Sometimes beauty only needs to be skin deep

Even fresh air is not original.

How can someone else define your duty?

Why is it wrong to feel strong emotions if you are English?

Would you change your DNA if you could?

Would be nice if I could borrow some DNA for a few days

There’s an atom bomb with only one atom in it. But I can’t see it.

Evoking the beauty, the stars so far away,
I like to watch geese at the end of day.
Patterns and poems disclose other worlds.
Feel the hand of a baby with the fingers all curled

See the trust and the smile when the mother is home,
To create entire worlds for the one she has borne.
For chaos and panic or not far away
Even in adults who don’t care to say.

The little hands touch me so deeply, so well;
How come the world is diving to hell?
How can we kill little wains by the score
Was it for this that I opened your door?

Was it for this that love electrified us,
And we were lost in each other, in the holy white dove.
Was it for war that we gave love our wombs
Making more soldiers and filling more tombs?

The bombs are a-loading they’re having parades.
It’s not North Korea, it’s Washington, dude.
Let the tanks roll on Corrie and the Bedouin tribes.
Let the allies laugh blindly as the Lord Jesus dies.

O take me, dear mother.Please take me away
I can’t see no point in saying my prayers.
The leaders’ religions are making God frown.
The desert is empty, the tents all dragged down.

The centuries of living so free , so mobile;
The holy land blessing as they pause for while.
The little black tents like wombs of the night
Are all gone to shredders as we sing, Silent Night.

Abandon not the wildness of your heart

In the unreformed, creation starts

There is no privilege in wealth nor gain.

In the rejected fragments life remains.

Remember man you are the dust and corpse

In all thats gone before there lingers hope.

Golden rod shall flourish and grow tall

In the gardens of our hearts its dust shall fall

Extract from the book by Marion Milner

An experiment in leisure

But if man’s salvation depended on his capacity to see the facts, both about himself and the outside world, and if the poets were the pioneers in this, what were the conditions under which poetry could grow? For a long time I had been puzzled by the continual recurrence of images from the Bible in my thinking. Then I find this note in my diary: Just supposing this is what the Gospel story is partly about? All this year it’s been growing in my mind, the possibility that the Gospel story is concerned, not with morals at all, not with what one OUGHT to do, because someone (God, father). expects it of you, but with practical rules for creative thinking, a handbook for the process of perceiving the facts of one’s own experience – and, of course, in this sense, with ‘salvation’, for it is ignorance and blindness which lead to the City of Destruction. And the central truth, is it that only by a repeated giving up of every kind of purpose, plunging into the void, voluntary dying upon the cross, can the human spirit grow, and achieve those progressive fusings of isolated bits of experience which we call wisdom, truth?

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/07/31/can-poetry-change-your-life

Extract

As radical as empathy and imagination can be, these qualities exist in the mind. But there is also a poetic language of embodied experience, one that uses poetry to seek out the body. In “Feeld,” the trans poet Jos Charles bends language, via willful spelling, to a place where it must be parsed slowly, struggled through, read not so much with the brain as the mouth. Language becomes a felt thing, a terrain to be crossed. The title itself toys with such a transformation, the word feeld being a marriage, perhaps, of feel, felt and field. Reading lines like “i care so / much abot the whord i cant / reed / it marks mye bak / wen i pass / with / a riben in mye hayre,” I can’t help feeling that the body — itself a shifting and malleable possibility — is the target for these poems.

Through the strange labor of deciphering the text, I come to understand that Charles is transmitting an experience that I must allow to travel from her body into mine. When I do, the distance between us alters. It grows smaller and strangely charged. I’m made to realize that the very vernacular of the poems also tampers with history; it announces a continuum where Chaucer and 19th-century enslaved blacks and a 21st-century white trans woman seem quite effortlessly to share a lexicon.

