"primroses" poems
I took the left path where hydrangeas grew and sleepy primroses under woods, edged shady trees.
The empty stream ran quietly dry
With grass cuttings piling high.
If one peeped, one would find tiny creatures
To cast a sparkle here and there, a delight.
So on tip-toe, with sandels bent
Up high I reached to take
The plastic fairy as she twirled a pirouette
In a theatre made by chance.
Reflected in a silver mirror intwinned with ivy branch
A mottled foal tends his dreams and Chrismas robin chirps.
My brother took the right hand path where the trees grew fruit
Ripe berries from the gooseberry bush bulged their prickles.
Dangling from hawthorn now a cowboy with a hat
Looking for his fellow Indian with the yellow back sack.
Sheep gather in a hollow, dark, protected from the sun
And Mr toad, now lost of paint, has turned a bit glum.
And so we leave our woodland friends and travel up the slope
Winding round the rose bed and goldfish where they float.
Then up we climb, the middle route, to jump the pruned clipped
Hedge.
The lawn divided in two halves, a contemporary taste.
Now we're nearly at that place where if one was to turn
Could see down across the land
To the sea and sand.
Of all the beauties that I've known
Nothing beats this Island home.
Love Mary x
My grandfather’s retirement bungalow was in Totland Isle of Wight.
It was named Innisfail meaning ‘Isle of Ireland’.
Behind, the garden led down to magical and delightful to children who came as visitors. My grandfather would prepare this woodland with some suitable surprises.
The garden and woodland deserved its own name and in retrospect
Is now named ‘Innislandia’ to suggest a separate, mysterious land.
Beyond the real world.
In the poem A Country Lane on page 8 the latched gate is the back gate to my grandparent’s garden and bungalow in Totland as above.
Jun 23, 2018
Jun 23, 2018 at 7:57 AM UTC
She's planting out her window box
Young shoots are showing through
She thinks about the Springtime
And the garden she once knew
There were primroses and daffodils
Sweet violets white and blue
She thinks about her husband
And when their love was new
Buds and blooms open up
They scent and colour Summer long
She thinks about those happy days
When they were young and strong
Sunset's falling sooner now
Petals drop, the show is done
She gathers up her Winter shawl
Prepares for what’s to come
May 19, 2017
May 19, 2017 at 5:26 AM UTC
pleasantly bothered,
with ***** came a violent lust,
honeysuckle, you suckled me
thunders struck as bodies aligned,
tongues entwined
I rocked with your rhythm,
your fingers had me opening up
like I was among the Primroses
you stroked at night
drunken eyes, gasping mouths
savage, reluctant, insatiable
you are, while I was, and still am
bewildered, dazed, but unfazed.
with the intoxication of spirits,
came a heavenly sin
Jun 21, 2022
Jun 21, 2022 at 11:27 AM UTC
Droop, droop no more, or hang the head,
Ye roses almost withered;
Now strength and newer purple get,
Each here declining violet.
O primroses! let this day be
A resurrection unto ye;
And to all flowers ally’d in blood,
Or sworn to that sweet sisterhood:
For health on Julia’s cheek hath shed
Claret and cream commingled;
And those her lips do now appear
As beams of coral, but more clear.
4.4k
'Tis spring; come out to ramble
The hilly brakes around,
For under thorn and bramble
About the hollow ground
The primroses are found.
And there's the windflower chilly
With all the winds at play,
And there's the Lenten lily
That has not long to stay
And dies on Easter day.
And since till girls go maying
You find the primrose still,
And find the windflower playing
With every wind at will,
But not the daffodil,
Bring baskets now, and sally
Upon the spring's array,
And bear from hill and valley
The daffodil away
That dies on Easter day.
4.4k
In praise of Eliza, Queen of the Shepherds
See where she sits upon the grassie greene,
(O seemely sight!)
Yclad in Scarlot, like a mayden Queene,
And ermines white:
Upon her head a Cremosin coronet
With Damaske roses and Daffadillies set:
Bay leaves betweene,
And primroses greene,
Embellish the sweete Violet.
Tell me, have ye seene her angelick face
Like Phoebe fayre?
Her heavenly haveour, her princely grace,
Can you well compare?
The Redde rose medled with the White yfere,
In either cheeke depeincten lively chere:
Her modest eye,
Her Majestie,
Where have you seene the like but there?
