Day: March 22, 2017

Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802

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London March 22nd 2017
BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne’er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

I backed up my computer,read a book

I did the wheelie bins, I wrote a poem
I made the beds and turned on several lights
I heard the News; my head feels like it is foam
What will happen next?Who has foresight?

The Bridge of Westminster is very fine;
But not when men fire guns at passers-by
Wordsworth wrote a poem; read it online
We thought  we  were well read; it  is a lie

By   killing two and wounding many more
The agents  wrecked their lives in evil’s thrall
They have closed again the  darkening door
Politicians  rise and evil calls.

Like Icarus fell  and no-one stopped to look
I  backed up my computer, read a book.

 

 

 

Emile and the claw varnish

New cats today

  • Stan realised it was time for Emile to have his annual flu jab.He stopped polishing the windows and picked up the phone.
    Hello,it’s Stan here.Can I make an appointment for Emile?
    Yes, come today if Emile has had a bath!
    Are you joking?
    Yes, the receptionist responded cheerfully.
    Actually, he did have a bath and now can swim breaststroke!
    How amazing, she said sweetly.
    Stan got out Emile’s travelling basket.He put some copies of The Independent inside in case Emile was bored.
    Here, Emile, I’m taking you for a ride in the car.kindly step into your basket,
    Can’t I sit by you and wear a seat belt?
    I fear it’s illegal.
    OK, granddad, Emile answered jauntily.He climbed into the basket and sat up staring out boldly with his great amber eyes.
    The doorbell rang.
    Hello, Annie, Would you like to come to the vet with us?
    She looked down at her violet velvet track suit and purple trainers with real gold laces.
    Yes, I’ll sit in the back with Emile.
    After ten minutes they arrived and parked the car under an elm tree.Stan carried the basket steadily not wanting the poor cat to fall in an undignified manner. Annie looked at her green nails.
    Do you like my nail varnish, Stan?
    To be honest, I prefer shell pink.
    Why is that, darling?
    It is more feminine!
    Feminine!But you can see I’m feminine!
    I like you to be even more feminine.
    Oh,yes , agreed     Emile, So do I.
    You men, she cried sweetly, never satisfied.
    I wouldn’t say that, my America, my Newfoundland!
    What’s up?Swallowed the dictionary.
    It’s a poem, actually.
    You’ve been reading again.It’s bad for you.
    Don’t you like to be my new found land?
    A bit late to ask now, she murmured seductively.
    Next moment they were in the empty waiting room.Then a man came in with a big black dog.Emile stared fiercely and the dog whimpered and lay down on the floor.
    The vet came out and asked Stan to bring Emile in.Emile gave a yell at the dog before Stan shut the door.So, said the beautiful young vet, how is pussy today.
    Emile remained silent.He’s fine,j ust needs his flu jab.muttered Stan.
    Come now, Emile come out of there.But Emile was clinging to his basket with ll his sharp claws.
    Are you afraid Emile?He asked kindly
    No, I’m not afraid, I’m just acting how vets expect cats to act.
    So Emile speaks English?
    He knows French too.
    Je t’aime Emile.
    Bedankt, madame.
    Stop showing off and get out of there, she doesn’t speak Dutch.
    Mein mutter wast immer krank,cried Emile.
    Get out now!
    Emile came out slowly and stood by this good lady.She looks a bit like Annie, he whispered.
    The vet took out a small needle and swiftly injected Emile.
    What a good boy, she sang, would you like a jelly baby?
    A jelly baby!Cats don’t eat jelly babies!
    Well, have a go!
    Emile stalked back to his basket, put on some glasses and began to read the editorial in The Independent.
    Stan was hoping to make a suggestive remark to the vet, but Annie came in.
    Hurry up, there’s a thunderstorm coming.Her nails were now pink.
    Did you change your nail varnish?
    No, the green was artificial nails!I took them off.
    Can I have some claw varnish.demanded Emile
    colour?
    I fancy teal, Emile miaowed.
    Teal!How ludicrous!
    What about red?
    Too pretentious.
    I don’t think I’ll bother then, the cat said languidly
    We men don’t have to bother about such things.
    Well, you are lucky, said Annie.
    I hate makeup and nail varnish, blow dries and manicures but I don’t feel feminine without it.
    You feel very feminine to me said Stan, running his hand softly along her forearm
    and patting her behind!
    Stan!Not here in the road!
    Why not? enquired Emile.It looks ideal to me if you go behind those bushes.
    Annie jumped into the car and drove away leaving Stan to carry Emile to the bus stop for a tedious journey home.Then she reappeared, opened the door and said,
    come on now let’s all go home.I’m sorry I drove away.I’m feeling a bit blue today.
    They got in and arrived safely home where Stan brewed a big pot of tea and let Annie sit on the sofa with her feet on  a cushion.He rubbed her head gently.Lovely, she purred.
    I like having my head stroked.So do I, said Emile loudly but alas they were too busy to hear or care.So Emile fell asleep and dreamed he was only a character in a story.

