A Dent
In memory of Michael Allen
The height of one stall at odds with the next in your grandfather's byre
where cattle allowed themselves to speak only at Yule
gave but little sense of why you taught us to admire
the capacity of a three-legged stool
to take pretty much everything in its stride,
even the card-carrying Crow who let out a war-whoop
now your red pencil was poised above my calf-hide
manuscript like a graip above a groop.
The depth of a dent in the flank of your grandfather's cow
from his having leaned his brow
against it morning and night
for twenty years of milking by hand
gave but little sense of how distant is the land
on which you had us set our sights.
poem by Paul Muldoon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Related quotes
Manners
For a Child of 1918
My grandfather said to me
as we sat on the wagon seat,
"Be sure to remember to always
speak to everyone you meet."
We met a stranger on foot.
My grandfather's whip tapped his hat.
"Good day, sir. Good day. A fine day."
And I said it and bowed where I sat.
Then we overtook a boy we knew
with his big pet crow on his shoulder.
"Always offer everyone a ride;
don't forget that when you get older,"
my grandfather said. So Willy
climbed up with us, but the crow
gave a "Caw!" and flew off. I was worried.
How would he know where to go?
But he flew a little way at a time
from fence post to fence post, ahead;
and when Willy whistled he answered.
"A fine bird," my grandfather said,
"and he's well brought up. See, he answers
nicely when he's spoken to.
Man or beast, that's good manners.
Be sure that you both always do."
When automobiles went by,
the dust hid the people's faces,
but we shouted "Good day! Good day!
Fine day!" at the top of our voices.
When we came to Hustler Hill,
he said that the mare was tired,
so we all got down and walked,
as our good manners required.
poem by Elizabeth Bishop
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Grandfather, Grandfather
Grandfather, Grandfather,
what do pandas say?
Grandfather, Grandfather,
as among the rocks they roll
and rather sadly play
a game that seems
to do with dreams
of places far away.
Grandfather, Grandfather,
what do pandas say?
Grand-daughter, Grand-daughter,
when the pandas play
rather sadly in the rocks
this is what they say
to one another as they seem
to remember in a dream
those places far away:
'Let us tell no one
the word that we say
softly to one another
as we roll and play.
For if they ever heard it,
the tall two-legged Understanders
who always want to know what pandas
like us love to say,
yes, if they ever heard it
they would take it away.'
poem by George Barker
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The God Of Fire
The God of fire
It took him twenty years
to write his novel.
Twenty refusals later
he gave the manuscript
to the fire which
greedily absorbed it.
A phone call from nowhere,
send us another novel.
It took twenty more years
to write a new book
and the god Agni
burnt his hands.
As a thank you.
Success at last he cried
to a man with a yellow helmet
carrying an axe.
poem by Oskar Hansen
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Mean Hunter
my grandfather still bend in his mattress
when we wake up
we as his grandchilds
have to leave the job
because with the job
live to become more having a meaning
my grandfather remain
to do not want to wake up
when evening
when we come home the
grandfather gived a smile and enquire to us
Have you grasp that meaning
we at a time reply
not yet
grandfather kept quiet, but at his hearts
remain to hunt the meaning
what he not yet earn also
by himself, in the corner of silent
poem by Prasetya Utama
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
My Grandfather
my grandfather drowned
while fishing...
i was only fourteen,
i took the call.
in the whirl of
funeral arrangements,
preachers, headstones,
and old hymns...
too much was forgotten.
he gave me my first
pocket knife, showed me
how to sharpen it....
when i grew up
i sharpened knives
for all the women
in the neighborhood.
i can still remember
him taking me to the depot
to watch the train pass by....
when i see a train now
i sometimes wonder...
if he's on it, and coming
for me.....
a way of life gone...
maybe better in some ways....
my grandfather died while fishing....
the fish won the battle
that night!
