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Feb 2016 · 712
A Villanelle for Anne
ShirleyB Feb 2016
They failed to filch her fine and noble mien
when Anne Boleyn endured the ****** stand.
Poor Queen! So swift the sword on Tower Green.

Fifteen thirty three could not foresee
this heinous act by Cromwell’s sinful hand,
yet still they failed to filch her noble mien.

‘Twas Edward sought to sully his regime,
obsessed with sons not gracing merry England.
Poor Queen! So swift the sword on Tower Green.

How stealthily does fortune warp the scene.
Betrothed in majesty; so bluntly ******,
And yet, they failed to filch her noble mien

The ‘hangman from Calais‘ equipped the scheme.
In haste he struck the deadly blow. Poor Anne!
Poor Queen! So swift the sword on Tower Green.

In face of death prevailed a humble queen.
‘God praise the King; long may he rule the land’.
They failed to filch her fine and noble mien
Poor Queen! So swift the sword on Tower Green.
ShirleyB Feb 2016
This year was different
or was it me?

same Trafalgar crowds
link-armed-laughing

pigeons
puff-chested gluttons

different air
full of afterthoughts
I could almost touch
fluttering away
like rusting leaves
on winter's breath

I waited
on our bench
dark cold
stark old
wood

lovers kissed shyly
birds squawked
she laughed
eyes wide
flushed cheeks

Valentine's heart pounding
in a fledgling chest

I wondered if she were me
willing me to remember
hugging him close

I longed
to melt inside her happiness

old words, love and burger-boxes
where do they go?
It's a sad Valentine's poem.
There is a video version of this poem on my blog at

http://videopoems.co/2016/02/05/old-words-love-and-burger-boxes/

tickled pink if you visit!
Jan 2016 · 1.1k
Leaving The Carousel
ShirleyB Jan 2016
You started to leave as the cold nose of Winter
bulldozed through Guy Fawks skies
and Christmas silent nights.

Your nearness was a far plane
of slumped reflection, deliberation,
contemplation of your plight, so mine.

Suspicion stirred in morning tea
and pre-work niceties.
You watched me when I turned my back,
your head buried in the ‘Daily Mail’,
too close to the print.

Denial hugged me a long while, dismissing
the cosseted phone and obsessive hygiene.

Giggling-head days, home-fire Wednesdays,
pledges in sweat daze
all rolling around
on a distant carousel.
I hoped you could see,
but hope could not override
your turning tide.

Your eyes begged for the ‘talk’,
so you could bring it up
like rancid *****.

Coward

You left in a yellow haze with the daffodils,
and I hated you

with all the love anyone could imagine.
View the video of this poem here
https://movingpoemsintopictures.wordpress.com/2016/01/18/leaving-the-carousel/
ShirleyB Jan 2016
He challenged me to write a Villanelle.
His smugness makes me bilious, but, hey,
He clearly doesn’t know me very well.

He planned to undermine me: I could tell
His chauvinistic manner and the way
he challenged me to write a Villanelle.

And yet, I’m tough, I work in Personnel.
I’ll write a Villanelle without delay.
He clearly doesn’t know me very well.

I scribble, scream, throw down my pen and yell.
Yet he, for sure, must live to rue the day
he challenged me to write a Villanelle.

My confidence begins to rise and swell.
He’s smugly watching from a way away.
He clearly doesn’t know me very well.

The marriage is a joke: in fact it’s hell.
He’ll get the papers through the door today.
He challenged me to write a Villanelle.
He clearly doesn’t know me very well.
Jan 2016 · 14.1k
Haiku Rejection
ShirleyB Jan 2016
rejection is hard
but rejection by reject
gone to new level
ShirleyB Jan 2016
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.
I might as well have stripped and posted ****.
I should’ve baked a chocolate cake for tea.

I twittered, face-booked, tumblred, endlessly,
but still it languishes in quietude.
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.

I promised video with poetry;
no cliché, hackneyed rhyme or platitudes.
I should’ve baked a chocolate cake for tea.

My blog is but a trickle in the sea
A place of literary solitude.
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.

I treasured all my followers, all three;
and yet, with heavy heart, I must conclude
I made a blog that no-one wants to see.
I should’ve baked a chocolate cake for tea.
A Villanelle
and the blog is http://movingpoemsintopictures.wordpress.com
ShirleyB Jan 2016
The ugliest woman that ever was born
was called Margery Pilkington-Brown.
If a monkey was born half as ugly as that
they would certainly have it put down.

