Blue Coffee

by Mitchell, Adrian

• ISBN13: 9781852243623
• ISBN10: 1852243627
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1996-09-01
• Publisher: Bloodaxe Books Ltd

Summary

Ever since Out Loud in 1968, Adrian Mitchell has been one of Europe's bestselling poets. His poetry's simplicity, clarity, passion and humour show his allegiance to a vital, popular tradition embracing William Blake as well as the Border Ballads and the blues. His most nakedly political poems - about nuclear war, Vietnam, prisons and racism - have become part of the folklore of the Left, sung and recited at demonstrations and mass rallies.
Bloodaxe already publishes Adrian Mitchell's Greatest Hits - his 'forty Golden Greats'. This new book brings together the poems he has written since his last collection, On the Beach at Cambridge, appeared in 1985. It will be followed in 1997 by Heart on the Left: Poems 1953-1984, making all his work available in the year of his 65th birthday.

Table of Contents

A Puppy Called Puberty	p. 14
A Dog Called Elderly	p. 14
Questionnaire	p. 15
Yes	p. 16
Golo, the Gloomy Goalkeeper	p. 16
Blood and Oil	p. 18
No, She Really is Upset, You Know	p. 19
Millennium Countdown	p. 20
Trying Hard To Be Normal	p. 21
Or	p. 22
Der Bucketspiel	p. 23
Cutting It Up	p. 23
The Olchfa Reading	p. 26
Booze and Bards	p. 27
Bottles of Poetry	p. 28
Poet	p. 28
Toys for Rich Kids, Toys for Poor Kids	p. 29
Poetry and Knitting	p. 29
Explanation	p. 31
He Might Have Looked Better in a Beard	p. 31
No Wages for Poets, Please, I Beg You	p. 32
The Murder of Michael Smith by Three Men in Kingston, Jamaica	p. 32
The Wilder Poetry of Tomorrow	p. 33
The Collected Poems of Gerald Stimpson, Esq	p. 34
Short Back and Sides with a Blowtorch, Please	p. 35
Movietone News	p. 35
For the Next Eurovision Song Contest	p. 36
Hot Pursuit	p. 37
For William Cowper	p. 38
A Unicorn for Salman	p. 39
Moondog	p. 40
Deep Purple Wine	p. 41
Parade	p. 42
Oh What a Lovely Man!	p. 43
Edward Hopper	p. 45
Footnote on the Edward Hopper Exhibition	p. 45
The One About Fred Astaire	p. 46
Mayakovsky and the Sun	p. 47
The One Good Poster	p. 48
The Perils of Reading Fiction	p. 49
Looking Down and Looking Down	p. 50
Dart River Bed	p. 52
That June	p. 52
The Rain in June	p. 53
A Million Daisies	p. 53
November on the Hill	p. 54
Winter Listening	p. 54
Winter Night in Aldeburgh	p. 55
Two Old Ladies Overheard in Totnes	p. 56
The Monster's Dream	p. 56
The Interrupted Nap	p. 57
Put Your Brain to Bed	p. 57
A Living Monument	p. 57
When the Dapple is on the Chapel...	p. 58
Syllables of Wasted Time	p. 59
Another Attempt at a Nature Poem, But Don't Worry, Ted	p. 60
Bird Dreaming	p. 62
Little Grey	p. 62
Sausage Cat	p. 63
A Cat Called Slumber	p. 63
Epitaph for a Golden Retriever	p. 64
For Golden Ella	p. 64
Elegy for Number Ten	p. 65
The Meaningtime	p. 66
Understanding the Rain	p. 66
A Cheetah, Hunting	p. 67
Here Come the Bears	p. 67
The Elephant	p. 68
Elephant Eternity	p. 68
Blue Coffee	p. 70
Vauxhall Velvet	p. 70
Frome Pomes	p. 71
By the Waters of Liverpool	p. 72
Three Swansea Triplets	p. 73
Night Thoughts in Swansea	p. 73
