A poem of poignant power. "Ramrod white stones" - so
evocative and right! The rest marches on to pull us along
through a journey that tells of so many lost young lives and
half-forgotten conflicts. US Union Army General Sherman said
"War is all hell" - and these lines remind of that reality in the most
personal way.

Comment is about The Allied Forces War Cemetery - Italy - 25th April 2021 (blog)

Original item by Jennifer Malden

On behalf of the crows, I wish to protest against this blatant "birdism". ?

Comment is about The Buffet Is Now Open (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

Hi Keith. My website is still under construction. In the meantime, a quick Google search should do the trick.

Also, if you're interested, below is the link to my debut chapbook

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58065112-how-to-wake-a-butterfly
?

Comment is about Loic Ekinga (poet profile)

Original item by Loic Ekinga

Entertainment indeed, Leon. And better still, free.
Thanks for the Like, Holden.

Comment is about TUFFEES (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

Ah yes, George Galloway. A former Labour MP, as was another rabble rouser, Oswald Mosley, who acquired a certain following. Mosley got his comeuppance at Cable Street. A great pity Galloway didn't suffer a similar fate at Batley & Spen. He certainly deserved to.

Comment is about The poisoned garden (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Sunday school hymn 'Tangles' was sung as 'Spangles'. What a hoot (we had to make our own entertainment in those days!)

Comment is about TUFFEES (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

Thanks for the likes, Aviva, Holden and Jordyn.

Comment is about Speckled Foxgloves (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

I think they already have Leon, greedy rascals. ?

Comment is about The Buffet Is Now Open (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

You're spoiling those birds Julie. They'll forget how to forage.

Comment is about The Buffet Is Now Open (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

John, Keith, Greg. I very rarely make comments or entry these days. I am one of the jangled wrecks you refer to. I have since Gulf Ops had a straight 8 hour kip since 1991 about five times. I average about 2 - 4 hours kip a night unless tanked up with the only medicinal still capable of providing respite, alas, it does not do well to medicate on a single malt, particularly when Social Services are using your own children as a gagging tool.

The poppy! One could almost ask, what is it, what does it now symbolise. It is a flower where controversy in colour alone as one time serious and respected news casters follow the lines of hate and jealousy, and opt to push for a colour change.

Poppies are red, and are still upon fields of Northern Europe and beyond. I do fear it is wilting now, for all reason of its reference has nowt but politic to hide the Sun.

As a former soldier, with years of PTSD on board, it does not get any better. You may learn coping skills but if anything, some events become the more frightening. I will give an example.

I was held up at gun point during The Balkan War. There was a guy with us who was serbian who latched on. HVO wollers tailed us and confronted us. We were at the bottom of some steps in a built up area, and they sealed off any escape exit. An asian man, perhaps mercenary, had his hand on his pistol, which was tucked down the back of his pants. He was stood interogating the serbian who was crying stating they were going to kill him. so he is stood with his hand on his gat ready to just................... one of us, who were working for UNPROFOR, began to try to escape. He kept trying to make it up the stairs but the armed militia kept pushing him down. As an ex soldier, you know that if you're going to go in you go in hard full vocal until you breathe no more. But this woller, he was silent as he kept trying to push past the armed militia.................he just said nothing in a half hearted attempt and he was an ex soldier.

we eventually were set free, the man ran away as fast as he could.

over the years, you replay a whole myriad of events that, even if no direct threat, became all the more powerful for indirect psychological trauma.

recently I have visited that incident. I myself scared, unsure whether it was the neg seventeen celsius or fear thart had my teeth chattering. I stood my ground but know, temperature has nothing to do with it, even if the interogation went on for over 30 minutes.

As i visit that place, I have been crying for the state the man was in, who silently tried to push past the armed militia. To begin to understand what must have been really happening inside his heart and psyche, is to visit a place no man, no man, or woman should ever have to be.

We are all wrecks. We are trained, we learn to bare it, we all, want 'away' at the end of the day. As you understand the mass of male cull on regular schedule, you begin to weep for what is thought of human males. And there, you know just what a disgust and disgrace, our rulers and class act actually are, our engineers of hate.

We look to food banks for food, we see former acquaintances and know the wars in the middle east are ilegal. You weep for muslim as a brother, so too irish or african, russian too. You look at the history of Arnheim, Flounders and even Culloden...............and there is an emptiness that a chalice has no bottom for the liquid to settle.

