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Poem on your mind

A platform to express and share your enthusiasm and passion for poetry. What are your treasured poems and poets? Don't hesitate to showcase the poems you've penned yourself!
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geo

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Re: Poem on your mind

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This is a song by The Band, written by Robbie Robertson

King Harvest (Has Surely Come)

Corn in the fields.
Listen to the rice when the wind blows ‘cross the water...
King Harvest has surely come.

I work for the union,
‘Cause she’s so good to me;
And I’m bound to come out on top,
That’s where she said I should be.
I will hear every word the boss may say,
For he’s the one who hands me down my pay.
Looks like this time I’m gonna get to stay,
I’m a union man, now, all the way.

The smell of the leaves,
From the magnolia trees in the meadow...
King Harvest has surely come.

Dry summer, then comes fall,
Which I depend on most of all.
Hey, rainmaker, can you hear the call?
Please let these crops grow tall.
Long enough I’ve been up on Skid Row;
And it’s plain to see, I’ve nothing to show.
I’m glad to pay those union dues,
Just don’t judge me by my shoes.

Scarecrow and a yellow moon,
Pretty soon a carnival on the edge of town...
King Harvest has surely come.

Last year this time, wasn’t no joke,
My whole barn went up in smoke.
Our horse Jethro, well he went mad,
And I can’t ever remember things being that bad.
Then here comes a man with a paper and a pen,
Telling us our hard times are about to end.
And then, if they don’t give us what we like,
He said, “Men, that’s when you gotta go on strike.”

Corn in the fields.
Listen to the rice when the wind blows ‘cross the water...
King Harvest has surely come.
-Geo
Question everything
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geo

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Re: Poem on your mind

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Perhaps I'm reading too much into this, but look at that last verse:

"Last year this time, wasn’t no joke,
My whole barn went up in smoke. . . ."

This makes me think that the real reason the narrator has joined the union is because they burned his barn down as a scare tactic to get him to join. And the earlier lines, "I work for the union because she's been so good to me" and "I'm a union man now all the way" now come across as ironic. I'm so intrigued with this interpretation that I went off on the web, looking for more information.

Here, we have the Reason To Rock page:
Given all of these variations from a normal chorus form, it may be better to view these lines as something else altogether. To me they seem to form another song that is combined with the central one. To use terms from William Blake’s poetry, it is as if we have a Song of Innocence intertwined with a Song of Experience. The haiku-like stanzas present the innocent perspective, focusing on simple sensual experiences of nature: the sound of the wind, the smell of the magnolia leaves, the vision of a yellow moon. And then the reference to “King Harvest,” a seemingly mythical symbol of the power of nature. All of these images work at a very simple, primitive level of consciousness, referring to timeless aspects of the natural world.

This effect is reinforced by the music. These three lines begin with simple, unadorned, hushed vocals, emphasizing the simplicity and naturalness of the images. When Levon Helm sings “Listen to the rice when the wind blows ‘cross the water,” we are waiting, expecting to hear something. Then, Levon Helm responds with a quiet, repeated, slightly rising tapping of his cymbal, mixed with Garth Hudson’s slowly emerging, swirling organ. The sounds and rhythms are natural ones, like the wind blowing through the trees, or cicadas on a summer evening. (Audio clip - 132K.)

Listen to the difference, though, when the band makes the transition to the verse. Nothing is simple or natural! The drums hold everything together, but the guitar, organ and vocals all seem to be fighting each other, straining under some heavy load. One organ line stops and starts, playing off the beat, keeping the listener off-balance. Robertson’s guitar crackles while Manuel is singing, and also between his lines, competing for attention. Richard hesitates in his delivery of the vocals, again as if under some stress, lagging a bit behind the beat. Another organ line quietly builds in the background during the first half of the verse, with long, sustained chords, in defiance of everything else going on. The musical message is clear: undercutting the hopeful optimism of the words in the first verse, there are powerful conflicts at work.
http://www.reasontorock.com/tracks/king_harvest.html

Interesting lyrics. What a great song too. It closes out side two of The Band's classic second album known as the "brown album."
-Geo
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Penelope

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Re: Poem on your mind

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Interesting verses geo. Farmers must be devastated when they are driven to give up their land because I think people are born farmers as they are born gardeners, one can't really 'become' a farmer; it seems to be inate.


