Teenage Blues/A Room Full of Candles

brebry@gmail.com


TEENAGE BLUES

Put me in a freak show

Let that be an end to it!

Alongside the bearded lady

I think I'd be a hit.

I don't think I'll go out tonight

I'll stay at home and mope.

I am damned by this pimple.

I haven't any hope.

Everyone else is pretty,

From the head down to the toes.

Life just isn't worth living

When there's a pimple on your nose. 

*

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A ROOM FULL OF CANDLES

My study is a room full of candles,

Candles that keep on burning.

(In truth it's a little spare bedroom

To which I keep returning.)

I climb up the stairs to my study

Where the candles are always waiting,

Standing stiffly to attention,

Eagerly anticipating.

Some are burned down to the wick,

Ideas that are long out-dated.

Some remain unlit

And, oh, how long they've waited!

Some are burning brightly

They are nourishing my soul;

I watch for the tiny flicker

As a flame relinquishes its role.

Some are ancient candles;

I scarcely recognise the flame;

Others are candles that will never be lit;

My indolence is to blame.

I have warmed my heart at these candles,

Which are lit by the urge to write;

Their flames have sputtered and flickered

Well into the night.

To others it's our spare bedroom,

A dull little room for sure,

But for me it's a room full of candles,

And I couldn't love it more.

*

*

Happy Birthday/The Map

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

(To be sung to the same tune as 'Twenty-one Today!')

Eighty-two today! Eighty-two today!

I've lost the key of the door

Never been eighty-two before.

Now's the time I can do as I like

But better not delay!

Who knows what's just round the corner?

Eighty-two today!

*

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THE MAP

(A cinquain)

Chart. 

Ancient. Mysterious,

Intriguing, fascinating, compelling.

The edge of knowledge.

Map.
*

The Bogey Hole/Golden Gooseberries

THE BOGEY HOLE

The name sounds very ominous,

Though it's innocent I've been told,

But a Bogeyman was a character

In fairy tales of old.

And a certain military Bogeyman 

Is associated with this scene,

A man in charge of Newcastle

Who was very cruel and mean.

One day he decided

That he needed a private pool

And his method of attaining it

Was typically cruel.

He lined up poor oppressed convicts,

Each one behind another

And made them beat the one in front

Brother scourging brother.

I hope he enjoyed his morning swims!

Morisset was his name.

Fancy being remembered

For such an act of shame!

*

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GOLDEN GOOSEBERRIES

(Watch out for alliteration!)

The golden gooseberries hung in splendour,

On my grandfather's garden fence.

Tantalising in fine fulfilment;

Round and illegally immense.

Illegal because the garden grower

Fiercely forbade our tender touch;

Gooseberries were for jams and jellies;

Dessert delights we loved so much.

But how they gleamed and glowed rotundly

Globular, golden, mouthwatering too.

We children chose to ogle odd ones,

Till growling Grandpa came in view.

Green gooseberries had a very sour taste,

Ripe red ones were always past their best.

The golden gooseberries! Pure perfection!

We'd steal one and leave the rest.

*

Lost!/I Remember Winter

LOST

Oh the tragedy! ( Capital T!)

It goes on and on occurring to me.

Two socks plunge into the sudsy foam

But only one of the socks comes home.

In the linen basket they've clung together

Hoping to dance in the windy weather

Side by side on the washing line,

(But only if the weather's fine.)

They may achieve this first ambition

And blow in the air in a clean condition.

But, alas, they're not free from danger....

Their next pirouette is even stranger.

Into the tumble-dryer they go

And this may be their greatest foe.

They're tossed around like leaves from trees

Are tossed around by a boisterous breeze.

They're parted, joined, then swirled again,

And every parting brings them pain.

It's up and down and side to side.

Exhausted, one of them tries to hide.

Secretes itself right at the back

And after a while they loose the knack

Of being joined at the hip for ever.

The tumble dryer has seemed to sever

A great relationship . It's rather sad

After all the togetherness they've had.

