POEMS - With Tongue In Cheek

[keithgood838]

The following is an excerpt from Tennyson's masterpiece,
In Memoriam, written as an elegy to his friend, Arthur Henry Hallam.
I hope to post further verses from this classic, of which this piece
is sadly more relevant than ever today:

RING OUT WILD BELLS

Ring out wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more,
Ring out the fued of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care and sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease,
Ring out the harrowing lust for gold;
Ring out the thousand years of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892)

[Eman]

One of Tennyson's best Keith, and how relevant indeed!!

[keithgood838]

NEW YEAR: A DIALOGUE

MORTAL: 'The night is cold, the hour is late,
the world is bleak and drear; who is knocking at my door?'

THE NEW YEAR: 'I am Good Cheer.'

MORTAL: 'Your voice is strange; I know you not;
in shadows dark I grope. What seek you here?'

THE NEW YEAR: 'Friend, let me in, my name is Hope.'

MORTAL: 'And mine is failure; you but mock the life
you wish to bless. Pass on.'

THE NEW YEAR: 'Nay, open wide the door; I am Success.'

MORTAL: 'But I am spent with pain; too late has come
your wealth. I cannot use it.'

THE NEW YEAR: 'Listen friend, I am Good Health.'

MORTAL: 'Now wide I fling my door. Come in, and your fair
statements prove.'

THE NEW YEAR: 'But you must open, too, your heart,
for I am Love.'

ELLA WHEELER WILCOX (1850-1919)

I wish all of my forum friends energising health
and soul-nourishing love in 2013.

Keith

[keithgood838]

Hi Eman, forgive me for dragging you away, however
briefly, from sun-enlivening San Diego to the cloud-dispiriting
London area; on the other hand I know you are not averse to
a little light verse:

POST-CHRISTMAS POST
(Dispatched with tongue in cheek)

Like welcome snowfall,
the daily flurries brightened our lives
and whitened our hallway
in the Advent of the most feted Birthday.

Now, post-Epiphany, we wince
at the manifestation of financial hailstones
hammering home reckoning dismay:
the excess postage price we have to pay.

Curmudgeonly January stays true
to his coldhearted reputation:
come Spring, post-haste, and drive away
daily delivered skies of grey ...

Keith Good

[Eman]

Spot on Keith and it's appropriate for January. Curmudgeonly yeah exactly describes me as Jaunuary is my birth month next Thursday to be exact! It's cold and gray here. It's about 39 degrees this morning!!

[keithgood838]

Happy birthday on Thursday, Eman.
Enjoy your 39 degrees and think of us
snowbound Britons. Here is January from
Longfellow's masterpiece, The Poet's Calendar:

Janus am I; oldest of potentates;
Forward I look, and backward, and below
I count, as god of avenues and gates,
The years that through my portals come and go.

I block the roads, and drift the fields with snow;
I chase the wildfowl from the frozen fen;
My frosts congeal the rivers in their flow,
My fires light up the hearths and hearts of men.

Jack Frost salaams to January's will
and delivers the post-festive chill;
the more ground-freezing the reckoning,
the better will be the blossom come spring.

(From Calendar Characters)

[Eman]

Keith,
Thank you. You know right now we have Frost Warnings in the evening as it dips as low as 29-35 degrees. Nothing like England or Ireland but really weird for San Diego, CA. It was so cold today I wore my bowler hat so my head wouldn't freeze..

[keithgood838]

I am a Johnny-come-lately to The Rarer Monro
having received the double CD as a Christmas present;
I can perhaps best sum up my reaction thus:

THE MARITIME MONRO

We embark to the apt prelude of I Hear Music and are soon
sailing under a Paper Moon hanging over a cardboard sea.
Next we Have The World On A String and we feel that we
have made the rain go, under the navigational nous
of Matt Uncovered. Whether he is masterfully surfing
the orchestral waves of Love Is The Same Anywhere,
gliding swan-like in the reassuring serenity
of The Clouds Will Soon Roll By, or taking us
on a Let's Find An Island, an away-from-it-all paradise,
then making the next port of call a nostalgic
trip back to The World We Used To Know,
we are exhilarated by this ocean-going, emotion-spanning
musical extravaganza whose finale is a radio broadcast
rounded off with jingling humour to muffle the downbeat
of the disembarkation gangway. I feel gratified to have
voyaged on the EMI luxury cruise liner, The Rarer Monro,
matchless value for money booked with HMV, the agent
whose swansong it seemed was presented just for me ...

Keith Good

[Eman]

Keith,
Awesome poem and I love how you interwove the song titles into your prose. Nicely done.

[ROBERT M.]

So you enjoyed the CD then Keith

[keithgood838]

Many thanks, Eman; your 'encouraging word' means
a lot to me. Robert, your hometown Tigers, far from
being worried about extinction, are currently striking
fear into the hearts of other big beasts prowling the
Championship jungle. On the subject of home towns,
I was agreeably surprised to receive a beautiful 2013
Calendar featuring A4 size colour pictures of the river,
streetscapes and statues that characterise my home town.
Within an hour of revelling in it I had written the following
poem, which I hope you guys will enjoy reading:

CALENDAR 2013
(A thoughtful gift from The Opinion)

Intriguingly couchant on lesser mail,
the Eire stamps and back-sloping hand
posed a pulse-quickening mystery.
Soon like-being-there, colour-captured images
of my home town, fixed in time's monthly frames,
came leaping out at me.
The scenic river ever-flowing through my thoughts;
the eponymous bridge; the memories-evoking weir
that powers recollections of Ballymodan boyhood
destined ever to endear.
St Peter's set in an upward vista with inviting open door;
St Patrick's resplendent in stain-glass and interior glory,
and ancient, spire-splendoured Christchurch
where now are worshipped wondrous artefacts of yore.
(the picturesque Golf Club, which once inspired a win
at the eighteenth earning a princely Eltham Irish
prize for nearest-the-pin.)
Pretty period Castle Cottages, former outlier quarters
of the Castle Bernard Estate; the rotunda-like Shambles,
flora-festooned choir practice scene of singing's secrets
revealed by organist Mrs Mary Baker, circa 1948; rambles
to the stone-clad, history-steeped Maid of Erin
and stalwart patriot Sean Hales.
The modern urban streetscape juxtaposed with
quondam century-old pony-and-trap sidereals.
Bandon portrayed around the year
and down the years, and viewed through
the ocular prism of a nostalgic tear ...

Keith Good

[Eman]

Keith, it sounds like you have captured Ireland to a perfect description! I didn't know you were from Ireland, been to Clontarf a few times and have loved it! If I had to choose a place to retire, that's one that would be on the top of my list! Not too city and not too country just a little in between each.

[ROBERT M.]

If I had to choose a place to retire, that's one that would be on the top of my list!

But would it be warm enough there for you Eman ?

[ROBERT M.]

Yes Keith we are doing "quite" well so far, but our form has been very patchy of late............and our goal difference is pathetic

[Eman]

Lol Robert I think I'd fly out of there for the summer though!! Ha ha