Poetry Blog by M.C. Newberry

Those in the throes

Of permanent prose

Do not, I find,

Linger long in the mind,

But often get stuck up my nose.

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I was still upset when I woke this morning;

How did Croatia win?

How did they snatch those touches

That saw their goals go in?

England had the chances

To put the game to bed,

And the memory of them dances

Forlornly in my head.

There's no advantage in "fast forward"

If mis-laying or mis-playing the ball;

Golden opportunities

Gone beyond recall.

Was...

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Woe betide if you dare to infringe

On the rights of others to grizzle and whinge;

Woe betide if you criticise

Lines designed to bring tears to the eyes;

Woe betide if you try to make

Out of them what's true or fake;

Woe betide if you seem unkind

When so many seem ready to say they mind;

Woe betide because sooner or later

You might upset a moderator!    

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I see politicians of blue,

Politicians of red,

Forget me and you -

By dogma they're led,

And I say to myself:

What a whiney fool world.

I hear moans of complaint,

Envy and spite,

Demanding...demanding...

 Anything seen as a "right",

And I say to myself:

What a whiney fool world.

I read and I hear

Of strangers on the shore,

Seeking new lives

Bu...

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Suddenly this morning

I was without care

When without warning

We passed on the stair.

Daylight was dawning

And my mind was elsewhere

Busily yawning

When I saw you there.

Now sadness I'm scorning

And I long to share

The heart that's adorning

This love-stricken stare.

So - every morning

I dash down the stair

Hoping the dawning

Will see you ...

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If you take to a London street

And strut with other marching feet

Besieging Parliament to insist

That its occupants keep a tryst 

With the demands from a foreign source

That keep control of this nation's course....

Waving banner and close clenched fist

Aren't you a Fifth Columnist? 

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Marking time should be a crime,

Only Man invents the ways

To remind ourselves of how it goes -

Each ticking off the days!

But when our spirits are in the dock

Of the Court of Vanished Time

We might regret we lived by the clock

And consider our obsession a crime

Which saw us slaves to a merciless master

As remorseless as the tide

That served to see unfulfilled lives go...

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Those on WOL for a while will know of my liking for combining verse/lyric and finding a song in the process.  The attached title is based on the predicament of an unlucky soul who realises by the way 

the loved one's gaze seems preoccupied, attention elsewhere as if "seeing" another, that the relationship is in trouble.  My thanks to Bob Evans for the recording.

MC 

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How to express the excitement, the way the morning feels,

Loading up the car with growing feelings of elation.

The allure of the distant open road waiting for your wheels,

All the exotic names on the map - each unknown destination.

The satisfying clunk of the driver's door, ready for the off;

The key in the ignition your passport to romantic places

The memory of those doubte...

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Have you had any thoughts about driverless cars -

And what progress proposes for our beloved jam-jars?

Tootling down the highway with your hands on the wheel

Is something to treasure...something to FEEL!

Look in the mirror - which would you want banished -

The aggressive boot bumper - or a driver that's VANISHED?

Personally, I'd prefer them both out of sight

So I can enjoy my ...

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How can you be

A real refugee

If you leapfrog a free Europe to get here?

This misuse of the word

Is an abuse of the word

When considering many instances met here.

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Praise the Lord that I'm not a copper

With this present lot parading in power,

And before you think that's improper,

I'm including the opposite shower.

Incessantly interfering

In a once great public service,

With stuff that have crims cheering

While the law-abiding get nervous.

Cut-backs on costs with severity

Because of political failing...

In the dubious n...

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Does assuming the moral high ground...

Projecting humanity and piety

Place that position as beyond profound -

And awkward "asks" from imperfect society?

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There are times when blogs on WOL resemble a procession

Of  those who might be better suited going to confession!

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Loris Karius - the young Liverpool ''keeper

Finished in Kiev a woebegone weeper,

Paying the price for some momentary mistakes

That probably see him suffering the shakes

With PTS flashbacks that won't set him free... 

Memories to haunt him and not let him be.

