Starship Asterisk*

As Spike's work has been so well received, I looked on YouTube to see if the Great Man had recorded any of his poems.
It seems that he hasn't, but here is a musical interlude for this poetic thread.
Spike Milligan is the one in a horned helmet... I think that this adds some high tone to the thread - I do hope that you agree?
Margarita

This musical poetry post is utterly exquisite - and totally different from dear Spike Milligan!

I was undecided whether to post this on the - not very active - music thread, or here.

The line between whether something is poetry or song is not one that I personally make - some of the best poetry is put to music and always has been. So I decided to post it here.

The words are from Hamlet - the songs Ophelia sings as she is going mad. This version doesn't attempt to convey the madness, just the beautiful songs. The music is a modern composition - by the singer's music teacher, I think.

I hope others enjoy this as much as I have done, and continue to do.

Margarita

Beautiful, Margarita. I like the "old style" of the newly-composed music, and the singer sang beautifully. Of course Shakespeare's words are always wonderful.

I just posted a Gabriela Mistral puzzle, so I thought I'd post a Gabriela Mistral poem.

Pine Forest

Let us go now into the forest.
Trees will pass by your face,
and I will stop and offer you to them,
but they cannot bend down.
The night watches over its creatures,
except for the pine trees that never change:
the old wounded springs that spring
blessed gum, eternal afternoons.
If they could, the trees would lift you
and carry you from valley to valley,
and you would pass from arm to arm,
a child running
from father to father.

Isn't it remarkable that this woman, who earned professorships abroad and spent much of her life traveling and teaching, was an almost complete autodidact? Her own formal education ended when she was twelve. At that age she had to start supporting her mother, who had been abandoned by her husband, Gabriela's father. Gabriela's first job (at twelve) was being an assistant teacher!

Ann

That is lovely, Ann. I can see why she won a Nobel prize.
Margarita

FYI...

A friend, John Fraser, has over the last dozen years or so created a massive web site of his writings. (He's a retired professor of English.) One part of the site is called Voices in the Cave of Being, Poetry and Form. And one part of that is A New Book of Verse, or ANB for short. ANB is a web-based anthology of poetry, unusual only for its breadth and depth of material.

There are about 630 poems reproduced within the site, and more linked to from external sites. As well, John has provided his own translations to various poems originally published in French or German.

It's a site you could well get lost in for weeks, or use as a resource for years to come. I hope you enjoy it.

Rob

(If it need be said, I receive no remuneration for this mention of his site. The site is entirely non-commercial in nature and contains no ads of any sort.)

It would be really nice if you'd post some of your favourites from your friend's amazing website, Rob.
Margarita

ROBERT BLY

Seeing the Eclipse in Maine


It started about noon.  On top of Mount Batte,   
We were all exclaiming.  Someone had a cardboard   
And a pin, and we all cried out when the sun   
Appeared in tiny form on the notebook cover.   

It was hard to believe.  The high school teacher   
We’d met called it a pinhole camera,   
People in the Renaissance loved to do that.   
And when the moon had passed partly through   

We saw on a rock underneath a fir tree,   
Dozens of crescents—made the same way—   
Thousands!  Even our straw hats produced   
A few as we moved them over the bare granite.   

We shared chocolate, and one man from Maine   
Told a joke.  Suns were everywhere—at our feet.

See the Apod for 9th May, 2013

MargaritaMc wrote:It would be really nice if you'd post some of your favourites from your friend's amazing website, Rob.

I realize I didn't say it, and one may not realize it... John is not a poet. He writes about poetry, so the poems are others'. Here is one of my favourites which he mentions. He says it's a villanelle.

Rob

******************

The Story We Know

The way to begin is always the same: Hello,
Hello. Your hand, your name. So glad. Just fine,
and Good-bye at the end. That’s every story we know,

and why pretend? But lunch tomorrow? No?
Yes? An omelette, salad, chilled white wine?
The way to begin is simple, sane, Hello,

and then it’s Sunday, coffee, the Times, a slow
day by the fire, dinner at eight or nine
and Good-bye. In the end, this is a story we know

so well we don’t turn the page, or look below
the picture, or follow the words to the next line:
The way to begin is always the same Hello.

But one night, through the latticed window, snow
begins to whiten the air, and the tall white pine.
Good-bye is the end of every story we know

that night, and when we close the curtains, oh,
we hold each other against that cold white sign
of the way we all begin and end. Hello,
Good-bye is the only story. We know, we know.

- Martha Collins

That is a beautiful poem, Rob. ( By the way, I had realised that your friend John Fraser is an anthologist - and a very good one.)

I had not heard the term villanelle before and it was interesting to read about it on the link you gave.

Wikipedia says that Dylan Thomas's "Do not go gentle into that good night" is perhaps the most renowned villanelle of all. As I had been thinking of posting this poem, I will do so now.


Dylan Thomas
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Margarita

Another from me, expressing how I feel just now!

Piet Hein
A bit beyond perception's reach
I sometimes think I see
That life is two locked boxes, each
Containing the other's key.

