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Terry Collett Sep 2012
You noticed, when you last
saw Betty the evening she
was dying, in the curtained
off area of the ward, that she
was wearing around her neck,
the wooden rosary you had

given her some months before.
Her husband had telephoned
you and said she was dying and
she wanted to see you. But when
you arrived she was already on
her way out, her eyes closed,

the death rattle taking hold,
her husband and her children
about her bed. The rosary, a
brown wooden cross with a
metallic Christ, was still there,
the Christ lying where her night

gown covered ******* slowly
rose and fell. When you’d seen
her some months back, in the
high street, she said she would
learn the prayers of the rosary,
and how grateful she was to you

for the gift, and she fingered it
there and then, her thumb and
finger rubbing over the Christ.  
You’d first met her a year or so
before as she sketched the large
gardens you visited as a group.

Her hand guiding the pencil as
the image was translated onto
the sketch pad, her eyes scanning
what it was she wanted to capture
in all its beauty. I like capturing

churches, she had said, watercolours
and pencil or charcoal as my aids.
You remembered words that evening
as she lay there dying from cancer,
the curtained area dim and silent
except for the rattling breath, just Betty

and the rosary in the end, and your
deep love and the unwanted death.
In memory of the late Betty Santer who died from cancer in 2007.
Derek Yohn Oct 2013
i can hear the crickets again:
chirping chirps,
deafening me, a silent sound
bears them unbidden to me,
supplicant, bathing darkness
across my skin.

you are thinking about me, again.

i am certain of it,
why else would you be so silent?

Give me your tongue for Christmas:
it is of no use to you.
i will give you the fingers
of my left hand,
so useless to me.
It is a fair trade, no doubt.
Then we will both have
nothing of value.
The young boy wrote his Christmas Cards
Wrote his name as neatly as he knew
He put the ones aside to take to school
And in his bedroom he hid two

These cards were special for the boy
One was for his Uncle, one was for his dad
The cards just had to reach them
And here's the plan he had..

He knew that mail to Santa Claus
Made it up to the North Pole
But, he wasn't sure just how his card
Would reach his fathers soul

You see, the boys dad and his Uncle
were taken by an IED
They'd both been gone two years now
Since the  boy was only three

He visited the cenotaph
In the park, most every day
He'd stop and he'd salute it
And then he'd go and play

It was a gentle hi to both of them
For he knew that at this place
He could feel them staring down on him
Though he'd forgotten his dad's face

He took the cards down to the park
And he left them by a wreath
Left over from November
He laid his two cards underneath

A man was walking past the boy
And he saw the boy salute
But, he also saw the Christmas cards
And he thought the whole thing cute

He waited for the boy to leave
And he opened one to read
It said  "Merry Christmas" , "Thank You"
"I miss you, yes indeed"

The man went to the nearest school
to ask about the lad
To find out if this one young boy
Was a student that they had

A teacher overheard his tale
And called the man in for a talk
At the end she sat there crying
She had to go out for a walk

She went to find his teacher
Told the tale of this young man
Then between them they sat down and
They both devised a plan

The next day when the class began
Christmas Cards they would write
Each one was for a soldier
And to them this just seemed right

They would set up a class field trip
To see the vets up on the hill
In the special Veterans Hospital
to the kids, this was a thrill

The hospital was telephoned
And the vets were set to meet
Miss Johnson and Miss Watson's class
To get their Christmas treat

The kids were dressed in sunday best
Like they were a month ago
But, this time it was different
This time there would be snow

Each card said "Merry Christmas"
All said thank you, some were sad
To think this project started with
A card left for a dad

After all was done and dusted
The kids continued on
They went down to the cenotaph
To give more cards to those now gone

The story made it through the school
And each day another class
Wrote Christmas cards to soldiers
And they delivered them en-masse

By the action of a little boy
who wasn't locked to a computer
He started a tradition
this young boy, the saluter.
Please read "The Saluter", if you haven't already to get an idea of who this young boy in the poem is.
Lawrence Hall Mar 2019
“The F_g with the Bow Tie” 1

            “Only in Russia is poetry respected – it gets people killed.
              Is there anywhere else where poetry is so common a  
              motive  for ******?”

