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User:JackofOz/Poems for remembrance

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  • Lord Lundy (Who was too Freely Moved to Tears, and thereby ruined his Political Career)
Lord Lundy from his earliest years
Was far too freely moved to Tears.
For instance if his Mother said,
"Lundy! It's time to go to Bed!"
He bellowed like a Little Turk.
Or if his father Lord Dunquerque
Said "Hi!" in a Commanding Tone,
"Hi, Lundy! Leave the Cat alone!"
Lord Lundy, letting go its tail,
Would raise so terrible a wail
As moved His Grandpapa the Duke
To utter the severe rebuke:
"When I, Sir! was a little Boy,
An Animal was not a Toy!"
His father's Elder Sister, who
Was married to a Parvenoo,
Confided to Her Husband, Drat!
The Miserable, Peevish Brat!
Why don't they drown the Little Beast?"
Suggestions which, to say the least,
Are not what we expect to hear
From Daughters of an English Peer.
His Grandmamma, His Mother's Mother,
Who had some dignity or other,
The Garter, or no matter what,
I can't remember all the Lot!
Said "Oh! That I were Brisk and Spry
To give him that for which to cry!"
(An empty wish, alas! For she
Was Blind and nearly ninety-three).
The Dear Old Butler thought-but there!
I really neither know nor care
For what the Dear Old Butler thought!
In my opinion, Butlers ought
To know their place, and not to play
The Old Retainer night and day.
I'm getting tired and so are you,
Let's cut the poem into two!

Second Canto

It happened to Lord Lundy then,
As happens to so many men:
Towards the age of twenty-six,
They shoved him into politics;
In which profession he commanded
The Income that his rank demanded
In turn as Secretary for
India, the Colonies, and War.
But very soon his friends began
To doubt if he were quite the man:
Thus if a member rose to say
(As members do from day to day),
"Arising out of that reply . . .!"
Lord Lundy would begin to cry.
A Hint at harmless little jobs
Would shake him with convulsive sobs.
While as for Revelations, these
Would simply bring him to his knees,
And leave him whimpering like a child.
It drove his colleagues raving wild!
They let him sink from Post to Post,
From fifteen hundred at the most
To eight, and barely six--and then
To be Curator of Big Ben!. . .
And finally there came a Threat
To oust him from the Cabinet!
The Duke -- his aged grand-sire -- bore
The shame till he could bear no more.
He rallied his declining powers,
Summoned the youth to Brackley Towers,
And bitterly addressed him thus--
"Sir! you have disappointed us!
We had intended you to be
The next Prime Minister but three:
The stocks were sold; the Press was squared:
The Middle Class was quite prepared.
But as it is! . . . My language fails!
Go out and govern New South Wales!"
The Aged Patriot groaned and died:
And gracious! how Lord Lundy cried!
  • Song At Parting
He left her lying in the nude
That sultry night in May
The neighbors thought it rather rude
He liked her best that way
He left a rose beside her head
A meat ax in her brain
A note upon the bureau read
'I won't be back again.' [1]
  • Say not the struggle naught availeth
Say not the struggle naught availeth,
The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.
If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke conceal'd,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.
For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.
And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light;
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly!
But westward, look, the land is bright!
  • The Deserter's Meditation
If sadly thinking, with spirits sinking,
Could more than drinking my cares compose,
A cure for sorrow my sighs would borrow
And hope tomorrow would end my woes.
But as in wailing there's naught availing
And Death unfailing will strike the blow
And for that reason, and for a season,
Let us be merry before we go.
To joy a stranger, a wayworn ranger,
In every danger my course I've run
Now hope all ending, and death befriending,
His last aid lending, my cares are done.
No more a rover, or hapless lover,
My griefs are over – my glass runs low;
Then for that reason, and for a season,
Let us be merry before we go.
  • from Four Quartets
Footfalls echo in the memory.
Down the passage which we did not take.
Towards the door we never opened.
Into the rose garden.
  • Dactyls for a Pounding Head
[1]
  • Described by Peter Pierce as "the best hangover poem in our literature" ("Addressing the ultimate questions", Canberra Times, 13 Mar 1999, Panorama, p. 21)
  • If I should go
If I should go before the rest of you
Break not a flower nor inscribe a stone
Nor when I'm gone speak in a Sunday voice
But be the usual selves that I have known
Weep if you must
Parting is hell
But life goes on
So sing as well.
  • I Don't Believe in the Sun
They say there's a sun in the sky
They say there's a sun in the sky
but me, I can't imagine why
There might have been one
before you were gone
but now all I see is the night, so
I don't believe in the sun
How could it shine down on everyone
and never shine on me
How could there be
such cruelty.
The only sun I ever knew
was the beautiful one that was you
Since you went away
it's nighttime all day
and it's usually raining too
The only stars there really are
Were shining in your eyes
There is no sun except the one
That never shone on other guys
The moon to whom the poets croon
Has given up and died
Astronomy will have to be revised.
In men whom men condemn as ill
I find so much of goodness still.
In men whom men pronounce divine
I find so much of sin and blot
I do not dare to draw a line (in some versions, I hesitate to draw a line)
Between the two, where God has not.
  • Constancy
You gave me the key of your heart, my love,
Then why did you make me knock?
Oh that was yesterday, saints above!
And last night - I changed the lock!
  • The Outspan
A morbid and decadent youth
Says - 'Beauty is greater than Truth'
And by beauty I mean
The obscure, the obscene -
The diseased, the decayed, the uncouth
I have come to the borders of sleep,
The unfathomable deep
Forest where all must lose
Their way, however straight,
Or winding, soon or late;
They cannot choose

