Poetry - just for the sake of it!

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SRD
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by SRD »

Well, some of the arguments are;
Because the lyrics are usually dictated by the tune rather than the metre.

Many of the forms of poetry can't be fitted to music.

Is the opposite also true that poems can be set to music but does that make them lyrics?

Can we really say that there is no difference between song and poetry?


It's a bit like the argument as to whether singer/songwriter music is folk music. To many the definitions are so blurred that it's impossible to differentiate them but to others it's obvious as to what is folk music and what is singer/songwriter.

One might be able to make the case that song lyrics are a subset of poetry but that immediately does away with the requirement of song to have a tune.

Personally, although I accept that it is possible to set poetry to music and that some lyrics stand on their own without the need for a tune, I consider the two to be separate art forms.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by Little John »

But you get nonsense poems and poems that the main purpose of is to present the sounds of the words and poems that are strictly rythmic.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

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`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
Yes this is the real "Little John" (or it could be "colin")
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by SRD »

Little John wrote:But you get nonsense poems and poems that the main purpose of is to present the sounds of the words and poems that are strictly rythmic.
And your point is?

Jabberwocky isn't strictly a nonsense poem, it has a point within the story of Alice Through the Looking Glass, which is itself not just a nonsense story. The poem also follows strict rules of metre. Wiki has much more on this and other, related, matters.
Children are like Slinkys - not much use for anything, but it always brings a smile to your face when you throw them down the stairs. Chinchilla
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by marymary »

James Macfarlan
"A man's a man for a' that" – how does he know?
Traipsing with his plough, the rural hero,
Swaggering down the lea-rigs, talking to mice,
Sweating his sickly verses to entice
Lassies he'd never see again, strutting
Through the salons in his best breeches, rutting
In a cloud of claret, buttonholing
Lord This, sweet-talking Doctor That, bowling
His wit down levees, bosoms, siller quaichs –
D'ye think he's ever heard the groans and skraighs
Of city gutters, or marked the shapes that wrap
Fog and smoke about them as if they could hap
Homelessness or keep hunger at bay? What,
Not heard or seen, but has he even thought
How some, and many, and more than many, survive,
Or don't survive, on factory floors, or thrive
Or fail to thrive by foundry fires, or try
To find the words – sparks scatter and bolts fly –
That's feeble – to show the new age its dark face?
The Carron Ironworks – how he laughed at the place,
Made a joke of our misery, passed on
To window-scratch his diamond-trivia, and swan
Through country-house and customs-post, servile
To the very gods from which he ought to resile!
"Liberty's a glorious feast," you said.
Is that right? Wouldn't the poor rather have bread?
Burns man, I'm hard on you, I'm sorry for it.
I think such poetry is dangerous, that's all.
Poetry must pierce the filthy wall
With cries that die on country ways. The glow
Of bonhomie will not let the future grow.

Edwin Morgan
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by marymary »

Television
The most important thing we've learned,
So far as children are concerned,
Is never, NEVER, NEVER let
Them near your television set --
Or better still, just don't install
The idiotic thing at all.
In almost every house we've been,
We've watched them gaping at the screen.
They loll and slop and lounge about,
And stare until their eyes pop out.
(Last week in someone's place we saw
A dozen eyeballs on the floor.)
They sit and stare and stare and sit
Until they're hypnotised by it,
Until they're absolutely drunk
With all that shocking ghastly junk.
Oh yes, we know it keeps them still,
They don't climb out the window sill,
They never fight or kick or punch,
They leave you free to cook the lunch
And wash the dishes in the sink --
But did you ever stop to think,
To wonder just exactly what
This does to your beloved tot?
IT ROTS THE SENSE IN THE HEAD!
IT KILLS IMAGINATION DEAD!
IT CLOGS AND CLUTTERS UP THE MIND!
IT MAKES A CHILD SO DULL AND BLIND
HE CAN NO LONGER UNDERSTAND
A FANTASY, A FAIRYLAND!
HIS BRAIN BECOMES AS SOFT AS CHEESE!
HIS POWERS OF THINKING RUST AND FREEZE!
HE CANNOT THINK -- HE ONLY SEES!
'All right!' you'll cry. 'All right!' you'll say,
'But if we take the set away,
What shall we do to entertain
Our darling children? Please explain!'
We'll answer this by asking you,
'What used the darling ones to do?
'How used they keep themselves contented
Before this monster was invented?'
Have you forgotten? Don't you know?
We'll say it very loud and slow:
THEY ... USED ... TO ... READ! They'd READ and READ,
AND READ and READ, and then proceed
To READ some more. Great Scott! Gadzooks!
One half their lives was reading books!
The nursery shelves held books galore!
Books cluttered up the nursery floor!
And in the bedroom, by the bed,
More books were waiting to be read!
Such wondrous, fine, fantastic tales
Of dragons, gypsies, queens, and whales
And treasure isles, and distant shores
Where smugglers rowed with muffled oars,
And pirates wearing purple pants,
And sailing ships and elephants,
And cannibals crouching 'round the pot,
Stirring away at something hot.
(It smells so good, what can it be?
Good gracious, it's Penelope.)
The younger ones had Beatrix Potter
With Mr. Tod, the dirty rotter,
And Squirrel Nutkin, Pigling Bland,
And Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle and-
Just How The Camel Got His Hump,
And How the Monkey Lost His Rump,
And Mr. Toad, and bless my soul,
There's Mr. Rate and Mr. Mole-
Oh, books, what books they used to know,
Those children living long ago!
So please, oh please, we beg, we pray,
Go throw your TV set away,
And in its place you can install
A lovely bookshelf on the wall.
Then fill the shelves with lots of books,
Ignoring all the dirty looks,
The screams and yells, the bites and kicks,
And children hitting you with sticks-
Fear not, because we promise you
That, in about a week or two
Of having nothing else to do,
They'll now begin to feel the need
Of having something to read.
And once they start -- oh boy, oh boy!
You watch the slowly growing joy
That fills their hearts. They'll grow so keen
They'll wonder what they'd ever seen
In that ridiculous machine,
That nauseating, foul, unclean,
Repulsive television screen!
And later, each and every kid
Will love you more for what you did.

