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BILLYtheKidster Jul 2010
"I don't blame you for writing of me as you have. You had to believe other stories, but then, I don't know if anyone would believe anything good of me anyway." - Who is it?

1859 -1861, month and day unknown.
As of this writing that's the closest we've come to his birthday.
So many records of his life are now all gone.
His tragic, short and violent life began when he was only just a very young child.
He was a lamb among wolves trying desperately to survive
the untamed Old West's most merciless and vile.
He was supposedly born in New York City,
but the state of New Mexico is where he'd be raised.
It would be there where he'd grow to young adulthood
and become familiar with the west's outlaw ways.
His first foiled crime occurred in New Mexico's Silver City.
He stole some butter and then sold it to a local merchant.
Upon discovery the local sheriff spanked the young boy silly.
Sheriff Whitehill then let the lad go with this stern warning,
"No more will I put a belt to your hide if we ever meet this way again.
If you again break the law, of this you can be sure, You'll Be Going To Jail My Friend!"
The sheriff was actually sympathetic. He wanted to give the boy a healthy fright.
He knew the kid was orphaned, alone and all on his own.
He could see that his future wasn't looking too bright.
It's sad for this boy was no dummy. Mary Richards, his teacher would say,
"He was a student who always had his homework in on time each and every day."
He would enthusiastically help with the classroom chores.
Schooling was not just education, it was an activity he adored.
He loved to read. He loved to sing. He loved to dance and even act.
He'd spend many days involved with his school plays.
His mother's death however would put an end to all of that.
Her loving memory probably grieved him all the rest of his short days.
He loved her devotedly and he lost her at a time when she was the whole of his life.
A large part of his heart surely died as he cried beside his mother at her deathbed that night.
After Mrs Catherine Antrim was laid down to rest,
her two sons would be separated and go from one foster home to the next.
The kid must have wondered if he'd ever again see his brother Joe.
Was Joe his older or younger brother? This is another fact we don't know.
We do know that their step father, one William Antrim ,
abandoned the offspring of his departed wife Catherine.
Catherine knew she was dying and probably married Antrim to insure
that her boys would always have a family and home.
If he promised to care for and love them, his promises weren't pure.
Catherine no sooner died and Antrim was gone.
He wasn't even there on the day that she died,
nor during the days that preceded the end of her suffering pneumonia.
With one last look into their eyes, he gave the brothers their final separate good byes.
William Antrim then left the boys and moved to Clifton, Arizona.
And so began the short and violent life of this unfortunate child.
Legend doesn't accurately portray the brutal harshness of the true life he had lived.
His was the tragedy of a promising young boy forced to become a man while still a child.
All would one day know him as Billy, the Kidster.
BILLYtheKidster Jul 2010
Back then it didn't matter who was right or wrong.
What mattered was who had the fastest gun.
The untamed Old West lived by a code back then. "I'll Die Before I Run."
An 18 year old boy wanders into town. All of the locals stare the young stranger down.
All of his instincts tell him to turn around, but he can't turn his back and run.
The youngster can't afford any fear. The kid's found himself much needed work here,
but the competition's greed is ruthless. That's why he wears a gun.
Young William Bonney was just another cowboy looking for work to earn an honest day's pay.
He rode into Lincoln County, New Mexico as a simple hired rancher's hand,
but he'd ride out to become a legend one day.
Today he's America's most famous bad boy, but he left us more legend than fact of all he did.
His legend continues to live on in stories, movies, books and song.
Who hasn't heard of BILLY the Kid?
BILLY the Kid's life of crime for many it seems
has been greatly exaggerated to the extremes.
He never robbed a bank, stagecoach or train.
He never harmed an innocent for pleasure or financial gain.
He was just a common stock thief. He'd steal horses and cattle
from corrupt, rich Cattle Barons who'd respond in ****** battle.
It was a lifestyle that Billy truly didn't desire,
but when your wanted by the law employers don't hire.
Yes he did **** but it was a justifiable sin.
If Billy hadn't killed them they would have killed him.
Some say he killed for vengeance but that was never his means to an end.
If he killed for anything it was for Justice for the ****** of loved ones and friends.
Many don't speak of or even know this, but back then this is what all who knew him saw.
Legally sworn Deputy William H Bonney, sworn to uphold the law.
Billy was once a bonified lawman with full authority to issue warrants and make arrests.
He could **** in the line of duty without fear of prosecution, imprisonment or arrest.
The Law Was Sworn First To The Lawman To Ultimately Serve And Protect.
Billy was one of many lawmen known as The Regulators.
They were law that Lincoln County would not soon forget.
Many today jump to the conclusion that Bonney was Billy's birth name.
He actually didn't begin to use the name Bonney until a few years before he was slain.
Where the name Bonney came from is still the unanswered question that continues to remain.
This issue alone has been known to drive historians insane.
Billy was a lad of many aliases. William Henry McCarty is believed to be his birth name.
Alias Henry McCarty, Alias Henry Antrim, Alias William Antrim Jr are all one and the same.
Kid Antrim was another alias that Billy became known to be.
His most common alias was simply The Kid.
Then one day suddenly he was William H Bonney and finally,
The Most Legendary Billy the Kid.
At the age of 12, legend says that he stabbed a man to death
because the man insulted his mother.
Legend also says that he killed a man for every year of his life.
It's been said that he was killed by a man once his friend.
Both were always seen hanging around with each other,
but it's also been said that The Kid was shot dead
because of his love for a woman that night.
Billy always fought to stay alive, when others would just accept their fate.
He did back then what he needed to do in order to survive.
It was **** or be killed if you dared to hesitate.
The Kid may have done some things that many can't justify.
Even so, his young life ended far too early to die.
Was he a victim of his time or was he truly the bad guy?
His entire truest to life story is about to unfold. Afterward you can decide.
NJ McGourty Dec 2012
I
In a land of myths, from the jaded isle,
Great stories are told of the brave and the guile.
But no legend of druids, of hags or ghouls,
Can compare to that of our own Fionn McCool.
In the province of Ulster, before armalite,
There lived a race of warriors who knew how to fight.
And who was their leader? The fiercest of the feared?
Of course it was Fionn! With his glorious ginger beard.
He had arms like a gorilla, at an impressive 8 feet,
And lived on a diet of very rare meat.
He drank only water he squeezed from stone,
And discovered 47 uses for human bone.
It was his giant strength that brought McCool his fame,
In kingdoms far and wide people knew his name.
But what was less renowned was his mental might.
Aul Fionn had towering intellect and wit to match his height.

