Thu 31st Aug 2017 19:28
Hi Frances, thanks for your comment. I love it when you use the word clever, it makes me happy. As for the fear, just keep away from John Travolta. (the boogeyman)
Thanks again for your comments.
Comment is about Boogeyman (blog)
Original item by DESMOND CHILDS
Thu 31st Aug 2017 19:20
Hi Collin, thanks for you humorous comment. Have been laughing on and off all day. I too now have that vision of John Travolta dancing down alleyways pricking people with a bony finger,very funny. I did think of changing boogeyman to bogeyman but decided to leave it as boogeyman in tribute to your comments and the great John Travolta. Thanks
Comment is about Boogeyman (blog)
Original item by DESMOND CHILDS
This poem reflects my life growing up obeying my parents, my teachers, my elders, and most importantly my God. It showed me there are many people who can control what happens in our lives but never completely control us unless it is God himself.
Comment is about The Controller of Life (blog)
Original item by Joseph Calderon
Thanks for your comments Cynthia, I'm glad you liked the poem and my biog. I think the word you're looking for to describe the profile pic might be "drunk" :D
It looks like you're a regular at WoL Sale, so I hope I'll see you there in November when I'm one of the guests.
Comment is about Cynthia Buell Thomas (poet profile)
Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas
Much enjoyed, Tom. Your themes are so inclusive of everyone's similar experiences, and yet highlighted with such clarity, and sincerity, and imagination.
Two little things to spot check: perhaps 'leant' and 'its'. Probably typo's, but worth fixing; the work is so outstanding.
Comment is about In Another Room (blog)
Original item by Tom Harding
Thanks Cynthia!
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
Richard, do we have an 'orbit' here on WOL. Maybe we do - but it certainly isn't geographic, deliberately. For awhile it wasn't just the UK. Poets came from the US and Canada and Australia and India and Africa and Europe. And were well received too. Sometimes, English was their second/third/fourth language.
Then, again, maybe 'like' does take to 'like'. And the stalwarts are just that - stalwart. Responsive and regular in their written input, with both poetry and comments. Without a doubt, poetry 'friendships' have developed. And there seems to be an inexorable lean to the North of England writers, with their famous 'one foot in romance and the other in necessity' which pervades the whole society. I have come to greatly appreciate this duality - the essence of 'Northern-ness', a very sharing and brutally honest outlook on life.
Just a thought.
Comment is about Richard Hartley (poet profile)
Original item by Richard Hartley
Much enjoyed. Deep and challenging. The title is brilliant, in itself a superb metaphor.
Comment is about We Are Them (blog)
Original item by Adam Whitworth
Iesha, I'll try to catch up with more of your work.
I'm sorry a Welcome to WOL is so late. I'm pretty sure I've commented on some of your other poems, but maybe not.
I'm not on site daily. Sometimes only once a week. But I will make an effort.
'merely a moment' indeed. Excellent phrase.
Comment is about iesha washington (poet profile)
Original item by iesha washington
This is a wonderfully original concept, and moves forward with pace right to the succinct ending.
I think the lines could be shorter in some areas. IMO, never worry about the length of your work. If the poem is long, it's long; and readers will stay with you if you are writing well and interestingly. Which you are.
If you really don't want a long work, then hack half of it out. It takes real effort to reduce ideas, and guts to jettison them entirely. But we have to learn how to do it. All of us.
Or, just leave it long. Maybe next time it won't feel so awful, reducing a poem by one third to a half. Think strong, strong words to catch maximum intent in the fewest syllables. A thesaurus is a second brain; I kid you not.
Comment is about The New Boy (blog)
Original item by iesha washington
I don't know how I've missed you thus far. I'll really try to catch up. That's an impressive BIO.
Are you trying to look scary in the photo, or just sun-blinded? Or intense and intellectual? Or maybe deeply 'composing'? It's definitely a 'catchy' picture.
Comment is about Joe Williams (poet profile)
Original item by Joe Williams
Totally delightful in content and execution, with a free, easy style.
I might repost my Tesco one called'The Single Man'. It always raises a laugh whenever I read it in public.