It doesn't compute, and you begin............to wretch for all that was thought of you. Thoughts that, to this day, they uphold as they use your own family to gag you from telling the truth.

There is a poppy, I could hold it in my hand, I could hold a rose, a daffodil, a thistle.......................you could even think of Spikes The New Rose and still, all of it, has become lost unless, marketable by fake.

A great poem I will dwell over for some years and place in a collage of understanding that persists only solemn tears.

..............'They Just Don't Understand.'

Comment is about The bloody poppy (blog)

Original item by John E Marks

Right ?✌? thank uh for the comment

Comment is about Lost fugitive (blog)

Original item by Nazia Khan

Welcome to WOL. I would welcome to read some of your poetry.
Keith

Comment is about Loic Ekinga (poet profile)

Original item by Loic Ekinga

There are different perceptions at play with a penalty. To the penalty taker the goals seem impossibly small; to the goalkeeper they seem as big as an aircraft hanger.
The advice about hitting the top corners holds true,MC, provided you do. It is very easy to undercut it trying to give it elevation, sending it arcing over the bar. On the other hand you can't "overcut" one to a bottom corner.

Comment is about The striker's fear of the penalty (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Loved the title as well as the poem. Can't understand why this got so little attention!
Jennifer

Comment is about By Which we are Known (blog)

Original item by keith jeffries

Really beautifully expressed, and mysterious. Think you mean that sometimes you have a perception of your own, hear or see something or someone, or are you thinking more about religious faith? Beuatiful and thought provoking anyway.
Jennifer

Comment is about Utterances of Wisdom (blog)

Original item by keith jeffries

Thank you Stephen, Thank you Aisha,
for your liking, making me happy.

Comment is about The Flower One Day (blog)

Original item by Michael Kwack

Quite right, Nigel, The heart will bloom after it falls.
Thanks for making me happy again.

Comment is about The Flower One Day (blog)

Original item by Michael Kwack

My thanks to those who have taken the trouble to "like" this
contribution.

Comment is about GROWING OLD ALONE (blog)

Original item by M.C. Newberry

Successful penalties are the result of diligent practice - as an old
Manchester player (famous for his ability to score them) constantly proclaimed. His advice to place them in the top corner
of the net cannot be faulted. No keeper, however agile or with prescience of the intention, can hope to reach that chosen spot.
On a corresponding note, I'm curious why players today so often
use the side of the boot when players of other days would use the instep/front of the boot...surely with more accuracy and power.

Comment is about The striker's fear of the penalty (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Thank you Keith for your comments on "Yard Work".
Nowadays, people shun physical work as if it's bad.
All they want to do is zoom calls. ha.
Physical work is equal to mental work.
It is a partner in our overall well-being.

Comment is about keith jeffries (poet profile)

Original item by keith jeffries

A lovely interview. Inspiring and instructional. Thank you.

Comment is about ‘I was too ill to write as normal, but the poems kept flowing’: Alwyn Marriage on her long battle with Covid, and the loss of a loved one (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

This poem can also be found on my page on the wonderful Football Poets website http://footballpoets.org/poets/greg-freeman/

Comment is about The striker's fear of the penalty (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Thanks Holden, Nigel and Matt for your likes here. I am really touched here (:

Comment is about No one there (blog)

Original item by Andy N

Thanks Jordyn and Holden for the likes here. Means the world (:

Comment is about Waiting (blog)

Original item by Andy N

Thanks Nigel. Being ages since I had a attempt at writing little Natureish poems. Enjoying this little series m8. More to follow.

Comment is about Waiting (blog)

Original item by Andy N

Thank you, Keith. I appreciate you stopping by and sharing your thoughts on this. ?

Comment is about In Memoriam (blog)

Original item by Emer Ní Chorra

footsteps of ghosts
imaginary witches spells
I hope don't
catch the bus
one of your best Andy.

Comment is about Waiting (blog)

Original item by Andy N

Thanks Andy I have a strawberry bed in the garden and get a good supply this time of year.

Comment is about Turning Red (blog)

Original item by Nigel Astell

The heart will fall
but like the flower
will grow to bloom
before you even know.

Comment is about The Flower One Day (blog)

Original item by Michael Kwack

Emer,

This poem has that special quality to take the reader where he or she wants to be, to mourn and remember. Written with mindful skill.