Roald Dahl
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by Little John »

I thought I recognised it. Or at least the style. Took a while to read down to the end and read the authors name.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by marymary »

Love, sans curtains
There are sealed destinations within, that can't be spelled on a shared map,
It’s like a tomb underneath the soul that lives in spirit and exists in a warp;
some carry the stillness till goodbye world, quietness then beyond a sky’s secret,
while some meet gravediggers of the soul's soil, who open the hidden garret.

For bohemians and mavericks I met, along the whiskey teeth of harvest corn
For a while we bond like tight-tied sheaves, but dry away to the bankrupt morn’
The last grain of sugar got swept by an innocent broom, fraught ants’ helter-skelter
You are a world sans curtains; you allowed this guest a loyal rent in your shelter

Chosen key of mine, you opened a thief’s hidden pain, to brace my weedy wings
Blest friend of mine, thrill of a poem, hidden verses flow like newborn tidings,
Loved song of mine, voice of a sunday choir, my buried music was ne’er so heard;
Sweet companion for this earth’s time, feel mine till long heaven’s safest gird.

Rangam Chiru
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by Little John »

Daydreams for Ginsberg

Jack Keroauc (you've got to read it out loud and read it right for it to work)

I lie on my back at midnight
hearing the marvelous strange chime
of the clocks, and know it's mid-
night and in that instant the whole
world swims into sight for me
in the form of beautiful swarm-
ing m u t t a worlds-
everything is happening, shining
Buhudda-lands, bhuti
blazing in faith, I know I'm
forever right & all's I got to
do (as I hear the ordinary
extant voices of ladies talking
in some kitchen at midnight
oilcloth cups of cocoa
cardore to mump the
rinnegain in his
darlin drain-) i will write
it, all the talk of the world
everywhere in this morning, leav-
ing open parentheses sections
for my own accompanying inner
thoughts-with roars of me
all brain-all world
roaring-vibrating-I put
it down, swiftly, 1,000 words
(of pages) compressed into one second
of time-I'll be long
robed & long gold haired in
the famous Greek afternoon
of some Greek City
Fame Immortal & they'll
have to find me where they find
the t h n u p f t of my
shroud bags flying
flag yagging Lucien
Midnight back in their
mouths-Gore Vidal'll
be amazed, annoyed—
my words'll be writ in gold
& preserved in libraries like
Finnegans Wake & Visions of Neal
Yes this is the real "Little John" (or it could be "colin")
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by marymary »

Mmmm - a new one to me. Thanks.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by Little John »

Jack Kerouac and Alan Ginsberg were two of the 50s hip jazz poets. I've read a few of his books - Dharma Bum, on the road for instance. One of those was serialised on radio 4 a few years back and the bloke that read it out was brilliant. It helps if you play come John Coltrane while you read it.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

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The Smuggler's Song
If you wake at Midnight, and hear a horse's feet,
Don't go drawing back the blind, or looking in the street,
Them that asks no questions isn't told a lie.
Watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

Five and twenty ponies
Trotting through the dark -
Brandy for the Parson.
'Baccy for the Clerk;
Laces for a lady, letters for a spy,
And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

Running round the woodlump, if you chance to find
Little barrels, roped and tarred, all full of brandy-wine,
Don't you shout to come and look, nor use 'em for your play.
Put the brushwood back again - and they'll be gone next day!

Five and twenty ponies
Trotting through the dark -
Brandy for the Parson.
'Baccy for the Clerk;
Laces for a lady, letters for a spy,
And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

If you see the stable door setting open wide;
If you see a tired horse lying down inside;
If your mother mends a coat cut about and tore;
If the lining's wet and warm - don't you ask no more!

Five and twenty ponies
Trotting through the dark -
Brandy for the Parson.
'Baccy for the Clerk;
Laces for a lady, letters for a spy,
And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

If you meet King George's men, dressed in blue and red,
You be careful what you say, and mindful what is said.
If they call you "pretty maid", and chuck you 'neath the chin,
Don't you tell where no one is, nor yet where no one's been!

Five and twenty ponies
Trotting through the dark -
Brandy for the Parson.
'Baccy for the Clerk;
Laces for a lady, letters for a spy,
And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

If you do as you've been told, 'likely there's a chance,
You'll be given a dainty doll, all the way from France,
With a cap of pretty lace, and a velvet hood -
A present from the Gentlemen, along o' being good!

Five and twenty ponies
Trotting through the dark -
Brandy for the Parson.
'Baccy for the Clerk;
Laces for a lady, letters for a spy,
And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

Rudyard Kipling
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by Little John »

Odd name, Rudyard.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by Little John »

They featured the Beat poets tonight on Radio 4's "The Write Stuff".

I didn't know that Kerouac was pro Vietnam war. Some good cameo stuff at the end, though.
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Re: Poetry - just for the sake of it!

Post by marymary »

Cargoes

By John Masefield


QUINQUIREME of Nineveh from distant Ophir,
Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine,
With a cargo of ivory,
And apes and peacocks,
Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.

Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus,
Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores,
With a cargo of diamonds,
Emeralds, amethysts,
Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.

Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke-stack,
Butting through the Channel in the mad March days,
With a cargo of Tyne coal,
Road-rails, pig-lead,
Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays.
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