My spaceship is ready
For me and cousin Freddy
Please help me hold it steady
I’ll run go get my Teddy.
Pluto today, Saturn tomorrow.
Stop your crying; ditch your sorrow.
We will leave first thing tomorrow.
Your light saber, may I please borrow?
I might need a weapon to protect us.
I’m taking my dog Magdalen Mama Gus.
We’re traveling light without too much fuss.
We’ll leave your cat though, he is such a muss!
The story of the young Jesus
Jesus was sceptical of his tribe as a trainee carpenter
he was lousy, could even make a bookshelf, he was bullied for this.
Jesus took umbrage and criticized the establishment of bootlicking priests
whom the Roman occupiers had given them power?
He took to hanging out with a group of radicals of the day
and since he was good with words soon became their leaders.
The groupies, one of the Magdalene, were for the pleasure of the flesh,
although Jesus was fond of this woman, he didn´t show it openly.
Jesus got big-headed thought he could take on the establishment
like when he chased money lenders out of the church.
He was wrong!
He was arrested mocked, and given a thorn crown, but he insisted
he was the proper leader of the people.
they crucified him, but women come to the rescue, healed his wounds
and sent him and Magdalen, the despised tart, to France.
He had seven children and ended his days as a valued goldsmith.
Magdalen longed to become a Parisienne
Unfortunately she felt more like a prairie hen
Working earnestly for the county’s aldermen
Tallying hydrogen nitrogen oxygen
Overseeing regimen and specimen
All lined up under lights of halogen
At times she closed her eyes and said amen
Holding her magical fountain pen
Writing poetry about way back when
She dreamt of being a beautiful Cheyenne
Canoeing down the river Darien
Banked by miles of green magnificent glen
She had countless fantasies since she was ten
Flying as free as a sweet wren again and again
But Magdalen always longed to be a Parisienne
AP: Honorable Mention 2020
The golden daffodils are fading fast,
But beautiful the bank of bluebells bloom.
This stand of beech trees has a lime-green cast
As sulphur yellow, flowers the spiky broom.
There is a madness to the month of May
Young boys sing madrigals from Magdalen tower
Fa-la la-la la, fa-la la-la lay
As birds sing lustily hour on hour.
Around the maypole children gaily trip,
As bumble bees buzz loudly in the flower,
And grown men dance with handkerchiefs and sticks :
A sudden breeze; black clouds portend a shower –
"Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May"
But soon enough, the sun will warm the day.
I stood by the bridge
Gazing down at the greens
Of the trees on the banks
At the union of streams.
Through mossed balustrade
Reflected I'd spy
The spires of Magdalen
In watery sky.
Leaves on the water
Red, yellow and gold
By unseen currents,
The near bank hold.
Bright against grey
In light autumn shower
A shimmering halo
Above the stone tower.
Wide wavelets circling
The still picture flows
A fast spreading mask
Where the hidden fish rose.
By the far bank
The ripple passes
Halting the gaze
Of hanging grasses.
Thinned willow and elm
Where pigeons coo,
As in the past
They forever will do.
Now Michaelmas comes,
New faces appear,
But Oxford unchanged
Will greet the new year.
I regret the anguish that I suffered from the church
No comfort for the questioner no solace for the lost
With rules and hypocrisy engrained in the folds
Of vestments golden -
I regret the bigotry of those times - no mercy for the sinner
The smell of incense sweat and fear
Garbled mutterings paying dear
Saving souls from extra torture
Hiding secrets from the world
Little infants buried outside little girls incarcerated
In the laundries of the Magdalen – starching sheets of rich mens’ linen
Feeling guilty for existing –
No eyes meet mine
To tell the sorrow of their lives
While Financiers Assisi
The scriptures never claim
one day all whores will magdalen
and disbelievers paul.
There is no verse that says
one day all thieves will dismas
by the city gate
while financiers assisi,
their eyes, their tin cups up.
Donal Mahoney
one last glearyeyed look
towards the clouded-sky,
and the legs trapped beneath her shook
loose the one thought she'd always denied.
she would watch his hand sweep
& cradle her neck, saying goodnight,
her eyes would follow and keep
watching his fading form, long out of sight.
his paintings always held something she loved,
black roses, swirling van gogh clouds,
overgrown gardens, virgin mothers in shrouds
at the foot of ashwood rosaries.
she a catholic, he the eucharist,
her acrylic oil dreams knew nothing of this tryst.
the way this magdalene posed for her last
portrait made her last painted tear,
her last skyward gaze immortal, or past,
divinity, or near.
Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.