Favourite Poem?

[Kahnai]

Here is one of mine.

Ballad of Birmingham

By Dudley Randall



Mother dear, may I go downtown

Instead of out to play,

And march the streets of Birmingham

In a Freedom March today?



No, baby, no, you may not go,

For the dogs are fierce and wild,

And clubs and hoses, guns and jails

Aren't good for a little child.



But, mother, I won't be alone.

Other children will go with me,

And march the streets of Birmingham

To make our country free.



No, baby, no, you may not go,

For I fear those guns will fire.

But you may go to church instead

And sing in the children's choir.



She has combed and brushed her night-dark hair,

And bathed rose petal sweet,

And drawn white gloves on her small brown hands,

And white shoes on her feet.



The mother smiled to know that her child

Was in the sacred place,

But that smile was the last smile

To come upon her face.



For when she heard the explosion,

Her eyes grew wet and wild.

She raced through the streets of Birmingham

Calling for her child.



She clawed through bits of glass and brick,

Then lifted out a shoe.

O, here's the shoe my baby wore,

But, baby, where are you?​

 

[Rapunzel]

Charlotte Dymond, an attractive 18 year old domestic servant was found murdered near Roughtor Ford on 14th April 1844. Her colleague and boyfriend, crippled farm-hand Matthew Weeks, was hanged for her murder. Her body had lain undiscovered on Bodmin moor for several days before it was found by a search party. The Ballad of Charlotte Dymond written by Charles Causley explains the story of the whole affair far more eloquently and concisely than I am capable of, so will let the ballad take it from here:



It was a Sunday evening

And in the April rain

That Charlotte went from our house

And never came home again.



Her shawl of diamond redcloth,

She wore a yellow gown,

She carried the green gauze handkerchief

She bought in Bodmin town.



About her throat her necklace

And in her purse her pay:

The four silver shillings

She had at Lady Day.



In her purse four shillings

And in her purse her pride

As she walked out one evening

Her lover at her side.



Out beyond the marshes

Where the cattle stand,

With her crippled lover

Limping at her hand.



Charlotte walked with Matthew

Through the Sunday mist,

Never saw the razor

Waiting at his wrist.



Charlotte she was gentle

But they found her in the flood

Her Sunday beads among the reeds

Beaming with her blood.



Matthew, where is Charlotte,

And wherefore has she flown?

For you walked out together

And now are come alone.



Why do you not answer,

Stand silent as a tree,

Your Sunday worsted stockings

All muddied to the knee?



Why do you mend your breast-pleat

With a rusty needle’s thread

And fall with fears and silent tears

Upon your single bed?



Why do you sit so sadly

Your face the colour of clay

And with a green gauze handkerchief

Wipe the sour sweat away?



Has she gone to Blisland

To seek an easier place,

And is that why your eye won’t dry

And blinds your bleaching face?



Take me home! cried Charlotte,

‘I lie here in the pit!

A red rock rests upon my breasts

And my naked neck is split!’



Her skin was soft as sable,

Her eyes were wide as day,

Her hair was blacker than the bog

That licked her life away;



Her cheeks were made out of honey,

Her throat was made of flame

Where all around the razor

Had written its red name.



As Matthew turned at Plymouth

About the tilting Hoe,

The cold and cunning constable

Up to him did go:



‘I’ve come to take you, Matthew,

Unto the magistrate’s door.

Come quiet now, you pretty poor boy,

And you must know what for.’



‘She is as pure,’ cried Matthew,

‘As is the early dew,

Her only stain it is the pain

That round her neck I drew!



‘She is as guiltless as the day

She sprang forth from her mother.

The only sin upon her skin

Is that she loved another.’



They took him off to Bodmin,

They pulled the prison bell,

They sent him smartly up to heaven

And dropped him down to hell.



All through the granite kingdom

And on its travelling airs

Ask which of these two lovers

The most deserves your prayers.



And your steel heart search, Stranger,

That you may pause and pray

For lovers who come not to bed

Upon their wedding day,



But lie upon the moorland

Where stands the sacred snow

Above the breathing river,

And the salt sea-winds go.

 

[The Dragon Master]

What's your favourite poem?

 

[Kahnai]

http://offtopix.com/topic/10070-favorite-poem-poems/

Mine is there...

 

[The Dragon Master]

Thanks XD



Merged XD

 

[beowulf]

there are holes in the sky where the rain gets in,

they are ever so small thats why rain is thin

 

[beowulf]

by Mike Harding.............most of this will be lost on you non brits lol



AKROYD’S FUNERAL



It was dark as a coal-hole picnic

On the day Grandad Akroyd dropped dead;

Work was scarce as rocking-horse droppings,

Not a church roof for miles had lead.



So cold that the flame on the candle,

Got frozen one Wednesday night,

And we had to warm it up in the oven

Before we could get it to light.



Some brass monkeys outside sung carols soprano,

You could ‘ear ‘em cursin’ and swearin’,

As they wandered ’round lost in the cold and the frost

They couldn’t find their bearings.



On Sunday our chicken for dinner

Was a pigeon from off next door’s loft.

