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Poetry

A long page of poems from Home Educating Parents and Children

First Summer Days

Blossom falling like confetti,
Lawnmowers buzzing like bees,
White clouds like fluffy pillows,
Birds fluttering like leaves.

Last Summer Days

Days growing shorter like candles burning,
Trees withering like a picked flower,
Freckly faces like raisin cookies,
School days looming like a big black tower.

By Greg Ashton (Age 9)

Truth

A seagull by the seashore,
Or the seashore by the gull;
Which way round I do not know
As the waves do me lull.

A sea of waves,
Or a wave of sea,
I have not been told.
I, neither, know the truth,
As the cries of seagulls echo
Through the caverns cold.

Grains of sand,
Or sandy grains;
But, is there a spot
Of truth in this world on
Which we live?
Surely, I think not.

By Greg Ashton (age 9)

IL MIO TESORO
(CLOUDS.)

Clouds transcending playgrounds were:
Worlds wide of fenced in
Unintended want,
subconciously sub-rosa;
Music stepping over
Silent boundaries of restraint
Searching for a soft blue word
like 'tesoro' you once heard.
You whispered it along cold corridors
and cried
For reasonable distance of desires,
Which, but for boundlessness of clouds,
Failed to slip within mind's reach.

Barbara S.

SLAVERY

African Nations
Taken to work on plantations

Crowded ships
Painful Whips

Metal chains
Bible names

Objects to sell
Life will be hell

Branded like cattle
Facing a battle

Working without pay
Until their death day

By Bilqees Age 9

Michael

Now, Michael is an Indoor Scarecrow.
He stands in the hall on his post.
Of all the scarecrows you can think of
Michael is more scary than most.

His hair is as wild as a Wild Thing;
It's purple and orange and red.
He has big eyes of beautiful blue felt,
And a cone nose stitched on to his head.

He ties up his hair with bright ribbons
And bells, shiny sequins and beads.
We love him, and talk to him daily,
And see to all his scarecrow needs.

If it's fine Michael goes in the garden
Where he enjoys a stand in the Sun,
But we have to watch out for the rain, 'cos
When he gets wet his nose starts to run.

Michael has lots of friends and relations
Who are featured in smart magazines,
But Michael himself don't seek glory -
To the quieter life Michael leans.

Through that's not to say he's solitary
By nature, or to loneness inclined,
For his social life can be a whirl, whenever
Michael himself has a mind.

He's spent many an hour in shop windows
Where he looks out as shoppers pass by.
And he's popular at Garden Centres -
He entices the punters to buy!

Michael seems to enjoy being with children.
In schools, he's at the heart of each group;
Though his nose is a major attraction
And when honked too much it starts to droop.

Nobody knows quite where he came from,
('Cept the elderly sewing machine),
And no one seems to know where he's going -
He's a mystery, always has been.

There'd be tales of Heros and Adventures
If Michael could speak, which he can't.
There's no telling what he would come out with
If I gave him a mouth, so I shan't.

Mary -
December 1999

Ode To My Mangle

A mangle is a wondrous thing
And mine is duck-egg blue
It stands outside the kitchen
And it's worth a bob or two.

'Twas made in 1950ish.
If only it could speak
A story or two it could tell
But all it does is squeak.

It's fully automatic,
I use it everyday.
Just stuff the sheets in, turn,
And watch the calories waste (waist) away.

A mangle's very well behaved,
Unlike the old spin drier
Which walked about the kitchen
Till it crashed into the fire.

A mangle, well, it's foolproof -
'Cept I have been heard to shout
"Oh Blast! There goes a button!"
When the shirts aren't inside out.

Next to it stands a washing machine,
It's only four years old.
Its motor went, its knobs fell off,
it's left out in the cold.

The mangle goes on undeterred
A marvellous appliance
I fetch the handle from the drawer -
The kids apply the science!

And when its rubbers perish
I replace them in a trice.
No call out fee, no engineer -
A spanner and a vice!

Oh why, Oh why, dear BBC
(Can someone answer true?)
Don't all machines, after fifty years
Still work as good as new?

