There was a young lady from Bangkok
Who wore a very short frock.
A tourist called Paul
Fell off a wall
At the shock of that very short frock!
There was a young lady from Bangkok
Who wore a very short frock.
A bishop called Paul
Said “angels will fall
At the sight of that very short frock!”.
Let nature inspire you…
Our rock garden at the Farmstead is singing. The columbine were so glorious this season they inspired me to write “The Choral Debut,” a haiku (Japanese-inspired, non-rhyming three-line: 5-7-5 syllable poem). I hope The Choral Debut inspires you to get outdoors and let nature sing its songs to you.
The Choral Debut
HAIKU by Bette A. Stevens
Rising with the sun
Pristine perennials join
The choral début
I enjoy designing posters to go with my poems and often use photos I have taken. As a former teacher (now retired) in grades four through eight, I’ve learned that kids of all ages love writing poetry and like me, they enjoy illustrating their poems too. It’s simple and it’s so much fun to tell a story in the three short lines of Haiku. Of course, you can write as many stanzas as you wish. I invite you to give…
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An insightful quotation.
It was 1871 when Swiss philosopher Henry Frèderic Amiel pondered on the nature of democracy in his “Journal Intime”. It is impressive how Amiel in few clear words nails effectively the problems implied by a representation where one is worth one despite merit, experience, education etc. and foresees the processes that will shape the world as we know it. Of course, he could not predict how the impact of modern means of communications would have made the development of those processes more dangerous and faster with the consequences we know worldwide, however, his intuition has become astonishingly and bitterly true.
“The masses will always be below the average. Besides, the age of majority will be lowered, the barriers of sex will be swept away, and democracy will finally make itself absurd by handing over the decision of all that is greatest to all that is most incapable. Such…
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I woke up this morning, drank a cup of coffee, smoked
A cigarette and stared at the wall. There was nothing
Special about this wall. It had no
Fancy wallpaper to draw your eye. No vibrant colors
That made it stand out. Just a plain dingy wall white and
bland in need of a good washing. A question came to mind
“What if I was this wall?” I ashed my cigarette and pondered
That. What if I was that wall. What if I was bland, boring, insipid?
That cannot be. I am not invisible like the wooden beams that
Support that wall. But what supports me if not boards
Of bones that is my skeleton? Yet I am not bland like the
Paint upon that wall. I have emotions that run deep and are
More complex than any wiring or plumbing can be. I have a
Past that have been…
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The best clothes poems
‘Clothes maketh the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.’ So Mark Twain is thought to have once opined; and yet poetry has been less concerned with the material features of our clothing than we might perhaps expect. How many classic poems about clothing can you name? In this post, we’ve tasked ourselves with choosing five of the very best poems about clothes.
John Donne, ‘To His Mistress Going to Bed’. No sooner have we begun this rundown of some of the greatest clothes poems, and we’re taking them off. Not too hastily, though: Donne’s poem may be regarded as one long literary striptease, as a naked Donne undresses his mistress verbally, one item of clothing at a time. Donne concludes ‘To His Mistress Going to Bed’ by leading by example: ‘Look, to show you how it’s done, I’ll take off…
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A powerful and moving piece of writing.
Izzy Gacusan’s short story ‘Fight or Flight’ was Highly Commended in the 2016 Marjorie Graber-McInnis Short Story Award. Here it is for your late-summer reading pleasure.
He’d been here before. He was familiar with the peculiarity of this place, but found no solace in this. He awoke just minutes ago, stiff bed sheets poking at him. After a moment’s confusion, his eyes centered and his brain registered. Crowe sat up with harsh velocity and sputtered a swear word before bounding out of the bed. The room was dim, lit only by the screens of the machines that surrounded him. They beeped incessantly, noises screeching into his ears all at once. But worst of all was the smell. It smelt of sterility, a kind of intense cleanliness that stung each time he inhaled. He stood next to the bed assessing the situation, forcing himself to make a decision. Fight or flight? He’d…
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Michael and I are very excited to have Balroop Singh visiting us today to talk about her lovely new poetry book, Timeless Echoes, and share one of her delightful poems.
![Timeless Echoes by [Singh, Balroop ]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/514tAGiDOqL._SY346_.jpg)
Certain desires and thoughts remain within our heart, we can’t express them, we wait for the right time, which never comes till they make inroads out of our most guarded fortresses to spill on to the pages of our choice. This collection is an echo of that love, which remained obscure, those yearnings that were suppressed, the regrets that we refuse to acknowledge. Many poems seem personal because they are written in first person but they have been inspired from the people around me – friends and acquaintances who shared their stories with me.
Some secrets have to remain buried because they are ours
We do share them but only with the stars
The tears that guarded…
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K Morris - Poet 