Woman in Sikkim: photo by Sukanto Debnath
Illustration from knitting blog
American World War I poster
Friday, 15 January 2010
Woolly Thoughts
First I thought of asking you to write poems about Wool... but it seemed too limited a subject.... so let's include Sheep... Ballads, sonnets, limericks, please yourselves, but there must be wool or sheep in there somewhere.
Herdwick Sheep: photo by Tony Richards
Irish sheep dyed in colours of local football team: photo by John Smyth
Woman in Sikkim: photo by Sukanto Debnath
American World War I poster
Woman in Sikkim: photo by Sukanto Debnath
American World War I poster
79 comments:
knit one
purl one
black white red blue
Grandma's scarf is
full of sheep
Sorry Zeph - just seen the pics and can't come up with pome right now but just love those pics.
Are these sheep the Python's scary intelligent sheep? I'd like to think so.
Herdwick sheep are reckoned to be pretty bright as sheep go, Mimi. Not sure about those two that let themselves be died funny colours, though...
dyed, even.
sheep shape
born shorn
woolly quickly
shorn again
At risk of acquiring a reputation for being all northern and morbid... I don't think I can better this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiXINuf5nbI
I don't quite know what this is. It's obviously not really a poem. I just started thinking about sheep and this is what happened.
They were old friends of my grandfather’s:
She, Joyce, had no sense of smell (a girlhood mishap
With a hockeyball – she was forbidden to have
Gas appliances in the house) – and he, Jack,
Used to teach (with my grandfather)
At a Wakefield public school (quite a temper
He was said to have, then – broke a plate,
Once, on a misbehaving schoolboy’s head –
He lost his memory or his marbles, in the end,
And he died, choking on a fishbone (or sixpence)
One Christmas Day).
I remember these things about them –
And I remember that they kept sheep.
He, Jack, gave me a lamb’s tail to keep.
At the time (I think) I thought lambs’ tails
Just fell off naturally, like catkins,
In the autumn, or that (like tadpoles)
Lambs just lost their tails when they
Didn’t need them any more.
Not so!
He, Jack, took their tails away, my grandfather explained
(No, no, not in temper – rather, so that blowflies mightn’t
Burrow horribly beneath the damp and fetid lambswool and –
Oh, never mind – it was kind, anyway, of bad-tempered
Jack to take their tails away, my grandfather explained).
Very good, Filo, Moonesque in its brevity but showing a typically Filean inventiveness with sound...
That looks pretty much like a poem to me Ringo, it'll do fine anyway. I've never understood about the tail-removing thing, isn't the purpose of the tail to be swished around and keep the flies away?
Lovely Jake Thackray clip, which led me to this splendidly anoraky Wikipedia page about the yan tan tethera counting system.
Counting sheep in a field as you whizz by on a high speed train is dead easy. Just count the legs and divide by four.
What do sheep do all day?
Sleep
Mull things over
Take stock
Keep a watchful eye out
Have a snack and sleep some more
Get rained on
The hegemony of the border collie
Clever dogs leap, creep, nip heels,
Restore order where it’s needed least
the above obliquely inspired by a Polish theatre director I once worked with, who liked to talk about bringing ordure out of cows. Eventually it dawned on us, he meant order out of chaos.
Munni, that's a classic! Made me spill my tea.
The Apotheosis of Ovinity
Thou bleatest! And Man heeds thy plaintive cry
With no attention save an upraised eye-
Brow. Yet, o fleece-clad race of quadrupeds,
An omen bright flames in th’empyrean overhead;
A star effulgent, lambent, tells me true:
This damaged Earth will be repaired by you.
‘Tis thee! wool-bearers, that will save our bacon,
When our cities are by earthquakes shaken;
Thy docile wisdom will our sins correct,
Thy prudent mien this fallen world protect.
The beef some had with you will soon be mute,
When Baron Herdwick’s rule bears precious fruit.
Thou leaders, press with haste no nuclear button!
The future’s bright! We’re all redeemed by mutton.
It is my belief that freep is half Bluefaced Leicester/half man. His instinctive understanding of the ovine gestalt, his weird ululating mating call, his thick wooly coat...QED...anyway:
Mary had a little lamb
Its fleece was white as snow;
It was shot dead by the anti-terrorist police,
Mary's in Guantanamo.