Mary -
October 1999

FIREWORKS

Fireworks Fireworks in the sky,
Booming Glooming very high,
Fireworks Booming,
Dark sky is glooming,
Dark sky at night,
Is filled with light.

Standing in the garden,
Shannon with a mard on,
Sparklers in our hand,
Waving about very grand.

Bangers go bang,
Crackers go crack,
Sparklers all around,
To brighten up the night.

November Walk

Frosty morning
Wispy grass like silver snakes.
Frozen puddles crack under my wellies.
The horse in the field
galloping along
snorts steam.
Glistening glinting ice on
a carpet of wet mud.

by Camilla (age 8)

Christmas is so much fun
lots of presents for everyone
if you wake up in the night
you might have a great big fright

Big fat man with a bushy white beard
with a bright red suit that looks so weird
may make you jump, don't be afraid
It's Santa with the presents he's made.

Chelsie Wade (10) with input from Mum, Claire

If Only

If only we'd known about it before
If only they'd told us we could
If only we'd known it was legal at least
If only we'd known where we stood

If only we'd known before secondary school
If only they'd told us in time
If only the Head had just told us the truth
If only we'd not been so blind

If only we'd read about it somewhere
If only we'd been aware then
If only each parent knew right from the start
If only we could start again

If only we'd not had to drag him to school
If only we'd known the law
If only we'd not been misled on the facts
If only we'd questioned it more

If only the government told you these things
If only somebody had said
If only they'd left us to do it ourselves
If only we'd heard of FREd

Clare M

The Clouds of Night

Oh I want you here,
This is how you want me.
In the wowee I can see this night,
In my life.

I can see the draught
And I want you here.
I who is this country
And I want you here,
With life.....
And this poem
Has a little cat.

I can know who my boyfriend
And me.
I'm last home.
I have nothing to do
Just sleep and tired
And I know what this England
Faraway small.
I can know who this life is
Me, life is me, life is me.

I can see how you want me.
Just what I know -
La la la, la la la.

Maria H. (aged 5)

Back in the Playground Blues

I dreamed I was back in the playground, I was about four feet high
Yes dreamed I was back in the playground, standing about four feet high
Well the playground was three miles long and the playground was five miles wide

It was broken black tarmac with a high wire fence all around
Broken black dusty tarmac with a high fence running all around
And it had a special name to it, they called it The Killing Ground

Got a mother and a father, they're one thousand years away
The rulers of The Killing Ground are coming out to play
Everybody thinking: 'Who they going to play with today?'

Well you get it for being Jewish
And you get it for being black
Get it for being chicken
And you get it for fighting back
You get it for being big and fat
Get it for being small
Oh those who get it get it and get it
For any damn thing at all
Sometimes they take a beetle, tear off its six legs one by one
Beetle on its black back, rocking in the lunchtime sun
But a beetle can't beg for mercy, a beetle's not half the fun

I heard a deep voice talking, it had that iceberg sound
'It prepares them for Life' - but I have never found
Any place in my life worse than The Killing Ground.

- Adrian Mitchell, from 'Heart on the Left'

The Sea

When I get to the beach
My toes go hot
While I run across the sand.
I see the glittering green blue sea
And I feel
Very happy to be there.
I run into the waves
And they hit me, splash....hit me, splash...
Cooling me down
And I swim
Into the sea.

by Edward (age 6)

The waves crash fluidity
The cliffs retreat solidity
The unyielding yields
Such is the paradoxical nature of all things

Vapours rise
Rain falls
Night retreats
As day calls
Such is the cycle of all things

Just as the tree contains within its seed the very essence of itself
So all forms of life contain the very essence of the Universe
Tree to seed
Macro to micro
Energy to matter
Photon to atom

All things are essentially one and the same
Within the Glorious Cycle of Permanent Impermanence

Debra Maddex

Armpits

Hot and sweaty all the time,
Perspiration like the brine,
Some are hairy, some are shaven,
(For lice there is no furry haven).

Some have black hair, some have brown,
Some have curls and some hang down.
Some are sticky, some are dry,
Deodorant is a must to buy.

