"allotment" poems
"A pen is mightier than a sword", they say.
But what does a pen do better than a blade?
Slay a dragon, slay a man
One draws blood and the other brings emotion.
"It's a waste of time", they all chimed.
A silly allotment of words that rhyme.
A metaphor lies deep inside,
To understand it, they lack insight.
"Why do you write?", they repeatedly ask.
"Is it for fame?Or just a fun game?"
I write to express what I fail to show.
It's my little escape from all the chaos.
-Wayward❤
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 1:48 PM UTC
All present in the stream of time,
Connected they build a line, a river which flows uninterruptedly,
The here and now, is the future of a pasts dream, a wonderous reality,
It is the futures past, the memories recorded within the depths of it
Gravity distorts time, causing it to slow down till it's stopping point lensed from a black hole, lurking within shadows of remorse in space,
Fished out from the sea of passing events, it keeps flowing, but now it does so while not including the fallen one who embraced a blackhole,
Time only knows one path, straight ahead with no slips and turns,
The present is the pasts future and what was thought to be possible,
It is the little wealth every living being possesses yet it is overseen and forgotten, until the moment of ones death drives gladly near,
From the womb to the tomb, drowning within the waves of a temporal lengh, the event of an entity's existence and its period.
A pace for an allotment, given from the complaints of an worldly life,
Spend it well, unlike the spring we cannot turn the tide, recycle again!
But for that matter the world of dreams holds a sweet embrace to all,
After all, you don't need to die in a dream.
~ Umi
Apr 2, 2018
Apr 2, 2018 at 6:26 PM UTC
I sit in the top of the wood, my eyes closed.
Inaction, no falsifying dream
Between my hooked head and hooked feet:
Or in sleep rehearse perfect kills and eat.
The convenience of the high trees!
The air's buoyancy and the sun's ray
Are of advantage to me;
And the earth's face upward for my inspection.
My feet are locked upon the rough bark.
It took the whole of Creation
To produce my foot, my each feather:
Now I hold Creation in my foot
Or fly up, and revolve it all slowly -
I **** where I please because it is all mine.
There is no sophistry in my body:
My manners are tearing off heads -
The allotment of death.
For the one path of my flight is direct
Through the bones of the living.
No arguments assert my right:
The sun is behind me.
Nothing has changed since I began.
My eye has permitted no change.
I am going to keep things like this.
5.4k
the lads are in tandem, biking well together
the lads are in tandem, biking well together
such is their dedication, on spec 24/7
such is their dedication, on spec 24/7
such is their dedication, biking well together
on spec 24/7, the lads are in tandem
they've a task to do, preserving their allotment
they've a task to do, preserving their allotment
strength and resources they expend, their energies focused
strength and resources they expend, their energies focused
preserving their allotment, strength and resources they expend
they've a task to do, their energies focused
the territory they range, both seeking thoroughness
the territory they range, both seeking thoroughness
again to-day they're in unison, their labors may yet pay off
again to-day they're in unison, their labors may yet pay off
again to-day they're in unison, both seeking thoroughness
the territory they range, their labors may yet pay off
both seeking thoroughness, they've a task to do
again to-day they're in unison, preserving their allotment
biking well together, they're labors may yet pay off
strength and resources they expend, the territory they range
on spec 24/7, the lads in tandem
such is their dedication, their energies focused
Nov 20, 2014
Nov 20, 2014 at 6:48 PM UTC
My mind was pulsing
with endless subtly shaded descriptors
and shockwave verbs,
when a pop-up alert flashed
red and yellow and blue…
YOU HAVE ONLY 9 WORDS LEFT !
ACT NOW !!!
YOUR LIFETIME ALLOTMENT IS 20,000,000,010 WRITTEN WORDS,
AND.........YOU HAVE USED 20,000,000,001.
ACT NOW OR LOSE YOUR RIGHT TO WRITE FOREVER!
BUT WAIT !!!!!!
COMPLETE THE SIMPLE FORM BELOW IN THE NEXT 60 SECONDS
AND WE’LL DOUBLE YOU TO 40 BILLION MORE.
