The Great Poetry Topic
Nanuq907
Member Posts: 2,551 ✭✭✭✭
Okay okay okay, I know everyone here is a manly man, a rough customer and doesn’t change their socks but twice a year. But manly man or not, we all have a funny bone. So here’s my contribution for the manly men who like a good chuckle. One of my favorite poems. Take the time to read it, preferably over a glass of bourbon. Cheers!
The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill
I took a contract to bury the body of blasphemous Bill MacKie,
Whenever, wherever or whatsoever the manner of death he die —
Whether he die in the light o’ day or under the peak-faced moon;
In cabin or dance-hall, camp or dive, mucklucks or patent shoon;
On velvet tundra or virgin peak, by glacier, drift or draw;
In muskeg hollow or canyon gloom, by avalanche, fang or claw;
By battle, murder or sudden wealth, by pestilence, hooch or lead —
I swore on the Book I would follow and look till I found my tombless dead.
For Bill was a dainty kind of cuss, and his mind was mighty sot
On a dinky patch with flowers and grass in a civilized boneyard lot.
And where he died or how he died, it didn’t matter a damn
So long as he had a grave with frills and a tombstone “epigram.”
So I promised him, and he paid the price in good cheechako coin
(Which the same I blowed in that very night down in the Tenderloin).
Then I painted a three-foot slab of pine: “Here lies poor Bill MacKie,”
And I hung it up on my cabin wall and I waited for Bill to die.
Years passed away, and at last one day came a squaw with a story strange,
Of a long-deserted line of traps ’way back of the Bighorn range,
Of a little hut by the great divide, and a white man stiff and still,
Lying there by his lonesome self, and I figured it must be Bill.
So I thought of the contract I’d made with him, and I took down from the shelf
The swell black box with the silver plate he’d picked out for hisself;
And I packed it full of grub and “hooch,” and I slung it on the sleigh;
Then I harnessed up my team of dogs and was off at dawn of day.
You know what it’s like in the Yukon wild when it’s sixty-nine below;
When the ice-worms wriggle their purple heads through the crust of the pale blue snow;
When the pine-trees crack like little guns in the silence of the wood,
And the icicles hang down like tusks under the parka hood;
When the stove-pipe smoke breaks sudden off, and the sky is weirdly lit,
And the careless feel of a bit of steel burns like a red-hot spit;
When the mercury is a frozen ball, and the frost-fiend stalks to kill —
Well, it was just like that that day when I set out to look for Bill.
Oh, the awful hush that seemed to crush me down on every hand,
As I blundered blind with a trail to find through that blank and bitter land;
Half dazed, half crazed in the winter wild, with its grim heartbreaking woes,
And the ruthless strife for a grip on life that only the sourdough knows!
North by the compass, North I pressed; river and peak and plain
Passed like a dream I slept to lose and I waked to dream again.
River and plain and mighty peak — and who could stand unawed?
As their summits blazed, he could stand undazed at the foot of the throne of God.
North, aye, North, through a land accurst, shunned by the scouring brutes,
And all I heard was my own harsh word and the whine of the malamutes,
Till at last I came to a cabin squat, built in the side of a hill,
And I burst in the door, and there on the floor, frozen to death, lay Bill.
Ice, white ice, like a winding-sheet, sheathing each smoke-grimed wall;
Ice on the stove-pipe, ice on the bed, ice gleaming over all;
Sparkling ice on the dead man’s chest, glittering ice in his hair,
Ice on his fingers, ice in his heart, ice in his glassy stare;
Hard as a log and trussed like a frog, with his arms and legs outspread.
I gazed at the coffin I’d brought for him, and I gazed at the gruesome dead,
And at last I spoke: “Bill liked his joke; but still, goldarn his eyes,
A man had ought to consider his mates in the way he goes and dies.”
Have you ever stood in an Arctic hut in the shadow of the Pole,
With a little coffin six by three and a grief you can’t control?
Have you ever sat by a frozen corpse that looks at you with a grin,
And that seems to say: “You may try all day, but you’ll never jam me in”?
I’m not a man of the quitting kind, but I never felt so blue
As I sat there gazing at that stiff and studying what I’d do.
Then I rose and I kicked off the husky dogs that were nosing round about,
And I lit a roaring fire in the stove, and I started to thaw Bill out.
Well, I thawed and thawed for thirteen days, but it didn’t seem no good;
His arms and legs stuck out like pegs, as if they was made of wood.
Till at last I said: “It ain’t no use — he’s froze too hard to thaw;
He’s obstinate, and he won’t lie straight, so I guess I got to — saw.”
So I sawed off poor Bill’s arms and legs, and I laid him snug and straight
In the little coffin he picked hisself, with the dinky silver plate,
And I came nigh near to shedding a tear as I nailed him safely down;
Then I stowed him away in my Yukon sleigh, and I started back to town.
