Best Euros Poems


They Don'T Bite Like They Used To

He sat there in his fav'rite chair, a blanket 'cross his lap 
And covering his snow white hair was his old fishing cap. 
I knew he could not talk to me since suffering the stroke, 
But still I sensed he could relate to ev'ry word I spoke. 
"I went and wet a line today ... down where you caught that cod. 
The biggest one you'd landed yet and though it was my rod 
I reckon he was yours all right ... but cod are far and few.  
They don't bite like they used to dad.  They don't bite like they used to." 
 
"The algae's building up again and stuffing up the creeks, 
Though at long last we had a fresh, the first in flam’in weeks. 
Pulled twenty stinking euros in, along with one old dew, 
But they had sores all over them, though still that's nothing new. 
The cotton farmers cry, "Absurd!  It can’t be from our spray." 
Perhaps the fish have just got aids from turning flam'in gay. 
Its getting pretty sad all right, but what can one bloke do.   
They don't bite like they used to dad.  They don't bite like they used to." 
 
"McDonalds seems to be the go and good old KFC 
And eating yellow-belly is a flam'in rarity.   
Your grandson won't go fishing as he says it's just for nerds 
And when I take the missus we just end up having words. 
I really miss our fishing trips, your company was swell 
And by the mist there in your eyes you miss them dad as well. 
I heard you sold your tinny mate, your outboard motor too.  
They don't bite like they used to dad.  They don't bite like they used to." 
 
They're introducing fingerlings and giving that a shot, 
But duckweed takes the oxygen which kills the flam'in lot. 
The droughts have had their toll as well and one thing that's for sure; 
I can't see in the future dad a remedy or cure. 
So mum's ducked down to Salty's mate and I would dare a punt 
She'll come back with a feed of fish before you say Rex Hunt. 
I guess we'll have to wash it down with some of your home brew. 
They don't bite like they used to dad.  They don't bite like they used to."

Premium Member Gentle the Air

When crisp Anemoi swerve in my mind
and gently rouse, oh ‘pon the fair moonlight,
I raise my cheeks  to taste the dew, refined 
through quivers of the ever- threading night. 

And copper-like, my senses, mildly clothed
with fibrils circling traces on warm flesh;
this zephyr cool, guiding south’s haze evoked
by luster held by Euros rain, afresh.

And dusk will print windchimes' echo 'fore dawn
while starlit harbingers will bid me still. 
My breath will feed the hours with time reborn 
as tender wafts on misty fleet claim goodwill.

That I, a child of air, shall testify
as witness to rare music of billows’ sigh.


----------
Shadow Hamilton's Gods Of Winds Contest

* Anemoi-- Gods of four directional winds
* Notos--God of south winds ushering summer and rain
12/26/2014

Premium Member Seagulls

Going on a tram to Lattes*,
the tram rails winding this and that,
but first, Montpellier was seen.
Tall buildings, cream and white,
and the sight of seagulls
near bright sea.

Best day was to be had in Lattes,
and ice-cream from bow-fronted shop.
Eight euros then to pay...
Tall buildings, monochrome,
and the sight of seagulls
near the sea.

The seagulls followed the tram back,
the tram rails winding this and that,
and then Montpellier re-seen.
Shops were shutting for the day
in tall buildings cream and white,
before the seagulls went away.


----------------------------------------------------------------

* pronounced Lat.

12/22/2015

Contest  - My Abiding Memory

Sponsor - Viv Wigley

1st placement win - a real prize for it (a ornament of a bird).
© Julia Ward  Create an image from this poem.


Premium Member Tippy Tappy Football

TIPPY TAPPY FOOTBALL

Tippy tappy football, I hear the pundits say
That's not proper football, that's not how you play
Tippy tappy football, now what's that all about?
Why can't they play like our lads and take the player out

Tippy tappy football, it's a generation thing
Six players through the middle and no one on the wing
Now tippy tappy football will never quite catch on
It's slow and it's lethargic and next year it’ll be gone

This tippy tappy football that the Spanish want to play
It's pass and move and pass and move and keep the ball all day
This tippy tappy football, It’ll be the ruin of the game
Why can't they shoot or make mistakes, it's really very tame

Tippy tappy football, now what's the great big fuss
We like blood and thunder, so it's really not for us
Yet this tippy tappy football, it's on the up and up
It's helped Spain win two Euros, and one Jules Rimet cup!

