Thanks you Cynthia. I am a musician so have ridden the roller coaster - this is a bit analytical and has had all the romance sucked out of it!

Comment is about MUSIC - HOW IT WORKS (blog)

Original item by ray pool

I meant the diction, you know, the play on 'fucked up' (which maybe you didn't intend - but - oh well - I have only the words to go on, not the background.)

Comment is about TITLE. (blog)

Dialect is so hard to write. You never cease to amaze me with the scope and talent of your work. Ever considered Oxford! :)

Comment is about Dha Kro’z Ov Al-bi-an (blog)

Original item by Ian Whiteley

Well put - no - brilliantly put.

Comment is about MUSIC - HOW IT WORKS (blog)

Original item by ray pool

Cynthia I'm disappointed.

Comment is about THE SOCIALIST SHIRKERS PARTY (blog)

Original item by M.C. Newberry

this is a beautiful poem, it's always the the spaces you leave that make the difference.

thanks for your kind comments on my poem 'today'.
daz

Comment is about Six-fifteen on a Rainy Evening (blog)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

Cynthia, many thanks for commenting on 'Murder Mile'. Best wishes, Greg

Comment is about Cynthia Buell Thomas (poet profile)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

Harry, you're right, the Wiki entry on Aldo Mori is fascinating - the fact that he was trying to broker a power-sharing deal with the Communists, which neither the Americans nor the Russians were keen on. Amazing what you can stumble upon down a back street. Greg

Comment is about Harry O`N eill (poet profile)

Original item by Harry O`N eill

Unforgettable! I was nineteen. A friend and I had hitch-hiked down from Keele in Staffordshire that afternoon, and we hitched back overnight.

Comment is about 'A tremendous sense of occasion': David Andrew on the Albert Hall Incarnation (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

This is so beautiful! It is short and to the point, but the possibility of being God opens and expands it. It really gets the reader thinking and connecting with their own life and possibilities, very well written.

Comment is about Wishes (blog)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

Aww thank you Cynthia! I want to say I deeply appreciate your commenting so thank you so much :). Yes it was a little wordy I was mostly just playing around with sounds and rhymes. I think it sounds better read out loud but I agree it isn't my best work, there's always things to improve.

Comment is about Untitled (blog)

Original item by Chloe

Hi Cynthia - apologies for my tardiness in replying to your comments on 'song of the wandering' - I've been absent (without leave) for a couple of weeks - and spent little time close to my PC. Thanks so much for your (usual) insightful comments - it is a sad subject which does require careful consideration before approaching - I'm glad you think it worked - if it hadn't it could be seen as opportunistic or morbid - neither of which, I hope, are true.

I appreciate your comments
thanks

Ian

Comment is about Cynthia Buell Thomas (poet profile)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

aye up Tommy - sorry - been absent (without leave) last couple of weeks - so only just seen your comment on 'song of the wandering' - aye - as you say, similarities with migrant voyages for centuries - and they will end up, if they survive, being taken advantage off in western towns and cities - as sure as night follows ay. thanks for your comments
Ian

Comment is about Tommy Carroll (poet profile)

Original item by Tommy Carroll

Thanks Lynn, it's much appreciated. :)

Comment is about On stolen sheets (blog)

Original item by Tommy Carroll

Love the whole but the last two lines are fab

Comment is about On stolen sheets (blog)

Original item by Tommy Carroll

Once again, great writing. Brilliant.

Comment is about karaoke (05/29/2015) (blog)

Original item by Zach Dafoe

On second thoughts, I agree with Cynthia about the
power of the content. It was the subject of culpability
that caused my first comment. People can be such
fools to themselves and today's society isn't geared
towards taking individual responsibility.

Comment is about To serve and neglect (blog)

Thanks Cynthia - I note your point about the line you
mention. The rhythm is there but your suggestion makes
it even tidier and whilst I'd like to have included the full
title in the content, I'll go for it!
Regards,
MC

Comment is about THE SOCIALIST SHIRKERS PARTY (blog)

Original item by M.C. Newberry

I like this too. Perhaps you could take out the period after 'You ' since you are actually making a statement - subject and verb - and lengthen the final 'You' with a dash - or smash it with an exclamation. Or not.

