Poets' Corner

[D. Allan]

Prose poems fascinate me, Neil. This is by one of my favorite poets:

Watermelons

Green Buddhas

On the fruit stand.

We eat the smile

And spit out the teeth.

by Charles Simic

[D. Allan]

Here is a prose poem I wrote about 1965. Believe it or not it was published in a monthly sheet at the University at Austin, Texas and they paid me one dollar. :-| That was the end of my career as a poet. :-)

CREDO

as necessary

or un-

the soaring bird

silent

tall trees naked or

clothed

streams that are traveling

traveling

or any large rock

which

waits

in the

desert

[cricket]

LOL, your career as a poet sounds like my career as an author! One published work, a couple of acclaimed works--but not much more!

I love it, by the way--your poem!

[D. Allan]

Thanks, Cris. I did manage to get rejection slips from The New Yorker and from Harper's Magazine. Should have kept them and framed them. Oh, well, guess I could always get more. :-)

[nuff sed]

Observations on a Sabbath School Class

(dedicated to those whispering in the back row)

Listen you biddies

Bestow the yak yak

Lest deacons invite you

To go farther back.

The rumble's disturbing

The rest of the class

As glances go backward

Hoping 'twill pass.

You notice I'm quiet

My hands in my lap

No noise am I making

As I take my nap.....

[cricket]

Hey deacon! Hey preacher!

Hey sabbath school teacher!

Come closer and bend us your ear.

Should we raise our hands higher?

You preach to the choir!

We know the end's already near.

[nuff sed]

Observations On Christian Education

Christian Education costs, they say

And some contend it doesn't pay

Can we a price put on a soul

As we continue toward our goal? For what we like we don't think twice

For quality we pay the price.

We house and clothe and feed our youth

Care for their needs, teach them the truth

We tell them stories, entertain

We must not let their interest wane.

But do we do all that we could

For their salvation as we should?

The home, the school, the church all do

A vital part to help us too.

Like a triangle,each a side

We cannot leave one open wide

For Satan's crew in dead of night

To change the signs from wrong to right.

As parents we must use each tool

To demonstrate the 'Golden Rule'

And why we're here,for what great plan

Our Heavenly Father created man.

"We can't afford our schools", some say

And think they've found a 'better' way.

So to the Public Schools they Send

Their kids----"It's cheaper in the end".

We can't afford to lend our youth

To those who have no love for Truth

Who train them just for now and here

Ignoring all that WE hold dear

That Christ is coming, soon we know

And to His Kingdom WE will go.

And so, my friends, what will it be?

Invest in Youth for eternity

For us the Father gave His son

Will He accept what We have done?

[D. Allan]

SILLY POEM FOR COMPACT-CARRYING GENDERS

When the mind goes blank

in the mid-afternoon

and your hair is a hank -

just a floppy cartoon

of it's usual fluff

and your posh is all poof

take your powder and puff

and you'll feel less uncouth

when you've smoothed off the shine -

you will have peace of mind.

[nuff sed]

You need two more lines

[D. Allan]

when you've smoothed off the shine

you will glow like the moon -

you will have peace of mind -

(in its frowsy cocoon.)

How about that, don? The last line should be spoken quietly and slowly. would it be too much to write it:

(in its froooowsy .... cocoooooooon)

?

[Neil D]

(e)]Hey deacon! Hey preacher!

Hey sabbath school teacher!

Come closer and bend us your ear.

Should we raise our hands higher?

You preach to the choir!

We know the end's already near.

A bit of inspiration on chris's poem...appologies to Chris for the taking apart and rearranging it...

Hey deacon! Hey preacher!

Hey sabbath school teacher!

Come closer move together

and bend us your ear.

Should we raise our hands higher and higher

That will inspire men to an ecclesiastical desire

that will be, in the hearts of men, absolutely heard...

to say something profound and say something absurd?

As a minister and a grocer, you preach to the choir!

You hawk your wears, you search for a buyer.

"It's the end! It's the end!" We know the end's already near.