Premium Member Greek Tragedy

Waiting in line, 
Before the ATM of closed banks for 60 Euros to withdraw under the scourging sun  
Old and invalid people are submitted to this daily torture, constantly moaning, for Our country’s suffering and for our own devastation, 
While twenty-seven percent the unemployment has climbed
Forty percent the salaries and pensions went down and twenty percent the taxes up  
Rendering hundreds of thousands of families poor with no money to feed themselves And their children 
When 
Close to one hundred thousand of our countrymen have attempted suicide of whom Ten thousand, unfortunately, have succeeded in ending their lives only in five years Because of the ruinous austerity measures taken to pay Greece's lenders  

Parthenon, is mourning Democracy's assassination in the place of its birth 
By the mighty creditors that suck the blood out of our veins 
The Greek government in agony has turn to our allies for help to restore our  Economy and thus to prevent the catastrophe that is approaching,
But the creditors, most of them anyway, with Germany leading the way,
To obliterate Greece wish with their unbearable and inhuman terms they have set
As though were our enemies and not our partners, because 
Humanity has been lost in their hearts and only for them the profit counts 

And I, one of the suffering Greeks, that shares the same lot as any,
In anxiety, a few words try to arrange for the tragedy of Greece to illustrate as a New Euripides or Sophocles but to no avail, 
So I am waiting in line under the scourging sun, hoping my turn to come, 
The sixty Euros, if am lucky, to get into my hands before the AMT is empty!




© Demetrios Trifiatis
    15 JULY 2015

The Four Winds

Boreas laughs and of his power we will know
His breath in anger, a white blanket appears 
He breathes out the north wind and snow
The master of cold and snow it appears

Zephyrus the calm one, sprinkles hope from the west 
The bringer of hope, the father of fruit and of flower
From Boreas won Chloris, she loved him the best
Unlike his north brother, land didn’t devour.


Notus, jealous of the crops Zephyrus brings forth 
Through summer he rages bringing storm from the south
Determined in storms to scorch the lands to the north
Flattens crops with hot winds when he opens his mouth  

But Euros the unlucky one, is he weak is he wild?
Different from Zephyrus, Notus and Boreas that blow.
From the East, he is either violent or mild.
But insignificant it seems to his brothers, we know.

But the God of all says he will hold these winds back
If not, none would be saved.
For come the day he takes his Kingship back
The land with false gods will be paved.
© 25/12/2014


David Henson

David can often be seen hot on the trail, 
Of Richard Whitehead, sprinter, runner, 
And was reported in Rio de Janero’s mail, 
As the 200m bronze medalist, stunner.

He went to St George Catholic College, 
Located in Southhampton, that busy port, 
Attended Hertfordshire Uni on the page
Of mechanical engineering, to his purport. 

But having joined the Army, made officer, 
One day he stepped on a hidden IED, 
So both his legs were amputated, better, 
But he walked in no time, sports to see. 

During his rehab at MOD Headley Court, 
David found himself by sports enthused,
And got into swimming, basketball’s court, 
Also sitting volleyball did find him amused. 

After rehabilitation David did a Masters, 
In biomedical engineering, at Imperial, 
He inquired into an amputee’s masters -
Their prosthetics - he had opinions vocal.  

At the Invictus Games he did many sports,  
To win the gold in the 200 metres sprint,
And so made the 2015 IPC Euro consorts,
In Doha, Qatar, to bear the UK flag, flint. 

The next year in 2016, Euros in Grosseto,
He was clipped to the line by Whitehead,
And so ran in Rio to entertain with gusto,
When he almost fell, but recovered dead.