The abuse online from rude Scouser fans

Should sentence those morons to suffer life bans

But Liverpool supporters are...

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Some who've suffered grief and strife

May see Time as the thief of life,

Every minute of every hour

Proving Time's remorseless power.

But Time's account is the sum of our days

Offering credit in so many ways,

And we owe it to ourselves- and it

To make best use of every bit.

Let 'waste not - want not' be your creed

For Time - the healer and true friend in need.

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Can anyone explain what love is?

Is it merely tarted-up lust?

And valuing it "beyond and above" is

Just disguising when need becomes must.

What is this weird dependency

Of one human being on another,

With hope in eternal ascendancy

As some soul seeks a like-minded "other"?

How many lines of poetry get written

Explaining how love is or ain't?

And how easy it ...

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Seventy five years ago this day saw one of the great morale-boosting events of World War Two - the

famous "Dambusters" raid on the industrial heartland of Nazi Germany.  Some years ago, I was

present in a small upstairs room of a Torbay pub to listen to the talk given by George "Johnny" Johnson,

the bomb-aimer of the Lancaster flown by American pilot Pat MacCarthy to attack the Sorpe Dam.

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Excuse me barely suppressing a groan

At yet another report of a "Me..Me..Me" moan;

And feeling the pangs of compassion fatigue

From these carping "isms" - as if in some league

Of who scores most points from achieving a mention

To move on ahead in the fight for attention.

With each utterance I recall that political gem:

"A period of silence would be very welcome" from them.

...

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During the night I woke up with some poetry lines in mind,

Then fell asleep again and on waking later, what then did I find?

That I remembered having the words my mind was set upon,

But blow me down, it brassed me off to find that they'd all gone!

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The ego argues

Wisdom discusses.

The first has minuses

The second -  pluses.

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The breath of an early dawn in Spring

Is like a choir eager to sing

To remind us of all that life can bring

The renewal of hopes and dreams that cling

From the early times when life was young

And we found ourselves adrift among

Fellow beings like flotsam flung

On some strange shore to which we clung,

Each with an unspoken fate to face

Engaged in some unspoken r...

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The English don't need to be told what they know,

That they take England wherever they go.

New lands may rail at the old empirical state

That saw them led to a former fate,

But they often retain the ongoing existence

Of worthwhile examples of the old perisistence

Of self-belief, faith and the rule of law

That took England to many a distant shore.

Other venturing empires the...

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Those of us taking the trouble to see

Know that experts don't always agree.

In point of fact, they'll often call out

Other experts - then watch just how they fall out!

They'll be keen to be interviewed

On whatever they deal in

Always seeking a renewed

Chance to invest personal spiel in 

Their status as experts beloved by the media

Who produce them like dogs trained to be...

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Here's a view of the poetry "competition"

From which I won't be budged,

With some words for those who presume erudition:

Judge not lest ye be judged!

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A Recherche du Temps Perdu

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Let no one try to persuade you that children do not know sensuality.  It is a falsehood.  But fear not, dear

reader, I refer to sensuality not the sexuality lurking to loom large in later life (how's THAT for alliteration?).

I was perhaps eight years old when I discovered an impulse to indulge the senses.  Ne...

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It had to happen sooner or later

Expelled by a WOL moderator!

Political poetry is suddenly taboo,

Yet I recall stuff from you-know-who

And tut-tut-tut and what's her name 

And others who abuse and blame

Those they see worth their invective

Left to their right to be selective.

WOL "not a platform for political views"?

Well, upon my soul - that's NEWS!

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I saw a miniscule black life form ascending my bathroom sink

And I refrained from turning on the tap as its progress made me think.

I even helped it on its way with a piece of handy tissue 

To reach to top of its vertical climb since its survival was at issue.

Something about its determined deed seized my rapt attention

And persuaded me to intercede - but I'm sorry to have to mentio...

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The harpies and the harridans are still out there;

The henpecked husbands too.

I know these don't define me,

But I wonder - do they define you?

