A girl crying
On a train.
Me trying
To restrain
The human inclination to say
“Are you okay?”
But what right have I
To intrude on a girl who does cry?
My dog noses
Her.
I swear
His compassion exposes
The British reserve
In me.
As I swerve
Aside, and let her be.
Following on from my post of 8 August, in which I said that I was exploring the possibility of having “My Old Clock I Wind and Other Poems” recorded, using Audiobook Creation Exchange, I am pleased to announce that my work is now in the process of being recorded. I will, of course post here once the audio version of “My Old Clock” is available.
In the meantime, anyone who is interested in reading “My Old Clock” can find it in paperback and ebook formats on the publisher’s website http://moyhill.com/clock/
The book is also available in braille, for sale or loan from the Royal National Institute of Blind People
The poet sat in his study.
His thoughts where dark and muddy.
The poet’s dog walked in,
With a wag and a grin.
And paws all wet and muddy!
There was a young man named Guy
Who was extremely fond of pie.
One sorrowful day
He passed away,
Which made the baker cry!
In this kind of venue
The menu
Has many dishes.
Dainty fishes
To be caught
And bought
By the naive or jaded,
As the waitresses are paraded
Through the gloom
Of the dining room.
“This dish I shall try”,
(Says the man of the world to his friend).
“In the end
Only a fool can deny
That money can buy
A smile From any fish’s eye.
Yet all dishes are the same
And the taste of distain
Is bitter in the throat
Of the man who gambles groat after groat”.
—
The groat is the traditional name of a long-defunct English silver coin worth 4 English pennies, and also a Scottish coin originally worth fourpence, with later issues being valued at eightpence and one shilling, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groat_(coin)).
There was a young man from Kent
Who hired an extremely large tent.
The wind blew strong
And before long
That tent was blown to Ghent!
There was a young man named Mole
Who had a dark night of the soul.
He grew ever more depressed.
His friends all stressed,
That he should stop digging a hole …!
There was a young lady called Gale
Who drank 10 pints of ale.
When the barman asked “are you okay?”
She replied “tomorrow I will pay,
Without fail, for all of this ale …”!
Those who control
And patrol
Are accepted
(not rejected),
For they prevent disorder
By protecting the cyber border.
Who needs Mill
When you can shop
As you will.
And the chop does fall
On those who look beyond the Chinese wall.
—
On BBC Radio 4’s “The World Tonight”, which was broadcast on Thursday 3 August, an interviewer asked a number of Chinese people what they thought of their country’s heavily restricted internet. (In China Twitter, Facebook and Google are banned and government approved channels are utilised by those wishing to go online). A few chinese do bypass blocking by using Virtual Private Networks (VPNS) and other similar services, however the majority of the Chinese population search for information and interact online using the approved (government) channels.
None of those interviewed criticised censorship. Indeed one interviewee went so far as to say that he approved of it, as the government needs to prevent disorder.
The interviews took place in a public park, which cause me to wonder whether all those being interviewed would have been quite so supportive of the Chinese Wall had the questioning taken place in private.
While I have visited China, I did not go online while there so have no experience of the great cyber wall surrounding that country.
The breeze
Whispering in the trees
Does please me so,
But when people whisper on the train,
I am driven half insane,
For I wish to know
What makes them whisper so …!
K Morris - Poet 