She [sonnet]
She won’t knock upon your door politely
and neither will she ask to be received;
What she gives should not be taken lightly:
Accept the fact you will one day be grieved.
May I Never…
May I never have my knees securely underneath the feeble table of this present world (imagining it to be the only thing there is). May I never live without extreme adventure taking me to distant reaches way beyond where I have ever been before. May I, when dead, be found upon some dangerous ledge or farthest edge or mountain-top or molten rock; but most of all may I be found alone – integrity intact, uncompromised, repentant only of the many times I’ve been so foolishly sidetracked.
Philip Sydney
There are so many noble people in past history who I wish I had known. I love to read about them and imagine what it would be like to be their friend – more real than any friends I have today (and many times more faithful 😉. Right now, I am reading “A Defence of Poesy”, by one of these historical friends: the poet who created the English sonnet, Philip Sydney (1554-1586). These people were not merely writing poetry but creating a language. So many new words that we now regard as “everyday” were written by people such as this. I often feel that I was a poet in that era too – probably some troubadour who lived and loved with all his heart and then came to a sticky end. History repeats itself…
Philip Sidney lived for just 32 years but he did more in that short life than most people do in a life twice as long today. Hardly anyone has heard of him. Yet there are 2225 quotations from him in the Oxford English Dictionary. He invented many words and phrases (for English was still in it’s teenage at that time) such as “bugbear”, “dumb-struck”, “miniature”, “far-fetched”, “milk-white”, “honey-flowing”, “my better half”, “conversation” and many many more. Oh yeah! Those were the days! 🙂
Tomorrow’s Tale [new poem]
I’ve taken off my useless coat and placed it on the frozen earth
in readiness for duelling with my stuttering future fate which,
as you might expect, was punctually late apparently because
a dalliance with some fair beguiling sweetly-smiling maids
plus all the after-bathes had stopped him in his grisly tracks
(at least that’s how the gossip-mongers falsified the facts).
A Sonnet for Sophie
As Autumn’s golden leaf-fall wake began
some two unveiling grieveful years ago;
the wind which blew devised a counterplan
and overturned your summer’s afterglow.
Just when you least expected such a call
(for until then your garden gaily grew)
a pale-faced cloaked intruder climbed the wall
and axed the tree which filled your field of view.
Revenge is Never Sweet [sonnet]
The taking of revenge implies a lack
of faith in natures wonderway to make
a person’s own wrongdoing bounce right back
upon them so they pay for their mistake.
Protection Racket [song lyric]
Searching for a reason
Trying to find the answer why
Brave hearts to believe in
Need to feel something real inside
So long in the desert
Dried up in the breeze
Barbed wire all around him
Armour-clad… he’s not sad inside
Our lives are but a brief continuous clumsy distraction from the inevitable
Almost everything which almost everyone does is designed to stave off any thoughts of one’s death (the only certainty in life). Our lives are but a brief continuous clumsy distraction from the inevitable. Yet, ironically, death is the only true liberation. (And there I don’t just mean physical death but metaphorical too). Facing death in the face, with a knowing smile, is the single most important thing we can do.
The Ball’s in your Court [poem]
What’s that? You said.
(you must have heard a funny little noise).
It’s a ball, I replied.
Doing what? You sighed (exasperatedly).
Just bouncing on your own side of the court,
said I, (but not beratingly).
But why? You intoned. Is there something
I’m supposed to do?
I scratched my head awhile
(for in my game I have no place for patent guile)
Rock of Sages [poem]
There is a rock on which
I set my stately arse —
a throne through which
a myriad fleeting concepts
quaintly pass untainted
every countdown day to
when I exit right of stage
with no surprise effects
(bedecked in disarray).
The Naked Troubadour 