Today is Easter, but it is also World Poetry Day. Do you have any favorite poems that you'd like to share?

Du fragst mich, wie ich heiße, weil du meinst, ich bin dir fremd.
Laß dir etwas von mir erzählen, dann merkst du, wer ich bin.
Ich habe viele Gesichter, und ich kann mich gut verstellen.

Ich bin dein bester Freund und ich bin dein größter Feind.
Ich halte einen Dolch und ‘n Kuß für dich bereit.
Ich leg dir eine Kette und ‘n Strick um deinen Hals.

Ich bin gut, und ich bin böse, bin Liebe und bin Haß,
ich bin ehrlich und ich lüge, wie es mir grad passt.
Mir kannst du nie vertrauen;, nur darauf ist Verlass.

Ich bin immer auf der Suche, doch ich weiß nie wonach.
Dauernd auf der Flucht und dauernd auf der Jagd.
Ich hab den Mut entdeckt und ich erfand die Angst,
ich bin Sieger und Verlierer im ewig gleichen Kampf.

Ich rede von Gefühlen und benutze den Verstand,
erklär mich für gesund und mach mich selber krank.
Ich will alles kontrollieren und ersticke langsam dran.

Meine Hände sind voll Blut und mein Herz voller Gold.
Ich erfinde die Gesetze und mach die Religion.
Ich bin mein eigener König und die Erde ist mein Thron.

Ich sehne mich nach Licht und bin süchtig nach dem Mond,
drehe mich im Kreis und denk, es geht nach vorn.
Ich lebe und ich sterbe im selben Atemzug,
ich bin Körper und bin Geist, auserwählt und verflucht.

Mein Name ist Mensch, ich weiß, dass du mich kennst.
Ich bin du, du bist ich, ich bin ein Mensch

(translate it yourself)

William Butler Yeats’ The Stolen Child sounds like spring to me.

Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we’ve hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.

Away with us he’s going,
The solemn-eyed:
He’ll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than he can understand.

I am a flower.
A sunflower.
The rain falls on me,
and, the sun shines on me,
and, makes me grow.

Written by JLeslie 1st grade. Published in the local paper circa 1973.

I think maybe it was a prediction about how much being in the outdoors means to me.

@JLeslie That is really cute. I would be a proud father if my little girl brought that home.

@Seek Thank you. I’d never read that one before. It is a good Spring poem.

I still have a copy of the newspaper in a box.

Byron, from Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage;

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more,
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean—roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin—his control
Stops with the shore;—upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man’s ravage, save his own,
When for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.

His steps are not upon thy paths,—thy fields
Are not a spoil for him,—thou dost arise
And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields
For earth’s destruction thou dost all despise,
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies,
And send’st him, shivering in thy playful spray
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay,
And dashest him again to earth:—there let him lay.

..,

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty’s form
Glasses itself in tempests; in all time,
Calm or convulsed—in breeze, or gale, or storm,
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime
Dark-heaving;—boundless, endless, and sublime—
The image of Eternity—the throne
Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime
The monsters of the deep are made; each zone
Obeys thee: thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone.

And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be
Borne like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy
I wantoned with thy breakers—they to me
Were a delight; and if the freshening sea
Made them a terror—‘twas a pleasing fear,
For I was as it were a child of thee,
And trusted to thy billows far and near,
And laid my hand upon thy mane—as I do here.

(another question asked earluer about being moved to tears – this makes me weep)

…

The Tyger
By William Blake

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp,
Dare its deadly terrors clasp!

When the stars threw down their spears
And water’d heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger Tyger burning bright,
In the forests of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

^^Junior Brit Lit just came flashing before my eyes.

The silver trumpets rang across the Dome:
The people knelt upon the ground with awe:
And borne upon the necks of men I saw,
Like some great God, the Holy Lord of Rome.
Priest-like, he wore a robe more white than foam,
And, king-like, swathed himself in royal red,
Three crowns of gold rose high upon his head:
In splendour and in light the Pope passed home.

My heart stole back across wide wastes of years
To One who wandered by a lonely sea,
And sought in vain for any place of rest:
‘Foxes have holes, and every bird its nest,
I, only I, must wander wearily,
And bruise my feet, and drink wine salt with tears.

~ Easter Morning, Oscar Wilde

@dxs Senior in high school, I read it for English classroom

Jesus rose from the grave on Easter, so why not a vampire? Still my favorite poem ever.

Vampire, by Vasile Alecsandri.

Near the cliff’s sharp edge, on high
Standing out against the sky,
Dost thou see a ruined cross
Weatherstained, o’ergrown by moss,
Gloomy, desolate, forsaken,
By unnumbered tempests shaken?

