Silly Ol' Poems

Mean-spirited millet maker in
the kitchen stirring
the pot, spitting fire
spitting fits
of rage over events
of ten years ago
feeding her family on
ten years worth of grief and bad
left over feelings
she can't quite come to grips with.
In her mean spiritedness
Millie millet maker
gripes over the short falls of others
and how she's done
them wrong.

Starstruck

Photograph by Nicholas Alan Cope

In the beginning
She made it
Clear
Her dislike of astronauts.

Pure contempt
For those suited up
Flyers-
Bound for beyond
Heaven.

Their journey
The effect caused
By a rocket fuel
Explosion.

Hurdle jumping
Through space,
Exploring galaxies
and bombing the moon.

For great cause
or for country,
For space glory.

Gold medalists in
the cosmic Olympics,
With flags flying.
None of it
Could be figured out.

Funeral Blues

Funeral Blues
by W. H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message She Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

She was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.