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    AC Benus
  • AC Benus
  • Author
  • 02/24/2016
  • 297 Words
  • 1,102 Views
  • 6 Comments
Poetry posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 

My Twentieth Year - 8. alliterations

Poem No. 20

 

Poems have dealt with life and love, and a lack thereof,

of pretty things, and heroic man that sings

 

I want to think above, of what's not been thought of

besides the same old fling, there must be something

 

How about some hogs, or a wagonload of logs;

Infested with lice, or with some such device?

 

Puppy dogs, and little-girl frogs;

ants, and mice – now, how do those matters entice?

 

-------

 

Shall I ever write newly of unspoken things truly?

after all, what's left, but burglary and theft?

 

Hey, now there's a thought duly, of something new and unruly

and if I fail with heft, at least I've tried to be deft.

 

Oh well, with that cavort, back to mundane things of sort

of love, of life, and songs of strife

 

Perhaps I'll just write of Mort, who drank a bottle of port

and fell out of sight, from a cliff of some great height.[1]

 

 

Poem No. 21

 

Is there anyone happy in the world today?

What happened to the children who used to play?

And the preachers who used to gossip –

They don’t anymore, they don’t speak of it.

 

I know why the children don’t play today;

It's because I'm not a child's stature, per se,

And why the preachers don’t speak of it –

They haven’t seen me in church for a bit.

 

What changes; the world or the people?

I have, for I've lost childish glow,

And it hurts the more I know –

Being of the earth makes me a cripple.

 

 

 

 


[1] Poems have dealt with life: My reaction to learning about internal rhymes and alliterations, lol.

Copyright © 2017 AC Benus; All Rights Reserved.
  • Like 6
Poetry posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 
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Chapter Comments

Mikiesboy

K, I havent been doing well figuring out poems lately.. so if I'm way off the mark, you can slap me long distance!
To me 20 is you fooling around with words and rhymes, Mort and port.. 20 made me chuckle a couple of times.
21, is the loss of childhood, seeing the world with older eyes and wishing you didn't have to, i guess morning the loss of innocence.

 

Both are wonderful AC ...

 

tim

  • Like 1
AC Benus
On 02/24/2016 06:13 PM, Puppilull said:

No 20 had me nodding my head. To me, poetry doesn't have to be only about the grandest things in life. To write life, real life is often more interesting. Besides, when you do that you can't help buttouch on love, the reason for being etc. In the mundane are traces of the grand.

Thank you, Puppilull. It is always an incredible thing to see and feel people take away personal meanings from my poems. This is a really great review, and I have to say, I now see No. 20 in a deeper way because of it. It's a full-circle experience, and I love it!

AC Benus
On 02/25/2016 05:19 AM, Mikiesboy said:

K, I havent been doing well figuring out poems lately.. so if I'm way off the mark, you can slap me long distance!

To me 20 is you fooling around with words and rhymes, Mort and port.. 20 made me chuckle a couple of times.

21, is the loss of childhood, seeing the world with older eyes and wishing you didn't have to, i guess morning the loss of innocence.

 

Both are wonderful AC ...

 

tim

Thank you, Tim; wonderful I'll take ;) I think you always get poems, and that's because you have a gift for verse yourself.

 

As for your comments, I like and respect both interpretations. With No. 21, the context may become a bit clearer when you see the next poem. It is part of the larger struggle of me coming out at that point in time. So yes, seeing the world with older eyes and not wanting to is perfectly accurate.

 

Thanks again!

J.HunterDunn

No. 20 made me regret that I can’t share my native tongue with you. The poem reminds me of a Dutch poetess (now deceased) with whose poems every Dutch boy and girl grew up. Lighthearted and dealing with the small things in life. But unforgettable, because, like in this poem, the rhymes and rhyming scheme are quite easy. That makes it also easy to learn by heart. It’s poems like these, that when imprinted on you young enough, will stay a lifelong companion. Lovely!
What changes, the earth or the people? you ask in No. 21. Both must be the answer, I think, it’s an interaction. Without change no growth. Although one can look back in wonder at the past, it’s what made the present. I see life as a lesson to deal with the present, while benignly accepting the past, which only seems better, but most of the time was not. The children still play and the preaches still gossip, they are just using other media.

  • Like 1
AC Benus
On 03/02/2016 01:03 AM, J.HunterDunn said:

No. 20 made me regret that I can’t share my native tongue with you. The poem reminds me of a Dutch poetess (now deceased) with whose poems every Dutch boy and girl grew up. Lighthearted and dealing with the small things in life. But unforgettable, because, like in this poem, the rhymes and rhyming scheme are quite easy. That makes it also easy to learn by heart. It’s poems like these, that when imprinted on you young enough, will stay a lifelong companion. Lovely!

What changes, the earth or the people? you ask in No. 21. Both must be the answer, I think, it’s an interaction. Without change no growth. Although one can look back in wonder at the past, it’s what made the present. I see life as a lesson to deal with the present, while benignly accepting the past, which only seems better, but most of the time was not. The children still play and the preaches still gossip, they are just using other media.

Thank you, Peter! If I may suggest, it would be a treat if you posted some of the work you mention on the Live-Poets thread. We may not be able to read the Dutch, but we can still savor the sounds and structure ;)

 

I like and appreciate your comments on both poems. At some point early on I realized that the past belongs to us, and some efforts to alter it to suit living concepts happens all the time. That is particularly true when it comes to the lives and loves of Gay people. It is due to active suppression by the majority that even Gay people are surprised to learn how rich and varied is Gay culture and history. We need to make them stop saying stuff like "There was no proof he was gay." Well deary, where's your proof that a man who dedicated 154 love poems to a man liked women??? hehe

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