A middling pudding on the table
flies hover in the livery stable
Mud-covered boots ascend to garrets
frowzy days London inherits
Dickensian scenes to rive your heart
by urchins, street vendors torn apart
Yankees delight in their ‘good old days’
Englishmen sniff the rot of decay
Categories:
dickensian, analogy, dark, england, history,
Form: Couplet
Monstrously Machievellian
Demonic pedagogic
Ominously Orwellian
Demagogic logic
Fools’ Musk-ovite mules
Zuckerberg zeitgeist heist
Dickensian dystopia rules
Google last post bugle
Fossil fuels myopia drools
Bellicose Bezos blows
Bro-ligarchy mates’ malarkey
Unions demonstrate
Amazon defenestrate
Hades Gates hierarchy
In the dock
Murdoch foxy skulduggery
Poxy TikTok runs amok
Crass puns..shock thuggery
This lot don't give a jot
.
Bitter sh**ter Twitter
Greedier needier seedier
The death of mass media
X marks the spot!
Categories:
dickensian, corruption, discrimination, earth, political,
Form: Rhyme
sordid surroundings
make for Dickensian tales
~ poverty triumphs
Categories:
dickensian, literature, money, poverty,
Form: Senryu
They don’t understand! They seem to not care! They should be so grateful that we’re even there!
So what if we make mistakes here and there, now and again. So what if they die, so what if they cry! Inequality needs maintenance which we wholeheartedly try to defend!
The poor cannot be allowed to live like the rich. The poor have to pay for our yacht, our wine, our parties and then crawl in their ditch.
Politics is now a free cash machine. But only for the ‘privately educated’ if you know what I mean!
They’ll just have to suffer and take the blame. They’ll just have to live like Dickensian peasants all over again.
England is ruled by greed and greed is what we’re here to feed. They’ll spend the next twenty five years paying for our lies. But who cares, their lives are as worthless as flies.
Categories:
dickensian, abuse, conflict, corruption, discrimination,
Form: Free verse
I won't look for you if the apocalypse arrives
It's those like me with the least reason to live
who will survive to continue searching in
vain for anything of value as we did before
civilization as we know it ceased to exist
when the finer things in life become
a tin of beans, clean water, a warm blanket
tinder for a fire and a safe place to sleep
when names mean nothing and money
is merely worthless paper printed with
portraits of monarchs and presidents
so precious previously to those with power
and influence who didn't give a damn about
people like us though they'd make a pretense
if it would be easy and to their benefit
when it was convenient and didn’t conflict
with the next high profile black tie event or
champagne soirée where the income
of the guest list for a single year that they
pissed away on the puerile and frivolous
would have ended world hunger and poverty
Life won’t be all that different honestly
struggling to stay alive though we don’t know
why as there’s nothing in it for us but
another Dickensian day of hopelessness
Categories:
dickensian, celebrity, humanity, life, money,
Form: Free verse
Squickleby Pickleby
Nicholas Nickleby
loses his Father and
feels quite forlorn.
Ralph his tight uncle a
disciplinarian
mean to the marrow
regards him with scorn.
Nicholas, penniless
uncompromisingly
works as a master where
boys take the flack.
Nickleby fears for the
safety of orphans there
rescues a cripple and
never looks back.
Granted this ending is
unsatisfactory
Dickens had plenty more
meat to this tale.
So to all readers I
send my apologies;
These double dactyls are
tricky travail.
01.01.2021
Based on the novel 'Nicholas Nickleby' by Charles Dickens
Double Dactyl (Win For Paid Membership) Poetry Contest
Sponsor : William Kekaula
Categories:
dickensian, literature,
Form: Double Dactyl
A scratching at dusty glass from piano keys
In a lace attic catacombs chests
bathed in blue panic
room stained window
Hiding from the tell to show
away bitter clown faces without
makeup to disguise frowns
from smiles
Glass of Rose wine in hand
Half black and white
harlequim dress worn
like princess Di
Bitting down on fretted untuned
strings
Yellow taxi clock running outside
in a traffic jam carpark
Great expectations Dickensian
clambering down unsteady
unsafe ladders
Floor by floor at breakneck speed
scissors running in hand
Final destination paused
Star's
City , Sparks , Fire
Takes me back melancholic
reminding me what it was
like to be a torturous teen
Dreaming of wanton love
and how fragile youth is
Categories:
dickensian, music,
Form: Free verse
King Arthurian of legend
St George
St Patrick
Mary Magdalene
To the Da Vinci Code
My toilet
My drug use
I remember i could read
I was a trainspoter
A night prisoner
I wrote during the war of the roses
Of the kings last stand
On B roads
Dedicated to marching knights
For weapons and edges
Set up camp for the night
Uneasily at sleep
I lie
I tragic at dawn
Tragic
Deadly
A 100 of thousand men
Seek Excalibur
To formation a round table
Unto which barge
Into a Dickensian future
The King is dead
Loose ends
Bury me in the Abbey
Imagination
Categories:
dickensian, slam,
Form: Free verse
Unlike Pegasus, they had magical horns,
now no unicorns are left
despite the lack of any government import bans.
