Poetry Corner (No Spam please)

[dragon wench]

Lost in the forest...

Lost in the forest, I broke off a dark twig
and lifted its whisper to my thirsty lips:
maybe it was the voice of the rain crying,
a cracked bell, or a torn heart.
Something from far off it seemed
deep and secret to me, hidden by the earth,
a shout muffled by huge autumns,
by the moist half-open darkness of the leaves.

Wakening from the dreaming forest there, the hazel-sprig
sang under my tongue, its drifting fragrance
climbed up through my conscious mind

as if suddenly the roots I had left behind
cried out to me, the land I had lost with my childhood---
and I stopped, wounded by the wandering scent.





You will remember...

You will remember that leaping stream
where sweet aromas rose and trembled,
and sometimes a bird, wearing water
and slowness, its winter feathers.

You will remember those gifts from the earth:
indelible scents, gold clay,
weeds in the thicket and crazy roots,
magical thorns like swords.

You'll remember the bouquet you picked,
shadows and silent water,
bouquet like a foam-covered stone.

That time was like never, and like always.
So we go there, where nothing is waiting;
we find everything waiting there.

Pablo Neruda

[Claudius]

A Recollection of Warmth

Memory recalls the embers of the fire as dazzling
and forgets the longing soothed and mesmerized
Long tongues licking in darkness
Sparks leaping on their brave voyage

Fragile Thoughts

The cattle shift and look up.
Into the eyes of a man shape
Some distance from the barb wire
The others return to their feast
As one ambles to the border
It can smell the fear in the boy
"Moo"

Wishful Breeze

The light through the trees is amazing and inspiring.
My heart is sleeping yet stirring I guess blowing a few bees along their course from flower to flower
worlds of color and pollen. Would love to fly!
I wish my heart could be such a home to insects.
Waters containing the potential: ocean sunlight and waves.
Washing against the shore,rhythmic cares telling us that all prayers contain an answer within them.

[fable]

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
And builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretched forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.

But the old man would not do so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

That's by Wilfrid Owen, a young British poet who signed up to fight in World War I. Before he died, in the last week of fighting, He. Got. It. He realized what it was truly all about: some older men sacrificing all the young ones they could find. Very pertinent for today, I think.

[BlueSky]

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
And builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretched forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.

But the old man would not do so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

That's by Wilfrid Owen, a young British poet who signed up to fight in World War I. Before he died, in the last week of fighting, He. Got. It. He realized what it was truly all about: some older men sacrificing all the young ones they could find. Very pertinent for today, I think.

For some reason reminds me of the Dylan song, covered by Pearl Jam..."Masters of War"

Edit: lyrics
Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks

You that never done nothin'
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it's your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly

Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain

You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people's blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud

You've thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain't worth the blood
That runs in your veins

How much do I know
To talk out of turn
You might say that I'm young
You might say I'm unlearned
But there's one thing I know
Though I'm younger than you
Even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do

Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul

And I hope that you die
And your death'll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I'll watch while you're lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I'll stand o'er your grave
'Til I'm sure that you're dead

[fable]

For some reason reminds me of the Dylan song, covered by Pearl Jam..."Masters of War"

A fine lyric, that, though the warmasters he tries to guilt trip will never feel guilt. Better to hate war directly, hate it for what it does, rip it to pieces, and to hell with Dolce et decorum and the rest of that obscene crap. I'd rather see young men grow old and die surrounded bytheir families, in peaceful beds, then become fertilizer in youth honored by governmental medals. I'd say a lot more on the subject, all of it graphically acute, if it weren't for Buck's rules. Simply consider them said, please.

So let's have a ghastly reminder of the utter uselessness of such invasions, courtesy of Country Joe and the Fish:

Come on all of you big strong men
Uncle Sam needs your help again
he's got himself in a terrible jam
way down yonder in Viet Nam so
put down your books and pick up a gun we're
gonna have a whole lotta fun

CHORUS:
And it's one, two, three, what are we fighting for
don't ask me I don't give a damn, next stop is Viet Nam
And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates
ain't no time to wonder why, whoopee! we're all gonna die.

Come on generals, let's move fast
your big chance has come at last
now you can go out and get those reds
cos the only good commie is the one that's dead and
you know that peace can only be won when we've
blown 'em all to kingdom come.

Come on wall street don't be slow
why man this war is a go-go
there's plenty good money to be made by
supplying the army with the tools of its trade
let's hope and pray that if they drop the bomb,
they drop it on the Viet Cong.

Come on mothers throughout the land
pack your boys off to Viet Nam
come on fathers don't hesitate
send your sons off before it's too late
and you can be the first ones on your block
to have your boy come home in a box!

[BlueSky]

We must be close to the same age, Fable...
At the mention of Country Joe, I was already singing the lyrics in my mind.:laugh:

[Claudius]

Here's a friend and someone I look up to's poem...

An Uncertain Trinity


It's raining cats and dogs in Detroit;
46 degrees at midnight and the Ball falling
in NYC. New Years has
an odd nostalgia - weeping
at once for the deaths of heroes and innocents,
winners, losers and tyrants.

