Recommend a Poem

Angeline

Poet Chick
Joined
Mar 11, 2002
Posts
27,041
Here is the sister thread to Tzara's Recommend a Book thread.

You can recommend a poem to an individual, group or the whole forum.

Say why you chose to recommend the poem you picked. What do you like or not like about it? Is there something interesting in the poem--format, punctuation, language, imagery, etc.--that you want to mention? If you pick a poem that we've all probably seen many times over ("Plums" by William Carlos Williams or "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer Day" by Shakespeare, for example), show us something new or different about that poem!

Make sure you give full credit to the author. Their name and your source for it (book, website, etc.), should appear with the poem.

Do not post a poem by a Literotica author unless you have their permission to do so. If you can't track them down, you can always link to the poem. Linking is not copying and it keeps the credit with the author. If the author agrees in writing (a pm is fine as you'd both have a copy) that it's ok to post their poem here, then feel free.

Ok? Ready? Steady? Go! :D
 
I must say that I'm excited by this thread.

Here is one of my favourite poems by Theodore Roethke. I find the imagery and implied movements in the poem pleasing.

I hope you enjoy it as well!


I Knew a Woman
BY THEODORE ROETHKE

I knew a woman, lovely in her bones,
When small birds sighed, she would sigh back at them;
Ah, when she moved, she moved more ways than one:
The shapes a bright container can contain!
Of her choice virtues only gods should speak,
Or English poets who grew up on Greek
(I’d have them sing in chorus, cheek to cheek).

How well her wishes went! She stroked my chin,
She taught me Turn, and Counter-turn, and Stand;
She taught me Touch, that undulant white skin;
I nibbled meekly from her proffered hand;
She was the sickle; I, poor I, the rake,
Coming behind her for her pretty sake
(But what prodigious mowing we did make).

Love likes a gander, and adores a goose:
Her full lips pursed, the errant note to seize;
She played it quick, she played it light and loose;
My eyes, they dazzled at her flowing knees;
Her several parts could keep a pure repose,
Or one hip quiver with a mobile nose
(She moved in circles, and those circles moved).

Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay:
I’m martyr to a motion not my own;
What’s freedom for? To know eternity.
I swear she cast a shadow white as stone.
But who would count eternity in days?
These old bones live to learn her wanton ways:
(I measure time by how a body sways).

(from poetryfoundation.org)
 
Lovely poem, Grl! Thank you for posting it. And I see what you mean about all the movement in it. :)
 
First of all I love humorous poems as most of you know, and this one by Pam Ayres had me chortling out loud. Pam Ayres is an English poet, comedian, songwriter and presenter of radio and television programmes, well known for the humour in her poetry and her insight into everyday situations. I reckon this one sums up Christmas to a T , we've all been there but not all of us can put it down so succinctly. When she reads her poems they are in a broad Berkshire accent.
.
Goodwill To Men - Give Us Your Money
by Pam Ayres
.
It was Christmas Eve on a Friday
The shops was full of cheer,
With tinsel in the windows,
And presents twice as dear.
A thousand Father Christmases,
Sat in their little huts,
And folk was buying crackers
And folk was buying nuts.

All up and down the country,
Before the light was snuffed,
Turkeys they get murdered,
And cockerels they got stuffed,
Christmas cakes got marzipanned,
And puddin's they got steamed
Mothers they got desperate
And tired kiddies screamed.

Hundredweight's of Christmas cards,
Went flying through the post,
With first class postage stamps on those,
You had to flatter most.
Within a million kitchens,
Mince pies was being made,
On everyone's radio,
"White Christmas", it was played.

Out in the frozen countryside
Men crept round on their own,
Hacking off the holly,
What other folks had grown,
Mistletoe on willow trees,
Was by a man wrenched clear,
So he could kiss his neighbour's wife,
He'd fancied all the year.

And out upon the hillside,
Where the Christmas trees had stood,
All was completely barren,
But for little stumps of wood,
The little trees that flourished
All the year were there no more,
But in a million houses,
Dropped their needles on the floor.

And out of every cranny, cupboard,
Hiding place and nook,
Little bikes and kiddies' trikes,
Were secretively took,
Yards of wrapping paper,
Was rustled round about,
And bikes were wheeled to bedrooms,
With the pedals sticking out.

