0012 The House of Metaphor
After you’ve negotiated that artfully-conceived
sharp elbow bend in the long, grand drive
through the fields of its estate,
and it hoves into view,
you always gasp – this palace
- no, more like a temple with living quarters –
set deep in the countryside, yet as sure
as one in Athens or in Rome;
yet that too is artfully contrived -
the slight mound it’s built on,
the cunning proportion that magnifies,
disguises, with its public face
the aptness of a family home;
its public rooms so grand, just echoing enough
to magnify a public speech; its family rooms
smallish, cosy; love and friendliness
live here. It says to the world,
stability; tradition re-affirmed; yet
this is our familiar family home.
It has its rooms, as rooms should be,
devoted to each family pursuit:
here’s the grand library
but here, with books so evidently, lovingly well read;
you almost missed the little girl, her hair and knees
curled round a book, deep in that leather green armchair;
the study, where your breathing seems to change,
there’s such a still and living silence here;
the nursery that emanates a lifetime’s care;
the children’s bedrooms set around it,
through which you ran and laughed and ran again; the window seats
from which you looked so wistfully
as childhood’s assurance faded into teenage questioning;
a house to leave,
a house to come back to;
a metaphor
as living, haunting, as the poetry it is.
poem by Michael Shepherd
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Related quotes
Why Can't Family Be Family Again
why can't family be family again
we used to always be friends
we used to huddle together
whenever we got scared
we felt the warmth in one anothers arms
because we knew the love was there
we used to build forts out of whatever we had in our rooms
and wage sars
throwing pillows, books, and brooms
we used to have mini mosh pits
with just the four of us
we headbanged and pushed
we screamed and pretended to cuss
we used to protect eachother
we used to defend one another
we used to stand together like brothers and sister
when mom punished us we would all resist her
we used to be a family
a family that would always care
we used to be a family with more happiness than despair
we used to be a family that never hogged food or air
we used to be a family that told eachother we were there
we used to be a family
a family that sat down toghether and ate
we used to be a family full of our own ideas that we create
we used to be a family that got along without debate
we used to be a family with more love than hate
so why can't family be family again
and remember why those times were so good
why can't family be family again
and treat eachother the way we should
why can't family be family again
and throw the hate away
why can't family be family again
and invite the love to stay
poem by Marco Jimenez
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Why Can't We Be A Family
why can't family be family again
we used to always be friends
we used to huddle together
whenever we got scared
we felt the warmth in one anothers arms
because we knew the love was there
we used to build forts out of whatever we had in our rooms
and wage sars
throwing pillows, books, and brooms
we used to have mini mosh pits
with just the four of us
we headbanged and pushed
we screamed and pretended to cuss
we used to protect eachother
we used to defend one another
we used to stand together like brothers and sister
when mom punished us we would all resist her
we used to be a family
a family that would always care
we used to be a family with more happiness than despair
we used to be a family that never hogged food or air
we used to be a family that told eachother we were there
we used to be a family
a family that sat down toghether and ate
we used to be a family full of our own ideas that we create
we used to be a family that got along without debate
we used to be a family with more love than hate
so why can't family be family again
and remember why those times were so good
why can't family be family again
and treat eachother the way we should
why can't family be family again
and throw the hate away
why can't family be family again
and invite the love to stay
poem by Ricky Baker
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Family Homes
everybody's mother is beautiful and brave
but my mother was little bit different
And was at the top of them
she was the bravest...the most beautiful..and the cleverest
we lived in a house
a very very ancient an and old house
ı ts plaster worn out and falling down
once a big and beautiful of our nomad ancestors
the camels of the long caravans used to rest in its garden
now the rooms of the house is rented to families in poverty
the kitchen...and laundry and washing were common for all
there was a in wall cupboard for bath in every room
in one of this rooms upstairs we lived
my mother..my brother and me
hiring it
they called these rooms faqmiliy homes
in turkish
in our homeland in turkey
in one of these rooms
lived shoe maker...rather a cobbler
with his son..daughter and wife
they were our beloved neighbours
he own the the room from his ancestors
the cobbler loved hunting
and had a peculı ar political opinion of his own
at downstairs
ther was a workman
came from his village
