I would be interested to know what other peoples favourite poems are.
Favourite poems
Moderators: KG Steve, Chantal, Tigger, peter, Chief Spud
Whilst I was thinking about favourite books I thought about a poem that my sister used to tell me when I was really small, called The Lady of Shallot, I used to be able to recite it off by heart, I have not been able to find it in any favourite poem books.
I would be interested to know what other peoples favourite poems are.
I would be interested to know what other peoples favourite poems are.
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oldherbaceous
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On either side the river lie. 
Kind Regards, Old Herbaceous.
There's no fool like an old fool.
There's no fool like an old fool.
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Malk
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Long fields of barley and of rye
Tennyson, Lord Alfred - you'll find it any of his collected works. It was one of my faves as a kid as well.
I don't know what my favourites would be now. Should be cheeky and say my own. But I like TS Eliot's - The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock especially when my partner reads it. He has a great voice.
I like Anne Michaels as well, but wouldn't say her stuff is my favourite. I don't really have favourite poems like I do books.
Tennyson, Lord Alfred - you'll find it any of his collected works. It was one of my faves as a kid as well.
I don't know what my favourites would be now. Should be cheeky and say my own. But I like TS Eliot's - The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock especially when my partner reads it. He has a great voice.
I like Anne Michaels as well, but wouldn't say her stuff is my favourite. I don't really have favourite poems like I do books.
Welcome to Finland!!
Try Google, Catherine. There are several versions of it on Google.
My favourite poem is probably "Anthem for doomed Youth" by Wilfred Owen, expressing the futility and pity of war. Shame that mankind hasn't learned from it.
My favourite poem is probably "Anthem for doomed Youth" by Wilfred Owen, expressing the futility and pity of war. Shame that mankind hasn't learned from it.
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oldherbaceous
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This is one of my favourites.
Morning Ritual
Spring’s green rumbling wakes me.
Slipperless dawn icing my feet with dew,
the crisp sky tumbles above,
a basket of dried blue cornflowers out of season.
On a slate stepping stone
butterfly cracks flit over damp-kissed
violet and gold snowflakes.
My sage fingertips remove
coiled damp leaves from the fence line,
autumn’s discards.
A tight fist pushes up
through drooping snowdrops
and rhubarb umbrellas,
ruffled plum wine splashed
among barbed wire and cobbles.
An echo of the past, my mother’s peonies,
blousy pink explosions,
nibbled open by fat black ants.
Jaws working, they peeled
the jewelled buds until they burst.
Coffee cup in hand,
the morning crossword staining her wrist,
her day began with a slow stroll to deadhead.
She checked tea roses
and floribundas for black spot,
aged dogs at her heels,
panting in the rising humidity.
Damp oak branches whispered of India ink.
Koi swimming beneath cloud lily pads,
the music of seeds
spilled from dark compost.
A green hummingbird blurred borders
a breath, a heartbeat in flight.
My first steps, blue roses,
transplanted forest violets,
gold-bearded,
throats veined indigo and white
to struggle in mortar filled soil.
In my own garden, two cats follow me,
noses buried in petals.
With her blessings, I dip my fingers
into good clean mud.
Any ideas who the very talented author is?
Morning Ritual
Spring’s green rumbling wakes me.
Slipperless dawn icing my feet with dew,
the crisp sky tumbles above,
a basket of dried blue cornflowers out of season.
On a slate stepping stone
butterfly cracks flit over damp-kissed
violet and gold snowflakes.
My sage fingertips remove
coiled damp leaves from the fence line,
autumn’s discards.
A tight fist pushes up
through drooping snowdrops
and rhubarb umbrellas,
ruffled plum wine splashed
among barbed wire and cobbles.
An echo of the past, my mother’s peonies,
blousy pink explosions,
nibbled open by fat black ants.
Jaws working, they peeled
the jewelled buds until they burst.
Coffee cup in hand,
the morning crossword staining her wrist,
her day began with a slow stroll to deadhead.
She checked tea roses
and floribundas for black spot,
aged dogs at her heels,
panting in the rising humidity.
Damp oak branches whispered of India ink.
