"parley" poems
1
Beat! beat! drums!—Blow! bugles! blow!
Through the windows—through doors—burst like a ruthless force,
Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation;
Into the school where the scholar is studying;
Leave not the bridegroom quiet—no happiness must he have now with his bride;
Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, plowing his field or gathering his grain;
So fierce you whirr and pound, you drums—so shrill you bugles blow.
2
Beat! beat! drums!—Blow! bugles! blow!
Over the traffic of cities—over the rumble of wheels in the streets:
Are beds prepared for sleepers at night in the houses? No sleepers must sleep in those beds;
No bargainers’ bargains by day—no brokers or speculators—Would they continue?
Would the talkers be talking? would the singer attempt to sing?
Would the lawyer rise in the court to state his case before the judge?
Then rattle quicker, heavier drums—you bugles wilder blow.
3
Beat! beat! drums!—Blow! bugles! blow!
Make no parley—stop for no expostulation;
Mind not the timid—mind not the weeper or prayer;
Mind not the old man beseeching the young man;
Let not the child’s voice be heard, nor the mother’s entreaties;
Make even the trestles to shake the dead, where they lie awaiting the hearses,
So strong you thump, O terrible drums—so loud you bugles blow.
4.8k
My auspicious and audacious assault augments the annoyance of aged accomplices.
My bodacious broadside of boffolas berates and buffaloes bros beneficently.
A classy crusade Clownishly chiseling and criticizing childishness.
A devilish ********** of dillydallying dullards; devoutly denying dimwits the dulcet dream of defiance.
Excessive, exuberant edification, ebulliently eliminating education-evictees.
A fair-weather frolic in flippancy with furious fools floundering in flawed foppishness.
Gregariously grating glum guys gleefully, growing grander garnishes of gripping gallantry gaily.
Heckling hooligans highlights my heavenly humor.
Irreverently irking irritable, iniquitous idiots in inestimably infuriating and incredible instances.
A jolly, jocular **** joking with jerks.
A kreiger kicking kleptomaniacs in the karyotype. (Cut me some slack, this is 'k', after all.)
A ludicrous, laughing lambaste of lollygagging lunatics, loftily loosing luscious lunacy on lucky losers.
A magnificent masterpiece of malfeasance, a monstrous, malevolent mission of massive misfortune for the minor minors missing no malicious missive.
A noxious, narcissistic niggling of nitwits, niftily nixing the noisome naivete of niggardly nobs.
An offhand, off-color outburst of outlandish observations to outclass the obnoxious overtures of obsequious offal.
A pragmatic prediction of possible platitudes or platypi, a placid parley of pyrotechnic pleasantries provoking Pyrrhic protections by prurient prats.
A quixotic quibble quarreling with a queer quarry.
Ribald ribbing, ruining the robust reality of the repreachful, repugnant, and rapacious with risque ridiculousness.
A silly, slighting slander of sluglike slavishness, succinctly sinking sloppy simpletons sourly.
Tracing the titillating talent of towing tyranny to towering terrors to tactless, togless, terrapins of the times.
Jan 7, 2012
Jan 7, 2012 at 11:25 PM UTC
Why do the tongues of little birds
converse with the morning?
And their hearts stanza their beaks
to parley each dawn?
Have men lost their voice?
That creatures so small;
Should be the guardians of days night.
© Qwey.ku
Jun 11, 2016
Jun 11, 2016 at 3:17 AM UTC
3
“Sic transit gloria mundi,”
“How doth the busy bee,”
“Dum vivimus vivamus,”
I stay mine enemy!
Oh “veni, vidi, vici!”
Oh caput cap-a-pie!
And oh “memento mori”
When I am far from thee!
Hurrah for Peter Parley!
Hurrah for Daniel Boone!
Three cheers, sir, for the gentleman
Who first observed the moon!
Peter, put up the sunshine;
Patti, arrange the stars;
Tell Luna, tea is waiting,
And call your brother Mars!
