English Poems From Neeps An Sheeps Poem by Sheena Blackhall

Pietà in Blue
I am in the departure lounge now,
Eating my statins and other health props
Which may or may not delay my exit time
The gate to the afterlife is not yet open

No use crying over spilled blood
I'm told. Jeepers creepers
In the silence I listen to no sound
In sleep I wait for you
To come to me in dream
Sometimes I wish I could open my Judas veins
And haemorrhage grief away, in a red flood

I wasn't up to snuff at parenthood
Now, remorse is a gut full of maggots
A wincing flagellation of the mind


It's May!
It's may and the blossoms are flying
The rain is a dusting of wet
The pansies have opened their faces
With a smile that it's hard to forget

It's May and the froglets are hatching
Dapper thrush shows his flashing black eye
Sings a paean of joy to the Heavens
And the creatures that live in the sky!


Ameirghin in the 21st Century
I am a drop of acid rain
I am the faeces in the sewer
I am the gutter, needle-filled
I am the trauma of the poor

I am the homeless refugee
I am the shroud that cancer weaves
I am the ocean rubbish choked
I'm the dead badger in the leaves


In the Town
The shopper's weighted like a set of scales
Outside the mall, Salvation Army band
A driver charges through an amber light
A waiter brushes crumbs into his hand

The traffic warden prowls to bag a parker
The harbour's coloured with an oil slick
The homeless beggar shifts from hip to hip
Strapped into buggies, infants squirm and kick


At the Music Lesson: for Skye-Marie
Like little ducklings toddlers bum shuffle
Chatter and cheep
Squeakers learning to move to the music

Some, half-fledged, run off to try their legs
Wobbling from side to side
Like coracles bobbing in water

A multi-coloured parachute floats like a rainbow cloud
Envelopes them in silk

Maraccas rattle, tambourines ching
Like anklets on an eastern temple dancer
Glitter balls lighting up their magpie eyes

Bubbles lead them away like the pied piper
Ping! They boomerang back to the nest of their mother's arms


Edward Lear
Edward Lear was born into a clan of twenty-one
His sister Ann brought Edward up as if he was her son
He suffered from grand mal, bronchitis, asthma, partial blindness
As well as from "the Morbids, ' yet another health unkindness

Lear primarily played the piano, the accordion, flute, guitar.
He set Tennyson's poems to music, that great literary star
His closest friend, his faithful chef, (disastrous as a cook)
He loved as dearly as his cat, Foss, of the furtive look

Foss had a shortened tail because a servant chopped it off
Despite this he assumed the air of a blue blooded toff
And when he died at seventeen, before two months had passed
His master joined him in the earth, who made the world laugh

Who can forget The Jumblies? The Pobble who has no toes?
And was there ever such a thing as the Dong with the luminous nose?

You could say, that wedded to his art, he was quite satisfied
But people can say anything, and usually they've lied



The Bloody Countess
Countess Lizzie Báthory was terribly gory
She chewed little girls for a snack
She beat them and burned them
She ate them, she starved them
As vicious, it's said as Count Drac

She spread them with honey, she sprinkled on ants
She bathed in their blood happily
She ate them on toast, and it was her proud boast
She dispensed with 600 that way

Transylvania's fine if you stick to the wine
Don't go poking around in the crypts
For one day she may rise
Bite a chunk from your thighs
As very bad dominatrix