I once had a doctor called Rose.

He had the most horrible toes

But he wore shoes so handsome

They cost a king’s ransom

He polished them until they glowed

The tree was creamy pale in morning light.

Now it darkens as we near the night.

The little branches shiver as we do

Hearing Putin’s name is like a blow

“Fear no more the heat o’ the sun” 

BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

(from Cymbeline)

Fear no more the heat o’ the sun,

Nor the furious winter’s rages;

Thou thy worldly task hast done,

Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages:

Golden lads and girls all must,

As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

Fear no more the frown o’ the great;

Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke;

Care no more to clothe and eat;

To thee the reed is as the oak:

The scepter, learning, physic, must

All follow this, and come to dust.

Fear no more the lightning flash,

Nor the all-dreaded thunder stone;

Fear not slander, censure rash;

Thou hast finished joy and moan:

All lovers young, all lovers must

Consign to thee, and come to dust.

No exorciser harm thee!

Nor no witchcraft charm thee!

Ghost unlaid forbear thee!

Nothing ill come near thee!

Quiet consummation have;

And renownèd be thy grave!

More About this Poem

Why is it so easy to destroy?

A life wiped out,a child,a girl a boy .

A railway station shelled as people flee

Death,oh death,my loved ones

lost to me

Cartology,,…….how to manage a horse and cart.

Cynicism,,… cultivating cynics.

Pointillism,,….. giving meaning to even very small things.

Logisticalist,,…..imitating logic.

Impressionism,……looking better than you ought to

Premodernism,…,a forward looking philosophy

Fictionalology,,,. The science of invention

Maternalism,….the love of people of all kinds

Do not take a lover to your bed.

Let him take you home and see you’ re fed.

Do not go on dates with married men

Don’t mistake a peacock for a hen.

if you want more money get a job

No need to fight or kill or rob

I’d like to creep into a double bed

With my dear old husband but he’s dead

I’d like to have my little cat by me

Watching television from my knee
Alas the cat took ill oh what a blow

Which loss was the worse,I do not know.

Now I have a television new

But ,I dont want to watch it with out you

Poetry and Religion
by Les Murray
From book: The daylight moon [

Religions are poems. They concert
our daylight and dreaming mind, our
emotions, instinct, breath and native gesture

into the only whole thinking: poetry.
Nothing’s said till it’s dreamed out in words
and nothing’s true that figures in words only.

A poem, compared with an arrayed religion,
may be like a soldier’s one short marriage night
to die and live by. But that is a small religion.

Full religion is the large poem in loving repetition;
like any poem, it must be inexhaustible and complete
with turns where we ask Now why did the poet do that?

You can’t pray a lie, said Huckleberry Finn;
you can’t poe one either. It is the same mirror:
mobile, glancing, we call it poetry,

fixed centrally, we call it a religion,
and God is the poetry caught in any religion,
caught, not imprisoned. Caught as in a mirror

that he attracted, being in the world as poetry
is in the poem, a law against its closure.
There’ll always be religion around while there is poetry

or a lack of it. Both are given, and intermittent,
as the action of those birds — crested pigeon, rosella parrot —
who fly with wings shut, then beating, and again shut.

From book: The daylight moon

National stealth worship

The devil’s service on Sunday in cemetery.

Fashionable health scares us.

Rational belch servers

What the Brontë was that?

It’s that pan again

Dickens?

No Dora’s.

When did you learn to read?

After I learned to talk

I don’t December any door

My poems are published all over the world by other people.

Plagiarism,,….I have lots of higher degrees and diplomas.

Should I worry?

It’s a compliment!

The poor can’t take this lockdown for too long
They have no back gardens, no birdsong
Their bed rooms shared, or they have none at all
No privacy, no silence, it appals

I hear them talked about in cruel ways
“They go into McDonalds every day”
Would you cook your meals in red wine bathed
If you had only got a microwave?

They can’t keep warm in winter in their homes
McDonald’s is a luxury they earn
Clean and neat with heating and hot drinks
They sit and look at me , like I’m the Sphinx

The average reading age in Britain’s only nine
They can’t read Boris’ letter, that’s malign

Intelligence agency,,…liars

Enormity, ..e book about norms

Academic ……….useless.

Smart,……too quick

Rapidity,… ,. Skill for canoe users.

Visibility,,,,.skill at being seen

Hostility,,,,..skill at receiving Holy Communion.

Flexibility,,…pliability.

Oh charm and beauty be our friends

As on our journey we thus wend

Times are hard and fear gnaws souls

Lord have mercy on us all

Virtuosity,,….being very charitable.

Precocity,,,going mad before most of us do

Animosity,,,. kindness to animals

Ferocity,,.,,having iron teeth and using them.

Democracy,,…. demons running a country.

Humorisity,,,….getting a degree in Yankee jokes

Criminology,,,, understanding criminals

Religiousity,,,.misinterpreting love.

Tasmania,,…going mad in the sunshine.