a very poor family indeed
wherever he found he worked
if he could
my mother used to help the family
she was found of this very very
one day ı heard the family went to germany
for food and living
my brother and me
were attending to a boarding school in istanbul
we used to come to our family home
in summer vacations
we were very happy in yhose days
with our room neighbours
my brother me and my mother
but theese poor happy did not last long
we grew up
my brother an archaeology professor
me a district governor
but we have never forgotten
those family houses
and the friendship and solı darı ty in them
we remember
those family houses from time to time
they are demolished now
high buildings are erected in their places
and my mother gone heaven in 14th dec ember 1994
her grave near a cross road waiting
ı always pray for her
ı feel she is always near me..guarding me
she was the bravest...most beauı tiful and the cleverest
ı have ever seen
life is not an easy plaything
poem by Metin Sahin
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
How I Fell
i fell so down
i want to be lied down in the ground
besides the ones i lost year round
i fell like a dog who just got put down
i need a girl to fell my pain
i fell if i had one it would ease my pain
i hate living in a foster home
why can't i live with a family member at home
i want to cry when i have to sleep in a stangers house
i fell so lettle just like a mouse
every day i have to fight to stay free
every day i have to be strong not to weep
i miss not hanging with my family
i got to see them more when i was locked down
i fell so bad right about now
every day that i live alone
i fell so bad
sir loc homes couldn't solve why i fell alone
i miss you guys i mean my family
i can't go on like every thing is dandy
i want to leave this cold cold world
maybe i won't when ii find that special girl
i can't wait to leave this world
please god answer me why didi it have to be me
my sisters went home i got put in a strangers home
i got tooken away from who ever i thought loved me
now they come around wanting to hug me
i can't stand living away from my family
please god help me
i fell so sad, bad and mad
poem by Phillip Dalsing
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Living House
I saw you in a house of rooms,
It must be saving the bed of contentment,
Feeding the living of people,
Creating contentment as you speak.
My love is fastened to the door
And the window is collapsing.
My violent pages work for the more,
Rooms are rooms meaningful.
The saviour is brought to the houses
And he saves us from slaughter.
I come to you in the middle of town,
As far as the eye keeps, like one hard.
The contentment is just about.
poem by Naveed Akram
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Shared Loneliness
A house is empty if you're alone.
Its rooms are too quiet for it's known
loneliness too, just like you.
It echoes with hollowness
and creaks with despair
for the lone figure it houses
has no one to share
its rooms.
It hears the steps of the solitary one.
It hears the sighs that weigh like a ton
on its floors and walls
where the sadness crawls.
It longs to be filled
with conversational tones
filling up its rooms.
The bedroom is lonely
and the living room too.
The kitchen has a setting for one
and only one cup of coffee to brew.
These rooms can house all of the pain
that lonesomeness brings and still remain
loyal to the one who's alone.
poem by Edwina Reizer
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Immigrant Man
Years pasted by us quick
Lost counting endless days and nights
The family I haven’t seen for years
Because Immigrant to another country
Challenging to survived work and living
No time to think no time to miss the family
Never thought of how much the family missed I
Forgive me I have not been home
For such a long time
But my heart has never left the family
And I have never taken my root away
I missed my country. I missed mostly my family
The family loving caring brought me up
Endlessly guide help and supports
Priceless ticket hearted joy going home
To see my beloved family
Which I haven’t seen for years
To celebrate with the family
This Chinese New Year 2008
Prosperity, Happy living healthy and peace
Miss the happiness time FOUR generations living together
In one house warmest loving and caring
The noise the cries none silences day or night
LOVE and HAPPILY in the heart
Love my root. Love my family
Loving from the bottom of our heart
Prosperity-Happy Chinese New Year
Arrived home 31/01/2008
Celebration Chinese New Year 07/02/2008
By Lee See Fee
poem by See Fee Lee
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Bones!
I well remember Sir Gordon Fitch
As much for his wealth as his plain language,
A spade was a 'bloody shovel' to him,
In truth, he was an arrogant man.
The Seventh Earl in a Stately Home,
But ruined then, half falling down
Though what remained was a grand old pile
It sat in the woods by Barkly Stile.
Three living rooms and a massive hall,
And fifteen rooms if I do recall,
The house had seventeen chimneys there
Soot-caked and brooding, beyond repair.
Three of the fires were boarded in,
The rooms so cold with the house snowed in,
We shivered and sat with our coats still on,
Scarves and gloves in the morning room.
