Mendi

Poor Post-Feminist

We’ve grown sperm in a Petri dish, and have power tools in pink,
there’s gizmos for jar lids, and stuff for blocked up sinks.
From suffragettes to girl-power we left the men behind,
but while embracing my fundament I never lost the wonderment
Of two strong arms around me and the masculine mind.

So I’m a poor post-feminist who’d really rather reminisce on
kisses placed with care on the back of my hand.
I’ve excelled at education and provided sons for my nation;
I run a tight ship at home but would rather not command.

Although my batteried pleasure is something that I treasure
I rather have a man to love, someone fitting hand in glove than
the splendid isolation of an independent mind.

My Abhorrence of Housework Unnerves Me

Now comes the time for pleasure;
The kids have spread their wings.
Out there exists a bright new world
Brimful of better things
Than cleaning, scrubbing, scouring, mending,
Boring household grind.
I'm downing tools, discarding rules,
Objectives redefined.

But....
You know those strange, sad people
Sometimes featured on the telly,
Who live midst in grime and chaos,
In houses rank and smelly?
Those folk whose harmless hobbies
Mutate from joy to curse,
Amassing, hoarding, stashing -
Elvis posters, thimbles, verse?

My secret fear is that ere long
Such plight could befall me.
A victim of my own small stand
'Gainst domesticity.
Might digits weld to keyboard?
Might piles of books conspire
To trap me in a corner,
Daily growing higher?

I've always been untidy,
My domestic order's poor,
And half my wardrobe contents
Lie sulking on the floor.
Although I put the rubbish out,
I often fail to dust.
The kitchen floor is sticky
And the dishwasher is bust.

I'm fearful I'll be found one day,
Crumpled 'neath my 'stuff'.
Stiff and cold and lifeless
'Cos I never cleaned enough.
And when at last they've dug me out
And my demise discussed,
Will it be 'death by crushing' (falling books) ,
Or 'asphyxiation' (dust) ?

I'll likely die eccentric,
Of that I'm fairly sure,
But please don't let me go to Hell
For not mopping the floor.
If Heaven does admit me,
My fingers I am crossing
That the inmates will not greet me
With a pile of wings for washing.

Though morbid to consider yet
My future in a coffin,
Ere long I'll have to think about
The one they cart me off in.
NB to self: keep hallway clear:
Though cleaning is a bore,
Ensure sufficient space remains
To shunt mine through the door.

Sally Carter

Busy old fool, unruly Sun,
Why dost thou thus,
Through windows, and through curtains, call on us?
Must to thy motions lovers' seasons run?
Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide
Late schoolboys, and sour prentices,
Go tell court-huntsmen that the king will ride,
Call country ants to harvest offices,
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime,
Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
Thy beams, so reverend and strong
Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
But that I would not lose her sight so long:
If her eyes have not blinded thine,
Look, and tomorrow late, tell me
Whether both the'Indias of spice and mine
Be where thou leftst them, or lie here with me.
Ask for those kings whom thou saw'st yesterday,
And thou shalt hear: "All here in one bed lay."

She'is all states, and all princes I,
Nothing else is.
Princes do but play us; compar'd to this,
All honour's mimic, all wealth alchemy.
Thou, sun, art half as happy'as we,
In that the world's contracted thus;
Thine age asks ease, and since thy duties be
To warm the world, that's done in warming us.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere;
This bed thy centre is, these walls, thy sphere.

The Sun Rising
by John Donne

Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

Translated by Edward FitzGerald

1
Awake! for Morning in the Bowl of Night
Has flung the Stone that puts the Stars to Flight :
And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught
The Sultán's Turret in a Noose of Light.

2
Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the Sky
I heard a Voice within the Tavern cry,
"Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup
Before Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry."

3
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The Tavern shouted - "Open then the Door!
You know how little while we have to stay,
And, once departed, may return no more."



10
With me along some Strip of Herbage strown
That just divides the desert from the sown,
Where name of Slave and Sultán scarce is known,
And pity Sultán Mahmud on his Throne.

11
Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse - and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness -
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.

12
"How sweet is mortal Sovranty!" - think some :
Others - "How blest the Paradise to come!"
Ah, take the Cash in hand and waive the Rest;
Oh, the brave Music of a distant Drum!

13
Look to the Rose that blows about us - "Lo,
Laughing," she says, "into the World I blow :
At once the silken Tassel of my Purse
Tear, and its Treasure on the Garden throw."

14
The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon
Turns Ashes - or it prospers; and anon,
Like Snow upon the Desert's dusty Face
Lighting a Little Hour or two - is gone.



20
Oh, my Belovéd, fill the Cup that clears
TO-DAY of past Regrets and future Fears -
To-morrow? - Why, To-morrow I may be
Myself with Yesterday's Sev'n Thousand Years.

21
Lo! some we loved, the loveliest and best
That Time and Fate of all their Vintage prest,
Have drunk their Cup a Round or two before,
And one by one crept silently to Rest.

22
And we, that now make merry in the Room
They left, and Summer dresses in new Bloom.
Ourselves must we beneath the Couch of Earth
Descend, ourselves to make a Couch - for whom?

23
Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend.
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust into Dust, and under Dust, to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and - sans End!


37
Ah, fill the Cup : - what boots it to repeat
How Time is slipping underneath our Feet :
Unborn TO-MORROW, and dead YESTERDAY,
Why fret about them if TO-DAY be sweet!

38
One Moment in Annihilation's Waste,
One Moment, of the Well of Life to taste -
The Stars are setting and the Caravan
Starts for the Dawn of Nothing - Oh, make haste !

39
How long, how long, in infinite Pursuit
Of This and That endeavour and dispute ?
Better be merry with the fruitful Grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit.


73
Ah Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits - and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire!

74
Ah, Moon of my Delight who know'st no wane,
The Moon of Heav'n is rising once again :
How oft hereafter rising shall she look
Through this same Garden after me - in vain!

75
And when Thyself with shining Foot shall pass
Among the Guests Star-scatter'd on the Grass,
And in thy joyous Errand reach the Spot
Where I made one-turn down an empty Glass!

TAMÁM SHUD

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

I feel sure my first Dreamwidth post should say something memorable, but there will be other days, other moods, momentous news. Today is one of those small days, it will soon be lost in the mists of time and no one I know will have cause to remember it for anything in particular.

Most of our lives are made up of these small days so I tip my glass to domesticity. A few years from now, my boys will have left home and who knows where I'll be by then? Maybe I'll look back on fondness then to a day such as this, with the two men who mean most to me in adjacent rooms, allegedly revising for GCSE and AS Level exams. It has rained today, its been cold enough for me to relight my Rayburn. I've been revising for an HR exam next week.

I've been single for a week and I'm bearing up. My ME is being a pain but then most of Saturday was spent doing frantic housework in preparation for a potential purchaser's viewing.

I feel suspended in time today - that still small voice of calm before the start of a race - I'm waiting for the Pistol BOOM then the noise and confusion and mad dash, heart pumping ears thumping, helter skelter - to What? Its all just round the corner, not yet revealed but tempting me with infinite possibility. But today I shall savour the calm.

Do friend me if you're already here and May the Fourth be with you also.....