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5793. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 7:54:40 AM Bruce Springsteen.
Christ no, Seamus, I don't have a rhyming creative bone in my body.....
But I've heard a few good lines
5794. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:03:40 AM Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J.
1972
track 2 of 9 5795. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:06:52 AM errr... Bruce Springsteen, if I failed to mention 5796. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:14:40 AM more bruce:
The flag of piracy flew from my mast my sails were set wing to wing
I had a jukebox graduate for first mate she couldn’t sail but she sure could sing
I pushed b-52 and bombed `em with the blues with my gear set stubborn on standing
I broke all the rules strafed my old high school never once gave thought to landin 5797. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:42:20 AM O Seamus, I can talk some trash 5798. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:43:07 AM I had skin like leather and the diamond-hard look of a cobra
I was born blue and weathered but I burst just like a supernova
I could walk like Brando right into the sun, then dance just like a Casanova
With my blackjack and jacket and hair slicked sweet
Silver star studs on my duds, just like a Harley in heat
When I strut down the street, I could feel its heart beat
The sisters fell back and said, Don't that man look pretty
The cripple on the corner cried out, Nickels for your pity
Them gasoline boys downtown sure talk gritty
It's so hard to be a saint in the city
I was the king of the alley, Mama, I could talk some trash
I was the prince of the paupers, crowned downtown at the beggar's bash
I was the pimp's main prophet, I kept everything cool
Just a backstreet gambler with the luck to lose
And when the heat came down it was left on the ground
The devil appeared like Jesus through the steam in the street
Showin' me a hand I knew even the cops couldn't beat
I felt his hot breath on my neck as I dove into the heat
It's so hard to be a saint when you're just a boy out on the street
And the sages of the subway sit just like the living dead
As the tracks clack out the rhythm, their eyes fixed straight ahead
They ride the line of balance and hold on by just a thread
But it's too hot in these tunnels, you can get hit up by the heat
You get up to get out at your next stop, but they push you back in your seat
Your heart starts beatin' faster as you struggle to your feet
Then you're outa that hole and back up on the street
And them South Side sisters sure look pretty
The cripple on the corner cries out, Nickels for your pity
And them downtown boys sure talk gritty
It's so hard to be a saint in the city
5799. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:49:52 AM Crazy Janey and her mission man were back in the alley tradin' hands
'long came Wild Billy with his friend G-man all duded up for Saturday night
Well Billy slammed on his coaster brakes and said anybody wanna go on up to Greasy Lake
It's about a mile down on the dark side of route eighty-eight
I got a bottle of rose so let's try it
We'll pick up Hazy Davy and Killer Joe and I'll take you all out to where the gypsy angels go
They're built like light
and they dance like spirits in the night (all night) in the night (all night)
Oh, you don't know what they can do to you
Spirits in the night (all night) in the night (all night)
Stand right up now and let them shoot through you
Well now Wild Billy was a crazy cat and he shook some dust out of his coonskin cap
He said, "Trust some of this it'll show you where you're at." or at least it'll help you really feel it
By the time we made it up to Greasy Lake I had my head out the window and Janey's fingers were in the cake
I think I really dug her 'cause I was too loose to fake
I said, "I'm hurt." She said, "Honey let me heal it."
And we danced all night to a soul fairy band
and she kissed me just right like only a lonely angel can
She felt so nice, just as soft as a spirit in the night (all night)
In the night (all night). Janey don't know what she do to you
Spirit in the night (all night) in the night (all night)
Stand right up and let her shoot through me
Now the night was bright and the stars threw light on Billy and Davy
dancin' in the moonlight
They were down near the water in a stone mud fight
Killer Joe gone passed out on the lawn
Well now Hazy Davy got really hurt, he ran into the lake in just his socks and a shirt
Me and Crazy Janey was makin' love in the dirt singin' our birthday songs
Janey said it was time to go so we closed our eyes and said goodbye to gypsy angel row, felt so right
Together we moved like spirits in the night, all night
Baby don't know what it do to you
Spirits in the night (all the night) in the night (all night)
...
they told me to do it!
stand up now and let it shoot thru yA
honey let me heal it 5800. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:56:46 AM Why did I pick that song?
