The phatic is common to both song lyrics and poetry; music aids the lyric, condemning it to be not quite poetry forever, while poetry is its own music, condemning it to be naked without music forever.
The two are never reconciled—the standard of poetry is never–-never—reached by song lyrics, which breaks the poet’s heart, a heart which travels into music’s realm, shunning its help. Madness and torture! Why do the two exist–-never to meet! Poetry and music! Divided heart! Divided mind! Poor, divided mankind!
As a healing device, we list the top 100 Song Lyrics As Poetry of All Time, with the single criterion: when we hear the song, do the lyrics intoxicate us as much as the music?
Note we do not ask the song to be judged as poetry—as words on the page. And yet—and yet—words are being judged.
The list below is not based on reading the lyrics alone on the page as if it were a poem, for this is to take the creature out of the water: we judge the lyrics with its music as poetry.
If an especially beautiful music accompanies the words of a particular song, making the words even more beautiful, we have to assume the words are responsible; the songwriter will sometimes experience this phenomenon: words inspire the music, as if the words and music were born together. It is as if the music were an aura around the words—words which nonetheless are not strong enough to be poetry, since they need the music. We celebrate this paradox—in our list—of poems which are not poems.
If one were to boil down the two essential criteria they would be: 1. originality and interest and 2. strongly realized feeling or idea, but we’ll briefly comment on why for each song.
1 Perfect Day (Lou Reed) performed by Lou Reed —Why: The haunting ambiguity: drug fix or romance? “I thought I was someone else, someone good”
2. Day In the Life (Lennon/McCartney) performed by The Beatles –“Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall”
3. The Good Life (Distel/Broussolle/Reardon) performed by Nancy Wilson –A love song with a tantalizingly puzzling message
4. Coming Back To Me (Marty Balin) performed by Jefferson Airplane –“Through a window where no curtain hung I saw you…coming back to me…”
5. Like A Rolling Stone (Bob Dylan) performed by Bob Dylan –“You shouldn’t let other people get your kicks for you”
6. America (Paul Simon) performed by Simon & Garfunkle –“Toss me a cigarette I think there’s one in my raincoat…”
7. Over the Rainbow (Arlen/Harburg) performed by Judy Garland –“That’s where you’ll find me”
8. Is That All There Is? (Lieber/Stoller) performed by Peggy Lee –A life-flashing-before-your-eyes song
9. Ruby Tuesday (Jagger/Richards) performed by Rolling Stones –“She comes and goes, no one knows…”
10. Both Sides Now (Joni Mitchell) performed by Judy Collins –“I don’t know clouds at all…”
11. I Want You (Bob Dylan) performed by Bob Dylan –“The cracked bells and washed out horns blow into my face with scorn…”
12. Forbidden Fruit (Oscar Brown Jr) performed by Nina Simone –“Eve and Adam had a garden, everything was great…”
13. American Pie (Don McLean) performed by Don McLean –A perhaps overly sentimental tribute to Buddy Holly…”the day the music died…”
14. Lather (Grace Slick) performed by Jefferson Airplane –A haunting lyric about growing up…”Lather was thirty years old today…”
15. She Loves You (Lennon/McCartney) performed by The Beatles –“She” instead of “I” makes it a song about three people instead of two…
16. Me and Bobby McGee (Kris Kristofferson) performed by Janis Joplin Best going-down-the-road song ever.
17. If You Go Away (Jacque Brel) performed by Shirley Bassey –One of those crushingly crushed-up love songs
18. Horse With No Name (Dewey Bunnell) performed by America –“The heat was hot…” You can walk into this song…
19. Yellow Submarine (Lennon/McCartney) performed by The Beatles –Intimates the ‘we’re-all-together’ spirit so nicely…
20. Jennifer Juniper (Donovan Leitch) performed by Donovan –“I am thinking of what it would be like if she loved me…”
21. Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite (Lennon/McCartney) performed by The Beatles –Phantasmagoria at its best. “And of course, Henry the horse…”
22. Maggie Mae (Stewart/Quittinton) performed by Rod Stewart –“I suppose I could collect my books and get on back to school”
23. Play With Fire (Phelge) performed by The Rolling Stones –“Well you’ve got your diamonds and you’ve got your pretty clothes…”
24. Mrs. Brown You Have A Lovely Daughter (T. Peacock) –The boy complains to the mother…different.
25. You’re Lost Little Girl (The Doors) performed by The Doors –The “little girl” is really the one in control; one can hear William Blake in it…
26. Sunny Afternoon (Ray Davies) performed by The Kinks –“telling tales of drunkenness and cruelty…”
27. Yesterday (Lennon/McCartney) performed by The Beatles –A simple, but perfect lyric: “yesterday came suddenly…”
28. Fakin’ It (Paul Simon) performed by Simon and Garfunkle –a masterpiece of introspective nostalgia
29. Maxwell’s Silver Hammer (Lennon/McCartney) performed by The Beatles –“Rose and Valerie screaming from the gallery…”
30. Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues (Bob Dylan) performed by Bob Dylan “When you’re lost in the rain in Juarez and it’s Eastertime too, and your gravity fails…”
31. Fire and Rain (James Taylor) performed by James Taylor — a wreck of a song, in the best possible way… “I always thought I’d see you one more time again…”
32. Irreplaceable (Beyonce, Ne-Yo, Eriksen, Hermansen, Lind, Bjorklund) performed by Beyonce “You must not know ’bout me…”
33. Mona Lisa (Evans/Livingston) Nat King Cole –“They just lie there and they die there…Are you real, Mona Lisa?”
34. Cry Baby Cry (Lennon/McCartney) The Beatles –“The duchess of Kircaldy always smiling and arriving late for tea…” one of John’s best…
35. Night And Day (Cole Porter) Fred Astaire –“in the roaring traffic’s boom, in the silence of my lonely room I think of you, night and day…”
36. As Time Goes By (Hupfeld) Dooley Wilson –“hearts full of passion, jealousy and hate…”
37. Ferry Cross The Mersey (Marsden) Gerry and the Pacemakers –“we’ll never turn you away…”
38. Georgia On My Mind (Carmichael, Gorrell) Ray Charles –“Georgia, Georgia, the whole day through…”
39. Ring Of Fire (Gilgore/Carter) Johnny Cash –“the flames gettin’ higher…”
40. The End (Jim Morrison) The Doors –“this is the end, beautiful friend, no safety or surprise, the end…”
41. The Times They Are A Changin’ (Bob Dylan) Bob Dylan –the ultimate protest/wake-up-to-reality song…
42. Everyday (White, Crisler) Buddy Holly –“Everyday, it’s a gettin’ closer, goin’ faster than a roller coaster…”
43. All You Need Is Love (Lennon/McCartney) The Beatles –“There’s nothin’ you can’t do that can’t be done…”
44. This Land Is Your Land (Woody Guthrie) Woody Guthrie –“This land was made for you and me…”
45. My Generation (Pete Townsend) The Who –the slinging, self-righteous, celebratory anger of the 60s in 3 minutes…
46. Let It Be (Lennon/McCartney) The Beatles –“Mother Mary comes to me…”
47. What’d I Say (Byrne/Robinson) Ray Charles –“Tell me… What did I say?”
48. Sympathy For the Devil (Jagger/Richard) Rolling Stones –Jagger wrote a Bob Dylan-type ballad and the Stones added mayhem..
49. Crazy (Willie Nelson) Patsy Cline –“Crazy for cryin’ and crazy for tryin’…”
50. A Whiter Shade Of Pale (Brooker, Reid, Fisher) Procol Harum –“and the waiter brought a tray…”
51. I Say A Little Prayer For You (Bacharach/David) Dionne Warwick –“The moment I wake up, before I put on my makeup…”
52. Dream A Little Dream Of Me (Gus Kahn) Mamas and Papas –“Stars shining bright above you, night breezes seem to whisper I love you…”
53. California Dreamin’ (Phillips) Mamas and Papas –“Well I got down on my knees and I began to pray…”
54. Hotel California (Felder, Henley, Frey) The Eagles –“But they can never leave…”
55. Walk On By (Bacharach/David) Dionne Warwick –“make believe that you don’t see the tears…”
56. Guess Who I Saw Today? (Grand/Boyd) Eartha Kitt –what a beautifully constructed little urban story…
57. Lovely Rita (Lennon/McCartney) The Beatles –“sitting on a sofa with a sister or two…”
58. White Rabbit (Grace Slick) Jefferson Airplane –“and the white knight is talking backwards and the red queen is ‘off with her head!'”
59. My Favorite Things (Rodgers/Hammerstein) Julie Andrews –“Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens…” Keatsian.
60. Smoke Gets In Your Eyes (Kern/Harbach) The Platters –“Now laughing friends deride…”
61. Stranger In Paradise (Borodin, Wright, Forrest) Tony Bennett –“If I stand starry-eyed, that’s a danger in paradise…”
62. Misty (Garner/Burke) Johnny Mathis –“When I wander through the wonderland alone…”
63. (They Long To Be) Close To You (Bacharach/David) The Carpenters –“Just like me, they long to be close to you…”
64. Ain’t Misbehavin’ (Waller,Brooks, Razaff) Fats Waller –“I’m home about eight, just me and my radio…”
65. Don’t Get Around Much Anymore (Ellington/Russell) The Ink Spots –“They’d have asked me about you…”
66. I’ll Be Seeing You (Fain/Kahal) Billie Holiday –“In all the old familiar places that this heart of mine embraces…”
67. Mack The Knife (Brecht/Weil, Blitzstein) Bobby Darin –“Oh the shark has pretty teeth, dear…”
68. Pirate Jenny (Brecht/Weil) Lotte Lenya –“Asking me, kill them now, or later?”
69. Tiptoe Through The Tulips (Burke/Dubin) Tiny Tim –“tiptoe from the garden, by the garden of the willow tree…”
70. What Is And What Should Never Be (Led Zeppelin) Led Zeppelin –“and if you say to me tomorrow oh what fun it all would be…”
71. Golden Vanity (anonymous) Pete Seeger –a tearful adventure novel packed into song…”and down sunk he…farewell, farewell to the Golden Vanity…”
72. Star Spangled Banner (Key) Various Artists –“O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light?”
73. Tiny Dancer (John/Taupin) Elton John –“Jesus freaks out on the street, handing out free tickets for God…”
74. White Christmas (Irving Berlin) Bing Crosy Best-selling single of all-time, according to the Guinness Book of World Records
75. Barbara Allen (anonymous) Pete Seeger –the most popular of the old ballads…”oh mother, mother go make my bed…”
76. Tenderly (Lawrence/Lawrence) Sarah Vaughan –“the evening breeze caressed the trees tenderly…” this is not corny; this is poetry
77. Lady of Carlyle (anonymous) Pete Seeger –another beautiful old ballad…”and for a space of half an hour, this young lady lay speechless on the ground.”
78. Take Me Home, Country Roads (Denver, Nivert, Danoff) John Denver –a big, outdoors song, one the best…”Almost heaven, West Virginia…”
79. Winter Wonderland (Bernard/Smith) Various Artists –so many great Christmas songs, but this one is especially charming…
80. If I Had A Hammer (Seeger/Hayes) The Weavers –Pete Seeger, who cut Dylan’s cords at Newport, was Dylan before Dylan…
81. Wayfaring Stranger (anonymous) Burl Ives –“I’m going there to see my father, I’m going there no more to roam…”
82. Silent Night (Gruber/Mohr) Various –the Ur-Christmas carol…
83. Paint It Black (Jagger/Richard) Rolling Stones –“I see a red door and I want to paint it black…”
84. Every Breath You Take (Sting) The Police –“I’ll be watching you…”
85. It’s All In The Game (Dawes/Sigman) Tommy Edwards –“And your hearts will fly away…”
86. You’re So Vain (Carly Simon) Carly Simon –“And your horse naturally won…”
87. Killing Me Softly With His Song (Fox/Gimbel) Roberta Flack –“I felt he found my letters and read each one out loud…”
88. It’s My Party (Gluck, Gold, Weiner) Lesley Gore –“I’ll cry if I want to…”
89. The End Of The World (Shave, Smith, Pebworth, Astasio) Skeeter Davis –“Don’t they know it’s the end of the world?”
90. Under the Boardwalk (Young/Resnick) The Drifters –“People walking above…”
91. It’s Now Or Never (Schroeder, Gold) Elvis Presley –“Tomorrow will be too late…”
92. I Will Survive (Perren/Fekaris) Gloria Gaynor –“At first I was afraid, I was petrified…”
93. Moon River (Mancini/Mercer) Andy Williams –“we’re all after the same rainbow’s end…”
94. Paper Moon (Arlen,Harburg, Rose) Nat King Cole –“it’s only a paper moon over a cardboard sea, but I’ll believe in make-believe if…”
95. Bennie And The Jets (John/Taupin) Elton John –“she’s got electric boots, a mohair suit, you know I read it in a magazine…”
96. Freed From The Gallows/Gallows Pole (anonymous) Ledbelly “I think I see my mother coming, riding many a mile…”
97. She’ll Be Comin’ Round The Mountain (anonymous) Pete Seeger –“she’ll be riding six white horses when she comes…”
98. Jam On Jerry’s Rocks (anonymous) Pete Seeger –“crushed and bleeding on the beach lay the form of young Monroe”
99. Come All Ye Fair And Tender Maidens (anonymous) Pete Seeger –I wish I were a little sparrow and I had wings and I could fly…”
100. Groundhog (anonymous) Pete Seeger –“We’re all going out to hunt groundhog…”
101. September In The Rain (Warren/Dubin) James Melton –“The leaves of red and brown came tumbling down, remember?”
102. Pretty Polly (anonymous) Pete Seeger –“Leaving nothing but the wild birds to moan.” We had to include one murder song…
103. Danville Girl (anonymous) Pete Seeger –“She took me to her kitchen, she treated me nice and kind…” And one hobo song…
Scarriet 
drew said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:24 am
What – no AEROSMITH?
I may have to renounce my membership…
http://connecthook.wordpress.com/tag/nobodys-fault/
thomasbrady said,
November 9, 2013 at 1:19 pm
I hate Aerosmith. The Doors are a thousand times better, much closer to Poe and Blake. Aerosmith, even when they try to be profound, are never beautiful or subtle. That song of Aerosmith’s you analyze on your blog has some interest but it’s finger-pointing and preachy, too.
noochinator said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:01 pm
I loved Aerosmith as an adolescent,
E’en shoplifted their tapes—
Now my interest is quiescent,
But this song still elicits gapes—
Thanks, drew!
drew said,
November 9, 2013 at 3:21 pm
I like the Doors too.
I probably like the Aerosmith song because of it’s preachiness… I go for that sort of thing.
I thought you might like the connection to Poe in the blog post… the first notes evoke “The City in the Sea” for me.
thomasbrady said,
November 9, 2013 at 3:39 pm
Yea, the Poe is beautiful.
rich smith said,
February 20, 2016 at 7:22 pm
Like a bird on a wire, like a drunk in a midnight choir, I have tried in my own way to be free.
thomasbrady said,
February 20, 2016 at 7:49 pm
I am metaphor mad. I’m naming the good in an effort not to be too bad.
Phoenix Woman said,
March 21, 2015 at 6:45 pm
Thank you.
Anonymous said,
April 15, 2016 at 2:59 pm
Btw aerostats is WAY better that the stupid DOORS!!!
thomasbrady said,
April 16, 2016 at 9:58 am
Doors made rock an art form. The Doors cast an insouciant spell. I guess you either get them, or you don’t. They are easily in the top ten of any must include list. Good guitar playing alone is not enough. Doors’lyrics often hit that rock song sweet spot, too. Poetry, no. But song and poetry will never be the same thing.
thomasbrady said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:06 pm
I love Aerosmith but I’d rather not pay.
Store detective surprised me: “Walk this way.”
noochinator said,
May 31, 2016 at 12:00 am
Andrew, do you remember this one by the ‘smith?
Desdi said,
May 31, 2016 at 3:04 am
Happy Memorial Day Noochinator —
That song is not by “the Smiths. ”
It is pure Amerikkan poetry by St. Tyler and Joe Perry from Sunapee NH. New England poetry played on electric guitars. It is in fact a Dionysiac dithyramb.
Puts Edgar Poe back in his place of course.
Almost as good as Mahler’s 6th (or was it his 4th ?)
As poetically enlightened Amerikkans, it behooves us to draw the line.
noochinator said,
May 31, 2016 at 9:01 am
Yes Desdi — it is a Dionysian work of our time… I wrote the ‘smith (short for Aerosmith) — but thank you for inspiring me to cue up “The Headmaster Ritual”:
Desdi said,
June 1, 2016 at 5:15 pm
Go forth and Noochinate every last one of them.
noochinator said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:13 pm
104. “Cool Calm Collected” (Jagger, Richards) Rolling Stones — “She’s so affected, cool calm collected” (although that’s really the only quotable line; features Brian Jones on kazoo and electric dulcimer!)
noochinator said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:15 pm
105. “Snookeroo” (Elton John, Bernie Taupin) Ringo Starr — “I need someone to cook for me/ and turn me loose at night/ I could be happy with a factory girl/ ’cause a factory girl’s my type” (Yeah, I know, I know, but who said lyrics have to truly express the feelings of their creators?)
noochinator said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:39 pm
106. “Stay with Me” (Rod Stewart & Ronnie Wood) The Faces — “Red lips hair and fingernails/ I hear you’re a mean old Jezebel/ let’s go upstairs and read my tarot cards”
noochinator said,
November 9, 2013 at 2:51 pm
I always thought of “Stay with Me” as the ultimate sexist song, but in this version Rod Stewart appears to be addressing a guy dressed in drag: “I don’t mean to tell ya/ that you look like a fella/ but you really shouldn’t wear your hair that long” — these lines are not in the well-known single version, though these later lines are, and they reinforce my theory: “Yeah I’ll pay your cab fare home/ you can even use my best cologne/ just don’t be there in the morning when I wake up”
drew said,
November 9, 2013 at 3:32 pm
What about Roxy Music (my favorite band all around)
or John Dowland?
