"schoolboys" poems
paper used to be scratched
pencil lead sharpened
long ago now
a schoolboys remembrance
schoolgirls too
friends
Oct 25, 2014
Oct 25, 2014 at 5:41 PM UTC
Busy old fool, unruly sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows and through curtains, call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers’ seasons run?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late schoolboys and sour ‘prentices,
Go tell court-huntsmen that the King will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices;
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
Thy beams so reverend and strong
Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink
But that I would not lose her sight so long:
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and, tomorrow late, tell me
Whether both th’ Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou left’st them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw’st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear ‘All here in one bed lay’.
She is all states, and all princes I;
Nothing else is.
Princes do but play us; compared to this,
All honour’s mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, sun, art half as happy as we,
In that the world’s contracted thus;
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that’s done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
This bed thy centre is, these walls thy sphere.
4.3k
161
A feather from the Whippoorwill
That everlasting—sings!
Whose galleries—are Sunrise—
Whose Opera—the Springs—
Whose Emerald Nest the Ages spin
Of mellow—murmuring thread—
Whose Beryl Egg, what Schoolboys hunt
In “Recess”—Overhead!
3.6k
Some fairground
by the coast
taken by the Baptist mission
by coach
and outside
some magic mirror tent
after having gone in
you said to Helen
not much in there to see
and the fairground guy
having overheard you said
not much to see?
come here and see again
and he took you
in the tent again
and showed you
how you looked
in front
of the various mirrors
in some you were thin
and tall and in another
you were broad
and fat or you were
squat as if someone
had sat on you
and squashed you flat
and you laughed at that
and the guy said
see there is much to see
so go tell your girlfriend
so you went out
of the tent
and said to Helen
yes it was good
the second time around
and Helen said
perhaps we should
go in together
and so you paid the guy
the money
and you went in
with her and stood
together in front
of the mirrors
and laughed
and she held
your hand
and you remembered
the guy saying
tell your girlfriend
and you guessed
she was
and that made
you feel happy
even schoolboys
of 10 years old
sometimes want girlfriends
secretly endeared
away from the sight
or knowledge
of other boys
as if it were some kind
of betrayal
of the schoolboy code
and as you walked
about the fairground
you watched
where others
on racing
wooden horses rode.
May 29, 2013
May 29, 2013 at 3:27 PM UTC
The rolls and harrows lie at rest beside
The battered road; and spreading far and wide
Above the russet clods, the corn is seen
Sprouting its spiry points of tender green,
Where squats the hare, to terrors wide awake,
Like some brown clod the harrows failed to break.
Opening their golden caskets to the sun,
The buttercups make schoolboys eager run,
To see who shall be first to pluck the prize—
Up from their hurry, see, the skylark flies,
And o’er her half-formed nest, with happy wings
Winnows the air, till in the cloud she sings,
Then hangs a dust-spot in the sunny skies,
And drops, and drops, till in her nest she lies,
Which they unheeded passed—not dreaming then
That birds which flew so high would drop agen
To nests upon the ground, which anything
May come at to destroy. Had they the wing
Like such a bird, themselves would be too proud,
And build on nothing but a passing cloud!
As free from danger as the heavens are free
From pain and toil, there would they build and be,
And sail about the world to scenes unheard
Of and unseen—Oh, were they but a bird!
So think they, while they listen to its song,
And smile and fancy and so pass along;
While its low nest, moist with the dews of morn,
Lies safely, with the leveret, in the corn.
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Mutilated chains of flowers
delineate where schoolboys cowered;
sixteen brick houses on St. James Street
reduced to red dust under homeless feet;
photographers pause, catching their breath,
spellbound by the neutrality of death;
clearing haze where the white chapel stood
reveals ever-dismantling wood;
the market's one register on a charred-black stand,
nearby derges lilt from a funeral band:
*...oh and as, and as
they're lain in silk and white ashes...
the town broken apart, flattened...