IMAGINE ALL THE SHIMMERING ADJECTIVES, THICK NOUNS,
CLEVER ADVERBS AND PITHY PRONOUNS YOU WILL HAVE!!!!!!!!!
Panicking, I clicked on the form
and furiously typed …
William Shakespeare
10 Henley Street Village South
Statford Upon . . . . . .
Sep 28, 2012
Sep 28, 2012 at 7:29 AM UTC
The allotment
is where I grow my mind,
tend my vegetables and flowers,
for hours and hours.
Turn over the sods,
pull up weeds,
for
we
think
them
not
flowers.
So there
I spend
hours
and
hours
what
do
you
do?
The allotment is where i spend hours and hours.
Jan 8, 2012
Jan 8, 2012 at 2:13 PM UTC
The allotment
is where I grow my mind,
tend my vegetables and flowers,
for hours and hours.
Turn over the sods,
pull up weeds,
for
we
think
them
not
flowers.
So there
I spend
hours
and
hours
what
do
you
do?
The allotment is where i spend hours and hours.
Dec 5, 2011
Dec 5, 2011 at 2:31 PM UTC
~
September 2024
HP Poet: Victoria
Age: 59
Country: UK
Question 1: A warm welcome to the HP Spotlight, Victoria. Please tell us about your background?
Victoria: *"My name is Victoria, I'm 59 and from Wirral, North West England. I studied and had a career in social work, predominantly the field of Child Protection. I was married, I'm happily single. I am the eldest of 6 and have 5 children and 5 grandchildren. Home growing up was dysfunctional, I lived through my teens with my nan. I'm passionate about my family, Liverpool fc and my friends. I was addicted ****** My bio says: "Previously life was complex, I helped make it that way, now, I keep it simple and fun." It's true."*
Question 2: How long have you been writing poetry, and for how long have you been a member of Hello Poetry?
Victoria: "I joined Hello Poetry in 2011 and that's when I started writing poetry. Mostly, I started with rhyme and then found that prose better fit my parlance."
Question 3: What inspires you? (In other words, how does poetry happen for you).
Victoria: "I'm inspired by my many experiences, with others and in nature. I'm inspired by poetry here, always. Many a poem has stayed with me, long after reading. Writing poetry was suggested to me and my writing developed, it gave me a voice to express, that which more often I had held silent."
Question 4: What does poetry mean to you?
Victoria: "What poetry means to me happens both in the reading and the writing. Poetry for me, gives and changes perspective, I gain new sensibilities and find through the writing, as in life there is, constant readjustment."
Question 5: Who are your favorite poets?
Victoria: "I have lots of favourite poets here, at Hello Poetry. I've made many friends and been fortunate to meet a few. I also enjoy discovering new poets and I am always amazed at the talent out there."
Question 6: What other interests do you have?
Victoria: "I enjoy fishing: music, photography and feeding my family home grown produce. I've rented an allotment plot for about 12 years, it is where I grow veg, fruit and flowers. My other pastimes are travel, walking, watching the footy and the occasional wild night out with close friends."
Carlo C. Gomez: “Thank you so much for giving us this opportunity to get to know the man behind the poet, Victoria! We are honored to include you in this ongoing series!”
Victoria: "Thank you, Carlo."
Thank you everyone here at HP for taking the time to read this. We hope you enjoyed coming to know Victoria a little bit better. I most certainly did. It is our wish that these spotlights are helping everyone to further discover and appreciate their fellow poets. – Carlo C. Gomez
We will post Spotlight #20 in October!
~
Sep 1, 2024
Sep 1, 2024 at 4:32 PM UTC
Quite admirable , awe-inspiring , a divine piece of manufacture
It’s capriciousness is an equivalent of swooning of rapture
This carpet conveys itself as flawless , the fragrance is pleasant
The glossy finish generates a yearning to have it present
The blissful texture is mesmerizing , subject to perfect knitting
Not to mention it’s size is perfectly fitting
~
Though the alternative side seems worn and tattered
And the fabric surrounding is scattered
There are pockets and splits
There are strewed fiber bits
Along the edges are multicolored spots
And the yarn had formed knots
~
At that point the onlooker would become flustered helplessly
Were they to take it into their tenancy ?
