• I love men, but not the Toffs,
  Nor the ones with hacking coughs.
  I would like an artist most,
  Especially with hot buttered toast.

  I love men,do men love me?
  There’s only one true way to see.
  Do your best to put them off,
  Wear flat shoes and never laugh.

  Study Wittgenstein and Kant,
  Study all that’s difficult.
  Parse Quantum theory as a hobby.
  Learn long words from the dictionary.

  Dance with Riemann,  swing with Joyce;
  Read Ulysses in a Rolls Royce.
  Enjoy Chess, Trigonometry;
  Weigh down your mind with  Geometry.

  Look around and see who’s left.
  That’s the man who loves you best.
  Once you’re wed and have a home,
  You can free your mind to roam.

  Throw away your library,
  Let your senses all run free.
  Wear bright clothes and enjoy some fun.
  Your second life has just begun.

Allen Ginsberg’s 1956 Poem “America”: a Lost Ending

Extract

The most famous line in all of twentieth-century American poetry can be found in Allen Ginsberg’s 1956 poem, “America,” which was published in the Pocket Poets series by Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s City Lights in the volume titled Howl and Other Poems. That famous line reads, “Go fuck yourself with your atom bomb.” It’s addressed to America itself, and it has been quoted and popularized by anarchists, communists, beatniks and hipsters over the past 36 years.

The poem ends on a whimsical note, “America, I’m putting my queer shoulder to the wheel,” a not-so veiled reference to the poet’s homosexuality, and his sense that though he was queer he had a role to play in the society as a whole.

https://aeon.co/essays/health-warning-social-rejection-doesnt-only-hurt-it-kills?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=6c7a876804-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_04_29_05_26&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-6c7a876804-70520193

Writing poetry is like trying to jump onto a wild horse as it goes by.
Or trying to get out of a  big vat of honey when the bees are angry
Or dreaming of wild tigers now tame for a moment
Getting a cat to wear a lead and go for a walk
It is unnatural, dangerous and mad
But I like it.
There.

https://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/poetic-asides/personal-updates/triolet-an-easy-way-to-write-8-lines-of-poetry

“Today, we’re going to look at the triolet (TREE-o-LAY), which has 13th century French roots linked to the rondeau or “round” poem. For over a year now, I’ve been trying to find a way to use the repetitive line heard so often in airport terminals: “The moving sidewalk is about to end.”

The triolet is perfect for this kind of repetition, because the first line of the poem is used 3 times and the second line is used twice. If you do the math on this 8-line poem, you’ll realize there are only 3 other lines to write: 2 of those lines rhyme with the first line, the other rhymes with the second line.

A diagram of the triolet would look like this:

A (first line)
B (second line)
a (rhymes with first line)
A (repeat first line)
a (rhymes with first line)
b (rhymes with second line)
A (repeat first line)
B (repeat second line)

So for the construction of my triolet, I already had my first line: “The moving sidewalk is about to end.” So after some quick thinking I decided to make my second line: and I’m not sure where to go. Pretty good (and true), since I usually don’t know where to go in airports. At this point, my poem looked like this:”

I’d love to gamble with the  lambs if only they had arthritis
He rambled on for so long  he got to Carlisle  before he noticed we were on a railway line.Dent  and Dent again
Dry your tears faster with  the new tumble-in dryer.
Save your tears to water the lawn.
Stumbling home took rages to achieve.
I did let my seat melt on once.
My car goes too fast for Lent
Ash Wednesday… we had ash every day in the fireplace!
I saw faces in the flames ………He burned all my selfies.Expensive to get a new laptop but he is my husband after them all.
We saw faces in the wallpaper.My father leaned on it often after being down the pit all day.He made a big impression on me.
I think confessing sins is a good idea, starting at the top with Mrs T May and Boris….don’t forgive them,Oh Lord am I evil?
Not really.
The cows don’t want us sucking their bladders all day. What did I say?
I’d like a  lion, say Judah?

