Saturday, 28 April 2012

Poems for Occasions

A funeral affair

 

There must be lots of things to say
About you now you're gone away
But most of them might seem unkind
At least the ones that spring to mind
You were not fair or good or true
You only seemed to care for you
You showed no heart or sympathy
So let us end you honestly
No one will cry for you today
At most a little prayer they'll say
Perhaps they'll urge you try again
But for god's sake be still till then

 

 

 

 

A wedding poem (not to be read at weddings)

 

Oh, another girl in big frock
Oh, another suited groom
Oh, another messy, lost flock
Oh, another sense of doom

Oh, another huge tiara
Oh, foundation everywhere
Oh, the bride looks like her father
Oh, those looks weren't made to share

Oh, another hundred places
Oh, another chicken dish
Oh, just look at those grim faces
Oh, they should have gone for fish

Oh, I bet they all want ABBA
Oh, except that fierce young man
Oh, he'll want early Nirvana
Oh, that's not the thing for Gran

Oh, are weddings ever special
Oh, they can just merge as one
Oh, they can be simply dreadful
Oh, may my day never come

 

 

 

 

Bad interview technique

 

What is it they say?
Imagine them naked
At the job interview
And I do
But it’s not bare bodies I see
It’s stark naked souls
Most disturbing
It makes me twitchy
And unlikely ever to gain employment

 

 

 

 

Happy war

 

I just can't do it
Can't write one of those inspiring
'They gave their lives with honour' numbers
Packed full of glorious verses
Poppy fields swaying
Twelve geese a-laying
It's not happening

Can't manage either
An anti-Bush and Blair anthem
Would love to write one
But just can't find the words
Blair, Blair
It's not fair
It's not looking good

Even avoiding the 24 hour news diet
War can be just too graphic for words I think
Men and women are taken to pieces
Some quickly, some slowly
Some end widows, some widowers
And what is the word for a mother, a father
Who no longer has any children left living?

The radio talks of war
And I see arms and legs
Loose without bodies
And lots and lots
And lots of blood
No poppies, no roses, no flowers really
Just boxes and bags of bits of people

Even the oh-so local papers can't avoid it
Every day faces smile out of people now dead
They are gone past us but the smiles remain
Unsettling, unfair, unbearable
Smiles show strangely the pain of loss
The quite possibly perfectly pointless sacrifice
They make writing difficult, living difficult.

 

 

 

 

Happy new hope 

 

Years have to start with hope, this is essential
We have to feel that good things are to come
A lack of hope can be most detrimental
It can stop New Year’s Eve from being fun.
No, seeing smiles ahead is fairly vital
We should see triumphs and tranquillity
We listen (hark) for fanfares by the skyful
Between them sighs contented, full and free.
We need to feel our hearts are in it with us
That hope has made it, somehow, through and through
Life’s switches may be always out to dim us
But we can think of ways to glow anew.
This New Year’s hopes might be the ones to make it
The outstretched hand - we see it, match it, take it.

 

 

 

 

Short valentine

 

Roses are red
Violets are violet
Please love me
My life's in the toilet










All poems by Rachel Fox (some time after 1997)

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