II
When news of Fionn's exploits reached a pub in Aberdeen,
A mammoth figure emerged from the pungent, men’s latrine.
The patrons gave a shudder as it stooped through the door,
“O...One more Ben?” stuttered the barman as his **** reached the floor.
The giant gave a shout and wretched a toilet door aloft,
“Who scrieved this scaffy drawin, sayin that I’m soft?”
Silence gripped the bar as the men examined with horror,
A crude etching of Fionn McCool thrashing Benandonner.
The men remained mute, as the giant turned carmine,
“You think this Fionn boyo’s tough, I’ll carve out his spine!”
And so the giant departed, making his way west,
But not before he slaughtered the group and downed the drinks they left.

III
A roaring voice came through the mist and reached our own Fionn’s ear,
But when he reached the Antrim coast, he near ****** himself with fear
Seeing Ben on Scotland’s edge, throwing boulders to the sea,
“I’ll turn yer lungs to bagpipes! Ye feeble wee beastie!”
Fionn trembled before the monster, twice as big as he,
With a chest as wide as a trawler and biceps thick as trees.
Now Fionn was not a coward but nor was he a fool,
As the rocks formed a bridge he saw ‘the late Fionn McCool.’
And so he sparked a plan to deceive the creature,
A plot in which his wisdom and his wife would feature.
Running to his house he rushed to build a crib,
And dressed as an infant to complete the fib.