How to sort your life out in three  moves
Begin by  writing  wisely of  your aims
Life  can be  much neater  in a groove

Don’t keep wondering if  your   friends approve
Do not  give your life  up to get fame
How to sort your life out in three  moves

String quintets on records will disprove
Old collections are just for the  lame
Life  can be  much  gentler  in a groove

Should we give up fantasy too lewd?
Is it better to admit what is not tame?
How to sort this life out  while it  moves

Sadness  may be joy, oh blues imbued
Do not let depression steal  its name
Life  can be mute misery in a groove

Look into the mirror, be amazed
See the lines where  laughter  has long grazed
How to  turn  life over  with  a heave
Life  can  turn too black stuck  in  that groove

When you wrote your book
The cat  lay across your shoulders like a prayer shawl
Through your window, you saw the trees
The Blackbird sang.
Now the chair is empty and   our cat has died
How could you leave me?
I’m lonesome  in that room
The birds are nesting again
The sun is hot
I’ve not opened the desk drawers
But I found your tie on my bed
Where can you be?

Mary was making a beef and beer casserole.But her casserole dish lid was too high for the small oven on her gas stove
What shall I do, she asked Emile.her cat?
I don’t know, mother, he told her.I never cook
I’ve told you before,I am not your mother.
Well, you feed me and wash me and keep my bed clean
I did that for Stan.I hope he didn’t think I was his mother
He was older than you, the cat informed her boldly
Yes.indeed he was 50 years older than me!
I know what to do, Emile mewed.He  stood by the phone and pressed 999
Soon the bell rang. In ran Dave, the transexual  transvestite paramedic dressed all in white as if for tennis
What’s wrong now, he enquired?
I can’t get this casserole dish into the oven, said Mary
I know what to do. Have you got either a pyrex plate or a cake tin with a loose bottom?
Mary looked into her cupboard and found a 6  ” plate
Dave put it on top of the dish having removed the high domed lid.
There we are, he cried. What number shall I put the oven on?
3 please, said Mary. You are so creative, Dave. Brilliant
Would you like to come back in 3 hours for a meal?
I’d love to, Dave cried. Unless I get called out by someone who needs me to find a knife and fork so they can eat their dinner
Would people really do that,Emile whispered?
You would not believe what people do

And so say all of us

With my broken-hearted syndrome and my allergy to dusk
With my head inside a bottle and my body  still unwashed
I don’t know my arrival time;my soul’s got  a new desk

I need a  pile of money, I wonder should I busk?
I need a sturdy saviour  as  Jesus  has got lost
With my broken-hearted syndrome and my allergy to dusk

I saw a few pink elephants but none had any tusks
I  need   a lot of money and a salad that’s been tossed
I don’t know my arrival time nor if my soul’s got  frost

We used to go to cinemas and consume  big bags of  crisps
Now that we are ancient we need a defter wrist
Mend our  potty syndromes and  the fear of  musk and dusk

The hair once long and silky  has  matured into small  whisps
The eyes so blue and singular   turn red when I am pissed
I don’t know my survival times nor if my soul loves rust

I  was looking for a husband but I found an  iron fist
Oh, men, you don’t need armour in the bedrooms of the lost
With my broken-hearted syndrome and my allergy to facts
I don’t know my arrival time, the timetable’s been wrecked

The wind blew fresh leaves
Across my pale countenance
I did not need that

The trees are swaying
Not as ballerinas do
Much more flippantly

They do not keep time
With human clocks and watches
A different drummer

The storm hovers here
Like an eagle on a cloud
Deciding on prey

Why use tarot cards
When we have sky and sunshine
When we have neighbours?

Sylvia saw a yew
Sylvia , a rook, the rain fell
Feathers gleamed like coal

Oh, Ariel  runs
Sylvia  becomes a myth
Knee and heel, the ride

Into the hot sun
Into the ennobling flame
The alchemy of  fire

Gold from coal dust comes
What good is this to children?
The cauldron bubbles

I am fortunate
If I can find two gloves now
One left and one right

The other problem
My hands are misshapen too
Ladies’ gloves might not fit me.

I can be a man
If I decide I want to be
There! I wear your gloves now.

But I prefer scarves
Made for women, with flowers
Embroidery, silk, cashmere.