Curiosity,,,.a desire to heal the sick

Is Lucifer the ruler of the earth?

In that case things are going to get much worse

Living standards rise like bubble gum

Stick a pin in when you’ve done the sun.

The moon is dark and neon lights glare out.

Be alert,we don’t know who’s about.

Satan and his demons run about

Handing out the ethics humans flout.

9

Men wore woollen trousers shades of grey

Jackets with big pockets day by day

Now there is are no adults we wear jeans

Even if we’re fat or very lean

No suits for work no hats and never ties.

No munching in the street no small pork pies

How to get things in proportion every day

Get a new perspective your own way

Climb up Winter Hill to see Welsh hills

Looking down we see old cotton mills

Not so very far away the sea

As placid as a snake or bumble bee

I  see a gentle globe, the winter sun
Setting into softness  like pink down
As if a gentle wind made sunset come

The watercolour  mauve has overrun
Wishing to make light  of winter’s frown
I can see how  winter  hurts the sun

Overhead  it’s soft grey tinged with plum
This is no  fit garment for a clown
But  gentle winter winds made sunset come

A blueness planetary makes our dome
As if a verb is subtly changed to noun
I can see how  night clouds flirt with sun

All the pink is falling,falling ,gone
The sun is left a monarch with no crown
As if a low dark wind made nightfall come

My heart is watered as the colours run
Combining,dying,falling,night has won
I still see a  shadow of the sun
Now   the work  of  wind  is  over, done

A double trunk,a Siamese twin

The tree is two though each is thin.

In summer sun the shadow’s short

The branches stretch with shyness taut

The tree stands gently waiting for the sun

Although trees cannot speak they like a pun

My hair is rough and cannot yet be spun

I’ll make a shawl when all the house works done.

Who is Al Jabber?

The brother of Al Gebra.

And few people love algebra.

Without algebra there would be no modern physics.

Is that bad or good?

We might be living in caves or sheds.

Could it be worse than paying a giant mortgage?

It could have been better though wild animals might eat us

Is that worse than being shelled by the Russians?

At least you would be providing food for the hungry.

Did Jesus include animals when he said,feed the hungry

As he didn’t speak English it’s hard to tell.In fact English had not been invented by then.

How about Irish?

I can’t say.

Let’s have a cup of tea.

Jesus never had tea

Would you if you could turn water into wine?

But could he turn wine into water?

So why do we use letters in algebra?

Numbers have no phones.

What would happen if parallel lines met,?

Trains would crash

What is the square root of minus 1,?

I didn’t even know numbers had roots square or circular.

How many degrees are there in a right angle?

I thought you got degrees at Uni .

I don’t understand what this right angle is.

It means Looking at the world in the best possible way.

What is trigonometry for?

Measuring triggers.

What is topology?

The height of wisdom

Why do we need numbers?

It takes two to tango.

I have got more and more incontinent.
Do stop admiring Europe

Why do the government tell us to eat more fruit and veg?
To help evacuate the Common Market from our bodies

Why do the government not have enough beds in hospitals?
They can’t all go to sleep at once

Why are the politicians so stupid?
Because we are.

I am still incontinent
Don’t worry, only another week in the EU
I’ll apply for an Irish passport
You’re not Irish
No, but my parents were

I will miss the Spanish omelettes
But you never go there.

I will not miss Mass on Sundays.
I will become an atheist and worship myself for an hour.Much more satisfying.

I wonder how Enlightened we are.
Well, the light is not the problem.It’s the vision.

I saw the Light once
At Blackpool?

God is love
So is real love God?

Can we go on the Trans Siberian Express?
Where to ?

1

Why divorce?

She has no moral flaws so I feel inferior.

So,….,I have become impotent.

Is impotence grounds for divorce?

Yes if it is only with her.

You / have another woman?

In my mind!

2

So why are you asking for a no faults divorce?

He has no faults, he is just ugly?

Was he better when you married him?

I was blinded by love

I see but you don’t

We never get washed at the weekend

We like to be dirty like coal

But when mother visits

She will say what is this is

Get me hot water and bowl

In the past people were dirty

But people looked roughly the same

Now we are phobic

After aerobics

We feel like a cat yet untamed

Our natural odours are sexy

Our nature propels us to mate

So get washed less often

And deodorant freshening

For procreation it’s never too late

What a my shame my husband is dead

I thought you were unhappy with him

Yes and from Weds I could have got a no faults divorce!

Well why were you keen to hide his faults?

The faults were mine

If he got home late I’d throw his dinner at him.

I wondered why you had so few plates.

I lied about him to the neighbours

Lying is hard when we forget which lie we said to whom,

I told them he beat me

Did he?

I beat him.

At what?

Chess

That’s not cruelty

It was to him

But he could have taken lessons

In what?

Being a good loser

To your own wife?

Well he was very sarcastic

He said for someone from the poorest street in Lancashire to have got into Cambridge they must have thought I was black