ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

If You Listen

If you listen very carefully, my son,
you will hear the voices boast of battles won,
but so many lives are lost,
and I mourn the awful cost
as the victors tell the tale when fighting’s done.

When the years that marked my life began to fade
I could recognise the price that must be paid.
What I did was built by hand,
so please try to understand
that a craftsman should take pride in what he’s made.

From beyond the grave I mourn the end of days,
see the red and white and blue, the sad bouquets,
and although you wonder why
I was reaching for the sky,
it was serving Mother Russia, not the praise.

While you cannot take my hand, hear me proclaim
my regret for all the deaths that haunt our name,
and the burden that I bear
is a heartache I must share…
a Kalashnikov’s too great a price for fame.

© David 16/11/15

You were quick of the mark David Terrific use of the prompts and that last line is a pearler. Well done - I really like this

I suppose David we could also include Samuel Colt and Hiram Maxim.

Thanks, Maureen. Yes, Neville, and a host of others inventors as well. Mikhail Kalashnikov only died a couple of years ago (2013), and it's reported that towards the end of his life he expressed regret at the lethal effectiveness of his creation. Sadly, it's become a symbol of mass murder.

David

Indeed, David. So much talent channelled into the creation of harmful implements and substances! Very thought-provoking and clever as always.

I've just realised that I've used a similar 5 line rhyme scheme for my current homework piece. That wasn't intentional copying - I didn't notice until after mine was done. We must be mentally attuned this week!

Cheers, Shelley

Thanks, Shelley. It's quite a useful structure to play around with in that it's just a little bit different (and your homework poem is different again as far as the rhyme scheme is concerned). In the Toolangi poem I stretched each stanza to 7 lines by having 2 short rhyming couplets in the middle.

Cheers
David

Yes, David, mine does use a different pattern from yours, despite them both being 5 line stanza structures. I noticed that 7 line variation with "A Hunnerd Years?". No doubt everyone will find it very interesting when it appears in the Poetry page (as I guess it will).

I'm enjoying branching out and experimenting with different structures and rhyme schemes ... I've done more of it of late. But as far as prizes go, I have to say that internal rhyme is still my most successful.

Cheers, Shelley

Yes, internal rhyme does seem very popular. As an alternative, this one could have been four-line stanzas with an internal rhyme in the third line:

If you listen very carefully, my son,
you will hear the voices boast of battles won,
but so many lives are lost, and I mourn the awful cost
as the victors tell the tale when fighting’s done.

But I preferred it with the two shorter lines...just a bit different, and less of a solid 'block' of words. To the extent they think about it (i.e. probably not much!), I reckon the general public have an image of traditional poetry as great clumps of verse marching down the page, and that could be off-putting. Not worth wading through. So breaking it up with some short lines, as Dennis did, for example, in The Intro and The Play, might just encourage more interest.

Cheers
David

Good point about the public David - breaking up the pattern a bit does indeed make for easy, smooth reading.
I love this of course - it is a powerful and clever poem, and that last line is just brilliant.

Yes, David, I agree with Catherine - good advice.

I think we've also both had the experience that a less conventional structure may "wake up" a judge who may have spent hours reading competition entries of a more standard appearance.

I think your poem works particularly well with the two short lines.

Cheers, Shelley