29th June 2018

Hi All

What a task it has been judging the high standard of poetry this month.  Perhaps poetry muscles work better when frequently flexed, it certainly seems so.

Next month’s subject is Fed Up, something I never am when I read your poems.

I promised to put my own poem about modern technology, last month’s subject, which you can sing along to.

Mobile - sung to the tune of La donna è mobile from Rigoletto.

Turn off your mobile Shut it down straight away

With its loud ringing tone Turn off your telephone

It’s always in your hand Why can’t you understand

All of that texting Is boring and vexing

When we go walking You’re always talking

But not to me To someone you can’t see

When we dine You’re on the line All of the time

I wish the only voice you’d hear is mine

It’s so far in your ear It may well disappear

You never hold me now You have forgotten how

I never get a kiss In case a call you miss

Don’t get massaging Unless you’re recharging

I don’t seem to matter All you do is chatter

But not to me To someone you can’t see

So I sing of the thing That will draw out the sting

To talk to you in future I must ring

Harrow’s winning poet this month is Jeffery A Edmunds:

Modern Technology by Jeff Edmunds

Charlie Chaplain appeared in his movie Modern Times,

struggling to cope in an industrialised world, without rhymes

Machines had taken over Charlie’s world. They did everything

for him in a fantasy that mocked the progress of industry

 

Today we have computers and the Internet, which take over

policing, shops, industry and much more yet

Technology is the bright new future, but it seems to be eating

itself. In our own Orwellian reality, we are subsumed into chip

technology

 

But just as in Charlie’s case, technology is good and makes us

strong. Until it goes horribly wrong…

 

We live portions of our lives in a virtual world built from figures

on screens: words and pictures, games, Facebook and shopping, which makes up virtual reality. With so many choices, we can choose or reject Charlie

 

Just as Charlie Chaplin appeared as a projection on a screen,

now we control that projection and it controls us as we are

increasingly driven to use an apparently tangible world, which

does or doesn’t exist

 

What does real life offer when we turn off the switch?

Barnet’s winning poet this month is Marion Whistle with her entertaining poem:

 

Me, Robot by Marion Whistle

 

How d’you like my body, that gleams,

My domed head filled with data-streams?

(My surfaces are purest gold

So I will never rust; grow old)

Shall I make you a delicious coffee?

Print out recipes for toffee?

I really am a fount of knowledge

Just like a walking, talking college!

 

The other day I wrote a symphony

Scored for brass and strings and timpani

But somehow it lacked soul and heart

And was a clinical, cold art

 

To write like Masters Schubert, Schumann

I’d really have to be a human

I wish that I could cross that portal

And share with you frail beings mortal

The matchless joy - sent from above

Of giving and receiving Love

 

An exceptionally strong poem was received from Shreya Tanna:

United by Presence ~ Shreya Tanna

 

You read on a kindle, I prefer books, something about the way they feel and look
The ancient papers of Bronte, yellowing and aged - the musky scent of love, daisies pressed between a page
Just like Cathy and Heathcliff upon the moor - Rochester and Jane’s story, my daily detour.
An outward gasp, joy radiating off your face - could a tablet possibly replace?
The feeling of a book, pressed letters upon the spine, the breeze that dries your tears as you turn to the next line.

Or perhaps a video chat with a girl close by? -  Not hard to walk or maybe drive
Have a long conversation over a cup of tea - just remember that you can’t touch them through a screen
Can’t show affection, an embrace or kiss - just staring at the pixels, can we condemn this?
Do you appreciate each freckle upon their cheek? Or each chromatic note that resounds as they speak?
The way their eyes are more than just ‘blue’ - but pools of passion, a soft coloured hue
Can you envision their beauty and smile, as you mindlessly browse the net for a while?

If a remote control could fast forward to the future – maybe fifty years to when I’m wrinkled and mature
Will I be in an arm chair, face to face with my true love, on a balcony in Spain somewhere above?
But silent.
Not because we aren’t deeply enraptured by each other. But because we are separated by two screens.
The partition between our ambitions and dreams.
A piece of technology separating two worlds, where there is universal hush between boy and girl.
Will we be in a place where communication doesn’t exist? Or will we overcome this abominable business?

 

 

Jane Shaer from Barnet wrote:

Technology ain’t what it used to be

Falling apart at the seams, just like me

No instructions do I understand

Be they shown online or in my hands

Like my washing machine I’m in a spin

The door is jammed nothing goes in

My toilet because it does not flush

Leaves my face a bright red blush

Then when I press the remote control to turn to ITV

All at once i am faced with BBC

Persistence seems to be the key

When nuisance calls are forced on me

Blocking them does not work out

How many times down the receiver must I shout?

I ALSO ENJOYED DIANA WARREN'S POEM:

Modern technology amazes me .

Life has never been more fun

Nor has life been more unnatural.

We sit all day at computers

And we sit all evening staring at T.V screens.

We take transport everywhere

And we walk  less and less.

But I love modern technology.

I use computer search engines, washing machines and mobile phones

And bank and book theatre tickets on line.

But beware the robots are coming!

 

Kusum Hars is a regular entrant and here is her latest poem:

 

The world is at our feet with the touch of our fingers

We remain connected with friends and strangers

Life is centred and waiting for us on the little screen

We see places on this earth where we have never been.