Justin Phillip Reed, whose “Indecency” received the 2018 National Book Award in poetry, writes close to the flesh. His poems take up the body in desire and violence, and they do so by thrusting the reader into a stark visceral encounter with their material. The poem “Portrait With Stiff Upper Lip” is graphically rendered so that it can’t be read line by line; the page must be turned, repositioned so that text, overlapping and running every which direction, can be seen. Beyond typography, the poem asks the reader to take on the physical and emotional sense of a black man hearing himself, or someone like him, discussed via fragments. A reader staggers through a field of statements like “looks like planet of the apes” “probably has / a huge” “probably has a parent” “in / prison” “NO” “[in / the / pen]” “I’ve never had” “with a really hot BLKguy.” The reader, dragged forward yet afraid to keep reading, is made to feel caught in a hostile gaze, shoved around by heedless voices.

Suzette Haden Elgin

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzette_Haden_Elgin

Recognizing language that escalates

Acknowledging that there are times when escalating a conflict is the appropriate thing to do, if your ultimate goal is discussion and some kind of mutual agreement, how you bring that conflict into the open and force others to deal with it–the language you choose, the process you follow–will make or break your chances of productive engagement.

• Blaming others.
• Being over-apologetic or accommodating. “That’s okay, you just go ahead and have a good time without me.”
• Asserting one’s rights, stating one’s perspective with absolute certainty, globalizing (what’s true for me is true for everyone else).
  Everyone knows that he steals. No one has a right to talk to me like that.
• Attacking someone’s personality or morality, someone’s motivations. You knew we had a different plan yet you went ahead unilaterally just to spite everyone. That manager is out to get us. I know you meant well, dear, but you lack judgment.

As hidebound as a leather chair-

As thoughtless as a broom;

He is more stuck  than is despair

Which hovers round his room

Hurt by  bullies in his school.

He made protective rules.

Never go out  with a girl

Never aid a fool.

Never vote in case you err

Never wear red  socks.

Be angry that life’s  so unfair

Live inside a box.

Always say your prayers at night#

Never read in bed

And never ever think about

What  you might do instead.

His menu was so regular,

From  change he gained no pleasure

He cut his meat up with  an axe

To make it hard to measure.

He counted every step he took

And every time he  wheezed.

He wrote it in his diary

And this act made him sneeze.

He was allergic to the air;

Allergic to the sun;

At least the tickle in his throat,

Made him laugh in fun.

He had a job with a big bank

He always wore a suit

Till one day his colleague said

That only plants had roots.

The implication seemed to be

He was in stasis glued.

He always wore the same old clothes

And ate the same old food.

Could he help himself and how?

Could he be softer skinned?

He dreamed he climbed up a great cliff

Despite  the gale and wind.

And so he  left the bank and moved

To work in a coal mine.

He crawled along the tunnels black

And measured them with twine

.

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«

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10509585.2014.899763?src=recsys,

Extract:

I argue that the oft-discussed connection between Wordsworth’s “wise passiveness” and Keats’s “negative capability” has led scholars to overlook Keats’s own notion of passivity as a persuasive, as well as receptive, force. I argue that Keats saw passivity as an embodied, and even physically demanding, attitude, that could prompt the interest and attention of others – an understanding that builds on the theatrical attitudes adopted by Romantic stage actors, who struck exciting poses to suspend dramatic intensity.

http://www.literary-articles.com/2010/02/wordsworths-views-on-poetic-truth.html?m=1

0

Aristotle was the fist who declared poetic truth to be superior to historical truth. He called poetry the most philosophic of all writings. Wordsworth agrees with Aristotle in this matter. Poetry is given an exalted position by Wordsworth in such a way that it treats the particular as well as the universal. Its aim is universal truth. Poetry is true to nature. Wordsworth declares poetry to be the “image” or “man and nature”. A poet has to keep in mind that his end (objective) is to impart pleasure. He declares poetry will adjust itself to the new discoveries and inventions of science. It will create a new idiom for the communication of new thoughts. But the poet’s truth is such that sees into heart of things and enables others to see the same. Poetic truth ties all mankind with love and a sense of oneness.

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https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-currently-at-war

If You Want to Understand Why Democracy Is Under Attack, Read This Book https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/30/books/review/ellen-reeve-black-pill.html?smid=nytcore-android-share

https://wp.me/p1XvpO-7o1

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jan/04/pat-barker-women-carry-the-can-long-term

In the afternoon god smiled at me

He took the form of great buzzing bee

He hovered over flowers and danced away

After that what could I do but pray?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sarcasm-spurs-creative-thinking/

The problem with sarcasm or even irony it is that people don’t always realize that you are being sarcastic.