When questioned, Gordon would shrug and say,
'Don't know, old man, it was just that way!
My Gramps did anything he saw fit,
A hundred years since that fire was lit.'
'My father told me to leave it there
The chimney smoked, and it choked the air,
There was no heat from the fire when lit -
You'll just have to make the best of it! '
My bedroom, too, like an old ice chest,
I couldn't sleep, I could get no rest,
I made my way to the library
Where a fire burned, and the books were free.
Old manuscripts ran along one wall,
Family papers, brittle and old,
Some volumes of ancient erotica
Under the name 'Biologica'.
Early prints of Victorian Dames
With not a stitch, and of course, no names,
I spent too long in there, I'll avow,
Comparing the women of then, with now.
I soon got restless and turned to walls
Of papers dealing with Barkly Hall,
Dry old screeds of entail and law
Way back to the old Crimean War.
One such cutting that caught my eye
Had told of the village of Barkly Stile,
A lad, just seven, had slipped away,
The villagers searched for him, night and day.
They searched the woods, they scoured the wold,
The ancient bell in the steeple tolled,
They set the hounds in the fields round there
But nothing was seen of Benjamin Clare.
Benjamin Clare had been and gone
Like a rainbow after a summer storm,
His mother did nothing at all but weep,
His father, he was the chimney sweep.
They left the village of Barkly Stile,
Came up in the world, so ran the tale,
They bought a house that was grand, complete,
A little bit rich for a chimney sweep.
I mulled on it, went back to my room,
Shivered and shook in the marble tomb,
Took the poker and found release
By prising the boards from the mantelpiece.
They fell away, piled up on the floor,
I walked to the passage and locked the door
Then peered on up through the chimney space
But all was dark in that soot-caked place.
I found in a cupboard a curtain rod
Which I poked up there, and began to prod,
When down with a rattle and caked with soot
There clattered the bones of a tiny foot.
And then some movement began up there
As weight was shifted, a tuft of hair,
Some ragged pants and a dirty shirt
And bones crashed down in the dust and dirt.
The skull fell out on the parquetry,
And lay there, looking on up at me,
My breath came out like a mist in there,
I'd solved the puzzle of Benjamin Clare!
He seemed to be grinning all over his face
Finally free from that dreadful place,
He'd long been stuck in that foetid air
Since the day that his father sent him there.
They'd paid him off, that I could see,
A house for his silence - Infamy!
Lord Gordon wasn't amused at all,
'The peasants will love it in Barkly Stile! '
'Why did you have to interfere?
You should have just left the blighter there,
He couldn't get out when it mattered most
And you can't light a fire, under a ghost! '
Two more bodies were found, at least
In the downstairs fireplace chimney-piece,
Another was buried just under the stair,
Suffocated, like Benjamin Clare.
I'm never invited to Stately Homes
Since the word passed round that I'd found old bones,
Their secrets are safe in the family plots
If I'm kept from their soot-caked chimneypots.
16 January 2009
poem by David Lewis Paget
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
And I Lounged and Lay on Their Beds
When I went to that house of pleasure
I didn't stay in the front rooms where they celebrate,
with some decorum, the accepted modes of love.
I went into the secret rooms
and lounged and lay on their beds.
I went into the secret rooms
considered shameful even to name.
But not shameful to me -because if they were,
what kind of poet, what kind of artist would I be?
I'd rather be an ascetic. That would be more in keeping,
much more in keeping with my poetry,
than for me to find pleasure in the commonplace rooms.
poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
It Runs In The Family!
The uncle is a barfly and he's
Locked up in jail for jay walking on a
Holy Sunday morning to the nineteenth hole
It runs in the blood of this alcohol ravaged
Family and the father is dying of the liver
Cirrhosis but he's adamant that he won't
Give up his love of the bottle and he has fled
From the hospital to drink himself to death
It has brought shame and untold suffering
To this family but the mother is an alcoholic
Par excellence and she will drink until she
Can no longer stand and she urinates on herself
She is gang raped by the drunkards the baby in
Her arms is in danger of suffocating in the
Vomit of the soused mother from hell
It runs in the family!
The daughter is an exhibitonist who likes
To expose what her grand mama gave her in public
The girl is a public nuisance and she has grabbed
The headlines of the rumor mill for a glass of beer
It runs in the family!