Put down the apple, Adam,
And come away with me,
So shalt thou have a pippin
From off my father’s tree!
I climb the “Hill of Science,”
I “view the landscape o’er;”
Such transcendental prospect,
I ne’er beheld before!
Unto the Legislature
My country bids me go;
I’ll take my india rubbers,
In case the wind should blow!
During my education,
It was announced to me
That gravitation, stumbling,
Fell from an apple tree!
The earth upon an axis
Was once supposed to turn,
By way of a gymnastic
In honor of the sun!
It was the brave Columbus,
A sailing o’er the tide,
Who notified the nations
Of where I would reside!
Mortality is fatal—
Gentility is fine,
Rascality, heroic,
Insolvency, sublime!
Our Fathers being weary,
Laid down on Bunker Hill;
And tho’ full many a morning,
Yet they are sleeping still,—
The trumpet, sir, shall wake them,
In dreams I see them rise,
Each with a solemn musket
A marching to the skies!
A coward will remain, Sir,
Until the fight is done;
But an immortal hero
Will take his hat, and run!
Good bye, Sir, I am going;
My country calleth me;
Allow me, Sir, at parting,
To wipe my weeping e’e.
In token of our friendship
Accept this “Bonnie Doon,”
And when the hand that plucked it
Hath passed beyond the moon,
The memory of my ashes
Will consolation be;
Then, farewell, Tuscarora,
And farewell, Sir, to thee!
2.6k
Noon had barely finished his circuit
when I engaged the Sun in conversation,
wondering if her healing rays were a golden ode to pain?
Abruptly interrupted;
shirts' silk thread dripping displeasure,
at the sudden moistness of its condition.
In return and in much the same verbal position,
I chided this thread,
intoxicated with sticky saline libation,
much less for the distraction
as opposed to the - parley intrusion,
citing;
“My dear shirt it’s impolite to gravitate beyond one's social inclusion”
Instinctively,
back and fingers joined this spoken foray
distancing themselves in unison
from the sozzled garments' argument.
Arching and pulling away,
his company no longer entreated,
whatever beauty he had,
now lost,
in his present
dis - position.
In agreement and sunshine unabating,
I attempted to continue our once lovely conversation.
But she;
her glow unwaning,
had moved on,
no longer finding such small talk entertaining.
© Qwey.ku
May 18, 2014
May 18, 2014 at 12:41 PM UTC
Am a Templar Knight whose allegiance is to Our Lord Jesus Christ
Sir Thomas de Charney is my name, Master of the fortress in Gaza
Was compelled to quill an account of an assault on the town of Ludd
My heart was also dazed and enamored by a young woman evermore
We left Gaza late in the day; I took 40 of my best knights with me
Fully clad in mail and helmets, we dashed long swords in scabbards
Short swords made at the ready to perlustrate with a days provisions
We headed east prepared to do battle, for God and for the cause
We approached Ludd; saw billowing smoke; heard strangled screams
I dispatched 35 knights throughout the municipality in groups of 5 each
My orders were; execute requisite to save townspeople from slaughter
An appurtenance to the initial order: no parley with these infidels
Before dismissing my men, I saw smolder swell left flank of the border
Saw a hovel, the thatch was burning out of control and spreading apace
Around the corner were three enemy soldiers crowding over someone
Until the last few years, I knew not what **** was; the worst in a man
Despite noise of city under siege, these ******** were intoxicated in sin
The remaining five knights accompanied me and covered the perimeter
I dismounted Petra, clutched the hilt of my long sword, made approach
The three heathen sensed my bearing and turned to meet their death
Then I saw her face and was transfixed
I would yield no prisoners
Today there would be justice for this woman
I pray for swiftness of divine retribution
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To be continued…………
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dec 29, 2014
Dec 29, 2014 at 1:54 PM UTC
65
I can’t tell you—but you feel it—
Nor can you tell me—
Saints, with ravished slate and pencil
Solve our April Day!
Sweeter than a vanished frolic
From a vanished green!