But you clothe the message as the best marketeer.

It's not the end, that we need, that will draw us closer.

It's the Christ and that's a whole different grocer...

The Christ is large enough for any congregation

and specializes in the most tiny mutation.

To grow many a variety of species, that may

Tell of His love in a varied way.

Whose primary purpose is surgical you see,

A new purpose, a new life, a new generousity.

Christ's love is as varied as any grower,

and it is in the heart, man what a sower!

It's springs to life and produces much fruit

and we find it is far more astute

than anything found in sabbath school classroom

whose academics are kinda in costume..

dress up stuff up,...man, I am repeating myself

and so, I must, this poem, place on the shelf.

[cricket]

Apologies not needed! Bravo, Neil! **Woot!!**

I actually had a couple more lines to add to it, myself. I wrote them down in haste on the airplane and seem to have misplaced them. If I perchance across them, I'll share.

I love that you've taken mine and gone where inspiration leads!

[cricket]

Apropos for the times,

From Babes in Arms, "Johnny One Note"

Johnny could only sing one note

And the note he sings was this

Ah!

Poor Johnny one-note

sang out with "gusto"

And just overlorded the place

Poor Johnny one-note

yelled willy nilly

Until he was bleu in the face

For holding one note was his ace

Couldn’t hear the brass

Couldn’t hear the drum

He was in a class

By himself, by gum!

Poor Johnny one-note

Got in Aida

Indeed a great chance to be brave

He took his one note

Howled like the North Wind

Brought forth wind that made critics rave,

While Verdi turned round in his grave!

Couldn’t hear the flute

Or the big trombone

Ev’ry one was mute

Johnny stood alone.

Cats and dogs stopped yapping

Lions in the zoo

All were jealous of Johnny's big trill

Thunder claps stopped clapping,

Traffic ceased its roar,

And they tell us Niag’ra stood still.

He stopped the train whistles,

Boat whistles,

steam whistles,

Cop whistles,

all whistles bowed to his skill

Sing Johnny One-Note,

Sing out with "gusto" and

Just overwhelm all the crowd

Ah!

So sing Johnny One-Note, out loud!!

Sing Johnny One-Note

Sing Johnny One-Note out loud!

[D. Allan]

In View of the Fact

by A. R. Ammons

The people of my time are passing away: my

wife is baking for a funeral, a 60-year-old who

died suddenly, when the phone rings, and it's

Ruth we care so much about in intensive care:

it was once weddings that came so thick and

fast, and then, first babies, such a hullabaloo:

now, it's this that and the other and somebody

else gone or on the brink: well, we never

thought we would live forever (although we did)

and now it looks like we won't: some of us

are losing a leg to diabetes, some don't know

what they went downstairs for, some know that

a hired watchful person is around, some like

to touch the cane tip into something steady,

so nice: we have already lost so many,

brushed the loss of ourselves ourselves: our

address books for so long a slow scramble now

are palimpsests, scribbles and scratches: our

index cards for Christmases, birthdays,

Halloweens drop clean away into sympathies:

at the same time we are getting used to so

many leaving, we are hanging on with a grip

to the ones left: we are not giving up on the

congestive heart failure or brain tumors, on

the nice old men left in empty houses or on

the widows who decide to travel a lot: we

think the sun may shine someday when we'll

drink wine together and think of what used to

be: until we die we will remember every

single thing, recall every word, love every

loss: then we will, as we must, leave it to

others to love, love that can grow brighter

and deeper till the very end, gaining strength

and getting more precious all the way. . . .

from - http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/16971

[D. Allan]

Absence makes the heart grow fonder

And now I have an urge to wonder.

But I'll return to you some day

Be good - don't fight too much. OK?

[cricket]

Wonder, if you must; wander if you may.

As the old, dear sweet book says,

"We'll meet again someday."

[D. Allan]

:)

will be back next week, ciao

[D. Allan]

Charles Simic, a writer who juxtaposes dark imagery with ironic humor, is to be named the country’s 15th poet laureate by the Librarian of Congress today.

