The House
In dreams
the same bad dream goes on.
Like some gigantic German toy
the house has been rebuilt
upon its kelly-green lawn.
The same dreadful set,
the same family of orange and pink faces
carved and dressed up like puppets
who wait for their jaws to open and shut.
Nineteen forty-two,
nineteen forty-three,
nineteen forty-four…
it's all the same. We're at war.
They've rationed the gas for all three cars.
The Lincoln Continental breathes in its stall,
a hopped up greyhound waiting to be sprung.
The Irish boy
who dated her
(lace curtain Irish, her mother said)
urges her through the lead-colored garages
to feel the patent-leather fenders
and peek at the mileage.
All that money!
and kisses too.
Kisses that stick in the mouth
like the vinegar candy she used to pull
with her buttery fingers, pull
until it was white like a dog's bone,
white, thick and impossible to chew.
Father,
an exact likeness,
his face bloated and pink
with black market scotch,
sits out his monthly bender
in his custom-made pajamas
and shouts, his tongue as quick as galloping horses,
shouts into the long distance telephone call.
His mouth is as wide as his kiss.
Mother,
with just the right gesture,
kicks her shoes off,
but is made all wrong,
impossibly frumpy as she sits there
in her alabaster dressing room
sorting her diamonds like a bank teller
to see if they add up.
The maid
as thin as a pencil stick,
holds dinner as usual,
rubs her angry knuckles over the porcelain sink
and grumbles at the gun-shy bird dog.
She knows something is going on.
She pricks a baked potato.
The aunt,
older than all the crooked women
in
The Brothers Grimm,
leans by a gooseneck lamp in her second floor suite,
turns up her earphone to eavesdrop
and continues to knit,
her needles working like kitchen shears
and her breasts blown out like two
pincushions.
The houseboy,
a quick-eyed Filipino,
slinks by like a Japanese spy
from French Provincial room
to French Provincial room,
emptying the ash trays and plumping up
the down upholstery.
His jacket shines, old shiny black,
a wise undertaker.
The milkman walks in his cartoon
every other day in the snoozy dawn,
rattling his bottles like a piggy bank.
And gardeners come, six at a time,
pulling petunias and hairy angel bells
up through the mulch.
This one again, made vaguely and cruelly,
one eye green and one eye blue,
has the only major walk-on so far,
has walked from her afternoon date
past the waiting baked potatoes,
past the flashing back of the Japanese spy,
up the cotton batten stairs,
past the clicking and unclicking of the earphones,
turns here at the hall
by the diamonds that she'll never earn
and the bender that she kissed last night
among thick set stars, the floating bed
and the strange white key…
up like a skein of yarn,
up another flight into the penthouse,
to slam the door on all the years
she'll have to live through…
the sailor who she won't with,
the boys who will walk on
from Andover, Exeter and St. Marks,
the boys who will walk off with pale unlined faces,
to slam the door on all the days she'll stay the same
and never ask why and never think who to ask,
to slam the door and rip off her orange blouse.
Father, father, I wish I were dead.
At thirty-five
she'll dream she's dead
or else she'll dream she's back.
All day long the house sits
larger than Russia
gleaming like a cured hide in the sun.
All day long the machine waits: rooms,
stairs, carpets, furniture, people -
those people who stand at the open windows like objects
waiting to topple.
poem by Anne Sexton
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Related quotes
45 Mercy Street
In my dream,
drilling into the marrow
of my entire bone,
my real dream,
I'm walking up and down Beacon Hill
searching for a street sign -
namely MERCY STREET.
Not there.
I try the Back Bay.
Not there.
Not there.
And yet I know the number.
45 Mercy Street.
I know the stained-glass window
of the foyer,
the three flights of the house
with its parquet floors.
I know the furniture and
mother, grandmother, great-grandmother,
the servants.
I know the cupboard of Spode
the boat of ice, solid silver,
where the butter sits in neat squares
like strange giant's teeth
on the big mahogany table.
I know it well.
Not there.
Where did you go?