Thank you for this

Keith

Comment is about In Memoriam (blog)

Original item by Emer Ní Chorra

John,
Thank you indeed for this poem. The land owned by aristocrats was at one time the land of monasteries and convents who fed the hungry, provided hospitality, employed local people and educated the young. More recently the bodies of our war dead lie in foreign fields or watery graves. The survivors of horror are now jangled wrecks incapable of work or re entering society. Poppies still grow where the heroes lie below. Men and women who never knew privilege, only duty without any real gratitude.

Thank you for this

Keith

Comment is about The bloody poppy (blog)

Original item by John E Marks

Aisha,
Thank you for reading and appreciating some of my poems. I find such interest in my work to be very encouraging.
Thank you

Keith

Comment is about Aisha Suleman (poet profile)

Original item by Aisha Suleman

I would beg to differ on the poppies, John. I've never seen so many as this year, while on holiday in the north-east. Fields of them, and many especially planted on grass verges by councils and the like. But I appreciate that's not really the point of this poem. And certainly great swathes of the north-east are owned by the Duke of Northumberland and his kind. England is in a right old state.

Comment is about The bloody poppy (blog)

Original item by John E Marks

Thank you for your kind words Jordyn.

Comment is about Geraniums (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

This was just lovely to read! Great write.

-J

Comment is about Geraniums (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

Thanks for the likes Aisha, Holden, Stephen G, Keith and Jennifer. Thank you also for the kind comments.

Comment is about Geraniums (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

I recollect some years after the setting for this piece, at the 1974 World Cup, MC, the Dutch players appeared as fuzzy orange blobs on our colour telly. The silky skills of Johann Cruyff were lost beneath an orange blur.

Comment is about WORLD OF SPORT (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

New Shoes - thanks for the kind comment and for posing the question. A storm can certainly create unrest by its effects, but can unrest create a storm? Maybe if we all try hard enough. A pending storm can create space, and quiet, which gives an unusual pause for reflection.

I am overwhelmed by the number of you who liked this poem. Thanks to Nigel, Tom, Nikhita, Jordyn, Michael, Aisha, Holden, Erika and Pete.

Comment is about Storm (blog)

Original item by Stephen Gospage

Yes, Peter West. You wouldn't have caught him doing the wrestling. Not with my grandmother about....

Comment is about WORLD OF SPORT (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

Today saw an email arrive about a £2000 pledge from two names from the acting profession. Getting there!!

Comment is about Campaigners reach £134,000 target for sculpture to mark WB Yeats in England with day to spare (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

JC - the TV days in question that I recall were "glorious black and white". Experimental colour television didn't come along until
the late 1960s and only on BBC 2 (with David Attenborough as
its controller. I distinctly remember the excitement at the
programming of the film "Singing in the Rain" (we stared
transfixed!) and that popular Western series "High Chaparral".
For a long time we had watched American imports with those
teasing end credits that told us they were actually in colour.
Hey - I've just remembered that
smoothie from cricket - step up Peter West.

Comment is about WORLD OF SPORT (blog)

Original item by John Coopey

Lovely, as usual, Ray! Loved 'till I shooked'. Just one question, how did you know it was a fox?

Jennifer

Comment is about THESE BOOTS WERE MADE FOR STEALING (blog)

Original item by ray pool

Magic in so few words!!!
Jennifer

Comment is about TRAPPED (blog)

Original item by ray pool

Absolutely! Jennifer

Comment is about From the dust (blog)

Original item by Cody Roach

Liked this one! Short and concentrated! I have had to give up geraniums because of that b.................y butterfly that gets at them. jennifer

Comment is about Geraniums (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

Never a dull moment!! Liked 'the elemental rage of a crackling pyre.' Jennifer

Comment is about Kindling (blog)

Original item by simon lucan

a fabulous description.

Keith

Comment is about Geraniums (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan

This poem would resound well in any monastic community. St Benedict directed that all monks should engage in manual as well as intellectual labour. By "yard work", washing dishes, ironing or cleaning the house, our minds are refreshed and open to inspiration. Yard work is time which is never wasted.

An excellent poem
Thank you for this
Keith

Comment is about Yard Work (blog)

Original item by d.knape

?

Comment is about CaMpbEll/bAker (blog)

Original item by Edbreathe

Thanks for the likes Nigel, Aisha, Holden, Keith and Stephen G. Also for the kind comments. Let us hope they receive good news about the pay increase soon.

Comment is about Congratulations NHS (blog)

Original item by julie callaghan