But the socks themselves are never blamed

Nor the dryer with the one sock claimed;

It's always the housewife, in this case me,

Who comes in for the usual commentary.

'You've lost a sock again,' 'he' cries!

'This has ceased to be a big surprise!

Every week you lose a sock!

And I am in a state of shock.'

Meekly, I run the sock to ground,

Hunting high and low until its found.

An Agatha Christie Mystery

Is 'The Search for the One Lost Sock' by Me.

*

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I REMEMBER WINTER

(from my English childhood)

Windblown trees and long-lain snows.....

Ice on the pond where no lily grows.......

Needles of rain from a dull grey sky.....

Threatening clouds way up on high.....

Everything dull and dark and drear.....

Remembrances from a long-gone year.

*

Carbuncle/Those Hooded Eyes

(For ABC Wednesday)

CARBUNCLE

Carbuncle.......not a  pretty word,

But rather fascinating.

We know it as a hideous boil,

Which is rather nauseating.

That meaning comes, in a curious way,

From the garnet, a precious gem.

It's fiery red and burning bright

In any diadem.

But that's not all! In architecture

A carbuncle is a mess,

A building which spoils the landscape

With harsh untidiness.

So carbuncle's a little word

Whose meanings we can guess;

Sometimes pretty, rich and red,

But sometimes just a mess.

*

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Seen in a gift shop in Stroud NSW

THOSE HOODED EYES

You're not one to show your feelings;

No-one can guess your pain.

You're in a little gift-shop

And there you will remain

Till someone shows some pity

And takes you off the wall,

And hangs you in her town-house,

Maybe in her entrance-hall.

No doubt she'll be Caucasian,

Seeing you as perfect proof

Of the fact that she has artistic 'stuff'

Beneath her very roof!

You'll be part of a 'collection',

And you'll, maybe, gather dust,

Alongside the Japanese fan she bought

And the neat little Mozart bust.

But I know you yearn for Bali,

Or some other Eastern land.

When I look into those hooded eyes,

Then I understand.

Sensible Solar/Still

brebry@gmail.com

SENSIBLE SOLAR

It looks so easy.......a sun-seeking roof.

The future's solar and here's the proof.

Surely such things could be easily done.....

There is such a lot of sun.

I look forward to a time

When ignoring it is crime.

How great if every roof could be

A source of electricity!

Here we see some garage space,

Such a very workaday place,

Using this wonderful source of power

To improve the shining hour.

*

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STILL

(An Acrostic)

Silently and secretly the wily spider waits,

Thinking of the helpless fly that he anticipates

In the centre of his web everything is still

Lest he disturb the coming prey he so desires to kill.

Lightly the fly lands

Trapped as by iron bands!

*

The Domain/Music

THE DOMAIN

Central Park, Hyde Park, parks worldwide........

Sydney has its Domain.

A refuge from the heat of summer,

Greened by refreshing rain.

A vast expanse of gardens

There by the Harbour side

A place to wander and wonder,

And the City of Sydney's pride.

*

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MUSIC

I don't play an instrument but I do like to sing,

(Though the voice is not as pleasant a a bird's upon the wing!)

I sing in a local choir and in a drama group

(Although it has been said I sound just like a frog with croup!)

And I can vouch for music as a means to ease the soul

At times when fear and sorrow may have taken quite a toll.

Singing alone is great, of course, I warble in the shower.

(Even though the notes aren't right I sing with a certain power!)

But singing with one's friends has even more effect I've found;

Togetherness creates a really scintillating sound.

Take the men at the football, carolling as one

Some of them tone-deaf, no doubt, and singing just for fun....

The result is amazing harmony! As the notes rise ever higher,

One would think one was listening to a huge stupendous choir!

And if the chosen team should loose, once they have dried their eyes,

They can say 'Well at least we sang so that was exercise!'

So those of us not opera stars can sing with all our might

And, who knows, all our voices may make everything seem right.

*