45 Mercy Street,
with great-grandmother
kneeling in her whale-bone corset
and praying gently but fiercely
to the wash basin,
at five A.M.
at noon
dozing in her wiggy rocker,
grandfather taking a nap in the pantry,
grandmother pushing the bell for the downstairs maid,
and Nana rocking Mother with an oversized flower
on her forehead to cover the curl
of when she was good and when she was...
And where she was begat
and in a generation
the third she will beget,
me,
with the stranger's seed blooming
into the flower called Horrid.
I walk in a yellow dress
and a white pocketbook stuffed with cigarettes,
enough pills, my wallet, my keys,
and being twenty-eight, or is it forty-five?
I walk. I walk.
I hold matches at street signs
for it is dark,
as dark as the leathery dead
and I have lost my green Ford,
my house in the suburbs,
two little kids
sucked up like pollen by the bee in me
and a husband
who has wiped off his eyes
in order not to see my inside out
and I am walking and looking
and this is no dream
just my oily life
where the people are alibis
and the street is unfindable for an
entire lifetime.
Pull the shades down -
I don't care!
Bolt the door, mercy,
erase the number,
rip down the street sign,
what can it matter,
what can it matter to this cheapskate
who wants to own the past
that went out on a dead ship
and left me only with paper?
Not there.
I open my pocketbook,
as women do,
and fish swim back and forth
between the dollars and the lipstick.
I pick them out,
one by one
and throw them at the street signs,
and shoot my pocketbook
into the Charles River.
Next I pull the dream off
and slam into the cement wall
of the clumsy calendar
I live in,
my life,
and its hauled up
notebooks.
poem by Anne Sexton
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Behind Closed Doors.
Miss Bundlestun watches the man
Next door go down the path to his
Car open the door climb in slam the
Door look up at her and give her an
Up you gesture with his middle finger
Then drive off. She lets the curtains
Fall back in place wondering if the
Gesture was for real or just a signal of
The common lot seen too often in the
Streets below even by the young who
Pass her by with gestures of the fingers
Or spew of tongue. He plays jazz on his
Hifi loud not quite to her taste and she
Often bangs on his door and shouts her
Complaints of noise or rowdiness from
Parties held all night. Her mother says
Nothing but sits silent in her dull armchair.
There is a clinging smell of decay in the air.
She denies the factor of her mother’s death.
She sits and talks or reads the news to her
Mother’s corpse dressed in last month’s cloth
And wasting skin. She thinks her mother (as she
Used to be) resides biting her tongue within.
poem by Terry Collett
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Shattered windows, Colors of white
Across the street is a new house with a room painted red, with no holes of white.
Next to me, a house purple, with its color pealing off, with holes of black and white
At the end of the street, an old house once yellow, what now remains white.
The sound of a hammer building a house, entering a place with a color unknown.
On the street,
Windows covered with ice
Some shine with light.
Some broken
Some fixed
Some lost, out of sight.
A house, two blocks from here.
Shines with lights of yellow, red, and green everywhere.
A wall keeping the wind from blowing anywhere.
The house next door, at the dawn of the day.
Paints its room black, and peals the color away.
The wall crumbles.
The wind blows across the colors of yellow, red and green
Breaks all the windows.
Turns the yellow to blue, red to black, and green to white.
The house two blocks away.
Adds a line of yellow red and green everyday.
To allow the house of blue, black and white to shine for us some day.
poem by Linda ErikssonBique
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The Ghost Train
A straw headed woman, and a barrel chested man,
A pocket full of posies with a hat brim full of sand,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
A dog chasing the tumbleweeds, across the sandy floor,
That drift along the platform, through the ticket office door,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
But don't tell me there's nothing coming, you don't fool me,
I hear the ghost train rumbling along the tracks - set them free,
And i hear them,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
The station master's writing with a piece of orange chalk,
A hundred cancellations, still no one wants to walk,
Keep the hungry children from the skeletons in the back,
Paid to keep an eye out for the gipsy caravan,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
I hear the ghost train rumbling along the tracks - set them free,
And i hear them,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white (don't try),
It's black and white (don't try),
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
And i hear them,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide...