Swifter than the hoofs of Horsemen
Round a Ledge of dream!
Modest, let us walk among it
With our faces veiled—
As they say polite Archangels
Do in meeting God!
Not for me—to prate about it!
Not for you—to say
To some fashionable Lady
“Charming April Day”!
Rather—Heaven’s “Peter Parley”!
By which Children slow
To sublimer Recitation
Are prepared to go!
1.9k
Water over stone speaks to me
Voices in my head or reality?
Bubbling, babbling, a fluid oration.
From liquid, an opus of reverberation.
Closer I get, speech becomes blurred.
A child, a crowd, an implicit word?
Retreat a step, lucid communique
Desire to immerse, ingest the parley.
Sit between banks in tears from on high
Hear her voice in the brook as I try
To understand, and follow the sentence at hand
A cacophony of silence sifted through sand.
Meaningless, mindless, numbing address
Just what’s so important she’s trying to stress?
Words from the distant, ghostlike, perchance
Wispy and passionate midsummer’s dance.
My ears reject resonance, but the mind draws it in
To decipher the past and perceive an old sin.
Apologetic, pleading, no mold to this play
Just babbling on, with no true thing to say.
Hands growing numb from water’s icy hold
Must leave this brook, for so I’ve been told
That mystery lives in the motion of hearing
Of water’s sweet journey beyond my heart’s clearing.
Aug 10, 2011
Aug 10, 2011 at 6:58 PM UTC
Himself it was who wrote
His rank, and quartered his own coat.
There is no king nor sovereign state
That can fix a hero's rate;
Each to all is venerable,
Cap-a-pie invulnerable,
Until he write, where all eyes rest,
Slave or master on his breast.
I saw men go up and down
In the country and the town,
With this prayer upon their neck,
"Judgment and a judge we seek."
Not to monarchs they repair,
Nor to learned jurist's chair,
But they hurry to their peers,
To their kinsfolk and their dears,
Louder than with speech they pray,
What am I? companion; say.
And the friend not hesitates
To assign just place and mates,
Answers not in word or letter,
Yet is understood the better;—
Is to his friend a looking-glass,
Reflects his figure that doth pass.
Every wayfarer he meets
What himself declared, repeats;
What himself confessed, records;
Sentences him in his words,
The form is his own corporal form,
And his thought the penal worm.
Yet shine for ever ****** minds,
Loved by stars and purest winds,
Which, o'er passion throned sedate,
Have not hazarded their state,
Disconcert the searching spy,
Rendering to a curious eye
The durance of a granite ledge
To those who gaze from the sea's edge.
It is there for benefit,
It is there for purging light,
There for purifying storms,
And its depths reflect all forms;
It cannot parley with the mean,
Pure by impure is not seen.
For there's no sequestered grot,
Lone mountain tam, or isle forgot,
But justice journeying in the sphere
Daily stoops to harbor there.
1.7k
In Shediac
The sidewalk threads up Main,
Past Church and hospital
To a yellow-frame;
Where wishes and the real world meet
Near Leger Street.
Here,
Quiet evening stairs leave cares,
And blueberries, dahlias and Parley's foam,
Like Sirens call our thoughts to home.
A quilt work of faces,
Some young, some grown,
Looked through windows to a time unknown,
Past the ledger of Grand-mere,
Past Hector's chair.
Though
Emilie was consumed with cooking,
Quilting, cleaning and sometimes singing,
She fed the dreams of her dear born,
And sheltered concerns of a heart well-worn,
Like a wrap-a-round porch in a Northumberland storm,
On Main Street.
These
Porch steps led to worldly affairs,
Finance, healthcare, CN, shopwares.
Each step, each child bore Emilie's breath,
Et dans l'eglise St. Joseph.
But
Bricks are brittle and paint will wane,
A picture or poem will fade and stain,
Yet Sirens still call out your name
In Shediac.
