Best Korea Poems
The Sounds of Korea
I hear the familiar sounds of Korea,
Of the crowing of roosters in the morning,
Of the fields, streams and marketplaces.
The tunes of shamanistic music band
The swirling of fire-lit cans of Jwibul nori,
The soup boiling sounds in a huge pot,
A crisp “tak, tak” sound of soybean burning
And the crackling sounds of dry branches.
Chanting at planting & threshing paddies
The singing of Hori and Gyeori songs
The striking of the bronze bell of Sangwonsa
Chanting-Beompae to Daeung Amitabh.
In the far-flung village of Sangyu
The flames of the daljips in the rice fields
Soars high in the sky on Jeongwol Daeboreum
Higher the flames, the greater is the harvest
Promising bounteous year and good health.
People dance Pansori at the tunes of Nongak
A feast is being prepared there,
The full moon catches people’s prayers
And spreads it to the high heaven.
Jwibul nori’-Mice burning game is on
Somewhere yet in another village.
The traditional burning of the rice paddies
To chase away the mice from the fields.
With crackling sounds of fireworks,
Warming and fertilizing the frozen fields.
=================================
Third Placement
Contest: Sounds Familiar
(November 2016)
Twas Hillig, but the Limey Gove
Did whine and witter in the Brext.
All Szyddly was the Orban cove
And Grabberwock out-Mexed.
“Beware the Grabberwock, my dear,
The salesman’s talk, the dubious thatch.
Beware his leakiwick, and fear
His groomious undersnatch.”
She took her righteous sword in hand.
Her people cried “Deplore, deplore!”
So rested she by the Dumdum tree—
And thought “deplore” some more.
And as in huffish thought she stood,
The Grabberwock, with hair aflame,
Came breitling through the barty wood,
And goebbelled as he came.
One, two! One, two! And through and through
His virtual blade went twitter-t***.
She got more voters, but he was POTUS
And he getrumphed like that:-
“See, I have slain the Hillinast!
I’ll build a wall, hire every mate!
I’ll bigly take America
And make it really grate.”
“I’ll put all Muslims in a book,
Intern them just like Nips,
And make sure Gooks use their own nukes
For the Trumpocalypse.”
“I’ll help the rich (more than that b****!).
I’ll make the bankers fat.
The blacks I’ll hump—and screw the Trump-
enproletariat.”
’Tis chillig. For the Sess-i-ones
Doth Bolt- and Bann-on on the right
All Vladdy are Assange’s tones
And prospects all outsh***.
Rob Whitford
Notes:
1. Needless to say, this is a parody of “Jabberwocky”, by Lewis Carroll
2. The first “Grabberwocky” was a much better poem—a “Jabberwocky” parody written in 1939 (http://www.waxdog.com/jabberwocky/nazi.html). Thanks to this for general inspiration, the title and the sadly still relevant verb “to goebbel”.
3. Re the slightly nerdy line 3, Beata Szydlo and Viktor Orban were the conservative nationalist Prime Ministers of Poland and Hungary, respectively, at the time.....
Copyright © Robert Whitford 2016
He said, “Yes, I flew a fighter plane over the hills, and the people
were running, they were just people, they were villagers, not soldiers,
they were running away,”
and a tear came to his eye, and it looked like a napalm-rain ,
as he dabbed away the guilt and regret;
because he flew a fighter plane over the hills, and the people
were running, running away;
but his rain caught them, cindered them; and they
weren’t soldiers, they were just people running away,
granddads, mothers, babies, aunts;
and they were all running, running, running - away
then he flew his plane home, over the hills, on to the deck,
in to the mess, and ate the food and drank some coffee, and
watched TV;
and they fuelled, and bombed him up, and he flew
again, over the hills, over the hills, far away, far away,
passing over the black-scorched earth, the granddads
and mothers the babies and aunts and his tears dropped
to the cockpit floor, the cockpit door, and the flames told
him to jump out quick, before they licked;
and when they found him surrounded by silk, they took him
back to the deck; and he watched TV and rested, and watched
the news, of people running, running, running away;
but they didn’t show the granddads , mothers, babies and aunts;
his grim, sycophants.
Look there! A newly wed bride steps out
Dismounting from the wedding coach.
The tradition expects the bride to step
On the lid of the traditional huge pot
Before entering into her home-to-be.
The pot being hanged on the threshold.
Look again! Smoke rising off the chimney,
The woman puts the soybean skins in the fire,
‘tak, tak, tak’ sound comes from burning wood,
Now the hearth blazes in flaming red
And brightens the woman’s beautiful face.
Her charms come unbidden
Like a phrase in a sentence.
An old man chanting first to the drums
And the paddy planters sing after him,
Sending the echoes over the Naju plains.
The old man shouts a word of command
And the planters move to the next line.
I hear the famous Hori & Gyeori songs
To converse with Mara and An cows
“Mara is stepping back- A-Ha!!!!
But An is just going slow, A-Ha!!!!
Where are you going cow?
Pay attention to where you are going
Here! Here! Boy, Here! Go straight!
Here, Boy, Here, Ahead we go!!!!!!!”
Thus, the earth is tilled,
The earth makes soft breaking sounds
The cows breathe heavily
The farmer’s song too gets out of breath
The calf feeds on her mother’s breasts
The life on the earth goes on and on..
=================================
Fourth Place win
The Country is Korea
Contest: Somewhere over the rainbow
GLOSSARY
Naju Plains: The productive agricultural plains of Naju.
Hori and Gyeori songs: There is a tradition of gathering cows with a song.
Jeonggeum-Ri: The most famous songs - Hori Song and Gyeori Song.
Gyeori: The name of a large plow pulled by two cows.
Mara: The right-hand cow in a team of two.
An or Ahn Cow: The left-hand cow in a team of two.
y twenty to thirty performers.
The Lay of Sir Donald
(Or: Le Chanson de Donald)
An orange man – of red and trailing tie,
Small hands, and copious twitter-feed – sing I!
Most staunch ’gainst Saracen and Mede is he,
Bare-armed and ruddy-necked his followers be.
Brightly he barteth, and knows how, full well,
In sev’n-score characters his truth to tell.
Courtly he is to nymphs – yea, most correct –
And any contradictions he’ll reject:
Talk of “ailuric rapture”, he maintains,
Was nothing more than banter between swains.
And though, by direst foe as “dotard” shamed –
By REGAL liege-man “moron”, too, proclaimed –
He’s shunned by ANGELA, the Teuton queen
For policies much nearer black than green,
He’s loved by VIKTOR, chief of Magyar horde,
And (still?) VLADIMIR, Muscovy’s dark lord.
But all now tremble at his reckoning,
In Orient far, with JONG the Hermit King.
Tis hard to know whose head is the more beefy
Or whose hair more eccentric’ly coiffefe.
“Since in ballistics you indulge, and fission,”
Quoth he, “Let us contend in micturition.
My country’s armoury is locked and loaded
To make yours but a wilderness,” he goaded.
You doubt he sets his cap at Tyranny?
That risk of Bloody Warre augmented be?
As well to doubt the POPE’S denomination,
Or Silvan Sites of Ursine Defecation!
My favorite time of day
Is sunset
As the sun begins to set,
I pour a glass of wine for my wife
Or sometimes rum or whiskey
And sit down to dinner.
Drinking our drink
While watching the sunset,
Over the western sea.
Sometimes, we take a walk
At sunset and watch the sun
Sink beneath the west sea
Off of Yeoungjong Island
Near the Incheon airport town.
We live on an island
So the sea is all around us,
The park nearby
Has splendid sea views.
And the mountain top
Is a great place
To catch the sunset
Over the nearby sea.
My favorite sunset story
Though comes from Barbados,
In the Caribbean sea.
At the right time,
Of the year,
Usually in winter,
At sunset,
When the weather cooperates
With a few clouds in the sky
As the sun sets,
You might be lucky
You might experience the green flash
as the entire sky turns bright green,
for a flash of a second,
then settles down into evening calm.
I experienced it four times
Four times in three years
Always, a special occasion.
the locals always claim
if you look for the green flash
it will not flash
but when you are ready
it will show its magic
and you will be lucky
the next day.
And we celebrated
With a glass of Mt Guy rum
A perfect way
To end a perfect sunset.
But in the end,
As long as I have my wife
By my side,
The sunset will always
Be a magical ending
For another day.
In our earthy paradise,
Spent with the love
Of my life by my side.
Cabbage Patch Kids Of North Korea
Most N. Koreans go to camp, Camp 22
365 days a year they stay
Eat 1 head of cabbage every day forever
They don’t need sun or play they say
Work occupies them
Children turn in their parents for some bread
Watch them tortured
When they die the children cry with joy
Wish they had more parents to sacrifice
To glorify the state for food
Cabbage is delicious with government approval
All children born in Camp 22 are killed at once
I guess you could say that is not very nice or much fun
But cabbage patch kids who do survive
Are permitted to eat a kernel of corn
From cow manure and work inside till they die
No less no more
It is a game of attrition not nutrition
But who are we to criticize
Camp 22 will survive
I hear the familiar sounds of Korea,
Of the crowing of roosters in the morning,
Of the fields, streams and marketplaces.
The tunes of shamanistic music band
The swirling of fire-lit cans of Jwibul nori,
The soup boiling sounds in a huge pot,
A crisp “tak, tak” sound of soybean burning
And the crackling sounds of dry branches.
Chanting at planting & threshing paddies
The singing of Hori and Gyeori songs
The striking of the bronze bell of Sangwonsa
Chanting-Beompae to Daeung Amitabh.
In the far-flung village of Sangyu
The flames of the daljips in the rice fields
Soars high in the sky on Jeongwol Daeboreum
Higher the flames, the greater is the harvest
Promising bounteous year and good health.
People dance Pansori at the tunes of Nongak
A feast is being prepared there,
The full moon catches people’s prayers
And spreads it to the high heaven.
Jwibul nori’-Mice burning game is on
Somewhere yet in another village.
The traditional burning of the rice paddies
To chase away the mice from the fields.
With crackling sounds of fireworks,
Warming and fertilizing the frozen fields.
=================================
Third Placement
Contest: Sounds Familiar
North Korea Now and Not Black Power
Is a prosaic
Of something quite archaic
Country far behind.
This is what I thought of after
watching news about North
Korea exploding another bomb.
Inferior countries are looking for
attention getters to overcome
and compensate for an inferior
complex. Of course, they thing
an occasional show of force and
people with uniforms full of medals
will also add to the austerity.
James Thomas Horn
Retired Veteran and Poet
why this strong man Kim Jong cried?
who can resist pains?
as President Kim Jong
saw his population decreasing,
he was crying in front
of the group of
some women.
pleasing them
to give birth to more kids
to avoid some challenges
in the future.
many women of North
Korea were touched by his speech
and also cried.
why this strong man Kim Jong cried?
who can resist pains?
The cry of President Kim Jong publicly
called attention of many leaders
who always neglect the citizens
of their counties.
President Kim Jong promised many things
to all women who will feel his pains
and bring more children
to life.
No matter how some folks
claimed that rapid
population of Africa
is the cause of climate change.
BUT
President Kim Jong continue
to expose some liars
As seeing importance
of rapid population growth
in his country.
Germany crashes
SK's clean sheet not enough. . .
both teams headed home
Copyright © 2018 by Mark Toney. All rights reserved.
Published 2018 in "2018 World Cup Senryu" via wattpad.com
Visit to Jade Garden
Visiting Jade Garden
Nar Chungcheong, South Korea
On a beautiful spring day,
The cherry trees were in full flower
Pink and white petals
The scent of cherry trees in the air.
Other trees just starting to bloom
Red, yellow and white tulips
Beginning to bloom.
The sounds of spring all around
Birds singing
People walking about.
Talking to one another
As they wander the pathway
Taking in the springtime splendor.
The sun warming up
The pathway winding
.Through the Forrest.
Snow, mountains, white horse
Flop side to side, bounce and flop
Majestic bumbling king
NOTE: I have not structured this form with iambic feet or any other meter. I found this form suits my faith in Jesus as LORD, closest to how I feel: SONnet
OCTAVE:
LORD, as morn yields to noon (or dawn) my SONnet will please, tease, release:
I greet thee, having access to Your throne by Jesus
And His sacrifice on Calvary: We pray against the Virus
With a sunshiny name, an aura of a name, "a garland" ...
Corona Virus, COVID-19, or SARS-Cov-2, Thy Hand
Is mighty and righteous, always Righteous, even in judgment
God of Grace and Love, forgiveness and Provisioning
Forgive me my greed, envy, jealousy, smallness and scheming
SESTET:
I intercede for others now ... as I taught in Gauteng, I now follow:
Make a prayer list, or start a Wall of Prayer at home. Workshops in 2019
With the plea: "U give 8 hours a day to your boss, why not time for God?"
All countries that begin with the letter "K" even if I privilege Kenya
Bless KOREAs (both) Kuwait, LORD do "save" - the Middle-East from war
Kazakhstan, and other former USSR republics, now with "ENTERPRISE" (free)
Trump A Houdini
Trump had actually been a Houdini,
And we thought that he was a meanie;
After he did have a case of diarrhea,
He then ended up in North Korea.
Trump compared to Kim is much older,
And Kim's head equals Trump's shoulder;
One feature both had which was same;
Each tiny brain looked like it was lame.
Just for you Rohini
Jim Horn