General Chat

Lizlynes,

I have many connections with Bushey in Hertfordshire, going back to the late 1700, I wonder if your entry was about one of my ancestors!?

Your Poppy poem has brought tears to my eyes and I am not ashamed to say I cried. Wars are terrible for most of the people involved. As a military family for hundreds of years we, like many others have suffered the loss of young and old. Even now we have serving family members, and know of many young people who are trying to protect innocent people.

I do not discuss the politics as such, for we live in a country, or come from a country where our young people can choose whether or not to engage life in the military.

Here in our part of Spain we started a Remembrance meeting a few years ago, it has been very successful and this year we have four couples from the UK visiting us just to share the day and Remembrance.

We will read this poem during the service.


Bridget

With Remembrance Sunday coming up, I thought I would post this.

Why are they selling Poppies Mummy?
Selling Poppies in town today,
The Poppies child are the flowers of love
For the men who have gone away.

Why have they chosen the Poppy Mummy?
Why not a beautiful Rose?
Because my child men fought and died
in the fields where the Poppies grow.

But why are the Poppies so red Mummy?
Why are the poppies so red?
Red is the colour of blood my child
The blood that our soldiers shed.

The heart of the Poppy is black Mummy
Why does it have to be black?
Black my child is the colour of grief
For the men who never came back.

But Mummy why are you crying so?
Your tears are giving you pain,
My tears are my fears for you my child
For the world is forgetting again.

I found this very thought provoking and am sure you all will too.

Lizlynes - lovely piece.

Have just found this 'Gem' which I'm sure will be familiar to ALL us ladies (and men too maybe!)

Here lies a poor woman who was always tired,
For she lived in a place where help wasn't hired,
Her last words on earth were, 'Dear friends I am going
Where washing ain't done nor sweeping nor sewing,
And everything there is exact to my wishes,
For there they don't eat and there's no washing of dishes...
Don't mourn for me now, don't mourn for me never,
For I'm going to do nothing for ever and ever'.

Epitaph in Bushey churchyard, before 1861, destroyed by 1916.
Quoted in a lettr to the Spectator, 2nd Sept 1922.

Dermot,
Very evocative is how I thought about this poem, I do not know the author, are there any more written by him.
Bridget :-)

The Old House
(Jim Anderson)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lonely I wander through scenes of my childhood,
They call back to memory those happy days of yore
Gone are the old folk, the house that stands deserted,
No light in the windows, no welcome at the door.

Here's where the children played games on the heather,
Here's where they sailed their wee boats on the burn,
Where are they now ? Some are dead, some have wandered,
No more to their home shall those children return.

Lone is the house now and lonely the moorland,
The children are scattered, the old folk are gone,
Why stand I here like a ghost and a shadow ?
' Tis time I were moving, Tis time I passed on.

Thanks Bridget...plan to look at another

Jan

Jan, this is a delight ful poem. Will you be searcing for more of her work?

I do hope so.

Bridget :-)

This lady was mentioned in a book I read and I googled and found this out . She was born in Northampton, married at 16 and had 8 children. Her husband and self before children went to USA, in 1630 to what we know as Salem. Eventually she became the uSA's first published poet, and is considered now as a bit of a suffragette. Her name was Anne Bradstreet

Here is one of her poems

To my dear and loving husband

If ever two were one, then surely we,
If ever man were lov'd by wife, then thee
If ever wife was happy in a man,
Compare with me, ye women, if you can,
I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold
Or all the riches that the East doth hold
My love is such that rivers cannot quench;
Nor ought but love from thee give recompence.
Thy love is such I can no way repay.
The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray..
Then while we live, in love lets so persevere
That when we live no more, we may live forever


I think that this is quite lovely

Jan

THE DAWNING OF THE DAY
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As I walked out one morning fair, it being in the month of June
The dew was sparkling on the grass and the small birds in full tune
And when returning from a walk, by the fields I chanced to stray
It was there I met my heart's delight by the dawning of the day.

Her head and beautiful neck were bare and mantle none she wore
Her golden hair, in ringlets fair, it hung her shoulders o'er
Her rosy cheeks and ruby lips, they stole my heart away
And I stood to stare at that Venus fair at the dawning of the day.

"Where are you going my pretty fair maid, where are you going so soon?"
"I'm going a milking my cow, kind sir, it being in the month of June
The pasture that my cow feeds on, it lies so far away
And I've got to be there each morning fair at the dawning of the day".

"Come sit you down, my pretty fair maid, supposing it was a mile
Come sit you down on this primrose bank and we will chat a while
With the lambs all sporting on every side and the meadows blooming gay
I'll pledge to you my heart and hand at the dawning of the day".

"Oh no, kind sir" the maid replied, "I cannot tarry now
My parents wait for my return from the milking of my cow
But perhaps we'll meet some other time, if you chance to pass this way"
She gently glided from my sight at the dawning of the day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(Tommy Makem sings this beautifully.)

Old Maid In The Garrett
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Now I've often heard it said from my father and my mother
That going to a wedding was the makings of another
Well, if this be so, then I'll go without a biddance
Oh kind providence, won't you send me to a wedding

Chorus:
And it's oh, dear me, how would it be
If I died an old maid in the garrett?

Well, now there's my sister Jean, she's not handsome or good-looking
Scarcely fifteen and a fellow she was courting
Now, she's twenty-four with a son and a daughter
Here am I at forty-five and I've never had an offer.