So I buried him as the contract was in a narrow grave and deep,
And there he’s waiting the Great Clean-up, when the Judgment sluice-heads sweep;
And I smoke my pipe and I meditate in the light of the Midnight Sun,
And sometimes I wonder if they was, the awful things I done.
And as I sit and the parson talks, expounding of the Law,
I often think of poor old Bill — and how hard he was to saw.
Comments
Did you just make that up?
Here I sit all broken hearted.
Payed a dime,
And only farted.
And fiery auto crashes
Some will die in hot pursuit
While sifting through my ashes
Some will fall in love with life
And drink it from a fountain
That is pouring like an avalanche
Coming down the mountain
Naw, that’s from Robert Service, the Bard of the North.
I'll try to keep it clean;
There once was a man from Nantucket,
Who kept all his cash in a bucket,
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man,
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.
Bob
There once was a man from Belair who didn't have very much hair
Someone put glue in the old mans shampoo and took off the rest he had there 😮
My old granddad used to tell me several......
There was an old man from Tonacco who smoked cigarettes by the stacko
When he was dead, they cut open his head and found a plug of tobacco 😮
I once thought about writing poetry as a hobby. Tried it and got so damn depressed I quit!
Here's another that's moderately risque......
Pretty Mary donned her skates,
upon the ice to frisk.
Wasn't she a silly girl,
her little * ???
Mary had a little lamb
its fleece was black as soot
and every where that Mary went
his sooty foot he put.
COMFORT
Say! You've struck a heap of trouble --
Bust in business, lost your wife;
No one cares a cent about you,
You don't care a cent for life;
Hard luck has of hope bereft you,
Health is failing, wish you'd die --
Why, you've still the sunshine left you
And the big, blue sky.
Sky so blue it makes you wonder
If it's heaven shining through;
Earth so smiling 'way out yonder,
Sun so bright it dazzles you;
Birds a-singing, flowers a-flinging
All their fragrance on the breeze;
Dancing shadows, green, still meadows --
Don't you mope, you've still got these.
These, and none can take them from you;
These, and none can weigh their worth.
What! you're tired and broke and beaten? --
Why, you're rich -- you've got the earth!
Yes, if you're a tramp in tatters,
While the blue sky bends above
You've got nearly all that matters --
You've got God, and God is love.
-Robert Service
As a one-time English Literature Major, I have seen more than my share of poetry. Much of it I despised. But that of Service, Frost, and Kipling are exceptions. Masterful stuff there.
BTW, limericks are more doggerel than poetry (even though writing one with proper rhyme and meter is a challenge) and 99% of them were composed in prison and are about sex. Not in the same league as poetry.
If you've ever seen something that you immediately thought of as "sheer poetry", you owe yourself the joy of reading something you instantly realize is "pure beauty."
Limericks? Then you'll like this one (warning no sexual content)
A dozen a gross and a score,
plus 3 times the square root of four,
divided by seven plus five times eleven
is nine squared and not a bit more.
What if Robert W. Service had written Little Boy Blue?
A bunch of cows were mooing it up
In the cornfield so they do tell
And down in the meadow a big flock of sheep
Was raising a bit of Hell.
And there wasn't a way
On that God awful day
Of stopping that crop wrecking crew
Because under a hay stack, lay flat on his back
Was a drunken Little Boy Blue.
The one poem that has stayed with me ever since reading it many years ago.
High Flight
by John Gillespie Magee, Jr. (1922-1941)
Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there
I’ve chased the shouting wind along and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace,
Where never lark, or even eagle, flew;
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
One of my all-time favorites. Wow. Thank you.
IF -- by Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up again with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
I still remember one from grade school, we had to memorize a poem for class to recite to the other kids in either 2nd or 3rd grade.
when the earth is turned to spring,
the worms are fat as anything
the birds come flying all around
to eat the worms right off the ground
and once when I was very young
I put a worm right on my tongue
I didn't like the taste a bit
and so I didn't swallow it
but oh it makes my mother squirm
because she thinks I ate that worm.
that dang thing has been stuck in my head for over 50 years, weird how you can't remember where you put the car keys, but something like that is there forever...........
http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poems_youngbrit.htm
Here's one I posted a while back.
Advice To The Confined
While recovering from my operation
I was terribly annoyed,
For the toilet was denied me
And the bed pan was employed.
I much preferred the bath room
But the nurse just shook her head,
And said “you're much too weak I think
For getting out of bed.
My experience with the bed pan
To this day makes me quail,
And I have been prevailed upon
To tell this harrowing tale.
In the small hours of the morning
Before the break of day,
Came a warning that I could not
Ignore, not yet delay.
The nurse brought me the bed pan,
slipped it under my back side,
While chills ran up and down my spine.
