Poetry Please - A Little Culture For The Masses

[aardvark6535 74]

At an all-boys school, we were all spell bound by "The Highwayman" at playtime, cutlasses and flintlocks were in abundance.

 

"The Highwayman"  by Alfred Noyes

 

PART ONE

 

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees.   

The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas.   

The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,   

And the highwayman came riding—

         Riding—riding—

The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

 

He’d a French cocked-hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin,   

A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin.

They fitted with never a wrinkle. His boots were up to the thigh.   

And he rode with a jewelled twinkle,

         His pistol butts a-twinkle,

His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jewelled sky.

 

Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard.

He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred.   

He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there   

But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,

         Bess, the landlord’s daughter,

Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

 

And dark in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked

Where Tim the ostler listened. His face was white and peaked.   

His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay,   

But he loved the landlord’s daughter,

         The landlord’s red-lipped daughter.

Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say—

 

“One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I’m after a prize to-night,

But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light;

Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,   

Then look for me by moonlight,

         Watch for me by moonlight,

I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way.”

 

He rose upright in the stirrups. He scarce could reach her hand,

But she loosened her hair in the casement. His face burnt like a brand

As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his breast;   

And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,

         (O, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)

Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped away to the west.

 

PART TWO

 

He did not come in the dawning. He did not come at noon;   

And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,   

When the road was a gypsy’s ribbon, looping the purple moor,   

A red-coat troop came marching—

         Marching—marching—

King George’s men came marching, up to the old inn-door.

 

They said no word to the landlord. They drank his ale instead.   

But they gagged his daughter, and bound her, to the foot of her narrow bed.

Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at their side!   

There was death at every window;

         And hell at one dark window;

For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that he would ride.

 

They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest.

They had bound a musket beside her, with the muzzle beneath her breast!

“Now, keep good watch!” and they kissed her. She heard the doomed man say—

Look for me by moonlight;

         Watch for me by moonlight;

I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way!

 

She twisted her hands behind her; but all the knots held good!

She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood!   

They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years

Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,

         Cold, on the stroke of midnight,

The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!

 

The tip of one finger touched it. She strove no more for the rest.   

Up, she stood up to attention, with the muzzle beneath her breast.   

She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive again;   

For the road lay bare in the moonlight;

         Blank and bare in the moonlight;

And the blood of her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to her love’s refrain.

 

Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot! Had they heard it? The horsehoofs ringing clear;   

Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot, in the distance? Were they deaf that they did not hear?

Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,

The highwayman came riding—

         Riding—riding—

The red coats looked to their priming! She stood up, straight and still.

 

Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night!   

Nearer he came and nearer. Her face was like a light.

Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep breath,   

Then her finger moved in the moonlight,

         Her musket shattered the moonlight,

Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him—with her death.

 

He turned. He spurred to the west; he did not know who stood   

Bowed, with her head o’er the musket, drenched with her own blood!   

Not till the dawn he heard it, and his face grew grey to hear   

How Bess, the landlord’s daughter,

         The landlord’s black-eyed daughter,

Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.

 

Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky,

With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high.

Blood red were his spurs in the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat;

When they shot him down on the highway,

         Down like a dog on the highway,

And he lay in his blood on the highway, with a bunch of lace at his throat.

 

.       .       .

 

And still of a winter’s night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,

When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,   

When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,   

A highwayman comes riding—

         Riding—riding—

A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.

 

Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard.

He taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred.   

He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there   

But the landlord’s black-eyed daughter,

         Bess, the landlord’s daughter,

Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

[Gormenghast 60]

THE BLEEDIN' SPARRER

 

We ‘ad a bleedin’ sparrer 
Lived up a bleedin’ spaht 
One day the bleedin’ rain came dahn 
An’ washed the bleeder aht.


An’ as 'e layed ‘arf drahnded 
Dahn in the bleedin’ street 
‘E begged that bleedin’ rainstorm 
To bave ‘is bleedin’ feet.


But then the bleedin’ sun came aht 
Dried up the bleedin’ rain 
So that bleedin’ little sparrer 
‘E climbs up ‘is spaht again.


But, Oh! - the cruel sparrer ‘awk 
‘E spies ‘im in ‘is snuggery 
‘E sharpens up ‘is bleedin’ claws 
An’ rips ‘im aht by thuggery.


Jist then a bleedin’ sportin’ type 
Wot ‘ad a bleedin’ gun 
‘E spots that bleedin’ sparrer ‘awk 
An’ blasts ‘is bleedin’ fun.


The moral of the story 
Is plain to everyone...
That them wot’s up the bleedin’ spaht 
Don’t get no bleedin’ fun

[carosio 186]

Poetry is the highest form of language.

