Poetry
Poetry Group
Poetry was one of the first groups to be started when our U3A was formed.
Since its inception it has been ably run by Peggy, until I took over last autumn (quite an act to follow).
Each month I ask members of the group to do some research and to find a poem relating to a theme, subject, idea or poet.
The results can be very varied: someone will read a deep meaningful poem on a subject, then the next person may read a poem by Roger McGough or Spike Milligan covering the same theme!
We are a happy group and we all enjoy our meetings - the two hours are gone in no time. One or two of our group write poetry and have even had some published, which is very humbling for the rest of us.
As an example here is a poem by one of our stalwarts, Richard Warner.
It reduced us to to tears of laughter and we hope we hear more of his work in the near future.
Maggie Pogmore
Listen to your Body!
“Listen to your body,” nurse said in A&E
“Remember you are eighty-nine and not still twenty-three.
By the bruises on your backside and the scars across your knees
It’s no more scaling ladders and no more climbing trees.”
Well, I’ve listened to my body for over eighty years
And the problems that it caused me would reduce strong men to tears.
But in spite of many heartaches, embarrassment and pain
My reckless, feckless body says, “”Let’s do it all again.”
I can’t be sure when all these problems first began.
I wasn’t yet a teenager still less a full grown man;
But my body seemed to tell me that the one I’d set my heart on
Should have face like Rita Hayworth and figure like Dolly Parton.
I have yet to find a partner who was anything like those,
But the search has been rewarding and some ran it very close.
So I’ve no complaints at all now, having settled on old age,
Content to stick with memories and not turn a final page.
I meet my maker or oblivion, in another year or two,
And I hope my ending’s fitting when that time comes and I do.
Not forgetful or forgotten in some sterile care-home bed;
But in loving arms that hold me or by falling on my head!