                                                -Osip Mandelstam 2

Spain. Poetry got people killed in Spain -
And still wherever tyrants of delicate nerves
And artistic sensitivities hear
Whispered rumors of whispered disapproval

And so an innocent, fearful and trembling
Must be motored away to a moonless death
Upon orders spoken, written, tweeted
Telephoned, telegraphed, or teletyped

One prays he has a moment to adjust his tie
Perfectly - as an honor to Poetry




1 The slur is attributed to Federico Garcia Lorca’s murderers:
https://lithub.com/dictators-****-poets-on-federico-garcia-lorcas-last-days/

2 Quoted by Yevgeny Yevtushenko in 20th Century Russian Poetry
Your ‘umble scrivener’s site is:
Reactionarydrivel.blogspot.com.
It’s not at all reactionary, tho’ it might be drivel.

Lawrence Hall’s vanity publications are available on amazon.com as Kindle and on bits of dead tree:  The Road to Magdalena, Paleo-Hippies at Work and Play, Lady with a Dead Turtle, Don’t Forget Your Shoes and Grapes, Coffee and a Dead Alligator to Go, and Dispatches from the Colonial Office.
louis rams Jan 2015
Yesterday my daughter e-mailed me again, asking why I didn't do something useful with my time.

"Like sitting around the pool and drinking wine is not a good thing?" I asked.

Talking about my  "doing-something-useful"  seems to be her favorite topic of conversation.

She was  "only thinking of me", she said and suggested that I go down to theSenior Center and hang out with the guys.

I did this and when I got home last night, I decided to play a prank on her.

I e-mailed her and told her that I had joined a Parachute Club.

She replied,  "Are you nuts?  You are 78 years old and now you're going to start jumping out of airplanes?"

I told her that I even got a Membership Card and e-mailed a copy to her.

She immediately telephoned me and yelled, "Good grief, Mom, where are your glasses?!






This is a Membership to a ******* Club, not a Parachute Club."

"Oh man, I'm in trouble again," I said, "I really don't know what to do. I signed up for five jumps a week!!"

The line went quiet and her friend picked up the phone and said that my daughter had fainted.

Life as a Senior Citizen is not getting any easier, but sometimes it can be fun
In the end when they send you off in
a coffin
and drink your goodbye with slices of egg and dutch ham pie,
you may wonder why they're saying nice things,when they couldn't be bothered to see how you where,when you were there among the living and giving your best.
You were a pest and let's face it, they couldn't stand you but look at them now,long drawn out faces,squeezed out cake cases litter the floor,what's it all for,who are they trying to fool?
Not me
for I've gone,
but suddenly I was the best thing since the advent of the wheel,I don't feel it at all,let them have their ball,play their games,cry hallelujah in all of God's names,it's a sham,a bit like the dutch ham which came from Algiers.
Let them shed tears,they'll *** less as my dad used to say,but it's a sad state of affairs when at the end of my days,some sausage mouthed man gets up and he says,
'we''ll miss him,our friend'
Send me right now to the Devil and how he will pay,it's not bad enough that I'm dead but to listen to this is really *******.

I would say this as I kissed off this world,

'he was a ****,bright not thick,,a waste of time in a time of waste and a pasty faced ,two toned, large *****,I'd rather that he telephoned,i couldn't stand the sight of him,he liked the sound of his own voice,you listened as you had no choice,will we miss him?not so much but in some weird way he touched us with that madness,sad less and even less than that,the beer he left us for the wake is in the barrel flat

that's a whole lot nicer than the type of spice they curry you with when you're on your way,and who am I to say all this?none but the one who will miss me the most.
Rachel Jun 2012
Last night I had a dream
so to see if it were true,
this morning when I woke
I almost telephoned you.

My fingers knew the number,
but my heart forgot the words..
so when you answered and asked who it was,
silence was all you heard.

Sometimes I wish that you were here
to make my dreams more real
but then I remember all of the pain
that you always made me feel.