Do not poetry and music kiss each other and become one in these songs?
thomasbrady said,
November 9, 2013 at 4:19 pm
Bobby Darin made a bet with a friend that he could turn any lyric fragment into a hit song and he won (Splish splash I was taking a bath) and what this demonstrates is that music does not need poetry to appeal and lyrics don’t need poetry to appeal and poetry and song lyrics, as similar as they seem, are not at all the same EXCEPT in some inexplicable realm which I have tried to intimate with my list and its introduction. I think we can peer at a certain set of words on a page for the first time and get a definite sense that: oh this sounds like 1. a clever insight 2. poetry 3. song lyric 4. joke 5. social commentary and so on. Now we can work backwards from this idea to see not the vague similarity but the crucial difference. The Dowland seems more like poetry than song lyric to me and this may be a compliment, I don’t know.
drew said,
November 9, 2013 at 6:07 pm
John D. was, is, and ever shall be THE Elizabethan rock star.
Long live Albion’s white rose our Gloriana Queen Bess and I hope they sink the armada…
I think he was a poet first and lutanist second but that order may be backwards.
Gary B. Fitzgerald said,
November 10, 2013 at 1:36 am
http://www.pulitzer.org/citation/2008-Special-Awards-and-Citations
Gary B. Fitzgerald said,
November 10, 2013 at 2:24 am
American Tune
Many’s the time I’ve been mistaken
And many times confused
Yes, and I’ve often felt forsaken
And certainly misused,
Oh, but I’m all right, I’m all right
I’m just weary to my bones,
Still, you don’t expect to be
Bright and bon vivant
So far away from home, so far away from home.
I don’t know a soul who’s not been battered
I don’t have a friend who feels at ease.
I don’t know a dream that’s not been shattered
Or driven to its knees.
Oh, but it’s all right, it’s all right
For we lived so well so long,
Still, when I think of the road
We’re traveling on
I wonder what went wrong,
I can’t help it, I wonder what’s gone wrong.
And I dreamed I was dying
And I dreamed that my soul rose unexpectedly
And looking back down at me
Smiled reassuringly.
And I dreamed I was flying
And high above my eyes could clearly see
The Statue of Liberty
Sailing away to sea
And I dreamed I was flying.
Oh, we come on the ship they call the Mayflower,
We come on the ship that sailed the moon.
We come in the age’s most uncertain hour
And sing an American tune.
Oh, it’s all right, it’s all right
It’s all right, it’s all right,
You can’t be forever blessed.
Still, tomorrow’s going to be another working day
And I’m trying to get some rest,
That’s all I’m trying to get some rest.
© 1973 Words and Music by Paul Simon
drew said,
November 12, 2013 at 1:34 am
I was definitely wondering why Simon & Garfunkel were nowhere on T. Brady’s list…
American Tune is a good choice –
lyrics from the albums Sounds of Silence and Parsley, Sage Rosemary and Thyme come to mind as well…
I think it is very subjective in the end.
Scarriet’s creators get to pick their favorites and then proclaim that those particular songs meet the stated criterion
( the lyrics intoxicate as much as the music)
but then – one man’s high art is another man’s black velvet painting.
thomasbrady said,
November 12, 2013 at 12:19 pm
“America” & “Fakin It” are S & G songs on the List. Yes, Drew, obviously there’s subjectivity involved but as the great Alexander Pope said a great judge is as rare as a great poet and Scarriet, in case you hadn’t noticed, is heav’n inspired.
drew said,
November 12, 2013 at 9:31 pm
I didn’t see them there – my bad (as the Heav’n inspired poets say…)
maryangeladouglas said,
April 6, 2020 at 5:59 am
That song would work for now. But I do hold out hope that America will be forever blessed, why not. And the world too when all is said and done. Was just listening to various and sundry Simon and Garfunkel dream like songs as a team and as solo artists. Very refreshing even still. Be Well.
David Bittner said,
November 10, 2013 at 2:32 am
Dear Tom, Wow, things have really been cooking on Scarriet while I have been busy with a couple of things like planning my mother’s 87th birthday party and mailing out copies (to friends) of my article on Northwestern University Prof. Ernest Samuels. It was just published in the Fall issue of “Western States Jewish History.” You know, I haven’t forgotten that it was on Scarriet where I saw some mention of Mr. Samuels, whom I took a course from myself in college, that inpired me to write the article about him. Asked to cut it and give it more pointedness, I ended up with just a five-page story, short and sweet. I think that now it is a “better read” than before. You yourself said it was a “good read” but you weren’t sure what its point was. Maybe now that it is a manageable size and shouldn’t overwhelm anybody — or perplex them– I’ll post it one day soon.
In the meantime, I got hold of Mary McCarthy’s book, “Birds of America,” where I remembered there was a brief description of Epicurus, the Greek philosopher often misunderstood as a “hedonist.” Peter Levi, the novel’s protagonist who is spending his junior year of college abroad, sets the matter straight: “Most people don’t realize he was an ascetic. I did a paper on him for a course in ethics. He lived on barley, bread and chese and water because he thought the simple life was the the way to achieve happiness, which he considered the “summum bonum.” Naturally nobody would believe that. Instead they believed all the lies the Stoics spread about him being a gourmet and lecherous with women. So now Epicureanism means just the opposite of his teaching.” I — this is David Bittner speaking again — can testify to the truth of that. As a child in Europe, my father and his fellow scholars would get a stinging blow on the cheek for trying to stump their teachers, along with the insulting epithet, “Apikoris”! (That’s Yiddish for “Epicurean.”)
Before I turn in, just a comment on songs. If the most important thing is the lyrics and not the music, how do you account for the fact that new lyrics are very often writen for old melodies, but not the other way around? Am I just “blanking” on the matter, or when are new melodies written for old lyrics? Good night!
“
thomasbrady said,
November 10, 2013 at 12:36 pm
David,
I don’t recall saying or implying that words were more important than music. I adore a good melody. It is the mysterious relation between the two that is our object here.
When I was trying to get a band together and looked at want ads, I noticed there was always drummer or bass or guitar or singer needed, but NEVER a songwriter. The singer-songwriter of the 60s replaced the old team of lyricist/composer/vocalist.
I wonder why poems are so rarely put to music? Is that what you mean? Donovan put music to Poe’s poem “Eldorado” on his album Sutras, a nice record from about 10 years ago. No, I guess you mean a song lyric identified with a melody given a brand new tune. The old ballad, “Barbara Allen” has melodic variations. Cover songs often bend the melody of a song. Paul McCartney wrote a new tune for “Golden Slumbers” when he saw it in a song book and he couldn’t read music. Well, there’s an example.
Ashu अशु said,
March 4, 2015 at 5:13 am
Oh, and Macca’s melody is SO much better than the candy-assed original. And Macca is actually one of the great rock poets, but SO terrible when he tries to write for the page.
thomasbrady said,
November 10, 2013 at 12:06 pm
Gary,
A friend of my parents in NYC, Francia, who worked in music publishing (she has a writing credit on “In Spain They Say Si Si” ) knew Paul and gave us his albums as they were released in the 70s. She said they thought “American Tune” was going to be his biggest song ever. It never quite caught on with the public, however. It didn’t become another “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.” Simon was an extraordinary songwriter. He should have stayed with Art. There are intangible factors surrounding the making of song that must be acknowledged sometimes.
Ashu अशु said,
March 4, 2015 at 5:18 am
[He should have stayed with Art.]
“A pretty face will last a year or two,
but pretty soon they’ll see what you can do.”
The same was actually true of Lennon himself, though he didn’t have the pretty face.
Gary B. Fitzgerald said,
November 11, 2013 at 1:44 am
Don’t forget:
A) Jimmy Webb, who wrote:
Galveston
Wichita Lineman
By the Time I Get to Phoenix
Up, Up and Away (In My Beautiful Balloon)
The Highwayman
MacArthur Park
All I know
B) Leonard Cohen
C) Woody Guthrie
D) Joni Mitchell
E) Neil Young
thomasbrady said,
November 11, 2013 at 12:53 pm
Gary,
I could easily make a list of a 100 more songs but I had to stop somewhere. My daughter was doing a school project on Joni Mitchell at the time—that’s why “Both Sides Now” is high on the list. I found out Joni had a secret kid she couldn’t raise and that’s why she wrote all those songs. I got teary when I found that out. I did consider “Wichita Lineman” and “Suzanne takes you down to a place by the river”…I should have included that one…Neil Young, yes, and “When the Saints Go Marching In”, I missed that one. “This Land Is Your Land” is on the list.
Gary B. Fitzgerald said,
November 12, 2013 at 12:58 am
I heard a rumor that they paved paradise and put up a parking lot.
thomasbrady said,
November 12, 2013 at 12:12 pm
OK I just got run over by a big ole yellow taxi. Thanks, Gary
Ashu अशु said,
March 4, 2015 at 5:25 am
[I found out Joni had a secret kid she couldn’t raise and that’s why she wrote all those songs. I got teary when I found that out.]
You may know that Mitchell and her daughter reunited in the nineties, to much media attention. Less attention was paid to the embarrassing subsequent souring of their relationship. Mitchell had the kid while living on Toronto’s Huron Street round 1970. I’m a Toronto boy meself, and Huron has always been one of my streets.
thomasbrady said,
March 4, 2015 at 1:13 pm
The daughter probably couldn’t handle Joni’s smoking!
drew said,
November 18, 2013 at 2:39 am
Regarding a favorite of mine you included in the list (Lovely Rita by the Fab 4): http://connecthook.wordpress.com/2013/09/25/lovely-reader-meter-made/
thomasbrady said,
January 25, 2014 at 9:37 pm
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zK-VtRTcEAE
This is Danville Girl, the last song on the list, performed by Pete Seeger. Look at how few views it has. Proves Scarriet is cool.
drew said,
January 26, 2014 at 12:21 am
You so ON, bro. 43 hits.
Danville Girl gots it goin’ ON like a hoochie train.
Thatz cause it’s not authentic fiction…
thomasbrady said,
January 27, 2014 at 12:28 pm
Drew,
It’s an easy song to play if you happen to play an instrument: C then F then right back to C. In the second part, C to G.
Tom
thomasbrady said,
January 29, 2014 at 2:24 pm
And now I find out he died…
I’ve been playing Danville Girl for the last week or so…
That’s uncanny…”I pulled my cap down down over my eyes, started down for the track. Caught the very next railroad car. Never did look back.”
A musical icon from my childhood…
Fare thee well…
maryangeladouglas said,
October 21, 2020 at 5:11 pm
FARE THEE WELL: TO MY GRANDFATHER MILTON B. YOUNG
my memory’s screen door opens to the stars;
there’s my Grandfather in the yard
gazing up at the constellations
‘That’s Telstar, going over us still,’
he whispers softly
his face in the moonlight lined;
no Hamlet’s ghost is he
though he whistled when he was worried.
He’s not worried now
tending the ghosts of the marigolds
and I am light years from then
though I wish it weren’t so.
I wish I could go and turn in my silver flats
in my 12 year old party dress of blue taffeta
(that used to be my cousin Rosalie’s)
and sing him the alphabet or a thousand other things
made of mystery and the beautiful, the blue back speller
but I’m too old for that now or else
he’s too young.
younger than I am now
but still in the pea green jacket with the fedora
trousers from the 1940s.
tall as any tree
still in love with the Space program
the baseball scores of the Arkansas Travelers.
and shining my shoes for school,
the penny loafers later on, in this nostalgic dream: to a farethewell,
bright as copper stars.
mary angela douglas 21 october 2020
thomasbrady said,
October 22, 2020 at 1:10 pm
“my memory’s screen door opens to the stars”
MILTON B ALWAYS YOUNG
maryangeladouglas said,
October 23, 2020 at 11:27 am
Thank you Thomas Graves. That was my favorite part too, the screen door that looked out on the universe and my childhood backyard at the same time and yes I did make a pun on my Grandfather’s name, haha. Which was very fun. Thank you for the beautiful sentiment at the end;it made me cry. I have been writing ‘tribute’ poems to my Grandfather off and on for the last several years. He died in the Bicentennial of America year but due to a terrible family mixup and other things I did not know he had died until much much later and then I couldnt even find out when. This year I took advantage of a free trial of ancestry.com for a week and toward the end of the week all of a sudden a record popped up indicating he died on October 5, 1976 and so I felt in a way this poem was the first real tribute poem I wrote to him because I knew finally WHEN he died exactly. Thanks again so much for your kind thought.
maryangeladouglas said,
October 25, 2020 at 11:25 pm
IF WE ARE AGGRIEVED IT MAY BE
if we are aggrieved it may be
that we plant rose gardens where only the dust blooms
even so there remains the rose of the mind
and in the mind, the breeze that cools, lime flower soft
and in the mind the green land eternal hovering aloft
where it is always sunrise
Eden is there. even under a winter sun concealed
where we gather shadows and are paid poorly for it.
the source of things dries up. the leaves are desultory
drifting in the wind thin as brown paper and nothing to wrap
in it so go the days. and everything once loved, away.
fluttering. over the abyss of Song.
but in the mind. in the mind and in the poem lit like a candle
through the night
Your Presence Lord is a thousand gardens blooming and prolonged;
my heart, plighted again
the scent of citrus. the jasmine wind
everything we missed when
we were far from home
dreamed of again
and setting sail
and the looking glass gleam
of all the bright past,
redeemed all our sodden griefs
from out their jails;
and You prevail.
mary angela douglas 25 october 2020
L is for Lyrics | Semicolon said,
April 26, 2014 at 12:32 am
[…] The Top One Hundred Song Lyrics that Work as Poetry […]
thomasbrady said,
April 30, 2014 at 6:51 pm
Probably should have included Fools Rush In and Cry Me A River.
Drew said,
May 31, 2014 at 3:45 pm
Hymns to Gods who choked on vomit
(undertaken in overdose;
rocks that never rose to comet
rolling – but ending comatose),
from a poem soon to be revealed @
http://connecthook.wordpress.com/
noochinator said,
June 19, 2014 at 6:30 pm
107. “Long Haired Lover from Liverpool” — this ditty was a number one hit in England in 1972, or so they tell me:
Jimmy Osmond – Long Haired Lover From Liverpool Lyrics
I’ll be your long haired lover from Liverpool,
And I’ll do anything you say.
I’ll be your clown or your puppet or your April Fool,
If you’ll be my sunshine daisy from L.A.
I’ll be your leprechaun and sit upon an old toad stool,
I’ll serenade you till I’m old and gray.
I’ll be your long haired lover from Liverpool,
You’ll be my sunshine daisy from L.A.
You’ll be my lovely daisy on the mountainside,
There are lots of other flowers, too.
But all the other flowers hung their heads and cried
Because the loveliest of all of them was you.
But you were evidently the exception to the rule,
I picked you quickly then I ran away.
‘Cause I was your long haired lover from Liverpool,
You were my sunshine daisy from L.A.
I’ll be your long haired lover from Liverpool,
And I’ll do anything you ask.
I’ll be your clown or your puppet or your April Fool,
Cut my hair, I’ll even wear a mask.
I’ll be your Valentine, and you’ll be mine, and things’ll be cool.
We’ll move along together every day.
I’ll be your long haired lover from Liverpool,
You’ll be my sunshine daisy from L.A.,
You’ll be my sunshine daisy from L.A.
I’ll be your long haired lover from Liverpool,
And I’ll do anything you ask.
I’ll be your clown or your puppet or your April Fool,
Cut my hair I’ll even wear a mask.
I’ll be your Valentine, and you’ll be mine, and things’ll be cool.
We’ll move along together every day.
I’ll be your long haired lover from Liverpool,
You’ll be my sunshine daisy from L.A.
Songwriters: KINGSLEY, CHRISTOPHER
Long Haired Lover From Liverpool lyrics © Warner/Chappell Music, Inc., VIRGIN EAR MUSIC
noochinator said,
August 1, 2014 at 10:34 am
How about spam e-mails that work as poetry, or at least song texts? This is ‘All-Natural Male Enhancement,’ Boston-based composer Michael Veloso’s brilliant choral settings of spam e-mail texts. The work, conducted here by Allegra Martin, is in five movements:
I. Fwd: I was looking at your profile (begins at 0:01)
II. (no subject) (begins at 1:21)
III. Only ant best way to elanrge your p_e.n|s. voyage scalps (begins at 3:35)
IV. enemy (begins at 5:40)
V. Our gilrs is verry yuonng attendees absolves (begins at 6:56)
Michael Veloso’s website can be accessed at http://mjveloso.com/
The texts of the spam e-mails are approximated below, but they can be better seen in their raw form at http://mjveloso.com/works/all-natural…
I. Fwd: I was looking at your profile (begins at 0:01)
Hi, my name is Tiffany! (wink)
My friend said you were a really cool person and I should get in contact with you!