Punctuation is the pits in page poetry. If unsure - leave it out entirely and let the reader be creative. No steering of ideas is probably better than iffy directions.

Comment is about You - (blog)

Short and spearing. Although, IMO, a person is not entirely defined by 'work', I do not make light of your poem's feelings.

Comment is about Unemployed (blog)

Original item by James Roper

I wish it were, Cynthia.

Comment is about TITLE. (blog)

Splendid - IMO, really terrific - not a word without its own power - for a challenging universal theme.

Comment is about school field (blog)

Original item by jeremy young

Poets are always drawing parallels (like - what is imagery?) but I think we are also, as a group, very sensitive to parallels of any genre, especially history.

I like the change to 'news/report prose' in the second stanza. Not worthy of poetical effort. And yes, that last line is poetically splendid.

Comment is about Murder mile (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Pithy and powerful.

Comment is about To serve and neglect (blog)

This has some good lines, and many points well made.

Try the fourth from last line without 'Party', and I think you will be delighted.

Comment is about THE SOCIALIST SHIRKERS PARTY (blog)

Original item by M.C. Newberry

I really like 'Gossip' also, Chloe. Well done. The comparisons, one after the other, make a strong statement about this familiar subject.

Comment is about Chloe (poet profile)

Original item by Chloe

I take it mother looked on drink as a sort of Jekyll and Hyde juice, that makes Scoutmasters view their charges from a different prospective, and funnily enough, as a result of our evolvement to a more tolerant society is now un-shockingly taken for granted as part of their remit.

Comment is about M.C. Newberry (poet profile)

Original item by M.C. Newberry

Chloe (my grandmother's name, and I love it), this piece is interesting - but it sure has a lot of varied metaphors. Would you consider one or two only? Sometimes brevity to express a strong idea is very effective.

Or was this effusion of comparison deliberate?

Comment is about Untitled (blog)

Original item by Chloe

Hi Harry

Thanks for your comment. I forgot to explain that the soldiers original distress from being badly wounded, was cruelly compounded with three hours of Victor Sylvester and his strict tempo dance recordings. And I might add the sweaty bodies jumping about to them on a candle-waxed dance floor, in times of great shortage, deodorants
being one, didn't help.

Comment is about Harry O`N eill (poet profile)

Original item by Harry O`N eill

Very humorous - even if the subject is serious - sort of -. Is the format deliberately - scattered?

Comment is about GO TO CASKET (blog)

Original item by ray pool

Ha ha - very funny.

Comment is about TITLE. (blog)

Thank you, Mr Pool. It is always very special to have a poem acknowledged. I will try to follow up with a look at your work as well.

David Moore is very good, isn't he? A bit like a storm- battered ship trying to get fresh bearings, with much to say and a true talent to express it.

Comment is about ray pool (poet profile)

Original item by ray pool

Aided & abetted by feminism and a lack of understanding
of human nature, there is now a concept that domestic
disputes, the old term for marital fall-outs, are somehow
the responsibility of the police and not the participants
and the courts to whom neither party will to go for help
despite proper advice and offers of assistance with the process. It is the most dispiriting experience to spend
much time playing the peacemaker between husband and
wife (partners?) only to be left in little doubt it's a just a
misunderstanding and things will be better (usually the woman's view) and will the police just leave. Grown-up
does not necessarily equate with adult when common
sense so often seems absent in such relationships and
absenting oneself from potential harm seems to equate
to be an admission of personal failure...hardly a way of preventing a further deterioration in a relationship,
with the chance of worse to come. Tragedy is
arguably the result of a lack of self-care and foresight in those who want NOT to believe in what COULD happen.
Sad but often true...with the police picking up the
pieces and undeserved brickbats for perceived "failure".

Comment is about To serve and neglect (blog)

Gregg,

As a socialist, catholic right winger in the innocuous minor Liverpool political scene in the fifties this fascinated me.
It makes a good read on Wiki.

It is a telling comment on the evil that humans do to each other over the course of history.