poem by Eric Cockrell
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
My Grandfather
The grandfather liked to watch the broadcast football
In the TV channel every night
In the morning he still sleep
When I departed for work
And his granddaughter departed for campus
When evening we the struggle channel
The grandfather liked to watch a football
His granddaughter liked to watch sinetron
While I liked the broadcast that funny-things
I have been tired worked
Was not again that attract attention in the TV agenda
Apart from laughing to release nerves that strict
Now the grandfather of temples sleeps
poem by Prasetya Utama
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
0075 The events of 12.25
the stable door shakes in the cold night wind;
the cattle snort and snuffle in the straw;
by city wall the lanterns glint on steel;
what will become of Mary's child this year?
for are we sure that miracles stay true -
if lost to mind, to heart, to memory?
will Herod have the last laugh, one year soon?
wise men and shepherds miss the heavenly?
will children fail to sense, soon, in the light
that glints on tinsel and bright packages,
the holy present in the gift's delight;
nor sense the angels' textless messages?
this baby, gift-wrapped in its shawl and stall
just may be - may still be - the Lord of All?
revisited
poem by Michael Shepherd
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
If You Only Knew
By my grandfather's bed, my mother is reading,
Psalm 62, God is our refuge,
My grandfather stirs, could it be,
he is waking, one final time,
he has something to say,
If you only knew what lies awaiting
If you could only see what I can see
If you could only hear the music playing
The angels singing sweet victory
Oh, if you only knew, if you only knew,
How much he loves you
By my grandfather's bed, my mother is broken,
Psalm 17, O God I call on you,
She doesn't want to hear
Any words about leaving
My grandfather says
song performed by by Randy Travis
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
They Are Tearing Down My Grandfather's House
(An NLP Editor's Choice Award Winner in Verdant Lands of Spring) They are tearing down my Grandfather's house,
it's made of wood and brick and stone.
The windows they've removed. To them it's real
estate, to me it's my heart being ripped in two.
The realtors, the bankers, the moneymen don't understand.
A house is more than made of wood, a house is made of man. My Grandfather's house is a memory that will
endure after it's torn down.
He's been gone for near thirty years, but his
house had lived on.
I know the world is made of change, and change
is all that's real. But one thing I cannot change,
that is the way I feel. I wipe a tear in the falling rain,
because they are tearing down my Grandfather's
house, and it gives me pain.
I love him as if it were yesteryear,
his wit and smile as warm as the sun.
The house once stood to remind me, but that too
is gone. They are tearing down my Grandfather's house,
it's made of wood and brick and stone.
Yet a house if more than made of wood,
a house is made of love.
poem by David A. Webb
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Where's My Billy Goat Gone To?
'Twas a birthday gift Miss Posie had
When she was nine, and twenty:
Not of gold -- Oh, no! -- nor gem, nor pearl,
Tho' he who gave had plenty.
'Twas a gift she took so much to heart,
Her neighbors thought her silly;
'Twas a B-A-B-Y (Baby) Goat,
A snow-white Baby Billy!
Pretty little Billy, Billy -- Oh!
Where's my Billy Goat gone to?
Take my home! Take my farm!
Yes, me too (if you want to);
But tell me! tell me!
Where's my Billy Goat gone to?
Pretty little Billy, Billy -- Oh!
Where's my Billy Goat gone to?
When she tried to teach him how to read,
Twas only "baa" he'd utter;
As she coaxed him then with cake and cream,
He'd slyly turn to butt her.
Yet he taught himself a thousand tricks,
And many a curious caper;
He would clamber to her chimney top,
And dine there on brown paper.
When the winter came she bought him shoes,
And flannel red she ordered
For a Sunday suit, with trousers cut
Four-legged and embroidered
On the steeple soon in tatters hung,
They set the parson snarling;
And he called that goat Be-el-ze-bub --
The one that she called Darling.
Pretty little Billy, Billy -- Oh!
Where's my Billy Goat gone to?
He was fond of roaming on the rocks,
With workmen in the quarry;
And if there he found their luncheon pails,
Not he but they were sorry.