song performed by by Madness
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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(Waiting For) The Ghost Train
A straw headed woman, and a barrel chested man,
A pocket full of posies with a hat brim full of sand,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
A dog chasing the tumbleweeds, across the sandy floor,
That drift along the platform, through the ticket office door,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
But don't tell me there's nothing coming, you don't fool me,
I hear the ghost train rumbling along the tracks - set them free,
And I hear them,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
The station master's writing with a piece of orange chalk,
A hundred cancellations, still no one wants to walk,
Keep the hungry children from the skeletons in the back,
Paid to keep an eye out for the gipsy caravan,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
Ooh - waiting for the train that never comes,
I hear the ghost train rumbling along the tracks - set them free,
And I hear them,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white (don't try),
It's black and white (don't try),
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
And I hear them,
It's black and white don't try to hide,
It's black and white don't try to hide
song performed by by Madness
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Seems So Long Ago, Nancy
It seems so long ago,
Nancy was alone,
Looking ate the late late show
Through a semi-precious stone.
In the house of honesty
Her father was on trial,
In the house of mystery
There was no one at all,
There was no one at all.
It seems so long ago,
None of us were strong;
Nancy wore green stockings
And she slept with everyone.
She never said shed wait for us
Although she was alone,
I think she fell in love for us
In nineteen sixty one,
In nineteen sixty one.
It seems so long ago,
Nancy was alone,
A forty five beside her head,
An open telephone.
We told her she was beautiful,
We told her she was free
But none of us would meet her in
The house of mystery,
The house of mystery.
And now you look around you,
See her everywhere,
Many use her body,
Many comb her hair.
In the hollow of the night
When you are cold and numb
You hear her talking freely then,
Shes happy that youve come,
Shes happy that youve come.
song performed by by Leonard Cohen
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Nancy
It seems so long ago,
Nancy was alone,
Looking ate the late late show
Through a semi-precious stone.
In the house of honesty
Her father was on trial,
In the house of mystery
There was no one at all,
There was no one at all.
It seems so long ago,
None of us were strong;
Nancy wore green stockings
And she slept with everyone.
She never said shed wait for us
Although she was alone,
I think she fell in love for us
In nineteen sixty one,
In nineteen sixty one.
It seems so long ago,
Nancy was alone,
A forty five beside her head,
An open telephone.
We told her she was beautiful,
We told her she was free
But none of us would meet her in
The house of mystery,
The house of mystery.
And now you look around you,
See her everywhere,
Many use her body,
Many comb her hair.
In the hollow of the night
When you are cold and numb
You hear her talking freely then,
Shes happy that youve come,
Shes happy that youve come.
song performed by by Leonard Cohen
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Reckoning
My mother was carried to heaven
On the day that I turned six,
She died of tuberculosis
Spitting blood in a coughing fit,
She'd been so ill for a long long time
That I couldn't recall her smile,
My father, he just grumbled, said:
'Your Ma will be gone for a while.'
'She's gone to sing in a choir up there,
Who knows how long she will be? '
But I saw the coffin that carried her out,
The hearse and the burial tree,
I watched as it sank down into the ground
And my father just left it there,
Went off to visit my 'aunt', he said,
A woman with long, blond hair.
I stayed at home, such a lonely child,
And went to a place in my head,
Where mother was fit and without a care
She laughed at the things I said,
My father left me alone a lot
So mother would tell me, 'Shush! '
We'd laugh and giggle when he went out
But talk in a sort of hush.
I played outside at other times
Where the grass grew long and wild,
I'd catch the skinks as they darted past,
I was always a curious child,
I'd bring the Sleepy Lizards home,
My father didn't mind,
He said I could keep the pets I caught,
I thought he was being kind.
But then one day he came on home
With this 'aunt', who moved right in,
He said they were married now, so I
Should call her 'Mum', not Jen.
I scowled, and went to my room to cry,
My mother was looking sad,
She said, 'just do what your father says,
I'm your Mother, but he's your Dad.'
This Jenny, she was all right at first
She tried to make me smile,
But I was feeling rebellious then,
And turned my back for a while,
I kept my rabbits and guinea pigs
And fed them out in their hutch,
But Jenny came out to look at them,
And she didn't like them much.