I looked at your profile and thought I would contact you.
I love meeting new people, I also love to talk. I just got my videocam working so you can see me to! It doesn’t cost you anything if you wanna watch/see me! You don’t even need your own videocam! This is not my screenname, but a friends. To contact me you need to go to my personal site (dont worry it’s a FREE site like Yahoo!) its the only way to contact me! My personal site:
Just Copy and Paste in your Broswer
http:/www.tifde.com/fritz.html
Best of love and regards, Tiffany
II. (no subject) (begins at 1:21)
Sitting at home bored . Find a date from us right here
What have you been searching for?
Hot sex
A married mom
A long lasting relationship
Find everything you need here
III. Only ant best way to elanrge your p_e.n|s. voyage scalps (begins at 3:35)
Hello. I know about your problem, man.
overseer Maxtor antics Carlisle bulged
I know that you always see a grin on faces of other men, when you goto shower after GYM…
greed smash Anabaptist excess helping
I know that your woman dreams about man with big and hard pne|s…And I know that you have small one.
weather mountains acetate breezily finders
I know your shame when you undrsse|ng when women look at you…
fungible spellings customer grips startup
I know what is it, because some time ago I had a little pne|s too.
cored sweetness poured Germans Kalamazoo
One time your woman will meet a man with a big dc|.k…
fevered subjecting shorts stiffens faithless
And you’ll loose her…
crypt start recoiled reformat calamity
As I lost my g|rl… But you have chance to correct situation.
payroll undresses diaphragm lockup economize
You have 100% guaranteed and safe way to ELNRAGE YOUR PNE|S!
minded updated donate dishonored repairer
Read M0R_E.
IV. enemy (begins at 5:40)
Rosario Wu,(
Govenment don’t want me to sell
UndergroundCD !Check Your spouse and staff
Investigate Your Own CREDIT-HISTORY
hacking someone PC!Get a new passport!
Disappear in your city
bannedcd2004
http:/c9003hosting.com/CD3/
,affectate ,slut
,ammonia ,boredom .
V. Our giIrs is verry yuonng attendees absolves (begins at 6:56)
Clara has a prretty face, hoI puusssy, Iong Iegs chloroplast’s
She came over.. I bussted out the pipe and we smoked and.. Liechtenstein
Gett ennjoy http:/olefun.biz/true/?enumerate
It’s nice when these girIIs will posing themselves on camera for a few buc=
ks Schnabel
essences derailed adverbs boor’s.
inclusion’s filmy ate brown bismuth
appointments elm adaptive auto maestro blacker badger
Anonymous said,
August 31, 2014 at 3:35 pm
This Onion piece pretty funny:
Bob Dylan Lays Off 2,000 Workers From Songwriting Factory.
Ha ha ha
noochinator said,
August 31, 2014 at 3:50 pm
http://www.theonion.com/articles/bob-dylan-lays-off-2000-workers-from-songwriting-f,31407/
noochinator said,
August 31, 2014 at 9:53 pm
108. I Bought Myself a Parakeet
noochinator said,
August 31, 2014 at 10:00 pm
109. You Need Us (The Honey Bees)
Drew said,
September 1, 2014 at 3:34 pm
Wow. I had forgotten all the useless hours I devoted to watching this inane show. I like the one where Gilligan began picking up radio signals in his dental fillings:
http://connecthook.wordpress.com/2011/08/26/transcendental/
noochinator said,
September 1, 2014 at 3:52 pm
And there are those who were truly inspired by the show:
Drew said,
September 1, 2014 at 4:00 pm
Speaking of true inspiration,
who did you like more – Ginger or Maryann ?
noochinator said,
September 1, 2014 at 7:52 pm
I gotta go with Eunice “Lovey” Wentworth Howell for the “best friend’s (grand)mom” vibe.
noochinator said,
September 2, 2014 at 3:37 pm
110. Now That the Night is Falling (Graves/Poe)
thomasbrady said,
January 1, 2015 at 3:21 am
Thank you Nooch….happy new year, dear friend …I don’t think Poe, as far I know, has anything to do with “Now That The Night Is Falling…” But Graves/Poe sounds nice…
maryangeladouglas said,
April 6, 2016 at 4:55 pm
Tom Graves, Now That The Night Is Falling is a beautiful piece by you. As fine a melody as anyone ever wrote. Beautifully, perfectly, satisfyingly melancholy and simultaneously serene, your signature, I believe, musically, poetically speaking. Is it possible you might be inspired to compose others along this line or even, to expand this work? It is a rich and silvery vein. Thank you. If not I will just listen to this over and over for its sheer, undeniable loveliness.
Allan Samuels said,
December 31, 2014 at 8:50 pm
I expected to see the lyrics from Stardust, which I find indescribably haunting and melancholy. Also Begin the Begin. And Deep Purple. I’d love who agrees with me.
thomasbrady said,
January 1, 2015 at 2:25 am
Allan,
Scarriet has a 100 best Jazz standard lyrics list…I believe Stardust is on that…
Happy new year!
Andrew said,
January 1, 2015 at 1:21 pm
Deep Purple are a great band; I agree with you- so love me please!
Ian Gillan also provided the voice of J.C. in the original cast (not the film version) of Jesus Christ Superstar – which is a great way to begin this New Year!
Anonymous said,
January 1, 2015 at 7:20 pm
I meant to say I’d love to KNOW who agrees with me. Also the lryics to Deep Purple. “When the deep purple falls, over sleepy garden walls”
thomasbrady said,
January 1, 2015 at 10:54 pm
Deep Purple was a piano hit with lyrics added later and it was responsible for the band name Deep Purple. The grandmother played the song at home for the singer as a boy.
Anonymous said,
January 6, 2015 at 10:24 am
This list is rubbish. So mainstream… Where is lyrics of Morrissey, Lou Reed, Ian Curtis, Roger Waters, Bono, David Bowie and Patti Smith?
thomasbrady said,
January 6, 2015 at 12:12 pm
Well, Lou Reed is at the top of the list, for starters.
Just because you could make another list doesn’t mean this list is “rubbish.”
Morrissey and Bowie are good suggestions.
thomasbrady said,
January 30, 2015 at 2:36 pm
http://www.maggiesfarm.eu/shadowlyrics.html
Andrew said,
February 3, 2015 at 5:52 pm
Not many stars age as elegantly as Emmy Lou:
http://tinyurl.com/m89gjvd
Phoenix Woman said,
February 15, 2015 at 9:34 pm
Emmylou and Louise Brooks and Nichelle Nichols: Three ageless women, and not a drop of botox between them.
Anonymous said,
May 25, 2015 at 12:53 am
Read these lyrics and tell me that this is not poetry : https://youtu.be/hARz7Ymilqo
thomasbrady said,
May 25, 2015 at 1:28 am
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=n-cD4oLk_D0
noochinator said,
August 4, 2015 at 11:10 am
Irving Berlin’s “I Love a Piano” ain’t bad as poetry — nor are “They’re Either Too Young or Too Old” and “Who Paid the Rent for Mrs. Rip Van Winkle” — all cued up below:
noochinator said,
September 13, 2015 at 3:52 pm
Lyrics to a song titled “Musical Chairs” by Jeremy Nicholas:
Beverly’s next to Joanie, and Jessye’s on her right,
then Montserrat can squeeze in
though it might be rather tight.
Earl Wild and Van Cliburn
have said they’ll both be here,
and Michael Tilson Thomas
which will make it rather queer.
Sinopoli and Previn will turn up without a doubt;
leave a space each side so they
can wave their arms about.
Luciano’s coming; let’s hope when he arrives
that he sits where he’s told
and that the scaffolding survives.
Yehudi’s next to Itzhak, and Isaac’s at the top
but as Nigel isn’t kosher
he’s a name we’ve had to drop.
We’ve Mstislav and Yo-Yo
(that’s Slav and Yo for short)
and there’s Julian Lloyd Webber too,
but as a last resort.
Gennadi Rozhdestvensky will join in all the games,
so will Esa-Pekka Salonen,
but how do you spell their names?
James Levine’s not coming,
he’s turned us down quite flat—
which isn’t so surprising
with a sense of pitch like that.
Zubin has accepted and Seiji’s such a dear!
Can you blame a girl for subtlely
advancing her career?
There’s Vladimir and Daniel, whatever shall we do?
For there’s Claudio Abbado and Riccardo Muti, too!
We’d better ask that woman who always talks such rot;
says she studied under Toscanini
(nobody knows just what!).
Now Mieczyslaw Horszowski, I put him at the head;
I sent an invitation, but apparently he’s dead.
There are one or two producers
I thought I ought to try—
there’s that so-and-so from Sony
and that creep from EMI.
Sir Michael and Sir Maxwell and
Sir Malcolm say they might —
I’ve seated Kathleen by herself,
I’d like to avoid a fight.
Placido says he will be here if he can fit it in;
he’s not sure if he’s in Paris, Honolulu or Berlin.
There’ll be paper hats and crackers, and what else
goodness knows!
Maybe cabaret from Kiri, singing hits from all her shows.
I think that’s everybody—
there’s you and me, my dear…
“But wait! We forgot David Helfgott.”
He’ll have to come next year!
thomasbrady said,
September 13, 2015 at 4:52 pm
What about Yeol Eum Son?
noochinator said,
September 13, 2015 at 9:01 pm
Her name should be subbed in for David Helfgott’s…..
noochinator said,
May 1, 2018 at 10:18 am
Here’s Ms. Son messing ’round with Doucet’s “Chopinata”:
forestblush said,
October 10, 2015 at 3:35 pm
Very lovely blog 🙂
Taylor swift said,
October 16, 2015 at 8:15 pm
Can you please make a new song and it will not have to be about the same thing over and over again okay thank you so much for the first half of the day before I go to sleep and I’m still waiting to be the first person to talk to you in a while
thomasbrady said,
October 16, 2015 at 9:38 pm
BY THE LIGHT OF THE SUN
maryangeladouglas said,
April 6, 2016 at 4:34 pm
CHERRY TRUMPETS
[remembering the trumpets of Herb Alpert “Up Cherry Street”]
transposing the cherry trumpets in the sunlight
or twirling a pink parasol shade
we came to life
in lessons of astronomy
when we could gaze and gaze
in our backyard and there’s Orion
and how it does amaze
Orion remains though others have gone away.
and the cherry trumpets replayed on the phonograph
and the cantinas blue as blue
their twilights tied with silver ribbons;
the evening dew.
time is music or music is time
we thought we knew.
it’s only later as the music fades
we feel that it’s not true.
and yet we linger when the music starts
and feel it’s altered in our hearts
as though we were fresh winds again
paused at a golden beginning;
sweet on the tongue as a candy that lasts forever
knowing all, all the songs.
mary angela douglas 6 april 2016
maryangeladouglas said,
April 6, 2016 at 5:35 pm
P.S. on Cherry Trumpets poem: Up Cherry Street and Cantina Blue were my favorite instrumentals of Herb Alpert and the Tiajuana Brass when I was around middle school age. I was just starting to learn Spanish and it seemed a golden backdrop to me for that though I realize it wasn’t mariachi music per se but very kin to it. I always though Alpert was highly underrated. His arrangements to me were fantastically rich and evocative of varied emotions. Not California psuedo Mexican pop appealing to all ages as it was so often portrayed even at the top on the back of the records. Haunting music. I know this thread is about songs with lyrics but I contend this music is lyrical without the words and deserves mention here as something poetic, metapoetry maybe. Autumnal music I always thought of it in my overblown way.
maryangeladouglas said,
April 6, 2016 at 5:57 pm
Correction on Cherry Trumpets: should be sparkled away, not gone away. I’m sparkling away now, at least I like to think so, and somebody out there or is it in the plural is probably thinking, thank God. I don’t mind what you thank God for even if it’s for me going away as long as you talk to Him now and then. You will feel a whole lot better about whatever it is you’re feeling bad about if you do. And if you feel good you can talk to Him about that. I don’t think He hears things of that natur, that much sitting at the golden switchboard of grievances day after day.
maryangeladouglas said,
July 9, 2021 at 5:21 pm
SWEET UNSECRETED LIGHT TERRESTRIAL CELESTIAL FLOODING MY EYES
sweet, unsecreted light terrestrial celestial flooding my eyes
the eyes of my eyes the heart of the heart and glancing off
small rain printed puddles as easily as you may from
ocean swells and the cream curve of the wave called devastation
the tremulous tremendous Ark of what is left to us
you do not hide from us the glory of God yet men will say so
and dart like bats into the lower depths
pretending the lid of the coffin is the sky
I will not deny, deny, deny
your dazzling enterpriseless enterprise
your emerald gleam in the shade
of all my days made and unmade your fugues;
infinitude I send this valentine to you
this white gold valentine seeped in clouds
the rainbow dissolve and the slow fade
in the rain weeping over the barren fields
where men have forgotten to sing to you to Him who made you
shine
to yield to you forsaking instead the paradiso for the inferno
and where in golden fortitude at times
you break down,
emblematic, witness of God.
mary angela douglas 9 july 2021
thomasbrady said,
May 31, 2016 at 9:58 am
noochinator said,
June 1, 2016 at 6:57 am
Tomas, are you into Ween at all? Two high school friends who started a band and became one of the most electic pop music acts ever — here’s one of their more intense songs that was set to animation by one of their fans:
thomasbrady said,
June 1, 2016 at 9:59 pm
Someone gave me a Ween CD about 10 years ago. I listened to it about a dozen times. I liked it. This sounds how I remember.
noochinator said,
June 1, 2016 at 1:11 pm
Tom, how about a post on the most heartrending songs, those ditties that cause the tears to flow from the eyes of most homo (and hetero) sapiens? Such a post could be a public service for those looking to spend some quality weeping-time with their favorite dominatrices. I suggest these as a starter:
“That’s the Way I Always Heard It Should Be” by Carly Simon
“Touch Me in the Morning” by Diana Ross
“Winkin’ and Blinkin’ and Nod” by the Simon Sisters
thomasbrady said,
June 1, 2016 at 10:01 pm
Scarriet did put out a 100 Songs That Make You Cry. Did you miss it? I like those songs. “Touch Me In the Morning” was written by a guy who lived right across the hall from me when I was growing up on 105th st in Manhattan, Michael Masser.
noochinator said,
June 1, 2016 at 11:59 pm
https://scarriet.wordpress.com/?s=100+Songs+That+Make+You+Cry
Thanks, I found the weeper post — I will check out the songs and see which ones make me dissolve into a hot mess…..
thomasbrady said,
June 4, 2016 at 9:31 pm
le Gamin en Moi said,
December 8, 2016 at 3:48 pm
Damien Saez, is a more modern song writer whose lyrics are essentially poetry. He is very well known and respected in France– He being a Parisian.
If you know french, listening to his songs, which are great in themselves, or reading his lyrics should be very pleasing!
🙂
thomasbrady said,
December 8, 2016 at 10:35 pm
Thank you, I’ll check out his music.
