National Poetry Day

Today is National Poetry Day. Reading any poems? 
Thought I'd just throw a few of my favourites into the ether, then realised how many you grow to love over the years. It's lovely to revisit.

Brian Patten - 

Looking Back On It

At nineteen I was a brave Old Hunchback

Climbing to 'tremendous heights'

Preparing to swing down on my golden rope

And rescue the Accused Innocence.

But on my swooping, downward path one day

Innocence ducked

And I amazed at such an act crashed into

A wall she had been building.

How silly of me to think myself able to rescue anything!

From "Little Johnny's Confession"  (Allen & Unwin, 1967)

Adrian Mitchell -

Lullaby for William Blake

Blakehead, babyhead,

Your head is full of light.

You sucked the sun like a gobstopper.

Blakehead, babyhead,

High as a satellite on sunflower seeds,

First man-powered man to fly the Atlantic,

Inventor of the poem which kills itself,

The human form, jazz, Jerusalem

And other luminous, luminous galaxies.

You out-spat your enemies.

You irradiated your friends.

Always naked, you shaven, shaking tyger-lamb,

Moon-man, moon-clown, moon-singer, moon-drinker,

You never killed anyone.

Blakehead, babyhead,

Accept this mug of crude red wine -

I love you.

From "out loud" (Cape Golliard, 1969)

Roger McGough -

30

sitting alone

with my bottle of sauce

KNOCK KNOCK

"who's there?"

noone of course

from "Summer with Monica" (Michael Joseph , 1967)

and just to prove I progressed beyond the 1960's..

Dorothy Porter

I survived

I've always known 

my enemies.

When I was a child

Amun had the better of me.

I was little Horseface

with the wheezing lungs

and the wet bed.

Amun threw me down

in drooling, pissing fits.

I was only a second son

they all thought I'd die.

Amun would climb on my face

and spread his black bum

over my eyes and mouth

I thought he'd choke me

while my brother 

Tutmose

swanned around Karnak

in white linen

Amun loved him.

But one day

my parents gave me 

Aten

like you'd throw a child

drinking from a street sewer 

a slice of honey bread

I gorged on my God

I swelled up huge

that year

Tutmose shrivelled up

and died

I survived.

From "Akhenaten" (Serpent's Tail, 1992)

Finally, a recommendation, if you're a biologist and admirer of Charles Darwin, to invest in "Darwin : A life in poems" by Ruth Padel. To go with this, you could also look out a very good CD of specially composed songs featuring Chris Wood, Katrine Polwart & Stu Hanna - "Darwin Song Project Shrewbury 2009" (SFFCD01).