[Point Blank Poets]

Tags

drug abuse, Great Britain, immigration, orphan, Poem, Poetry, poetry reading, Point Blank Poets, United Kingdom

Here’s a group of performing poets from the United Kingdom. There’s a little chat in the middle, but the two that are performed are well written and performed dealing with issues in a modern world.

[Ageing Schoolmaster]

Tags

ageing, Ageing Schoolmaster, children, death, life, poetry reading, school, spokenverse, vernon scannell, youth

by Vernon Scannell
And now another autumn morning finds me With chalk dust on my sleeve and in my breath, Preoccupied with vague, habitual speculation On the huge inevitability of death. Not wholly wretched, yet knowing absolutely That I shall never reacquaint myself with joy, I sniff the smell of ink and chalk and my mortality And think of when I rolled, a gormless boy, And rollicked round the playground of my hours, And wonder when precisely tolled the bell Which summoned me from summer liberties And brought me to this chill autumnal cell From which I gaze upon the april faces That gleam before me, like apples ranged on shelves, And yet I feel no pinch or prick of envy Nor would I have them know their sentenced selves. With careful effort I can separate the faces, The dull, the clever, the various shapes and sizes, But in the autumn shades I find I only Brood upon death, who carries off all the prizes.

[Dirth]

Tags

carpe diem, death, dirge, Kenneth Fearing, Poem, poetry reading

Dirth
by Kenneth Fearing

1-2-3 was the number he played but today the number came 3-2-1;
Bought his Carbide at 30 and it went to 29; had the favorite at
Bowie but the track was slow–

O executive type, would you like to drive a floating-power, knee-
action, silk-upholstered six? Wed a Hollywook star? Shoot
the course in 58? Draw to the ace, king, jack?
O fellow with a will who won’t take no, watch out for three
cigarettes on the same, single match; O democratic voter
born in August under Mars, beware of liquidated rails–

Denouement to denouement, he took a personal pride in the cer-
tain, certain way he lived his own, private life,
But nevertheless, they shut off his gas; nevertheless, the bank fore-
closed; nevertheless, the landlord called; nevertheless, the
radio broke,

And twelve o’clock arrived just once too often,
Just the same he wore one gray tweed suit, bought one straw hat,
drank one straight Scotch, walked one short step, took one
long look, drew one deep breath,
Just one too many,

And wow he died as wow he lived,
Going whop to the office and blooie home to sleep and biff got
married and bam had children and oof got fired,
Zowie did he live and zowie did he die,

With who the hell are you at the corner of his casket, and where
the hell’re we going on the right-hand silver knob, and who
the hell cares walking second from the end with an Amer-
ican Beauty wreath from why the hell not,

Very much missed by the circulation staff of the New York Eve-
ning Post; deeply, deeply mourned by the B.M.T.
Wham, Mr. Roosevelt; pow, Sears Roebuck; awk, big dipper;
bop, summer rain;
Bong, Mr., bong, Mr., bong, Mr., bong.