A quick look at his lyrics: Angry Marxism. Sounds too adolescent and too negative to be great poetry….that’s just a first impression…
One of his lines…”we’re not descended from apes but from sheep…” Of course that’s always going to have appeal: berating the ignorant…
noochinator said,
April 30, 2018 at 9:50 pm
“A Strange Boy” by Joni Mitchell
A strange boy is weaving
A course of grace and havoc
On a yellow skateboard
Thru midday sidewalk traffic
Just when I think he’s foolish and childish
And I want him to be manly
I catch my fool and my child
Needing love and understanding
What a strange strange boy
He still lives with his family
Even the war and the navy
couldn’t bring him to maturity
He keeps referring back to school days
And clinging to his child
Fidgeting and bullied
His crazy wisdom holding onto something wild
He asked me to be patient
Well I failed
“Grow up!” I cried
And as the smoke was clearing he said
“Give me one good reason why”
What a strange strange boy
He sees the cars as sets of waves
Sequences of mass and space
He sees the damage in my face
We got high on travel
And we got drunk on alcohol
And on love the strongest poison and medicine of all
See how that feeling comes and goes
Like the pull of moon on tides
Now I am surf rising
Now parched ribs of sand at his side
What a strange strange boy
I gave him clothes and jewelry
I gave him my warm body
I gave him power over me
A thousand glass eyes were staring
In a cellar full of antique dolls
I found an old piano
And sweet chords rose up in waxed New England halls
While the boarders were snoring
Under crisp white sheets of curfew
We were newly lovers then
We were fire in the stiff blue-haired house rules
noochinator said,
May 2, 2018 at 12:21 pm
“Joe Public” — The Rutles
My name is Joe Public, I’m sure you all know me
Sometimes they call me ‘the man in the street’
But I don’t mind
I’ve got my place in society
I’ve got my feet on the ground
I’ve got my pride and my prejudices
No one can push me around
My name is Joe Public, I’m sure you all know me
Sometimes they call me ‘the proletariat’
But I don’t mind
They know me for my common sense
They know they can’t please all of me
They know I can’t be fooled all of the time
I am what I am and I’m happy to be
Joe Public, that’s me
Joe Public, that’s me
I put my faith in the powers that be
Joe Public—that’s me
My name is Joe Public, I’m sure you all know me
Sometimes they call me ‘the great unwashed’
But I don’t mind
Sticks and stones may break my bones
But names can never hurt me
I’ve got my pride and my prejudices
I am what I am and I’m happy to be
Joe Public, that’s me
Joe Public, that’s me
Joe Public, that’s me
Joe Public, that’s me
I put my faith in the powers that be
Joe Public—that’s me
I put my faith in the powers that be…
I’m sure you all know me…
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maryangeladouglas said,
March 17, 2019 at 12:18 am
LEARNING
gold flakes off the sun
or stardust streams from the once upons
and suddenly you stand inside the crystal.
not outside, looking at the diagram again, uncomprehending.
or feel on your face the winds of Athens,
Shakespeare rising
and you, the Dialogues, you are the plays, each one
as though you spoke each word in your sleep originally.
or it’s bright midsommer on a jam coloured day
when you feel called inside the treasure heaped caves
eluding chores
and wander in…
the dream within the dream and Calderon…
oh life, the fleeting the beautiful has come and gone
and now returned, you hear the light leaves murmur
in their song that you like Shelley are the King of clouds.
or Queen of the May or the Saint envisioning the
curative fountains, directed to find them
on some Saturday…
what century am I today you feel like Alice
still in the same blue dress wondering at her desk that
then the strawberries gleamed too
in Junes and children sat in school
reciting golden numbers feeling metrics
like the drone of bees outside the open windows
sanguine amid the flowers
till called to attention. in their new school shoes
from such reveries…on the eve of undeclared war
or simple as cream, the walking out the doors
to waiting trains;
the winter seeds sown.
let us revisit these scenes
all the way down to their sunless seas
the Christmas ghost pleads (or Coleridge, who knows)
and you go with them through the clouded dells
to all that you could never spell
or with the Blessed Damozel
to forgotten wishing wells, or come upon shelves unshelved of
untranslated biographies
in fragments, seraphs in tears
for all the unrecorded years…
one star upon a stone
that sang out:”Christ!” along a tolling road
and you elucidating, on your way, your own
while some take orders for a seamless garment
the cost of dreams the cost of dreams the cost of dreams
mary angela douglas 16 march 2019…
maryangeladouglas said,
February 17, 2020 at 8:08 pm
AH HOW IT FEELS
ah how it feels to be moved about the board as if you
were a game piece in someone else’s war
and they want you somewhere else
so as not to spoil the view
and ah the greatest sorrow is
they dont see you as you
but a thousand categories all aligned
and not a single star that shines
shines down, on you
according to statistics and their expert
point of view.
ah.
God in His heaven preserve us still
from those who move us by their will
to be surrounded by the very rich
and not by those who dream in a ditch.
mary angela douglas 17 february 2020
Crystal Towers Public Housing
Winston Salem, NC
maryangeladouglas said,
April 6, 2020 at 6:03 am
WHAT IF WE WERE THE DREAM OF GOD
what if we were the dream of God
and something woke Him up
before he finished us
a star falling out of orbit
or a bird from its nest
a baby penguin that could get no rest
or the wind through the trees of Heaven.
oh please go back to sleep my little sister said
in this story
that’s what I from the dream would have told Him
please leaning over the gate of dreams
and holding onto Mamas hand.
mary angela douglas 6 april 2020
maryangeladouglas said,
July 6, 2021 at 11:54 pm
THE DRIFTING PETALS SET AT NAUGHT, THE CLEMENT WAVE
if you are petulant in a time of peace
impatient with the petals drifting at your feet
and ignorant of who painted them peach or plum
I don’t really have one thing to say to you except
what will you do when the real wars come
how will you handle it or will you just go deeper into gloom
as into your only room and slam the door a door since to you
apparently that’s all a door is for
when it could be a portal into truth, or Christ the door and an end to rue
and ruthelessness on your part you who make grousing such an art oh
petulant generations what have you to do with petals, the stars,
the vagrant clouds the name of beauty cried outloud
or courage or fortitude
you will yourself to be sulky
and so you are
who are you I wring my soul to ask of you
why have you made from your apriled life
this irascible tomb
mary angela douglas 6 july 2021
maryangeladouglas said,
March 18, 2019 at 6:41 pm
This poem is not about Scarriet. Scarriet is not a contest. Scarriet is mystical, like the weather. You think you know the forecast and then you don’t. You can’t pinpoint when the winds will rise. This is just a poem I wrote to feel better about not qualifying for a contest due to everything on my blog being considered previously published work. So be it I said recovering my original happiness. And then wrote this and it was FUN.
EVERYTHING IS NOT A CONTEST IF YOU DON’T WANT IT TO BE
everything is not a contest
if you don’t want it to be
I don’t want it to be.
what if they held auditions for the birds
what if some birds didn’t make the cut
how triste we would be.
the forests filled with pared down song
maybe two. tops, three. what would the mute birds do
limited to:
whatever wasn’t previously sung.
why should you wait for months
to hear back from the magazines
till Kingdom come
when you can go anywhere
in the great outdoors
maybe to the canyons
and recite for free
I like canyons better than magazines.
think of the echoes.
the resonance. the company
of blooming cacti keeping their secrets.
they know how it feels to be patient
awaiting their flowering, published to the winds.
patience doesn’t really even come into it.
not being compared. not worrying about
first serial rights.they can fare.
friends with the starry nights
unaware of the contradictions and the spite
of trying to prove in a dry spell
to the resident cognescenti
they really are capable of flowering.
meanwhile they defend themselves
from condescending smiles
with their prickles like Exupery’s rose.
well, they might.they could. who knows.
really, they don’t have to do anything.
just wait for the desert Spring.
isn’t that something worth singing about?
flower on your own. crawling to no throne.
you will know
the happiness of not being paid in copies.
not bartering your Manhattan for trinkets.
of singing because you want to.
painting or dreaming.
skipping in the lanes.
sans the workshop disdain.
the grim reengineering
right within your hearing
for the MFA.
stand in the clearing.
far from the fray.
joy is better that way.
sound never dies they say.
already you would be immortal
sing song saying it
even in your dust bunnied room.
even in a tomb.
due to the laws of sonics.
happy in your phonics.
barely whisper your latest sonnet
to a crowd of angels…
sound never dies. nor music.
music in God, the trefoil union intact.
the heart singing all on its own
undeterred, silvery perhaps,unbeknownst.
like a ghost.
in its own mystique.
proofread by no creep;
poor editor with no sleep.
a heightening mirage
leaving its sound print, invisible track upon
the open universe soaring above the pines
so that the leaves sigh.the upper atmosphere.
clouds in their vagueness;
the air, bursting with wings
and turquoise.
mary angela douglas 18 march 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
March 26, 2019 at 6:53 am
for children trapped in wishing wells
for all of my hushed nightingales
for the carrion crow that caws from the bleachers:
carry this up to God in a silver slipper
that children may no longer
live among thorns.
Mary Angela Douglas 26 march 2019
Mary Angela Douglas said,
April 8, 2019 at 3:02 pm
AWAKE
[a piano piece for my sister]
is that the far kingdom she asked
through sleep misted eyes
through sleigh bells
through the tolling of dreams
small angels held her hands
I knew she was there
though the room had faded into space
the space between keys when you are little
with your first piano piece
and proud; is it Christmas there already
I heard her say in the sharp breeze
in the blue breeze turning the corner
where our roof froze over and the leaves
not long ago, on the trees, soft gardenias
in an in between season the colour of clouds.
you were clad in snow and if I could have
I would have painted you in blue and rose
the way you looked at five or four
in your first sun dress
oh don’t get cold I cried aloud in my sleep
then everything vanished.
and I was what they call in this life,
on any green apriled evening
wrapped in pearl occasions like a first concerto
younger then,
and “awake.”
mary angela douglas 8 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
April 12, 2019 at 6:55 am
THE RAINS ARE SWEEPING THE CANYONS WHILE WE’RE ALL INSIDE
beautiful canyons spanned the distance
but we were all at work.
at school.
in the laundry rooms.
watching tv.
what if it had been different
what if we hadnt kept our heads down
when the Perseids showered
their gold for free.
what if freedom was for beauty.
playing the mandolin
under the moon.
what if candy cane deliberations
in the Christmas drug stores
at the last minute, while the snow flew
had meant everything always.
and the Nativity.
set in the window
with its yellow bulbed star
its radiance
and the beauty
spanning the distance
had been
where we lived
instead of just
keeping our heads down.
taking someone else’s word for it
taking one test in the row
and passing the rest down soundlessly
when the silver rains swept through;
motionless. registering only
all the second hand things we knew.
or were expected to.
mary angela douglas `12 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 12, 2020 at 5:25 am
MONSTER FLOW CHART: HOW IT WORKS
the important monsters sit in the front
its easier for the ones on the aisles
to arrange their tails, say, if they are dragons
but anyway
next rows left to right the second tier monsters
and so forth
standing in back near the triple locked doors
the plebians.
standing up.
the whole time
the main monster is speaking.
waiting to be eaten.
mary angela douglas 12 september 2020
thomasbrady said,
September 12, 2020 at 1:59 pm
Not your usual kind of poem, Mary. What inspired this?
garybfitzgerald said,
September 14, 2020 at 1:23 am
Sounds a lot like our congress!
maryangeladouglas said,
September 14, 2020 at 4:34 am
Workplace memories, Tom. Workplace memories. And the need to chortle. Merged with my lifelong shuddering distaste for the poem Beowulf.
maryangeladouglas said,
September 14, 2020 at 4:37 am
Ha. Good one Gary. The whole kit and kaboodle.But I dont write political poems. However, the shoe does fit.
maryangeladouglas said,
July 8, 2021 at 1:14 pm
TO THE UNKNOWN POETS, IN THEIR ANGUISH
if they do not say your poem is beautiful
how do you know that wounded birds
do not come to the quiet pools and drink
that what you think indifferent silence is the breathing of comets
forgotten winds gathering speed and that those winds
will lift the sail of everyone that grieves
it is a flower opening in a desert, your poem
and at its heart the last known drop of dew
think this.
whenever they grieve you. whenever they are remiss
so that the golden ball falls down the fairy tale well
and seems irretrievable when
they say nothing, nothing at all.
mary angela douglas 8 july 2021
maryangeladouglas said,
April 14, 2019 at 4:08 pm
LATE SUMMER
for my sister Sharon (yet again)
you’ll wear your trapeze pink
and dangle from a cloud
or we’ll go gleefully
to the five and dime
in search of dangly earrings,
once upon a time
and come back with hair ribbons instead.
lilac cologne.
new stationery with fanciful borders.
that was the summer we planned.
and hamburger stands
and blowing out straws
at our Grandfather
sitting at the little table
thinking we were grownups
while he beamed.
and we breathed in pink and green
watermelon after the games.
already we were full up on cracker jacks
but he would have to explain
to Grandmother
why we looked sick
at the mention of supper.
though double dipped ice cream
was not amiss.
I remember this.
how the mown grass fragrance
made we want to never leave.
the drone of airplanes above
the vivid zinnias.
and the sky trails.
how I cherished
getting the mail
full up with school ordered paperbacks.
the summer classics.
the quick fizz of coca cola
in the jelly glasses
poured over ice.
the sifting of days.
the malted ways.
piano pieces in the afternoons.
I miss you all.
and call you over
the backyard fences of Heaven.
mary angela douglas 14 april 2019
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
April 15, 2019 at 4:03 pm
From now on, when someone says “you got MAD skeels,” I’ll know what they’re talking about.
maryangeladouglas said,
April 15, 2019 at 10:36 pm
BEAUTY ITSELF IS BURNING DOWN: TO NOTRE DAME CATHEDRAL, APRIL 15. 2019
beauty itself is burning down
a newsman cried
with Notre Dame lit like a torch
against the sunset sky
what can we say
from faraway
will the rose windows melt inside
I wondered, can it be so many saints have died
and now their images too their agonies renewed
for another contract, lease
is the name for Paris, rue,
not rosemary, please forget me
what I knew or thought I knew of
Hugo, I thought randomly
cathedrals burning in a green april
april, the cruelest
does the world skip a beat in an afternoon
of eight centuries
the world within the world
we never see
not being visionary
the cathedral erupting into great roses
in a penultimate Spring
the cathedral a great green candle
consumed for the Lord
as if by example, we should be shorn
of our somnombulance
in the lily of this hour
with the traffic no longer surging, transfixed
in the rose of its crumbling
singing, singing singing
the bell into the tower
the tower withstanding
the bell in the tower
the bell in the tower
beyond all wars and scars
the little mockeries in peace time
and yet, crowds grew
and thronged the singeing avenues
willing the walls to stay
for hours and hours
the spire of Notre Dame
our lady’s arrow-sorrow
lit in a golden flame, flickered, floated sideways
what next? The flaking, flinging down of stars. the moon falls into the earth, a mirror no longer
ashes for beauty?
time itself collapsed in a deep black hole
remnants of a single spring twilight
our souls in the rubble still singing.
will not cease, will not leave it this way
on this, no calendar’s day.
mary angela douglas 15 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
April 16, 2019 at 7:47 am
AFTERMATH
waking up at 3 a.m. at first, no thought
it’s still dark
then suddenly, the sinking of the heart anew
oh no, it really happened not to you
to the cathedral
weeping embers still
oh blessed mirage,
kaleidoscopic ark
and smouldering dawn
no war did this.
what must they think of us
in Heaven
who built you stone on stone
that you might remain
the myriad tollling
hours refrain from speech
what words can reach
what hearts can cmprehend
the loveliness lost
how mended, how
we kneel in your dust
and find
His radiance still,
within.
mary angela douglas 16 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 15, 2020 at 12:52 am
THE DREAM OF COMING FROM THE EYE DOCTOR
shadows, but light prevailing is what you see
in the scene where you are coming back from the eye doctor
and this is in a future somewhere not defined yet
the work in progress no one’s ever read
your eyes are skies with clouds and all you see is Heaven
even at the grocery store while waiting at the curb for the
light to turn and you tap with a hidden cane or a shepherd’s crook
the pavement and cannot see that others look at you strangely
the sun is everything now a white gold light that fully fills the frame
of the window you have opened or the one that God has opened
and you see the angels plainly now the familiar faces from home
light years ago
a pink ribbon of a sky
and then, you are gone.
mary angela douglas 14 september 2020
maryangeladouglas said,
April 16, 2019 at 3:06 pm
ADMIXTURE OF KABAKOV, ILYA (AND NOTRE DAME)
here is the boat
you want to get in.
to go to the other shore.
the other shore is a toy.
this does not deter you
from drawing up many plans.
the plans take on
their own luminosity
they have their own closet now
and several angels.
the glass of rose windows
reverts to sand
the plans are everything now.
mary angela douglas 16 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
April 17, 2019 at 11:04 am
WHEN IT GETS THIS WAY
things have fallen off a table
and landed where there are pears,
apples
burnished in gold
where we are told odd fables over breakfast
and midas cornered,
the mice pattern fine clothes
allotted the miracle
of a spot of jam
a fallen crumb
do I hear singing from the attic,
remotely view
the girl in the pier glass cracked
in the chanson
where the rubies gush through
of the light allotted her
where bluebirds fetch
her snowy gowns?
garlands of myrtle…
and the three lilies.
Notre Dame.
my poems burst into flame
and the toy ladders cannot reach them
weeping the violet or the rose.