...in marble graves and mahogany
under skeletal laurel branches...
...on down to sleep, to sleep...
...we may walk with weathered ease...
...oh we may consider, may remember,
a granted time, an affirming love...*
Oct 10, 2012
Oct 10, 2012 at 1:40 PM UTC
It was me, I killed the Butler
and what you've heard is true.
But before I am condemned
Let me explain to you...
The milkman killed the ferrel cat,
set a trap and let it starve
So now no longer there will be
sick kittens in his yard.
The schoolboys killed the milkman
Maybe it was some sad trick
Maybe it was just an accident
I'll let you take your pick.
The Butler killed the schoolboys
I won't pretend that I know why
He shot them each in the chest
then fired his gun into the sky.
And yes, I killed the Butler
I didn't even know his name
He snuck up upon me
and now I'm the one they blame.
Oct 20, 2014
Oct 20, 2014 at 1:55 PM UTC
Oh something just now must be happening there!
That suddenly and quiveringly here,
Amid the city's noises, I must think
Of mangoes leaning o'er the river's brink,
And dexterous Davie climbing high above,
The gold fruits ebon-speckled to remove,
And toss them quickly in the tangled mass
Of wis-wis twisted round the guinea grass;
And Cyril coming through the bramble-track
A prize bunch of bananas on his back;
And Georgie--none could ever dive like him--
Throwing his scanty clothes off for a swim;
And schoolboys, from Bridge-tunnel going home,
Watching the waters downward dash and foam.
This is no daytime dream, there's something in it,
Oh something's happening there this very minute!
1.5k
Beauty is not flowers, given by a lover.
Nor is it meadows and birdsong.
And definitely not the pantomime of Weddings, with their
Hyperbolic declarations and parodies of tailoring on
Bodies too well-fed to house them.
Instead, it is the soft curl of cigarette smoke, blue
And graceful against the grime of a steamed window.
Or in a poky kitchen, the remains of our meal crusting on
Our plates, too absorbed were we in conversation
To even remember the taste.
It is the chuntered breath, just after,
When we are both trying to ignore how bad
We smell, and getting slightly annoyed that our heartbeats are out of sync
And thinking how nice a drink or a shower would be.
It is seagulls beside a river, in a military line, with
White trails of **** Jackson Pollocking down the wall
On which they stood, and how they all took flight one by one
Like dominoes as I approached.
It is certainly not sunsets. After all, they occur every day
And can be captured in a photogaph. It’s the accompanying silence
That makes sunsets special, and that is better found in libraries anyway.
It is somehow more impressive to silence human tongues than watch
The suns tired routine once again.
On a bus full of rowdy, starched schoolboys with filmy faces,
Posturing about experience, Beauty is the one boy reading.
Beauty is not safety. It is daring and bold. Or perhaps it is quiet and
Trying to be ignored, I don’t know. Perhaps we shouldn’t care a jot.
Beauty is that thing that should be ugly,
But is not.
Dec 5, 2011
Dec 5, 2011 at 2:32 PM UTC
Sunshine yawns, stretches and cracks through the sullen black out curtains of december.
it shudders my eyes to see what's like an earthquake in the sky.
mighty cries of yellow and gold speed through the coal of my horizon like a bamboo vine
like the wrinkles and ***** of an old school football beaten and broken by the ***** shoes of nasty schoolboys
frightening the mighty oppressors.
Seasonal Affective Disorder
I walk
I with a capital I because the quake of light resolves my sadness for a second or two.
a stillness in the air that
all that is lost is lost
and all that is won is won
and all we can do is rejoice in the now.
the light
presses the skeletons of naked wintered trees onto the bus' window
now pale and murky with the last of the black frost.
their bony fingers wrapped around my bus with the natural cradle of a mother to her new born babe.