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One thing to note about the  past -

What's done is done, the die is cast,

And we are bound to move away,

Obliged to face each passing day. 

Nothing can be changed but then

the bad stuff shouldn't happen again.

If we insist on judging what went before

Let's do our own best to make sure

We learn from what the past can teach

With its "don't do" lessons within reach

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With a chuckle and a nod

God took Ken Dodd.

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Hurry, hurry, hurry,

Come get your share of worry;

Politically inspired...media fired,

To smother you like slurry!

Your every day must burn

With this or that concern,

To go to bed, near off your head

And there to toss and turn.

We're targeted by hysteria

That makes us feel inferior -

Hardened by a predictable return

To the need to feel superior.

But we're in the...

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When in solitude I steal time to think

And of your cherished memory drink,

I wish my lonely loving cup

Was with your own sweet self filled up.

But many a sup the lip has sought

Is always better given than bought,

So I think on with you in mind

And from your cherished image find

Some consolation for a heart

So cruelly made to play this part.

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Some words of advice to women and men

To ponder and practice now and again:

You women - the following is politely proposed -

There are times when it's wise to keep mouth and legs closed.

You men - bear in mind that it's right to resist

Any temptation to insist with your dick or your fist!

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Imagine there's someone using a gun

Or a sharp bladed weapon for ill,

When it comes to their use

Let's not be obtuse 

The aim is usually to kill.

A gun or a knife that threatens a life

Is the extension of minds in a role

That seeks to impose

Their will upon those

Whose fate they want to control.

If someone is armed and others alarmed

At the threat that they represe...

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O'Neill's with the angels now!

O kneel Harry - and show them how

You came to find your rightful place

In that unseen heavenly space,

And why your sprightly eighty nine

Was a prelude to a life divine.

The guardians of its gates may cheer

But we miss your presence a lot down here!

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Who do I blame for importing the "high five"...

Childish palm slapping - like kids on the skive!

What happened to the respect of the pat on the back

Or the nod and the shaking of hands?

Now it's high fives and hugs

Like punks high on their drugs

Or those posturing scruffbags in bands!

Folk who've achieved their mature years

Now clap hands like kids with far fewer years

E...

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WOL parades a "Poem of the Week" for our edification - and, occasionally, our education.

In the light of various responses to material that is posted, some of which are both enlightening and

educational, perhaps we should juggle the letters of "Poem" around to have a "Mope of the Week"

- with a nod towards the most entertaining variation appertaining to words of  comment and criticism

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War is some fine madness,

A tale of vanity's woe;

But from that great insanity

Can a greater sanity grow -

As successive waves of humanity

In their tides ebb to and fro? 

Is the cruel price of each sacrifice

The cost of what we must know?

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At the outset let me firmly state

I'm all for paying "the going rate"

For what is done - no matter by whom,

But sport itself is a selective broom.

The Olympic female on a winter day

Who throws herself on a tin tea tray

To hurtle down a tube of ice

At speeds that make the sane blink twice

Is worth far more than what comes in pay

To others in the sporting fray.

There ar...

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In lands where they originate

Religion is a tool of hate,

Aimed at the freedoms that we give here,

So why do they choose to come and live here?

Declaring that an infidel

Deserves to feel the fires of hell.

I have this question in my mind

But doubt a "faithful" answer I'll find;

Are Muslim cuckoos flying west

To oust our own bird from its nest?

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I tend to suspect the stuff we're told

About Health Care woes being down to the old;

Those who steadfastly paid their tax

While others get treated off their backs:

Alkys, druggies, and malingerers who

Install themelves in the NHS queue.

The old would rather be off their trolley,

Installed in beds bought by their lolly,

Before being placed in proper care

For those who've ...

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I wait with breathless anticipation for details of the "brief" to be followed by the introduction of a 

Minister for the Lonely.  Happily living alone, content in my own company, but ready to chat to all

so inclined to enjoy what was called "shooting the breeze", I'm not convinced that this new

post is either practical or desirable.  Our human condition is affected by numerous and various

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