Rolled up in Christmas paper
The Action Men were tensed,
All ready for the morning,
When their fighting life commenced,
With tommy guns and daggers,
All clustered round about,
"Peace on Earth - Goodwill to Men"
The figures seemed to shout.

The church was standing empty,
The pub was standing packed,
There came a yell, "Noel, Noel!"
And glasses they got cracked.
From up above the fireplace,
Christmas cards began to fall,
And trodden on the floor, said:
"Merry Christmas, to you all."
 
Last edited:
Bells.

Summoned by Bells John Betjeman's autobiographical blank verse poem was made into a BBC programme in 1976 the you tube link to which follows:-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsDb-dgXnU4

The first part deals with his childhood between 1906 and 1914.

Betjeman who recites in this recording was a premature 70 at the time with the onset of Parkinson's disease already evident. His reading in the instantly recognisable 'quavery wavery' voice is perfect for this work. Not a 'great' poet, but Betjeman was a very good one, with an observant eye, technically skilled and a talent for conveying atmosphere, especially what he called the modest emotions.

Modern critics have mostly looked down their noses at Betjeman 'lightweight, the suburban poet." Betjeman himself would not have minded. He would have admitted nostalgia, but his observational accuity would never allow sentimentality to creep in. He achieved the impossible, the sale of his verses by the hundreds of thousands to a people he loved, and who loved him. Very much a poet of the English, he never quite took himself seriously, a poet to be enjoyed rather than over analysed.
 
Robert Herrick

Delight in Disorder

By Robert Herrick

A sweet disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness;
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction;
An erring lace, which here and there
Enthrals the crimson stomacher;
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribands to flow confusedly;
A winning wave, deserving note,
In the tempestuous petticoat;
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie
I see a wild civility:
Do more bewitch me, than when art
Is too precise in every part.
 
I'm enjoying reading the poems posted thus far.

Ishtat, the Betjeman is homely but such an interesting window into another time. I see what you mean about the strong observation keeping the poem from falling into bathos. It really draws one into the world. I'm going back to listen to more! :)

Ogg, I know this Herrick poem and I think I actually wrote a variation on it (from a woman's pov) as some point. Now I'm looking at it and wondering if it's a sonnet variation. It's not pentameter, but it is 14 lines with a mostly intact rhyme scheme and an ending couplet. Is there a story behind it that you know? Maybe some of our sonneteers can weigh in on it.

Thanks for the poems, guys. :rose:
 
[This Red Cup]
Valerio Magrelli

And the crack in the teacup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
—W. H. Auden

. . . as when a crack
crosses a cup.
—R. M. Rilke


I have from you this red
cup with which to drink to all my days
one by one
in the pale mornings, the pearls
of the long necklace of thirst.
And if it drops and breaks, I, too,
will be shattered, but compassionately
I will repair it
to continue the kisses uninterrupted.
And each time the handle
of the rim gets cracked
I will go back to glue it
until my love will have completed
the hard, slow work of a mosaic.

It comes down along the white
slope of the cup
along the concave interior
and flashes, just like lightning—
the crack,
black, permanent,
the sign of a storm
still thundering
over this resonant landscape
of enamel.


Translated by Dana Gioia
Source: Poetry Magazine (1989)
 
More Betjeman

Slough
by John Betjeman (1906 - 1984)

John Betjeman published his poem about Slough in 1937 in the collected works Continual Dew. Slough was becoming increasingly industrial and some housing conditions were very cramped. In willing the destruction of Slough, Betjeman urges the bombs to pick out the vulgar profiteers but to spare the bald young clerks. He really was very fond of his fellow human beings. Slough is much improved nowadays and he might be pleasantly surprised by a stroll there.

Slough

Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!
It isn't fit for humans now,
There isn't grass to graze a cow.
Swarm over, Death!

Come, bombs and blow to smithereens
Those air -conditioned, bright canteens,
Tinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans,
Tinned minds, tinned breath.

Mess up the mess they call a town-
A house for ninety-seven down
And once a week a half a crown
For twenty years.

And get that man with double chin
Who'll always cheat and always win,
Who washes his repulsive skin
In women's tears:

And smash his desk of polished oak
And smash his hands so used to stroke
And stop his boring dirty joke
And make him yell.

But spare the bald young clerks who add
The profits of the stinking cad;
It's not their fault that they are mad,
They've tasted Hell.