Sure it was depleted
And maybe it was slightly untreated
Though it was equally handsome
Despite it’s opposing filthy expansion
~
Then the beholder would ponder a tad
And realize the flaws weren't so bad
They were to be contemplated abnormally
Though as well stood out morbidly
The allotment seemed now suitable
And each side was mutable
Feb 9, 2015
Feb 9, 2015 at 6:03 PM UTC
I tried to feed the pigeons with seed
at the end of the driveway,
not even a modicum was eat
unlike my friends 5 cultivated visitors.
Only tonight he is watering his Dahlias
and Sunflowers.
I casually forgot to water my tub of potatoes .
Energy and priority
burns with this capricious summer.
and as good as we think we are
its Brendan who
manages to surpass the conundrums
forever your plantsman and allotment stake- holder
Jul 25, 2013
Jul 25, 2013 at 4:47 PM UTC
no mean feat to reestablish,
palpitating those few seconds
when arms-in-motion wave frantic,
in desperation,
in fall-prevention mode,
comical and tragical,
a salty suite,
and the semi-familiar
taste of fall/failing
the freshest fear,
jalapeño hot on the tongue
some months ago,
the thinnest tightrope,
not an obstacle feared,
what I lacked for,
I could not say or now recall
the kindness of calm prevailed
now tension lines drawn,
under the feet,
around the neck,
high voltage wires that
no artist-survivor-breadwinner
can walk without trepidation
though you don't see my arms flailing,
there are faint marks on my soles,
parallelograms on my throat,
where fear has tested
the prowess of its equipment
my life retrospected,
have miracles
made and gained,
given and taken
nine lives used up so many times,
thought my allotment was
nine X nine to the power of nine,
stupid-stopped looking over my shoulder
the poems came so easy,
every phrase overheard was a
story explicated, and the insights slid
from throat to paper so fast
I did not count myself blessed,
just merely fortunate
well fortunes veer,
turn left bad right,
no direction home,
and what was easy,
now impossible
how the story final beds,
will keep you posted,
right now all I can predict
with 100% surety,
the fall is surely coming
for the summer-man
the sun cannot burn off
the fog that paralyzes his
ship to shore,
invisible the safety of port,
the horn sound more of a croak,
his voice, ashamed of failing,
has this man both
landlocked
and lost at sea
Aug 10, 2014
Aug 10, 2014 at 4:39 PM UTC
This is for those hemp clad allotment dwelling new-age professionals,
riding the crest of an organic wine wave,
with heads tilted so far back,
showing off their vanilla white, Dulux painted nostril showroom.
11am, it's not too early,
community centre trip,
twisting and stretching,
kneading and rolling eighteen-month old Oscar into a morally righteous,
gluten-free,
linseed loaf of faux intelligensia.
Tofu and thai veg stirfry please,
healthy and nutriousness,
Nah!
it's greasy and delicious.
Cultured, not truly,
it's Anglicized cuisine really.
Less like a political activist,
more like the organic bourgeoisie.
Mar 28, 2013
Mar 28, 2013 at 8:10 AM UTC
After a day on the allotment digging
and bitten by bugs
planting the future of my life
it is nice to be by myself
so I can dream my day
things scare you
and you never no
what will bit you
but I must
get this done
before the night
a bird came
visited me
it is spring
you have
young
as I have to
this is my day
and i give to you.
Apr 16, 2014
Apr 16, 2014 at 3:25 PM UTC
In a tiny allotment right next to the zoo
A miniature jungle was planted and grew
The flora was dense and the air became hot
But confined to a tidy rectangular plot
An unthinkable duo of creatures converged
And it's said that a spanking new species emerged
For a curious beast was reportedly seen
Roaming and munching on anything green
Make haste! Away! It's the Buffagorilla!
A shredder of lettuce and cereal killer
With hooves at the front and hands at the rear
The Buffagorilla is near!