Edited November 28, 2023 by carosio
typo

[cressida 1,585]

6 minutes ago, carosio said:

Poetry is the highest form of lamguage.

......and the most romantic?    the Highwayman is.

 

After reading the sparrow poem,  perhaps not.

Edited November 28, 2023 by cressida

[hauxwell 244]

A North East Poem

 

Pease pudding hot
Pease pudding cold
Pease pudding in the pot
Nine days old.
Some like it hot
some like it cold
Some like it in the pot
Nine days old.

[*Wallace* 333]

11 hours ago, Mister M said:

That was a song by the Venga boys

I think they ripped off John Lee Hooker.

[Guest]

I remember enjoying trying to tease apart The Wasteland at college.  This is my favourite though:

 

This Be The Verse - Philip Larkin

 

They **** you up, your mum and dad.   

    They may not mean to, but they do.   

They fill you with the faults they had

    And add some extra, just for you.

 

But they were ****ed up in their turn

    By fools in old-style hats and coats,   

Who half the time were soppy-stern

    And half at one another’s throats.

 

Man hands on misery to man.

    It deepens like a coastal shelf.

Get out as early as you can,

    And don’t have any kids yourself.

[Guest]

Forgotten about this: you can listen to it here.  Samuel West's Pandemic Poems.  A great resource from his lockdown project of 2020.

 

ETA Meant to edit previous post, not post a new one. 🙄

Edited November 28, 2023 by Guest

[cressida 1,585]

16 minutes ago, Hecate said:

I remember enjoying trying to tease apart The Wasteland at college.  This is my favourite though:

 

This Be The Verse - Philip Larkin

 

They **** you up, your mum and dad.   

    They may not mean to, but they do.   

They fill you with the faults they had

    And add some extra, just for you.

 

But they were ****ed up in their turn

    By fools in old-style hats and coats,   

Who half the time were soppy-stern

    And half at one another’s throats.

 

Man hands on misery to man.

    It deepens like a coastal shelf.

Get out as early as you can,

    And don’t have any kids yourself.

My brother once said to me 'do you think our mother gave us a complex about spiders,' I didn't remember that but I know she was afraid of mice,

she saw one once and jumped on a chair.

[hackey lad 3,991]

8 hours ago, trastrick said:

Not even such literary works as

 

12 pence one shilling
20 pence one and eightpence
30 pence 2 and sixpence
40 pence 3 and fourpence
50 pence 4 and tuppence
60 pence 5 shillings

 

and

 

30 days hath September.....?
 

30 day hath September, my Dad taught me . Is that really a poem? 

[trastrick 866]

1 hour ago, hackey lad said:

30 day hath September, my Dad taught me . Is that really a poem? 

Well at least it rhymes. Not like today's Poetry Prize Winning self absorbed dissonant crap.

 

THIS is a poem! By a master of the language.

 

LOCHINVAR

By Sir Walter Scott

 

O young Lochinvar is come out of the west,

Through all the wide Border his steed was the best;

And save his good broadsword he weapons had none,

He rode all unarm’d, and he rode all alone.

So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,

There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.

 

He staid not for brake, and he stopp’d not for stone,

He swam the Eske river where ford there was none;

But ere he alighted at Netherby gate,

The bride had consented, the gallant came late:

For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war,

Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.

 

So boldly he enter’d the Netherby Hall,

Among bride’s-men, and kinsmen, and brothers and all:

Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword,

(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word,)

“O come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,

Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?”

 

“I long woo’d your daughter, my suit you denied;—

Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide—

And now I am come, with this lost love of mine,

To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.

There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,

That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.”

 

The bride kiss’d the goblet: the knight took it up,

He quaff’d off the wine, and he threw down the cup.

She look’d down to blush, and she look’d up to sigh,

With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.

He took her soft hand, ere her mother could bar,—

“Now tread we a measure!” said young Lochinvar.

 

So stately his form, and so lovely her face,

That never a hall such a galliard did grace;

While her mother did fret, and her father did fume,

And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume;

And the bride-maidens whisper’d, “’twere better by far

To have match’d our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.”

 

One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear,

When they reach’d the hall-door, and the charger stood near;

So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung,

So light to the saddle before her he sprung!

“She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur;

They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,” quoth young Lochinvar.

 

There was mounting ’mong Graemes of the Netherby clan;

Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran:

There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee,

But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see.

So daring in love, and so dauntless in war,

Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?

 

I can still recite it from memory, Inspired me, it did.

 

.

Edited November 28, 2023 by trastrick

[cressida 1,585]

I'm liking young Lochinvar❤️