I am one.
white puffs of yes tickle the big blue pond of nothingness while
steel bands of gold stretch across what was once such a dark and frightening place where i would become withered and broken as a plant beside a patient,
dying with them.
stretches over me like I'm looking up from beneath the bridge
instead of down to the sea below.
the sunlight washes an old town in gold
making it clean again.
the darkness is over and the new has begun.
all we have to do
hell, all we can do
is absorb it.
experience it.
survive it.
my pestering thoughts join me in looking across at what has been the source or so many sleepless nights for me and others;
together in peace for a few tender moments,
a football game in 1914, Christmas day.
January is now
spring is now
life is now.
he is here.
sunlight has awoken and is laughing with me once more.
I am in love.
and I am happy.
the bells of spring
peel like the layers of darkness above my head.
life is infinite once more
and the sunlight dances on the grave of sadness
and the world plays in major chord again.
Jan 9, 2014
Jan 9, 2014 at 1:54 PM UTC
there are echoes of christmas chimes
in the midsummer dreamscape she has
woven on our bedsheets with
her photographs and pencil sketches
there is much to be done and little time to keep
she gently sweeps away such frail notions
and with sparkling wonders
shining in her eyes she unwraps the day
with her girlish laughter's and warm joys
there are christmas chimes in the beautiful light of her eyes
i am there in her afterglows and tender kisses
im there to kiss the bells in her dreadlocks
as stillness once more settles like a ****** snow
soft and silent gently while we slept
im there in her afterglows
with english schoolboys charms
to dazzle and delight
because i live for her smile
because i live for her joys
Jun 16, 2014
Jun 16, 2014 at 11:33 PM UTC
Some place
Some time
There was a tea shop.
Open not just in the mornings,
But at noon and the evenings too.
Mornings, the menu read
Uzhunnuvada, idli,dosa,
Uppuma, vellayappam,idiyappam,
Sambar, payaru curry,kadala
And several chatnis.
Noon, the menu read
Aviyal,achinga,pachadi,
Kichadi,pulisseri,thoran,achar,
And several kinds of buttermilk.
Evenings, the menu read
Sukhiyan, bonda,
Pazhampori, parippu vada, mulaguvada,
Diluted milk, black coffee
And several forms of tea.
There was a cook in that tea shop.
There was an owner for that tea shop.
Both had a son each.
Those boys went to the same school.
They studied in the same class.
They sat on the same bench.
Whenever he was hungry,
One of the boys thought of
The owner of that tea shop.
Eyes widening with admiration for
The great man that he was!
He could eat anything
Whenever he was hungry,
Reaching for it in the container
Or poking his head into the food shelf
Or entering the kitchen itself.
He could take anything,
The boy salivated.
To the query “What do you want to be?”,
He even replied once that
He wanted to be that man.
But, whenever he was hungry,
The other boy thought of
The cook in that tea shop.
He lauded him in awe of
the great man that he was.
He could cook and eat
Anything any time any quantity,
He imagined jealously.
To the query “What do you want to be?”,
He even replied once that
He wanted to be that man.
Wait, don’t leave yet,
Dusting off your bottom
After reading an average poem.
Sighing indepthly
Or grunting lazily
Or belching sourly.
You are free to leave after
Answering a few questions.
Who owns this tea shop actually?
These schoolboys from the tea shop,
Whose sons are they actually?
There is another boy
Besides these two
In this poem!
Who is he?
Dec 11, 2013
Dec 11, 2013 at 9:17 AM UTC
Black Israelite haters, excused,
led to schoolboys reviled and accused
of white racism, hate.
The reaction was great--
but the whiteboys were merely amused.
Progressives were driven berserk
by a teenager's innocent smirk.
The old shaman tried shaming:
and drumming and blaming,
but none of those strategies work!
Mr. Phillips, the activist drummer
gave Regressives their Indian Summer--
till a teenager's smirk
drove the demons berserk
and made dumbed-down regressives much dumber.
If a smile is a cultural crime
then the criminals need to do time.
Every whiteboy must go
in this cracka-ass show
and I'm guilty for reason of rhyme.
