Tag Archives: humanity

APART-IAL EXPLANATION

January 12, 2020humour, Life, poem, PoetryGuest poem, humanity, humour, Life, lou faber, poem, poetryThe Cheesesellers Wife

Oh this is good… from Lou Faber

an old writer and his words

It is all to often debated
what sets humans apart
the other species, and that
will not be agreed any time soon
(which a cynic would note
is one such thing itself).

Freud would claim it is only
our ego, our sense of self,
which may explain why people
are so capable of being self-
ish, and I suspect he was
certain he was wholly correct
but I would give him only partial credit.

It is far simpler than that: record
your voice, record a Sandhill
crane and play them back
and I assure you that you
will say you sound nothing
like what the recorder heard
while the crane will nervously
look all around for his unseen kin.

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Brief bloom

February 28, 2018astronomy, beauty, cosmology, Life, nature, philosophy, poem, Poetry, Science, Science Fiction Poetry, science poetry, speculative poetryastronomy, Earth, environment, hope, humanity, Life, NASA, nature, Science Fiction, Science Fiction Poetry, science poem, science poetry, solar system, space, speculative poetry, sun, Technology, travel, volcanoThe Cheesesellers Wife

We are a brief bloom
On the fragile skin
Of a molten body
Encircling a massive furnace

We are a blossoming of sentience
With encrusted technologies
Craving wonder, hoping for company
Seeking knowledge and excitement

We truly are stardust
Our bodies built from atoms
Forged in successive stellar explosions
We crave the glories of the Universe

We are Human

Re-blogged from last year

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160510.html

Bones

December 6, 2017archeology, poem, Poetry, Science, science poetryarcheology, history, humanity, Life, poem, poetry, prehistory, science, science poetryThe Cheesesellers Wife

Slender bones, delicately traced
staring grinning skulls.
No skin, no muscle,
no eyes, no heart or other parts.
Yet they tell a knowing eye many tales
of wounds healed, muscle strengths,
diseases and battles fought.
Indications of the life lived
and sometimes the death faced.

Hidden Freedoms

September 28, 2017Life, poem, PoetryEmpire, family, freedom, history, humanity, immigration, Life, Malta, national poetry day, poem, poetry, poetry challenge, ValettaThe Cheesesellers Wife

Child of Empire, he freely starved in Valetta
Free to resent the many fat priests
Free to go
Desperate, hoping

Stowaway to Istanbul
Free to be beaten by the Ottomans
Sent back to hunger
Not stopped yet

Stowaway to Britain
Set loose in Imperial London
Free to prosper
Free to work

Free-diver repairing Brighton’s Pier
Freely volunteered in 1914’s Expeditionary Force
Free to marry, to be British
Free to stay

Forty descendants, freely British
Freely given gifts of a Maltese boy
Seven fought in British wars
Immigration can be a free gift

Written for Today’s National Poetry Day, which this year has the theme of Freedom.

As usual, when given a prompt or theme, my mind heads off slightly askew. This poem tells some of the story of my Maltese Grandfather. He came to Britain as a stowaway with nothing, found welcome and work. We need to remember how many of us are descended from people like him — and to remember to allow others similar freedoms.

Topiary

August 31, 2017archeology, garden, poem, Poetry, Science, science poetryarcheology, Guest poem, humanity, Neolithic, poem, poetry, prehistoryThe Cheesesellers Wife

A map in a foreign language is a misheard story.
The path broken by translation. The betrayal of truth
That slips in, knife-quick, between the fireside and the forgetting,
Stripping the stones of all but cautions to take care
As you step between the constructed cracks, the topiary-shaded grass,
Of gardens grown from the bones of unremembered past.

The paper creases with the the grim grip of disappointment,
Lines bend and meld together, new tracklines between
The dead-living things. And so, new stories begin.

Time has slid away from you here,
Paths well trodden and unseen through the depth of years,
Local tales sing little of your legacy,
The trail an ephemeral, skin-thin thing;
Your mounds made a mockery, mirrored in suburban topiary.

Penelope Foreman

From her blog ‘Suspicious Mounds’

Source: Archaeopoetry #3 – Topiary

Seal

July 27, 2017archeology, art, nature, poem, Poetry, Sciencearcheology, art, history, humanity, Life, Nunalleq, poem, poetry, prehistory, sealThe Cheesesellers Wife

Liquid eyes looking through time, staring out from the wood
Lost possession, unregarded litter, draft for a larger work?
It is treasure now
Seal eloquently sealed into timber
Sparse lines, rich artistry

I’ve just discovered an interibfng wordpress arceological site amd was moved to write the above poem after looking long at a seal carving they have found.

https://nunalleq.wordpress.com/

https://nunalleq.wordpress.com/2017/07/26/artefact-of-the-day-july-25th/

Nunalleq is the name of an archaeological site in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta region of Southwestern Alaska. The University of Aberdeen Department of Archaeology, in partnership with the village corporation Qanirtuuq, Inc. and the Yup’ik Eskimo village of Quinhagak, Alaska, is working to record archaeological sites threatened by rising sea levels along the Bering Sea.

Nunalleq means ‘the OldVillage’ in Yup’ik. Previous years excavations (2009 & 2010) reveal that this ‘old village’ dates back at least 700 years. It is a multi-period prehistoric (or precontact) Yup’ik winter village site.

I refute your logic

April 8, 2017Life, love, philosophy, poem, Poetryhumanity, Life, logic, love, philosophy, poem, poetryThe Cheesesellers Wife

I refute your logic

I refute your logic
We will pass through it
As if it doesn’t exist
Lying here grasping each other
Waiting and holding
Until further disturbed

The teenage years

March 29, 2017children, Life, love, parenting, poem, Poetrychildhood, children, family, humanity, Life, love, parenting, poem, poetry, teenagersThe Cheesesellers Wife

The teenage years

All bets are off in the teenage years
You still share your child’s hopes and fears
But they are a child no more –Can you hear that slammed door?
It’s a bumpy ride–Sometimes Jekyll, sometimes Hyde
You love them to bits, you can’t stand them any more
And there again is that slamming door
You glimpse a young woman, you glimpse a young man –Try to catch them if you can
Sometimes it seems they’re a toddler again –Needing to share some of the pain
Do you remember when this was you?
Now you know what your parents went through……

Re-blogged from 2015….

The other nations of this Earth

March 26, 2017beauty, Chickens, Life, nature, Pets, philosophy, poem, Poetry, Wild lifeanimals, beauty, Earth, Henry Beston, hens, humanity, Life, nation, nature, philosophy, Wild birds, Wild lifeThe Cheesesellers Wife

The other nations of this Earth

The other nations of this Earth live along side us
Misunderstood, undervalued, used and abused
So many of us not longer see them
We fortunate few may wilfully misunderstand
But many see the truth, see the power and strength
Even in a hen, blackbird or crow
Animals are the other nations of this Earth
Caught in the net of time
Travellers with us on this one green globe

“….the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours, they move finished and complete, gifted with the extension of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings: they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth.”
~ Henry Beston

Road to Nowhere

February 8, 2017Life, philosophy, poem, PoetryBeowolf, humanity, Life, Nowhere, philosophy, poemThe Cheesesellers Wife

Road to Nowhere

We stumble along, believing we hold the map
Believing we guide our path or someone does somewhere
From the darkness to the light and back
The bird flies through the drinking hall and is gone
Leaving memories, echoes and silence
All we are is memories and echoes
All we can do is try to fracture the silence.

Re-blogged from a year ago…..