Apr 29, 2014
Apr 29, 2014 at 10:36 AM UTC
A forward rush by the lamp in the gloom,
And we clasped, and almost kissed;
But she was not the woman whom
I had promised to meet in the thawing brume
On that harbour-bridge; nor was I he of her tryst.
So loosening from me swift she said:
“O why, why feign to be
The one I had meant—to whom I have sped
To fly with, being so sorrily wed,”
’Twas thus and thus that she upbraided me.
My assignation had struck upon
Some others’ like it, I found.
And her lover rose on the night anon;
And then her husband entered on
The lamplit, snowflaked, sloppiness around.
“Take her and welcome, man!” he cried:
“I wash my hands of her.
I’ll find me twice as good a bride!”
—All this to me, whom he had eyed,
Plainly, as his wife’s planned deliverer.
And next the lover: “Little I knew,
Madam, you had a third!
Kissing here in my very view!”
—Husband and lover then withdrew.
I let them; and I told them not they erred.
Why not? Well, there faced she and I—
Two strangers who’d kissed, or near,
Chancewise. To see stand weeping by
A woman once embraced, will try
The tension of a man the most austere.
So it began; and I was young,
She pretty, by the lamp,
As flakes came waltzing down among
The waves of her clinging hair, that hung
Heavily on her temples, dark and damp.
And there alone still stood we two;
She once cast off for me,
Or so it seemed: while night ondrew,
Forcing a parley what should do
We twain hearts caught in one catastrophe.
In stranded souls a common strait
Wakes latencies unknown,
Whose impulse may precipitate
A life-long leap. The hour was late,
And there was the Jersey boat with its funnel agroan.
“Is wary walking worth much pother?”
It grunted, as still it stayed.
“One pairing is as good as another
Where is all venture! Take each other,
And scrap the oaths that you have aforetime made.”
—Of the four involved there walks but one
On earth at this late day.
And what of the chapter so begun?
In that odd complex what was done?
Well; happiness comes in full to none:
Let peace lie on lulled lips: I will not say.
1.5k
The chill of winter bites into the skin
And the valley sleeps in muffled din
In the freezing blustery winter night
The shivering trees stay huddled and tight
Stars have lined up in the sky
With cotton clouds swiftly sailing by
The moon light seeping through the veil
Makes the foliage glisten in the dale
Sharp noises sounding eerie
Leave the valley a place so scary
These sounds parley in a tongue unknown
Of gory tales, to none ever known
Did some cannibal tribe once congregate
In this nether territory to live segregate
What midnight revels had they held
No one knows and history remains cold
Now, here amid thickets and thorny shrubs
Where darkness, like a Fiend proudly struts
And in leaf fringed corners and crevices wide
Serpents coil with poisonous fangs in hide
Look, the sly fox walking stealthily away
After feeding greedily on his hapless prey,
Through the ravine and down the furrow
How he sneaks into his covert burrow
The glassy brook that mirrored the skies
Now in dark, under a thick blanket lies
But the water rushing through pebbles and rocks
With sonorous music, the nightly calm breaks
Among the branches of towering trees
Birds have perched and roost in peace
Little birdies with downy feathers
Cuddle under their mothers splayed wings
From far off woods comes a shrieking howl
As frightening as the hoots of a night owl
Wind, rushing through needle pines
Sounds like a child when he, in pain whines
Now the valley sleeps in muffled din
Until the Sun for his daily ritual parades in
In day light this valley would be up and awake
And life for sure will a renewed turn take
Nov 27, 2016
Nov 27, 2016 at 5:47 AM UTC
As I stand over the ruin, the deepest dark, swallowing black,
Hope is at the mercy of a terrible minds acts.
Torn dreams in scared memories with such a devastating array,
An inner darkness so pure, ripping the guts of black holes away.
With an anger that burns like the center of the earth, so hot,
Waiting to spill out to melt your sweetest, hopeful thoughts.
The heart bleeds void in the darkened soul, your irresistible hatred of my iridescent glow,
The unstoppable will that impedes blood, so cold, with icy fingers that drain your soul, slow.