I can cook and I can sew, I can keep the house right tidy
And wake up in the morning to get the breakfast ready
There's nothing in this wide world would make me half so cheery
As a wee, fat man who would call me his own deary.

So come landsman or come kingsman, come tinker or come tailor
Come fiddler or come dancer, come ploughboy or come sailor
Come rich man, come poor man, come bore or come witty
Come any man at all who will marry me for pity.

Well, now I the way home, for nobody's heeding
Oh, nobody's heeding to poor Annie's bleeding
So, I the way home to my own pity garret
If I can't have a man, then I'll have to get a parrot.

Theres quite an art to falling apart
as the years go by
and we know life didn't begin at 40
We all know thats a lie

Our hair is getting thinner
But our waists are not
the few teeth we have
Are beginning to rot

We smell of Vicks Vapour rub
Not Chanel No 5
Our doggedness is the only thing
Thats keeping us alive

When asked of our past
Every detail we'll know
Except what we were doing 10 minutes ago

Well you get the idea
What more can I say ?
Why not read the obituaries
Like you do every day

If your name is not there
You'll once again start
perfecting the art of falling apart

So I'm able to to say this
as an old friend to you
A very old friend
Who is falling apart too

Despite theres only half of me left
These birthday wishes I send
Not at all half heartedly
All the very best, my very dear old friend


Hope you all enjoy this ...found it when looking for a suitably rude verse for a friend who has reached 65...will post that one another day

Jan

Clover, thanks for the new entry. I have not known this one before.

Bridget

PS I have a migraine which I am trying to shift so will be back later, I hope.

Bridget

Back again. Another one learned in school.

The Stolen Child (W.B.YEATS)

Where dips the rocky highland
Of slueth wood in the lake
There lies a a Feary Island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats
There we,ve hid our feary vats
Full of berries
And of Reddest Stolen Cherries.

Come away O human child,
To the waters and the wild,
With a feary hand in hand,
For the world,s more full of weeping
Than you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses,
The dim grey sands with light,
By far off the furthest roses
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
Whist the world is full of troubles
And is anxious in its sleep.

Come away, O human child
To the waters and the wild
With a feary, hand in hand
For the World,s more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wandering waters gushes
From the hills above Glen-car,
In pools amoung the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek from 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 feary, 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 hillside
Or the Kettle on the hob
Sing peace into the breast
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal-chest
For he comes, the human child,
To the water,s and the wild
With a feary, hand in hand
From a world more full of weeping than he can understand.

What a good page so far! Well done to everyone. Thank you for keeping this this thread so informative.

I will be adding some time next week

Bridget in Spain :-)

'The Listener' By Walter de la Mare

'Is anybody there'? said the traveller,
Knocking on the moonlit door;
And his horse in the silence champed the grass of the forest's ferny floor,
And a bird flew out of the turret,
Above the traveller's head:
As he smote upon the door a second time,
'Is anybody there'? he said.
But no-one decended to the traveller;
No head from the leaf fringed sill
Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes,
Where he stood perplexed and still.
But only a host of phantom listeners that dwelt in that lone house then,
Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight
To that voice from the world of men:
Stood thronging the faint moonbeams on the dark stair
That goes down to the empty hall;
Hearkening in an air strirred and shaken by the lonely travellers call.
And he felt in his heart their strangeness
Their stillness answering their cry,
While his horse moved, cropping the dark turf
'Neath the starred and leafy sky;
For suddenly, he smote upon the door,even louder, and lifted his head:
Tell them I came and no-one answered,
That I kept my word, he said.
Never the least stir made the listeners,
Though every word he spake fell echoing through the shadowness of the still house
From the one man left awake:
Aye they heard his foot upon the stirrup, and the sound of the iron on stone
And how the silence surged softly backward,
When the plunging hooves were gone.

Horses & Plough.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Oh, many the breezes that blow in the spring
and as sweet is the music the song thrushes bring,
but I sigh for a scene that I seldom see now,
a man in the fields with his horses and plough.

Farewell to the days of my youth long ago,
when I harnessed my team near the valley below.
Then away to the highland we scythed all around
To turn the hard green sod with horses and plough.

Invoking a blessing I started the day,
I yearn for another that's what I would say,
asking for guidance to keep my know how
and strike a straight furrow with horses and plough.

Then up at the headland every once in a while
I rested my body all aching with toil,
the sleeve of my shirt swept the sweat from my brow
as I gazed at the work of my horses and plough.

Whistling and lilting the words of a song
lightened my labour all the day long,
with the seagulls around me and the rooks on the bough
all searching for the bounty of horses and plough.

But the clatter of tractors, pollution and all,
has crippled the cobble and sad was his fall,
while far away OPEC we richly endow
Not counting the value of horses and plough.

Very soon I'll be called from this valley of woe,
to the fair fields of Heaven I hope I will go.
One request from St. Peter I hope he'll allow:
Eternal employment with horses and plough.

Just seen an interesting saying, apparently it is Swedish.

Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow.

Lizlynes and Dermot

Thank you both for resurrecting this post. I guess that the summer time is not the best for threads similar to this.
I shal try to put my brain in gear and see what I can come up with in the next few days.

Bridget

Here lies the body of Emily White,
Who put out her left hand ,
and turned to the right!!!!



I'm afraid that this is the best that I can do for the time being!!