Tag Archives: a month with yeats

A Few Minutes

One of those Monday’s with few minutes to spare, and so, a few Minute poems (8,4,4,4; 8,4,4,4; 8,4,4,4/aabb, ccdd, eeff)for Jane Dougherty’s ‘A Month with Yeats’ – Day Twenty, Poetry Challenge inspired by the verse below from Yeats’ poem, ‘The Old Age of Queen Maeve’. The painting is IvanBilibin‘s illustration to a Russian fairy tale about the Firebird, 1899.

‘out of the dark air over her head there came

a murmur of soft words and meeting lips.’—W.B. Yeats

breath to death

in dim-lit sterile cells we wait
to meet our fate
the reeper’s sweep
our souls to keep

medicated interventions
good intentions
stripped dignity
dis-harmony

we rage against eternity
our destiny
is but a breath
to peaceful death

Branded

it’s comes to ‘do you believe them?’
all the women
nothing to lose
who claim abuse

for if you side with privileged men
know in the end
you’ll share their shame
for selfish gain

it really does come down to this
you can’t dismiss
you’ll wear the brand
of where you stand

~ kat


Praying…Not Praying

‘We who still labour by the cromlech on the shore,
The grey cairn on the hill, when day sinks drowned in dew,
Being weary of the world’s empires, bow down to you,
Master of the still stars and of the flaming door.’—W.B. Yeats

Praying…Not Praying

Those of us who have lost hope in praying,
pray that there is a special place in hell
for those self-righteous zealots in churches
defending vile monsters high on the hill.
Piously waving tomes filled with fables,
quoting their misplaced contextual creeds,
heaping full judgment on anyone other,
claiming compassion while lowly hearts bleed.
Surely a just god would be disgusted
by vacuous souls who claim him by name,
who pour salt on wounds; hang with abusers,
no tinge of conviction, remorse or shame.
If you are listening god, if you’re out there,
isn’t it time for your rapturous sweep?
Call forth your faithless; send them wherever.
If they’re not here we might actually know peace.

~kat

Another verse From ‘The Valley of the Black Pig’ for Jane Dougherty’s ‘A Month with Yeats – Day Nineteen’ poetry challenge. And it’s those pigs again! My poetry as a result, of late, seems more like rants. But I do find them cathartic. Living in this alternate reality is not for the faint of heart! Peace!


Of Flying Pigs and Truffles

From “Valley of the Black Pig”…

‘The dews drop slowly and dreams gather;’ —W.B. Yeats

Of Flying Pigs and Truffles

Those pigs! They are flying…fleeing in droves,
exposed by the truffles they guzzled with glee,
their gluttonous bingeing, now everyone knows.
Soon they will pay for their vile thievery.
Those truffles! So rare…such delicacies.
They should be savored by pallets discerning,
their place on the plate given prominency,
respected and honored in delicate servings.
It’s been quite the scandal, this wild exposé.
The talk of the barnyard, in locker room speak.
Oh, those pig’s days are numbered, not sorry to say,
and to truffles uprising, the victory tastes sweet.

~kat

Inspired by the news of the day, the slow dripping drop of the dews and the title of the Yeats poem, for Jane Dougherty’s ‘A Month with Yeats’ – Day Eighteen Poetry Challenge.


’til the mourning

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Photo by rmac8oppo at pixabay.

‘The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,’ —W.B. Yeats

lay me down on beds of clover
as the gloaming ebbs to darkness
let’s pretend that we’re still lovers
despite the veil’s cold opaqueness
whisper on the nor-east breeze
fill the twinkling dippers full
arouse those long forgotten dreams
persuade me to embrace them still
brush my lips with dewy kisses
in the din of silence wrap me
memories are bitter blisses
but without them, where would I be?
hush me now, stop this complaining
I’ll just imagine you are near
bear the slug of time remaining
a life alone, not death, to fear

~kat
For Jane Dougherty’s “A Month With Yeats” – Day 17 poetry challenge inspired by the verse above from Yeats’ poem,‘ Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven’. Photo by rmac8oppo at pixabay.


R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

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‘Do you not hear me calling, white deer with no horns?’—W.B. Yeats

 

sickening the surreptitious poison
seething decades long, progress regressed
strides reversed, equality is frozen
by patriarchal fools who ‘know what’s best’
deafened to the earnest accusations
of innocents so easily oppressed
gather they, in secret consultation
seeking to exploit, for gain, the nation

slowly voices from the ash, defiant,
demanding recompense, proclaim, ‘me too’
legion, they are over being silenced
willing to face demons, armed with truth
exposing vile molesters, cads and tyrants
and they’re not backing down, this is a coup
apathy is never a solution
stir the masses, join the revolution

~kat

A two-octive Ottava Rima poem (abababcc, dededeff – Each line is of a 10 or 11 syllable count) for Jane Dougherty’s ‘A Month with Yeats – Day 16‘ poetry challenge based on the verse above from Yeats’ poem ‘He Mourns for the Change That Has Come Upon Him and Longs for the End of the World’