I guess it is for the better
that we are still apart
I thought my mind had accepted that
until in my dream, again, you broke my heart.
Keith Wilson May 2018
BT
BT telephoned
six times at home
to sell me
a mobile phone

They wore me down
and then they charged
fourteen pounds
forevermore

Now I've put it
back in the box
I'll send it as a gift
Pre postage paid
and even weighed
BT will pay for it
wordvango Sep 2014
At my house
I have a skylight and on a rainy night through
fall drops of heavenly dew, cats visit through.
Daily I repair others fallen ceilings.
But, i look up into the sky, and
bless my telephoned pole hole and
see stars glowing. That pole
brought me
a start to meaning
living now. with no limits
to my future, or ceilings
to hold me down.
Johnny Noiπ Jul 2018
Oh my darling, oh my darling
Oh my darling,     Clementine
You are lost and gone forever
  u've become the AlphaBabe,    

Clementine deep in the    cavern,   
coming out    on a hidden canyon
Excavating for a mine
she'd discovered a subterranean jungle
Paradise & decided there & then [sub·ter·ra·ne·an
to return:  ˌsəbtəˈrānēən/adjective:   subterranean
existing, occurring, or done under
                        nnnn the earth's surface.
secret; concealed.
"the subterranean world of the
behind-the-scenes television              power brokers"
Origin

early 17th century:            from Latin subterraneus
(from sub- ‘below’ + terra ‘earth’) + -an.

   to return to stay; [   -an
suffix
suffix: -an
1.
forming adjectives and nouns, especially from:
names of places.
"Ohioan"
names of systems.
"Anglican"
names of zoological classes or orders.
"crustacean"
names of founders or leaders when referring to them as sources.
"Chomskyan"
2.
CHEMISTRY:         forming names of organic compounds,
                                 chiefly polysaccharides.
"dextran"nn             Origin:             based on Latin -(i)****,
     -aeus, adjectival endings.            an
an,ən/determiner
                            determiner: an
    the form of the indefinite article
               (see a) used before words
       beginning with a vowel sound.
an-1        .                        prefix: an-
variant spelling of a-1 before a vowel
                    (as in anemia, anechoic ).
Origin:         Origin
from the       Greek.
an-2
prefix
prefix: an-
variant spelling of ad- assimilated
                                   before n (as in annihilate, annotate ).
an-3             prefix: an-                    variant spelling of ana-
        shortened before a vowel                 (as in aneurysm ).
a
ā,ə/determiner: an
1.                                    used when referring to someone
    or something for the first time
             in a text or conversation.
"a man came out of the room"
used with units of measurement (                      ) to mean one such unit.
                                 "a hundred"
one single; any.
"I simply haven't a thing to wear"
used when mentioning the name
of someone not known to the speaker.
"a Mr. Smith telephoned"
someone like (the name specified).
"you're no better than ******"
2.               used to indicate membership
                 of a class of people or things.
"he is a lawyer"
3.
used when expressing              rates or ratios; in, to, or for each; per.
"typing 120 words a minute"
                                 Origin
           Middle English: weak form of ān ‘one.’
a-1               prefix: an-
not; without.
"atheistic"          Origin          from Greek.
ana-              prefix: an-
1.        up.
                    "anabasis"
2.     back.
                 "anamnesis"
3.                again.                "anabiosis"
Origin:                from Greek ana ‘up.’ [                   ]Dwelt a miner,
49er     And his daughter,  Clementine

Oh my darling, oh my darling
Oh my darling,     Clementine
      You have gone & become
         AlphaBabe forevermore
               Darling, Clementine

Light she was like a fairy
And her wrinkled soles      
              were size  nine
Herring bone corset,         dancing    
         *******;
Birkenstock s         on  her big feet

Oh my darling,    oh my darling
Oh my darling,        Clementine
You have gone & become an [        ]         AlphaBabe-
             forevermore;
Darling, Clementine

   Drove she the Ugly ducklings to
        the water
Ev'ry morning            just at nine
Hit her        foot against a rock &
accidentally Baptized Herself in (           ) the foaming brine;