Her head was as bald as a billiard ball,
yet the hair on her chin was quite long.
For a girl to be cursed with a whiskery beard
was, in anyone’s thinking, quite wrong

Mrs Pilkington cried, “Nurse, please take it away.
It’s a miniature monster from hell.”
“Put a bag on its head,” said the nurse, with a wave,
“If you need a supply, ring the bell.”

So Mrs P stayed for a month and a day
‘Till they told her, quite firmly, to go.
The nurse sympathised with a rolling of eyes
as she packaged the Lady-Shave Pro.

“Oh, what a disgrace when they look at her face
and they see she’s a hideous brute?”
“We’ll give you a bag with a hole in the top.
You can hide her away in the boot.”

So Mrs P left with a feeling of dread
planning what she could do with the sprog.
She drove to a wood at the edge of the park
and left Margery under a log.

“That’s a terrible thing that you’re doing,” he growled.
Mrs P jumped a mile or two.
The Park-Keeper peered at the face in the bag.
“Can’t you find it a home at the zoo?”

Downhearted, she took little Margery home
to a cupboard, until it was night.
She couldn’t risk anyone catching a glance
of poor Margery’s face in the light.

When Mr P saw his new daughter he scowled,
“God Almighty, my dear, what is that?
Has it crawled from a stone in the corner of hell,
or been dragged from a hole by the cat?”

“It’s our baby, dear heart,” cried a hurt Mrs P,
in a trice, feeling rather endeared.
“She may not be nice, but she’s our flesh and blood
with my feet and your belly and beard.”

“Well, yes, I suppose with her seventeen toes
and a nose that could open a tin,
she is rather unique in a curious way
and we’re blessed that she isn’t a twin.

She’s ours, as you say. We can’t give her away
So she’ll stay as a Pilkington – Brown.
We’ll  give her a shave and a hat with a brim
And avoid going into the town.”
For Martin
Jan 2016 · 572
Man Musing
ShirleyB Jan 2016
I wonder, sometimes, why it is a fact,
A gifted, handsome man should be alone.
My iambic pentameter’s intact,
And yet I tend to lyric on my own.

Alliteration alienates romance.
The ladies scorn my struggle with cliché
They scoff, then aggravated, wring their hands.
Yet still I need to couplet every day.

I’m thinking as I sit beside my date,
“I’ll syllable you soon if I am able.”
At times my meter renders me irate.
It’s difficult to rhythm at the table.

“Another cup?” I search her face for clues.
She looks a little bored. It can’t be me.
I pass the menu for her to peruse.
“Why don’t you try a blended Chinese tea?”

I’m formulating ditties as she speaks.
“I think I’d like to go. I’m rather hot.”
“Do stay. I’ve ordered brussels sprouts and leeks.”
Her grimace indicates she’d rather not.

I wonder if I’ve aimed a little low.
Her diction leaves a lot to be desired.
I’d like to teach her how to ebb and flow,
But ‘clueless’ leaves me, frankly, uninspired.

She fidgets nervously and looks away.
I wonder if the woman is a freak.
“I hope you’re not illiterate,” I say.
I may have been a little indescrete.

My fears were justified, she’s never heard
Enjambment quite like mine in all her days.
She slaps my face and tells me I’m absurd,
Then dumps me in a non-poetic daze.

I could have blessed her with a monologue;
Enthralled her with the kernel of my quill;
enchanted her with dazzling dialogue,
If only she’d have stayed to pay the bill.

Now woe is me. I’m lost and incomplete.
Lamenting my position; full of doubts.
Deliberating how a man can eat
A double share of leeks and brussels sprouts.
Jan 2016 · 2.3k
A Villanelle For Budapest
ShirleyB Jan 2016
When muskets shattered bones within the chest,
an era slipped from time; new shadows born
where history cast its cape on Budapest.

Their fate entombed in honour; doom the guest.
No haven in their valour, loudly worn,
when muskets shattered bones within the chest.

The sabre steel lies dormant in its quest,
its master slain in scarlet fields of corn,
where history cast its cape on Budapest.

One leader freed; damnation for the rest.
Thirteen there stood; thirteen then shot at dawn,
when muskets shattered bones within the chest.

These Arad martyrs, ever standing lest
long centuries erode the passion borne
where history cast its cape on Budapest.

Glasses do not kiss, by grief’s request.
Laid quietly the ghosts that gently mourn
where muskets shattered bones within the chest
when history cast its cape on Budapest.
During the 1849 Revolution, the Hungarians were overthrown by the Austria/Russia.
13 Generals were subsequently executed. Their memorials still stand in Arad. Legend has it that whilst the execution was taking place, the Austrians were clinking their beer glasses in celebration. The Hungarians vowed never to clink beer glasses for 150 years. It is still considered in bad taste to this day.

— The End —