It's the rain that won't let us shrug off
the moment as 'just another tick of the clock;'
the rain and wind that howl
as if there were indeed
spirits stored in every moment of time, all waiting
for a wet and dripping New Years' night to tear open
both the gross and subtle veils and soar around
in cycles apparent to anyone
who is accustomed to look for signs.

In a week we lost a Statesman, a
Genius of Life and Funk and a Tyrant.
Jerry Ford and
James Brown both strove
to heal, Saddam Hussein reveled in the blood
of others and now has only the memory of
such swollen feasts to keep him company in his grave.

And we are left to count the tokens;
to take the coins from the eyes of the dead
and dying and see
if there are messages written
in the gaze of those who sing their own songs
of death and dying.

How do we count the hours? How do we
gather the mossy wisps and gossamer fogs of
our dreams of rainy nights? How do we
separate, process and
feel the many emotions that are spoken,
bandied about and sold? How do we
count the blessings hidden
amidst the contradictions?

Life is abundant in ironies; Jerry Ford
decrying the war 2 weeks before his own death
and the solemn count of
3,000 American Lives tallied
on New Year's Eve; James Brown passing quickly
days before he was to appear in NYC on this
very night of rain and shadows;
Saddam hung on the same gibbet
that had delivered so many deaths
sent by his very hand.

It is easy to succumb to the emotions
of the masses; to succumb to the banality
of clichés that form the
worship of this most
uncertain of Trinities.
Sorrow at the passing of the Statesman,
Regret at the passing of the Godfather of Soul,
Righteous Gratitude at the passing
of the Tyrant. The Nobility of Sorrow and
Regret sullied by association with dissonant emotion,
the cat-call and grackle of those who revel in
the exploitation of any convenient death.

Is there more to feel - and less - if we
take the time to build our own emotions from
the milieu of those
paraded as meet and proper -
if we remember the sorrow that each life entailed
along with the moments that lead to ends both
glorious and horrific?

For myself, I abide the changes of death with
a sense of Wonder; my sense of gratitude for Jerry
and James acquired from
long acquaintance with the
arts of both men. Saddam, however, tempts me to rail
in the enjoyment of a death rendered as 'justice,'
a justice, however, my wisdom decries
as never a matter of joy.

In the stead of the gawker's delight
at the sorrow of another, I feel sorrow for
the pains of a life that drove
a handsome little boy
into the arms of the callous and religious where distortions
rendered the arts of the assassin and tyrant. I feel sorrow
as well for the Mountains of People that he killed, and
the ocean of pain that is not yet
full enough to make those who fill it daily
with the blood of their own tears to say Enough -
to Demand Peace.

3,000 dead in Iraq is sorrow
more than sufficient to quell my own
need for suffering. The
hundreds of thousands
of dead in Iraq an underreported quotient
that more than matches the mood of such
a surreal and rainy night;
December on the heels of Autumn
turning to winter and yet holding onto Summer -
even as we surrender the dream.

GhanaBhuti
January 1, 2007
Midnight to 12:27 am

[fable]

We must be close to the same age, Fable...
At the mention of Country Joe, I was already singing the lyrics in my mind.:laugh:

56, here. Aren't you about that age, oldtimer?

[BlueSky]

56, here. Aren't you about that age, oldtimer?

Fairly close, 52 at last count...but as posted somewhere in these forums, my mind still thinks I'm in my twenties....

[Claudius]

Phantom Pain

Nerves won't give me peace
Dull pains almost on the edge of pleasure
But never rectifying to whole calmness
Toying with smashing the furniture
Instead turning to the cool night air
The moon is yellow shrouded in cloud
Not pure
Just like me
At least a morsel of relief

[Tricky]

I'm liking Yeats a lot right now. I read a little every night. I think that, to an extend, we are similar of character. Not that I could write worth a damn.

That crazed girl improvising her music.
Her poetry, dancing upon the shore,

Her soul in division from itself
Climbing, falling She knew not where,
Hiding amid the cargo of a steamship,
Her knee-cap broken, that girl I declare
A beautiful lofty thing, or a thing
Heroically lost, heroically found.

No matter what disaster occurred
She stood in desperate music wound,
Wound, wound, and she made in her triumph
Where the bales and the baskets lay
No common intelligible sound
But sang, 'O sea-starved, hungry sea.'

I think this is about Maud's daughter, Iseult, probably a child here. I don't have the booklet that provides background information to the anthology near me to know for sure, but I love the imagery anyway.

[Claudius]

Recommendation

Promise me, promise me this day,
promise me now,
while the sun is shining above
exactly at zenith, promise me
even if people crush you
under a mountain of hatred and violence,
even if they walk on your life
and crush you like a caterpillar,
even if they amputate you,
disembowel you,
remember, brother,
man is not our enemy.
Only your compassion and
your loving kindness are invincible,
and without limit.
Hatred can never respond
to the beastliness in humankind.
One day when you are by yourself
facing cruelty,
your courage intact,
your calm eyes full of love,
even if no one knows of your smile,
blossoming as a flower in solitude of great pain,
those who love you will still see you
while traveling through a thousand worlds
of birth and death.
Alone again, I will go on
with my head bent down,
knowing that love has become eternal.
And on the long difficult road,
the light of the sun and the moon
is still there
to guide my steps.