Jan 24, 2019
Jan 24, 2019 at 7:33 PM UTC
I have a schoolboys sense of humour,
Oh yes it's true, it's not just rumour,
I always laugh at bums and willys,
It's immature and very silly,
I cannot help my humours taste,
I try to keep it above the waist,
Yet down the slippery slope I slide,
This 'Carry-On" sense of humour of mine,
Farts, poos, **** the crudest jokes,
Belong much more to bad *** blokes,
Double meaning things that people say,
Is my specialist subject anyway,
Even though I know it's daft,
I do enjoy a ****** laugh :)
Jul 9, 2014
Jul 9, 2014 at 5:24 PM UTC
This is for the prom queen
This is for the prom queen
who wears her crown of insecurities
with shaking knees
and sees
her body as disgusting
always adjusting
lusting for perfection.
It's for the kids who seek affection
or attention
and can't tell the difference.
It's gonna be okay
It's for the kids who always sit in the back
It's for the "Test tomorrow panic attacks"
It's for the kids on the fast track
to unsatisfying lives.
It's gonna be okay
This is for the kid with dreams set before him
that bore him.
Who wants more than
a marriage and a mortgage.
It's gonna be okay
This is for the over-drinkers and the over-thinkers
and the ones who hope one will stop the other.
It's for the mothers
whose daughters are sinking,
thinking they have to be
drinking
in order to make friends.
It's for the sleepless nights that never end.
it's gonna be okay.
This is for the kid with the bad complexion
and the invisible girl who hides her scar collection
under her shirt
amongst the hurt,
***** looks,
And her favorite books
It's okay
It's for the boy that's abusing
and the girl that's confusing
it for love
and because of that
does not see she's beautiful
It's gonna be okay
It's the for the friends we lose
and the poisons we choose.
It's for the kids that wake up late
the ones that can't wait to graduate
and for the wallflowers trying to participate
It's gonna be okay
It's for the monsters under our beds and in our heads
that wake us up at 4 A.M
And for the all stupid things we've said
It's gonna be okay.
It's for the kid who sees his face foggy in the mirror
and does not have the means to make it clearer
It's for the kids who have it all
and the kids who see their life in a ball
It's for every single brick in the wall
for the ***** words on ***** stalls
and for the brokenness inside us all.
It's gonna be okay.
It's for the kids who wear masks
made of broken smiles and empty laughs
and crack a little more everyday
it's for the way
we smile and say we're okay
It's going to be okay
It's for the skinny girl starving to be a model
and looking for love at the bottom of the bottle
with a magazine cover for a role model
it's gonna be okay.
It's for the fat girl whose proud of who she is
because she knows that beauty lies within
it's for the holy kids so afraid to sin
that they forget to live
It's gonna be okay.
This is for the kisses under the bleachers
and the schoolboys crushing on their favorite teachers
This is for the kid who drinks tears from his beer
for the football stars
and the closeted queers
It's for the late night phone conversations
for the vibrations
of infatuation
and the sensation
of summer vacation.
It's for the chronic liars
and nervous first-timers
the cancer survivors
and the poetry writers
It's for the lives we've been given
the cars we've drunk driven
and the shells in which we live in.
And it's for the normal kids
It's gonna be okay.
Feb 9, 2014
Feb 9, 2014 at 3:40 PM UTC
A lit candle illuminating the room as shadows darken the walls
The little schoolboys and schoolgirls chatter loudly in the halls
The smell of pumpkins, uneasy cold air, in this season of Fall
Woman, recoiling away from my unholy punches of Satan
Simon's inferno has begun!
There would be men robbed at gunpoint, children being stabbed
Cats and dogs are being skinned and women being grabbed
Elderly man is sobbing, wanting to die once and for all
I shall end it all for him, no teardrops shall fall
My stormy disturbed eyes reveal it all...
