Best Fifes Poems

Roads rising up from Irish mists in merry jigs
To the flowing tenor song
Sung by the River Boyne born from Tara's Keep
As Patrick's paschal fire
Weaves truth from stones of blarney
And lucky charms of Erin's spring
Cloth hills in kilts of green clovers with four leaves
To the Kerry...

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One day I was passing time
And wrote these words upon the lines,
I know not where they came you see
The Winds of Time were there for me.

If I could open a door to the past
And there before me were the paths
I'm not quite sure which I...

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I walk an already trodden path...
Uncertain, of future lives that lie ahead

But, in faith I close these earthly Ojibwa eyes
In trill, thus, I hear the old ways in your presence amidst Chinook winds
As harmonic they play across the plains, from sacred astral pipes
Mimicking cricket songs...

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I love life, that's probably apparent
By the happiness in all my poems
When I make my final curtain call
Want the biggest celebration known

Don't want none of that mourning stuff
No sad songs, no shedding of tears
Just want some joyous good time fun
Great food and buckets of cheer

Tradition...

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I hear the music calling me
From the smooth and shiny rows of keys
The ebony and ivory
And all the melodies between
‘Come!’ it says, ‘And play a song
Upon your fingertips I’ll canter along.
Befriend the scales—arpeggios
Follow the tune wherever it goes
Let your heart become the notes
Let your soul...

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The worst thing that can happen in life
Is to be buried alive with your wife
To quarrel for eternity
About insignificanties
While listening to the drums and the fifes


© Jack Ellison 2015...

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Beating drums mark his last march and fifes play lowly, a breeze blows on blackthorn blossoms,
Raised high above on hardened shoulders for the mourning march, that slowly glides him along,
A hero, a name carved in precious polished stone, this is his last the most important...

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Why is everyone more worried
      about another's attire
Is their own life so bleak and 
      dire
You help them climb higher and
      higher
While we wallow in their mire
Is their life what you desire
What is it you are to aspire
Listen to the hark of the town
       cryer
We have...

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Beating drums mark his last march and fifes play lowly, a breeze blows on blackthorn blossoms,
Raised high above on hardened shoulders for the mourning march, that slowly glides him along,
A hero, a name carved in precious polished stone, this is his last the most important...

Continue reading...

The British were coming. 
As dawn's cold fingers 
clawed the eastern sky, 
men scurried to their stations, 
all too aware of the rhythmic crump 
of that ugly distant drumming. 

The Threat was inching closer, 
a scarlet thing with many spikes 
shimmering in the first sun....

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Wriggled in her arms.
Lost in an adventure of romance, moving far afield.
Though I have no weakness for writing, 
my story got underway.
Wallowing in the admiralty of her beauty
Adorned with beautiful antique ornament
Adulterated with the laudable attribute of nature
Epitomizing the 6th day work,
and the adroit molding...

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Christmas eve night coming home
When grand marketing is done
Foot stepping high over stony loam
Heart panting for the merry fun
Suddenly the noise is not the same
The humming of figuring tongues
Changed to bush crackling with flame
The frantic scream of happy lungs
The scampering glee of feet, and there
The...

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Peaceful so he seems for he sleeps now. 
Just the sound of his breathing I hear.
Quiet and still is he, just like a soft spring eve.
A blanket serves as his security in a world so uneasy.
Shielding him from fifes great harm.
Soft and gentle,  like...

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I love life, that's probably apparent
By the happiness in all my poems
When I make my final curtain call
Want the biggest celebration known

Don't want none of that mourning stuff
No sad songs, no shedding of tears
Just want some joyous good time fun
Great food and buckets of beer

Tradition...

Continue reading...

Today there won’t be a parade;
Concessions that Covid has made.
With no bagpipes or fifes
It’s befitting, since life’s
At a standstill from which we’ve not swayed.

Still, I’m wearing a bit o’ the green
Though, of course, if I had to come clean,
Being Irish I’m not
But I’ve never forgot
On...

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