The Witness Remains

Flarebombs bloom on the dark sky
A child claps his hands and laughs.
I hear the sound of guns,
and the laughter dies.

But the witness
remains.

Message

Life has left her footprints on my forehead.
But I have become a child again this morning.
The smile, seen through leaves and flowers,
is back to smooth away the wrinkles,
as the rains wipe away footprints on the beach.
Again a cycle of birth and death begins.

I walk on thorns, but firmly, as among flowers.
I keep my head high.
Rhymes bloom among the sounds of bombs and mortars.
The tears I shed yesterday have become rain.
I feel calm hearing its sound on the thatched roof.
Childhood, my birthland, is calling me,
and the rains melt my despair.

I am still here alive, able to smile qietly.
O sweet fruit brought forth by the tree of suffering!
Carrying the dead body of my brother,
I go across the rice field in darkness,
Earth will keep you tight within her arms, my dear,
so that tomorrow you will be reborn as flowers,
those flowers smiling quietly in the morning field.
This moment you weep no more, my dear.
We have gone through too deep a night.

This morning I kneel down on the grass,
when I notice your presence.
Flowers that carry the marvelous smile of ineffability
speak to me in silence.

The message,
the message of love
and understanding,
has indeed come to us.

[Yeltsu]

This is an old saying I read in an article by Clifford Geertz called Religion as a Cultural System. I think it beautifully sums up what he calls "the problem of evil" - regarding how we have trouble explaining injustice, a problem religion can aid us with.

The rain falls on the just

and on the unjust fella;

But mostly upon the just,

because the unjust has the just's umbrella.

[LeoStarDragon1]

Poetry Corner.

#00: When I saw this thread pop-up, that inspired me to change my signature to the only limerick I have memorized. I memorized that easily as teenager when I didn't know that "vagina" is Latin for "scabbard". (I didn't learn that though until my forties, unless I was 38 or 39. That's fairly recent for me, the way my mind works.) Adds a new twist to it for me. Sort of an "anti-war" one after seeing the movie "Watchmen". People pay to get into war and pay to get out of it too. (Hm. She was no Harlot from Kew, but Helen of Troy was the face that launched a thousand ships, albeit not in a "Farside" meaning. )

#01: When I was in high school, we were required to write poems as a part of the learning process. One of the styles had the possibility of the title being longer than the poem part itself. I haven't seen my effort ever since then, but if I recall right, the title was something like this, "A Baby Describing a Baby Fish" and the poem part was simply, "Guppy Puppy!"

#02: One time I wrote this on a Christmas card for one of my managers at work: "Hail Mary, full of Grace! Hello, Mary Beth! Cute of face! Merry Christmas!" I may have added more to it than that, but the references to two different Marys was what impressed the crew the most.

#03: Within recent memory, I attended a relative's funeral. "Taps" was played during the proceedings at some point. What most of us didn't know until then, was that it was also a song with lyrics as we were only used to hearing it played as an instrumental piece. I kept the funeral program, but I couldn't find it just prior to posting this. So, damn, I had to resort to consulting "Wikipedia" again. (Where did that program go?!)

According to it, the original was purely instrumental and the lyrics were added later. There's a debate about it all. But the lyrics I was looking for are
the ones I'm posting here.

TAPS

Composed by Union Army Brigadier General Daniel Butterfield.

Original Bugler: Oliver W. Norton.

Fading light dims the sight
And a star gems the sky, gleaming bright
From afar drawing nigh,
Falls the night.

Day is done, gone the sun
From the lakes, from the hills, from the sky
All is well, safely rest;
God is nigh.

Then goodnight, peaceful night;
Till the light of the dawn shineth bright.
God is near, do not fear,
Friend, goodnight.

On a side note: My younger brother and I were in the "Boy Scouts of America" together back in 1978 and 1979 or so. "Taps" is also played at "Lights Out" time. My brother and I and earned "Genuine U.S. Brass Bugles" by selling greeting cards. The Scoutmasters wanted us to learn how to play "Taps" for that purpose. But our bugles didn't work well to begin with and that is why we'd stopped trying to learn how to play them. So someone else resorted to playing a harmonica for that purpose. So from my own personal experience it is harder to play it on a bugle than to sing it. In any case, I thought I'd share the lyrics here for any one else that didn't know there were lyrics.

[fable]

Razors pain you;
Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you;
And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful;
Nooses give;
Gas smells awful;
You might as well live.

--Dorothy Parker

[dragon wench]

Arriesgare La Piel
(I Will Risk My Skin)


Last night, perhaps it may
Have been necessary
To make the useless decision
Of seeing you
Be it in the middle of the night
Be it in the middle of death

My heart is a winged horse
My decision is a bitter spade
I will come back searching for what I love

In spite of the uncertainty that seizes me
I will risk my skin to see you again
Even with a high price
For the misunderstanding
Because life is like an instant
Within the past vastness of this year

A year of waiting and a year
Without memories
Which I prefer not to prolong
Between the knife of your past
And the wounds of my awakening

Inti-Illimani