Your ultimate despair is my inevitable strength, I exuberantly feed on your passionate fear,
If you would only entertain a certain parley with me, I have a seductive secret my dear.
If not for formality, you would have already been devoured, but you're the delicate flower,
So crystal and pristine, I wait to bath inside your light, only increasing my power.
Over places deep within you, so beckoning to my dark, where I hold time,
You may have peace in the day....but in the night...your *** is mine!
Jan 23, 2014
Jan 23, 2014 at 9:07 AM UTC
Outside my unseeing windows
Stringed lamp posts
Pierce the deepest night.
Lights still dance
Along the streets,
Reflected in silent pools,
Splashed by gentle roars
Of pavement rubber
Racing the idled road.
Beneath my candid room
The aircon units gargle
Their cold nocturne
Of sleep and thought.
The sidewalk stays mindful --
Witness to murmured kegs
And murdered heels,
Its quiescence reverberates
The gentle parley
Of blaring merchant loons.
The boulevard refuses
To choke in darkness.
My mind will wait until
The clamour of morning
Shatters this weighted gloom.
Jul 30, 2011
Jul 30, 2011 at 7:48 PM UTC
“YOU’RE JUST LIKE YOUR FATHER!”
screams the judge,
wielding a whiskey and a weaponised Women’s Weekly,
as I flare inside but choose instead to smile meekly.
Was my Dad the spawn of Jeffrey Dahmer?
Or the bloke who used to watch Kojak, on a Sunday, in pyjamas?
In fairness though, the absence of the villain of this piece,
last seen clubbing in Ibiza with a girl who’s not his niece,
does nothing to lighten this affair.
Especially with his crimes bequeathed to me, his heir.
The charges apparently too ignoble for repentance,
I brace to bear the brunt and bile of sentence.
Her glib-gab gores each guilty glance.
Each chapter claimed by circumstance.
Her words a whip, envenomed lace,
lashed out anew upon my face.
It matters not that he’s elsewhere,
I stand accused for the genes I wear.
I’d serve notice now, demand redress,
if he hadn’t eloped to a vague address.
The urge to silent scream? Repressed.
Repeal rejected, defence disbarred.
Appeal affected, mis-trial marred.
A deafeningly dead deal is on the cards.
I pause perpetually and play the clock,
Until “New Witness!!” echoes around the dock.
Youngest courtroom entrant in our history,
identity unknown and gender still a mystery.
“Oh, look how wonderful this is!” coos the judge.
Now as sticky sweet and seasonal as fudge.
“Of course this cherub must approach the bench,
with the defendant as mouthpiece to represent”.
“Pray tell, sinner, its testimony loud and clear"
*Cue a minor mandate that only I can hear *
A pause. A private parley.
The pup's prose presented without palaver:
“I will grow, just like my father”.
May 10, 2017
May 10, 2017 at 3:20 PM UTC
I wake and find myself in love:
And this one time I do not doubt.
I only fear, and wander out
To hold long parley with a dove.
The innocent and the guilty, met
Here in the garden, feel no fear.
But I'm afraid of you, my dear.
There was a reason: I forget.
And I by shyness am undone
And can't go out for fear I meet
My poems dancing down the street
Telling your name to everyone.
The lichen peels along the wall.
My conversation bores the dove.
He knows it all: that I'm in love
And you care much and not at all.
I shall stay here and keep my word.
Glumly I wait to marry dust.
It grieves me only that I must
Speak not to you, but to a bird.