Not a blade of grass grows nigh it,
Not a peasant lingers by it.
E’en the sombre bird of night
Shuns it in her darksome flight,
Startled by the piteous groan
That arises from the stone.

All around, on starless nights,
Myriad hosts of livid lights
Flicker fretfully, revealing
At its foot a phantom, kneeling
Whilst it jabbers dismal plaints,
Cursing God and all the saints.

Tardy traveller, beware
Of that spectre gibbering there;
Close your eyes, and urge your steed
To the utmost of his speed;–
For beneath that cross, I ween,
Lies a Vampyre’s corpse obscene!

Though the night is black and cold
Love’s found story, often told,
Floats in whispers through the air,
Stalwart youth and maiden fair
Seal sweet vows of ardent passion
With their lips, in lovers’ fashion.

“Restless, pale, a shape I see
Hov’ring nigh; what may it be?
‘Tis a charger, white as snow,
Pacing slowly to and fro
Like a sentry. As he turns
Haughtily the sward he spurns.

“Leave me not, beloved, tonight!
Stay with me till morning’s light!’
Weeping, thus besought the maid;
‘Love, my soul is sore afraid!
Brave not the dread Vampyre’s power,
Mightiest at this mystic hour!’

Not a word he spake, but prest
The sobbing maiden to his breast;
Kissed her lips and cheeks and eyes
Heedless of her tears and sighs;
Waved his hand, with gesture gay,
Mounted–smiled–and rode away.

We rides across the dusky plain
Tearing along with might and main
Like some wild storm-fiend, in his flight
Nursed on the ebony breast of Night?
‘Tis he, who left her in her need–
Her lover, on his milk-white steed!

The blast in all its savage force
Strives to o’erthrow the gallant horse
That snorts defiance to his foe
And struggles onward. See! below
The causeway, ‘long the river-side
A thousand flutt’ring flamelets glide!

Now they approach, and now recede,
Still followed by the panting steed;
He nears the ruined cross! A crash,
A piteous cry, a heavy splash,
And in the rocky river-bed
Rider and horse lie crushed and dead.
Then from those dismal depths arise
Blaspheming yells and strident cries
Re-echoing through the murky air
And, like a serpent from its lair,
Brandishing high a blood-stained glaive
The Vampyre rises from his grave

The original version of the poem: by Phyllis McCormack, a nurse in a nursing home, back in 60’s. Cranky old man is the newer version. Either way. I love this poem.
Crabbit Old Woman

What do you see, nurses what do you see
Are you thinking when you are looking at me
A crabbit old woman, not very wise,
Uncertain of habit, with faraway eyes,
Who dribbles her food and makes no reply
When you say in a loud voice—I do wish you’d try
Who seems not to notice the things that you do
And for ever is losing a stocking or shoe,
Who unresisting or not, lets you do as you will
With bathing and feeding, the long day to fill
Is that what you are thinking, is that what you see,
Then open your eyes, nurses, you’re not looking at me
I’ll tell you who I am as I sit here so still,
As I used at your bidding, as I eat at your will,
I am a small child of ten with a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters who love one another,
A young girl of 16 with wings on her feet
Dreaming that soon now a lover she’ll meet;
A bride at 20—my heart gives a leap,
Remembering the vows that I promised to keep
At 25 now I have young of my own
Who need me to build a secure, happy home;
A women of 30 my young now grow fast,
Bound to each other with ties that should last,
At 40 my young sons have grown and are gone;
But my man’s beside me to see I don’t mourn;
At 50, once more babies play around my knee.
Again we know children, my loved one me
Dark days are upon me, my husband is dead,
I look at the future, I shudder with dread,
For my young are all rearing young of their own

And I think of the years and the love that I’ve known.

I’m an old woman now and nature is cruel

‘tis her jest to make old age look like a fool.

The body it crumbles, grace and vigor depart,

There is now a stone where once was a heart

But inside this old carcass a young girl still dwells

And now and again my battered heart swells

I remember the joys I remember the pain,

And I’m loving and living life over again.

I think of the years all too few – gone too fast,

And accept the stark fact that nothing can last.

So open your eyes, nurses open and see

Not a crabbit old women look closer – see me.

I love the honesty of this poem!
“How about a nice poem about Spring, love?”
“F*ck off”
Spring

BY EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY
To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know.
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify?
Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.

^^She was hillarious to go drinking with, according to Dorothy Parker.

The prose-poetry below isn’t about Spring or Easter or anything happy, but it is good and extremely poignant. @zenvelo posted a reference to it a couple of years ago and I’ve never forgotten it. On second thought, it’s a bit long to post here and I don’t want to kill this string.

