'Timothy Winters'

Timothy Winters comes to school
With eyes as wide as a football-pool,
Ears like bombs and teeth like splinters:
A blitz of a boy is Timothy Winters.

His belly is white, his neck is dark,
And his hair is an exclamation-mark.
His clothes are enough to scare a crow
And through his britches the blue winds blow.

When teacher talks he won't hear a word
And he shoots down dead the arithmetic-bird,
He licks the pattern off his plate
And he's not even heard of the Welfare State.

Timothy Winters has bloody feet
And he lives in a house on Suez Street,
He sleeps in a sack on the kithen floor
And they say there aren't boys like him anymore.

Old Man Winters likes his beer
And his missus ran off with a bombardier,
Grandma sits in the grate with a gin
And Timothy's dosed with an aspirin.

The welfare Worker lies awake
But the law's as tricky as a ten-foot snake,
So Timothy Winters drinks his cup
And slowly goes on growing up.

At Morning Prayers the Master helves
for children less fortunate than ourselves,
And the loudest response in the room is when
Timothy Winters roars "Amen!"

So come one angel, come on ten
Timothy Winters says "Amen
Amen amen amen amen."
Timothy Winters, Lord. Amen

Charles Causley

A Suspended Blue Ocean
Hafez


The sky
Is a suspended blue ocean.
The stars are the fish
That swim.

The planets are the white whales
I sometimes hitch a ride on,

And the sun and all light
Have forever fused themselves

Into my heart and upon
My skin.

There is only one rule
On this Wild Playground,

For every sign Hafiz has ever seen
Reads the same.

They all say,

"Have fun, my dear; my dear, have fun,
In the Beloved's Divine
Game,

O, in the Beloved's
Wonderful Game."

Thanks a ton Muganda for this sweet gem, and the dude who started this thread.I've cherished this poem, over and over....

Valentine
Carol Ann Duffy

Not a red rose or a satin heart.

I give you an onion.
It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.
It promises light
like the careful undressing of love.

Here.
It will blind you with tears
like a lover.
It will make your reflection
a wobbling photo of grief.

I am trying to be truthful.

Not a cute card or a kissogram.

I give you an onion.
Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips,
possessive and faithful
as we are,
for as long as we are.

Take it.
Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring,
if you like.

Lethal.
Its scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife.




How Do I Love Thee?
Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with a passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, --- I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! --- and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

THE PASSAGE - Christopher Okigbo, scholar and soldier in the Biafran War

BEFORE YOU, mother Idoto*,
Naked I stand;
Before your watery presence,
A prodigal
Leaning on an oilbean,
Lost in your legend.
Under your power wait I
on barefoot,
watchman for the watchword
at Heavensgate;
out of the depths my cry:
give ear and hearken…

DARK WATERS of the beginning.
Rays, violet and short, piercing the gloom,
Foreshadow the fire that is dreamed of.
Rainbow on far side, arched like a boa bent to kill,
foreshadows the rain that is dreamed of.
Me to the orangey
Solitude invites,
A wagtail, to tell
The tangled-wood-tale;
A sunbird, to mourn
A mother on a spray.
Rain and sun in single combat;
On one leg standing,
In silence at the passage,
The young bird at the passage.

SILENT FACES at crossroads:
Festivity in black…
Faces of black like long black
column of ants,
behind the bell tower,
into the hot garden
where all roads meet:
festivity in black…
O Anna at the knobs of the panel oblong,
hear us at crossroads at the great hinges
where the players of loft pipe organs
rehearse old lovely fragments, alone-
strains of pressed orange leaves on pages,
bleach of the light of years held in leather:
For we are listening in cornfields
Among the wind players,
Listening to the wind leaning over
Its loveliest fragment…

* A village stream. The oilbean, the tortoise and the python are totems for her worship.

i carry your heart with me - e.e. cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go, my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in my heart)

I used to really enjoy this rock track , many years gone-by....though my lyrics were not necessary close to what they should be. Ideally i i've died laughing at what my lyrics compared to what they actually are......


Patty Smyth, a poet & American singer and songwriter.
Genres

Rock, classic rock, pop rock, New wave



Out There
Lizzy got married on Christmas Day
On the Coney Island Coast, I remember the way
She stood in the cold
With the sun in her hair
Me and my brother were standing by
I remember my mother started to cry
Liz just looked at the sea
A million miles away
I said, now Lizzy can you tell me what you see
And tell me why
You keep a looking
Out there
Why you keep searching
Out there
When everything you'll ever want or need
Is right here, with me

Yeah and I took a ride with whoever would ask
I looked for the future, was done with the past and the present
Hey that was just something to get through
And the nights went by
And the years went too
My life was a mirror
The reflection was you
And at the end of the day
My voice was so far away
Ooh but maybe you could tell me who I am
And tell me why
I keep a looking
Out there
Why I keep searching
Out there
For something you can't taste or touch or see
No no no
Cause it's right here, in me

And I know it's all an illusion
You see what you wanna see
And I know, I know, ain't nothing gonna rescue me now

I can take all this confusion
I just wanna be here now

And everything you'll want or need
I know
It's right here
I keep a looking
Out there
I keep reaching
Out there
For something you can't taste, touch, or see
No no no
Cause it's right

I said
Na na na
Na na na
Na na na
Out there
Na
Na
It's always right here
=================================================
Patty Smyth , the album went gold, as a result of the popularity , "Sometimes Love Just Ain't Enough", peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 100 and also went Gold. And made it to the top 100 millennium hits globally.Its an all-time classic, to this day.....








Sometimes Love Just Ain't Enough


I don't wanna lose you,
I don't wanna use you
Just to have somebody by my side
And I don't wanna hate you
I don't wanna take you
But I don't wanna be the one to cry
That don't really matter to anyone, anymore
But like a fool I keep losing my place
And I keep seeing you walk through that door

But there's a danger in loving somebody too much
And it's sad when you know it's your heart you can't trust
There's a reason why people don't stay where they are
Baby sometimes love just ain't enough

Now I could never change you
I don't wanna blame you
Baby you don't have to take the fall
Yes I may have hurt you
But I did not desert you
Maybe I just wanna have it all
It makes a sound like thunder
It makes me feel like rain
And like a fool who will never see the truth
I keep thinking something's gonna change

But there's a danger in loving somebody too much
And it's sad when you know it's your heart you can't trust
There's a reason why people don't stay where they are
Baby sometimes love just ain't enough

And there's no way home
When it's late at night and you're all alone
Are there things that you wanted to say
Do you feel me beside you in your bed
There beside you where I used to lay

And there's a danger in loving somebody too much
And it's sad when you know it's your heart they can't touch.
There's a reason why people don't stay who they are
Cause baby sometimes love just ain't enough.
Baby sometimes love just ain't enough.

=================================================
Patti Smith inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2007

The True Gentleman
John Walter Wayland


The True Gentleman is
The man whose conduct proceeds from good will and an acute sense of propriety, and whose self-control is equal to all emergencies;

Who does not
make the poor man conscious of his poverty,
the obscure man of his obscurity,
or any man of his inferiority or deformity;

Who is himself humbled if necessity compels him to humble another;

Who does not
flatter wealth,
cringe before power, or
boast of his own possessions or achievements;
who speaks with frankness but always with sincerity and sympathy;
whose deed follows his word;
who thinks of the rights and feelings of others, rather than his own; and who appears well in any company,

A man with whom honor is sacred and virtue safe.

My favourite poem too