IV
With the last stone in place, Ben crossed the sea,
With ‘murrrdur’ in his heart, his eyes mad with hateful glee.
He crouched to enter the house after kicking through the door,
Grabbing Oonagh in his hand, “Now where’s yer husband *****?!”
Fionn’s wife was calm as he held her off the ground,
But wretched as she smelt the breath of a gum-diseased hound.
“He’ll return soon,” she said as the shoes fell off her feet.
“but put me down and while you wait I’ll fix you something to eat”
While Oonagh was in the kitchen, Big Ben released a smirk,
“From the size of his wife, killing McCool won’t be much work.”
Oonagh lead the deception, returning with some cake.
But had placed rocks in the batter, before she’d begun to bake.
Benadonner was surprised, when he took his first bite,
He reached into his mouth and removed a pearly white.
Not wanting to seem weak, by refusing a McCool snack,
The giant continued to eat the stones until all his teeth had cracked.

V
Gumming back a sob, the brute looked around,
He spied the crib in the corner, and was disturbed by what he found.
A child sleeping soundly, but of such monstrous size,
Ben, now blind with tears was fooled by Fionn’s disguise.
Coughing to hide his alarm, the Scottish giant inquired.
“Is Fionn McCool the man, to whom this weeun is sired?”
Oonagh laughed and replied, “He’s his father’s son, no doubt.”
“Sure I remember he was six foot four when I popped him out.”
Now the Scot started sweating, THE BABY WAS FECKIN TITANIC!
When he imagined the father’s size the goliath began to panic.
He ran from the house, kilt flapping in the wind,
As McCool watched from his window, he kissed his wife and grinned.

VI
While Ben crossed the bridge, he dismantled his creation,
To ensure the ****** couldn’t follow, he divorced the nations.
Now centuries later, if you need proof today,
The remains of Ben’s bridge is called the Giant’s Causeway.
Leslie Philibert Jan 2016
The strandcafe
                   was lined
                   with Hitchcock seagulls

as you looked over
                   your glasses
                   with concern
                   and said

that I did not understand Hegel.

A time ago of rage, and joy and rain.
In Memoriam Liam Clarke
bones Jun 2016
Carrickfergus (1937) - poem by Louis Macneice.


I was born in Belfast between the mountain and the gantries
To the hooting of lost sirens and the clang of trams;
Thence to Smoky Carrick in County Antrim
Where the bottle-neck harbour collects the mud which jams

The little boats beneath the Norman castle,
The pier shining with lumps of crystal salt;
The Scotch quarter was a line of residential houses
But the Irish quarter was a slum for the blind and halt.

The brook ran yellow from the factory stinking of chlorine,
The yarn mill called it's funeral cry at noon;
Our lights looked over the lough to the lights of Bangor
Under the peacock aura of a drowning moon.

The Norman walled this town against the country
To stop his ears to the yelping of his slave
And built a church in the form of a cross but denoting
The list of Christ on the cross in the angle of the nave.

I was the rectors son, born to the Anglican order,
Banned for ever from the candles of the Irish poor;
The Chichesters knelt in marble at the end of a transept
With ruffs about their necks, their portion sure.

The war came and a huge camp of soldiers
Grew from the ground in sight of our house with long
Dummies hanging from gibbets for bayonet practice
And the sentry's challenge echoing all day long;

A Yorkshire terrier ran in and out by the gate-lodge
Barred to civilians, yapping as if taking affront;
Marching at ease and singing 'Who Killed **** Robin?'
The troops went out by the lodge and off to the Front.

The steamer was camouflaged that took me to England-
Sweat and khaki in the Carlisle train;
I thought that the war would last for ever and sugar
be always rationed and that never again

Would the weekly papers not have photos of sandbags
And my governess not make bandages from moss
And people not have maps above the fireplace
With flags on pins moving across and across-

Across the hawthorn hedge the noise of bugles,
Flares across the night,
Somewhere on the lough was a prison ship for Germans,
A cage across their sight.