**Written by: Dom Moraes
Dominic Francis "Dom" Moraes (19 July 1938 – 2 June 2004) was an Indian writer and poet who wrote in the English language. **
Nov 5, 2017
Nov 5, 2017 at 11:21 PM UTC
Costume
We parley great loss but we hide it by a disguise who me no look see this was made from the finest cloth
It allows me to fit in it goes every place you will find many have the same outfit as mine little do you
Know the cost but oh how entertaining my guests never complain they insist I give the best times any
Where but this suits everything we know and care about does anyone hear something that sounds like a
Roaring fire in some of the greatest times it seems to bleed into my thoughts its funny how truth pierces
The darkness with the greatest reason it makes arguments that can’t be denied but fortunately with
Enough disregard and neglect you can ignore it into non-existence too bad you can’t do the same for the
Soul that is eternal oh if you could measure the spirit that love abides in isn’t it a good indicator you can
Do some of the most horrible things be reckless thoughtless and with burning shame blacking in the
Worst way your good name even among friends if they knew some things you are involved in they
Would shun you and you wouldn’t argue with them but in the midst of all of this benevolent love
Still calls to you with a sure promise of restoration it is blessing that sweeps you into vales of purist bliss
Nowhere is there a feeling that matches this knowing but look what I am what I have done still you are
Lost in mighty waves of love until you finally see can there be a bigger fool than I but sadly how many
Know or experience this ultimate acceptance they stir up evil without end at the slightest sign of ******
Pleasure they pursue and are caught up in fanciful and at times the most stupid acts we are truly fine
Tuned and bare strains of madness in the real facts we are creatures that are susceptible to destructive
Means that only offer harm and ultimately death this can all be remedied by the simple act of changing
Our alliance from one who only seeks our destruction to the one by His spirit will by his word lead us
into temples of soul stirring life lifting victories we can find help first for ourselves then as it says rescue
others actually plucking them from the burning sadly not all will listen but some will walk out of the
cruel dimension that was not always the reality we are children lost but now found by the great cost
and sacrifice that love demanded and couldn’t be denied
Jan 9, 2012
Jan 9, 2012 at 7:19 PM UTC
So many desire endless drugs and women
I just see you as the only woman near my milky way
Don't let the spark go away
Always having to participate a parley
Looking for a smart way
To fight off the troubles at my beach
Sep 2, 2018
Sep 2, 2018 at 10:23 PM UTC
It's an illness, and what a wicked one. It lasts five stages. Through four stages it tortures you the best it can. It tortures you with nostalgia and melancholia. I will tell you about these four stages, until you finally reach the fifth and last stage, the stage that will feel like redemption to you. Brace yourself, this illness can **** before you reach the final stage.
Stage 1, denial / delusion
In this stage, you will deny what happened, and will live in a fantasy your poor mind created for you to keep you alive.
You know exactly what has happened, you know the truth. However, this hideous creature, this torturous illness won't let you "get over" the truth that easily. It will torture you with false hopes, wrecking your mind because each and every night, you will wonder if what has happened was real or just a bad nightmare of yours.
If you made it, be lucky for a second. Stage 2 is awaiting you.
Stage 2, wrath
In this stage, you will feel an ager, a rage you never felt before. You will have the urge to destroy and to burn, not only things, but also you, the memories, and just everything and everyone surrounding you.
The illness wants to destroy you, and it gives you ire so you can "prepare" yourself for what will come for you. Destruction in the finest, most painful ways, you can't even imagine.
You survived Stage 2, now let's take a look on how desperate you can become in Stage 3.
Stage 3, negotiating
In this stage, your desperateness to wipe the slate clean will show. The illness makes you parley with the wildest, most unreal people you may meet in your life, only to undo what has happened.
You would sell your sould to the devil.
You would give your life to the Grim Reaper.
You would… You might even want to make a deal with me.
I think we should stop about what you would, it might get to horrendous for you. So we reach Stage 4, the stage that has the highest verisimilitude to **** you.
Stage 4, depression
You will cry waterfalls of tears, so be careful that you don't drown in the sea of hot, salty water your ever so beautiful eyes created.
This stage of torture is where the illness got quite creative. I'm sure you heard a lot about depression, but in reality it is even worse than the worst you expected. It might feel unreal from time to time, but I tell you, it is real – savagely real.
It might **** you, so try your best to survive this stage. That's the only admonition I can give you.