I have composed it in my sleep
the thing to say
when it gets this way
but the throat of the swan
on the spun glass rivers
is braided with tears.
mary angela douglas 17 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
April 18, 2019 at 6:39 am
MY POEM HAS MANNERS
my poem has manners
sometimes it is diffident
it will pour tea
when there isn’t any in the house
and the cup is cracked
the one with a favorite flower
but you don’t notice
when you drink from it
the whole world seems
hand painted by God
well, who else would it be
although they pretend
he’s not only
an unknown artist
he’s unknown period
.
he’s not even there
well did you make stars
my poem wants to know
or is merely rhetorical
perhaps you should go
my poem wants to cry
it’s like that a lot
you would know
if you lived with it
if you watched it sprout
green leaves.
or wings
if you saw the way
it looks into the distance
as if, into a mirror.
or into the wind
the way it brings roses
into the day
on impulse
and scrapbooks the tears
of small children;
then, their amethyst smiles
mary angela douglas 18 april 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 2, 2019 at 5:29 pm
IN CASE
I dreamed we passed through clouds without aeroplanes
and we were no one’s Project
but lived as we pleased, in the meadows,
understanding the field flowers,
or, when it rained,
under the broader leaves:
durations of the sunlit, the introspective hours
where the light floated through us
in gipsy coloured rays
as though we were prisms.
no census taken, night or day
we became stars and twinkled
in such profusion
they gave up counting us;
resigned from that illusion.
we became rich in ways
not easily boxed
making crowns of tinfoil,
crumpled candy wrappers
we crowned ourselves
and perched our green badged lean to’s
close to the wishing wells
in case the elusive armies
no prisoners taken
and the dogs of blizzards
dormant, should suddenly awaken.
mary angela douglas 2 may 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 4, 2019 at 9:59 am
IN THE COUNTRY
in the country, where one grows old
and the roses shadowing into their dusk
the moon held aloft, a pale green lantern
by whom are these things noted, gardenia soft;
the moon a wide ribbon woven through clouds
consumed for the Soul, that silver moth
it’s the crescent of ending
I behold or you, as you were,
before the floods the candles’
drift on the snowy cakes
the present of it all
in star flecked tissue revealing
you,
on your small porch
looking out on your allotted ocean of time
and the foam of it aqua,
unto the stars, the swing’s wide measure
on the playground dreamed
the dust rising from the shoe scuff of it
the blues and the greens in a whirl
on the carousel colored in; carillions counted,
blossoming pink to white;
the horses raving, frozen as they were
and turning into the Fair remembered
one was fire, singing the milkmaids
in a dawn, the faun colored roses
the heart tuned to pearl
and the dew tinged hour
the freshness rose it was ever Easter
rising, sweets in the grass half hidden
the dime witched dial crumbling you thought
was diamond
the Disneyland beckoning,
reckoning,
of childhood tears behind
dried, in the sullen a pinwheel wind
the music box wounding of it, forgo;
the purple rising,the iced tea clinking
of the glass you were drinking the purple of
what is past and that gleams
the gleams of it far behind now
the Star ahead
the may blossom falter of it;
the ones that loved you
when you were new,
the honeysuckle bright of it,
blazing up
renewed, it’s Christmas;
the angels draw nigh;
Hans Andersen, in a sleigh
parting invisible snows.
mary angela douglas 4 may 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 4, 2019 at 3:38 pm
THIS AND THE THIMBLES SCATTERED
this, and the thimbles scattered
the ones of gold
with the Princess seamstress gone gathering
small mushrooms after the rains
I remember;
we marveled at her marble cake
the bakery made
could she return?
where the traffic stilled.
the raspberry sun
upon our childish once upons.
now the moon has gathered
her ivory flowers in:
our Grandmother’s folded fans
will I recognize your shadow in Heaven
so that I do not sln,
missing the cue of “Rumplestilskin;”
slipping
on polished stairs in a fine gown;
short of the railing
strawberries, cream in an opal dish
oh I wish, I wished, closing my eyes
splashing the angelic.
no one wanted to ruin The Play
to be the one at fault in The Ballet
drawing the curtains;
out of tune with the day, with singing Everywhere.
my thought is a spindle in the wind
it has that quality unwinding
this again and the thimbles scattered
no more patchwork
no more pincushion moon;
valentine saints with the arrows through
she just Was
no more the brightness of thread
which to choose
the where to begin in the musical measure
which riddle to shine
embroidered in time
she never said
when spooning the honey
on our bread.
just God is the Flower that does not fade;
be good, not clever.
in any weather.
you aren’t sugar;you won’t melt.
mary angela douglas 4 may 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 9, 2019 at 3:38 pm
WHO ARE WE THAT YOU SHOULD SQUANDER
who are we that You should squander on us
so many stars, illuminations over the castles
so bright so bright
we forget where we are
in the summer grass
with the fire balloons ascending
the sprinklers, in a purple blue dusk.
there it is, the perennial grace note
in my poem from Ray Bradbury;
torchlight for the gazebo
thank you, Ray.
thank you God who in your green shade
have furnished for us
so many songs.
early and late.
on the piano, the pianola.
oh let the gate, wide open, survive
let all the singers arise
in a silvery stream
beyond sunrise
beyond our qualms
there, with the children making mud pies
where the gardens sing too full of gardenias
and the perfumes of forever,
wafting us on.
mary angela douglas 9 may 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 10, 2019 at 5:15 pm
WE LIVE ON
we live on in the nursery of the world
despite unfinished grocery lists,
keys that plunge to the bottom
of any bag.
what’s to be had now what’s to give away
though Aurora’s rosy fingers
still can tinge the day
at its earliest.
are we on our way
to somewhere we can’t name.
I don’t know.
but in my dreams
sometimes I’m in unknown towns
with familiar scenes.
in old factories
looking for the exit to the right street
the one to take me home.
but home is a ghost ship too
waiting its turn
at the stoplight
gazing ironically at the old trees.
when they sigh I remember
the poet Rilke almost said at times
who sighs anywhere in the world now
sighs for me.
mary angela douglas 10 may 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 14, 2019 at 4:55 pm
SOMETHING
even in a closed system, God can breathe on the pane
out of the ash a sudden ember
though the eye remains
shuttered.
there, on the border of dreams
one may not remember in the morning
something stirs the curtains
in a heralding way.
who can say what it is for sure.
was it the wind
the child awaking early wondered
something else, that gold let in
why pretend if not to know
something glows;it isn’t us.
something
in search of what was when:
Eden, and the rusted gates.
mary angela douglas 14 may 2019
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
May 17, 2019 at 3:10 am
Something in the way MAD moves,
Attracts me like no other luver.
Something in the way she Grooooves
me.
thomasbrady said,
May 17, 2019 at 3:34 pm
Something in search of what was when:
Eden, and the rusted gates.
MAD is the real thing.
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
May 19, 2019 at 1:16 am
I should have pronounced it “loo-vah”
maryangeladouglas said,
May 19, 2019 at 1:02 pm
THE RISING
beginning again on the green leafed path
with the dew on the grasses, our diamonds,
or the overhang of orchid clouds
amazed at our looming shadows on the ground
the alphabet,
all the colours!
and telling time out loud;
telling time by what He said:
“I will make all things new.”
he said this I think, I feel,
in golden letters.
in the tick of the fairy tale clock,
and I play nocturnes again
on my Grandmother’s Steinway piano
observe the irises
take comfort in the demitasse
the way my Grandmother pronounces it,
of hand painted roses, or violets;
on a background of cream. the late strawberries.
the view from the screen door
the sound of near bells
I implore you oh Heavens
for the calendar towel of linen in any year
with the old mill stream;
the songs my mother taught me
in a dream;
the songs without words.
the same cherished pines.
more time to remember
the way that we have come
the rising,
not the setting,
Son.
mary angela douglas 19 may 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
May 22, 2019 at 4:53 pm
DISPENSATIONS
in the eternal moment in your teardrop dispensation
suspended we survive
though we don’t how we are still alive
waiting out the storms.
a crystalline peace descends
the wind picks up
loaded with fragrances
though we don’t know
where the next dollar is
coming from
or who will come beating an old drum
and take our loved ones away.
the axe seems at the root
in the middle of the day and yet
it could happen this way
that angels will stand guard
at our decrepit doorsteps
freezing the axe stroke,
the bureaucratic stroke of the pen.
we are golden.
who cannot turn the Ikon to the wall.
we are in your high tower.
the moment flowers between us oh Lord,
and your deliverance is sure.
mary angela douglas 22 may 2019
Anonymous said,
May 23, 2019 at 3:54 pm
MARISOL IN WINTER SUNLIGHT
Marisol in the marigolds, rose gold aftermaths
was captured in a pose with small birds glittering
about to rise from earth
and Midas the only futile thing in the landscape froze
turning himself to gold and there lost kingdoms shone
as she ran up to greet him with a handful of flowers,
a little girl.
no witnesses but God then tears were stopped forever,
forever immortalized;
and the instant before
with the scudding clouds o Marisol
he could not reach oh Midas
small king that he was,
a token of golden anguish
and the winter sea, its gilded wave
suspended over all,
mary angela douglas 8 july 2018;23 may 2019
Anonymous said,
May 26, 2019 at 10:20 pm
THERE IS NO WILDERNESS
there is no wilderness
in which he will not write
of running streams
or label the stars in jars
and set them on shelves
for future, for tender, reference
counting the opaline his;
every instant, an amethyst.
you will say, perhaps,
why must he sieve the snows;
does he really need that many starfish?
or to carry the roses from Here to There
in a rundown workshop
all chimney smoke
and no wood…
to an infinite garden?
if he only could.
beware of him the mothers cry
clutching their infants close.
he comes from the tribe of wishes
shining into no mirror at all
and crystal pendants
on foreign chandeliers;
year on year,
gathering prisms like moss;
and into the great concertos
that have not yet arrived
he will dodge as into thickets.
why is he alive
at such a cost, contradiction
of being lost and labyrinthine too
pressing the words down carefully
into the Spring mud
as if they would fly away:
the scudding clouds.
and growing stranger day by day
radiant and painting the sun
in an unequal contest;
developing the film all night
ah he is armor bright,
inured to all affliction
so that tomorrow,
the contract with dawn
may be renewed.
mary angela douglas 26 may 2019
Anonymous said,
May 24, 2019 at 10:43 am
ESSE QUAM VIDERI
sometimes truly in a desultory mood
I wonder how is it possible that
so many seem to be seeming to
actually be doing something
so that it all rolls on
when in fact, it is nothing, or
worse than nothing
something to cause more pain
for those out in the rain
and for this nothing they are
praised, paid highly, even promoted
feted even and there is so much paperwork
old file cabinets even overflowing
to be gone through to be filed
on a daily basis
with intemperate notes in the margins
about those who’ve failed in life
so they say, talking among themselves
at the awards banquets
“but we’ve made progress.’
oh they
as if they solved the great equations, parade,
solve nothing at all
and gaze at a person
as if, at a wall, inscrutably
thinking what’s for lunch
I have a hunch;
meanwhile, those affected by the outcomes
suffer even more
because they are judged on top of judged
like a judgement layer cake
by those who don’t admit
their own mistakes ever
and perhaps these people
the wall people
haven’t even made mistakes
but have just been kicked unmercifully
or are something to be stepped over
even when not stepped on
or else are not seen or heard
except by those who collect brownie
points for listening;
or more and more data, extrapolating
from those
who are regarded herd
a diseased herd at that,
so let’s fix them.
and it is everywhere this way.
how long can this go on
I wonder as if trapped in some Aliceian dream or
as if some people would be relieved today
if an asteroid hit the earth or is on it’s way
right now
where the deck is not only stacked
it comes to life and flies in your face
and calls you when you’re wounded, a disgrace
the face somehow they can’t erase,
in the face of everything real, everything you feel
it’s just
children trying to tie their shoes
while other children trip them up
or cases
in which there is no appeal
and everyone knows this but you
even when there are tons on the dockets
for those with empty pockets
for there are judges
pretending to judge
to be ruling on something
all the time
that make a miserable person
even more miserable
call out to God
because, truly
He is the only one
on some days who will NOT “start the conversation up”
keep the thread going, as they say
who actually does something instead
for those still alive from a thousand cuts
not giving socks to those on the street for instance
when what they really need, isn’t it obvious
is a roof, four walls and a door that shuts.
a little sleeping in, not driven from the fold
where rain and judgement
can’t seep in.
beyond the games of “let’s pretend.’
we are charitable.
mary angela douglas 24 may 2019
Anonymous said,
May 24, 2019 at 4:03 pm
RECENTLY, THIS LETTER FROM SHALOTT
I sought the courtly world but it had vanished.
behind the curtains of uncertain dawns
I stood, the unappointed lookout, looking on:
gone were the purple banners and the gold
banishing of the small fears
held aloft at the parades
and decked in flowers.
I stood amazed and soundless then for hours;
the battles I thought over, veering
back, shone illimitably:
in the Pageant of everything unwon.
fresh rains have washed the back roads in the sun
while I scoop rainbows from the clouds…
they’re falling away like leaves in the last
horrific winds before the calm,
but not taking me with them:
the years that no mirage sustained.
and through no haze I contemplate again
the debut in the perfect white dress
the embroidered handkerchief bestowed
the golden task importunate
only you would recognize at all.
I am seeking my lost King, the corner of a last word-
tranquil, folded down;
and reverence linked with song oh, long ago
left for dead.
knowing that I may find instead
ruined cornices dripping icicles before spring…
and these few winter roses for a crown;
more than enough to live.
my mute processions I have gathered tenderly
in the emerald shade of God.
oh let the lights shine down on Camelot renewed,
confessed in these late dreams without regret.
let knights be true.
and constancy my only jewel
though held aloft in the final verse
by fingers this absurdly frail still weeping snow
above the apparent waters of the town.
mary angela douglas 19, 21 may 2012
Anonymous said,
May 25, 2019 at 6:51 am
VAN GOGH SEEN SIDEWAYS OR FROM GREAT DISTANCES ABSTRACTED, INFLUENCED BY KABAKOV…
to understand the founding of the sun
the enigma of clouds in their various
dispositions of rose
there arose one
who had within himself
the reality of sunflowers
who burst upon the page
in saffron
who faded as the day fades.
as the day fades,
I think on my porch,
my invisible wrap around porch
of him;drinking my tea with mint;
not him exactly,
but the way that he saw clouds,
the cloudiness in his work and in his stars
if, indeed, that may be called his;
maybe, for a little while, on loan
that comes and goes
that flows out windows
through the poplars
and into the green Beyond
into the green beyond
where the railing is
mary angela douglas 25 may 2019
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
May 25, 2019 at 2:34 pm
Good one, MAD. I like the little repetitions.
Anonymous said,
May 29, 2019 at 5:53 pm
WAITING YOUR TURN AT THE OPEN MIC, WITH LIGHT REFRESHMENTS SERVED
“My soul, be not disturbed
By planetary war;
Remain securely orbed
In this contracted star…”
Elinor Wylie, Address To My Soul
it isn’t that there should be rules
only it would be good if you could stop the cymbals, noise in your head (the whole time someone else is reading their one poem)
of your own poetry and how nervous you feel to get up there yourself.don’t worry. all things have an end.
this moment is itself a single star blinking.
be still
know only that you are listening
to soul translation
from the original
like sea music coming out of a seashell
held close to the ear and pearlescent.
or static from an old radio used in wartime,
obsolescence
at least in part, you’ve only got
as far as that poet could get the transmission
to come through, without the text
you have to listen hard to catch it
the quartz instances, the heart slipping
on wet stones
then starting up, tremulous
quaking,fish or mermen,
who can tell
a shift in the music, a broken spell,
the ship is freed
the icebergs brood ineffectually
but we sail on.
what if in a huge field the poet before you
has suddenly come upon a rare flower
and drifting, you miss the name…
medicinal flower, the one that would have
healed…the hidden code revealed.
the phantom word in no dictionary at all.
there is life in the flow of words paid attention to,
if not in homage,
no matter how flawed
it may be the heartfelt flaw is the one beauty resplendent
in the antiseptic reading room
doled out by the library with a disclaimer.
where some are gathered
and certain angels, say, are whispering there:
by the back wall:
old speech teachers,beatific; language itself, pale
growing paler, murmuring to a few:
Speak louder, so they may hear you at the Poles…
you may be the last poets anywhere.
as in the last moments of everyone on earth
sometimes, there is gold in the last utterance
of Light
they will say later, in Heaven, on other planets.
referring to this event.
listen…
what if it is, will be, the next batter up,
the last words that you hear, the numbing toll,
the last cherry glaze on consciousness itself.
mary angela douglas 29 may 2019
Anonymous said,
May 29, 2019 at 8:06 pm
should be, in lines 13 and 14: “used up in wartime’s obsolescence.
Anonymous said,
May 29, 2019 at 8:13 pm
and ending should be:
“the last cherry glaze on consciousness itself;
rustling of crab apple tress, indistinguishable
from moonlight”
md. etc.
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
May 30, 2019 at 2:07 am
Beautiful poetry.
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 8, 2019 at 3:05 am
WAITING
tonight I think of waiting.
everyone waits.
I wonder, did He wait too
long ago, when the world was new
for the seed to become a star
to illuminate
a pomegranate darkness
did he watch ferns and shade them with his hand
and place them near trees once they had full shade
was everything made from His waiting
even the peacock fan
all waiting was Love in Him.
somehow we could not wait enough
and so, we packed it in and left Eden.
and now everyone waits. for something.
parents wait for the dawn
hoping their children will live on
prisoners wait for their parole
or wonder, how can I grow old
behind bars
babies wait to be picked up
spinsters for the street car
sleepy children for the end of the story
refugees wait between lands
oh how can they
and many wait for sustenance
in vain. for anyone to call them by their name
not from an agency.
to be safe again in their own homes.
for the war to end.
and long to begin again.
so many wait alone and pray
their pain will not be great
when angels come to the gate
when finally they depart
and all, all wait with a broken heart
that was in my dream…
afraid that the boat of Heaven
will leave without them
some shortlisted year
that no one will know
they were ever even here.
mary angela douglas 7 june 2019
Deuteronomy 31:8 It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”
thomasbrady said,
June 12, 2019 at 3:08 pm
“a pomegranate darkness”
That’s as good as “wine dark sea”
Mary Angela Douglas is a modern Homer.
I wonder if anyone knows it?
maryangeladouglas said,
February 10, 2020 at 1:08 pm
that is a beautiful thing to say. Thank you Thomas Graves. Too much laurel by far for my head though, I think. But kind of you. Maybe the phrase deserves a snip of lilac though from Whitman’s porch. I hope so. I am sorry this is my belated thanks to you because I missed the comment when it was made.