I went to school in Dorset, the world of parents
Contracted into a puppet world of sons
Far from the mill girls, the smell of porter, the salt-mines
And the soldiers with their guns.




Louis Macneice
I looked for Louis MacNeice on HP but couldn't find him, so have posted some of his poetry in case someone else comes looking too..
Ryan O'Leary Oct 2018
Starting way up north from
from fair head in Antrim to
mizen head in Cork there is
not a Border Collie in the 32
counties wishing for a return
to The Troubles before the
Good Friday agreement when
meat was forbidden by the
Catholic Church because fish
is for felines and it was seen
by many canines as a blatant
act of segregation, racism and
even discrimination for which
the animal kingdom of Eire
(In the absence of a Monarch)
has been audibly vocal in all
of the four provinces, many of
the nations kennel clubs and
at last years Crufts Show in
Earls Court London, a Kerry
Blue refused to stand on the
winners podium with a Poodle
who shared first place, because
she was a vegetarian and not
at all sympathetic or supportive
to a universal diet for all breeds
on the island of Ireland.
BILLYtheKidster Jul 2010
Judge Bristol pronounced his sentence with the following words and said,
"The said William Bonney, alias Kid, alias William Antrim
shall be hanged by the neck until his body be dead, Dead, DEAD!!!"
Shackled Billy left the courthouse smiling, almost as if in glee.
"Why are you smiling?" an interviewer asked him inquisitively.
"What's the point in dwelling on the dreary side of life?" the Kid responded,
"Today the joke is on me."

A true tribute to The Kid's charm, humor and endearing personality.
The above is not legend. The above is true documented history.
solEmn oaSis Dec 2015
I have been practicing singing this in acapella.


~~~~~~~o0o~~~~~~~

rock of ages cleft for me,
let me hide myself in thee;
let the water and the blood,
from thy wounded side which flowed,
be of sin the double cure;
save from wrath and make me pure.

Not the labors of my hands
can fulfill thy law's demands;
these for sin could not atone,
thou must save,and thou alone.
In my hand no price I bring,
simply to thy cross I cling;

While I draw this fleeting breath,
when mine eyes shall close in death,
when i rise to worlds unknown,
and behold thee on thy throne,
Rock of ages, cleft for me,
let me hide myself in thee

~~~~~~~o0o~~~~~~~

ROCK OF AGES
WORDS: AUGUSTUS TOPLADY, 1775
SUNG BY: ANTRIM MENNONITE CHOIR
VIDEO BY: *SE SAMONTE
"Life without a music is just like death without a witness!"
because I do love Hymn ...i just wanted to share this kind of song.
entitled Rock of Ages
hope you add and like it! For hymn is a music.
AND TO ME... MUSIC IS POETRY
Nat Lipstadt Jul 2015
"I write because writing is the hardest work I’ve ever done. It is slow and painstaking and frustrating. I do not begin with an idea or a theme, and I don’t make outlines. I don’t have a plan for the ending or, usually, for the next page or the next line. Even short pieces might take shape over years. Everything that I have ever seen, done, or felt, had, shared, or lost, is in play, and*
the word of the day is, on most days, confusion

I no longer regret writing, or the life I have made along the way. I’ve learned too much and come too far, and I am in pursuit of an art form. It took a long time, and a lot of work, to get to this point, and I will never find an end to it. I have a problem that can keep me busy for the rest of my life. I have something to look forward to."