I see Calliope speede her to the place,
Where my Goddesse shines;
And after her the other Muses trace
With their Violines.
Bene they not Bay braunches which they do beare,
All for Elisa in her hand to weare?
So sweetely they play,
And sing all the way,
That it a heaven is to heare.
Lo, how finely the Graces can it foote
To the Instrument:
They dauncen deffly, and singen soote,
In their meriment.
Wants not a fourth Grace to make the daunce even?
Let that rowme to my Lady be yeven.
She shal be a Grace,
To fyll the fourth place,
And reigne with the rest in heaven.
Bring hether the Pincke and purple Cullambine,
With Gelliflowres;
Bring Coronations, and Sops-in-wine
Worne of Paramoures:
Strowe me the ground with Daffadowndillies,
And Cowslips, and Kingcups, and lovèd Lillies:
The pretie Pawnce,
And the Chevisaunce,
Shall match with the fayre flowre Delice.
Now ryse up, Elisa, deckèd as thou art
In royall aray;
And now ye daintie Damsells may depart
Eche one her way.
I feare I have troubled your troupes to longe:
Let dame Elisa thanke you for her song:
And if you come hether
When Damsines I gether,
I will part them all you among.
4.4k
I hope she knows what she's getting herself into.
I hope she knows what your heart sounds like after a night of
comparisons between her handwriting and mine.
I want you to know that I am through with dumbing
myself down to fit inside your god complexed hands.
Don't tell me I never tried to save us.
I wrote you songs with knives on my palms
and your ears were anything but listening.
I had a dream about you every night since you told me
you didn't know how to love anything with a heartbeat and hope.
I started sleeping again when you came back, and oh when you came back...
I am not sorry that my temper is as short as the lifespan of us.
I am not sorry that your smile is the only one that ever made me
want to wake up in the morning.
I am all pain and long long longing and she has always been
a storm with a heart dead set on your stillness.
Our problem is that I never stop shaking long enough for the dust to settle.
I've been writing with the same pen for four years and
you still only recognize my words when she plays them back.
Let it not be confused, foggy or incomprehensible-
you were the one.
Until the one became none and I stopped being a number when you stopped counting miles.
I hope she loves harder than a woman with dementia, relearning parts of you every morning
in the places you reserved with my first and your last- maybe next time.
Maybe next time, maybe next life will be different.
Maybe I'll be patient, stronger, I'll stop covering my smile. You'll stop pretending to be in love.
I will stop shaking and the dust will settle and her poetry will make you sick.
Her poetry will sprout evening primroses and she won't know that you always fall asleep before midnight
or that you're allergic to flowers that bloom when the sun is down.
Apr 26, 2014
Apr 26, 2014 at 8:55 PM UTC
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes,
Flow gently, I’ll sing thee a song in thy praise;
My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
Thou stock-dove, whose echo resounds thro’ the glen,
Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den,
Thou green-crested lapwing, thy screaming forbear,
I charge you disturb not my slumbering fair.
How lofty, sweet Afton, thy neighbouring hills,
Far mark’d with the courses of clear winding rills;
There daily I wander as noon rises high,
My flocks and my Mary’s sweet cot in my eye.
How pleasant thy banks and green valleys below,
Where wild in the woodlands the primroses blow;
There oft, as mild Ev’ning sweeps over the lea,
The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and me.
Thy crystal stream, Afton, how lovely it glides,
And winds by the cot where my Mary resides,
How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave,
As gathering sweet flowrets she stems thy clear wave.
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes,
Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays;
My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
2.8k
Thus the Mayne glideth
Where my Love abideth;
Sleep ’s no softer: it proceeds
On through lawns, on through meads,
On and on, whate’er befall,
Meandering and musical,
Though the niggard pasturage
Bears not on its shaven ledge
Aught but weeds and waving grasses
To view the river as it passes,
Save here and there a scanty patch
Of primroses too faint to catch
A weary bee…. And scarce it pushes
Its gentle way through strangling rushes
Where the glossy kingfisher
Flutters when noon-heats are near,
Glad the shelving banks to shun,
Red and steaming in the sun,
Where the shrew-mouse with pale throat
Burrows, and the speckled stoat;
Where the quick sandpipers flit
In and out the marl and grit
That seems to breed them, brown as they:
Naught disturbs its quiet way,
Save some lazy stork that springs,
Trailing it with legs and wings,
Whom the shy fox from the hill
Rouses, creep he ne’er so still.