I knew, she wrinkled her powdered nose
And said, 'Oh pew! They stink!
We'll have to find you a hobby, one
That's pure and clean, I think.'
I heard her talking to father, say
That she thought I was rather slow,
She wanted the garden tidied up
So my animals had to go.
It was just about that time, I think
That my mother said goodbye,
She couldn't stay in that house, she said,
It was time for her to fly,
She left me alone in a great big world
So I brought a Lizard inside,
And put it under my bedclothes
Thought it a perfect place to hide.
When Jenny made the bed, she screamed
And shook me like a rag,
She went and got a kitchen knife
And a plastic shopping bag,
She made me put the Lizard in
Then she took the bag outside,
And stabbed and stabbed 'til the Lizard bled,
'Til my Lizard friend had died.
'Now bury it! ' she said to me,
'And don't you ever dare
Bring filthy animals into this house,
For if you do, I swear...'
At this she put the knife to my throat
And stood and watched me scream,
I saw the hate in her powdered face
It was like an awful dream!
Whenever my father left the house
She'd always scream and shout,
Knock me around for the slightest thing
Then drag me, throw me out,
Lock the door so I couldn't get in
And give me nothing to eat,
She said if I told my Dad on her
It would only get me beat.
She killed my rabbits, cooked them up
And served them from a pot,
She gave me a crooked, evil grin:
'You'd better eat the lot! '
I found myself in a black, black rage
Inside, at the things she'd done,
And hoped that my father would go on out
And buy himself a gun.
He never knew what she did to me,
I never would dare to say,
I knew that she'd get me on my own
And then there'd be hell to pay,
So I stayed outside in the barren fields
And found me a hessian sack,
Then went for a hunt with a long, forked stick,
It was time to get her back!
I waited until he'd gone away,
Was gone two days or more,
Then bit my tongue as she raved at me,
Spat hate from the kitchen door,
The morning came, and there wasn't a sound
To come from that angry head,
And I will never regret the day
I put a snake in her bed.
10 March 2009
poem by David Lewis Paget
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Strand
I saw my father’s face last week,
across the gulf of time..
I chanced upon a photograph
That you had left behind.
His hair shock white, his shoulders large
from years of heavy toil,
His eyes pale blue, his hands were rough
from working with the soil.
I thought I saw his face again
Across a crowded room
It must have been a trick of light-
a product of my gloom.
I saw my father’s face last night-
within a vivid dream.
We walked familiar streets of home
in forty year old scenes.
Long vanished homes and people
paraded through my head.
I did not choose to break the mood
or remind him he was dead.
I took my father’s hand last night
We walked a moon lit shore.
The beach’s sand was coarse and black
the surf a subdued roar.
The land behind was all I know,
But the Ocean beckoned me
So together, hand in hand,
We stepped into the sea.
*** *** *** ***
*• a poetic term for a shore (as the area periodically covered and uncovered by the tides)
poem by John F. McCullagh
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Old Jimmy
With the aid of walking stick he shuffles down the side street and time has left him looking stiff and gray
And truly it can be said of old Jimmy that he is one who has known a better day
Ageless father time takes care of everybody there was a time when he could run quite fast
But now he only can walk at a slow pace and all of his better days are in the past.
He was a football hero in his heyday the best on ground in nineteen forty one
The day that his club played in the Grand Final without him the Premiership could not be won
Close to his prime and in his early twenties on looking back that seems so long ago
It's true that time leaves it's mark on everybody the man who once ran fast now walking slow.
The hard games of football he played in now on him telling he has arthritis in his painful right knee
An injury that forced him into retirement when he was past his prime at thirty three
Back in the forties and fifties he was a football hero but football heroes like the seasons come and go
And that he once was a Grand Final hero is something few young people wish to know.