FOR THOSE WHO WROTE THE POETRY OF RAIN
for those who wrote the poetry of rain
as if they mingled with it I write
each small refrain for those
who spoke in the language of clouds
I whisper this aloud
and with the wind to them I send
each line’s regal end
that is no ending.
for those who lived
the fragrance of the rose
the root the stem
the metamorphosis and then who
could who did dispose
with one phrase a world of woe
I dedicate my life as Rilke said
far beyond strife to live and
to go on knowing.
words, as the vessels of the Lord
contain all Beauty.
and enduring love.
mary angela douglas 8 february 2020
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 8, 2019 at 5:46 pm
INCIDENT ON A TRAIN
I take you out of my pocket on the train
carefully
and you shake off the rain
because this raincoat isn’t waterproof
and fling the droplets all over the place
while I pray please Lord of the emerald bird
the topaz eyes, or of the sapphire, growing wise
you, in your rubiness please
make my bird, invisible
and I see the prayer has worked to set up
an invisible screen, kind of a Chinese one
with miniature dragons, thread jeweled suns
so that I and my pet will not be seen
and more to the point, not charged a fee.
here we are. the landscapes rolling by
the washlines with their wash to dry
in all the pastels. small children with their mouths agape
too stunned to wave…
but birdie wants some brunch,
and Im not sure what’s on the menu
for a Firebird, even a small one..
or will I have to feed it, sigh,
just poetry drafts again. old maps
a few saltines.
pimento cheese.
some raspberry Canada Dry.
mary angela douglas 8 june 2019
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
June 9, 2019 at 2:32 am
Thumbs up!
thomasbrady said,
June 12, 2019 at 3:11 pm
I like it! Delightful! I reminds me a little of Paul Simon’s “America” but the words are even better even than that…
Anonymous said,
June 12, 2019 at 3:52 pm
Oh yeah, the raincoat, haha, real detail among great whimsy. I always remember the part that seems to stand stock still in the song “And the moon rose over an open field.” At the same time hearing that song I always wished I had on hand Mrs. Wagner’s Pies which I imagined to be those sugary blue collar pies you always used to find in gas station convenience stores. Dont know anymore as I no longer travel. Yum. We still have them in NC. Little pecan pies too. very small. as if made for elves (not by them, as in Keebler). But probably 1000 calories. What if they came with poems.
Anonymous said,
June 13, 2019 at 12:25 am
Be careful. His bow tie really is a camera.
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 12, 2019 at 3:58 pm
THE LAST WORD THAT YOU SAID
I dreamed that poetry was the last word that you said
the one that had broken off, broken off starlight and
fallen by the road
and it had taken root where no one knew
and broken into bloom
and had become a vast tree
some said the tree of night made more beautiful
with the moon behind clouds and moonlight, then,
imagined.
moonlight then imagined it was poetry too
as there were no singers left who would sing that
when called upon to sing
in storerooms where the dead arts are kept,
in the attics of beauty long neglected
where children go to play
when it rains, when they are disconsolate,
to discover they still can wear it
though it doesn’t fit them yet:
moonlight, the yard, and the blossoming blossoming Tree.
mary angela douglas 12 june 2019
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 12, 2019 at 4:10 pm
Influenced I know at least in part by Pauline Hanson’s exquisite poem SO BEAUTIFUL IS THE TREE OF NIGHT but beyond that, all the storybooks I ever read or that were read to me in little kiddom.
maryangeladouglas said,
February 16, 2020 at 5:49 pm
COLOURS
I listen to colours to the sound of leaves
wind brambled and remember walking through brief
meadows up the hill
to shattering traffic the feeling of mechanical wheels
yet still when it thundered the color was rose
i have passed all the vast equations strewn on the green boards
and understood not even fractions but I know it is certain good
to listen to colours to the sound of leaves wind brambled
to walk through meadows and the cherry trees up ahead the
pink through the fence glimpsed to return home
with your skirt full of brambles and the thorns of small plants
having no other defense than this
to recount to no one listening but with such happiness
I have walked in the beautiful places
and I have not been ashamed.
mary angela douglas 18 february 2020
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 12, 2019 at 5:20 pm
SOME SUMMER
we’ll go spend every pirate coin at the carnival
and then come home to tea
with little pink cakes
how would that be
we spoke to the empty cupboards for her sake
willing them to become
suddenly magical, all twinkly
and fling themselves open to reveal
pink cakes and more
apple core Baltimore
jingle bell time
and one shaded moment
for the wild violet surmise
we feel, while on appeal.
oh close the screen door
cause they all want to be
the one and the only
queen of the white honey
they only come to steal
and the causeways brimming
with gipsies…can’t you just feel it…
or skate on moonlight, plum dusted
who is there to stop you
in the carport
at least in dreams with their bicycle bells
and the evening in violet seams
comes down
it all comes down
in blue taffeta.
still needing to be hemmed
said Grandmother, magical Grandmother.
her mouth all full of pins.
mary angela douglas 12 june 2019
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 12, 2019 at 5:24 pm
my grandmother really did have perfect enunciation. she could have said all that and more with a mouth full of pins, every word like crystal.
Mary Angela Douglas said,
June 12, 2019 at 5:32 pm
Haha. Maybe my grandmother would think some of my poems need to be hemmed, but I doubt it. Im pretty sure some people would prefer I trim them all the way back to haiku but Im not the one in charge.
Anonymous said,
June 13, 2019 at 12:36 am
ghosts in gabardine hammered on the wing
just to hear William Shatner scream those gremlins are gonna make the plane crash….remember T Zone Nightmare at 25,000 feet. my sister and I used to scare each other by pressing our nose against the glass on the living room picture window when one of us was inside. Looks exactly like that gremlin. Try it. This may seem off the subject but Paul Simon did use the word gabardine in that song America. If I ramble I’m not aging. This is the folk song thread and Im a rambler and a gambler. No I’m not.
Anonymous said,
June 13, 2019 at 12:37 am
oops. its not the folk song thread. I still dont have dementia and I dont play BINGO.
Anonymous said,
June 13, 2019 at 12:46 am
And it was Nightmare sy 20,000 feet, not 25,000 but who cares;once you see the gremlin in the party city gremlin suit on the wing, all the numbers go out of your head anyway.
Anonymous said,
June 13, 2019 at 12:47 am
at not sy. bye.
Anonymous said,
June 19, 2019 at 8:29 pm
SADNESS COMES IN WAVES I SAID
sadness comes in waves I said
they closed the door
leaving me to wander near the shore
of it
captive to the day of writing me off
like a bad debt.
they did not care that the ebb and the flow of it
seeped under their door, and marled, and beautiful
as disastrous
pooled in the well waxed hallways, lapped at the balconies’
recreational edge.
my pledge I have kept
windswept
ridiculed, words skewed slightly sideways
by the knowing smiles.
I dont know what they know.
or how they tally up the miles.
God keep me safe.
under no bitter moonlight nor escape
unmined. with no resort but You
oblivious to the time we live in
they think they’ve wasted with me.
in the palace of your mercies,
with my small candle lit.
and Infinite.
mary angela douglas 18 june 2019
Anonymous said,
June 20, 2019 at 2:54 pm
CONFUSED, TANGLED WITH STARLIGHT
{to Jesus, the Light of the World]
did the dark illumine the corners where you were
confused, tangled with starlight
no longer sure of its demesne
how could it remain the same
in the presence of true Light
perhaps the Magi wondered
in their flight from Herod
warned in dream.
it takes centuries to gleam
what else did Rembrandt mean by mingling
dark with light so that it seemed
alchemical, all of it, gold
waiting to be born.gold petticoat showing through
the funereal.
Light shines the scripture says
in darkness
darkness does not understand
why suddenly
it is embroidered with marigolds
and the children are singing it hymns.
mary angela douglas 20 june 2019
Anonymous said,
June 22, 2019 at 3:59 pm
I KNOW YOU WILL
I know You will catch me whenever I fall
into the nets of Your delicate provision
whenever I envision
the world as it was before.
before when you were dreaming
of the colour green
of the canopies of trees and clouds.
before You said one word of leaves, aloud
when Light was a thing unseen.
and wished for, by the angels.
I will remember with You
the notebooks on birdsong
please
going back to those scenes:
Eden before the ruin.
looking for mushrooms
and the tiniest flowers
spellbound for hours
in the green shadows.
in the plum’s purest stain.
the benison of rains;
Orion.
mary angela dougla 22 june 2019
Anonymous said,
July 4, 2019 at 11:53 pm
COLD READING;NOT TO BE RESUMED
it comes back to you like a wave, a cold one
strong enough to knock you down
you feel you are reading your own poem soundlessly
before a crowd but
there’s such a lack of resonance
in the room
you might be reading in a tomb
and not the one where those who died
for beauty rest.
for truth, o, even less.
and a something’s not in tune.
how discontented the orchestra seems
some Greek chorus in a dream
chanting the victims home but there’s no bier.
no Delphic fire.
never mind I said to my soul.
we will be brief
and sail away before we come to grief
captive for a day
that turns out to be a century
like one mistaken, from a foreign shore or
entering through the wrong door
to a stranger’s wedding reception
with radar like detection
scanned and banned
when they assess
you’re not one of the guests.
mary angela douglas 4 july 2019
Desdi said,
July 8, 2019 at 2:35 am
I can’t handle the sheer verbiage . . .
Anonymous said,
July 8, 2019 at 2:42 pm
TO THE MINOR POETS IN A HEARTLESS HOUR, SPEAKING LOVE TO POWER
[to Valerie Macon, who lives for all poetry.and who rose to the occasion]
in almost any poem
someone else’s heart is on the line.
to think this way
is to be subject to the rejoinder
too much schmaltz.
I think, really? Is it better to ignore
as has been done before
of course, always in the name
of Higher Criticism a poet, a peon’s inalienable soul?
of holding to golden literary standards
the person writing anything at all.
in their starry scrawl
as if in the dock, or in jail.
to make them feel, they failed.
is this necessary?
we are all small.
we all try to be known.
some for power.
to occupy a throne.
I am not speaking of those.
even small insects in their summer fields compose
and float up to God
their miniature hymns.
are unacknowledged poets
not as worthy as them?
mary angela douglas 8 july 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
July 27, 2019 at 5:37 pm
As If The Trees Could Not Help;Or Dystopia In Its Meager Hour;Or The Brightest Light Bulbs In The Room…
as if the trees could not help but burst into flowers
nor the stars swirl into galaxies without them
or streams run. under the summer sun
they have decreed all things to grow
in depressing mandates issued by the score
and as they see it, are charged
with telling us so. even how to breathe.
this is the nightmare role
they have conceived
who take notes on the less fortunate
they suppose are unenlightened or just plain lazy.
the lightest reading of the old forgotten tales
would enlighten them
that men perceived to be in ill fortune
are often the most blessed.
but you can’t tell them anything
they don’t think
they already know unless they can think
that you know less. o so much less
though you are schooled in great distress
they imagine they were the first
to come to all knowledge.
and have degrees from every college,
earned or not.
lead the horses to water as you will
they will not drink
no matter what their thirst
unless you think they thought of it first.
mary angela douglas 27 july 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
July 28, 2019 at 12:01 am
CORNER OF THE SKY
that’s your corner of the sky
I whispered to no one standing by
to those who had gone before me unexpectedly
so that the day forever was divided into two parts
the part when I thought they were still on earth
and the part where it seemed to break down
why is there such a veil between heaven and earth
I asked the rains when they swept like the harp glissandos
music, over pain
oh our Sustaining cannot be measured
like a star for magnitude
that’s your corner of the sky I sang and sang
and prayed that it was true.
mary angela douglas 27 july 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
July 28, 2019 at 2:21 pm
THE MOON AT MY WINDOW FOR FREE
sent on a mission to mars and afraid of heights
would I conquer my fear if not the Martians
mending my parachute year to year
having barely mastered sewing on buttons
of a silver, a milky hue like light streaming through
whatever place I was dreaming in at the time.
I practiced gliding in my room in my bright shoes
while reading the news and counting down the days.
but no one was buying it.
who am I to sell moonlight in a jar
red rocks from a distant star
but keep in mind
others went out to the gold mines on a whim
and found nothing then
but empty pockets nights of no diamond sleeping.
I hope to write no resume someday
to live on a planet where this is not required
to define why I should be paid by the hour
when I have Mystery, the moon at my window
for free and all the pearl glorias
singing inside me.
mary angela douglas 28 july 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
July 28, 2019 at 3:46 pm
IT IS NO MARVEL AFTER ALL THESE WARS
‘…Irish poets, learn your trade…’William Butler Yeats
it is no marvel after all these wars
that we should tune the harp once more
and find in every leaf and fin
a gold that limns it all.
Yeats came not to vanish here.
become the sound of distant spheres
disclose the waning, yearning years
and bring to light their sullen eclipse.
let jewels still fall from poet’s lips
who know the mysteries are real
who dare to form from what they feel
a music keened, a boat well keeled
and let the winds of God drive on
in every trembling, rose like song but
rooted in a firmer zeal
in beauty founded, found again
beyond the weal of human sin
let heart be tested in the fire
and find in words the worlds expired
that lived on in the banished soul.
let language be the bell that tolls.
and not the slogan that pretends.
mary angela douglas 28 july 2019
Desdi said,
July 30, 2019 at 7:15 pm
There was a young man
from Nantucket, whose verse
Desdi said,
July 30, 2019 at 7:16 pm
was always Haiku
maryangeladouglas said,
August 3, 2019 at 5:04 pm
ALL THOSE LION DENS
I dreamed that God would lift me from this place
above the lovely tree lines and the sorrowful town
above the Goodwill lost and found
the remnants for the formerly working poor
and the Angel of Death out keeping score
in the count of all the homeless heads
no longer called by their Christian names.
There I would see from galaxies so far removed
the rains sweep in, the birds, and then I would
hear transfiguring birdsong flooding everywhere
the poor had once been.
all those lion dens.
mary angela douglas 3 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 4, 2019 at 1:37 pm
ON SHELLEY
I think of his poems as cloudy weather, magnified
the lark ascending always
a kind of natural ecstacy and yet, immortal in its saying.
ennobling.
but I wonder if Shelley
would have been acknowledged in our time
when so many proscribe in diatribes:
only the political is real. and political poetry.
I am glad he was born then
so that his cloudy imagination
remains on the antique page
undisturbed. as snow at the poles must be
a dream on a now forgotten stage
a dream within a dream
with all your modern semi revolutionary zeal
you cannot kill, not even in yourselves
but only- conceal.
mary angela douglas 4 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 6, 2019 at 5:06 pm
ANOMALIE
I have seen the after mirages of the visionary sometimes
and been effectively, momentarily punished for that seeing
but I still know despite all punishment
what I know and I do not dress for success because
it isnt the outward thing I want to be.
call me an anomalie or whatever you will
I am rooted in sheer poetry forever
and soon, this tree will grow wings and disappear
or leave its rings in a mirroring lake
from which forgotten kingdoms rise.
mary angela douglas 6 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 6, 2019 at 7:58 pm
AND BE RAISED
for Walter de La Mare
walking at dusk in starlight
some have lived
parting the trees as moonlight does the clouds
making their silvery vows
scene after shining scene.
what is it now you waited to believe
caught between centuries as you clearly were
dim is the thought you thought that you preferred
when shifting.. gleam to gleam.
then you are shadow,
sorting out what you dreamed.
bear with it as you can
the livelong days
pass, as you pass among them
in your praise.
tread as you may in velvet
the sad maze
you’ll still be kind
in the wanings, and be raised.
mary angela douglas 6 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 7, 2019 at 12:48 am
CLARITY
I sought clarity but darkness was on the wind
things that couldn’t be mended then
with their one wing
had taken their toll:
hairline fracturing the china soul
I sought somewhere else to go, to be
to remember what it was like
walking under a canopy of trees
thinking that time on earth was a green roof
to cover me, since I wished hard enough for it.
if I get permission and the necessary paperwork is done
can I speak to you who skip brightly on dry land
while I am drowning the best I can.
what should I say.
have a nice day?
while waiting for the ship to come
and feeling like something inventoried.
should I bring you bouquets
and lighten your load
where sunken treasures are.
should I wish upon a star
I will mend my heart with red sealing wax
and carry on as if I were a tree
newly branched.
and play my part in the mystery.
that the sun in my heart is
still sparking words
even if the world goes dark.
mary angela douglas 6 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 7, 2019 at 7:08 am
CHRIST WITH HIS BRIGHTER SHADOW I BELIEVE
Christ with his brighter shadow I believe
though I’m not one for walking out to sea
I know He’s there
when the wind is fair
and when no one says anything to me.
and if the earthquake breaks the seams apart
he’ll be whatever’s left of my scared heart
the ore of gold revealed
and the way, out of it all.
mary angela douglas 7 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 7, 2019 at 8:10 am
HOUSE OF STICKS
we were beggars but we begged from no one
anything but the right to breathe for ourselves.
to watch the shells fall apart
revealing nothing.
so had seeming become an art
so many aspire to
with their own particular Brand
while the image within
of the Weeping God
they don’t understand.
I will be without everything then
with no professional repartee at all
still the skies are His
who swallowed gall
and though I am deemed small,
even minuscule
in the general census of things
still, still I know
far better to be His fool
in a house of sticks
burned down to the Wick
than to live like this
to play the role
and defraud your Soul.
mary angela douglas 7 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 14, 2019 at 12:31 pm
NOMENCLATURE
should we call You by your weeping name
when so much of beauty remains you left for us
on the day that we left Eden.
shall we be Rumplestiltskins, asking it again,
your weeping name, demanding our small toys back.
Ah, Christ, the vagrant hopes grow dim
above the stealing, the conniving worlds;
when wretched men are used to balance budgets,
then, true wretchedness begins.
there is no end of that accounting
no matter how many borders are crossed
or crossed out and sealed. sealing us in.
I see your cross and you on it lifted high above
the spheres and the earth truly a matte and manic flatness
too dull now without you here to gloriously intervene
now that speaking in stars is done.
arise and come you said to us
so many things blessed, blessed are the poor,
for everything,
for what they endure; for the kicking down
the perennial stairs, the wicked and the fleeting glares
I need as flowers do the Sun
your Weeping Name. for oh in sunshine or in rain
through all of Eden that remains.
