How Old Are You?

How old are you my dear friend?

Old as the woman I touch

Said Groucho Marx when questioned
I like this answer much

How old are you my friend asked?

I said older than you

But not as old as that man

With no teeth left to chew

Our age? How vague we try and be

When people ask, and delve

We want to hide, embarrassed

And keep it to oursel...

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The Oak

(This is based on a true recent happening in our WOL community.  It inspired me to follow it into the future....)

They gently laid their loved one

When life no longer woke

Beneath a chosen memory

A living sapling oak

They watched the oak tree grow and grow
They watched, and also grew
Until they could no longer watch
They died, but oak still grew

Their...

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Hither-Thither Rehab

I am 10,000 miles away

A long long way from you

I lived in UK five long years

Now back with kangaroo

I'm seeking intellectual

Interaction, yes

My mind goes hither-thither-like

I'm in a great big mess

I visit rehab often

De-hithering my mind

The nurses know me well by now

Hugs/kisses, plenty kind

One of my fellow poets

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Pushing Boundaries

“If you do not push the boundaries,

you will never know where they are “ (T.S Eliot)

Poems can deliver

Sorrow, hate or mirth

As we come across them

From our end, to birth

I enjoy experimenting

When I sit down to write

How can we break tradition

Unless we lift our sight

New things won't be discovered

If we don't push b...

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Throwing Up

While I write 'bout fun and games

And throw them up on site

I also can write satire

Mix fun within my bite

I don't like seeing doom and gloom

Thrown up on site

But I'm just one opinion

Whether wrong or right

Our site exists for everyone

To throw up what they think

Within WOL's Code of Ethics

Rinky dinky dink

Don Matthews Novemb...

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Knock Knock. What's Going On Here?

I've learnt something new from a poem

That I didn't know existed before

The poet (UK) called it 'Knock Knock'

Which I thought was about someone's door

The poet she talked about Knock House

I thought what the heck's this about?

For not having lived in that area

A knock house? It left me in doubt

So went to a web dictionary

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Down the Rabbit Hole

I do write very different

To anyone on WOL

But that's not in our comfort zone

To go down rabbit hole

But why can't I be like Lewis ?
 

Don Matthews November 2019

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I've Failed as a Poet Again

Hillbillys Caff once again I do sit

It's hopeless, don't know what to write

I'm doing my usual look-looking around

But there's no ideas coming in sight

So what does a poet do lacking ideas?

With me it's to internalise

To turn on myself, making neurons go round

See what they can bring me, surprise

Damn! Looks like I've failed as ...

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The Stars Are Our Future

(There's something about the underlying message here that bothers me. To say we are 'done with this place, let's go find another' is a cop-out. The underlying cause is too many people. Population continues to increase and we breed like rabbits. The Earth can only sustain a finite number of people. There is an urgent need to reduce population to a sustainable level ...

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Boomerang. It's all Wrong

You know I'm a rhymer

From over the sea

Throwing my boomerang

In circles. You see

I hear you all thinking

Is he really real

Or taking the piss

If so, what's the deal?

Our boomerangs come

With sticker removed

Which said 'Made in China'

Then aborigine grooved

The grooves are then filled

With mock aborigine art

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My Boy He Went To Kindy

My boy he went to kindy

Equipped with bag cocaine

It made him feel like Spiderman

Jump buildings no complain

I plead not guilty Your Honour

Post Script

Massachusetts Benny Garcia, 29, has been charged with drug possession 100 bags of cocaine and heroin and reckless dangerment of a child. He is pleading not guilty

Don Matthews...

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I Like My Gloomy Doomy

I like my gloomy doomy

It gives me such a hit

Want more, can't get enough of it

I like to feel real shit

YAY!

Dark clouds, death, destruction

Gimme gimme more

Doomy gloomy, need my fix

Shit, I thee adore

YAY!

Fun don't you dare come near me

I'll boot you out the door

Shit! I've writ you in my verse

Jeezes wha...

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Cafe

Inspired by my frequent visits to Hillbillys Cafe where I drink coffee and chat with my Muse Thalia

I'm sitting in a cafe

Favourite drink in hand

Voices drift around

Quiet. Indecipherable

Lost in my own thoughts

Peripheral images interrupt thoughts

Then there's the soft music wafting round

One minute there – next minute gone

Cap...

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Amateur Poet Bert Applies For Entry to Like-Minders Society's Theme Park

Stood at the Theme Park Entrance

Watched Minders flying by

On their rollercoaster

I wanted in, did sigh

A sign nailed to the Entrance Gate

Said welcome please come in

But need to be invited

No riff-raff taken in

Deciding I'm no riff-raff

Prepared my C and V

And sent it to t...

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Greed Rules the World – I Guess

We're always reading about climate change

But we still keep digging up coal

For sale around the world

I guess digging up coal is profit making

So that won't stop till the world ends

And by all accounts that won't be too long

I guess greed rules the world

And that will never change

Don Matthews November 2019

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Checking Into Rehab

I have a pile of poems

Sitting in my drawer

They never seem to lessen

They seem to just get more

My mind is just too active

I try to shut it's door

It laughs at me, picks up my pen

And starts to write some more

Sounds like I've got a problem

Mind's taken full control

Must go book into rehab

It's your fault, yes you WOL

...