Old Jimmy slowly shuffles down the side walk a mere shell of the man he used to be
In forty one he starred in the Grand Final when he was near his prime at twenty three
And father time has left his mark on Jimmy and time 'tis said for anyone doesn't wait
And the grim reaper will take the king and pauper and the grim reaper will take the football great.
poem by Francis Duggan
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The Abandoned House And The Man Who Drags His Shoes To Make The Necessary Sound
when you arrive in the house
(the house that both of you built 17 years ago)
no one is there
not even the three white dogs
you have accepted this face of loneliness
without a mouth
it is its nature now
gentle in silence
there is nothing to talk about with someone else
when someone else is far away and seemingly taking all the hearts out
the door and the hinges have to keep things for themselves
for in truth, those who left the stairs
they still love
you have the key to the door of the kitchen
and that is where you start the journey towards the living room
you scurry on some little memories
it is like putting some words in your notes
in here and there beyond the margins
but it is not that endless really
for whatever it be
joy or death there's got to be an end
that is the truth of the meaning of
this word
it could be a dead-end
a street of walls
& then actually you are caught
in flagrante
where your only choice
is to go back,
retrace,
remember,
refresh
refrains, refrains
of a
love song
you go back to the room look longingly at the bed
the blankets are dusty and the pillows are stained with so much emptiness
or guilt
scruples
Freudian analysis
Carl Jung's other possibilities
of reconciliation
this is a very soundless world and
every part here is keeping its mouth shut
their layers of concealment are thick
and their canopies of
self-defenses are hard
you feel like this is one kind of a giant shell
and you are inside it
its flesh
all blistering
flesh
you decide to wear your shoes all throughout this scrutiny
this journey into marriage
into childlessness
into what if's
you drag your feet with your shoes on
as though someone is suffering and wanting to die
and you hold the collar
and you hurt the backbone
and in that open window
you imagine that someone may finally
jump like a scared cat
nine lives
thirty-six softest feet
you purposely make a sound with your shoes
tapping and tapping
and tapping
to create those sounds
of the past dances
just to fill an empty room
some thoughts jump out of the window
dressed in euphemisms
as the ceiling creates its own crankiness
its cloudiness
nine cats in you jump out that window
falling softly on the grass below
all thirty-six
dreams
it is nice to see of course
nine unharmed cats like fluffy cotton blown by the wind and gently
softly land on the grass
it is no wonder
why men sometimes invoke the sound of their whistling
indeed it is by this time
very relaxing
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Bad Boys
Woo-woo
Dear mummy, dear daddy,
You had plans forme, I was your only son.
And long before this baby boy could count to three,
You knew just what he would become.
Run along to school,
No child of mine grows up a fool,
Run along to school.
When you tried to tell me what to do,
I just shut my mouth and smiled at you,
One thing that I know for sure-
Bad boys
Stick together, never sad boys
Good guys
They made rules for fools, so get wise...
Dear mummy, dear daddy,
Now Im nineteen as you see,
Im handsome, tall, and strong.
So what the hell gives you the right to look at me,
As if to say hell, what went wrong?
Where were you last night?
You look as if you had a fight.
Where were you last night?
Well I think that you may just be right,
But dont try to keep me in tonight,
Because Im big enough to break down the door.
Bad boys
Stick together, never sad boys
Good guys
They made rules for fools, so get wise...
Boys like you, are bad through and through.
Still, girls like me, always seem to be with you....
We cant help but worry,
Youre in such a hurry,
Mixing with the wrong boys,
Playing with the wrong toys.
Easy girls,
And late nights,
Cigarettes, and love bites
Why do you have to be so cruel?
Youre such a fool
Bad boys
Stick together, never sad boys
Good guys
They made rules for fools, so get wise...
song performed by by George Michael
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Stage Three
no one enters the house using the door.
The doors close without the use of hinges and locks.
The living room is turned upside down.
The traces of my steps are a myriad labyrinths of
puzzles, cross, crescent, moon, sun, stars, and
dead leaves just below the body of a rotting log.
Log on. Say some more. This is freedom.
The railings are roses. The stairs are rivers.
The walls are faces of the one you make love.
The roofs are ideas. Theories live there and metaphors
Abound in the living room.There is an old piano and you
Begin to play: Vienna woods. You dance the waltz with her.