It shambles about at the darkest of hours
On hedges it crunches and bunches of flowers
On daffolil bulbs and petunia petals
With hearty aplomb on a cluster of nettles
Covertly perusing with maximum hush
It can wander through gardens disguised as a bush
No carrot or parsnip is safe in its bed
And the marrows are quaking in vegetable dread
Depart! Retreat! It's the Buffagorilla!
The broccoli butcher and vegetable killer
With ape like features and horns of a steer
The Buffagorilla is near!
So if you hear a mention of butternut theft
Or notice a garden, all bare and bereft
Insure your potatoes for damage and loss
Give the salad a purely precautionary toss
For a creature is roaming the byway and track
With its legs at the front and its arms at the back
And it might be your gooseberries or chervil he spies
So I beg you take heed as I once more advise
Be gone! Take flight! It's the Buffagorilla!
The strawberry napper and cucumber killer
Just hide in your cellar and steer well clear
The Buffagorilla is near!
Nov 20, 2013
Nov 20, 2013 at 7:07 PM UTC
I thought
my thoughts
were bigger than anyone's.
Maybe I was bigger than anyone.
This served to isolate me
from the fact that I am small, not bigger and I am okay
with that.
When did it begin? Why would I need this mechanism of living?
Did it start at birth? Or when my cat died in our house fire?
Maybe...
When I lost my father to his mental illness? When he was taken away?
Maybe the ****
When the trauma set in?
If I am a mass of cells, a living organism,
vulnerable to this world of others.
I need protection. There was none when little. Children need protection.
I developed my bigger-self by watching others. I learned to protect.
I learned to heal. I learned to forgive, but always, my thoughts
were bigger than yours. You didn't recognize so I appeared
aloof, angry, bitter, warming, smarter, friendly, volatile, politically correct, patient, intense, stubborn, caring, wistful, shattered and put together again. I was all over the map. I couldn't find my waypoint, until now.
This is life's way. Our vehicle is our thoughts.
I am not bigger in thought, in action or in self. I am tired of running away, of blaming, of being ashamed.
I no longer need protection other than from myself.
I am now relaxing in the part I could not have been taught. The idea that even experiences, over and over and over again, would teach me my lesson. You ask why people keep repeating
mistakes. This is our allotment. The price each of us pays.
It is my thoughts that save me now, wondering about my son, his illness, about my predicament
after years of hard work, unabashedly independent, procuring mindfulness, deliberating the Buddhist way, meditating on thoughts,
through a maze of my twelve steps
that I now for this moment am alone in. My thoughts deconstructed. More connected, but not bigger.
My shoulders drop, my face unfurrows, my heart slows, a tear begins if I let it. I am released. I will not suffer further.
How can I tell you, I am not bigger any longer and I am at peace.
Mar 4, 2018
Mar 4, 2018 at 4:10 PM UTC
London is an onion.
Not one of those big, brown juicy globes
you can buy in packs of three, from Tesco,
No, an earthy, shrivelled relic from an old geezer's allotment,
With trailing fronds and a few infestations.
If you were to take a bite, your eyes would smart and your body rebel with a cough, a shudder and a wheeze,
But moments later, a smile would be playing round your lips,
Such a sensory adventure, though not exactly pleasant, can still be savoured,
And you'll remember the taste forever.
Londoners are weevils, hiding in the layers.
Outer, inner, some of us worm our way between them all.
Me, I tend to head for the heart of the thing,
Soho, Southwark, the inner sanctums.
I sometimes venture nearer the surface, the outer edges,
But too close to the unknown, and unfamiliar air,
And I start to pine for the centre.
You can work between the layers,
But the many skins are tougher than you'd think,
Better to burrow down, find a place to sustain
The appetite of a hungry little grub.
Sep 15, 2013
Sep 15, 2013 at 3:01 PM UTC
We have our allotment,
our bit and our share,
an instant, a moment,
it can seem so unfair.
I'm running and chasing,
I'm trying to subdue,
theres no way to stop it,
it can quickly allude.
It's often just wasted,
or squandered away,
and feel so eternal,
like a long lonely day.