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Nobody

I can be annoying

I can be nice

It's all a slice/part

Of don matthews life

Why do you Don

Lower-case your name?

Maybe it's because

I'm not seeking fame

I'm little don Nobody

Like Emily Dickinson

Writing rhyme poems

As just simple don

Don, you're an enigma

You've just upper-cased

Yourself as a Nobody

And Don you've effaced

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What Fires Me Up To Write Poetry?

So what fires me up to write poetry?

(We all go through this at some time)

What causes that itch to take pen up

Convert mind's ideas into rhyme?

Doesn't matter be it prose be it rhyming

Poetry has it's own unique way

Of expressing our hopes, thoughts and feelings

Than other written forms of today

There's something about po...

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Running Out of Cotton Wool

You know I grew up on a farm

Could always have drowned in the lake

Died from the fall of a big tree

Or simply from treading on snake

And then there's the horse-drinking trough

Was always near top (pretty full)

Could easily have fallen from a galloping horse

Or gored by our favourite pet bull

So by today's standards

I'm pretty ...

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Publish-Time

Publishers today don't seem to

Like the written rhyme

They say it's out of fashion to go

Rhyming all the time

I think of William Shakespeare, Yeats

Their work was full of rhyme

And if they were alive today

They would lack publish-time

Today there's little teaching how

To grow the art of rhyme

Into an art form fashion that's

Deserving ...

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When You Get to My Age

When you get to my age

You say just what you think

What others think don't bother you

Rinky dinky dink

When you get to my age

I write down what I want

Don't care about the colour

Don't care about the font

You hurry and put down on page

What's inside your head

'Cause when you get to my age

Time is limited

Don Matthews...

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Like-Minders Society Renewed Attempt to Heal Rift With Traditional Poets Association

The Like-Minders Society

Broke away from

The Traditional Poets Association because

They couldn't flap their offbeat wings

They became frustrated. Understandable

The TPA were peeved. Also understandable

No-one likes breakups

The LMS first attempt to heal the rift

Was a...

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Space Reversal

Expansion – do you like it ?

I must admit I don't

More people, cars, pollution

Give me more space ? - you won't

In fact your space reversing

A feeling I can't bear

It makes me claustrophobic

Don't think you really care

Perhaps I'm just old-fashioned

And long for yesterday

When people, cars, pollution

Did not get in my way

Fo...

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Listen Up There Rhyming Board

Listen up there Rhyming Board

(Yes, you lot in the sky)

I have a group of rhymers

Who cheer me as I try

Please don't disappoint them

Don't come down on me hard

I want to write new poetry

I'm not another Bard

Don't worry 'bout my gramma

Blindfold your eyes to ain't

I might spell great as 'triffic

I'm no-ones poet saint

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Good Question Poet Critic

Maybe this ain't

Ain't poetry

Didn't write it for you

Just wrote it for me

Poet if you think

It ain't poetry

Then why did you post it

On website poetry?

Good question critic

Why post it on here?

It pulled my emotions

I ended in tears

Critic?......

Don Matthews July 2019

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Editor I Need Some Help Here

I’m wanting some help with my poetry

I need to unburden my brain

It's giving me mental thrombosis

Imagine the state of my pain

Have you had a mind-clot of neurons

Who want to stop whirring around ?

I rely on their whirring-aroundness

To tell me they're perfectly sound

I think I'm expecting too much of

My neurons I want to ...

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Poetry and Me

(In response to Vautaw)

Poetry to me's

About pulling emotions

Sad, happy, angry

Concocting life potions

Sometimes the potion's

Concocted with sad

Draws at the heartstrings

(We're not all iron-clad)

You (bit like me?)

Feel sadness quite deep?

Get tears in the eye?

Might fall in a heap?

Sometimes the potion's

Concocted wi...

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Once Upon a Time in the Land of Faraway Poetry Lived........

Once upon a time

In the Land of Faraway Poetry

Lived a group of poets called

The Traditional Poets Association (TPA for short)

However

A small group among them

Became frustrated

Because they couldn't flap

Their offbeat wings

So

They formed a breakaway group

And called themselve...

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OH&S Gone Mad

As children we were given fritz slices

Which had smiley faces built in

The supermarkets and butchers all gave them

(No reader, my poem's not fin)

A customer just happened to slip

On some fritz which was dropped on the floor

Though hitting her head she was not injured

You can guess the reaction of store

A ban was placed on giving smiley faces

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Anomoly of the Law

Criminal: I admit I killed him Your Honour

Judge: Because you have admitted your crime

I am reducing your sentence from

30 years to 20 years

Victims family: We don't understand ?....

Community: We don't understand ?....

And so a murderer is released into the community too early

Don Matthews September 2019

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