The men used to be strong, for now they are weak
These skies of an unholy red, continue to cry it seems
I must go home now, let me out of this dream
Satan's sadistic smile continues to gleam
To the cries of women being *****
And the children continuing to scream
Aug 24, 2011
Aug 24, 2011 at 1:09 PM UTC
The whole city is dry
Dust collects around the feet of skeletons who rest against the streetlamps
Drunken schoolboys ride down the side walk
Swaying back and forth to unknown music
Like a dandelion in the moonlight
****** packs of dogs roam the streets
Looking for a corpse
Licking the bones clean
Buildings rise tall and white
A row of teeth gnashing together against the light
The ****** moon is ashamed at the beauty
Now rusted and broken
Long legs that step from torn black limousines
Tall women in ripped black dresses
Sway hips in the hot summer night
Hair standing on end at the thought of alcohol
******* raddled coat checker
Watches with a cigarette
Dangling from his lips
White blazer splashed with mud
On his left shoulder
There I was
Slinking down the back alley
Looking for a store bought life
Long lost in some war
Maybe it is the call of the jazz club
Dying on the corner
Or my hand locked to a paper bag
I got from the gas station
Maybe it was clouds
Laughing at me
I am jealous of their freedom
As the float past me
Pointless as a puddle
I stepped into the gutter
Black water to my ankle
Knee deep in depression
But the air was warm
Lights danced like candles down the winding street
Who knows where I’m going
I don’t seem to mind
Feb 20, 2012
Feb 20, 2012 at 1:31 AM UTC
Full camouflaged and beret headed
troop of marching schoolboys
passed by the window
Led by men
who should by now
know
so much better
Apr 10, 2014
Apr 10, 2014 at 8:03 AM UTC
These are the words we speak,
When pillow talk isn't enough.
I never knew you could be so weak,
Like a schoolboys words, as he tries to be rough.
In these gallows I found home,
A deadly game of love to me,
You're everything I'm not,
Everything I hoped I could be.
So I'll sing my songs
In hope your heart hears them while you sleep.
And I'll poison your dreams,
In hope my words will bury deep.
I can say im heaven sent,
An angel of despair.
I am more than anything,
You could ever hope to bare,
Feb 28, 2013
Feb 28, 2013 at 3:47 PM UTC
The unsettling fishtank
dream remains/ luminous!
& yet confined to it's own/serene state
of sheltered existence, there is no/reaching in and interrupting this Indian fire two thousand years old/only a deep sense of burden that you couldn't n will never/
be a section of its gaze
There will be no kindling of Spirit while whispering the secret of your/madness to
a staircase/
There will be no eyes & alms to forgive and guide your restlessness at night/the sky will not forget your cowardice in absolute emotional expression
How you stray from kissing a holy lover the way you've always ached to!
The Summer will not reverse its eternal poetry from your skin/
will not smile watching you blunder through childhood, tending to your fear with higher
priority than your great wound
It (this longing to be smothered & worthy rest) will not reschedule to next week
just because you read the daily horoscope
and it "applies" to you now!
/soldier & your MobyDick heart & saintly revelations on the silence of your neighbors & shaving off ur insecurities/causing you to bleed & be sent off to the HOSPITAL & the staff is laughing down at your mangled face, anyways
& you have done with the destruction caused in a moment of blushing cheeks
Dye fills the head with ego painting & unexpressed volumes ! Oh!
The circus remains fearless but still uninformed, worn down in its senseless practice & schoolboys cry observing the clouds lose train of thought to the music of Berlioz
My terrible soul skips/unblinking from the pondrous black cat who lingers above my dreamworld/to Gustav Klimt & his empyrean entanglement/
out to the parking lot which cannot mind it's own bussiness
trees of insoluble space
haiku lion
prisons kept hush hush
so its prisoners may forget
again where they weep
(how are you dear? I wish I could be a lasting impression)
Since birth
many of us have successfully
avoided the barbaric
heat of life
I haven't been uplifted by beautiful
laughter in a long time
the laugh that uplifts this whole Earth
A child to die so early
Feb 19, 2017
Feb 19, 2017 at 4:33 AM UTC
i was romanticising her genitalia like oysters,
i know the boys in school thought
of fish first, but the same boys didn’t go
to brothels and seen prostitutes oil up;
come to think of it, given the above facts
i’m going to romanticise her genitalia with leeches
from now on - and in reverse? as for me?
well plenty of skyscrapers... boring...
comparing her’s to leeches fits the strategy;
and once, and once a boy of sixteen could
buy a ***** mag in a shop in Ypres without
the female shop owner looking at him like some pervert.
