I don't have a return ticket
not sure if this train
is coming from somewhere or going onward.
In the next seat a 'mick' relative,
we converse in a grunting verse.
Rough hands caked with unspoken words
indicate long pauses.
On the move trying to recall
something familiar, a town, a stretch
of passing scenery. A once fractured memory,
Some kid is beating a tin toy drum
I think it is me, his short pants are dark blue,
they are too tight;
he is going to the seaside one day.
The child is annoying.
A journey battles on.
it whistles through the bygone:
will someone meet us in loco parentis?
I am an outgrown poet full of the Irish,
I am a jigsaw piece
for the numbed seekers of unfilled holes.
This is a video game,
this is a play station
with play passengers
getting on and leaving.
Bareboned is the bodkin that grooves
a map far from anywhere.
Passengers stare out of my window
I begin to count the eyes.
I have much time to ponder,
to wonder if this rattling line
has an end
or perhaps has been pulled up
long ago
by ice Mammoths?
Categories:
bodkin, poetry,
Form: Free verse
This scarecrow is no country bumpkin
His bottom and head are ripe pumpkin
Touch him if you dare
He’ll give you a scare
By pricking your hand with a bodkin
Inspired by the picture Lin sent to me
25-09-17
Categories:
bodkin, body, food, humorous,
Form: Limerick
That Sabbeth day when both sides bled,
Palm Sunday fourteen sixty one.
A blizzard raged as arrows sped,
With armour piercing bodkin head.
The war of roses had begun,
That Sabbeth day when both sides bled.
The frozen ground and beck ran red
This battle site was near Towton.
A blizzard raged as arrows sped.
When all seemed lost, the vanquished fled.
The White rose claimed the day was won,
That Sabbeth day when both sides bled
With nine and twenty thousand dead.
No place to hide, nowhere to run
A blizzard raged as arrows sped.
The Crown of England it is said,
With bloodied hands when day was done
That Sabbeth day when both sides bled,
A blizzard raged as arrows sped.
3/ 2/ 2015
Categories:
bodkin, war,
Form: Villanelle