9/11

9/11
The world trade towers,
The pentagon and the white house.
Attack THEM, they are evil.
The government that protects the oil corps.
The American Government uses its military to steal oil.
Socialize the losses and privatize the profits. 
Stupid, confused, Americans.  
Israel is an American military base
1948, 
Control the oil, control the future. 
Truman, cemented America as a superpower. 
Israel: Expanding settlements, stealing land. 
In trade for keeping the oil in the hands of corps. 
Oil traded in dollars: no Euros allowed,,, 
Or we beat the war drums, evoke fear.
America and its Zionist military base. 
Topple democracies, replace them with dictators,
No taxing the rich to feed the people in the middle east.
Socialism is evil. 
We worship greed, AKA: Capitalism  
The people want to tax the oil companies and get a check,
The way they do in Alaska
Sarah Palin, The American socialist, who is too ignorant to know it. 
If this is not the history you know…
Either I am ignorant or you are….
Oh, my voice is like nails on chalkboard, it cant be true can it?
My propaganda of anti-Americanism
I love this country, my friends and enemies tell me to leave it, 
But this is my country and I am here to change it. 
I will go down with my ship

The Wild Winds - Not the Williwaw

As the screaming Sirocco swept the sands,
Suffocating the Shiekh's Sixth Sick Sheep,
It's sister, Simoon, soon sought to strike
The sweat-suffering Sultan's sweet sleep.
Then came the Khamsin, and  Calima, too,
- Dust-devils, Diabolos, Lavaan, Loo!

Angered, Aeolos, King of the Air,
Council called up with him in chair
Boreas, Euros, Fair Favonius,
Zesty Zephyr, alll were there

With solemn, sullen, scowl he said:
I'll rout these rascals, send you instead.

The howling hot-heads harassed no more
As the Aeolian Airs soothed the Shiekh's sandy sore!

(At his point I petulantly wind up my windy verbiage - 
As continuing ceaselessly and adamantly with unending alliteration would surely end in gibberish and garbage)

Premium Member Amsterdam

If you seek to fully understand,
This complex human jam,
You just need a ticket in hand,
To fly to Amsterdam!

History walks the streets here,
In every pavement stone,
You find friendship and cheer,
 On every face In town!

Watch the cyclist to the right,
They have the right of way,
Trams, buses are packed tight,
As the Dutch start their day!

Explore the city on your foot,
And relish the jolly sites,
Take a camera click and shoot,
The brilliance of the nights! 

Tall buildings on either sides,
With waterways in the middle,
Spend a few euros on a ride,
To solve the human riddle!

Four centuries you will travel,
In a ride around the Gracht,
The mysteries quickly unravel,
As you relax in the raft!

Seventy bridges link the city,
That floats on wooden piles,
“The dancing ladies” look so pretty,
As they lean to their sides!

Great masters of colour and paint,
Lived their lives on this land,
Amongst the  sinners and saints,
Were Van Gogh and Rembrandt!

War and peace, joy and tears,
Carved this beautiful place,
Good days amidst daunting fears,
As they etched out their space!

Coffee shops are  everywhere,
And the window girls in town,
It is Cannabis best be aware,
Before you bite and gulp it down!

It is a beautiful, honest city,
That is fair to one and all,
While the rest of us talk of piety,
Our values and morals appal!

Health and wealth together ride,
On cycles, buses and tram,
Simple honesty is their guide,
In the city of Amsterdam!!

Rob Davies

Rob played semi-professional rugby, 
From when he was 4 until the age of 21, 
When he got a serious spinal cord injury, 
Whilst playing that rough game spun. 

As part of his rehabilitation sessions, 
At Rookwood Hospital, exists in Cardiff, 
He played table tennis for his arms, 
Which he continued thereafter, his quiff. 

That was from 2005, but by ’11’s Euros, 
He qualified for London’s Games 2012,
The Paras of tremendous meme flows, 
About disability sport, now off the shelf.

But he left lonely and without a medal, 
Which made him determined, craving, 
So he increased the work and the mile,
He sweat each day, a medal engraving. 

He was World No. 6 in 2012, not good, 
For him, so he worked on consistency, 
And became the Euro Champ good, 
In Italy with singles and team tenancy. 

In 2015 at the Euros again, in Vejle, 
In Denmark, he did the same thing - 
Topped the charts with his angle, 
In both events - it was plain sailing. 

Then, the major victory came in Rio, 
The crowd erupted wildly at his win, 
Because the tension had been audible, 
When he’d wrangled to win gold vin.

