Skip to main content

Poetry Friday -Poems To Blow You Away

Image result for windy

It has been exceedingly windy in my neck of the woods the last few days. Cold, icy blasts of wind have blown across the bay and bullied those of us dwelling on the shore. The leaves of autumn have been dancing in my garden.The trees bend and cower.

So, batten down the hatches and hang onto your hat, because all this windy weather prompts me to share a couple of wind driven poems. 

It also provides an opportunity to reintroduce a couple of poets, previously celebrated here- the wonderful of Spike Milligan and the equally amazing Max Fatchen return to blow you away with their words.  

WINDS LIGHT TO DISASTROUS
As I sipped morning tea
A gale (force three)
Blew away a slice of toast
Then a gale (force four)
Blew my wife out the door
I wonder which I'll miss the most
She was still alive
When a gale (force five)
Blew her screaming o'er Golders Green
When a gale six blew
And it took her to
A mosque in the Medanine
Now I pray to heaven
That a gale (force seven)
Will whisk her farther still,*
Let a gale (force eight)
Land her on the plate
Of a cannibal in Brazil
As I sit to dine
A gale (force nine)
Blew away my chips and Spam
But! a gale (force ten)
Blew them back again,
What a lucky man I am!

Spike Milligan
*Father Still, a stationery priest.

WINDY
The gale upon our holidays
Was not your passing breeze.
It gave our tents a fearful wrench
And bent the frantic trees.
So, if you've seen a flying tent,
And then observe another,
Please call us at your earliest,
We're also missing mother.

Max Fatchen

Image result for leaves in the wind





Comments

  1. Since we had, last month, what was termed the 'bomb-cyclone' blizzard, your poems make me wonder why I didn't write about it. I did post pictures, but went from window to window, quite fascinated. It did not damage anything of mine, but blew trees over elsewhere, plus a few roofs, what you might expect. "We're also missing mother" is a laugh considering her day is Sunday. Hope she's found! Thanks, Alan!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We always find ourselves prioritizing Linda. You still have those pictures to stimulate your thoughts moving forward. Hopefully they find mother in time for her special day. Happy Mother's Day!

      Delete
  2. Love the humorous poems you've shared, Alan. It seems we shared inspiration this week. For Michelle's Ditty Challenge, I shared a poem giving Instructions To Wind.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Glad you enjoyed my shared poems. That old blowhard, wind is a universal feature and we are grateful for the writing inspiration it delivers. Thanks Kimberly.

      Delete
  3. I enjoyed the poems you shared here today.
    It was windy earlier this morning until I hung a load of clothes on the line. Where did that breeze go?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You have poetic inspiration in your closing words Cheriee. Glad you liked my choices.

      Delete
  4. These are great. I think Spike Mulligan wrote one of my favorite children's poems. I'll have to go check. And I enjoyed the surprise ending of the second one.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Liz. Spike Milligan had a unique take on life. Hope you find that poem. Poet as investigator...I like that.

      Delete
  5. These are such fun poems. Thanks for sharing them. I'll keep them in mind -- and hang onto my hat -- the next windy day we have.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They are very much poems abounding in fun Kay. -And continue to hang onto your hat on those days of windy weather.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Poetry Inspired by Images and Objects

There are many ways pictures and photographs can be conscripted to support the writing of poetry. Allow me to share a few ideas with you: Old photographs are a great source of inspiration. Cynthia Rylant explored this idea with great success in her book 'Something Permanent' where she employed the Depression era photographs of Walker Evans to add a new voice to the starkness to the lives of people experienced under extreme circumstances. I have used this strategy to spark many individual poems. In ' I Bet There's No Broccoli On The Moon,' I used a photo I had taken in 2004 while living in New York to inspire a poem. The poem was based on a story related by a friend who grew up in New York.  I regularly combined poetry and pictures in my writer's notebook, drawing on inspiration from the photograph and my personal memories. We can also utilize existing cartoons and illustrations to create ekphrastic poems. I frequently use the illustrations of Jim Pavlidis to co

Opposite Poems

O pp o s ite P oem s In his book, ' How To Write Poetry,'  Paul Janeczko presents the idea of opposite poems. Paul suggests they could also be referred to as antonym poems. This is wordplay and it's fun to try. Here are some examples Paul provides to help us see very clearly how these short little poems work. I think the opposite of chair Is sitting down with nothing there What is the opposite of kind? A goat that butts you from behind Paul Janeczko You will  notice the poems are written in rhyming couplets. They can be extended so long as you remember to write in couplets. Paul shows us how this is done. What is the opposite of new? Stale gum that's hard to chew A hot-dog roll as hard as rock Or a soiled and smelly forgotten sock You might notice that some of Paul's opposite Poems begin with a question. The remainder of the poem answer the question posed. Opposite poems are a challenge, but it is a challenge worth trying. Not e

Powerful Poetry, 'Refugees' by Brian Bilston

  This week, Poetry Friday is hosted by Janice Scully  @ Salt City Verse where Janice shares some original words and offers us a taste of Thomas Carlyle to ponder. I encourage you to join a host of poets from all around the globe and visit Janice's page... Almost two years to the day, I wrote a post featuring the poem 'Refugees' by Brian Bilston. The poem was included in Brian's first book of poetry, 'You Took The Last Bus Home.' A very powerful Reverso poem and technically brilliant.  A Reverso poem can be read from top to bottom or bottom to top. It will often express opposite opinions depending on which way you read it. Such poems really make us think. A Reverso poem is like a picture turned upside down, a frowning face upended to reveal a smiling one. The poem read in reverse, contradicts itself with an opposing message. In 'Refugee' Brian Bilston focuses on a societal issue that tends to polarize feelings and the opposing views are clearly in eviden