As the cold thing touched my hide.
I tipped back on my shoulders
Soon my legs were stiff and numb,
The odds were against me
I'd die before it would come!
In this up and down position
The leverage wasn't there,
But with tremendous effort
I did break a little air.
When at last I got results
I grew faint with dread,
I wondered if I'd hit the pan
Or was it in the bed?
While my heart was weakly fluttering
I felt with cautious care
With a sigh of satisfaction
I discovered nothing there.
But my troubles were not over,
As I was soon to find
For how was I to manage
to wipe the place behind?
The muscles in my back bulged out
as I stood on my head
And made a few wild passes
and nose-dived out of bed.
With patience I continued
Oblivious to my pain,
For modesty prevented me
From leaving any stain.
I had no more than finished
This Herculean feat
When I became aware of something
Sticky on my sheet.
Cold sweat beaded my brow
As I slowly raised my gown,
And there upon the snow-white sheet
was a hideous spot of brown!
So the laws of gravitation
Have proven – sure as fate
That you can't stand upon your head
When you evacuate!
Sick people often grow worse,
And I know the reason why -
The bed pan is the wheel on which
They're tortured til they die.
There is a future for some genius
To invent some kind of diaper,
or back adjusting thunder-mug
With an automatic wiper!
FLEAS by Ogden Nash
"Adam had 'em"
I gave my love a cherry
That had no stone
I gave my love a chicken
That had no bones
I gave my love a story
That had no end
I gave...
Sorry...
I worked with a gal many years ago spent her spare time writing pomes she had note books full of them been doing it for years
I read some , she would ask me to read that she would work on at lunch and break at work , . they were above my pay scale LOl but I would still complement her for effort if nothing else
she was going to publish a book but the cost to do so was too high I think she had a couple that were put into other peoples books on pomes , maybe later on she did I really do not know I hope / wish her the best of luck how ever it went for her she truly enjoyed writing them it was a passion for her .
as for the one "Brookwood" posted as a kid I remember some TV stations ( well we had two any way ) played it as the last thing each night before going off air .
Thanatopsis
BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT
To him who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;—
Go forth, under the open sky, and list
To Nature’s teachings, while from all around—
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air—
Comes a still voice—
Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix for ever with the elements,
To be a brother to the insensible rock
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,
The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,—the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness between;
The venerable woods—rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks
That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,
Old Ocean’s gray and melancholy waste,—
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom.—Take the wings
Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
Save his own dashings—yet the dead are there:
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep—the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw
In silence from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one as before will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,
The youth in life’s green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man—
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those, who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, which moves
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
SONNET 145
Those lips that Love's own hand did make
Breathed forth the sound that said 'I hate,'
To me that languish'd for her sake:
But when she saw my woeful state,
Straight in her heart did mercy come,
Chiding that tongue that ever sweet
Was used in giving gentle doom,
And taught it thus anew to greet:
'I hate' she alter'd with an end,
That follow'd it as gentle day
Doth follow night, who like a fiend
From heaven to hell is flown away;
'I hate' from hate away she threw,
And saved my life, saying -- 'not you.'
-Wm. Shakespeare
So I grabbed my 44! Sorry!
pingjockey, you're a poet that didn't know it but your feet show it cause they're Long Fellows! 🤣
It is raining here............
.............and I have no beer.
It really is raining and I don't have beer...........thought it was funny after a couple shots of vodka though.
For the dog lovers out there.....
Mongrel
A puppy dog without a collar
Annexed me on my evening walk;
His coat suggested fleas and squalor,
His tail had never known a dock.
So humble, trusting, wistful was he,
I gave his head a cautious pat,
Then I regretted it because he
Accompanied me to my door-mat.
And there with morning milk I found him,
Where he had slumbered all the night;
I could not with displeasure hound him,
So wonderful was his delight.
And so with him I shared my porridge -
Oh! How voraciously he ate!
And then I had the woeful courage
To thrust him through the garden gate.
But there all morning long he waited;
I had to sneak out by the back.
To hurt his feelings how I hated,
Yet somehow he got my track.
For down the road he sudden saw me
And though in trees I tried to hide,
How pantingly he sought to paw me,
And yelped with rapture by my side.
Poor dirty dog! I should have coshed him,
But after all 'twas not his fault;
And so I took him home and washed him,
- I'm that soft-hearted kind of dolt.
But then he looked so sadly thinner,
Though speckless clean and airy bright,
I had to buck him up with dinner
And kept him for another night.
And now he is a household fixture
And never wants to leave my side;
A doggy dog, a mongrel mixture,
I couldn't lose him if I tried.
His tail undocked is one wild wiggle,
His heaven is my happy nod;
His life is one ecstatic wriggle,
And I'm his God.
-Robert W. Service