Poetry!

[Njaco]

Big, ya just sent a chill through me.

On this very day my father died 6 years ago and that was what we wrote on his funeral rememberance cards. Time for a shot.

 

[BikerBabe]

The only thing that impresses women is a big fat co*k and loads of $$$$...-cut-

Oh dear, Les: Thanks for the laugh of the day here!
You make me believe quite strongly, that my understanding of men is a whole lot better than your understanding of women! *chuckles* *wipes eyes*...heheheeeheheheh...

 

[SpitfireKing]

I think my balls just went back up inside...

Well, glad you guys showed him

 

[BikerBabe]

The Invitation

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting in your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dreams, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit in pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own,if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tip of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, or to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story you're telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul.

I want to know if you can be faithful and therefore be trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see beauty even when it is not pretty every day, and if you can source your life from God's presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of a lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, "Yes!"

It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have.

I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children.

It doesn't interest me who you are, how you came to be here.

I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied.

I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone with yourself, and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

~ Oriah Mountain Dreamer.

 

[RabidAlien]

Methinks it would be a pretty rare individual indeed who could say "yes" to all of those. I certainly can't...but would like to be the type of person who could.

 

[BikerBabe]

I hear you, RA. It's one helluva "To do"-list, but good none the same.

 

[T-6]

"A man of few words" by Meville Hardiment

Black eyed Corporal Farrell
was a man of few words other
than the usual anglo-saxons
sprinkled around barrackrooms
and camps. He had no words
for the ragged shrapnel slicing
through his kneecaps but
used his morphia and that was that.
We sat side by side in the sun,
for 'lightning never strikes twice
in the same place' I had said.
Side by side wishing the frank
sharp crack and slap of shrapnel
would cease and leave us be.
He might have dreamt of England
and some soft hospital bed. I don't
know, and we just waited. And then
a sniper's bullet holed his head.
He looked at me reproachfully and barked
'F*ck!"

 

[T-6]

"Luck" by Denis McHarrie

I suppose they'll say his last thoughts were of simple things,
Of April back at home, and the late sun on his wings;
Or that he murmured someone else's name
As earth reclaimed him sheathed in flame.
Oh God! Let's have no more of empty words,
Lip service ornamenting death!
The worms don't spare the hero;
Nor can children feed upon resounding praises of his deed.
'He died who loved to live,' they'll say,
'Unselfishly so we might have today!'
Like hell! He fought because he had to fight;
He died that's all. It was his unlucky night.

 

[T-6]

"An Irish airman foresees his death" William Butler Yeats

I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate
Those that I guard I do not love;
My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan's poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public man, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.

 

[T-6]

I read this little bit of verse about Bomber Command a year ago or so ago. I've tried finding it again but can't. I'm pretty sure this is how it went but don't remember if this is all or just part of it. Does this ring any bells for anyone?

Every bloody evening at half past bloody eight
You can hear us on the runway with the throttles through the gate.
"Lift off, you big black bastard! We're twenty minutes late!!"
And we have to bomb the Ruhr in the moonlight.

 

[A4K]

Not in the same vein, but...

He was born by the sewer,
By the sewer he died.
Some say it was murder
But I say 'sewer-side'...

 

[RabidAlien]

Found in a bathroom stall at Big Bend Nat'l Park:

You can squeeze it,
you can shake it,
you can bang it on the wall:
but its always in your undies
that the final drop will fall.

 

[Readie]

Here's two of my favourite poems.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.


I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

Cheers
John

 

[bbear]

Well said Readie, a touch of class at last.

And i'll swap you 'the windhover' for the 'eagle'

hopkins
I CAUGHT this morning morning's minion, king-
dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.

tennyson
He clasps the crag with crooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ring'd with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls

there are other 'air power' related ones i'm sure

 

[meatloaf109]

"There once was a man from Nantucket..."
Oops, sorry, somebody already posted that.

 

[Readie]

My favourite verses from the 'The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam'


'The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.


And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky,
Whereunder crawling coop't we live and die,
Lift not thy hands to It for help--for It
Rolls impotently on as Thou or I.'

Eternal truth in these words.
Cheers
John

 

[Alex .]

Bumping up on old thread if I may, found this poignant poem whilst reading about Irish aircrew in WWII

Possibly written by Norman Robinson, Killed in Action 24th November 1943 (Bomber Command)

"We have no graceful form, no flashing shape
To flicker, fish-like, in the dome of sky;
No famous whine of motor glint of light
Proclaim us to the earthlings ear or eye

Darkly we go, unseen, by friends unsped,
Leaving the homely fields that are our own,
Up to the heights where sunsets' early red
Changes to blackness. We are there alone.

No heat of battle warms our chilling blood
No friendly soil beneath us if we fall;
Our only light the stars, whose fickle mood
Will lead them to desert us when we call.

Death down below or stealing through the dark
Awaits our coming with a silent grin;
Bellowes' fireworks curtained round our mark
Form doors of fire, through which we enter in.

Flame, smoke and noise surround us for a while.
A shuddered jerk the load goes screaming down;
Cold hands and feet move levers for escape;
A chain of fire bespatters through the town

Back to the darkness, friendly now we speed
To count our wounds, and set a course for home.
Speaking to base, attentive to our need,
Watching for that far-friendly line of foam.

Hour upon hour, the long-drawn journey seems;
Fights and searchlights still our road proclaim.
Salt-eyed, we watch the heaven for the Huns,
Weary we dodge the heaven-splitting flame.
Then, with no certain victory to impart, out of the dawn we drop from frosty light.
Welcomed alone by those who saw us start
And watched and waited for us through the night."