2.6k
She minds her little sister
Babysitting in the woods
Flowers bunched up in her hand, primroses perhaps
Devoutly kneeling, she offers them to the child
As hair flows down her back
A long blonde waterfall
The child with open arms
Learns how to receive
And how to give
In a corner a written plea
Take me now for twenty quid
Reduced from twenty five
Unloved, unvalued even for the frame
Now rescued from indignity
And lifted from the skip
Sep 18, 2012
Sep 18, 2012 at 4:29 PM UTC
Brightest flowers of early spring
The scent of a daffodil
Smell pure and sweet
These lovely flowers always bring
Sunshine that never will
Earthy, moist, steamy, and rare,
like tropical flowers perfuming the air.
I can smell across the street,
That delicate scent carried on the breeze,
Coming from a daffodil, seeking release.
Be dimmed by veil of cloud
Pop out of the ground in spring
Primroses so sweet and colorful
is a flower warm weather brings
Green stems that stab with loveliness,
Rich petal-cups to hold
the wine of spring to lips
Those cling like bees about their gold!
Each leaf, each bloom, each blade of grass
fill our world with color
but the Daffodils with their yellow coats
bring us springtime like no other
Oh let them live as nature meant,
I smell that scent so sublime.
The smell of a daffodil all over my face,
The sweet scent of a daffodil, will have me crazed.
There is nothing better than the scent of daffodil
Oct 19, 2019
Oct 19, 2019 at 6:46 AM UTC
Primroses bow their heads as if laden with early morning dew, while
The sinking sun, across the North rise, casts a shadow of your face,
Into the cold dark copse; No goddess or girl. Ashen.
The path you used to wander, lies covered in memories of Yesterday
Here, we spent our youth amongst natures beasts and bugs,
Collecting Butterflies and conkers from the Ancient Horse Chestnut, and
Where the river crosses between the pines we sat, and planned
Somewhere here I look for answers…. Silence rains down.... Thoughts,
Trampled by giant grief. Skeletons remain, drawing deeper into darkness
Birds hush, the air drips with sadness. In the past I have lost keys
Now I have lost half of my DNA. My world has suddenly become smaller
Consequently I am braver in the daytime, night time extenuates my cowardice
It is easy to fall in love with grief, it’s surroundings and demeanour
It was over almost as fast as it had begun. Where now? What now?
Tomorrow I shall tell myself that life must go on, that she is with God,
Watching over us. Today I tell myself…Tomorrow never comes…
Oct 4, 2011
Oct 4, 2011 at 10:13 AM UTC
The angels come more frequently now,
Their visits like spring primroses,
Full of five-petalled, open-palmed beauty and quiet energy,
An unexpected surprise.
For they will come again; persistence is a virtue, it seems,
And I’m not quite lost yet.
They smile encouragingly and their sparkling laughter fills the void;
It lingers in the memory.
And with them I can breathe full-lung and be joyful,
Shout and dance naked in the street if I like.
Or dye my hair blue.
But of course I don’t.
Because for now I am content to let them fill my soul with wonder,
To be their angel in return,
And to wait for next year’s blooms.
Copyright © 2013 Vicki Watson
Nov 20, 2013
Nov 20, 2013 at 6:55 AM UTC
The willow stood flower-like as a star.
The birds were like a choir following thy
Mellowed tune
As I whistled through the light winds in the air
And the meadows were green with mint and clover.
In the center laid a carpet of buttercups
Exploding with vibrant shades
Of purple primroses.
The blue sky crawled
And dripped onto the leaves
Where the green cadmium leaves of the willow
Were lifted and bounded in my soul.
The cleavage of the hands
That sing may hold the dust
From the clouds above
But the remembered memory is left alone
As the tightening of the roots
Gathers me together;
Finding the tune that embraces him
Enfolding him into a wandering dove.
Happy thoughts I had
When I slept at night
Upon a branch
Making faces with the moon
Listening to the willow
Whistling, humming
With its harmonic beat
In G Major.
But now summer has blown away;
It is gone forever.
In deciduous opening
When leaves had fallen
Like my youth
Before it drifted away;
I had vacant memories and happy
Pictures of childhood days
Where I had been alone
And wrote swiftly with pen and paper.
©Jack Aylward
Oct 22, 2015
Oct 22, 2015 at 7:36 PM UTC
O husband, behold the marks that mar your handsome face!