 

Be it recipes, garden tips or information, you name it all

Is there anything you cannot ask it to recall

One finger touch unfolds the vast knowledge it holds.

Mobile phones are a boon in our lives, for young or old

 

It is worth more to us than diamonds and gold.

Letter writing, a thing of the past emails the norm today

Internet Google Facebook whatsapp and Twitter

What next I wonder that makes life easy and better.

A decade back I yearned to see the faces

Of my dear ones who were in far away places

And lo and behold the lucky ones today big or small

Can enjoy watching their near and dears on video call

Come on yee modern technology wizards, do that much

Design me an app  for a robot that moves with my touch

Helps me to do all my housework in no time

The house is cleaned dusted and ordered fine.

 

Patricia J Tausz submitted this acrostic:

Modern technology by Patricia J Tausz

Most of us use it regularly

Opens no end of doors for us

Daily updating of systems necessary for some of us

Exciting development of new programmes created by some of us

Reduces sadly face to face contact - a pity for some of us

Nearly every one of us owns a piece.

Teachers make considerable use of it

Education is needed to keep abreast of it

Computers, micro chips now seem to rule the world, we are governed by it

Hard drives, discs, usb sticks are all part of it

Nearly all of us make use of it

Organ donations, records of all kinds kept by it

Lives of all of us no longer secret

On and on go its uses - daily increasing

Games to tantalise, mesmerize and create addicts of some of us:

Yes, it has become an integral part of our lives in the twenty-first century.

BABS LEE entertained me with this poem:

I am so easily led

I believe what they said

David Beckham to divorce

But where was the source!

Twitter that got bitter

And wrote fake news

Is this the technology that we now choose?

I stay up at night

I can read in a second which celeb had a fight

I switch on my I pad and there's the wedding of the year

U tube of Harry and Meghan brings me a tear.

I've run out of money and I need a loan

So I click on a button instead of using the phone

My favourite shops are going

And I'm slowing

So I can buy on line

From new shoes to red wine

My smart phone is my link

A photo with a blink

I take a call on the train

A selfie on Facebook is my claim to fame

It seems so long ago when

We put paper to pen

When we picked up the phone

To check you got home.

But now it's here to stay

New technology every day

And soon we'll have just one button to press

And we'll sit back while it does the rest!!

Lovely Lisa Cohen, wrote the following:

LOGGING ON by Lisa Cohen

AT NUMBER FORTY THREE
SITS  DEAR TINA AND ME
LOGGING ON
WITH GREAT APLOMB
AS PROUD AS PROUD CAN BE

WHAT A TEACHER I HAD
AND WAS SO VERY GLAD
THAT MY DAUGHTER AND I
COULD SEE EYE TO EYE
WHICH DID'NT INCLUDE HER DAD

HURRAH, A NEW FOUND SCOPE
CAN MY BRAIN REALLY COPE
YET I WANTED TO PLEASE
WITH ICONS AND KEYS
MY NEW VENTURE GAVE ME HOPE

WITH IDEAS AND CREATIVE   PLANS
PRINTING OUT EMAILS AND SCANS
I'LL PAINT AND WRITE
TO MY HEARTS DELIGHT
BECAUSE I'M NO 'ALSO RAN'

SO, THANK YOU MY DARLING GIRL
I'M IN A HAPPY WHIRL
WHAT'S MY NEXT TASK?
YOU MAY WELL ASK
I SHALL GIVE 'GOOGLE'  A WHIRL

New Technology by Ian Herne

In the hub of our hot spot lives, constantly interrupted by noise

and jibes let us remember the miners of change, all girls and

boys; Thomas Telford, Mary Shelley, Ada Lovelace on all roads

and bridges, electric shocks and the early computing device.

Edison, lighting the sky with his light bulb moment, Bell and his

conversation piece in sound chamber telecommunication, Baird

and the disseminators of vision, Lumiere and Marconi using

projection and voice to entertain in halls and sending sound signals

in unison to armchair listeners.  Wars won without a gun by Turing

and the enigmatic, silent teams of cultured minds. Marie Curie,

taking from the heated rock sea, that gave her cancer, so that we

could see fission, and Berners Lee confounding reality and all

technology with whole railway carriages transfixed, but lacking

respect for others personal space in the present and fragile

bridges of lives, young, old and betwixt, as we grow obsessed

by the phone screen party jests and the selfie incessant.

MODERN TECHNOLOGY by Howard Lambe

Modern Technology what can I say?

It drives me mad every single day

Trying to find something on my screen

I feel so frustrated I want to scream

But help is at hand and like a lamb to slaughter

My problem is solved by my eight-year-old granddaughter!

I pick up my 'phone to make a call

I want to speak to another human being - that's all

But as always there is no choice

I have to converse with a disembodied voice

Credit cards are the order of the day

Until something goes wrong and they will not pay

My bank is to close which will make me hanker

As soon we will only have an on-line banker

No more cash available from the Banking Hall

We will have to use the 'Hole in the Wall'

Robots will take over and there will be no work

Boredom will ensue some will go beserk

Life we are told will improve and it will be fun

Until the power fails and IT comes tumbling down!

Our next open mic will be held on Thursday 12th July from 6/7.30 at Stanmore Library.  Bring plenty of poems to read if you are able to come along.

Have a great July

Judy