You survived? Congratulations! Hereby we reach
Stage 5, acceptance
In this stage, the final stage, you finally reach the redemption you craved for so long. You will finally be able to leave behind what has downed you so much. You will be able to fly again, your wings are back.
However, be careful. This stage is the shortest of them all.
Many people before you have failed before reaching this salvific stage.
I hope you won't underestimate the illness. You might have reached redemption, but it only waits to strike again and to devour you.
Be careful, even for I will watch over you.
May 17, 2014
May 17, 2014 at 5:08 AM UTC
Among summer so cruel
With heat grazed by the darkest brawn
What sun giveth life if blue or scarlet, need life live so
To name thy frith upon such UV life, such ultraviolet sight
And in UV thou love without flaw
On what corner the street so narrow, the intersected and the intersection
Eyne come not forth, make way for the immortal heart
Parley not for mutual love, thy earn is thy gain
And with growing grief thou spill thy blood in rivers of outness dreams
Lie not in the roseless garden
Be or be not as thy nature thou swear
Be, so mayst thyself is sworn
Lovely love, we canst not ever die
...if we ought to be, in ultraviolet light.
Sep 22, 2017
Sep 22, 2017 at 8:53 PM UTC
I WILL NOT CEASE FROM MENTAL FIGHT
"Hush...hush!" he'd
suddenly shush
us kids
going" "Wot...wot?"
"Snipers!"
"Where...where?"
we'd whisper half scared.
"Everywhere...everywhere!"
he'd hiss under his breath.
Even in his beloved
red and yellow rose bushes.
( Fred shot in the head
still bleeding in Picardy ).
Or the *** in
the garden shed
which we'd storm
with a barrage of conkers.
"The bleedy blighter
got away!"
They had followed him
home from Flanders.
Or just...
never went away.
Mother said he'd
lost his....
but he'd play
marbles with us
kids
all day.
Rubbed his tolley
against his bonce
"Big Bertha"
he'd call her.
"Yer losing 'em...yer losing 'em!"
he'd sing with great gusto.
We had to let him win
or he'd swear like anything.
"Stop dat slanguage!"
Mother would swear at him.
He sang saucy French songs
"mes saucisson mes amis!"
but only when he be-
-came squiffy
which was more
than often!
Mother begging us:
"Don't listen...don't listen!"
But we inky-dinky
parley-vous'd with him.
A chorus of us kids
belting out:
"...Oh I didn't know how
to tickle Mary
but now I know how!"
"War is all about
saving your skin!"
Most of his mates
lost theirs.
He still calls them
by their names
as if they are
just...there.
"The ghosts of the sofa!"
They sit and watch
the radio with him.
"Manchester Utd 2 -"
He sings ADIEU LA VIE
and cries in French.
Left his left leg
in a trench
but still loves
to dance.
"I dance as badly or
as goodly as I did before
no less...no more!"
More and more
often he hides
under the stairs
eating raspberry jam
or marmalade
in the dark
crying now
in English.
Hiding still
from the Wipers' snipers.
He hates apple and plum
"all we...ugggh...ever got!"
And loudly the cupboard
it sings.
"...without food so long
I've forgotten where my face
is..."
(Fred lost his...)
I always remember him
coming out to salute
surrender to us
as he recites
in a little child's voice.
"When the Rock of Gibraltar
takes a flying leap at Malta
you'll never get yer ********
in a corn beef can."
Jan 13, 2017
Jan 13, 2017 at 9:24 AM UTC
I'm having trouble with
The voices in my head
While I speak simple english
They speak fluent french
So I never really know
Just what is being said
Which makes it hard to understand
The voices in my head
I never know exactly
What it is that I should say
Did I arrive at the conversation early
Or am I much to late
Either way I hate to make
The voices sit and wait
While I pull out my French-English Dictionary
And flip through every page
So now every Tuesday
Since Tuesday last
I have been preparing
By taking a French class
So I'll be at the ready
To give an answer back
In case the voices in my head
Ever feel the need to ask
Feb 22, 2015
Feb 22, 2015 at 7:37 AM UTC