Unknown

[edit]
  • As others see us
There were the Scots
Who kept the Sabbath
And everything else
They could lay their hands on
Then there were the Welsh
Who prayed on their knees
And their neighbours
Thirdly there were the Irish
Who never knew what they wanted
But were willing to fight for it anyway
Lastly there were the English
Who considered themselves a self-made nation
Thus relieving the Almighty of a dreadful responsibility

Unknown

[edit]
  • Variant on "Mary had a little lamb"
Mary had a little lamb
Her father shot it dead
Now Mary takes her lamb to school
Between two chunks of bread

Is it possible to "win" anything anymore?

[edit]
Is it possible to "win" anything anymore?
To actually have a victory? I'm not so sure.
To seek an advantage over one's fellow souls?
The concept, I suspect, is extremely full of holes.
To trounce one's fellow creatures and be somehow supreme
It sounds rather like a troubled, angry dream
To take the gold having kicked some loser's arse
And to leave them with the waste paper and plastic and broken glass.
A victory? What in heaven's name is that!
What do you do with it? Wear it like an ostentatious hat?
And if this so-called "victory" is such a fine achievement,
How come it's often followed by a lifetime of bereavement?
Surely there's another, better way of doing well
Without the hope of heaven or the threat of hell.

As I rode out one windy morn

[edit]
As I rode out one windy morn
To play upon my alpen horn
A plastic bucket passed me by
And caused my little goat to shy
I then dismounted upside down
And balancing upon my crown
I heard the fading eerie sound
Of bucket bouncing on the ground
"Bunka bonka bunka ...... bonk
Dunka ...... donka dunka ...... donk
Bonka .... bunka .... bonka ...... bunk
Donka dunka donka ...... dunk!"
An empty plastic bucket tossed
Upon the wind alone and lost
And bouncing to eternity
Is that a metaphor for Me?
1 May 1999

Life's a room without a floor

[edit]
Life's a room without a floor;
The entrance and the exit door
Connected by a tightrope
So balancing a bright hope
Against an overwhelming gloom
We make our way across the room
Until ... half way ... perhaps
The rope just maybe snaps.
And yet, regardless of the cause
We make it to the great outdoors.
19 March 2011

If I were a refugee

[edit]
If I were a refugee
What a nice one I would be,
Not in need of gilding,
My traumas would be character building.
The wars that overturned my life,
Atrocities and endless strife
And persecution hateful,
Would have taught me to be grateful.
I'd have no breaking point at all
Lock me up against a wall
And I would sit and wait
And smile and say "no worries mate".
30 April 2011

When love has been neglected

[edit]
When love has been neglected
It can only be expected
That in the space love used to fill
A nasty terror cell then will
Take form and soon take hold,
A fearful little mould.
So if you have the wish
Take your Petri dish
And cultivate a cell of love
And by the moon and stars above,
In reverence and in duty,
Nourish it with beauty.
21 May 2011
  1. ^ in Tom Hiney, Raymond Chandler, p. 60