Whispers mossy on the carpets. The toilet is kept empty
And shiny white tiles, glossy to the feel of your fingers.
The bedroom is bare. You too complete the picture.
An hour of sex. Gracious! This house is the most beautiful
House of our neighborhood.
It is not our home yet. Tomorrow we unpack.
The distance is our journey. And it is somewhere else
With someone you still love. It is not I.
I am just a picture: black and white, and dusty.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Red And Orange
Ther's a red house,
Inside there's an orange door.
Beside that there's a red carpet,
On top of an orange floor.
There's a red table,
Below an orange ceiling.
Upstairs there's a red bed,
Inside an orange room.
There's a couple of red people sleeping soundly,
Next door two orange ones too.
Outside there's a red truck,
No one knows what to do.
I don't see the proble,
Why don't you leave us all alone.
But now I see the red more clearly,
And I know what's done is done.
And I'll float away with the cloudy smoke,
Before the inevertable happens and I start to choke.
Good bye red house,
So long orange door.
I'm going for a long sleep noe,
Six feet under the floor.
Gala
Gala hangs from the window frame
Dressed in black and white
Her face is colourless
In the moonlight
She turns around and her lips move
But the words just drop away
She leans on the back of a chair
And her arms begin to sway
She and I can hear voices
Talking in the room next door
Saying things we used to say
That we cant believe in any more
Weve seen too many castles crumble
Made too many innocent mistakes
Who could have known that one house
Could hold so much heartbreak?
And then the clockbell rings
The wind blows in -
Gala makes for the door.
Her eyes blaze
And her hands are shaking
She opens her mouth and roars!
Gala doesnt want, gala doesnt need
She claws at her face
With her nails till it bleeds
She runs down the stairs
In her poor bare-feet
Shes too woman to cry or go down on her knees
Then her mother is there
And her voice is soft
She pulls gala close
She soothes galas cuts
And gently chides
And gala knows...
That gala shouldnt worry
She neednt be afraid
Because there are sailors on the sea tonight
In ships that God made
Look! they cast out the line
With a heave two-three-four
And they sing as they pull
Our lost souls aboard
song performed by by Waterboys
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Gala
Gala hangs from the window frame
Dressed in black and white
Her face is colourless
In the moonlight
She turns around and her lips move
But the words just drop away
She leans on the back of a chair
And her arms begin to sway
She and I can hear voices
Talking in the room next door
Saying things we used to say
That we cant believe in any more
Weve seen too many castles crumble
Made too many innocent mistakes
Who could have known that one house
Could hold so much heartbreak?
And then the clockbell rings
The wind blows in -
Gala makes for the door.
Her eyes blaze
And her hands are shaking
She opens her mouth and roars!
Gala doesnt want, gala doesnt need
She claws at her face
With her nails till it bleeds
She runs down the stairs
In her poor bare-feet
Shes too woman to cry or go down on her knees
Then her mother is there
And her voice is soft
She pulls gala close
She soothes galas cuts
And gently chides
And gala knows...
That gala shouldnt worry
She neednt be afraid
Because there are sailors on the sea tonight
In ships that God made
Look! they cast out the line
With a heave two-three-four
And they sing as they pull
Our lost souls aboard
song performed by by Waterboys
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Hailstone Food
My father loved the rain
Rain with hailstones
Twenty years gone past
When green and blue
Was all I knew
No red of blood
Nor ‘supreme’ of white
Nor ‘beauty’ of black
Just green and blue and love
It rained with hailstones
White stones from heaven
My father knelt down
On wet September grass
His head to the sky
Few stones in his hands
My father said
‘‘Thank you Lord for hailstone food! ”
I recall less of other days
When it didn’t rain
Perhaps such days were spent
Patiently waiting to say
“Thank you Lord for hailstone food! ”
Twenty years long wait
Four hearts waiting, breaking
My father waiting, breaking
Waiting! ?