David Wetherill

David started playing table tennis, 
At the age of ten in his local club, 
Where his dad worked as a coach,
And where his brother played him. 

He was born with a bone disorder, 
Rare Multiple Epiphyseal Dysplasia, 
And is a graduate of Sheffield Uni, 
In Biological Chemistry medical.  

He attended Beijing and London,  
And won many medals in 2014,
In Italy, Slovenia and Slovakia, 
And in Romania 2015 gold, silver. 

Then the Euros in Vejle, Denmark,
And David won singles and team, 
Bronze, and then in Lignano 2016,
David won bronze and team silver. 

In Rio he made the quarter finals, 
And was born in Torpoint, Cornwall,
Just before Christmas time in 1989 -
He lives and he trains in Sheffield.

Kim Daybell

“Anything can be achieved if you set your mind to it.” 
Kim was born with the rare disease Poland’s syndrome, 
Which means that he has abnormal or missing muscles, 
On the left side of his chest wall, but surgery did tone. 

A student of Medicine and Surgery at Leeds University, 
He was a proud junior, the Under-13 level World No. 2, 
In the sport of table tennis, ‘cos it's speed and closeness, 
Instantly excited him when he tried it at nine, it had hue. 

He made his international debut in 2008 at age sixteen, 
And won lots of gold medals, came fourth at the Euros, 
In 2011, which took him onto the London Paralympics, 
Which are set in him as his epic, life-changing clothes.

So at the Slovenia Open in 2013, Kim won the bronze, 
And then at the European Championships in the singles, 
He made the quarter finals, but then at the Belgian Open, 
He took the gold in the class 10 of the singles with ingles. 

2014 saw him win a silver at the Slovenian Open again, 
And then when he travelled to the Cote d’Azur to compete, 
In their International, Kim consolidated his choice talent, 
By stylishly taking the gold in the singles, a victory sweet. 

Kim took a year off his studies in 2015 to prepare for Rio, 
And in 2016 at Italy’s Lignano Master Open, determiner, 
He secured a bronze in the singles, so Rio was certain, 
There he reached the singles, team quarters: a winner.

Sara Head

Sara played basketball in squad ParalympicsGB, 
At Euros, at Worlds and at Commonwealth Games, 
In Manchester and in Melbourne, and had TT victory, 
At the Paralympics in London with her team-mate. 

Her boyfriend introduced her to table tennis nifty, 
And she’s a paralytic, from a virus at the age of 15,
“Meeting people in the same situation as [myself]
was a real eye-opener…it opened up my life again.“

In 2013 Sara and Jane Campbell took the gold, 
In the team event class 1-3 in Bayreuth, Germany, 
And then she won bronze for herself in the singles, 
To ride right onto 2 bronzes in Slovenia, Slovakia. 

Illness and surgery were then her disappointing lot, 
But she returned in the Lignano Master Open 2016,
To win a fine silver for the team. In Rio, the quarters, 
For both singles and team matches. Born 12/04/1990.

Ade Orogbemi

Ade is a 2.5 wheelchair basketball player, 
Who was born in Lagos in Nigeria in 1978,
His home town is Liverpool, a Mersey sayer,
In Spain club BSR Amiab Albacete is a date. 

He lives partly in London, joined the Bullets,
And he’s travelled with the sport worldwide, 
German, Italian, Israeli and South Korean sets, 
Sunshine is his normality to love and abide. 

In 2003 at the Europeans in Sassari in Italy, 
Ade and his basketball team won the bronze, 
And in 2005 at more Europeans, Paris’s sway, 
The GB squad came second with silver cons. 

Then in 2007 at the World Champs, Germany, 
A silver was wrought, and in Beijing in 2008,
TeamGB won a bronze to the podium occupy, 
And in 2011 a gold fell, Isreali Euro freight. 

2013 and TeamGB won the Euros, Frankfurt, 
2015 they won another Euro gold, Worcester,  
So in 2016 at Rio Ade contributed to support, 
His team to add a bronze to this large cluster. 

Ade was jailed by Liverpool Crown Court,
For claiming over £33000 of state benefits:
Housing, council tax benefit, income support, 
In 2009 he spent six months with jail slits.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace