For Vincent Van Gough’s ‘The Starry, Starry Night’
Outlines crash into swirls
Miss Del Amico asks, what do you see?
Is that a sky of blue curls?
Outlines crash into swirls
Time to dive for some pearls
Will I find this painting’s key?
Outlines crash into swirls
Miss Del Amico asks, what do you see ?
My father loved the stars
In another life,
permitted education,
his facility with numbers
might have made him
a famous astronomer
instead of an accountant
See that bright one?
That’s Beetle-juice
I remember him telling
Yes, I’d say meekly
wishing to please
But I couldn’t of course
It was all just fuzzy blobs
See that milkbar on the corner?
No I said. Didn’t want to be sent
somewhere I couldn’t see
Stupid child! they thought
It never occurred to them
that I really couldn’t see.
So on my seventh birthday
a bicycle purple painted,
with Virginia
in gold down the crossbar
the most beautiful bike ever seen
I was terrified
to ride it, I couldn’t see
where I was going,
what was in front
I walked it to school
to Brownies after school
to have it admired,
to show it off
but I couldn’t actually ride it.
Six months later
my myopia finally spotted by a teacher
I learned to ride with my new glasses
I was never very good
never enthusiastic
never worthy of the bike’s beauty
The skill now long forgotten
Virginia said: I was myopic (short sighted) from birth, but no one realised until a teacher called my parents when I was seven. I didn’t know of course – that’s just how the world was – it didn’t occur to me that it might look different to different people. After I got glasses I was fine – but never really confident riding a bike, however beautiful the bike was. Now I’m old. When they removed the cataracts from my eyes, they fixed the myopia as well, so no more glasses! There are some things I miss though, especially the pattern of circles of light through a dense leaf canopy. But now I can see the birds instead. I’ll never go back to bike riding though.
I first wrote this poem in response to a prompt on another poetry site, Silver Birch Press. The prompt was ‘learning to ride a bike’. It will fit into my autobiography in verse (not yet published) A Myopic’s Vision.
Certainly not. You’re more likely to drown
if you swim under skies that are murky and brown.
And what’s that fence here for? Who cares if it’s green.
I’m more concerned with its ungainly lean
and its reason for being here. Something’s not right.
It belongs somewhere else (and would look better white) –
which prompts me to wonder just where it has been.
Did it come in a storm? What’s it all mean?
Blue bottles on beaches don’t appeal either,
glass ones or stinging ones. I insist neither
of these little dangers should ever be seen
on a beach where I swim; I’m a stickler for “clean”.
And one other thing: there’s no one else here;
I like to know that a life-guard is near.
That settles the matter. I wouldn’t go in.
I’d choose somewhere else for my holiday swim.
But if you’re inspired by your re-arranged mess
the outcome, I’d say, is anyone’s guess.
Oops!
I’ve got my brother’s lunchbox
With The Wiggles on the lid,
He must have picked up mine instead
(He’s just a little kid.)
So Charlie’s got my health bar
And my favourite yoghurt snack,
And I’ve got little kiddie lunch –
Too late to change it back.
I could go and see the teacher,
But she’ll say, “Don’t bother me,”
I guess I’m stuck with Charlie’s lunch,
I’ll be half starved by three.
Here we go….what is this stuff?
One tin of custard pears,
Two egg and lettuce sandwiches
Cut into tiny squares,
Three cherry drops with jelly tops,
Four skinny carrot sticks,
Five cubes of watermelon, no,
You’d better make that six.
And right down at the bottom is-
What’s this! A chocolate crunch!
WOW!
Where’s my place? I need some space,
I’m having Charlie’s lunch.
On a Monday wet and cool,
I decided on a day off school.
‘Get up at once,’ my mother said,
So I threw up all over the bed.
I groaned about feeling really horrid,
She only had to feel my forehead.
I knew I was sick with something contagious,
But her disbelief was really outrageous.
I clung to my bed, so she just got meaner,
And bashed me with the vacuum cleaner.
The blood that flowed from my bleeding nose,
She washed away with the garden hose.