Maybe you better pelt me quick with your displesure!
You Bellvue local jokers, you are cracked.
hahahahahahahaha 5801. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 8:58:37 AM This is only open to ny JOKERS in the next 30 minutes 5802. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 9:04:52 AM he ragamuffin gunner is returnin' home like a hungry runaway
He walks through town all alone
He must be from the fort he hears the high school girls say
His countryside's burnin' with wolfman fairies dressed in drag for homicide
The hit and run, plead sanctuary, `neath a holy stone they hide
They're breakin' beams and crosses with a spastic's reelin' perfection
nuns run bald through Vatican halls pregnant, pleadin' immaculate conception
And everybody's wrecked on Main Street from drinking unholy blood
Sticker smiles sweet as gunner breathes deep, his ankles caked in mud
And I said "Hey, gunner man, that's quicksand, that's quicksand that ain't mud
Have you thrown your senses to the war or did you lose them in the flood?"
That pure American brother, dull-eyed and empty-faced
races Sundays in Jersey in a Chevy stock super eight
He rides `er low on the hip, on the side he's got Bound For Glory in red, white and blue flash paint
He leans on the hood telling racing stories, the kids call him Jimmy The Saint
Well the blaze and noise boy, he's gunnin' that bitch loaded to blastin' point
He rides head first into a hurricane and disappears into a point
And there's nothin' left but some blood where the body fell
That is, nothin' left that you could sell
just junk all across the horizon, a real highwayman's farewell
And he said "Hey kid, you think that's oil? Man, that ain't oil that's blood"
I wonder what he was thinking when he hit that storm
Or was he just lost in the flood?
Eighth Avenue sailors in satin shirts whisper in the air
Some storefront incarnation of Maria, she's puttin' on me the stare
and Bronx's best apostle stands with his hand on his own hardware
Everything stops, you hear five, quick shots, the cops come up for air
And now the whiz-bang gang from uptown, they're shootin' up the street
And that cat from the Bronx starts lettin' loose
but he gets blown right off his feet
And some kid comes blastin' round the corner but a cop puts him right away
He lays on the street holding his leg screaming something in Spanish
Still breathing when I walked away
And somebody said "Hey man did you see that? His body hit the street with such a beautiful thud"
I wonder what the dude was sayin' or was he just lost in the flood?
Hey man, did you see that, those poor cats are sure messed up
I wonder what they were gettin' into, or were they just lost in the flood?
5803. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 9:21:26 AM don't that man look pretty? 5804. Ulgine Barrows - 9/17/2006 9:26:07 AM spirit in the night
luv ya
5805. Macnas - 9/18/2006 10:46:40 AM Thomas Kinsella
Scylla and Charybdis
Abstracted, sour, as he reaches across a dish
Of plaice, his hand on a tray of birds, O'Neill
Uplugs the weary fan: flat heaps of fish
Exhale. He watches Reynolds grope and pile
His window opposite with melons, fresh
Leather of cabbage, oranges . . . and smile.
Wiping his gamy hands he turns and thirsts
Abruptly for clay and fragrance, until it seems
The South in a sweet globe sinks to his lips and bursts.
And yet red-wristed Reynolds dreams and dreams
That he flies with the snipe in the sparse bracken, or thrusts
Cold muscle to the depths and dumbly screams.
I have slipped at evening through that ghostly quarrel,
Making a third, to round the simple moral.
5806. Seamus - 9/19/2006 7:55:11 PM Mac! Cén chaoi a bhfuil tú?
Kinsella and this sonnet in particular are on the short list for favourites from these quarters.
I've always loved how the voice has O'Neill (Scylla) and Reynolds (Charybdis) dream each other's lives through the windows of their shops in the quatrains and then interposes himself, Ulysses unbound, as the third of the "moral" in the couplet.
Kinsella, a master of description:
the weary fan
flat heaps of fish
fresh leather of cabbage
gamy hands
The South in a sweet globe
red-wristed
the sparce braken
cold muscle
And in terms of craft, "red-wristed Reynolds" is one of my favourite examples of top beat alliteration in a trio, without the overbearing repetition of the visual "r". Do you realise how very difficult that is to carry off? Put it this way, I've never come close.