But in a small amount maybe it’s ok

Her little paw  was delicate to hold

I pressed the pads to make the claws come out

She didn’t mind but stretched luxuriously

A happy  sigh came from her mouth.

She  wriggled slightly all over

Then subsided back into the deep sleep

I think cats must dream the same way we do and for the same reasons.

https://www.thepoetrysalon.com/tps/2019/06/21/why-are-people-afraid-to-write-poetry/

Most people don’t realize that writing poetry is less about Allen Ginsberg’s, “ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,” and more about everyday truths, small happenings and fleeting human moments (which, when you feel them deeply enough, are equivalent to that ancient heavenly connection). In an age when telling the truth is a revolutionary act and face-to-face contact comes through a screen, just taking time to talk about something commonplace like, let’s say, “a narrow fellow in the grass” (Emily Dickinson) whom we spotted on our way to work, well. Damn. You’d think a writer with that much observational power must have a special pipeline to deeper, unfathomable mysteries.

I  thought I’d take a photograph of you.
You were sitting in the garden full of smiles
But now you’ve gone and I am sadly  blue.
I wonder if there’s any hint or clue
Even our policemen have no files
I thought I’d take a photograph of you
What’s a human being supposed to do?
Even copying this takes such a while.
But now you’ve gone and  I am feeling blue
The power that runs my mind has broken, fused
Sometimes even women feel quite frail
I thought I’d take a photograph of you

My brain is held together with some glue
I am well bewildered, I am riled
Everybody else  is gone so I feel blue
By your love this lady was beguiled.
And even now my love has never failed
I meant to take a photograph of you.
But now you’ve gone and I feel  sad and blue

https://www.theguardian.com/books/article/2024/jul/27/pat-barker-benjamin-myers-voyage-home-rare-singles-in-conversation-im-absolutely-intolerable-when-im-not-writing?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

In my dreams I travel deep and low
Into the happy world of long ago
The jacket on the chair that smelled of smoke
The funny tales, he sang, he laughed, he spoke

So faint the memory yet ,strong are its remains
Security and love in our domain
The brushes and the stipplers all stood by
For noone told his tools that he would die.

On his shoulders, like a queen I rode
So safe and happy on the path he trod.
His voice was clear and he could whistle too
In those days men were used to do

And love shone from him on my mother dear
She laughed and made us cakes for Sunday tea
What tragedy to leave his children five
But in that distant space he is alive

The fire as red as any glowing rose
We were dressed so well in home made clothes
Too happy, needing no words to relate
Our sense of being in this generous space

I can’t get back to them I cannot swim
The passages too wet, the light so dim
Yet I feel it in my body faint and clear
Death is not the end of those so dear.

Deep inside our minds , ancestors live
And to out hearts a depth and breadth they give
Yet missing him,I hover near the place
Where I might dive into his lost embrace

The table where we banged our little heads
The chairs to close together like a bed
The teapot  always full, the sugar bowl
The fire, the kettle , pussy cat and coal

The fireplace had its oven nice and warm
Looking at red coals made me feel calm
The children seem to play in that far space
All around is love  am so on I gaze

https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony

Extract

Irony is a term for a figure of speech.^[1] Irony is when something happens that is opposite from what is expected. It can often be funny, but it is also used in tragedies. There are many types of irony, including those listed below:

• Dramatic irony, when the audience knows something is going to happen on stage that the characters on stage do not.
• Socratic irony, when someone (usually a teacher) pretends to be stupid in order to show how stupid his pupils are (while at the same time the reader or audience understand the situation).
• Cosmic irony, when something that everyone thinks will happen actually happens very differently.
• Situational irony e.g. Mr. Smith gets a parking ticket. This is ironic because Mr. Smith is a traffic warden.
• Verbal irony is an absence of expression and intention. Sarcasm may sometimes involve verbal irony.
• Irony of fate is the misfortune in the result of fate or chance.
• The difference between of things seem to be or reality.