It was a Christmas season In East London,
Tiny Tim and the fat goose had been killed off in distant wars,
the goose received the George Cross for gallantry
(posthumously),
and little crippled Tim was shot by us
for running away from a hail of bullets.
Mum and Dad had hidden in a cellar
while Unicorns died left and right;
they had given up on Christmas -
we just listened to it on the radio.
Back then it was a monochrome world,
and grey was as good as sunlight to us.
There were minstrel shows,
but people of any color were not allowed…
no one defined what ‘not allowed’ meant.
The Jews were blamed for the lack of Unicorns everywhere.
It was a time for reflection, and reconciliation,
a time to regroup the happy forces of Dickensian novels
and shove them in the faces of Unicorn deniers.
Later in that holy season, gay folks were invented,
we had to all stop being ‘gay’ or even moderately content,
but we kept our belief in unicorns’
in a typically English half-hearted way.
Categories:
dickensian, poetry,
Form: Free verse
There’s nothing finer, in a sense,
Than certain words in present tense.
Words which are incredibly,
Etched on your mind indelibly.
Immaculate, petulant, magnificent, sinew,
Incredulous, superfluous, to name just but a few.
Sacrament, procrastinate, intestate - may seem,
Draconian, Dickensian, obsolete, obscene.
Gratuity, embouchure, gnaw with silent 'g',
Juggernaut, cantankerous, words which I must decree,
Are remarkably, stupendously, fantastically sublime,
And should be used magnanimously, each and every time.
Biblical, whimsical, statistician, brie,
Words which are surprisingly, absolutely free.
Insatiable, perpetuate, onomatopoeia,
Existential, exemplary, words you shouldn’t fear.
Exponential, candid, xylophone or muse,
Malign versus benign - never to confuse.
Reptilian, gazillion, fragility, beguile,
Elucidate, excruciate, go the extra mile.
Psychopath, pedestrian, sesquipedalian,
(That last word I must admit is somewhat alien),
But never doubt, you have some clout, with words that randomly,
Demonstrate, accentuate a sense of liberty.
Categories:
dickensian, word play, words,
Form: Rhyme
People with family dressed up in the Victorian style
Returning home as the Mass services over awhile.
Which in olden times was Communion or Eucharist
Where people remember, the savior Jesus Christ.
Who died for us and came back to his loved ones
It’s the memorable “birthday of the unconquered sun”
It seems to be the Dickensian Christmas time
A bridge between the old and new Christmas.
There is subtle sweetness in the sun’s glow
As people’s shadows fall on the white snow.
Barren trees, branches in twig like manner
The winter has come with his stern scanner.
Look there on the roof how the icicles hang
Winter has taken rest from sturm und drang.
People will go from house to house to greet
In the eve watch nativity plays on the street.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Date 1-22-14
Based on the 1st Picture "Christmas Day" by Isaiyah
7th place win
**Sturm und drang means a state of violent disturbance and disorder.**
Categories:
dickensian, religious,
Form: Rhyme
I see a wrapped gift
It is a china Santa
I’d wanted figures
Of the three ghosts of Christmas
Past, Present and Yet To Come
I drop the figure
It smashes on the hearth stones
Then I spot a note
And wondering what it says
I sweep the smashed china up
The note is from Claus
He says I should be careful
And look after things
He says that I may receive
Dickensian ghosts next year
Jack Horne for Linda-Marie’s Santa's Surprise contest
Categories:
dickensian, fantasy,
Form: Tanka
Oh come all ye faithful to a lovely little town
Oldie worldie houses have windows of brown
Snow filled window corners like Dickensian age
The holly and the ivy adorn the Christmas stage
Christmas trees outside the shops lit up so pleasantly
The subtle light is given off from each and every tree
When entering this quaint little town the magic of years gone by
Takes us back to Victorian times with the wonder of it we sigh
Hot chestnuts are roasting the aroma fills the air
People sipping hot mulled wine at the Christmas fair
Children are singing carols excited by it all
Waiting for the hour to come when Santa will call
The big brass band is playing in the square
People and children are now everywhere
Carrying their lanterns lighting their way
What a lovely place to visit on Christmas Day
(Entered in Carolyn's Christmas Contest)
Categories:
dickensian, holidaychristmas, christmas,
Form: Rhyme