And me Dad pumped it up with his bike pump, too hard

And our Sunday dinner buggered off.



‘What would you like to eat now, Dad?’

Said our Mam, picking her nose,

‘Hard boiled eggs,’ our Dad said,

‘You can’t get your fingers in those.’



We couldn’t afford to kill t’ chicken,

So we boiled some water up hot,

And with bunches of dried peas tied to its knees,

It Paddled about on the top.



Me Grandad had mortgaged his pension

‘Til 1994,

While me Gran in her vest, was outside doing her best,

With a red light above t’coal shed door.



‘I can’t stand’t no more,’ the old man cried,

A mad light shone in his glass eye,

‘We’ll have to defraud the insurance man

Hands up, I want a volunteer to die.’



Mam said she would have, but she were too busy,

Our Albert said his library book was due back,

Gran said she would but her and her mate,

Had got tickets for last Saturday’s match.



So we drew straws to settle the matter,

But there was never no doubt,

‘Cos me Dad cut me Grandad’s in haIf wi’t’ bread-knife,

Just as he was pulling it out.



I’m too old to die,’ he said, using the cat

As a club to belabour me Dad,

‘All right,’ me Dad says, ‘you don’t have to die…

Just lie down and pretend as you are.’



So me Grandad lay down on the hearth-rug,

And we called the doctor in.

Gran took out a bottle and glasses,

And got him smashed on her dandelion gin.



He said me Grandad had died of a very rare disease,

A bad case of tropical frostbite,

Then he staggered off out and we all heard a shout

From the street ‘cos he slipped in some dog shite.



Our Billy ran round for the Man from the Pru,

Gran filled him with dandelion gin,

He paid £4.10 in used chipshop yen

And said, ‘When are you burying him?’



‘Oh, We weren’t thinking of burying him,’ Grandma said,

‘Thinking of having stuffed meself,

Or embalming him in Plasticraft,

And keeping him on’t mantelshelf.’



‘Nay, yon is illegal,’ said Man from Pru.

‘Grandad will have to be buried,

In a box and shroud in constipated ground.’

At this Grandad looked reet worried.



The Man from the Pru’ said he’d come to the burying

And see as how things were done quite right,

Then he staggered off out and we all heard a shout

From the street ‘cos he slipped on that stuff that I told

you about before.



‘I’ve just done that, ‘said the doctor,

So the insuranceman rubbed his nose in it.



So the pretend corpse now had to be buried,

Me Dad got an old kipper crate,

When the holes got plugged and the wood it looked good

With plastic brass handles on – great.



‘We’ll only bury you just till he’s gone,

Then we’ll dig you up, honest,’ Dad said.

It took a bottle of gin before Grandad gave in

And lay int’ box to play dead.



Me Gran looked down at the box saying, ‘What a lovely corpse.’

Tears fell on her dripping and toast,

When the body at rest shoved his hand up her vest, saying

‘Now then, how’s that for a ghost?’



So we put the box on big Mabel’s coal cart

And off to t’cemetery we set,

We followed on bikes and all seemed quite right

Until another burying we met.



A policeman was stood on point duty,

‘Cos there was a fault on the traffic lights,

But he fell to the ground with his arms flaying round

‘Cos’ he slipped on the road on another load of that stuff I was

telling you about before.



‘We just done that,’ said the doctor and the insurance man,

So the policeman rubbed their noses in it.



As he spun on the ground the traffic flew round,

And the two buryings got in a jam,

Their driver took a poke at me Dad wi’ a wrench

And got a kick up the shoemaker’s off me Mam.



When we sorted it out we’d got the wrong box;

Grandma said, ‘Ee, we won’t see no more of him,’

When their driver come round our burying we found

Had gone to the crematorium.



By the time that we got there the service was done,

You could hear the organ play.

As the congregation wept hankies and sniffed,

And our kipper box was on its way.



The shutters were open, we all heard the flames,

And suddenly Grandad gave a yell,

And a coffin with legs and its arse end on fire

Ran out on t’conveyor belt!



O’er the pews and out through the window,

The burning kipper box ran,

And we all cheered the crate as it swam through the lake

Chased by me Dad and me Mam.



‘A blessed miracle,’ said me Gran,

But the Man from the Pru went quite white;

‘Ruined,’ he roared, he would have said more

But he slipped in the road on some more of that stuff I’ve been telling you about.



‘I’ve just done that, ‘said the policeman,

So the insurance man rubbed his nose in it.

 

[Rapunzel]

there are holes in the sky where the rain gets in,

they are ever so small thats why rain is thin

Brilliant! I love this and I love the Mike Harding one.

I haven't heard any Mike Harding jokes in forever. Is he still doing the circuit?



I'm going to go along to Youtube now and see if I can find any Max Boyce.

Oh, these lads from the valleys are funny. Bless 'em.

 

[alestairsimon]

words of mind



through words we express our Formality

although words aren't content with our Reality



with words we show our Emotion

regardless of our confused Devotion



within the words Lies the Truth and the Conclusion

that, Words, are a Real Illusion