And the son has been hauled off to
The mental institution and this soused drunk family
Do you think they care?
Do you run a rehabilitation program that will
Save the alcoholics them from themselves?
poem by Ngaka Motaung
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Obon
Deceased spirits
Family’s ancestors
Vital part
Family life
Family tradition
How far dispersed
To gather at
Family home
The reunion
Affectionate moments
To spend with
Living family members
To honor memory
Of family who have passed on
To spend time
To spruce up graves
To guide the souls
Of the ancestors
Lantern are lit
In front of family homes
With fruits
And assorted foods
Set on a Buddhist altar
They are welcomed home
Upon rivers and streams
Touching and poetic launch
Of illuminated lanterns
To guide spirits back
poem by Ahmad Shiddiqi
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
A Home is a Family is Love
Coming home after a long leave
Is always comforting.
It’s funny how a home is a home,
And not just a house or building.
A home is where a family resides.
Without a family there is no love,
And without love a home doesn’t exist.
A home, love, and family coexist
And without one the others don’t.
Is that why so many are lost,
Because they don’t have a home
Or family or for that matter love.
They look hopelessly for these,
But really never find them.
Home is where the heart is,
Love comes from the heart,
And families share that love.
I’m sorrowful for the lost among,
Because my three are wonderful.
Is it that some are not as blessed,
Or is it they just don’t look?
poem by Britney Hogue
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Tv Show
I walk around in the market, late at night
I walk around in the empty aisles
And I dont know why
I need to be, close to the light
So I walk around in the middle of the night
I drive around in the neighbourhood
I want to lose my house
I drive around on the freeway,
I guess I want to lose myself
Turn the key, turn the dial
Listen to the radio and just drive for a while
Yeah, I got no place to go
I wish I could come home
To a life that looks like a tv show
Wish I could see my television family waiting for me
Where no one fights, no one screams
No one lies, and no one leaves
I dont care how the story ends
I want to feel like Im living again
I drive away from the city
Need to see the sky
Drive away from the bad things
That made me close my eyes
Leave it all, in the past
Drive away going nowhere fast
Yeah, I got no where to go
I wish I could go home
To a life that looks like a tv show
Wish I could see my television family waiting for me
Where no one fights, no one screams
No one lies, and no one leaves
I dont care how the story ends
I want to feel like I use to feel
I want to feel like Im living again
Whoa, Im living again
Whoa, Im living again
Whoa, breathing out and breathing in
Whoa, Im living again
Walking away from the circle
Need to find myself
I think I need to start over
Need to start making sense
Breathe out, breathe in
I wish I could start all over again
I wish I could do it all over again
I wish I could come home
To a life like the one that I use to know
I wish I could some day see everything back the way it use to be
Where no one cries, no one screams
No one hits you, and no one leaves
Everybody knows how the story ends
All the bad guys lose and the good guys win
I wish I could do it all over again
Ooh, I want to feel some day I can really start living again
Whoa, Im living again
Whoa, Im living again
Whoa, Im living again
Whoa, Im living again
song performed by by Everclear
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
House Of Many Rooms
The sound of the clock ticking
How this old house creeps
Another storm tonight approaches
So restless I can't sleep
Dark filled big long rooms
Portrait of a lady in view
Corridor that never seems to end
From a distance I thought I seen you
House Of Many Rooms
The sound of heavy rain falling
Feelings sourround of another place
An oval mirror hangs on the wall
And there I thought I seen your face
The smell of wild flowers
A gentle breeze blows from outside
Heavy laced dark curtains
A vision of you before my eyes
House Of Many Rooms
poem by Suelynn Walters
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
My family(concept of art)
My family my tree
Deep rooted in my heritage
My family my tree
Who I'm the fruit of her
My family fair sky
Where my sun always shine
My family there are my roots
Where I got MIne and me
My family is my word
My family is my blood
My family is my fine touch
My family
is big heart
Who love with no hurt
My family is my love
for that love I love
And I hate
What I hate so
My family is my moral code
MY culture
And my bank acount
Never been out of cash
My family is my fortess
And my fortune
My family is not
fall out of fishion
My family face
is always fancy
My family is what
You never know
me with out
MY color
My conscious
And my concept of art
poem by Sallam Yassin
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Not So Perfect Family
The perfect family
Or so it seems
All the children
Shining like beams
They are smart, athletic
Witty and fun
Loved by all
Hated by none
The dads a teacher
The mom runs the store
They volunteer in the community
Always helping the poor
Their accomplishments
Shine in public light
Nothing they do wrong
Everything right
This is the model
Many inspire to be
Although this family isn’t perfect
That they’ll never see
How do I know
You may not have guessed
Im part of that family
And let me tell you
We’re no better than the rest
Dads never home
He only has time for his friends
Time with the family
He has yet to spend
Not the marriage she wanted
She’s always sad
Mom’s always invisible
To my dad
Except for the times
When he comes home late at night
The smallest thing in the world
Can cause the biggest fight
Three younger sibling
Two always cry
Have to be strong for them
In the face of loves lie
Why be together
When distant at heart
For all these years
They should have been apart
But that they wont do
For the youngest three
Who still live at home
Life unimaginable, it would be
So my parents pretend, everythings okay
Although trapped together forever
To give us the lives we live
Feelings of true love, for them felt never
The perfect family
Not quite what it seems
This thought to us children
Nothing more then a dream
poem by Brianna Trombley
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Family I love
love my family with my hold heart.