For he raised aloft his iron brow,
Despite the foreman's clamor;
And the pails, he crushed them one by one,
As with a blacksmith's hammer.
Pretty little Billy, Billy -- Oh!
Where's my Billy Goat gone to?
Then for pails replaced and pails concealed
Each morning he went searching,
Till at last he found a shining prize,
Upon a boulder perching.
Had he read its label, "Dynamite!"
He might have known his blunder;
But he gave it one tremendous blow,
And then came peals of thunder!
Pretty little Billy, Billy -- Oh!
Where's my Billy Goat gone to?
poem by Henry Clay Work
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Grandfather Says
"Sit in my hand."
I'm ten.
I can't see him,
but I hear him breathing
in the dark.
It's after dinner playtime.
We're outside,
hidden by trees and shrubbery.
He calls it hide-and-seek,
but only my little sister seeks us
as we hide
and she can't find us,
as grandfather picks me up
and rubs his hands between my legs.
I only feel a vague stirring
at the edge of my consciousness.
I don't know what it is,
but I like it.
It gives me pleasure
that I can't identify.
It's not like eating candy,
but it's just as bad,
because I had to lie to grandmother
when she asked,
"What do you do out there?"
"Where?" I answered.
Then I said, "Oh, play hide-and-seek."
She looked hard at me,
then she said, "That was the last time.
I'm stopping that game."
So it ended and I forgot.
Ten years passed, thirtyfive,
when I began to reconstruct the past.
When I asked myself
why I was attracted to men who disgusted me
I traveled back through time
to the dark and heavy breathing part of my life
I thought was gone,
but it had only sunk from view
into the quicksand of my mind.
It was pulling me down
and there I found grandfather waiting,
his hand outstretched to lift me up,
naked and wet
where he rubbed me.
"I'll do anything for you," he whispered,
"but let you go."
And I cried, "Yes," then "No."
"I don't understand how you can do this to me.
I'm only ten years old,"
and he said, "That's old enough to know."
My Strange Land
I hold the memory of us in my hand
and drift away to a distant land
Candy trees and sherbet sand
As I hold the memory in my hand
I close my eyes and drift away
to a better happier day
A day when I could laugh away
The demons of this darker day
I drift away in a sea of dreams
where nothing is quite as it seems
Purple dragons, childhood dreams
Nothing quite as it seems
I embrace the strange new sights
flying candy Christmas lights
It's okay these child like sights
Fireworks explode in bright white light
In my head things are strange
reality is not in range
where everything is fine yet, strange
Gumballs on the firing range
I wish I could understand
Take you to this distant land
where I live each day now understand
Don't be scared of me in my strange land.
poem by Tamsin Burnett
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
A Homeland
My beautiful Armenia
that since the day
i never saw
Though It was my
dream since my
chidhood days
The longing and the
love of a mother land
Melted with ache and passion
always were there
At the deepest
corner in my childish
heart
The love and the
ache of being away
from the home
gave me the
inspiration to write
The first poem i've wrote was about my motherland
Yet all that I knew
about my home
i've learn it from
the history books
I've watched the
beauty of my home
with the eyes of my soul
I figured it in my mind
I saw it with the eyes
of my soul and i
admired
Every time a friend
asks me
'what do you want from
homeland'?
I answer
'.A bottele of an air
and a piece of
stone'
From the grounds of
my home.
To kiss the ground
of my grandfather's land
To smell and breath
the pure air
The memorial lands
rich in history
Where my
grandfather's
memories lie.
poem by Sossi Khachadourian
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Just Too Grand
I suppose if I wanted,
I could be a prude and standoffish.
With a résumé to prove,
In my life I've accomplished...
What few can and could do.
If...
I chose to put my nose up in the air.
And carried on with that kind of flair.
My mother's father,
Had been a leader of his own band.
Appearing here and there and across the land.
And for some reason then,
I couldn't 'stand' him.
He was just too grand!
And those feelings were mutual.
I just was not impressed.