The Rape Joke
by Patricia Lockwood

The poem won the 2013 Pushcart Prize.

Jesus said unto to Meg
“Meg…… don’t beg
You may only hath one leg
Dost thou desire an easter egg?
There, there, sweet Meg”

@ragingloli So you’re finally revealing your sex, hey? And your proclivities?

Dust of Snow

BY ROBERT FROST

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree

Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.

Here’s one from Seamus Heaney…

When all the others were away at Mass

When all the others were away at Mass
I was all hers as we peeled potatoes.
They broke the silence, let fall one by one
Like solder weeping off the soldering iron:
Cold comforts set between us, things to share
Gleaming in a bucket of clean water.
And again let fall. Little pleasant splashes
From each other’s work would bring us to our senses.

So while the parish priest at her bedside
Went hammer and tongs at the prayers for the dying
And some were responding and some crying
I remembered her head bent towards my head,
Her breath in mine, our fluent dipping knives–
Never closer the whole rest of our lives.

@flutherother That’s beautiful!

Then this:

An Irish Airman foresees his Death
BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;
My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.

I wrote this:

Half a league, half a league, Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!
“Charge for the guns!” he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Someone had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.

Flash’d all their sabres bare,
Flash’d as they turn’d in air,
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder’d:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right thro’ the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel’d from the sabre stroke
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they rode back, but not
Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came thro’ the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honour the charge they made,
Honour the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred.

This was written by Patrick Pearse, leader of the Easter Rising in Dublin 1916.

The Fool

Since the wise men have not spoken, I speak that am only a fool;
A fool that hath loved his folly,
Yea, more than the wise men their books or their counting houses or their quiet homes,
Or their fame in men’s mouths;
A fool that in all his days hath done never a prudent thing,
Never hath counted the cost, nor recked if another reaped
The fruit of his mighty sowing, content to scatter the seed;
A fool that is unrepentant, and that soon at the end of all
Shall laugh in his lonely heart as the ripe ears fall to the reaping-hooks
And the poor are filled that were empty,
Tho’ he go hungry.
I have squandered the splendid years that the Lord God gave to my youth
In attempting impossible things, deeming them alone worth the toil.

Was it folly or grace? Not men shall judge me, but God.
I have squandered the splendid years:
Lord, if I had the years I would squander them over again,
Aye, fling them from me!
For this I have heard in my heart, that a man shall scatter, not hoard,
Shall do the deed of to-day, nor take thought of to-morrow’s teen,
Shall not bargain or huxter with God; or was it a jest of Christ’s
And is this my sin before men, to have taken Him at His word?
The lawyers have sat in council, the men with the keen, long faces,
And said, `This man is a fool,’ and others have said, `He blasphemeth; ’
And the wise have pitied the fool that hath striven to give a life
In the world of time and space among the bulks of actual things,
To a dream that was dreamed in the heart, and that only the heart could hold.

O wise men, riddle me this: what if the dream come true?
What if the dream come true? and if millions unborn shall dwell
In the house that I shaped in my heart, the noble house of my thought?
Lord, I have staked my soul, I have staked the lives of my kin
On the truth of Thy dreadful word. Do not remember my failures,
But remember this my faith
And so I speak.
Yea, ere my hot youth pass, I speak to my people and say:
Ye shall be foolish as I; ye shall scatter, not save;
Ye shall venture your all, lest ye lose what is more than all;
Ye shall call for a miracle, taking Christ at His word.
And for this I will answer, O people, answer here and hereafter,
O people that I have loved, shall we not answer together?

Robert Frost’s Death of the Hired Man has always been one of my favorites, as well as all the poems my mother wrote and published.

@Pachy I find a lot of Frost’s poems very moving. Home Burial is devastating.

Yes indeed, @janbb, moving is the right word. And accessible. I’m a great fan of his poetry.

My favorites don’t seem to fit into any particular category at all, but this does happen to be one of them:

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird
by Wallace Stevens

I
Among twenty snowy mountains,
The only moving thing
Was the eye of the blackbird.

II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.

III
The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a small part of the pantomime.

IV
A man and a woman
Are one.
A man and a woman and a blackbird
Are one.

V
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.

VI
Icicles filled the long window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.

VII
O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?

VIII
I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;
But I know, too,
That the blackbird is involved
In what I know.

IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles.

X
At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light,
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.

XI
He rode over Connecticut
In a glass coach.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his equipage
For blackbirds.

XII
The river is moving.
The blackbird must be flying.