Oh my darling, oh my darling
Oh my darling,     Clementine
       You are gone & become the AlphaBabe
           forevermore;
Don't pity me,      Clementine;

lips painted Ruby Red                   outside the roadhouse
Blowing  pink                                bubbles popping her gum,  
                           soft and fine
But, alas,           I was no *******
So I lost my Clementine
:|
Oh my darling, oh my darling
Oh my darling, Clementine
You are lost and gone forever
Dreadful sorry, Clementine

How I miss her! How I miss her!
How I missed     my Clementine
But I *****           her little sister
I&            forgot my Clementine

Oh my darling, oh my darling
Oh my darling,     Clementine
You are lost and gone forever
To become    the AlphaBabe:  
                         Clementine
Johnny Noiπ Feb 2019
Hot moon
The body, the sea and the beautiful
white earth, I've drunk at her fame.
Making a Gold Printer.
Music is a source of water pollution.
Young or over the phone. Sleep
on the child; An example
of a comforting tree; What
is Enormous and What Is It Now?
But I'm dying to die from drowsiness;
It's in the skin. And who shall
declare his generation?
However, the hope of heaven,
I want to change the KlKlik clips.
Cloud music can always bring
cool, raindrops. The meat
in irrigation canals is increasing.
Litter on ***** sticks
and ***** bricks Listen directly
to the logs of the word, directly into the hair,                     the feminine hair.
                        The development of the gods,
the emotions,                                                        ­        the birthdays, the dirt,
and the color of the game.
But it will not be lost.                                         Every day I worked my day,
and a day with my weapon,
and the leaves were colors,
colors, colors, ***, and so on.
His body is white, white,
clean and beautiful, in the body of the body,                and is in itself proper.
                                                                ­    The wall of the beloved little star
is not easy before it dies. It cannot find a new color.      Totally all in Brazil, Australia, Australia, and in life.
At the top of the river, El Pasqui is at the top of the river.
After the laptop was heard,                   victims of the war heard the victims.
Believe in Latin plays. More afraid of the sun.
The warm handwriting, the moon,
their special honors have long been transformed by nature.
When the voice of gold or water
or the minister is heard, the laughter of his son.   I have a tree from the bush,
                                                        and I have a dancing dream in the bushes,
and remember the current trend is very small.
But now, I'm pretty,                        I'm not like no other person in the garden,
I cannot point fingers or adapt to cuddle.                                           Iku Kuu.
The Surah includes parks,
ground cooking, and dust.                                Throwing it in a wooden box
and laughing at the stage,
I laughed in a Roman ball in Rome.
Success Stories are sports icons for some people,
especially in the desert. Do not miss.
This is contrary to the attitude of the Lord.
The eclipse on the wall, though very small, is not dead.
Kiev flopped like snow. Heart movements
and high open African-American openings,
all creatures and long-term benefits. With current heat.           Listen to ears, ears and ear ears.           Moreover, the deeper feature of the good intentions
of the mind is in two sentences
and in two words.     But the game is stressful.
Enjoy books, love, sea and the moon.
When I received the gold and the young men
telephoned over the phone,                                                        I had a desire
to change what they wanted,                                 and the water did not drop.
But one of them is skin, and I realize it's moving,
and I'm hoping that the book will be without hope when I sleep.
I always have rain, rain, and irrigable water.                   I feel cold and cold. Listen to the bubble window to listen to hearing.
Important changes in the future,
in the future, at birth,             and any other content.
But this is not lost.                 Every day, they were washed
away by the cold weather, every day,
with my friends, friends, and hands, all day in and day out.
Color ink, flower colors
kevin Jun 18
To.  ohhdl@dalailama.com
Hello Young Friend

Perhaps they telephoned your suffering



Peace love wisdom
To all my liberated Irish souls

The middle path does well in Irish ink again

Kendall some rest?

The unopening of the recalcitrance cat eyes
Ecliptic disenchanted nomidic flight

His mediocrity Wisdoms sublime
The foolish write
The wise ego dies
Zen

Ergo, ergot!

— The End —