    And so so all of us.

Mamma didn’t raise no fools

Rebecca Wolff

He died before we could honor
him correctly. Candied

impulse through the brain.
Your will subverted

that’s a tree, a treatment,
a genealogy. Oddly enough if I need something

someone is sure to give it to me.
To supply me with it. Oddly enough,

it’s not about cutting slack
but about positive reinforcement

Detergent in the sense that it is

emergent

deterrent
where the nascent

meets the latent
I put my tongue in the path

dug up some chestnuts.
“We’ll keep looking

for a place for you
inside of nature”

I can’t remember how I died.
Writing something down at the time

the grave had been disturbed.
Next thing you know, I’m making

an entry in my diary: No use
letting it get cold.

You are perfect for me by Rebecca Wolff

Rebecca Wolff

because you’re psychic
no one else could understand me
the way you

do and

I say
Drink Me

I say it to you silently
but it calls forth in me

the water for you
the water you asked for

Real poetry which is also funny

 

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 From hair fashion displays 2017

 

https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/text/serious-art-thats-funny-humor-poetry

Quote:

Carolyn Forché, someone who has never been accused of being a funny poet, has said “irony, paradox, surrealism . . . might well be both the answer and a restatement of [Theodor] Adorno’s often quoted and difficult contention that to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric.” But what did the philosopher and critic Adorno mean by this fatuous statement? No poetry? Or just a very, very serious and earnest poetry? Because, let’s face it–earnestness is almost always bad art. Good art makes us think; it has more questions than answers. Often, but not always, satire does this too. But earnestness almost never does this–that’s not its job. Earnestness is comforting. It wants to hug us. And we want to be hugged sometimes. But sometimes we want to laugh while poking holes in self-righteousness and oppression, whether it be literal political oppression or oppression of a quieter sort – cultural and aesthetic oppression. Irony and satire are such a good antidote to oppression because oppression needs to be earnest (or at least look earnest) in order to be feared by those it seeks to cow. Oppression cannot work alongside irony because it believes in its own righteousness and a monolithic concept of truth that must be asserted to the oppressed with a straight face. Irony and satire are the tools by which the oppressed get to make fun of the oppressors without the oppressors getting it.

The English are rebuilding Hadrian’s Wall.

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The space dividing  rage and fear is small.

Vision is attenuated there.

Emotions tangle, stutter, are appalled

 

Homo sapiens, how wise a call?

Vision is restricted, eyes are bare

The space between the mind and fear is small.

 

 

The English are rebuilding Hadrian’s Wall.

Scottish Muslims  enter England here

Emotions jangle, stutter, are appalled

 

Historic acts return as do old brawls

Roman villas, altars, were they here?

Vision is restricted, eyes are shields

 

Why not put a  barbed wire fence around Whitehall?

Let’s divide off Wales, they asked for more!

Emotions rise and  angry are our  calls

 

 

The Scots must raise their taxes, we’re the whores.

How about a war to fund all wars?

The English are rebuilding Hadrian’s Wall.

Emotions rise as anger takes us all.