(that last line is a fine, dry poetic commentary)

Comment is about Murder mile (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

I feel far too young to comment! In any event, I was
excused unwanted participation in the Scouts (before
later years in another uniform) when my mother heard the
scoutmaster liked a drink!
:-)

Comment is about As a baby I never felt embarrassed having my nappy changed...But I do now. (blog)

Very vivid and lucid I love it!

Comment is about Intense (blog)

Original item by UInk

Ken,
Just to cheer you up.

Last Saturday in the Legion we heaved our octogenarian limbs on to the deserted dance floor to do a jazzy little kind of a two step, Only for Cyril (90) and Betty (circa 90) to get up an execute a nifty jive (talk about being bested!)

We staggered back to our wheely-zimmer friends trying to look like a pair of sports,but got something from the evening when another couple of circa 90 year olds told us where we could get some reasonable geriatric travel insurance.

No wonder the Pope said that Europe was now `elderly` and haggard`.(mind, he`s no chicken himself!)

Enjoyed your lead soldier, happy Christmas, vicar spying boys brigade boyhood...That must have been a lousy dance if those soldiers would rather go back and fight.

A wartime destroyer-sailor told me that once -when they were bravely leaving the Mersey to face the u boats - the captain broadcast that they would have to return because of engine trouble...He said that they all gave the captain a loud, hearty cheer.

Comment is about As a baby I never felt embarrassed having my nappy changed...But I do now. (blog)

Hi Cynthia. I just read Hurricane and was bowled over by the sheer impact and word wizardry - almost Dhaliesque if I may say! It reminds me of a poem by Ted Hughes about wind - different style but yours makes a great treat of imagery. Ray

Comment is about Cynthia Buell Thomas (poet profile)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas

Thanks John. Words of wisdom indeed. Keep looking on the bright side, while we're still top side of the geraniums

Comment is about John Coopey (poet profile)

Original item by John Coopey

Thanks for looking at 'Murder mile', John. Yes, these two nearby events were the first things I came across when we pitched up at our apartment.

Comment is about Murder mile (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

Ken - you should delete your 'history' as you go. It will save the embarrassment when you shake a six. "Every six fucking weeks" - too right, soldier. Too right.
I look at the blossom in Spring and the dead leaves in Autumn and think, "how many of these fuckers have I got left to see". It's scarcely worth planting the geraniums!

Comment is about As a baby I never felt embarrassed having my nappy changed...But I do now. (blog)

Cheers Colin. I changed his name, but otherwise it's true. There but for the grace of god, and all that..

Comment is about ILL REPUTE. (blog)

Beautifully written poem, Jane. People such as Alan deserve to be remembered and I found it deeply moving.

xx

Comment is about Alan (Henning) (blog)

Original item by jane wilcock

Let it pour, indeed, Shirley.

Comment is about Memorial Day (blog)

Original item by Shirley Smothers

Portsmouth certainly seems to be a very vibrant place for poetry, Helen. I don't think I'm lined up as a guest poet at Guildford, but Maggie did enlist me to perform at a gig at the Rifle Club in Portsmouth in March. And I certainly hope to look in at Tongues & Grooves at some time in the future.

Comment is about Helen (poet profile)

Original item by Helen

Striking parallel, Greg.

Comment is about Murder mile (blog)

Original item by Greg Freeman

"Hill" - such a little word for such a big ego.
(He is on the right lines about "accessibility", though; personally, I have always thought it should be banned except in connection with wheelchair ramps and crotchless panties).

Comment is about 'Self-schooled poet' Simon Armitage bids to become Oxford professor of poetry (article)

Original item by Greg Freeman

'Boots?'...tee hee.xx

Comment is about Arse over pip (blog)

Thank you for the kind words. Colin, it literally was an early morning wake up poem, wrote it straight onto my phone at 4.30am pretty much how it's presented here. The dream was exactly how it happened in the poem. Lucky, really, like catching a vivid silver fish from the murky depths of sleep

Comment is about A Second Chance (For Terri) (blog)

Original item by Russ Litten

Cynthia 50 shades of water :)

Comment is about Cynthia Buell Thomas (poet profile)

Original item by Cynthia Buell Thomas