The cost,
you can't buy it,
and it's easily misused,
It's treasured and priceless,
and can never be reused.
No matter,
how badly,
you try and hold on,
you can't even touch it,
then it's suddenly gone.
So just make the best,
and do what you can,
sieze every small moment,
in this very small span.
Jun 26, 2011
Jun 26, 2011 at 8:59 AM UTC
Nestled
in a gyroscope
of allotment, haybail and heath
is the scenery of
my solemn country.
The skyrise, hollows. the
dripping
fat of the land.
The cities have boomed
and they're beautiful.
Like open roses they're
garlands of wire,
pylons and street-lights.
A thorny crown
on a girl in a nightclub. They're
blistering
they drink, kiss and drink.
And all the while
we live with whispers
splashed like
blood in a gutter.
As murmurs
pumped
through the strip-lit veins
of an office block.
Its a life where
prayers
are mist on train windows.
When we walk
we check our
reflection in car windows
and we're beautiful
we run
our hands
through our hair
knowing
we were babies born with
horns for this.
When we ride
its over
railroad boneyards,
the sleepers are
metal teeth locked in
asymmetrical laughter
at everything
at everyone
at nothing.
The skies are a
psychosis of sunlight, clouds,
vapour trails,
it's heaven
and
we're bent at the alter,
our shadow on
the crypt
has horns.
Mar 10, 2015
Mar 10, 2015 at 3:32 PM UTC
We cannot seem to understand
that one perceives personally with limited scope,
a minuscule allotment, a slippery vision of time.
We believe to hold witness to a great single minded river,
this metaphor is bought wholly
and sold solely to sweeten our short life-
As one word often leads to the next,
a parent sires child
thinking this is the most powerful measurement of truth
we use to falsely foolproof our assurances
and assuage any feeling of being a victim,
eaten by time.
It is a shared dream of the dead man's final words-
they carry weight, meaning and purpose.
Needing to be painfully comprehended and carried self evident.
A literary reflection of our need for death to matter,
to have matter and be of substance is a view of ourselves linearly,
as a line drawn between birth to death
then- maybe
a cathartic eternity.
Apr 16, 2011
Apr 16, 2011 at 8:13 AM UTC
Conservative these days now means
The richest are the few who glean
The wealth that exists in our land.
The rest of it is sleight of hand.
After decades of this foolishness
We have grown weary of your mess.
We don’t think we can ever win
This country back to from you again.
You seem to hate those who are non-rich
And include them in every austerity pitch.
You refuse to help them feed their brood
Then pay the farmers not to grow food.
You cover yourself with glowing self-praise;
People starve, you grant yourself a raise.
You stand before the rich and genuflect
And subject your constituents to neglect.
You want every child to be born
Then vote to have their allotment shorn.
You seem to want them not to thrive;
You only protect them until they are alive.
You send the soldiers to march and die
And deny them benefits. Tell us why.
Is it because you have your wealth
And no longer care about their health?
The most hateful game you always play
Is making the voters look another way.
While you make laws that take their rights
You engage them in unimportant fights
About who is sleeping with whom today
And who is straight and who else is gay.
Or you worry the people about war
While you funnel subsidies by the score.
You pay your friends and give them jobs
Then call your opponents egregious slobs.
You engage in double-talk about the facts
And claim calumnies are helpful acts.
You accept your fortunes from commerce
And agree to treat the populace worse.
No matter how often you rearrange things
You edits end up being very strange things.
We need to hear our own clarion call
And push this kind of politics to the wall.
We must do more than hope for liberty
And once again fight for the land of the free.
We can’t just sit around at home and mope.
As it is, today, we can only sadly hope
That some liberty you will choose to take
Will cause the regular people to awake.
