Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark
Don’t Be Afraid Of The Dark
Don't be afraid of the dark,
of all the things there are,
only some of them are seen,
wait by the door and trap the light,
cup it, swallow it.
Now it's always there, settled in your stomach, just below your ribs.
Under the bed is a peacock egg,
wrapped and safe to grow,
crow and strut,
keep it close and warm,
it may hatch at any moment,
a constant promise,
but it must be cared for,
kept away for special people,
people like you who keep it safe,
who believe in peacock eggs
under the bed.
Don't be afraid of the dark.
Some teachers say if you speak a word
the ripples of sound will wave and keep going,
out and away and will never end,
bounce off walls and fly into each other
hooked by the tails of ‘y’s and ‘j’s,
come out of chimneys,
get swallowed by people along with light,
get trapped in peacock eggs
and wait to hatch, for the people
who believe in peacock eggs
under the bed.
Don't be afraid of the dark.
Grumpy Angry Teacher
Is It Too Early For Poetry
Is it too early for poetry?
When should it be?
When beasties come out in the dark?
When beautiful sunsets light up the park?
Or when someone is doing it for free
Finding the words, just for me
Does it really have to rhyme?
All the blinking time?
And they don’t know I’m not really listening
Because they can’t see inside my head.
What’s he said?
Is it too early for poetry?
I want to see with my ears
Rub my eyes to hear better
Big Breath
Breath out - rushing to school
Big Breath
Breath out - couldn’t find PE kit this morning
Breath in - strange man in assembly
And breath out
National Curriculum
Add to Dictionary
My little girl says that a boy in her class
never changes the spelling of words on computers
But just presses ADD TO DICTIONARY
ADD TO DICTIONARY and make new words
Change the spelling of words,
change the meaning of words
Change the laws of spelling and language,
make everything absurd
So alter minds and perception, recreate the world
Rename animals, plants and trees and
ADD TO DICTIONARY and make it so.
From sad to Said so all sad things get talked away
From mad to made because what is made can be unmade
From Parent to patient, father to further, mother to smother-hover got to love her
ADD TO DICTIONARY and make it so.
Change the world by shifting it’s blocks
From hard to easy, are maybe easier
From unsay able to shout able
Undoable to done
From Poet to Premiership footballer,
Business tycoon or royalty
No on second thoughts dreamer,
themer screamer poets are richer,
From cat to dog, from dog to cow from cow to bird
To fly away.
Learn to make words because you never know what you might need to say
ADD TO Dictionary and make it so
Type all the bad, mad, nasty things, all the things that make people fright and fight
and children quiet, type them there in electric paper, electronic letter blocks
With pictures on that make words then change their spelling and so change their nature
Rename the world to make it your own
ADD TO Dictionary and make them so. I am your accidental parent, Not because when your mum and I knew you were coming and going to be born we were surprised and delighted, but more surprised, no we kinda thought you would come to live with us, it’s because anything I have done as a parent has been It’s because when I went to school they never taught us the really important things like: Reading wage slips, painting pictures, how to play Smoke on the Water on an electric guitar and how to be a parent, should we ever be one, not everyone is, not everyone has to be, I’m sure those important things are taught in school now after all these years, I mean it would be ridiculous not to. All the noblest efforts to raise a happy balanced you who knows right from wrong and will mostly choose right, can seem along way away sometimes, do what I say and not what I do, guidance on things I don’t understand, sage advice that you will remember for years doesn’t come. Then you tell me you remember a wave on a beach on a holiday and what it did four years ago and how you felt. What will you remember of me? How you felt? As you slowly walk away from our shared beach and tides of days, and find your own patch and view and we will visit each other on the constantly resetting sand. There will be a time when education teaches you to Compare and Contrast and I may not be the I am your accidental parent, learning some things but it is mostly accident not design, I guess the trick is to keep going and leave an impression, a memory, a belief that although we were accidental, accident prone, parents making it up as we go along, You know we tried.
Accidental Parent
an accident more than planned
but lots are going to be.
‘Best Man in the world anymore’ as long as that doesn’t really matter to you, who cares, not me.
Copyright G S Buss 2009