The angry red where poison left its sting,
Where my arms trembled.
Where I failed to save you,
If ever you were mine to save.
O husband, remember when your eyes first met mine!
We were so young,
When we married beneath the world tree.
When we danced among cowslips and primroses,
Like life would always be dancing.
O husband, think fondly on the first child!
Meant to be a great warrior,
Born as night broke into dawn.
Born a prince who would never be king,
By no fault of his own doing.
O husband, think too on the second son!
The magician and scholar,
Gentle in thought and action.
Gentle in word and deed,
That innocent youth.
O husband, cry for that betrayal!
The punishment passed down
By highest authority and greatest king.
By queen who shared my lineage,
Who in punishing you punished us all.
O husband, forgive my tears!
Those that drip down my face,
Landing on our dirtied robes.
Landing on your ashen skin,
As cooling as the poison is hot.
O husband, my strength grows weak!
She the always faithful,
My arms burn with the weight of two small corpses.
My arms sing with the agony of venom,
Fingers trembling where they grasp the golden bowl.
But O husband, I shall never leave!
Faith unwavering I sit by the eternal flame,
My husband the Silvertongue whose voice has long gone out.
My husband the Sky Traveler, who now lays bound to the earth,
I shall hold the bowl unto eternity.
O husband, behold the marks that mar that handsome face!
The angry red where poison left its sting,
Where it is soothed by the tears from mine own cheeks.
Where I failed to save you,
If ever you were mine to save.
Jan 11, 2016
Jan 11, 2016 at 12:50 AM UTC
You are my dandylion
and I wait with stealth of a summer day
for you to stop preening in the field
of high grass and green bottles.
Yes. I wait, stroke you gentle
with the ease of the summer breeze
as you sway and waltz
for the primroses and the cricket.
I watch with willful patience
like the ripening of the wild belladonna.
as you tease with your burst of yellow
for the field mouse and the garden gnome.
Yes. I will wait like summers heat
And when you are done,
And when your pretty
petals
lay
limply
at
your
roots,
I will take you gentle into my summers grasp
and with my summers breathe
blow your beautiful grey afro out unto the world to swallow.
Dandylion, pretty primping boy are you.
Sahn 6/7/2014
Jun 7, 2014
Jun 7, 2014 at 2:51 PM UTC
Laying upon the grass black as soot
Tangled wings, feathered broke
I gaze down upon your yellow beak
And hope that you might speak.
Jewelled in the grass where
Primroses Spring to life
I bend slowly to one knee
And listen for a sound or two.
Peering into your sparkling eye
Hoping you can still see
Knowing that I love you bird
Treasure this last minute still.
Lifting you softly from this spot
I see you are quite new
With days ahead where singing led
I bent and kissed you.
Love Mary x
Mar 27, 2018
Mar 27, 2018 at 11:49 AM UTC
yellow primroses,
in your blonde hair,
the summer wind blowing
and messing it up.
you are dancing without
a care in the green meadow
that you adore
and the village where you
grew up.
floral wreaths on top
of your head,
the sun is beaming over you.
and like this,
with flowers in your hair,
flowers that almost
match your hair color,
and that sun dress that i adore,
you are still perfect,
and you'll always be.
Mar 30, 2014
Mar 30, 2014 at 11:26 AM UTC
We met on the morning when the sun waded
through the window
mopping up the nights shadows as it invaded
every corner of my working space.
I was ready to react to other poets at work on AP.
She came along with a blistering title
and abundance of words, beguiling
and packed with imagery, dark and dense,
laced with succinct and sinful metaphors
wolves and watchmen, ****** energy swirling
around in thickets and primroses
promises broken and bleeding on the threshold
of their hearts, but gone, each on their own
sun and sin sprinkled pathways to other partners.
Only she wrote poems
He wrote her off!
Who was this stranger, tearing her heart out
on these pages, soulful and sinful, unheeding,
unashamed at being beaten and bruised
by her lovers tantrum now
migrated to a new nest of instant **********
She bled her words out in rhyme and rhythm
Holding on to fragments of a dream
fast fading at the edges.
I wrote her some lines of happiness
instinctively telling her to calm down
and think about what freedom meant
and where it lead in the rocking horse world
of thin relationships.
She replied with two words
in acid structure: **** off!
I never heard from her again.
The sunshine continued to invade the day.