My taste is quite good
I know  I like your image
You stand on the bridge in Prague

In Wenceslaus Square
The orchestra played Ma Vlast
The Elektion

Holocaust Museum
Children’s coloured drawings are
Butterflies for God

He died too with them
So we have no  floor to stand on
Everything’s trembling

I forgot I am.
I was lost somewhere other
How I stand on air.

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/discord

Extract

Inside my heart, this sacred place
Where freely mingle truth and grace
Where friends and enemies alike
Are viewed as equals for love’s sake

Inhabited by deeper self
In touch with  soul that in me dwells
I leave  my failures  gladly here
I will not live in morbid fear

I don’t insult the force divine
By pride in any good that’s mine
For willpower cannot birth virtue
But  can  attend to the eye’s  view

By trusting in   the vast unknown
We turn attention from the known.
Our eyes relax and  gaze without
To  bring proportion  to our doubts

Trust, itself. will widen gaze
And enable us to find our ways.
With terror, fear or loss of pride
Constriction comes to human eyes.

Perception is the highest good
By what we see, we choose our road.
The blind rush like the swine to hell
In patient, watchfulness let’s dwell.

He has done  with me, his earthly woman now
Gone away as dust motes dance in air.
I must live, I wonder where and how

To the fiercer visions, my eye goes
All is snatched while we  seem mute and  bare
He has done  with me, his earthly woman now

What is this killing Nature, it does cow
The mighty King, the princess blue-eyed, fair
I must live, I wonder when and how

Life is  may  be the flood plain and the flow
Emperors are killed by   those who dare
Who has gone from me, a widow now?

The Ouse drops from the Pennines and it grows
Until it  drowns the earth,  the Minster’s prayers
Must I   stay  on grievous tears afloat?

Oblivious to the people and the stares
Oblivious to  this   sleep and its nightmares
He did  for me, his earthly  female spouse
I  could not swim, my heart  sank from the blow

Near my destination my mind swerves
The object of my  passion’s hard to catch
In a fast car   bending roads to   curves

Do we ever  overcome our love?
Do we think the next one  is our match?
Near my destination my mind swerves

I am thinking of the words I heard
When the door was left upon the latch
Shall my car  grind roads into deep curves?

With the passion my  heart  leaps and heaves
The Sacred Heart was mentioned , a faux pas
Near my  start and  end ,my mind  will swerve

The tarmac heats as if it wants to leave
The rubber on the tyres  screams at last
In a fast car   bending roads to   curves

We mix up the future and the past
The future is not written nor surpassed
Near my destination my mind swerves
In its fast car   bending roads to   curves

Sitting in the garden with no thoughts
Empty minded,listening to the birds
Ideas rise up like fishes to be caught

Activity and purpose may be taught
Not silence and deep listening  beyond words
Sitting in the garden with no thoughts

Creative moments  cannot yet be bought
We think upon the  conversations heard
Ideas rise up like fishes to be caught

The mind is best when muscles are not taut
Then the  creatures wild may be allured
Sitting in the garden with  these thoughts

What  arrives is rarely what we sought
Pain and feelings darker may occur
Ideas rise up like fishes to be caught

Relaxation  makes the  visions blurred
This is not the end of the affair
Sitting in the garden with my  thoughts
Ideas rise up and dance and then are caught.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/feb/06/jacqueline-wilson-interview

“It is strange,” says Wilson as she gets up to leave, “that sometimes people assume the worst of children if they come from poor families. I remember being astonished when I took my daughter to a party given by her schoolfriend’s parents. They lived in a lovely, big house very near the block of council flats where I grew up. The mother was very friendly to me, and said how pleased she was that our daughters were friends because obviously she could have nothing to do with ‘those dreadful scary rough children from the council flats’. I didn’t want to embarrass her by saying that I had once been one of those very children.”

https://www.biography.com/writer/john-keats

“It has been an old comparison for our urging on – the Beehive; however, it seems to me that we should rather be the flower than the Bee – for it is a false notion that more is gained by receiving more than giving – no, the receiver and the giver are equal in their benefits. The flower, I doubt not, receives a fair guerdon from the Bee – its leaves blush deeper in the next spring – and who shall say between man and woman which is the most delighted”