A calumny, Mish. My foresheep number among them some Jacobs, Cheviots and Suffolks.
Important amendment to my poem. The fourth line should not read 'in', but '...i' th'empyrean...'
Very nice, freep, I always like a poem with "th'empyrean" in it.
A fine political squib from Mishari, and btw Munni: I was delighted to see a border collie make its appearance, wonderful beasts.
Offie, but wouldn't you go to sleep before you'd finished counting?
I phoned the bank; a gentle voice replied:
“Good afterno-o-oon, it’s Dolly here,
what he-e-elp may I provi-i-ide?
Intere-est’s way down from last ye-e-ear,
lower than other ba-a-nks you might have tri-i-ed.
Why don’t you borrow just a thou or thre-e-e
on e-e-easy terms?” But I declined.
She uttered her goodbye, it seemed to me,
in tones more snarling and far less refined
I even thought to hear her teeth snap wolfishly.
Yes, staying awake is one of the problems I've faced a lot recently. Counting lamas doesn't help, and neither does this thread.
The man from the city:
"Why is there a dog in that field?"
The man from the city said,
"Eating grass like he were a sheep?
Shouldn't he chase them instead?"
"Where is this dog you say you see?"
The girl from the country pled,
"I can see only grazing sheep,
Has the fresh air turned your head?"
"There he is chewing on that shrub,"
The city dweller exclaimed,
"You call yourself a country girl?
Do you need it all explained?"
"Yes, I do need explanation,"
Was the girl's bemused reply,
"How in a field with nought but sheep
You a ghostly dog espy?"
"I know what a sheep should look like,"
The city man did retort,
"A fleece of white and jet black face -
This is nothing of the sort!"
"Ah Sir, I see"..."I see the truth!"
As with laughter she did weep,
"That grazing dog you swear you saw
Is"... "Is really a black sheep."
I was saddened to see our comrade freep
had become involved in worrying sheep
the sheep were worried that his ancient cur
might infect them with its mangy fur
And I was referring to the counting of sheep, not the poems, ewes and rams.
Very good, Pinkerbell, reminded me of this for some reason.
Glad you cleared that up, Offie :)
Oh dear Zeph, I feared something horrible would happen to the dog, at least he only got shaved.
Offie, would counting the tails not suffice? The problem with your system is the effect of the odd three-legged ewe.
Billy(goat), that problem is offset by the well-known mouton à cinq pattes effect.
Just been reading a wonderful book in which the Mouflon makes a fleeting yet vital appearance. Here's one to look at - intelligent? I think so, could probably write his/her own pome.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mouflon_2.jpg
That's a fine Mouflon. They look as if they've borrowed a set of horns from a much larger animal and then decided not to give them back.
http://www.harcourtbooks.com/Images/LittlePrince/trans1_new.jpg
____________
I l from: the Petit Prince
l Sheep I
l inside I Ship the sheep for cheap
l___________I to: MUNNI
Asteroîde 90209-
sorry that was a box with a sheep inside by the drunkard who drinks to forget that he is ashamed of drinking-
and the box broke loosse.........and the sheep is gone.
Had to share this latest discovery, sort of Progrock/alpine fusion, clearly with a lot of drugs involved!
Not really woolly, except that there is a lot of facial hair.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpV5InLw52U
oops...
Ah, Guitou, I'd forgotten the sheep inside the box... an early form of virtual sheep.
http://www.ebooksgratuits.org/html/st_exupery_le_petit_prince.html.
Pinkerbell, yes, very strange. Yodelling.
Zeph,
You forgot the sheep inside the box? you should check your morning post may be the box comes back with a familiar sound ...bêêêêhhh....
Has anybody here ever read Le génie des alpages ?
If you're into sheep (as Ingrid said to Greengrass), it's a must.
Offie, I never have, but judging by this description it's just up OtherStuffers' street (or alp). I like the bit about "different dialogs and simultaneous happenings, making the overall impression of a totally absurd and secluded world", sounds familiar to any blogger...
I must search them out, sadly as is usual with me and French humour I shall probably miss 50% of the puns.
for the french humor we have to french you more.
Have you ever read any Alphonse Allais, Zeph? I can recommend him...
Mishari, either Guitou or Offie has recommended Allais in the past, on some thread or other, but I haven't got round to reading him yet.
Guitou, ooh, you Frrrench are so naughtee!
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