Yes. Sigh.

I'll share that sigh with you, if it'll help.

Piet Hein! Now that brings back memories. Being a math nerd when I was young I first became aware of him during the buzz about the Super Ellipse, back in the mid-60s, I guess. Only after that did I find out about his poetry. And I found out much later that he only made famous use of the shape, he wasn't its inventor.

Here's another of his poems, one that may save the day - or just cause another sigh.

A Psychological Tip

Whenever you're called on to make up your mind,
and you're hampered by not having any,
the best way to solve the dilemma, you'll find,
is simply by spinning a penny.
No -- not so that chance shall decide the affair
while you're passively standing there moping;
but the moment the penny is up in the air,
you suddenly know what you're hoping.

- Piet Hein

Rob

Oh dear, Rob- I had never heard of Super Ellipses... being, as I am, the polar opposite of a Maths Nerd....

Which is why the two locked boxes resonates so much.... OH - how I WISH that I was a Maths Nerd...

I start to think that I understand something astronomical and/or mathematical and then
This was the occasion of the most recent meltdown

Margarita the Amathematician (like an anti-particle...)

A pome as a P S
By Anon.
A flea and a fly in a flue
Were imprisoned, so what could they do?
Said the flea, let us fly,
Let us flee said the fly
So they flew through a flaw in the flue.

Having just become all nostalgic for the sea and sailing, following setting 'Spica's Spanker' as a puzzle, I feel very much in need of a dose of:

Sea-Fever

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

John Masefield (1878-1967)

Another Masefield sea poem. Partly brought on by my discovering that there are aromatics
in space

Cargoes

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, amythysts,
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.

~ John Masefield

Happy Birthday MargaritaMc!

art awakens the senses
composing reflections from life's reasoned fences
encoded skill and mind is the foundry
beyond the grip of night's emotional boundary

Oh, is it your birthday???
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARGA- RITA!!!!

MargaritaMc wrote:

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

This musical poetry post is utterly exquisite - and totally different from dear Spike Milligan!

I was undecided whether to post this on the - not very active - music thread, or here.

The line between whether something is poetry or song is not one that I personally make - some of the best poetry is put to music and always has been. So I decided to post it here.

The words are from Hamlet - the songs Ophelia sings as she is going mad. This version doesn't attempt to convey the madness, just the beautiful songs. The music is a modern composition - by the singer's music teacher, I think.

I hope others enjoy this as much as I have done, and continue to do.

Margarita

Another memorable Ophelia Song

emc wrote:Happy Birthday MargaritaMc!

art awakens the senses
composing reflections from life's reasoned fences
encoded skill and mind is the foundry
beyond the grip of night's emotional boundary

Thank you, emc and Ann, for the birthday wishes. Yep - 65 today. I'll soon be grown-up!

Re The Other Ophelia Song...

Margarita
Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that people who have the most live the longest!

MargaritaMc wrote:Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that people who have the most live the longest!

In that case, I'm one step ahead of you But i don't know for how long though, as you can go a lot faster with them Whizzy wheels than i can with my very flat feet.
Question... does Margarita go good with cake IF so... feel free to splurge on yourself. IF not... try something different than cake.

MargaritaMc wrote:Yep - 65 today. I'll soon be grown-up!

You're a mere sprout! I've been 65 for over 7 months now and I'm just getting used to it. They tell me I'm now a golden ager. It must be all that gold that makes my joints stiff.

Anyway, Happy Birthday!

Rob

Happy Birthday MargaritaMc!



didn't know yesterday was your birthday; what a coincidence!


"It's Marguerita time, after nine, summertime, any time"



. . as they say!

Again - many thanks for the greetings! And the Margaritas - which I have never tasted. I'm not even sure what is in them
But I DO enjoy Margarita pizze ... But not too often. We old ladies can put weight on, even if we do whizz around

Funny you should start this. My wife and I discovered a hummingbird nest in our back yard a few weeks ago. We've had great time watching the egg's hatch and the babies grow. Yesterday the first left the nest in the morning and, when I got home from work, I grabbed the camera to take some final parting shots. I caught Mom feeding the last one but lamented as it flew off. It got me thinking about that process - now you all get to endure my thoughts.


Homes Are for Leaving

Why do we move from our familiar homes
When just we start to be settled in
It starts to feel crowded
And then it begins

We want go too
As it starts in our Mothers
She wants it too
We’ve become quite a bother

Then comes the crib
It seems such a great place
Full of our toys
But soon it’s all gate

Next it’s the floor
Such a dimension to scamper
We leave it as fast
As we see there’s a hamper

The first time we head
Away from the home
It’s off to a place
To fill up the noodle

Then away form the parents
The teen-agers depart
Their peers are more interesting
And that it does smart

As life ages us we feel
The need to coalesce
With those who do fill us
With similar successes

Make me wonder if mankind
Will have a very similar whim
Head off from Earth
To the stars we go then

Only a few typos.
"We want to go too" to start

"Makes" me wonder in mankind... to end