But every body waited for him
I think my father never knew
About the power within him
To make the rain fall
Down once again
And hailstones to scatter
His September lawn
I know now
He was a patient man
Yesterday I dug a hole
And I closed a chapter
With all my childhood’s tears
I put my father in the ground
Funny this:
As the body went down
The clouds began collecting
As the sand filled the hole
The rain began to fall
And as we left the site
White stones scattered the land
poem by LLM Mbatha
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Walk Into This Room
Dont let em get to your heart
Dont lose your diamonds swimmin in a lake when its (? ? )
The whole wide world feels like a shrine built to the worker bees
Who stole it from God anyhow
Lay it down child
Lay it down child
And walk into this room
Dont let em get to your spark
That little light in the back of everything that says this
Isnt for madder love
The whole wide world feels like a clan of mad scientists removing the juice
So they can freeze-dry you and put you in a box
Lay it down child
Lay it down child
And walk into this room all made with love for you
Lay it down child
You can
You can
Lay it down child
And walk into this room
A hundred candles to make the walls come alive
A little frank insence to sweeten the air just right
Now take my hand
And open the door
And open the door
Yeah, oh...
Yeah, oh...
Lay it down child
You can
You can
Lay it down child
And walk into this room
Walk into this room
Lay it down child
Just lay it down, lay it down
Lay it down
Lay it down, lay it down
Into this room
song performed by by Live
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Ogre Slam-The-Door
There is a certain castle that is beautiful and fair,
And plants, and birds, and pretty things, fill every room and hall,
But alas! for the unhappy folks who make their dwelling there,
A dreadful ogre haunts the house and tries to kill them all.
Some day I fear will find them dead and stretched out in their gore
The victims of this ogre grim, this wicked Slam-the-door!
He's a very tiny ogre just about as tall as you!
He never carries hidden arms, or plays with guns and knives.
And yet he almost splits the heads of people thro' and thro.'
And I think him very dangerous to comfort and to lives.
And he often shakes the castle from the ceiling to the floor.
This awful, awful ogre known as little Slam-the-door.
He gets up bright and early, and he's, oh, so wide awake!
And wo! to all the sleepy heads and invalids who doze,
They dream the sky is caving in, or that a vast earthquake
Has suddenly convulsed the world and ended their repose,
As to and fro, and up and down, still noisier than before,
They hear the hurrying, flurrying feet of ogre Slam-the-door.
Though the Princess of the Castle has a headache, and is ill,
Though the Prince is in his study and wants quiet for an hour,
This wicked little ogre won't be quiet-or keep still
I almost think he sometimes knows he has them in his power.
Alas, alas for all the folks, their sorrows I deplore-
The folks shut in that castle with the ogre Slam-the-door.
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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A bottle of wolf’s poison
At dusk little Martha walks
pass the back of the old house
that is build of heaped blue Jacob stone
and her older sister who has to watch her
is a distance away in the orchard
where she is catching small gnats
with shouts of joy.
The sun glows orange red
on the horizon and the rays hits
a brown bottle that protrudes
from one of the cracks of the Jacob rocks
and at a distance
it looks to three-year-old Martha
like her mother’s kitchen knife
and quickly she walks closer
on her little feet
and she tries to take it, but it is stuck tight.
With a long stick
she digs the bottle out,
bites it open with her small teeth
and there’s pink liquid
that flows down her throat.
Still she wonders
what this bottle is doing here
and goes round the corner
into the kitchen
where she finds her mother
and gives the bottle to her.
Her mother turns white from fright
as it is wolf’s poison
and deadly strong
and her shout is so loud
that three of Martha’s older brothers
run in from the outside.
“Go and milk one of the cows
and bring some more milk, hurry”
is said to Pieter
and she takes a bucket of milk
from the pantry
and pour some in a glass for Martha to drink
while Pieter runs
as fast as he can to the stable.
“Drink sis drink, ” Martha is begged
and glass after glass is given to her
until she starts to vomit
and still they beg her to drink
while they pour some more glasses of milk
and the pink poison
comes out with the vomit
and Pieter brings some more
fresh hot milk
and pours the jug out
and Martha shakes and cries
and they beg her to drink
and still more is poured into glasses
and she drinks
until she vomits the entire poison out.
[Reference: Wolf’s poison is strychnine.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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