In the Queen's Hotel, Swansea	p. 74
Night Thoughts in Treorchy	p. 74
I Am Tourist	p. 75
March in Vienna	p. 76
London in March	p. 76
The Postman's Palace	p. 76
Julie's House in Deya	p. 78
Lerici, the Bay, Early on Saturday, May	p. 78
The British School at Rome	p. 79
Helsinki Notes	p. 79
Peace Memories of Sarajevo	p. 79
For my Friends in Georgia	p. 80
New York	p. 81
Which Do You Want? The Truth or the Treacle?	p. 81
One Week of Hell on SR 2	p. 82
From an English Phrase Book	p. 84
Don't Call Us	p. 84
When the Government	p. 85
Twenty-one Haikus	p. 86
The Boy Who Danced with a Tank	p. 88
Sweet Point Five Per Cent	p. 89
Shanty Town Song	p. 90
The Lion Dancers	p. 90
Ten Holes for a Soldier	p. 91
Old Man in Swains Lane	p. 92
My Father and Mother or Why I Began to Hate War	p. 94
Childhood Memories	p. 95
Rainbow Woods	p. 95
The Bully	p. 96
To the Sadists of My Childhood	p. 97
Putsborough Sands	p. 98
Making Poison Gas	p. 99
Spitfire Daydream	p. 100
After Reading Hans Christian Andersen	p. 101
As for the Fear of Going Mad	p. 101
Grandfather's Footsteps	p. 102
The Sound of Someone Walking	p. 103
Just a Little Bit Older	p. 103
Keep Right on to the End of the Bottle	p. 104
Ode to the Skull	p. 104
My Orchard	p. 105
Poem in Portugal	p. 107
Time-Bone	p. 107
An Ode to Dust	p. 108
Mid-Air	p. 110
Give Me Time - Autumn Is at the Gates	p. 110
Slowdown	p. 112
Two Anti-Environmental Poems by Volcano Jones	p. 114
A Warning to Those Who Fly	p. 115
Criminal Justice for Crying Out Loud - A Rant	p. 115
Full English Breakfast	p. 116
Dreamcakes	p. 117
Oldverse	p. 118
Moving Poem	p. 119
Stuck Together Song	p. 119
Funlovers	p. 120
For Pam	p. 120
After the Third Election of Thatcher	p. 121
Flakes	p. 122
Pull On Your Parent Hood	p. 123
O Captain! My Captain! Our Fearful Trip Is Done	p. 123
Every Monday	p. 124
Screw It Yourself	p. 125
Seasonal Fanfare	p. 125
The Sons of Fred	p. 126
Icarus Talking to His Dad	p. 126
November/December 1989 in Romania	p. 128
If You're Lookin' for Trouble You've Come to the Wrong Place	p. 128
My Father's Lands	p. 130
A Late Elegy for Jock Mitchell	p. 133
Goodnight, Stevie	p. 133
With Love to Alan and Shelagh Hancox	p. 133
Reggie Smith in Paradise	p. 134
For Michael Gough on His birthday	p. 135
Brightness of Brightness	p. 135
For My Old Friend Jeremy Brooks	p. 137
Maybe Maytime	p. 138
Celia's Flower	p. 138
Nineteen Dollars Ninety-five Cents Haiku	p. 139
Sometimes Awake	p. 139
For Me and You	p. 139
Exit	p. 140
Thank You for All the Years We've had...	p. 140
The Lake Is a Piano	p. 141
An Open Window	p. 142
Doreen Webster Teaches Us a Zulu Dance	p. 142
Ode to Deborah Levy	p. 142
Your Name	p. 143
Happy Breakfast, Hannah, on Your Eighteenth Birthday	p. 144
For Amy	p. 145
Sam's Way	p. 145
A Flying Song	p. 146
Reaching for the Light	p. 146
To Caitlin Riding on My Shoulders	p. 147
Stufferation	p. 148
Silence	p. 150
Boty Goodwin	p. 152
The Forest and the Lake	p. 155
The Boty Sign	p. 156
A Flower for Boty	p. 157
Good Luck Message to Boty	p. 158
Telephone	p. 158
Every Day	p. 158
For Boty	p. 159
Especially When It Snows	p. 160
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.