When deodorant came along
It stopped that awful sour pong.
Now we usually tend to meet
People with armpits smeeling sweet.

by Peter Bohme (aged 10)

(This poem was written to prove that one can write a poem about anything, from armpits to roses).

No Way - The Hundred is There

The child
is made of one hundred.
The child has
a hundred languages
a hundred hands
a hundred thoughts
a hundred way of thinking
of playing, of speaking.
A hundred, always a hundred
ways of listening
of marvelling, of loving,
a hundred joys
for singing and understanding
a hundred worlds to discover
a hundred worlds to invent
a hundred worlds to dream.
The child has
a hundred languages
(and a hundred hundred hundred more)
but they steal ninety-nine.
The school and the culture
separate the head from the body.
They tell the child
to think without hands
to do without head
to listen and not to speak
to understand without joy
to love and to marvel
only at Easter and Christmas.
They tell the child
to discover the world already there
and of the hundred
they steal ninety-nine.
They tell the child
that work and play
reality and fantasy
science and imagination
sky and earth
reason and dream
are things that do not belong together.

And thus they tell the child
that the hundred is not there.
The child says
"No way - The hundred is there".

Loris Malaguzzi (Translated by Lella Gandini).

Dragon in the Dark

Dragon shining in the moon
Rakes the people to their doom.
Air is thrumming with the humming of death coming very soon.
Ghastly fire in the air,
Overhead flies despair,
Now he's coming with the humming of wings thrumming through the gloom.

In Smaug's ire
Nocturnal fire,

Terror, cringing, children whingeing, hair is singeing in the pyre.
Heat is resounding,
Enemy is bounding,

Death is ringing, bowmen stringing, Smaug's death-tune the guardian's singing.
Air is rushing,
Roaring, gushing,
Killed the dragon is, Smaug is dead, people hushing, hushing, hushing.

by Peter Bohme (aged 10)

This poem is about a scene from "The Hobbit", and uses the phrase "Dragon in the Dark" to provide the first letter of each line.

Critical Analysis - Try This.

Let her Speak, let her speak.

She opens her mouth and you shovel bricks in.

Let her see, let her see.

Your windows are so many your panes blind her eyes.

Let her dance, let her dance.

But your chairs are too hard for any soul to move on.

Her womb contracts
Her stomach heaves
Her lungs lunge forwards.

A scream so defiantly deafening breaks the chains of bondage.
EXPLOSION

Your buildings collapse, to the ground.

Wings tear through her skin.
She, in ecstatic agony,
instinctively shifts her position,
freeing her feet
from your
concrete
shoes of learning.

As she flies towards the sun,
the rivers break their banks,
flooding your farmlands.

Ancient Oaks uproot and stomp across your towns.

Whilst you stand naked,
so small
with the eyes of a terrified child,

still

you do not understand.

Hagwithahatchett (aged 40)

Relationships - Not Therapists

"Love and power", the Crone said to me,
to retain both, together, is the key.
To living full and living rich,
poverty of soul is the only Bitch.

So come now Ceridwen stir
Your cauldron well.
Give all your daughters
eternal knowledge and
redeem us from hell.
Ceridwen that which was stolen
was returned nine fold and more.

The menopausal woman
need not grow too old but just open the door,
grow wealthy with knowledge
and truly have heart.
What was once an ending
can be a new start.

Go now Gynaecologist and search
for your womb.
Put down your bloody scapel
and now leave the room.
Return to the madness
from which you have come.

I outstretch my arms
and soak in the Sun.
"Hail Ra" said the good men
"Hail Ra now and rise"
as the good men saw death
with a tear in their eyes.

And mortals set sail for
the place of the Gods.
Down into the underworld
where wise women have trod,
seeking forgiveness
and seeking true life.

Dare Zeus become humble,
acknowledge his wife?
Dare God take a woman,
call her by name
and bless her with babies
who too look the same?

The meeting of beings
an important affair -
let's be human, my friend,
if only we dare.

Hagwithahatchett (aged 42)

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I live not myself, but I become/
Portion of that around me; and to me/
High mountains are a feeling, but the hum/
Of human cities torture.//

Byron

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