Children poems
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The Reformers
© Rudyard Kipling
Not in the camp his victory lies
Or triumph in the market-place,
Who is his Nation's sacrifice
To turn the judgement from his race.
"Tis An Old Tale And Often Told"
© Frances Anne Kemble
Are they indeed the bitterest tears we shed
Those we let fall over the silent dead?
Malcolm's Katie: A Love Story - Part II.
© Isabella Valancy Crawford
O, Love builds on the azure sea,
And Love builds on the golden sand;
And Love builds on the rose-wing'd cloud,
And sometimes Love builds on the land.
The same embrace
© Ivan Donn Carswell
We talked with family last night, not mine or yours
specifically but ours, the ones we love familiarly. When
little Jake (though not so little now) was heard to say ,
Goodbye, I gotta go, it was like our hearts were breaking;
Italy : 35. Caius Cestius
© Samuel Rogers
When I am inclined to be serious, I love to wander up
and down before the tomb of Caius Cestius. The
Protestant burial-ground is there; and most of the little
monuments are erected to the young ; young men of
O Lord, Our Father
© Mark Twain
O Lord, our father,
Our young patriots, idols of our hearts,
Go forth to battle - be Thou near them!
With them, in spirit, we also go forth
From the sweet peace of our beloved firesides To smite the foe.
Fragment
© James Weldon Johnson
The hand of Fate cannot be stayed,
The course of Fate cannot be steered,
By all the gods that man has made,
Nor all the devils he has feared,
Not by the prayers that might be prayed
In all the temples he has reared.
Share of obligation
© Ivan Donn Carswell
If the debate rages in the pages of the news today
then Im confused, Ive searched and found no evidence.
Perhaps the anger of some residents about a Catholic school
thats due to close because its roll has fallen lower
Partisanship and politics
© Ivan Donn Carswell
Were I not a patriot, which of course I am, I would explain
just how the term remains a sticking point within my craw,
how it contains a core of prudish mockery, dissembles jingoistic
claims. But I am and not ashamed. I love the land, the people
Old Black Joe
© Stephen C. Foster
Gone are the days when my heart was young and gay,
Gone are my friends from the cotton fields away,
Lake Otamangakau
© Ivan Donn Carswell
II Awake, aware in tented night,
a flax bush shuffled glissé tread
of frond on frond and seed-pod prattle
marching on the fractious wind
surrounds the tent, and lake, and night.
Jessie of Gibraltar
© Ivan Donn Carswell
Our lives were founded on this rock, this Jessie of Gibraltar
Whose unfailing love endured beyond her ample nursing,
And we grew out of a rich and favoured childhood aware
Her powers were real (we tested them enough to know their soundness) into
It seldom snowed Part III
© Ivan Donn Carswell
It seldom snowed they said, and they were nearly right. In all of nine eventful
seasons crystal white on average graced the place just twice a year. A smaller
fall, an over-night preceded heavy snow. And heavy snow remained a week,
blocked drains and closed the Desert Road; but no complaints, our children
I cannot let the moment pass
© Ivan Donn Carswell
I cannot let the moment pass without a weary greeting,
or retard the recent past where shadows still are fleeting,
Id sabotage the future by just staring in a mirror
and never let the glimmer pass and try to hold my image fast
Touched my family
© Ivan Donn Carswell
Even from afar came shouts of recognition
joyful voices rang across the years disdained and
faces of our childhood unforgot fit instantly familiar names;
voices still the same despite the extra grey, the extra lines,
Forsaken promises
© Ivan Donn Carswell
Nothing came to claim my muse, instead I dreamed
of freedoms neatly folded in a treasure chest lying in the debris
of a crater; the best were simple choices, the rest forsaken
promises bombed to shreds beside their makers.
Every Time I laugh Aloud (An Ode to Short People)
© Ivan Donn Carswell
Every time I laugh aloud, who springs to mind but Johnnie Howard?
Cathartic laughter eases stress which Johnnie causes in excess,
so when I hum acerbic lines of Randy Newmans quirky song
dont want no short people round here,
Does the name toll a bell?
© Ivan Donn Carswell
Let them declare Jihad then, let them despair that I
will speak the truth as I see it, and where that truth bears
brutally on their lies I will have applied my brand of terrorism as
desperately as they do theirs. Abu Bakar Bashir,
I Thought I'd Served Her Long Enough
© Walther von der Vogelweide
I thought I'd served her long enough,
and sat dejected and confused