farmers still

at the kitchen table
we cup our hands around coffee mugs
to fight off the chill of fall rains
we talk about late harvest and sprouting swaths
and the whims of marketing boards money-lenders
and mother nature
we remember past years with bumper crops
and how the north-east quarter always produces
but this year the swaths are under water
and tough as things seem it's not so bad as Harrisons
after their auction last year they moved to the city
they say they used to lie awake wondering if the old boss cow
made it through the winter if the brockle-faced heifer
calved on her own
they drive out to check other people's crops
on land their grandfather homsteaded
stop in at coffee row talk about the weather
like they were still here

From Maverick Western Verse 1994 Gibbs Smith Publisher
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
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Saffron

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Re: Poem on your mind

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I like this one -


You and Your Ilk
by Thomas Lux

I have thought much upon
who might be my ilk,
and that I am ilk myself if I have ilk.
Is one of my ilk, or me, the barber
who cuts the hair of the blind?
And the man crushed by cruelties
for which we can't imagine sorrow,
who would be his ilk?
And whose ilk was it
standing around, hands in pockets, May 1933,
when 2,242 tons of books were burned?
Not mine. So: what makes my ilkness my
ilkness? No answers, none forthcoming.
To be one of the ilks, that's all
I hoped for; to say hello to the mailman,
nod to my neighbors, to watch
my children climb the stairs of a big yellow bus
which takes them to a place
where they learn to read
and write and eat their lunches
from puzzle trays—all around them, amid
the clatter and din,
amid bananas, bread, and milk.
all around them: them and their ilk.
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Re: Poem on your mind

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Boy, Gerard Manley Hopkins sure did know how to put energy and intensity into a poem.

No worst, there is none
Gerard Manley Hopkins


"No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief,
More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring.
Comforter, where, where is your comforting?
Mary, mother of us, where is your relief?
My cries heave, herds-long; huddle in a main, a chief
Woe, world-sorrow; on an age-old anvil wince and sing -
Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked 'No ling-
-ering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief'.

O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall
Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap
May who ne'er hung there. Nor does long our small
Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep,
Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all
Life death does end and each day dies with sleep."
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oblivion

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Re: Poem on your mind

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This guy certainly does love alliteration, doesn't he? Certainly adds to the energy and dynamics, though.
Gods and spirits are parasitic--Pascal Boyer

Religion is the only force in the world that lets a person have his prejudice or hatred and feel good about it --S C Hitchcock

Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it. --André Gide

Reading is a majority skill but a minority art. --Julian Barnes
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Penelope

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I'm thinking about my two grandsons - one is 10 years old and today is the first day of his SATs Exams to see which grade he will be allocated at secondary school.....he was quietly confident this morning....

My other grandson is 10months old and is just full of pure joy.......

Benediction

Bless this little heart, this white soul that has won the kiss of
heaven for our earth.
He loves the light of the sun, he loves the sight of his
mother's face.
He has not learned to despise the dust, and to hanker after
gold.
Clasp him to your heart and bless him.
He has come into this land of an hundred cross-roads.
I know not how he chose you from the crowd, came to your door,
and grasped your hand to ask his way.
He will follow you, laughing and talking, and not a doubt in
his heart.
Keep his trust, lead him straight and bless him.
Lay your hand on his head, and pray that though the waves
underneath grow threatening, yet the breath from above may come and
fill his sails and waft him to the heaven of peace.
Forget him not in your hurry, let him come to your heart and
bless him.

Rabindranath Tagore
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
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Penelope

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Re: Poem on your mind

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Honestly, I am rubbish!!!! I posted that poem 'Benediction' because I was thinking about my grandsons, and it was 'On my Mind'.

But I was originally thinking about the Manley Hopkins poem....and its intensity and the comparison with my own favourite poet, on a similar theme, but with a very different more lyrical 'attitude' - attitude????? is that the word?

Closed Path

I thought that my voyage had come to its end
at the last limit of my power,---that the path before me was closed,
that provisions were exhausted
and the time come to take shelter in a silent obscurity.

But I find that thy will knows no end in me.
And when old words die out on the tongue,
new melodies break forth from the heart;
and where the old tracks are lost,
new country is revealed with its wonders.

Rabindranath Tagore
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
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giselle

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Re: Poem on your mind

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Great poem Penny, I love Tagore poems, he just has such a grasp of the human condition.
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Penelope

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I'm glad you like him too giselle, although I have to admit that I love his face and when I see it unexpectedly, as recently occurred in our daily newspaper, my heart skips a beat.....which is a bit ridiculous at my age.....but I like it. :mrgreen:
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
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