I have lost my own.
mary angela douglas 14 august 2019 Crystal Towers Public Housing Development Winston Salem, North Carolina
maryangeladouglas said,
August 17, 2019 at 10:00 pm
I READ OF A BOOK ON THE HISTORY OF GLASS
I read of a book on the history of glass
in the National Museum of Ireland
and I thought on a cloud drifting day
with the rains not that far away in Carolina,
I thought, all that has passed
my thinking on the destiny of glass
and high Irish song.
yet still from the aeons where I belonged
a faint stirring rises like the wind,
signaling a storm
the kind that clears the air for clear eyed speech
or shatters it all
and angels beseeching
the beautiful, the faltering airs behold them fallen where
I could not reach
and all was lost from each to each
in a thuderclap morning.
what matters now in the aftermirage
green island and fair where I never was yet wanted to be
I never went to the National Museum of Ireland.
but something in me seems a part of that
and I feel that this is so through the little else I know
through the door that has no key
they will come back to me, in the rounding of the hour
the wounds that have staying power-
and become the sea.
mary angela douglas 17 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 18, 2019 at 3:25 pm
SENTENCES
the beautiful sentence.
the beautiful sentence, alone.
the lillypad sentence
floating
the suspended sentence pale green in its estuaries.
on the wily paper drawn in thick pencil!
I want to write in the largest cursive writing ever
spiro-graphing in cuneiform on flaming poster board
with a Magic Marker
and each successive sentence even larger
because it is the way I feel
when beauty is reeling me in;
but the teacher marks me down for this.
like it’s a sin
in the Sixth Grade, on my report about Jane Eyre,
on Unruled Paper.
it has taken decades for me to understand
why this seemed tyrannous;and why I fumed on the orange
school bus home.
If you do this again…she said, not unkindly.
It is Spring. trellised with lilies, small violets;
the cream bright rose. and we learn madrigals.
a sentence for posies my
Grandmother says and she should know
Shakespeare writ large in sepia
in vast memorials echoing still;
my mother sings of Marble Halls
I will too, despite you all
whoever you may be who imagine
you are in charge of me sentencing me
for sentences ah
my bailiffs, cuffing me
for the way they weave in and out of traffic
or how they appear in dreams;so scintillating,
the way they behave in public company
or pirate like, at sea, brandishing adjectives.
the way they distinguish themselves in opal suddenly
above lost centuries skywriting
on cloudy evenings perilous and clear
showing the way to the King
beyond the wistful the inarticulate heart,
clanging and clanging:
the one and invincible Star.
the sentence of where You are.
mary angela douglas 18 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 20, 2019 at 2:53 pm
STILL SINGING
dear Christ I do not ask superfluous mansions
or the gifts of State
I will wait for you in hovels
or even at the gate, with no roof ever.
only do not sever the heart I kept for You.
what can I do knowing the longitude and latitude
of all ships as they drift.
for me the midnight shift
the candle at its wick
You alone are Light.
I do not need emergency supplies.
or to be overwise.
or to be assured You will endure.
only surprise me with Your green
in every april seen, Spring at the door
even if I through no window look.
or turn to see in indigent liberty
only one blossom left in a desolate field,
to be the one left
still I will honor You
in the falling of the dew
in the bird with one wing reft
still singing.
mary angela douglas 20 august 2019
Crystal Towers Housing Development (under disposition)
Winston Salem, NC
maryangeladouglas said,
August 27, 2019 at 11:23 am
THE ELEPHANT MAN RECALLED
it seemed to him that he should be
the same as others
that he should lay down his head
at Bethel and see the heavens open
the angels descend on ladders
filaments of the stars.
how hard his pillow why would it matter
if he could dream God was not far
oh from the mocked misunderstood
the misshapen vessel that he was
lumbering amid the tiaraed.
flocked to by the tittering crowds.
feted and lovely the center of all praise
he knew he knew he would never be but leprous-
lonely in his days beyond all human anguish to withstand
and in his carnival life abandoned
so ridiculed the elephant man I see him
at the end on a silken pillow sink
as if to say, just once let me be like them
with a dreamlike visage, brokenness
the final snap of the knotted thread he almost sped
into the arms of the crucified Lord.
mary angela douglas 27 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 28, 2019 at 5:18 pm
I DREAMED OF COLOSSUS
(This is not a political poem. this is against the political throttling of the individual, individuated beauty of each human soul; imago dei, for those who think they were born to engineer it, on both sides of the aisle. who lie and lie and lie…
It is, in fact, a nightmare and not a dream though as for Alice in the horrid wonderland, the key is on the glass table, if you only look for it; and the Door to the beautiful garden as I do not believe in leaving the reader stranded)
———————————————————–
I dreamed of colossus and a marble stair
where I looked out on everywhere from the last landing
on the same blank scene
and I woke up and I said I will mean
more than the vastness of snow over the empires
of no soul. those selling even the moonlight for profit and
control
and the view from the empyrean
that outranks God.
all these greek names.
what they reign over now.
sadness the myth of sadness
I can see, all its golden apples
rolling down the hill. the Princess, in name only.
distress and the case for myrrh
and the crystal devastations
of the king’s will; Cassandra and Antigone
perhaps for a little while I’ll be
but never never the chorus
for the song is not good
that hammers fate, determinism home
like a nail through the heart
to rule in God’s stead.
Only Christ is free.
let it be understood.
there’s a tyranny in dreams
that lord it over others.
their sisters and their brothers.
though I am a glass harp
and not the timpani.
still, I dreamed of colossus.
and I wish I never had.
mary angela douglas 28 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
August 30, 2019 at 1:19 pm
THOSE WHO IDENTIFY DIAMONDS
there are those who identify diamonds
inspecting them under a spectral light
so that they may more freely
crush them into diamond dust.
should we go quietly
summoned under moonlight
or should we pray
all night on our knees about the trending Gethsemanes
that we may be delivered
from such as these
should we leave overnight
the unbaked bread
the droning words they gave us to recite instead
of the ones that well from our own hearts
should we allow and allow and allow
the kingdoms of the dark.
how can I know
when my own crushed soul
is bleeding continually
God save us from the unseen petty tyrannies
from those who slaughter and yet
we are still alive.
my God how long all saints have cried have cried
under His crystal throne
sometimes I think the world is on the brink
and Jesus will come to see it all
hidden behind office walls
in the schoolroom, in the hall
everywhere the wolves devouring the sheep.
everywhere beleaguered people
failing to fall asleep for dread of the next work day
while those with invisible truncheons
wield their power
every bloody second of every hour.
mary angela douglas 30 august 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 1, 2019 at 8:31 pm
USED THAT WAY
I would like to be treated as an individual
and not as an anecdotal source
written up in a magazine a journal
of great repute reviewed by someone’s peers
making the career of someone
far younger, even brilliant
or shown upon the screen
of the ultimate power point presentation Machine
making the scene as a sliver of the pie chart
though it’s art Im sure of that, of a certain sort
to undergird someone’s mission statement
so the voiceless can be heard and really
when does that ever happen but snap to it
to applaud the populations sewn in half
and magically restored ;
final theses by the score on the subject full of buzz.
my life having furnished details on the above
in places I myself would most likely
not be welcome, much less hired.
to earn another praise is perhaps the
action of saints. to use another’s lifetime
to grind out statistical reports so you can
visit all the resorts
I cant have any mercy for.
or fellow feeling.
forgive me if I am wrong.
but all of us here not so collegially
really don’t want our anguish mined
so you can flourish in the daily grind yourself
while we’re on parade:
clear examples of everything
wrong with our country
so some say; or props of the progress you’ve made
while given props for throwing shade on us
in turning our lives around but
in the wrong lane. forgive me if I complain.
and may I just say, having found my own voice by myself
we just dont want to be used that way.
mary angela douglas 1 september 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 3, 2019 at 12:33 pm
I’d Rather Be Warm Than Trendy: A Cheery Winter’s Tale
I want a winter coat that sweeps the ground
no matter what they say to me in town
when they dart out in shirt sleeves
even though they’re freezing;
endow me with their fasionista frowns.
well, it’s alright.
I want a hat that covers up my ears so tight
though I will not be counted as your peer.
two hats, or three and I’ll be filled with glee
and then I’ll be a happier me
though you think I look so absurd
and then a scarf that winds around the moon, the earth,
or could, woolly, woolly
good good good good good
I’ll be warm as toast
confident in the Holy Ghost
with cherry mittens on and then some.
warm all day.
no matter what you say!
jingely jingle all the way.
as if Im in the month of May.
mary angela douglas 3 september 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 9, 2019 at 8:11 am
A FEW METAPHORS ON WORKING FOR A LIVING
we have felt half measures, quarter measures
and measured words, too
slogging through rain, or sleet, or snow
almost as soldiers do or simmering summer parking lots
like deserts
to make up the city plotted distance from the bus
to where our warehoused duties wait.
probationed like prisoners from the word go
in some places
you know, to show us who’s in control.
and you’re on trial, or even, on loan.
and don’t know anyone this far from home…
oh, my soul by planetary wars be not disturbed
the poet wrote. I add as a footnote.
this is what is called
working for a living and we are grateful
and forgiving
considering the alternatives.
yet when push comes to shoving us out the door
because you know they want to make more
and the easiest way is to cut your job
whatever it is
to make a Merry Christmas for the shareholders.
how can we not have a stake in this
when our lives are at risk, our families too
or maybe, only, our modest hobbies.
what we consider our life. our shabby home library,
more than shabby chic;
astronomy, keeping the goldfish fed.
other countries, torn by strife
by bloody civil unrest we know, we know
and children on their own
in every kind of zone
have suffered more than we, than me,
in the land of the nearly free on weekends
and I bow down and on my knees
for them.
but one small hymn
I sing for all my peers
who are counted failures.
wait. wait for the Gate swinging open
for your tears are heard
despite your being herded.
by the one who is the Word
that cannot be broken
who won’t use you like a token
to barge through the golden turnstiles.
though from the time that we sign on
each day survived seems like a miracle.
still to be there.
but for how long.
each day feels a little
like the French Revolution.
new heads may roll.
so you perfect your role
in the enterprise avoiding the tumbrils
the best you can
being pretty far out
from the chain of command
and they’re not sending the
Coast Guard
to find you in the flood.
though the One they crucified will.
_________________________
(the poet I cited is Elinor Wylie)
P.S. may God truly bless companies, managers,
coworkers who still retain the milk of human kindness.
and forgive those who don’t.
mary angela douglas 9 september 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 11, 2019 at 3:21 pm
SO WHAT IF WE THREW WORDS INTO THE AIR
so what if we threw words into the air
repairing nothing
they were all we had
aspirant jugglers that we were
but sometimes merry
spinning our plates
while Time waits at the Gate,
the garden one.
beyond it are the Fates
spinning the gold of Shakespeare,
Keats, the clarion greens of Rilke,
all those letters.
from high towers he called the angels
and his words grew little wings
and they have gone so far
into my heart
as to become a landscape
littered with stars.
we wrote in cloud breath on the panes
of Christmas;
punctuated in offices on our own
keeping the dream of appled home
amid the tiny exiles.
the sword upraised from the Lady’s lake.
brush your rosebud tears away
for what seems to have come to you
too late. the amber birds of Mahler rise
to stay your executions.
maybe the heart gives out,
but Music remains
like the golden ball in the well
the frog kept fetching back
alas alack the goose queen, princess, cried
stepping out in the moonlight on the Other Side
where she never can grow wise
because she can’t leave lace like
wonder, ever, behind.
the clouds shaped like the bracelet charm
pianos.
mary angela douglas 11 september 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 13, 2019 at 5:23 pm
TO WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
as far as day is from night then
you would be tuning your harp
near the rills down to Benbulbin
or where I cannot wind
because I’ve never been there.
but I have been in poetry
thick as field flowers up to my chin
in it so that the gold rubs off
and I would remember clouds
and their roselit aftermaths
and so much then
that could not be said
any longer, in words.
where has the treasure gone
and who has filched it now.
who will find them again
the lost longings crystallized
the music, measure by measure recalled
the strains of immortal language
falling on the air
like thundering pearl.
and the awe of it all.
mary angela douglas 13 september 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 14, 2019 at 1:25 am
HERR RILKE’S HIGH SCHOOL REUNION
oh to the drill and the picking apart of the heart remembered
at dinner is poetry’s orphan picking at his food
impossible to imagine the perjuries
in the drawing room
where pupils learn manners
and how to cloak mockery
beneath it all. fall in.
its the fall of the year
he walks the footpaths endlessly
and the leaves are with him sympathetically
and the roots of trees
the stars, far from military occupations.
robot student expectations
click heels. it comes again
endless misery to the dreamer
perched as if before death
on an unseen branch
that weeps in the constellations
only for him.
mary angela douglas 13 september 2019
Anonymous said,
September 17, 2019 at 2:00 am
This is good. I like when you get weird. The weirder the better.
maryangeladouglas said,
September 17, 2019 at 4:01 pm
There is nothing weird about my writing or my subject matter. I dont know why you would even say such a thing. But to each his own.
maryangeladouglas said,
September 17, 2019 at 4:36 pm
You can throw all the spitballs you want at the Sun. Light is still light. And spite is the cheapest cereal toy of all.
Anonymous said,
September 18, 2019 at 7:27 pm
You don’t take a compliment worth a shit.
Desdi said,
September 21, 2019 at 6:59 pm
I also like when she gets weird.
Nothing weird about that.
No spitballs, no spite.
maryangeladouglas said,
September 17, 2019 at 4:03 pm
IN THE ARKANSAS WOODS
the bridge is broken where it stood
the bridge of stone
the mill wheel will not turn again
and I miss home.
November’s startled leaves by some mysterious angel, jinn
by some weird turning of the wind
will lift in random flight
the earth rich loam it feels my own
the skies filled with their ransomed light.
I used to feel with every leaf
like Shelley, my whole soul could lift
and in far childhood with a small wagon
i carried whatever I could of drifts
time has drifted now
I am the same somehow
sifted by love and grief
for this little bit
in the woods at dusk
but turn I must
through all this gold that now has set
and the leaf mold’s beauty
I can’t regret.
mary angela douglas 17 september 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
September 24, 2019 at 1:32 pm
THE WAY TREES GROW IN DREAMS
the way trees grow in dreams
their roots out toward the stars
when the great storms come
I wanted an art song made of this
in an unwritten language.
oh I felt wistful on the looking glass side
looking back at home and its inversions missed.
I wanted to grow like trees in dreams
and so I thought of this
sending this message, waking from one.
one dream like a sigh with a faint imprint on the morning
I have left for you here.
when you are clouded
reading your lines.
when the silver shoes you’ve shod.
things lined in velvet disappear
roots first, defecting,
into God.
mary angela douglas 24 september 2019
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
September 26, 2019 at 1:52 am
I like the term “shod” Defecting into God? HELLO.
Anonymous said,
October 4, 2019 at 2:44 am
I find it rather interesting that room was made for a children’s song, and yet, no Pink Floyd… Curious
thomasbrady said,
October 5, 2019 at 5:09 pm
I love Syd Barrett and Floyd. As lyric writers, they are certainly good, but as “poetry” it’s either a bit campy or a bit obvious. Could have included them, certainly. If someone makes a song suggestion, we have been known to add it right to our list…
Desdi said,
October 4, 2019 at 12:18 pm
Love the Floyd’s early stuff.
I tuned out after “Wish You Were Here”.
Piper at the Gates of Dawn, Saucerfull of Secrets, More, and Meddle are my faves.
What’s your favorite ?
Pop Leibel (@Pop_Leibel) said,
October 6, 2019 at 1:41 am
Careful with that axe, eugene.
Gary B. Fitzgerald said,
October 7, 2019 at 1:30 am
Another brick in the wall.
Desdi said,
February 17, 2020 at 4:10 pm
Forgot to mention “More”, soundtrack of a quirky film but great songs IMO.
noochinator said,
February 16, 2020 at 10:57 pm
‘Animals’ has its moments— didn’t appreciate it as a callow 16-year old, but now that I’m pushing 60 it sounds a lot deeper. Herezit live!
Tracklist:
00:00 Pigs On The Wing (Parts I-II)
04:25 Dogs
22:20 Pigs (Three Different Ones)
39:41 Sheep
maryangeladouglas said,
October 12, 2019 at 1:23 am
YOU MY METAPHOR ROBED IN GOLD
for John Donne in his devotions
You my metaphor, robed in gold
My Light My Night
my new and old
my Spring My Winter
in repair
the ghost of Beauty
everywhere
though I am mocked on every side
and in my tears left to abide
I know that You my tower shall be
beyond the lies of mimicry
beyond the clique’s door
clicking shut
beyond the fear of mold and must
my Diamond and my star removed
the witty marking
Christ’s own fool.
one of an abandoned tribe
a poet seared
a friend denied
still I wait and not alone
where You remain
my only home.
mary angela douglas 11 October 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
November 5, 2019 at 8:20 am
THE SUM OF WHAT YOU ARE
the voice you hear
from long ago
could be the voice
of all the snows
could be the light of all the stars
of all the feelings near or far
you felt just when
the world was new
until the sorrows
ransacked you
until the mornings cold and drear
deprived you of the voice you hear
at this late age of all the snows
of all the stars and meteor glows
of all the feelings near or far
you feel again
the door ajar
to take you from the sorrow here
that cut your heart from year to year
and lead you then through all the snows
away from all of hardship’s blows
away from what you felt of fear
to One who loved you oh so dear
who made the snows who made the stars
who made the sum of what you are.
mary angela douglas 5 november 2019
thomasbrady said,
February 17, 2020 at 3:36 pm
“You my metaphor, robed in gold.”