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
List of poems
Sticking it Out
Sent the crowd into a dreamy haze of laughter
What a Sucker
They sensed the theme and shouted bring it on
Barefoot in the City
Shaking heads with slight tut tut tuts got them going more and more
Jumping Jack Flash
By this time a drunken crazy mob screamed at me - - - that was just my fellow poets!
Comment is about Oldknow Open Mic Event August 2017 (photo)
Original item by Stockport WoL
Thanks Rob, glad you liked it!
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
Great message and thank you for your kind comment on my recent poem. AMC
Comment is about DON'T QUIT (blog)
Original item by lynn hahn
Very interesting; I like 'awareness' and 'thoughtful'. The contrasts are strong, and the ending only too realistic.
Comment is about What we do... (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries
Frances Macaulay Forde
Thu 31st Aug 2017 14:46
I also find this clever - and admit to some 'fear in my heart'...?
Comment is about Boogeyman (blog)
Original item by DESMOND CHILDS
I think that every time we write a poem, we are actually 'committing' a prayer to the page, the ether, another mind - just an effort of sincere communication from one human person to another. And usually without rancour, if you couldn't exactly call it LOVE.
I was very young when I realized that most people approach prayer as 'bargaining', 'trade-off'. And I thought, even then, how ridiculous such a notion was, robbing the whole concept of magnificence. And what is life without MAGNIFICENCE? So, I think you must pray a lot.
Comment is about Congregation (blog)
Original item by Laura Taylor
Joe - a brilliant 'what if' element to this piece. Missed opportunities or misread signals maybe. Love it.
Rob
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
Oh this is wonderful Ray. Cynthia has it right - it sparkles. Love the idea and the execution.
Comment is about LATE SUMMER WIND (blog)
Original item by ray pool
Thank you Cynthia - great praise. Without saying too much, it most definitely involves love.
And thank you too David. Yes. I'm not an atheist, although I was raised as one, but I'm not religious in the 'this is what we do in church' kind of way either. I've only prayed once...
Comment is about Congregation (blog)
Original item by Laura Taylor
So I am one with both
solitude for my
creativity and the other
for my sanity.
?
Comment is about Two in One (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries
And thanks David too. Yes, I like a bit of refelctive nostalgia in poetry, and I find myself putting it into my own work quite a lot. Glad you liked it!
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
No I think that was Elvis McGonagall!
Thanks for the comments Colin, glad you liked it.
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
<Deleted User> (13762)
Thu 31st Aug 2017 07:54
was that a bit of wind escaping at the end of the audio Ray? Own up, have you've been on the cabbage soup again? Assuming then that this poem is indeed about flatulence then the line 'puffing deckchairs inside out' is a gem. Not sure about the 'mackerel spindrift' though. Sounds messy.
I'm sorry, I'm in a silly mood this morning. The poem is lovely and though I joked, I did like the deckchair and spindrift lines the best. All the best, Col.
Comment is about LATE SUMMER WIND (blog)
Original item by ray pool
<Deleted User> (13762)
Thu 31st Aug 2017 07:40
Boogeyman or Bogeyman? I had visions of a murderous John Travolta Saturday Night Fevering through the back alleys and dark places of your poem looking for disco dancing victims and meeting Michael Jackson screaming Thriller Thriller!! Maybe I'm thinking of Boogie Nights? God I miss disco.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ob9sDpmRuqc
Seriously though, I do like your spooky poems Desmond. Halloween is not so far away - save the best till then.
Colin.
Comment is about Boogeyman (blog)
Original item by DESMOND CHILDS
<Deleted User> (13762)
Thu 31st Aug 2017 07:28
simple and effective, I love the sausage scanning line and if there were girls like that at my local Co-Op I might be more tempted to shop there!
btw, you weren't the guy who worked down the chip shop who swore he was Elvis by any chance?
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
This poem is from my debut pamphlet, 'Killing the Piano', being published in September by Half Moon Books. You can get it from me at any of the gigs I've got coming up (see my profile for the list), or you'll soon be able to get it from my website www.joewilliams.co.uk.