Examples[change | change source]

• In Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet, Juliet takes a potion that will put her to sleep, making her look dead. She does this in the hopes of being reunited with Romeo. He incorrectly learns of her death, and kills himself. This is an example of dramatic irony, as the reader/viewer knows she is not dead, but Romeo does not.
• A common example of cosmic irony could be that a child wants some kind of pudding, and misbehaves to try to get it. The parent withholds it because of the child’s behavior.
• Verbal irony can be found in sarcasm, but not just that.
• In Sophocles‘ play Oedipus Rex, Oedipus acts out based on the knowledge of his fate which in turn leads to the fulfillment of the tragic fate. This is an example of how fate plays on irony.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2010/04/humor-and-poetry

Extract:

In 1993, I took a left turn one day out of my MFA program and found myself at the National Poetry Slam in San Francisco. There I discovered several poets who were funny for the sake of being funny. Particularly Hal Sirowitz from New York (“don’t stick your arm out the window, mother said” and Matt Cook from Milwaukee (“it was easy to write the Great American Novel, back when there were only five American novels”) Both poets initially delighted me and confounded me: There are no similes, a voice in my head said. What would Tom Lux (my first teacher) say? the voice continued. Despite my resistance, I believe those poets gave me a kind of permission to explore humor a little more vigorously in my second book, The Forgiveness Parade (1998), for “I thought the word loin and the word lion were the same thing. I thought celibate was a kind of fish”. Perhaps in that book there were places where I was too vigorous in my pursuit: looking back there are a few poems that are just a little too jokey somehow, a little one-dimensional.

I am becoming aware of how some humor can set a roadblock for the poetic speaker, making it impossible for the speaker to get back to a serious place. And how some other (less frequent) uses of humor can leave that door open. I want to leave that door open

I remember all the  funny things we did
Peering into windows lit by lamps
Climbing cliffs then chased by geese and dog

Walking down from Redcar, sea so still
After Saltburn Pier, the cliffs high jump
I remember all the funny things we did

Wandering Whitby in a sea grey smog
Eating a pork pie cut into lumps
Climbing cliffs then chased by geese and dog

Old Hunstanton , white sands where we’d sit
The wild spikes of the gorse spread out unclamped
I remember all the colours,scents, and that

I feel the joy inside my heart is lit
Woe is leavened by old nature’s stamp
Climbing high then chased through mud by dogs

We see in shadows shades are not so stark
In Studland Bay astonished by skylarks
I remember all the humour and the love
Climbing cliffs then caught by geese and God

( We were chased by geese in Devon after climbing a cliff.No doubt chased by a man after we peered into his garden)

https://www.themarginalian.org/2017/10/11/a-life-of-ones-own-joanna-field-marion-milner/#:~:text=which%2C%20in%20the%20sobering%20words%20of%20E.E.%20Cummings%2C%20%E2%80%9Cis%20doing%20its%20best%2C%20night%20and%20day%2C%20to%20make%20you%20everybody%20else.%E2%80%9D%20Try%20as%20we%20might%20not%20to%20be%20blinded%20by%20society%E2%80%99s%20prescriptions%20for%20happiness%2C%20we%20are%20still%20social%20creatures%20porous%20to%20the%20values%20of%20our%20peers%20%E2%80%94%20creatures

Loneliness, the word’s not strong enough
For widows and their masculine counterparts.
Ripped in half, that’s more the phrase; like tough.

No arms left now, that never will rebuff.
No eager lips which whispering love impart
Loneliness, the word’s not strong enough

People say, of course, the going’s rough
The coming’s gone and nothing shall gestate
Ripped in half, that’s more the phrase; like, tough.

Never more to share cartoons and laughs.
Never more to be a chosen mate
Loneliness, the word’s not wrong enough.

Did we know the heart of what we had?
Did we learn the art of love. of fate?
Ripped in half, that’s more the phrase; like, tough.

You have gone and closed now is the gate
In a mad ball, I dance with love and hate
Loneliness, the word’s not strong enough!
Ripped in half, that’s more the phrase; like, tough.

Flowers by virtue of design
Appeal to both the heart and mind
First, perceive and then dwell on
Beauty, truth and thus reason