He was born in Belgrade and came to the U.S. at the age of 16.

He began writing poetry, he says, to impress girls!

The New York Times has an

ARTICLE about him by Motoko Rich.

A stanza from one of his poems:

"A dog trying to write a poem on why he barks,

That’s me, dear reader!

They were about to kick me out of the library

But I warned them,

My master is invisible and all-powerful.

Still, they kept dragging me out by my tail"

[D. Allan]

Two Poems for August

There is a story about a poet who was asked to talk about what his poem meant "in ordinary terms". He replied that if he had been able to express it in ordinary terms, he wouldn't have written the poem. Children are often very open to poetic language, and there are many poems that children enjoy hearing over and over. Poems open imaginations. If your read-aloud times haven't included some poems, you could check the library for some good anthologies for children.

Here are two for you to enjoy:

August

The opposing

of peach and sugar,

and the sun inside the afternoon

like the stone in the fruit.

The ear of corn keeps

its laughter intact, yellow and firm.

August

The children eat

brown bread and delicious moon.

- Federico Garcia Lorca

The next short poem describes perfectly the approach to the natural world that so many children instinctively practice:

Step out onto the Planet

Draw a circle a hundred feet round.

Inside the circle are

100 things nobody understands, and, maybe

nobody's ever really seen.

How many can you find?

- Lew Welch

- Donice Wooster in Family Matters, a blog at www.fcchurch.com

[Dottie]

My two favorite poem books when I was little were "A Child's Garden of Verses" by Rob't L. Stevenson, and a book called "If Jesus Came to Your House."

I like beauty in poetry, not deep thinking (I can't think deep).

[D. Allan]

Welcome to the club, Dottie; I can't think deeply either. Well maybe if I were in a coal mine, or a submarine.

[John317]

I

A Gentle Knight was pricking on the plaine,

Y cladd in mightie armes and siluer shielde,

Wherein old dints of deepe wounds did remaine,

The cruell markes of many a bloody fielde;

Yet armes till that time did he neuer wield:

His angry steede did chide his foming bitt,

As much disdayning to the curbe to yield:

Full iolly knight he seemd, and faire did sitt,

As one for knightly giusts and fierce encounters fitt.

2

But on his brest a bloudie Crosse he bore,

The deare remembrance of his dying Lord,

For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he wore,

And dead as liuing euer him ador'd:

Upon his shield the like was also scor'd,

For soueraine hope, which in his helpe he had:

Right faithfull true he was in deede and word,

But of his cheere he did seeme too solemne sad,

Yet nothing did he dread, but euer was ydrad.

Canto I, The Faerie Queene, Edmund Spenser

[John317]

For Dottie:

The Snail

By Gladys Sims Stump

A snail is such a funny thing.

I saw one just this morning.

He was walking past my house.

Last night it had been storming.

I watched him go along the path.

He had a slow, slow pace.

With a house on his back-- he

Wouldn't be expected to run a race.

A home like a snail, no, no, no.

I wouldn't like it, you see.

The load would be heavy,

But-- worse than that--

No one could live in the house with me.

[D. Allan]

'ydrad' - a nice word. of the same ilk as 'yclept'

Quote:

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Ydrad \Y*drad"\, obs. p. p. of Dread.

Dreaded.

Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad.

--Spenser

The Gentle Knight, at first sight, seems to embody some contradictions. He feared nothing, but rather himself was dreaded (although 'gentle'). He is 'Full jolly' yet 'too solemne sad.'

[John317]

Here is a prose poem I wrote about 1965. Believe it or not it was published in a monthly sheet at the University at Austin, Texas and they paid me one dollar. :-| That was the end of my career as a poet. :-)

CREDO

as necessary

or un-

the soaring bird

silent

tall trees naked or

clothed

streams that are traveling

traveling

or any large rock

which

waits

in the

desert

I think I see some influence of c.c. cummings maybe there.