Comment is about The Prettiest Girl in the Co-op (blog)
Original item by Joe Williams
The line about teaching a duck to do hopscotch made me laugh out loud, Lynn. Such a great image.
Comment is about GENDERS (blog)
Original item by lynn hahn
'Still as the night and deep as the sea' - a quote in English from a German poet whose name I forget. I sang this many times as an 'Art Song' during my vocal training so many years ago. This work evokes the same 'feeling' although it is not a 'love song'.
But, you know, maybe it is. 'Love' has many faces. I think this poem is magnificent. As, IMO, is your mind.
Comment is about Congregation (blog)
Original item by Laura Taylor
<Deleted User> (18118)
Wed 30th Aug 2017 20:24
I enjoyed reading this so much. I found it moving and honest.
Comment is about The New Boy (blog)
Original item by iesha washington
Probably not. Otherwise, you wouldn't be asking the question.
'heretical' is an interesting word to use. As is 'should' in 'should aspire to be...'
IMO, 'there are no banisters to hold' is really good, very evocative.
Comment is about WordPlay (blog)
Original item by MyDystopiA
Sparkling - with imagery beautifully rendered, and the imagination that birthed it all.
Comment is about LATE SUMMER WIND (blog)
Original item by ray pool
thank you for the welcome and especially for the comment, Colin.
Comment is about Does the oak of autumn (blog)
Original item by Chesley
Eseosa and MC, thank you for your comments. The latest confirmed death toll from Sierra Leone is over 1000 and expected to rise. Keith
Comment is about Black Lives Matter? (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries
this is really deep and controversial. not a write up for the weak minded. Thanks for your encouraging comments keith.- Eseosa
?
Comment is about Black Lives Matter? (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries
A delicacy of thought in a strong format makes this an easy and delightful poem to read and ponder and faces up to the age old question of adaptation and peace. Wonderful and fully deserving of the accolade. Examining it is like marvelling at the structure of a stately home.
Ray
Comment is about 'Cottage Garden' by Chris Armstrong is Write Out Loud Poem of the Week (article)
Original item by Greg Freeman
Eseosa,I love this poem as it shows an insight into another´s soul and their disguised vulnerability. Thank you. Keith
Comment is about Voices in my head(pt 1) (blog)
Original item by Eseosa
Lynn,
thank you for your kind comments. It's comforting to know that someone else can relate. I love the stories you tell within your work as well. ??
Comment is about lynn hahn (poet profile)
Original item by lynn hahn
HI David, thanks mate for taking the trouble. I think this little rant is a live poetry thing to go with a certain type of character - dead from the neck up. It all spilled out. Honestly I thought I wouldn't put much effort in this time, as I sometimes feel as though poetry writing is just squeezing on an empty toothpaste tube. (!)
Raymondo.
Comment is about NO FRILLS (blog)
Original item by ray pool
Hello, I have enjoyed the poem posted as a Sample. I look forward to reading more. Kind Regards. Keith
Comment is about Nourhanne Khairy (poet profile)
Original item by Nourhanne Khairy
Hello Adam, This poem probes the human psyche in terms of our place in the created order and challenges us to think more of our nature as participants in a great endeavour. Thank you again for this. Keith
Comment is about We Are Them (blog)
Original item by Adam Whitworth
Terry, thank you for this. You have a good point. Keith
Comment is about Not Included (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries
Love the sentiment Keith, it's very familiar ?
Comment is about Two in One (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries
Hi Ray, thanks for your feedback on On Leave, encouragement always appreciated. The first line, possibly the last line, belongs to Ernie Pyle, WWII correspondent who, as you may know, was very popular for his companionable, unhyped stories from the front, for the folks back home, who are involved too, of course.
Dom.
Comment is about ray pool (poet profile)
Original item by ray pool
I really like your work. So easy to digest but so full of flavor.
Comment is about Lyrical Lexa (poet profile)
Original item by Lyrical Lexa
keith jeffries
Thu 31st Aug 2017 19:31
Cynthia, I am most grateful for you kind comment. Keith
Comment is about What we do... (blog)
Original item by keith jeffries