive then.


Carl Sandburg
 
Follower

My father worked with a horse-plough,
His shoulders globed like a full sail strung
Between the shafts and the furrow.
The horse strained at his clicking tongue.

An expert. He would set the wing
And fit the bright steel-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 hob-nailed 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 round 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
 
Pam Ayres

Oh I wish I'd looked after my teeth

Oh, I wish I'd looked after me teeth,
And spotted the perils beneath,
All the toffees I chewed,
And the sweet sticky food,
Oh, I wish I'd looked after me teeth.

I wish I'd been that much more willin'
When I had more tooth there than fillin'
To pass up gobstoppers,
From respect to me choppers
And to buy something else with me shillin'.

When I think of the lollies I licked,
And the liquorice allsorts I picked,
Sherbet dabs, big and little,
All that hard peanut brittle,
My conscience gets horribly pricked.

My Mother, she told me no end,
"If you got a tooth, you got a friend"
I was young then, and careless,
My toothbrush was hairless,
I never had much time to spend.

Oh I showed them the toothpaste all right,
I flashed it about late at night,
But up-and-down brushin'
And pokin' and fussin'
Didn't seem worth the time... I could bite!

If I'd known I was paving the way,
To cavities, caps and decay,
The murder of fiIlin's
Injections and drillin's
I'd have thrown all me sherbet away.

So I lay in the old dentist's chair,
And I gaze up his nose in despair,
And his drill it do whine,
In these molars of mine,
"Two amalgum," he'll say, "for in there."

How I laughed at my Mother's false teeth,
As they foamed in the waters beneath,
But now comes the reckonin'
It's me they are beckonin'
Oh, I wish I'd looked after me teeth.
 
one of only 2 or 3 positive poems in the fantastic antology 'the world's wife' by carol ann duffy =

Anne Hathaway
"Item 1 give unto my wife my second best bed" (shakespeare's will)
The bed we loved in was a spinning world
of forests, castles, torchlight, clifftops, seas
where he would dive for pearls. My lover's words
were shooting stars which fell to earth as kisses
on these lips; my body now a softer rhyme
to his, now echo, assonance; his touch
a verb dancing in the centre of a noun.
Some nights, i dreamed he'd written me, the bed
a page beneath his writer's hands. Romance
and drama played by touch, by scent, by taste.
In the other bed, the best, our guests dozed on,
dribbling their prose. My living laughing love -
i hold him in the casket of my widow's head
as he held me upon that next best bed.

anne hathaway was shakespeare's wife btw :)
 
Roger Robinson - The Last Dance

Yes i know one's already been posted today... but this one is so good i have to post it now while the book it's in (an anthology called The Fire People, published by Payback Press and edited by Lemn Sissay) is still in my bag...

The Last Dance

I step in the party and vibrate
from late night bassline therapy.
Left my stress at the coat room
I've come to dance a wounded mind
before it bleeds insanity lead me to a dancefloor
to nod thoughts to the tempo.

Satin skinned sisters
boogie curves to a beat,
as brothers seek solace
in sexy silhouettes
of hearts flowering in dark corners.

But back to my beat
Stylus sliding lyrics for my mind set,
grooves soothe the rest.
Ears suck soul notes for energy
Hi hats shift my hipbones
break beats shake my waistline
hearts and bass beats synchronize
and for four minute moments,
I am music

yeah,
I'm the ghetto lullaby
floating from towerblocks
caressing young faded heads
on the corner.

I'm the embraceable tune
of first time lovers
thumping funky rhythms
on a rickety bed.
Yeah, I am music
so I dance.

I dance steps
delicate as barefeet
on a broken glass mile.
Drowning in music
catching smiles and breaths on melody.

Dole queue blues drench my T-shirt
my dirty nikes stepping rhythm
from a month of tears.

DJ picks up the pace
and the place jumps and waves
hands swaying in the air
a testifying chorus of pain.
DJ flinging down commandments plastic.

Then music's spirit leaps
out the speakers
on a tidal bass
breaking on our faces.