She hit me with the old straw broom,
And kept chasing me from room to room.
At last she drove me out of the house,
And called me a dirty conniving louse.
I threatened to fling myself under the bus,
Determined to end this dreadful fuss.
When thrown on the bus with a parting curse,
I knew that life couldn’t get much worse.
Still dripping blood, an awful bother,
The driver threw me back to mother.
Didn’t she scowl as she made the decision,
That I could stay home and watch television.
Message in a bottle
Sent from a land far away
Message in a bottle
In the sand to stay
Message in a bottle
Special words inside
Message in a bottle
The sea no longer hides
Message in a bottle
Out there for all to see
Message in a bottle
Is this message sent to me?
Mice are nice
to keep as pets.
They’re quiet little things.
But when they’re happy
you can bet
your pet mice like to sing.
Their complex songs
both short and long
make each mouse quite unique.
So other mice
know in a trice
who made that special squeak.
Our ears can’t hear
their high-pitched trill.
Mice sing in ultra-sound.
But sneaky cats
will get a thrill
to hear that food’s around!
The bottle on the beach was green,
In the most beautiful tint I have seen.
But other bottles from my past
Were mostly white.
The empties waited at the gate in a crate.
When the milkman was late,
I’d wait at the gate till he arrived.
The Milkie came with a loaded horse-pulled cart.
He’d run beside it as the horse moved slow
And he moved fast.
My mother would send me out with a shovel
After he’d gone, to collect the manure
For her roses, hydrangeas, and fuchsias
Whose blooms were so full and wide,
They leaned against
The fence like fat ladies dressed in coloured ball gowns.
The bottles were smaller at school,
With strawberry and chocolate flavoured straws
For the lucky ones,
Who would let me have them when
They were finished.
I’d save them in my desk for the next day.
But I was always grateful
To just suck the milk from the bottle,
Even on hot summer days
When it had waited too long in the sun
For playtime to come around.
Those innocent days are all gone.
Like sand at the beach
They got swept out to sea,
To be brought back again to land on the tide.
My memories will always call back
Days with white bottles that sparkled
With the morning light, and tinted green
Ones found submerged on the beach
During Sunday School picnics.
Anastasia said: I thought this picture inspiring. As you can see, it created a daisy chain of memories together with the smell of the horse manure I’d collect for my mother as a child. I can recall the clink of bottles and the sound of the horses’ hooves on the bitumen.
Star Wishing
Space was a glittering,
Glamorous eyeful
So I wished for a star—
But I got a sky full.
They covered the floor
Like sparkling snow;
They lit up the house
With a dazzling glow.
They caught in my hair,
They filled up my lap;
They poured like diamonds
From the kitchen sink tap.
The Milky Way draped me,
A burning white shawl.
Constellations were bright
Works of art down the hall.
The Southern Cross
Pointed me onto the lawn.
I looked to the sky;
It was bare and forlorn.
So I wished them away;
They returned to the night.
I should not wish again.
I should not—but I might.
Jessica said: Star Wishing is my response to 2016 poetry prompt #35 (Stars). I read a lot of picture books and I’ve noticed that wishing for (and often getting hold of) a star is a common theme. This made me wonder how things would go if instead of getting one star, the wisher got a galaxy’s worth.
The breeze coaxes
the windows open:
Windows as large as doors;
Windows as small as Nana’s china blue
dinner plates;
Windows of rainbow coloured glass
covered with trees and angels;
Windows frosted, so you can’t see through them,
textured and light grey.
The breeze beckons the windows open
creak
squeak
knock, knock.
The breeze doesn’t care if they are latched
lifted,
or pushed out
as long as
they open.
The breeze remembers when
windows had no glass
and were just open squares in
the walls and there was no air conditioning.
The breeze knows that some windows
are so clean and clear
that when they are closed
clueless birds fly into them.
Splat!
Whoosh! Ha, ha!
The breeze chuckles its cooling fresh breath
through open windows
into the outback houses
wishing for the end of summer.
Australian Children’s Poetry 