Navvies Poems | Examples


List of Member Poems

The Hanging Tree

Come, my love and meet me
Come, my love and meet me
Along the fields by The Hanging Tree
Come, my love and watch the navvies building the canal there,
Near The Hanging Tree
Come, my love and rest here
On the blackened roots of The Hanging Tree
Come, my love, sing with the ghosts by The Hanging Tree
Dirges for thieves, murderers and rogues
Killed on The Hanging Tree
Oh, come, my love and sleep beneath The Hanging Tree
Sleep with the other sweet boys I loved like thee.
Sleep, my love, beneath The Hanging Tree

Premium Member A Hovel In the Woods

I stumbled on a hovel in the woods
Dug in a foothill roofed with mossy shakes.
Inside, its furthest wall was made of stones
Piled high to make a chimney and a hearth.
Two stovepipes served as draft to bring in air.
No window spent what little warmth there was.

Who built this cell and for what purpose built?
If navvies built some shelter from the cold,
Then why not near to any railroad tracks?
A two day hike from any farm or town,
It made too far a lovers’ rendezvous.
Was it to help someone who’s lost survive?

Unlikely as it was, it might have been,
But only those who know to look can see
So meadowed as it is in growth and slope.
Opposing thumbs can easily unlatch
Its door inviting all who enter in
And equal welcomes guest or ghost alike.

Apology To Eliot

Let us go to certain half-desserted restaurant
Where cheese is spread on the table like an elkmilksheet  
Steaks are burnt, curries are bland, puddings are mulberry mist
Let us go to certain half-deserted street
Where women come and go like milkrunners
Wenches in hand the spanners span the Einstein's space
( Here I am dizzy,I am confused, should it be my space?)
They are savvy nuts pulling legs of navvies 
They are all dancing quirks and frizzling squidface
I am Nero, I am nerd, I like to fly like a booming bird
But hey see all ******** I am bamboozled in a brown pit
I am cheated, I am a cheat
I am timid, I browbeat
Let us go to certain half-deserted street
Kiss her kill her miss her mess her give Sue a treat
I am not fit.
I have heard bunkers singing
Weapons roar, F-16 kinking
Tattered cops and freaks swinging
Cows are mooing churchbells ringing.
Children laughing, couples blinking
Midsummer snow snowstars twinkling.
Churchbells ringing........................
Shanti Shanti Shanti.


Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
The navvies were round knocking on doors
They had some tarmac left and they could get more
Yes we needed the drive and a path
But we weren’t going to be in, that was the first laugh.

We trusted them and listened to what they said they would do
They would weed kill the ground and add hardcore too
The day they arrived we would be at work 
But they promised crossed hearts they would not shirk

We arrived home to a fantastic new drive
Their promise they kept, is was a surprise
Until one week later a dandelion grew
It stuck up green leaves through the tarmac so new…

On investigation we made a tiny little hole
To find we could lift the path in a roll
No hardcore or weed killer we had for our money
Just a path we rolled up… looking back it was funny.

© 19/08/2012

Tarmac= Black Top
Navvies were Irish Gypsies

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