Arthur L Wood - Farewell Angelina - Original Poem

My poetry collections 'Poems for Susan' (2020) and 'Scarlet Land' (2021) are available from my shop: https://ko-fi.com/arthurlwood/shop If you wish to contribute to the channel, you can make a one time donation here: https://ko-fi.com/arthurlwood Farewell Angelina, I’m destined to go, Across the far mountains covered with snow, I kiss you intrepid, for each is the last, Our future is dead, more dead than our past. Farewell Angelina, now girls of renown May lie with your poet, ere they may drown Like troubled Ophelia, lost to her men, Destined to play her, are women again. Farewell Angelina, I go for the smiles, I go for the art, and the pain that beguiles, I tried to conceive a love in your heart, But there I discovered a way to depart. Farewell Angelina, the triangles try To see a direction beneath the dark sky, I lend my heart gladly, and now I repent, I wish I could take back the letters I sent. Farewell Angelina, like frost in the wood, I turn and envision a path, so I should, It may be less travelled and frighten your mind, But round the next corner who knows what I’ll find. Farewell Angelina, my song has begun, I learnt from my melodies, I learnt to have fun, I purchase an absinthe, and string up my life, And lose my sweet girlfriend, and lose my sweet wife. Farewell Angelina, now twenty long years, Stretch out before me, unabsent of tears, When ravens are knocking, western winds blow Farewell Angelina, Angelina, I go. - That man can make the world sit up and listen, His footsteps are the dreams of fairy pixies, He speaks as if possessed by folken gypsies, His ideas gleam and glow and glide and glisten. Ohho! Ye cannot see him and refuse to frolick, All women beam their eyes if they can look, And many men are frozen melancholic, Or joyous, both, aye, every life is shook. Ohho! Heed him, careful, tread with caution here, The devil oft appears a man of light, But see the spell-ful movement of his flight! He wraps us in his beauty, have no fear. Ohho! To fall in love with Hamlet, dangerous choice. You will lose your heart and lose your voice. - Hush the town tonight, the moon is sliced and hurt, The world is weeping in a serious dance. She is forsaken, and she cannot roll her soul Around this f*****g sun no more; She stares into the emptiness of space. She is in a trance. She bursts, she clamours, she pours forth her grief In mist and gloomy morning dew. She says, ‘I have nothing more to do’. She says, ‘No. I have nothing more to do’. - Upon these leaves, can we tread? Upon this hurt do we play? To heal the heart what do we say? Do we lie, or do we plead? Or do we tell the truth, What if that truth is death? What if an honest breath, Undoes the maddened youth? What do we say, what do we do, If hurt shall be the consequence? Do we give the courts defence? Do I tell the truth to you? Do you tell lies to me? Am I a plaything for your sport? Am I something, am I nought? Do you love truthfully? Can you love, or are you corked With indecipherable toys, Do you flirt with all the boys, Should I wish we never talked? Upon these leaves, can we tread? What do we dread, what do we dread? Will we find love when we are dead? Do we lie, or do we plead? - Christ was walking to Emmaus by my side, the other day. I thought he was a normal looking chap. I left him for a starbucks, see you mate. Christ walked to Emmaus, with you today. We leave him for a coffee and a cake. - And so the Earth lay bleeding, But this aint doom and gloom! We are here to sing ye songs, Strike up ye strong bassoon! A swift is in the vaulted sky, The dog has killed a rat! The world has launched a nuclear bomb! The brain is in the vat! - There’s been a hundred spears within my frame, My heart is far too vulnerable for words, It hurts to even think my real name Is gone. Is gone. Like ancient birds Of attic Rome, and yet their song survives In tunes we think immortal, so said Keats And true enough we know of many lives And words that seized on mighty feats. And so my name perhaps shall never die, My name, Laurence, she took it all away, I had some love to give, I shone one day, And she, that evil she, threatened with a lie. And Keats shall finally die, it’s nearly time, I’d give another ninety years or so, If we even make it. Who shall know A nightingale extinct, and gone the rhyme? I sublimate my grief, I tread upon the leaf. You chop my heart like we Used to chop a tree. I find a hundred reasons To stay awake at night, I walk without a vision, A torch in the sunlight. Is Eliot listening, Is Joyce in here, Is my room the haunt of poets tonight? Is there something in my mind tonight? Is there something else to find tonight? The answer, a death knell, a syllable, a sullen sigh, the unjust nature of the universe in one petty cruel, eviscerating word: No. - Yet with my morning brain I listened once again, And heard Another word: Yes. #Poetry #Literature #OriginalPoem #Poetry #Poem #ArthurLWood

Added 23 Sept 2026