Donald Antrim^


~~~

though the waters are eerily placid,
the beard roughened wind
beneath a grey, solemn overcast,
predicts, foretells, enhances, over casts (ha!)
the mood of the moment

but it is not causal for
native, irregularly regular
is the word of the day,
on most days,
confusion

life is my tale of two cities,
for now, for me,
it is best and worst of times,
a cyclical, bent and dinged cylinder,
contains a shape shifting persona
seeking the solidity of a
single polarity

higher highs and lower lows,
the new normal, a new word,
still a slung slang concoction,
not yet unapproved by Merriam Webster

I drink up the external contradictions of
the stiff breeze buffeting the
serenity of the water's horizon
a perspective that always calms,
mirror mocking, so matching
the stiffened interior of
this buffeted flesh form

"I no longer regret writing,
or the life I have made along the way
I’ve learned too much and
come too far, and I am in pursuit
of an art form"


rewriting my own internal art form, daily,
incorporating the free, external, unasked for edits,
craft blending the backwards and the forward,
living the confusion that birthed
this poem,
this person,
this art form
~~~
July 18, 2015
Shelter Island, N.Y.
^These paragraphs were excerpted from the article below
The Unprotected Life

http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-unprotected-life?mbid=nl_071715_Daily&CNDID;=38006813&mbid;=nl_071715_Daily&CNDID;=38006813&spMailingID;=7913140&spUserID;=MTA1MDU2Mzc0NDY2S0&spJobID;=722223542&spReportId;=NzIyMjIzNTQyS0
John F McCullagh Mar 2017
In her majesty's prison hospital
The patient slipped in to a coma.
For two months he had led a fast
in solidarity with his brothers.

The men of ‘H” block wouldn’t don
Such clothes as thieves might wear
They were  brave Irish Republicans;
Politics put them there.

They dressed in sheets and blankets
When denied their clothes to wear
In this time of the “Troubles”
the “Blanketmen” prepared.

No warder's food would they accept.
No uniforms would they wear.
The world was focused on Long Kesh
and the brave lads dying there.

Bobby Sands was comatose;
His breathing shallow; his pulse was weak
This Native son of Antrim
Nevermore would speak    

Just Twenty Seven years of age
As he slipped into the past
Bobby Sands was the first to die,
But he wouldn’t be the last.
Bobby Sands passed from this life on 05/05/81. The cause of death was starvation. He is a martyr To the Irish Republican cause
Brian Turner Aug 2021
Chaffinch on bended straw
Holding on for the ride
Like a red metal horse on a giant spring
I stare, it sings

3000 crows, maybe more
Gather noisly on the telegraph wires
4000 crows now, maybe more
Start fighting, some gore

Sea mist coming in over the Antrim shore
Sea mist cooling air round our skin
Farmer's wince for the time of day
Too late for the last of the hay
Notes from my break on the North Antrim coast in Northern Ireland staying near Portrush. Not far from the Giant's causeway.
BY ANY OTHER NAME
( for the miracle that a Brian Ings is)

the kestrel
hovers high
over the Devil's Mother

it knows nothing
of the names
that humans give to things

such as mountains
or indeed
its good self

it only knows
the heights
that it can fly to

and how
glorious a thing
the wind beneath a wing

if it's gaze could
penetrate
the gift of language

it would perceive
how time changes
mountains and name-ings

it watches words
mutate back into
the original Irish

so that the Devil's Mother
that it flies over today
was once the Demon's Testicles

"Magairlí an Deamhain!"
it screeches
the name

through the dense fog
of  Anglicisation
or Bastardisation.

or God forgive us
the virus of
Religion

and it would croak
with laughter
at its own

nomenclature
"*** Dearg" or
Red *****

it is thankful for this moment
of human sentience
so that it can laugh at itself

as a Red *****
flying over
the Demon's Testicles

but in an instant
the instant
is gone

and it is only this
miracle
of being

the beauty
of its flight
in the midst of a gale

"*** dearg
ag eitilt thall
magairlí an deamhan!"

it chuckles in Kestrel
before translating itself
back into the English

"A kestrel
flying over
the Demon's Testicles!"

*

Ballypitmave in County Antrim would be known in Irish as Phite Méabha ‘townland of Maeve’s *****’. Or as the good old Revn Cupples would have it ‘town land of the pit of shame’
We are talking of a Goddess here or a figure of mighty myth so the Irish would not be afraid to call a ***** a ***** and all hail the Goddess.

— The End —