Baptised reborn refreshed
I dance
I dance tears of sour sweet sweat
in slowly choreographed steps of death,
and the only thought I can hold is this tune
and if this party ends its too soon
so I dance, I dance
in clubs of dark damp grief
as hips of hurt sway some relief
I scream
I jump
I smoke
I drink
I groove
I dance
I dance
like this dance may be our last.
 
Selfish arrogant manipulative ruthless
James Farrell


Selfish,arrogant, manipulative,ruthless
shotguns,flick knives, knuckle dusters,bats,
flash backs, car wrecks, break downs, Jesus,
Never being there when you need him,
blisters, ulcers, toothache, stress,
crack up, no back up, lack of, lonliness,
salvage, worthless, rubbish, despair,
pretending when there's nobody there,
fucker, wanker, twat, cunt , dickhead,
small things,
nothing surprises you much, you don't surprise anyone,
money, bills, build up, don't show up,
your own funeral, work's shit, it's boring, demeaning,
no one listens, deaf ears, falling, drowning,
denial, all your life, in a bathtub, bleeding,
not succeeding, dreaming, kid's, smoking,
on the streets, looking like chimney sweeps,
grafting, crafty liitle fucker, stealing,dealing,
no answers, left out, forgotten, bottles,
half empty, whisky, tepid, being sick,
on the carpet cos you can't handle it,
losing it, panic, limit, yourself,
to poison, when you're horny, fist fuck her, shut up ,
madly, deeply, hurt, under your fingernails,
it's hell, don't want to talk about it, pathos, catharsis,
Narcissus, creepy, homosexual, junky,
outcast, not funny, coming down, paranoid,
I'm not paranoid,
hangover, life threatening, in debt , to yourself,
we'll work it out, it'll work itself out, work out,
twice a week, you're clever, meat and tatties, braindead,
bugs, thugs, derelict people, in your head,
it's chaos, not funny, scared to fall asleep, oh no,
in a dream, I'm running, bolting , horses, lightening,
striking, my skull, life's dull, when you''re lonely.
 
James Farrell's a good mate of mine from my days in Asia. He's originally from Yorkshire and was published in the UK a number of times in the mid to late '90s...I think he won some fairly prestigious 'Young Poet of the Year' award at some point around then.
 
And while the thread's back...

A True Maid

NO, no; for my virginity,
When I lose that, says Rose, I'll die:
Behind the elms last night, cried Dick,
Rose, were you not extremely sick?


Matthew Prior (1664 - 1721) English Poet
 
Here's one from Lorca on his birthday:

Gacela of the Dark Death
_
I want to sleep the dream of the apples,
to withdraw from the tumult of cemetries,
I want to sleep the dream of that child
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas.
_
I don't want to hear again that the dead do not lose their blood,
that the putrid mouth goes on asking for water.
I don't want to learn of the tortures of the grass,
nor of the moon with a serpent's mouth
that labors before dawn.
_
I want to sleep awhile,
awhile, a minute, a century;
but all must know that i have not died;
that there is a stable of gold in my lips;
that i am the small friend of the West wing;
that i am the intense shadow of my tears.
_
Cover me at dawn with a veil.
because dawn will throw fistfuls of ants at me.
and wet with hard water my shoes
so that the pincers of the scorpion slide.
_
For i want to sleep the dream of the apples,
to learn a lament that will cleanse me of the earth;
for i want to live with that dark child
who wanted to cut his heart on the high seas.
 
Here's summat Ted Hughes wrote as a young un in Mexborough.

The Zeet Saga or Pale tale I (Extract)

“On the prairie, in the sunshine
Nibbling cactus on the grass
Yesterday I met a man who
Barked, and wouldn’t let me pass.

Holding up his pipe of sandstone,
Shouting loudly o’er the storm,
Bid me halt, and told a story
How to keep the lightning warm.

With my fist I smote the mountains
Scooped a seat amid the shale
Checked my compass with the Plough
And sat to listen to his tale.

Then he rolled his sunshirt sleeves down,
Knocked his pipe out on the sea,
Toying casual with a bison,
This the tale he told to me:

‘In the wide Saharan desert
Lives a creature called the Zeet,
Lays its young in oblong boxes,
Stacked in barrows from the heat; . . .”