Jun 28, 2015
Jun 28, 2015 at 8:48 PM UTC
I attained that you are predetermined,
quiet and an ever stalwart girl
I attained you are admiring success
and you are precisely deigned
with truthful excitement and analyses each move you make
you are an expertise really,
and you have the ability to learn with understanding
you're introspective, yet you're introvert
Let me say you like September breeze - my month
That's why I have a faculty to detect a bigger picture of you
That's why I consociate with you
I'm sure God brought you to life just for me
Me and you have allotment in common,
and we can achieve the innermost of it
I would name her portia, your name of course
if I were to have a baby girl with you
from your intellectualist optimism,
I'm sure she would adapt clearly
I'm sure she would suits the two of us' s integrity
if we are a summer breeze,
she would be like a December beverage
The three of us full of smiles
Apr 23, 2016
Apr 23, 2016 at 9:17 AM UTC
The ****** for any Allotment holder
is harvesting Pumpkins with foliage,
for October, with the clocks back
they'll relish digging over the ground
looking forward to another year.
Meanwhile the Farmers markets at Herne Hill and Dulwich
will set our retro chic spiraling,
a half loaf of brioche and a Mrouzia Tajine purchased
amidst the newly penny conscious
"adequate provision" becomes our norm.
Oct 26, 2012
Oct 26, 2012 at 6:57 PM UTC
audio me in... tell the b.t. off standards
to change the connection to lie to get to syria...
i wanted to become a butcher too...
not butchering people though...
onomatopeias of resonance of blah... blah...
you know... woollen trill...
i want the target bacon, i want to target bacon
on that **** head-banging with a pony
while blowing a sheen into a rodin marble
for the glisten of a haircut mare...
dark ivory like purple of a grenade of indigo
blotched with blood...
and spanked / spiked by kandinsky...
i told you i woz a barking gimmick, a barking cult-piece of mafia...
you’ve been warned dear bouncer allotment and semi-detached...
hey kieran - had his kidneys transplanted aged 15...
took to having a ****** aged 16 on the south park fence
when two ******* eyed us and the boys came to make cake...
oi boys r’ us you mention st. petersburg anywhere south of the thames?
i thought so...
make that spelling spaghetti for a kebab of dead meat
appealing:
it’s making headlines, people are fed fat but sugar headlines...
when fat headlines... people will be fed sugar...
salt will never compromise the use of steroids for balloon pop protein
for a mere attire of the bow tie undone with laze.
Nov 30, 2015
Nov 30, 2015 at 8:00 PM UTC
"...here, where the blades in the ceiling
interrupt...
this...is the place you left
home to get locked out from..."
--Sally Van Doren.
Step again, and we move along
the haphazard course of tragic occurances
expressed as the passage of news events.
Elegant, the couple has immunity by
the honor of necessary respect. In this
perspective, looking at the ceiling we, all,
see the patterns of the stars, currents
of speculation and the influence from space.
{ [ _ q int r ( q ) ] / ( d e , d n ) } =
[ d u _ ( x ) y ( N , Z ) ] .
After it had gone away, the memory was
a continuation. Each comparison left its
emptiness; only the universe continued to be
a ceiling above the (floor, bed). In the flowers,
the next springs bouncing through their
allotment, the years were reaching for
a prominent eternity. The change of phase
being self determined, like the space of
quotation, the resolution adjusted the course of
needed, pine forests, needed barrels of oil, rain,
sustainable living becoming the fire
of the rebuilding. This, we remembered with
journalism by interpretation, pointing to importance.
Jan 13, 2014
Jan 13, 2014 at 8:22 PM UTC
Not poetry, just reminiscing
When I came out of the army in 1985 after serving for 24 years I settled in the county of Suffolk where my first wife came from
Suffolk with old fashioned ideas and old fashioned views. In fact unless you had been resident for at least 20 years some of the villagers still classed you as an outsider.
Anyway I decided to get an allotment (not sure what you call them in the U S) so that I could grow my own vegetables.
Just across from me was the plot rented by Allen, 70 going on a hundred years old. I never did find out. Anyway it was early spring and I stood there scratching my head when Allen wandered over
" What's up boy" he said
I explained that I was new to the area and new to growing vegetables and wasn't to sure about when to start getting seed into the ground
He looked at me with those timeless eyes and said
"Sit bare arsed on the ground boy and if your **** still ain't cold after 10 minutes then that'll be the time to sow"
Jan 14, 2015
Jan 14, 2015 at 2:39 PM UTC