I will note, in passing, that the man knows how to rime--until the couplet, root words all (and a name) and everywhere in one or two syllable end words. And the obvious comfort with the slant rime of "O'Neill" and "pile/smile"--that is called being sure of yourself. Why do so many think that a sonnet must be of Love, Thee and Thou, God and King, when in truth, the muck and blood and clay and cold muscle here would seem to fit in no other form. Of course, this is, in the end, a love and God sonnet anyway, but that's of no importance here.
Go raibh maith agat, Mac, for posting a favourite.
It's good to see old friends, this poem and you. NB: "old" in the second usage as in the length of friendship and not chronological age.
Seamus
5807. Macnas - 9/20/2006 8:48:00 AM Ta me go maith, agus don dan, ta failte romhat.
Even to the likes of me, Kinsella, the poets poet, has demanded my attention since I was directed to read and learn "Mirror in February" during my short stay in secondary school.
I've always liked his poetry for the simplest of reasons, the words and images resonate with me, and I find him more identifiably Irish than Heaney, even though Heaney is the current quintessential Irish poet.
The poem at hand, I think a delight to read, and it brings very vivid memories and images to mind. If you've ever wandered around Cork, and went to the English Market, on the south side, nearest Oliver Plunkett street, you would have found yourself among the fish stalls.
Traditionally, fishmongers would also have whatever game was in season, particularly waterfowl.
In my minds eye, I can see braces of mallard hanging over trays of black sole, plaice and monkfish. Snipe were never hung up, being such a small bird and were kept on a tray or dish.
When He says "leather of cabbage", you can feel the squeaky hide of the broad cabbage leaf in your hand. The opposites, the gamey smells of the fish stall against the earthy and sweet smells of the green grocers, and the intertwining of the two as the shopkeepers daydream, is a great hook that makes me come back to this poem time and again.
The meanings, the tale behind the tale, eludes me even when it's explained. I think, that I get caught up in the actual devices he uses, as I too, in my mind, have sped along the nap of the earth with the snipe, and I've watched the sea bass, in those rare moments where strong autumn sunshine shines through the dull green water, hunt among the inlets and troughs where the rock slopes down to the Atlantic on Howse strand, with them as they chase their prey through the drifting kelp and freezing water.
And in the end, I don't think it matters what gift you take from such a poem.
5808. alistairconnor - 9/20/2006 10:05:36 AM I enjoyed the poem the first time, but three times as much now...
Do another one! 5809. Seamus - 9/20/2006 4:10:15 PM Benbaun aubade
Busie olde foole, unruly Sunne;
Why dost thou thus,
Through windowes, and through curtaines call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers seasons run?
(from "The Sunne Rising" by John Donne)
Obsidian night,
unruly sun.
We spill off the dark
smoke wet wool
that burns
to swim in warm dew.
I am ploughman
of your feathered grasses
as sun-warmed sweat
rains over my back,
shines in your lips
and drips, drips down
where the urgent colder wet
connects us. Arching up,
I see fell runners.
The day's
first climbers
are coming
over the crags.
[Benbaun (Binn Bhán) is one of the Twelve Bens (Na Beanna Beola), a series of twelve quite modest peaks in Connemara of coastal west Ireland, where I am from. Fell running is an athletic event somewhat like cross-country, except that the course includes topping any number of mountain peaks--in the case of the Bens, all twelve.]
(Given what real poetry looks like in Mac's contribution, perhaps the epigraph for this should be changed to "You sir are no Kinsella".)
Seamus
5810. alistairconnor - 9/20/2006 6:19:29 PM I can't read that without moving my lips. And feeling vertigo too. Benbaun aubade. C'est pas de la daube. Works for me.
I was down Dingle way (not in May, but in July) and I climbed Brandon, hand in hand with my girls, a little way.
5811. seamus - 9/21/2006 5:41:13 AM Why, thanks, alistair.
If not a stew, then maybe a cold porridge.
Hold onto the Brandon memory. It sounds a good one.
Seamus 5812. Macnas - 9/21/2006 9:38:36 AM "You sir are no Kinsella"
Why should you be, sure aren't you already Seamus, nach bhuil?
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