Times article here (password = asdf, user = asdf will let you in)
 
Now, here's a funny thing.

What do this man:

_343059_hughes300.jpg


and this man:

billysheffutd.jpg


have to do with one another?

The answer is that both Ted Hughes and Billy Whitehurst came from Mexborough, apparently. I didn't know this until I read the previous post. It's a bit spooky though, because some time ago I wrote this parody of Hughes' poem View Of A Pig.

View Of A Pig

The pig lay on a barrow dead.
It weighed, they said, as much as three men.
Its eyes closed, pink white eyelashes.
Its trotters stuck straight out.
Such weight and thick pink bulk
Set in death seemed not just dead.
It was less than lifeless, further off.
It was like a sack of wheat.
I thumped it without feeling remorse.
One feels guilty insulting the dead,
Walking on graves. But this pig
Did not seem able to accuse.
It was too dead. Just so much
A poundage of lard and pork.
Its last dignity had entirely gone.
It was not a figure of fun.
Too dead now to pity.
To remember its life, din, stronghold
Of earthly pleasure as it had been,
Seemed a false effort, and off the point.
Too deadly factual. Its weight
Oppressed me - how could it be moved?
And the trouble of cutting it up!
The gash in its throat was shocking, but not pathetic.
Once I ran at a fair in the noise
To catch a greased piglet
That was faster and nimbler than a cat,
Its squeal was the rending of metal.
Pigs must have hot blood, they feel like ovens.
Their bite is worse than a horse's -
They chop a half-moon clean out.
They eat cinders, dead cats.
Distinctions and admirations such
As this one was long finished with.
I stared at it a long time.
They were going to scald it,
Scald it and scour it like a doorstep.

- Ted Hughes

View Of A Real Pig

Billy Whitehurst's career is finally dead.
He weighed, they said, as much as three men.
Eyes closed, playing only in snatches
His lack of skill stuck out.

Such weight and thick pink bulk
Set in a player seemed not just bad,
It made him less than lifeless, further off
The ball, just like a sack of spuds.

I heckled him without feeling remorse
One feels guilty insulting the bad,
Making them worse. But Fat Billy
Did not seem able to play at all.

He was too large. Just so much.
A poundage of lard and pork.
His talent had entirely gone.
He was indeed a figure of fun.

Too bad to even pity.
I remember his poor play of old
No earthly use or pleasure there had been
False in his effort. He gained us no points.

I'm deadly serious. His weight
Obsessed me - how could he be moved?
No trouble in cutting him up
His use of elbows was shocking but pathetic.

Once he ran half the pitch in the hope
Of catching his opponent
Who was faster and nimbler than he was
He squealed when Billy's tackle rended flesh.

Players must have hot blood, they have to run.
But Billy’s bite was worse than Vinny Jones’
He chopped another’s legs half off.
He spent his money down the dogs.

Distinctive, yes, but admiration no:
Billy Whitehurst was long ago finished.
I watched him for a long time. Expect to see him
Drunken and washed up on a doorstep.

- Justin Horton
 
Giving Potatoes


STRONG MAN:

Mashed potatoes cannot hurt you , darling
Mashed potatoes mean no harm
I have brought you mashed potatoes
From my mashed potato farm

LADY:

Take away your mashed potatoes
Leave them in the desert to dry
Take away your mashed potatoes -
You look like shepherd's pie

BRASH MAN:

A packet of chips, a packet of chips,
Wrapped in the Daily Mail
Golden juicy and fried for a week
In the blubber of the Great White Whale

LADY:

Take away your fried potatoes
Use them to clean your ears
You can eat your fried potatoes
With birds-eye frozen tears

OLD MAN:

I have borne this baked potato
O'er the Generation Gap
Pray accept this baked potato
Let me lay it in your heated lap.

LADY:

Take away your baked potato
In your frusty musty van
Take away your baked potato
You potato-skinned old man

FRENCHMAN:

She rejected all potaoes
For a thousand nights and days
Till a Frenchman wooed and won her
With pommes de terre Lyonnaise.

LADY:

Oh my corrugated lover
So creamy and so brown
Lut us fly across to Lyons
And lay our tubers down.



Adrian Mitchell
 
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