Your Favourite Poem

[neonleon]

The Shout
by Simon Armitage

We went out
into the school yard together, me and the boy
whose name and face

I don't remember. We were testing the range
of the human voice:
he had to shout for all he was worth

I had to raise an arm
from across the divide to signal back
that the sound had carried.

He called from over the park — I lifted an arm.
Out of bounds,
he yelled from the end of the road,

from the foot of the hill,
from beyond the look-out post of Fretwell's Farm —
I lifted an arm.

He left town, went on to be twenty years dead
with a gunshot hole
in the roof of his mouth, in Western Australia.

Boy with the name and face I don't remember,
you can stop shouting now, I can still hear you.

 

[Dithering Dougie]

I think it's maybe either Les Dawson or maybe Spike Milligan.

She stood at the bridge at midnight,
her lips were all a quiver,
she gave a cough
her head fell off,
and floated down the river.

 

[summerisle]

I think it's maybe either Les Dawson or maybe Spike Milligan.

She stood at the bridge at midnight,
her lips were all a quiver,
she gave a cough
her head fell off,
and floated down the river.

One of Spike's :

Said Hamlet to Ophelia
I'll draw a sketch of thee
What kind of pencil should I use
2B or not 2B

 

[chrissyjack]

There was a young man called Gandhi
Went into the bar for a shandy
With his great loin cloth
He wiped of the froth
And the barman said " Blimey, that's handy "

S Milligan

 

[harris78]

Can I Carry You?

I guess that I can hold you
one more time before you grow.
And tell you that I love you
so that you will always know.
Please let me tie your shoe again.
One day you'll tie your own.
And when you think back to this time
I hope it's love I've shown.
Can I help you put your coat on?
Can I please cut up your meat?
Can I pull you in the wagon?
Can I pick you out a treat?
One day you might just care for me,
so let me care for you.
I want to be a part
of every little thing you do.
Tonight could I please wash your hair?
Can I put toys in the bath?
Can I help you count your small ten toes
before I teach you math?
Before you join a baseball team
can I pitch you one more ball?
And one more time can I stand near
to make sure you don't fall?
Let's take another space-ship ride
Up to the Planet Zoor.
Before our Cardboard Rocket
doesn't fit us anymore.
Please let me help you up the hill.
while you're still too small to climb.
And let me read you stories
while you're young and have the time.
I know the day will come
when you will do these things alone.
Will you recall the shoulder rides
and all the balls we've thrown?
I want you to grow stronger
than your Dad could ever be.
And when you find success
there will be no soul more proud than me.
So will you let me carry you?
One day you'll walk alone.
I cannot bear to miss one day
from now until you've grown.

 

[ItsOKImAPilot]

I don't know much poetry but I had to take a class in it. One of our assignments was to write a poem to a prisoner. Being an uncultured swine, I always associate poetry with love so I found the assignment weird. This is what I wrote:

My love shall extend
Emanating from my heart
Through those iron bars
And unto your arms
You should escape
Like in Shawshank Redemption
For you the state should make an exception
After all that b***h had it coming
For blowing up yo' man's phone

 

[ilikecheese]

Rose are red
Violets are blue
I have a gun
Get in the van

 

[Mutzo Nutzo]

Adlestrop

by Edward Thomas



Yes. I remember Adlestrop—
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.

The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop—only the name

And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

I walk my dog around Adlestrop almost every day - it's really beautiful there

 

[davids]

An Idea of Order
by Michael Murphy


As they have all this past month,
Cars stack up along the incline
Of the Brow, hood to tail to hood.
Scarred by freight, broken-backed,
This is the last half mile of road
The workmen have left to shuck
With gravel, before raking tarmac
To an acrid bubbling skin.
Engines idle, as ranged to the east
Thunderheads promise more of the same

Slant rain as rises as steam.
Angling the rear-view mirror
To check up on my daughter
Babbling away to herself in the back,
I turn down the radio, listening to
Those sounds she means for speech,
Approximations of all our needs.
She knows I’m watching her, so
Smiles, sideways
Out through the clouded window.

One of the workmen stops
To tap the glass. What he wants to tell her,
I imagine, cannot be exchanged
For any of the words she owns.
The world, he’s trying to say,
Has changed. That that,
Lifting a hand to the sky,
Is a Perorbital hematoma,
And those dark-suited voices
Booming across the Atlantic

Threatening payola,
Collateral, the hills raised low
By Starlifters and Tornadoes
Are hung up on a God, who,
This time seven days ago,
Watched as two planes swung south
Above America. Now,
He shrugs, returning to his job,
We can’t even be sure if those
Towers of vapour are ice or smoke.

 

[summerisle]

I walk my dog around Adlestrop almost every day - it's really beautiful there

I've passed the site of the station on the train, but had to ask because you would't know it was there. I've been to Kingham and the surrounding area on a warm spring day - birds a tweeting and a hum in the air. Houses must cost a bomb. Lucky sod to live there

 

[GrandOldTeam]

I don't have a favourite poem, but thought this one was pretty good;

 

[The Cowboy]

Boom Boom
Boom Boom Boom Boom
Boom Boom Boom

 

[Mutzo Nutzo]

I've passed the site of the station on the train, but had to ask because you would't know it was there. I've been to Kingham and the surrounding area on a warm spring day - birds a tweeting and a hum in the air. Houses must cost a bomb. Lucky sod to live there

I consider myself very lucky.

 

[summerisle]

 

[Jacko93]

I really like Scroobius Pips spoken word stuff.