Ypres? yeah, school trip, visiting world war one trenches,
enjoying the atmosphere running in them like a
crazy dispatches boy trying to **** some chlorine on the sly,
which i think is the scary bit, but don’t worry,
we had female troopers with us, so we could shoot and ****
and not worry about the infidelity of our girls back home
to some shady ‘enry ‘hinaski.
but from what else i can remember, six of us broke off
from the rest and decided to go to a brothel,
but being schoolboys we didn’t have enough money
or were simply not convincing material for a free one with
the belgian beauties -
i had to wait a few more years before i had enough dough
but then it was with a ukrainian beauty in poland
after i realised that the university i attended was a nunnery.
Sep 30, 2015
Sep 30, 2015 at 1:23 PM UTC
take my word for it
we're both worth it
in your hour of implosion
our time keeps going
midnight, the familiar smell of
strange boys trying to hold you
your mouth a cauldron of poison
touching all the things you don't want to
loosing yourself in dark skies
won't bring the stars any closer
old photographs fill your mind
how can he change that quick
i'm not so sure
older boys don't know the things
our silly schoolboys taught us
like how to hold your words in
to make other heads combust
regret will hold your hair
as you prepare to throw up flowers
from the dances you went to
in his green suit
now April Showers
I regret most of it
looking deeply into his eyes closed
next time you fall and scrape your knees
know that the pain may be predisposed
put down the drink
come lay with me
what can we build
our strategy
to use this pain
and smear the blood
across the sheets so tragically
(i wish that you were here with me)
Apr 26, 2015
Apr 26, 2015 at 12:36 AM UTC
The bell from that church makes me sneer
Barks of those dogs makes remind me of something
Schoolboys arguments thought me something
Concerto from the piano that sleep on the sofa makes me feel lost
The piper's pipe I think of
As these new songs writes my name on the breeze the blows
Reminds me of colourful moments
It reminds me what I am!
Jul 12, 2016
Jul 12, 2016 at 6:21 PM UTC
You know your alphabet, yes you do, all twenty six letters you say by rote.
Few know there once was Twenty- seven, one more of which you should take note.
It is the humble Ampersand; the character you see today
Used mostly as a linkage between two corporate proper names.
It does mean “and” it always did; its shape from Latin is derived.
Its name is a type of Mondegreen, by pronouncement it is described.
Back in Elizabethan time when schoolboys said their alphabet
They did not end with “X.Y.Z” but with “and per se &”
The Roman “Et” was anglicized and its usage codified.
Jan 3, 2015
Jan 3, 2015 at 2:05 AM UTC
when the politician crooned
and made a mistake
today is today
and he goes out this way
he takes a picture with a fictional villain
and pretends he’s a saint
makeshift melodies
working their way through the mansion
of the ******* bunnies
more preoccupied than the rest of us
more
preoccupied
junkyard schoolboys
walking into desert islands
and ******* magical spells
only to come out
horrendous, ugly muggles
useful only for punching tickets
at the next show
juniper berries
crisping up a salad
and making it sweeter to swallow
lunches that are bittersweet
because of the conversation
you couldn’t swallow
evergreen trees
standing the test of time
in the middle of a long
deserted island
evergreen trees
in a deserted island
providing pin cones
for the restless settlers
trying to prepare their dinners
Jan 23, 2016
Jan 23, 2016 at 6:37 PM UTC