It's not their fault they do not know
The birdsong from the radio,
It's not their fault they often go
To Maidenhead

And talk of sport and makes of cars
In various bogus-Tudor bars
And daren't look up and see the stars
But belch instead.

In labour-saving homes, with care
Their wives frizz out peroxide hair
And dry it in synthetic air
And paint their nails.

Come, friendly bombs and fall on Slough
To get it ready for the plough.
The cabbages are coming now;
The earth exhales.
 
Two more powerful poems!

T-Zed, I am unfamiliar with this poet, but love the poem: a whole world of a story in a crack in a cup!

Ogg that is a great counterpoint to Bells. What happened to Slough during WW2? And if it was destroyed did Betjeman take any flack for it? Fascinating!
 
Sonnet for the Sin of Foolishness

Sonnet for the Sin of Foolishness,
by Rebecca Morgan Frank (from Georgia Review, 2006)

Love is a false god, a masked fraud
that even the atheist courts with belief.
A magician favored for his sleight of hand.
We love to be fooled. We follow
a trail of circumstantial evidence
built by other blind believers. Why would we doubt
what even the godless hold pure? Every moment
in love’s grip takes us further from reason.
And when it’s proven absent, not even leaving ash?
We perform our ablutions, place pennies and lockets
on its altar, search the faces of people on the train.
Oh, Love, we whisper from the streets—
make me a follower, make me care for no other
but you, you the enemy, the savior, the absent
plea, the adored and ageless fallacy.


I found this poem recently while looking around the Georgia Review, and it really moved me with its spare language and wistfulness. Some might see it as cynical; I don't see it that way. I see it as speaking truth.
 
Two more powerful poems!

T-Zed, I am unfamiliar with this poet, but love the poem: a whole world of a story in a crack in a cup!

Ogg that is a great counterpoint to Bells. What happened to Slough during WW2? And if it was destroyed did Betjeman take any flack for it? Fascinating!

Slough was bombed but not destroyed. However, Betjeman's poem gave impetus to planning regulations that were just beginning to come into force when he wrote the poem. Post war developments provided for much more open space, parks and gardens, and a restriction on unfettered urban sprawl.

Betjeman wasn't the only advocate of better town planning. He was one of many, but his poem Slough put into simple terms what many expressed at greater length. The town of Slough now celebrates how much it has changed since Betjeman wrote the poem, even if some of us still think it is a dump. :)
 
Mer, that is a lovely sonnet. It is a sonnet, right? It calls itself a sonnet. *Scratches head and looks around for those who act like they know what a sonnet is.* :D

Ogg, thank you for the 411: that is a great postscript to the two poems (even if Slough is still a dump!).
 
:rolleyes:
Mer, that is a lovely sonnet. It is a sonnet, right? It calls itself a sonnet. *Scratches head and looks around for those who act like they know what a sonnet is.* :D

Ogg, thank you for the 411: that is a great postscript to the two poems (even if Slough is still a dump!).


I would probably not know a sonnet if it ran me over with a tank :rolleyes: so don't feel qualified. I would rely on Tzara or AH or Annie, those better versed in verses that obey forms. I'm glad you like it.

And the thread is just teeming with interesting poetry - way cool! Thanks for starting it!
 
:rolleyes:


I would probably not know a sonnet if it ran me over with a tank :rolleyes: so don't feel qualified. I would rely on Tzara or AH or Annie, those better versed in verses that obey forms. I'm glad you like it.

And the thread is just teeming with interesting poetry - way cool! Thanks for starting it!

You're welcome. Thanks for having the great idea. :)
 
Slough was bombed but not destroyed. However, Betjeman's poem gave impetus to planning regulations that were just beginning to come into force when he wrote the poem. Post war developments provided for much more open space, parks and gardens, and a restriction on unfettered urban sprawl.

Betjeman wasn't the only advocate of better town planning. He was one of many, but his poem Slough put into simple terms what many expressed at greater length. The town of Slough now celebrates how much it has changed since Betjeman wrote the poem, even if some of us still think it is a dump. :)
Interesting rhyme scheme to the poem. I'll just mention, for those like me whose accent is Northwestern American, that "Slough" is pronounced so as to rhyme with "cow" rather than like "slew" which is how people in my part of the country would usually pronounce the word. :rolleyes:
 
T-Zed, I am unfamiliar with this poet, but love the poem: a whole world of a story in a crack in a cup!
I came across the poem in an article about translation in The Writer's Chronicle (it was, among other things, comparing Gioia's translation of the poem to one by Jamie McKendrick). I've since read some more of his poetry and really like him.