My love is Joy to love my family
Family is sad and happy and love.
Family is fun and painful and pretty.
My family is like all families we have
love and we have happiness and tears
I love my hold family
My family is like angels who fly in sky
I am grateful that I have family that loves
me.
My family are kind and nice and fun to be
around
My family is painful like all familys are and
heart breaking and Evil sometimes
My family is heart breaking and deadly like
everyone else
Hey I can't stop loving my family not matter what
it coats in the family.
Way my family is just makes me want have family
with someone be as good as they are.
But God know I love my family
and our love is great to have in life
and even know they leave he world they still
a live in my hearts.
poem by Kristina Riggs
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
NEGRENSE HOUSE, Silay
it is retold that in this house
live the ghosts
whose bodies of women and
children
of a religious family
were huddled
sometime in the
1800 mercilessly killed
by cruel monsters
inside the basement
the white bearded man
who sits on one of those antique
chairs
says that cries can still be heard
from those
12 empty rooms
the place is
a historic landmark now
where this old house stands still
unwavering to the
passage of time
unlike those which were
buried a long time ago
by limbo
and cannot be remembered
you cannot feel dust here
as one looks at the world from this window
one can feel
eternity at the fingertip
the words pass by
as i stand still trying to listen to the faint
cry of the
wind from the sugar fields
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
This House Is Empty Now (feat. Burt Bacharach)
These rooms play tricks upon you
Remember when they were always filled with laughter?
But now they're quite deserted
They seem to just echo voices raised in anger
Maybe you will see my face
Reflected there on the pane
In the window of our poor
Forlorn and broken home
Still this house is empty now
There's nothing I can do
To make you want to stay
So tell me how
Am I supposed to live without you?
These walls were lined with pictures
Remember the glass we charged in celebration?
But now I fill my life up
With all that I can to deaden this sensation
Do you recognize the face
Fixed in that fine silver frame
Were you really so unhappy then?
You never said
So this house is empty now
There's nothing I can do
To make you want to stay
So tell me how
Am I supposed to live without you?
Oh, if I could just become forgetful
When night seems endless
Does the extinguished candle care
About the darkness?
It's funny how my memry
Will bring you so close then make you disappear
Meanwhile all our friends must choose
Who they will favour, who they will lose
Hang the garland high or close the door
And throw away the key
This house is empty now
There's no one living here
You have to care about
This house is empty now
There's nothing I can do
To make you want to stay
So tell me how
Am I supposed to live without you?
This house is empty now
There's no one living here
You have to care about
This house is empty now
There's nothing I can do
To make you want to stay
So tell me how
Am I supposed to live without you
song performed by by Elvis Costello
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Family talk
The world is our home
The cosmos is our family
We should keep the secret
Within the family.
Here is our family
There is love there is hate
There is lust there is vengeance
There is jealousy there is greed
There is loyalty there is betrayal.
We are all here in the family
In this family no body is
Taking birth nobody is dying
And all are constant and eternal.
The world is our home
Our family and it is ours.
poem by Gajanan Mishra
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!