Author Notes
True story. Old story. Love story are born and die this way. There are hundreds of poems on this site that used just those words when either gets dissed. Bad luck goes good luck comes. The sun continues to invade the day.
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.
Apr 19, 2014
Apr 19, 2014 at 1:18 AM UTC
Depression has eternally descended in the ether
Dust,dusk,dullness and darkness are trying to gather
The ghosts are setting out for the adventure
Oh dear!
Dunes are dancing
Snails are smirking
The oysters are hiding their pearls
Evening primroses are starting their prayers
The whisper and the whistle of the mauve twilight are being felt
Emptiness and silence are being smelt
Aug 5, 2021
Aug 5, 2021 at 9:17 AM UTC
Looking out at the white, frosty snow
covering branches, twigs and everything
Like a cold blanket, warming the soil
little shoots just waiting for Spring.
Blushing blossom just patiently hibernating
Getting ready to air those frilly frocks
Shaking out their creases to the wind
Ticking off the days to go on imaginary clocks.
The worms slithering underground in icy times
just waiting to get to the surface on a warm day
tapping their tails, hurrying time along
waiting for spring in an impatient way.
Birds with crinkled beaks pecking for berries
hoping for something easier to catch their sight
Just waiting, the Robin, just liking the frost
but then he sees the hungry birds in mid flight.
The creatures, the flora and little me waiting
for the blue of the bells, the white of the shade
waiting for primroses, the blossom on twigs
and of course waiting for the Easter Parade.
Jan 22, 2016
Jan 22, 2016 at 1:20 AM UTC
After a week of hot sun
we find the garden has been iced
thickly, like Christmas cake.
A blackbird on the bird table
scoops snow in his beak.
A day later,
and the primroses have survived
the snow, the apple tree buds too.
The country's sparrow population
hides in the hedges,
bread in their beaks bearding their faces.
A song thrush lands on the lawn.
Making a stance like Jesus,
a worm tethering him down,
he flutters once into the air
exposing his cartoon trouser feathers
before he pulls the worm free
and breaks it in two with his beak.
Then the hedgerow birds scatter,
and all is still,
but for the sparrow hawk,
disappointed this time,
skittering up and away.
Feb 25, 2014
Feb 25, 2014 at 7:25 AM UTC
You
are a dancing
dandelion
lioness,
lounging lovely
in the liquid
sun rays,
licking power off your paws.
An audience stands
awestruck as
you
parade through town
picking primroses
to make them all
their own crowns.
Tell me
tenderly,
as we sip blackberry wine,
about tearing up
the space-time continuum
and jumping,
cannonball,
into oblivion.
You,
miss maestro,
make marvelous
mountaintop melodies,
collaborating with the
yodelers and the
midnight goat herders
as the common man
in the valley
bites mouthfuls
out of your music
to warm his belly
and bring him to bed.
You
are a fantastic
flying
fingerling potato,
finding your way
deep in the ground,
growing
outwards and beautiful,
towards the surface and the center.
Your eyebrows could level lava spewing volcanoes!
Your laughter leads lambs back to
their loving homes from
the fertile fields they roam!
You,
vivacious Venus,
waltz in from the kitchen
calling out harmonies to the song birds
and slingshotting kisses
to all of your faithful
misters and misses.
Your bag may hang heavy,
but you have so many hands to help carry it.
You,
my dear,
are the sun
beaming magnificent.
Jan 14, 2015
Jan 14, 2015 at 2:13 PM UTC
I’m lost in my thoughts, utterly alone,
staring at those huge peaks clawing at the heavens.
This little homestead dwarfed by those mountains.
I feel small here, this country is vast
and there’s no one here, another planet
victorious in making a more beautiful Earth
without vile creatures poisoning it.
The air is fresh and smells of primroses
and ozone from a distant thunderstorm
behind me across the plains.
This must be a dream, I think to myself,
but I’m too afraid to pinch my arm,
just in case I’m right.
At the Jenny Lake overlook, the mountains looming
as I sit by the water so still,
reflecting the mountains so well
that I can’t tell up from down.
The smell of the pines overwhelms me
and I wade into that cool water
as an eagle whistles into a valley,
the mountains whistling back
and I whistle too, caught in the moment.
The others on the shore whistle too,
and I swear the dozen of us were infinite.
Jul 5, 2017
Jul 5, 2017 at 7:34 PM UTC