XIII
It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar-limbs.

—
@ragingloli, I’m missing a few words, but I get it.

Miss Me – But Let Me Go!
Author Unknown

When I come to the end of the road
And the sun has set for me
I want no rites in a gloom-filled room.
Why cry for a soul set free?

Miss me a little – but not too long
And not with your head bowed low.
Remember the love that we once shared,
Miss me – but let me go.

For this is a journey that we all must take
And each must go alone.
It’s all a part of the Master’s plan,
A step on the road to home.

When you are lonely and sick of heart
Go to the friends we know
And bury your sorrows in doing good deeds.
Miss Me – But Let me Go!

I found this gem while grieving. That is exactly what my friend wanted to tell me.

When I was in third grade I had to memorize a poem. I chose Robert Frost’s Mending Wall. Something about it appealed to me even then, though I didn’t grasp its metaphorical level. These days it seems strikingly relevant:

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbour know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
“Stay where you are until our backs are turned!”
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, “Good fences make good neighbours.”
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
“Why do they make good neighbours? Isn’t it
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down.” I could say “Elves” to him,
But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, “Good fences make good neighbours.”

@thorninmud One of my top favorites.

And another top favorite of mine:

Poem In October

by Dylan Thomas

It was my thirtieth year to heaven
Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood
And the mussel pooled and the heron
Priested shore
The morning beckon
With water praying and call of seagull and rook
And the knock of sailing boats on the net webbed wall
Myself to set foot
That second
In the still sleeping town and set forth.

My birthday began with the water-
Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name
Above the farms and the white horses
And I rose
In rainy autumn
And walked abroad in a shower of all my days.
High tide and the heron dived when I took the road
Over the border
And the gates
Of the town closed as the town awoke.

A springful of larks in a rolling
Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling
Blackbirds and the sun of October
Summery
On the hill’s shoulder,
Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly
Come in the morning where I wandered and listened
To the rain wringing
Wind blow cold
In the wood faraway under me.

Pale rain over the dwindling harbour
And over the sea wet church the size of a snail
With its horns through mist and the castle
Brown as owls
But all the gardens
Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales
Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.
There could I marvel
My birthday
Away but the weather turned around.

It turned away from the blithe country
And down the other air and the blue altered sky
Streamed again a wonder of summer
With apples
Pears and red currants
And I saw in the turning so clearly a child’s
Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother
Through the parables
Of sun light
And the legends of the green chapels

And the twice told fields of infancy
That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.
These were the woods the river and sea
Where a boy
In the listening
Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy
To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide.
And the mystery
Sang alive
Still in the water and singingbirds.

And there could I marvel my birthday
Away but the weather turned around. And the true
Joy of the long dead child sang burning
In the sun.
It was my thirtieth
Year to heaven stood there then in the summer noon
Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.
O may my heart’s truth
Still be sung
On this high hill in a year’s turning.

Can we dedicate this lovely thread to @gailcalled?

^ Yes, that seems appropriate.

Definitely.

We should dedicate this thread to all our lovely jellies who passed away too.

Yes, @Mimishu1995 very appropriate.

How did I miss this!?
Here a couple originals from my archives.
I do have some serious writings, but humor is my gig. haha

I don’t want to be a Pillow. ( Ode to a goose )

I don’t want to be a pillow
or a jacket or a throw
My life was not created
to warm people in the snow

I do not want my body parts
mashed into a can
and spread upon a cracker
in culinary land

Do not bathe my sad remains
in a citrus glaze
My life was not created
to be roasted, baked or braised

Do not pluck my downy breast
as berries from a vine
My simple life belongs to me
and all of me is mine

The bad haircut

Thinning hairs upon my head
some cling to life and some are dead

She cut my fragile fronds so wrong
some too short and some too long

She set the blades to shear too short
and lopped the tower off my fort

A mule and plow
might be preferred
to trample ‘cross my wispy herd

What evil scissors did she wield
to kill my sparsely planted field

Silky stalks and tender shoots
torn from my scalp with dying roots
A seasons growth, without a trace
harvested above my face.

Gadwicke son of Smethwicke

Gadwicke son of Smethwick
was a cat who’d gone quite mad
hence the nickname ” Madman”
fell upon this furry cad

He came and went through windows
took his drink straight from the tap
refused to use a litter box
and drooled when in your lap

His behavior was atrocious
his attitude quite vain
and when discovered in the act
would glare with cool disdain

His fighting was disruptive
his reputation very scary
Although a fancy cat was he
his brawls were legendary

No other creature, large or runt
dared to cross
let alone confront

This madmans turf
was no mans land
and foolish nomads
bore his brand