I like that Mary. You come up with the most stunning phrases.
maryangeladouglas said,
February 17, 2020 at 8:09 pm
Thank you so much, Tom. I appreciate that as does the poem itself.
thomasbrady said,
February 17, 2020 at 4:57 pm
“the voice you hear
from long ago
could be the voice
of all the snows
could be the light of all the stars
of all the feelings near or far
you felt just when
the world was new
until the sorrows
ransacked you”
This is a clinic in meter—all iambic rhythm (the VOICE you HEAR from LONG a-GO, etc) and then boom! “RAN-sacked you” is dactylic. Sound echoing sense.
Well done!
This is rare in poetry today…
maryangeladouglas said,
February 17, 2020 at 8:11 pm
Wow. I didnt even know I was doing that. I really write poetry by ear, inner ear. I cant read the music of the iambs and etc. unless I make a conscious effort with the poetry handbook by my side. I mix up the names for things. But cool to know I accidentally did that, haha. You would know better than I, that’s for sure.
maryangeladouglas said,
February 18, 2020 at 11:31 pm
I ATE WORDS
I ate words.
you use what you have.
under the bitter the lemon coloured moon.
I ate words. or wove them on a loom
to make fine cloth
though not of gold but golden
illuminated, like icons.
sometimes I put them in a salad.
then I was the princess along a reedy bank
gathering sweet grasses for soup. or wild onions.
spoken to almost by little birds
soupcons of light.
I was led
to drink water
from fair streams
and in the end I dreamed of home.
feeling less alone.
mary angela douglas 18 february 2020
maryangeladouglas said,
November 7, 2019 at 3:33 am
TO THE STATE OF ARKANSAS ON THE MATTER OF MY SISTER FILE THIS UNDER CRUEL CASE 60PR-16-226
they will bring you information back in a thimble
that maybe was true two years ago.
you will scrape the bottom of the well
of wishes. but there will be no residue.
you will write and there will be no reply.
or there will be a reply as transparent as glass
taking wing into the Invisible
and meaningless in any language.
we are free scream the posters
scream the candidates on tv
or whisper to themselves at odd moments
happy with their salaries.
that their favorite restaurant in a chic spot
is always glad to seat them.
we are free I cry myself to sleep.
free to be told nothing
as if our heart had disappeared
our soul skipped town.
mary angela douglas 6 november 2019
maryangeladouglas said,
February 8, 2020 at 6:32 pm
TO VIRGINIA WOOLF, AGAIN
“her hands moving beautifully through the teacups”
I read this line in a book by Virginia Woolf. it was her first one.
well; who could drown that line.
or others, cathedral lit.
the colorist, sublime.
did you ever read her really
I bite my tongue not to ask
her critics first and last
and I’m still wondering
about all of that.
I dont think you heard a word I said
I seem to hear her delicately peal and laugh
watching the inward rose bloom outward
far from Time at tea, with Lytton.
dressed in blue as the Heavens are blue
and in a bright mood ever.
her hands moving beautifully through
another page of wonder.
snow on snow.
mary angela douglas 8 february 2020
maryangeladouglas said,
February 20, 2020 at 12:37 am
STILL, THE WATCHER
all the words I’ve ever read
all the music that I’ve heard
lodges in my soul forever
blue jay feather mocking bird.
small steps taken in the sunlight
by the guardian trees at home
I still keep though home has vanished
I am my own Rosetta stone.
rings of trees, light caught in amber
remnants of the honeycombed
stowed inside in winter weather
kept my failing heart, alone.
snows that fell in flower cups
frost that fell before their time
blossom still like starlight in me
gold and silver in my rhyme.
asking nothing fame nor fortune
just to walk beneath the stars
still I watch and still the Watcher
watches over me and mine.
mary angela douglas 19 february 2020
noochness said,
May 3, 2020 at 5:58 pm
Speaking of Disneyland (mentioned above),
Here’s a poster from “The Realist” that I love:
Chado said,
October 18, 2020 at 12:27 pm
I thought of Thomas and Noochinator when I found this. Piano part of Roxy Music song “She Sells”. Lyrics (as poetry) are below. Tom, I still am sad you don’t like Roxy Music. 😢
Now you’re talking in headlines
Up to the minute and free
Stop press, hold the front page
Up as a mirror
Are you reading me?
Watch you walking in waltz time
A jigsaw puzzle in tune
Or are you faking a straight line
To suit yourself too soon
Rather nouveau than never
Contemporary ideal
Some natural kind of poet might slow it
But she sells more my speed
She sells country and modern
Ancient western song
Of oriental confusion
You so right, me so wrong
Now you’re fixing to fly me
Auto-erotic, please,
On the break that you’re gliding.
Your lingerie’s a gift-wrap
Slip it to me
Nine till five
The daily grind
Made-up lies
Make up my mind
Same machine consuming you
Consuming you
Oh why
She sells . . . I need
Oh why love why
She sells . . . I need.
noochness said,
October 18, 2020 at 6:47 pm
Seeing the pianist’s sleeves, I thought for sure it was Eno playing!
thomasbrady said,
October 19, 2020 at 2:16 am
Yeah I couldn’t help but notice that sweater. Good grief. As for the song, it sounds vaguely like a song by Queen—I heard hints of Bohemian Rhapsody. The lyrics don’t do anything for me…
Chado said,
October 18, 2020 at 12:41 pm
And after listening to and loving this song for years, I finally got the word-play of the title:
“She Sells”
(yes I can be a bit slow, you are right)
thomasbrady said,
October 18, 2020 at 4:12 pm
I love these guys. Twoset Violin. Every video I’ve watched by them so far has been great. I don’t hate Roxy Music. I just find it meh.
Chado said,
October 22, 2020 at 7:00 pm
OK. But I don’t get the connection between these two and Roxy.
Did I miss something obvious?
thomasbrady said,
October 24, 2020 at 3:19 pm
Chado, I think you did miss something obvious. You said you were “sad” that I don’t like Roxy Music. Roxy Music, or anything, is liked, or not, due to the musical taste of its listeners. I like Twoset Violin because I LOVE Classical Music, from Bach to Brahms to Satie and Ravel. So I can’t help it, if musically, Roxy Music is just not that impressive to me. That leaves their extra-musical elements, and their lyrics—which are…what? Why should I have strong feelings for these? On a scale of 1 to 10, how interesting are these, in terms of poetry, sensibility, wisdom, humor, art? Are these that impressive, so that I can overlook the musical shortcomings? I’m afraid not. I don’t know what else I can say. How many bands and composers are there in the world? I just don’t have time for Roxy Music. Never mind Mozart or Ravel. What about Syd Barrett’s Pink Floyd, or Brian Jones’ Rolling Stones, just to name a couple of pop bands. The field of good or interesting music is too crowded. It’s too strong a statement, really, to say “I don’t like Roxy Music.” I don’t have time for them. I fully understand, that by saying this, I’m only going to drive you further away from understanding, and the end is result is that you will find yourself liking Roxy Music a little bit more. But that doesn’t matter, because the amount of love you have for Roxy Music makes no difference to me whatsoever.
Chado said,
October 24, 2020 at 3:37 pm
Ok. Now I understand the two Asians comparing Mozart and Salieri. You clarified it for me. Thank you. I am fanatical about Roxy, but you are rlght, in comparison to most classical music, Rock’n Roll is primitive. I wish I had listened to more Classical but my tastes were corrupted early.
Goran said,
October 24, 2020 at 10:30 am
https://genius-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/genius.com/amp/Nick-cave-and-the-bad-seeds-where-the-wild-roses-grow-lyrics?amp_js_v=a6&_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D#aoh=16035349272387&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&_tf=Fr%C3%A5n%20%251%24s&share=https%3A%2F%2Fgenius.com%2FNick-cave-and-the-bad-seeds-where-the-wild-roses-grow-lyrics
thomasbrady said,
October 24, 2020 at 3:30 pm
Goran—those lyrics are good.
The theme is common in old ballads. Here’s one:
Pretty Polly —anonymous
This is how Peter Seeger sang it back in the 50s
Oh Polly, Pretty Polly, come go along with me
Polly, Pretty Polly, come go along with me
Before we get married some pleasures to see
They rode over mountains and valleys so deep
They rode over mountains and valleys so deep
When Pretty Polly she began to weep
Oh Willie, Oh Willie, I’m afraid of your ways
Willie, Oh Willie, I’m afraid of your ways
I fear you will lead my poor body astray
They went up a little farther, and what did they spy
They went up a little farther and what did they spy
A newly-dug grave, and a spade lying by
Oh Polly, Pretty Polly, your guess is about right
Polly, Pretty Polly, your guess is about right
I dug on your grave the best part of last night
He stabbed her in the heart and her heart’s blood did flow
He stabbed her in the heart and her heart’s blood did flow
And into the grave Pretty Polly did go
He threw a little dirt over her and started for home
He threw a little dirt over her and started for home
Leaving nothing behind him, but the wild birds to moan.
Chado said,
October 24, 2020 at 4:09 pm
I have searched for these lyrics ever since a friend sang it in high school decades ago. Never knew it was covered by Pete Seeger.
It is quite the tragic Appalachian ballad. A real Scot/Irish death trip.
noochness said,
October 25, 2020 at 1:31 pm
When I saw “Willie, oh Willie”, I thought of this one:
noochness said,
October 26, 2020 at 7:54 am
This is a pretty good one — I recognize some of the films but not all:
maryangeladouglas said,
July 13, 2021 at 7:34 pm
THE SENDOFF TO THE PALE BLUE GALAXY 500
I hope that when I die my grandfather comes to pick me up
in his pale blue Galaxy 500 Ford with Grandmother by his side
in her rose taffeta with the velveteen jacket and the rhinestone buttons
Mama in the back seat in her lilac Easter dress is working on poems in
an Eagle tablet with the two dogs, Fearless and Poochum Woochum
Tak a tak a Toochum getting along famously hanging out the window
and my sister just around the bend emerging from Carnegie Hall
in Heaven to massive applause and bouquets thrown from here and there
and huzzahs and hurrahs
and she climbs in too, there’s plenty of room even for the bouquets
and we pull up to Hamburger Heaven a roadside stand
across the way as plain as day the Heavenly Arkansas Gazette
where my father has just put the galactic issue to bed in the white night that is Heaven
now the stars being visible in daylight
we are singing Pickin on A Harp with a Golden String
and our harmonies are Grand.
even Grandiloquent.
with Hershey Bars, the silver foil peeled back
in abundance; Wheaties, the Breakfast of Champions.
mary angela douglas 13 july 2021
maryangeladouglas said,
July 13, 2021 at 7:47 pm
oops. Hershey Bars. Not good to mispell that one;just lost my golden ticket to a lifetime supply of them.
thomasbrady said,
July 14, 2021 at 3:58 pm
Fixed it, Mary. A happy poem, indeed.
Lindt Dark Chocolate 95% Cocoa is healthier, they say…
maryangeladouglas said,
July 14, 2021 at 6:39 pm
Thank you Thomas Graves. Golden keeper of the Scarriet vault. Im sure you’re right about the chocolate. Good to know. Hershey bars for my Grandparents were imbued with a kind of halo though since chocolate was expensive for them durinig the Depression and rationed I think in WWII or at least, sugar was. When my Grandmother would give us Hershey Bars and apples after school in the late 1950s and early 1960s, she handed the Hershey bars to my sister and I as though they were bars of gold from Fort Knox. So I like when I can, haha, to “load every rift” with that particular golden ore. Thanks for noting it is a happy poem;the best way to describe it. I could want no better category for it.
maryangeladouglas said,
July 14, 2021 at 6:49 pm
I just thought of something kind of funny. My grandparents often sang little bits of songs or recited poems together spontaneously for us out of the clear blue nowhere of the moment. It would have been fun if they had sung that song with the memorable line “Come away with me Lucille/in my merrry Oldsmobile” as my Grandmother’s name was Lucy Jane. But they often broke out into that celestial round: “Pickin On A Harp With A Golden String” and we would join in. That really did happen. The extent to which it feels like all that happened on another planet is pretty great now although as soon as I stepped out of the house it was always that way. Their HOUSEHOLD was another planet, even back then. A planet I truly loved and the only one I ever felt at home on.
thomasbrady said,
July 15, 2021 at 2:33 pm
My daughter sings to herself a lot. My mother never put a record on. My father had the great record collection of all kinds of music, classical, folk, jazz, etc I sing and whistle and hum all the time. I think I get along better with people who love music—especially classical and sentimental music…I think I’m a much better person because I let Mozart’s piano concerti 11 thru 27 pour into my soul almost every day, as well as other kinds of music….I’m not a snob, either, I pick out all kinds of pop songs on the guitar once in a while. Melody, melody, melody. People say “I prefer rhythm.” Well, sure. You can’t have melody without rhythm….
maryangeladouglas said,
July 15, 2021 at 4:50 pm
Absolutely wonderful to know all this. I do appreciate your intense musicality and especially love your lists of various songs as have so many others. You certainly have an ear for the beautiful phrase in music as much as for the beautiful phrase in poetry and at least some of us still know they are deeply related: the musical note and the poetic one. Fantastic about your Dad’s record collection and growing up that way. I will have to look into Mozart more. I have heard him in a general way since babyhood as well as many of the classical greats due to my Grandmother and her record collection and her constant piano teaching in our childhood home but music is like an ocean especially classical music and it is always possible to learn more and to listen in a more detailed way;I will happilly look into the concerti of Mozart you have mentioned and gain a new insight I am certain not only into Mozart but into your abiding love for him. For myself I guess I would say I favor, out of the classical most, Beethoven, Ravel, Debussy, Faure…but its all a wonder …and its so endlessly refreshing and lovely. Listening to Mozart every day is a wonderful way to live. Hope you write more about music as well as poetry and of course, your own poetry which you pursue with so much dedication. Let the music come through always. I would say also, while on the subject, I think your reading voice is quite musical and I do enjoy the short musical pieces you have written that you share. They have a kind of out of time ghostly quality I especially like.
maryangeladouglas said,
July 15, 2021 at 4:57 pm
Forgot to say I also love Mahler, Sinding, Charles Ives and Aaron Copeland a lot. The only jazz I ever really liked was Rublen Blades album America but I dont share his political views needless to say. Doesnt stop me from loving the music. Folk scene long time loved the music of Joan Baez especially her earlier voice, the lyric soprano. I feel like in her case politics knd of ruined her voice. Eventually. And her trying to be a blues singer. She had such an exquisite way of singing the Child ballads I dont think anyone else could ever compare. And it is beyond wonderful your children have musical tendenceis too, but heck, how could they not have?
maryangeladouglas said,
August 27, 2021 at 11:18 am
MY GRANDMOTHER’S PIANO
so let one diamond scarab constellation lie
gathering the evening into pale indigo folds
and we will recount old stories out of those long agos
from Schirmer’s library in red and gold
or bid the long cherished music rise
as if, composed on the instant.
in every piano now I hear the one
most customary Steinway in my Grandmother’s home
sweeter to me those notes than as Scripture imparts,
the honeycomb
or any that clashed in Beethoven like storms
dazzling the birds into extravagancies of birdsong
or in the gushing streaming of rain down the drainpipes and into the
suburban lanes that I remember too. and all that ethereal blue
of Little Rock’s sky written views
as Stevenson said “oh home no longer home to me
whither will I wander…” from you
now that that piano has set like an ebony sun
the lid closed down in plum eclipse; sheet music shuttled away;
the glass bright sounds surely having drifted so much farther into
Space
than when we were children not knowing how time could run;
mystified;learning about grace notes.
serenades;the occasional tarantella
in rose flame taffeta
my Grandmother smoothing the dream chords
of her Liebestraum…long into the late afternoons.
the may flowering early moons of the Spinning Songs of aspiring
pupils have spun their irremediable gold
oh lovely music;that cannot be resumed.
I hold to you and will not let you go.
mary angela douglas 26, 27 august 2021
thomasbrady said,
August 27, 2021 at 6:27 pm
That piano has set like an ebony sun,
the lid closed down in plum eclipse
…
Oh lovely music that cannot be resumed
maryangeladouglas said,
August 28, 2021 at 2:35 pm
You always catch the glint of the gold behind the darkening trees Thomas Graves. In any poem of anyone.
maryangeladouglas said,
February 19, 2022 at 6:51 pm
IN LOVE WITH THE LIVING DAY
may we be in love with the living day
we who have traveled far from
the realms of childhood or so we’re told
or made to believe;
with the peach, the gold
and silver finishings of clouds
the fragrances of rain in all seasons
the halos around the moon
the cropping of stone.
I have loved the earth in a quiet way
alone
a small bell ringing in His vast carillons
still with the mingled voices of the past to say,
in a fairy tale, seeming:
do not depart from me oh loveliness of evening
may I see still the rainbows at night converging
and never blind to music sense in my one true soul
when gathering all my beautiful suppositions, oh
the billion watt white gold
candelabras of the sun.
mary angela douglas 19 february 2022