I like the idea for this thread.
 
Interesting rhyme scheme to the poem. I'll just mention, for those like me whose accent is Northwestern American, that "Slough" is pronounced so as to rhyme with "cow" rather than like "slew" which is how people in my part of the country would usually pronounce the word. :rolleyes:

Many English place names have tripped up the unwary. I give you .........
Belvoir – Beever
Fowey (Cornwall) Foy
Gloucester – Gloster
Holborn, Central London – Hoe-burn
Mousehole, Cornwall – Mowzel
Happisburgh - Hazebrer
Wymondham - Windum
Magdalen College (not a place but worth a mention) - Maudlin
Woolfardisworthy, Devon - Woolzery
 
Many English place names have tripped up the unwary. I give you .........
Belvoir – Beever
Fowey (Cornwall) Foy
Gloucester – Gloster
Holborn, Central London – Hoe-burn
Mousehole, Cornwall – Mowzel
Happisburgh - Hazebrer
Wymondham - Windum
Magdalen College (not a place but worth a mention) - Maudlin
Woolfardisworthy, Devon - Woolzery

Along the same lines -
Caius College also in Cambridge - Keys

Just thought of Worcester - Wooster :D
Pontefract -Pomfrit
 
Last edited:
As a matter of interest we would pronounce slough as a word as sloff, Snakes shed or slough off their skins.
 
Meditation on a Grapefruit

BY CRAIG ARNOLD

To wake when all is possible
before the agitations of the day
have gripped you
To come to the kitchen
and peel a little basketball
for breakfast
To tear the husk
like cotton padding a cloud of oil
misting out of its pinprick pores
clean and sharp as pepper
To ease
each pale pink section out of its case
so carefully without breaking
a single pearly cell
To slide each piece
into a cold blue china bowl
the juice pooling until the whole
fruit is divided from its skin
and only then to eat
so sweet
a discipline
precisely pointless a devout
involvement of the hands and senses
a pause a little emptiness

each year harder to live within
each year harder to live without

Source: Poetry (October 2009)

I love how so simple and joyful this is.
 
Another simple, joyful poem by one of my favourite poets.

Onions

Lorna Crozier
From: Sex Lives of Vegetables.


The onion loves the onion.
It hugs its many layers,
saying, O, O, O,
each vowel smaller
than the last.

Some say it has no heart.
It doesn't need one.
It surrounds itself,
feels whole. Primordial.
First among vegetables.

If Eve had bitten it
instead of the apple,
how different
Paradise.
 
The Turkish Trench Dog - Poem by Geoffrey Dearmer

Night held me as I crawled and scrambled near
The Turkish lines. Above, the mocking stars
Silvered the curving parapet, and clear
Cloud-latticed beams o'erflecked the land with bars;
I, crouching, lay between
Tense-listening armies peering through the night,
Twin giants bound by tentacles unseen
Here in dim-shadowed light
I saw him, as a sudden movement turned
His eyes towards me, glowing eyes that burned
A moment ere his snuffling muzzle found
My trail; and then as serpents mesmerise
He chained me with those unrelenting eyes,
That muscle-sliding rhythm, knit and bound
In spare-limbed symmetry, those perfect jaws
And soft-approaching pitter-patter paws.
Nearer and nearer like a wolf he crept —
That moment had my swift revolver leapt —
But terror seized me, terror born of shame
Brought flooding revelation. For he came
As one who offers comradeship deserved,
An open ally of the human race,
And sniffling at my prostrate form unnerved
He licked my face!


Geoffrey Dearmer lost his brother at Gallipoli shortly before he landed there himself. After Gallipoli he fought on the Western Front. He lived in apparent obscurity until his poems, including The Turkish Trench Dog, were published on his 100th birthday.
 
Many English place names have tripped up the unwary. I give you .........
...
Magdalen College (not a place but worth a mention) - Maudlin
Woolfardisworthy, Devon - Woolzery


Speaking of.... how do you pronounce this one - Balliol College?

And that Devon place - whoa, how do you get from the original to that?
 
Back
Top