Today?
I can understand why he was that way.
And I hope he has forgiven me for saying,
Whenever he telephoned to speak to my mom...
'Ma, some guy is on the phone claiming to be your father.
You know...
He of the George Frank Roberts Band.'
~That's 'your' grandfather.~
And I'm Sammy Davis, Junior.
Dedicated to my grandfather:
In Loving Memory
George Frank Roberts,
Englewood, New Jersey
'Love you, grand-daddy.
Even though we had 'many' differences,
of opinion.'
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
If the grandfather of the grandfather of Jesus had known what was hidden within him, he would have stood humble and awe-struck before his soul.
quote by Kahlil Gibran
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
Jesse James
(neil morris)
I'll tell you about jesse and frank james
My grandfather was personally acquainted with them
My grandfather lived in the southern edge of baxter county, arkansas
And they stayed all night with him lots of nights
And my grandfather told me there was a lot of those robberies that was layed to jesse and frank james
And he knew they didn't do it 'cause they was at his place when it happened
But you couldn't tell the public that
When they get their minds made up that somebody's done something
Why the public's gonna stick to it anyway
My grandfather, he knew them as boys
And they could come to his place and go without anybody paying attention 'cause nobody expected them
Down in arkansas, see, 'cause they was from missouri
Now that's the story that my grandfather told me when i was just a boy
And he said that frank james, at that world's fair,
I think it was 1901 in st. louis him and jesse were both there
My grandfather and frank james were together there
And that frank james offered to bring jesse there alive
He said that the man that the ford boys killed wasn't jesse james at all
But the fellow they killed was just about the size of jesse and he was red headed
And he wasn't any relation to the fords
See, jesse james was a known cousin to charles and bob ford
That's what my grandfather said
He said jesse and frank were not even in that part of the country when that fellow was killed
And the ford boys, why, they collected a thousand dollars for killing jesse james!
Now the song says that the ford boys killed jesse
None of us up here in the mountains believe that, no sir!
song performed by by Ry Cooder
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
The Old Family Picture
In the old
black-and-white
family picture,
I see
great grandfather
dead drunk
with his hat
slightly skewed.
In the same old
black-and-white
family picture,
I see
grandfather
as drunk as
his father is
with his hat
also slightly skewed.
Father fools
great grandfather
and grandfather
with his rice-washed-water
as the good old home-made
Makoli.
They all believe him.
1996
poem by Sangnam Nam
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
What is a Grandfather?
What is a Grandfather?
A Friend, a confidant, and a mentor
That is what a Grandfather is.
Call him Grandfather, Grandpa, or even Pappy.
Just a thought of him and your heart is happy
A kindly face and snow-white hair
In his gentle eyes there is no disappointment
There is no despair
A whisper, a smile and secrets to share
A bond that is beyond compare
Fishing poles and bedtime stories.
Dressing as Santa, or even the Easter bunny
Hidden pockets full of money
JPM 1/21/2008
The Old House Of My Grandfather
sometimes as i walk early morning
when the suns starts to climb up on the hill
i think of grandfather's house
old, and spacious on top of a hill
overlooking his farm where his carabaos graze
his goat and cows and ducks teem,
oh, those were the years of bounty
and there was no worry,
about what to eat what to do
where to go,
times changed, and now we are always on a race
taking much work, and buying lots of things
sometimes we regret, taking and throwing
going and then returning
apparently, for no purpose and without meaning,
we live in a new house now with glass windows
and iron grill and high and thick walls and fences
we speak less, we move more,
we laugh less, we discuss more,
the old house of grandfather was burned in 1968.
this new house burns all day, and there is no fireman coming.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
A Piori Love
In dreams / I formed you
In sweat / I gave you life
In tears / I gave you passion
In the heat / I gave you molten eyes
In the night / I gave you raven hair
In the morning / I gave you dawn’s smile
In the tremor / I gave you love
With the spark of infinity / I brought you forth
poem by Guillermo Veloso
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!