Koi swimming beneath cloud lily pads,
the music of seeds
spilled from dark compost.
A green hummingbird blurred borders
a breath, a heartbeat in flight.
My first steps, blue roses,
transplanted forest violets,
gold-bearded,
throats veined indigo and white
to struggle in mortar filled soil.
In my own garden, two cats follow me,
noses buried in petals.
With her blessings, I dip my fingers
into good clean mud.
Any ideas who the very talented author is?
Kind Regards, Old Herbaceous.
There's no fool like an old fool.
There's no fool like an old fool.
I;m not very well read however at school,in Yorkshire in the 60s I was given the following poem.I believe it was written by a yorkshire woman Edith Simson.It's always made me smile
Heap of Trouble
I had a little compost heap,to which I wore a track
Being always on my way to it,or else just coming back.
I fed my compost heap on weeds and rags and flower heads;
On orange peel and cabbage leaves and fluff from under beds.
My eye lit up when I beheld the corpse of bird or mouse,
I couldn't wait for death to come to flowers around the house.
I cut my hedge and mowed my lawn more often than I need
and bore the clippings joyfully my hungry heap to feed.
Alas against it's appettite my heart I couldn't harden
I've got a lovely compost heap.............
But where the hecks my garden?
Not quite the poetic standard set but I've always liked it
Heap of Trouble
I had a little compost heap,to which I wore a track
Being always on my way to it,or else just coming back.
I fed my compost heap on weeds and rags and flower heads;
On orange peel and cabbage leaves and fluff from under beds.
My eye lit up when I beheld the corpse of bird or mouse,
I couldn't wait for death to come to flowers around the house.
I cut my hedge and mowed my lawn more often than I need
and bore the clippings joyfully my hungry heap to feed.
Alas against it's appettite my heart I couldn't harden
I've got a lovely compost heap.............
But where the hecks my garden?
Not quite the poetic standard set but I've always liked it
sanity is overrated
favourite from my school days, The Donkey (G.K. Chesterton)
& My Land can't remember who wrote that.
Not a poem, but I like it
The Value of Old Age
Remember, old folks are worth a fortune, with silver in their hair,gold in their teeth,stones in their kidneys and gas in their stomachs,
I am quite a frivolous old girl,I am seeing five gentlemen each day.
As soon as I get up, Will power helps me out of bed, then I go to visit
Lou. Next it's time for Mr. Quaker to give me my oats.
They leave and Arthur Ritis shows up for the rest of the day, he doesn't stay in one place very long,so he takes me from joint to joint.
After such a busy dat I am ready for bed with Johnny Walker.
And oh yes, I am flirting with Al Zymer
The Vicar came the other and said, at your age you should be thinking about the hereafter, I told him, Oh I do, no matter where I am in the lounge,or upstairs,the kitchen or the cellar I ask myself, now what am I here after?
Bren
& My Land can't remember who wrote that.
Not a poem, but I like it
The Value of Old Age
Remember, old folks are worth a fortune, with silver in their hair,gold in their teeth,stones in their kidneys and gas in their stomachs,
I am quite a frivolous old girl,I am seeing five gentlemen each day.
As soon as I get up, Will power helps me out of bed, then I go to visit
Lou. Next it's time for Mr. Quaker to give me my oats.
They leave and Arthur Ritis shows up for the rest of the day, he doesn't stay in one place very long,so he takes me from joint to joint.
After such a busy dat I am ready for bed with Johnny Walker.
And oh yes, I am flirting with Al Zymer
The Vicar came the other and said, at your age you should be thinking about the hereafter, I told him, Oh I do, no matter where I am in the lounge,or upstairs,the kitchen or the cellar I ask myself, now what am I here after?
Bren
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oldherbaceous
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Just love it Bren.
Kind Regards, Old Herbaceous.
There's no fool like an old fool.
There's no fool like an old fool.
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alan refail
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alan refail
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Just to bring a more sombre note: R S Thomas was a great poet, but "miserable old bugger", but I find it hard to shake off his poetry, like this one:
Reservoirs
There are places in Wales I don't go:
Reservoirs that are the subconscious
Of a people, troubled far down
With gravestones, chapels, villages even;
The serenity of their expression
Revolts me, it is a pose
For strangers, a watercolour's appeal
To the mass, instead of the poem's
Harsher conditions. There are the hills,
Too; gardens gone under the scum
Of the forests; and the smashed faces
Of the farms with the stone trickle
Of their tears down the hills' side.
Where can I go, then, from the smell
Of decay, from the putrefying of a dead
Nation? I have walked the shore
For an hour and seen the English
Scavenging among the remains
Of our culture, covering the sand
Like the tide and, with the roughness
Of the tide, elbowing our language
Into the grave that we have dug for it.
or the more lyrical one on the death of his wife:
A Marriage
We met
under a shower
of bird-notes.
Fifty years passed,
love's moment
in a world in
servitude to time.
She was young;
I kissed with my eyes
closed and opened
them on her wrinkles.
`Come,' said death,
choosing her as his
partner for
the last dance, And she,
who in life
had done everything
with a bird's grace,
opened her bill now
for the shedding
of one sigh no
heavier than a feather.
Reservoirs
There are places in Wales I don't go:
Reservoirs that are the subconscious
Of a people, troubled far down
With gravestones, chapels, villages even;
The serenity of their expression
Revolts me, it is a pose
For strangers, a watercolour's appeal
To the mass, instead of the poem's
Harsher conditions. There are the hills,
Too; gardens gone under the scum
Of the forests; and the smashed faces
Of the farms with the stone trickle
Of their tears down the hills' side.
Where can I go, then, from the smell
Of decay, from the putrefying of a dead
Nation? I have walked the shore
For an hour and seen the English
Scavenging among the remains
Of our culture, covering the sand
Like the tide and, with the roughness
Of the tide, elbowing our language
Into the grave that we have dug for it.
or the more lyrical one on the death of his wife:
A Marriage
We met
under a shower
of bird-notes.
Fifty years passed,
love's moment
in a world in
servitude to time.
She was young;
I kissed with my eyes
closed and opened
them on her wrinkles.
`Come,' said death,
choosing her as his
partner for
the last dance, And she,
who in life
had done everything
with a bird's grace,
opened her bill now
for the shedding
of one sigh no
heavier than a feather.
The gardeners Hymn (by Barbara Robinson)
All things bright and beautiful
All creatures great and small
All things wise and wonderful
The Lord God made them all
But what we never mention though gardeners know it's true,
Is when he made the goodies, He made the baddies too.
The greenfly on the roses,the maggoys in the peas,
Manure that fills our noses, He also gave us these.
The fungus on the goose-gogs, the clubroot on the greens,
The slugs that eat the lettuce and chew the aubergines.
The drought that kills the fuchsias,the frost that nips the bud.
The rain that drowns the seedslings,the blight that hits the spuds.
The midges and mosquitoes the nettle and the weeds.
The pigeon in the greenstuff,the sparrows on the seeds.
The fly that gets the carrots,the the wasp that eats the plums
How black the gardeners outlook,though green may be his thumbs
But still we gardeners labour midst vegetables and flowers
And pray what hits our neighbours will somehow by pass ours.
Bren
All things bright and beautiful
All creatures great and small
All things wise and wonderful
The Lord God made them all
But what we never mention though gardeners know it's true,
Is when he made the goodies, He made the baddies too.
The greenfly on the roses,the maggoys in the peas,
Manure that fills our noses, He also gave us these.
The fungus on the goose-gogs, the clubroot on the greens,
The slugs that eat the lettuce and chew the aubergines.
The drought that kills the fuchsias,the frost that nips the bud.
The rain that drowns the seedslings,the blight that hits the spuds.
The midges and mosquitoes the nettle and the weeds.
The pigeon in the greenstuff,the sparrows on the seeds.
The fly that gets the carrots,the the wasp that eats the plums
How black the gardeners outlook,though green may be his thumbs
But still we gardeners labour midst vegetables and flowers
And pray what hits our neighbours will somehow by pass ours.
Bren
-
oldherbaceous
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Why thank-you Malk. 
Kind Regards, Old Herbaceous.
There's no fool like an old fool.
There's no fool like an old fool.