Bless  the continuous stutter
Of the Word being made into flesh

Leonard Cohen from  The Window

Low sun  shines
Glistening  holly leaves,ah
A wood pigeon passes

All the trees shiver
And the ends of shrubs waving
Makes me think,goodbye

Leaves like littls stars
Bare wood like burnt sienna
With its glowing orange tinge

Why are shadows long?
The sun blinds me in winter
Then it creates a  moving image

Indifferent sun
Knows not of Syrian hell
But God remembers, suffers

Criminal Jesu
God descended to this world
He dies with victims

Why the torture
Fighting inevitable~But why such sadism/

Weep as the trees  lean
Sparrows  nests shudder, remain
Life is here again

ach

The doctor was in error
Deep down the crab  was  growing
The hogweed  fertile

Yes, he was forty
Is that old  or young these days?
Yes, he has gone now

His boy is  at school
He screamed for  forty minutes
After,”Dad is dead”

Total loss, a pool
Grows larger with each tear
Stars and rainbow meet

Try to catch a tear
They are not like mercury
They can disappear.

All the tears to shed
Like an old coat we grow out of
Who will they become?

Oh,God, the birthing
A fatherless child  is near
Thanks to the deep freeze

No Sylvia Plath writes.
The spaces will not lean on
Their  new solitude.

See night descending
Tear sacs burst while new stars sing:
And all shall be well

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fragmentation_of_memory

Fragmentation of memory is a memory disorder in when an individual is unable to associate the context of the memories to their autobiographical (episodic) memory. The explicit facts and details of the events may be known to the person (semantic memory). However, the facts of the events retrieve none of the effective and somatic elements of the experience. Therefore, the emotional and personal content of the memories can’t be associated with the rest of the memory.^[1] Fragmentation of memory can occur for relatively recent events as well.

The impaired person usually suffers from physical damage to or underdevelopment of the hippocampus. This may be due to a genetic disorder or be the result of trauma, such as post-traumatic stress disorder.^[2] Brain dysfunction often has other related consequences, such as oversensitivity to some stimuli, impulsiveness, lack of direction in life, occasional aggressiveness, a distorted perception of oneself, and impaired ability to empathize with others, which is usually masked.

I saw  the sun rise over the North Sea
Accentuating coloured fishing boats.
The beauty of the dawn gave hope to me
A restful pleasure made my soft eyes dote.
The peace of this small town has caught my heart.
Scenes from ancient times  come close again
The gulls swoop down and  sketch their flying charts
Remote as ever from the realm of man.
The shingle beach, the  Church  where Britten lies
The in and out of tides  of salty sea;
An exact match of houses, hill and skies;
The amber shop, the chip shop, the oak tree.
In my mind I walk in love again;
Though of the two, a single one remains

Black against light sky
Bright flowers blown ; bare branches now
Reach  beseechingly.

Reluctant sun hangs
Sending thin light  and pinkness
To clouds sleek as  cats

Now paling, blue grey,
I see mauve dying into dark
Night sky edges in

The  blackness awaits;
Dreams dangle  like stringed balloons
A new born gurgles

How full the holly!
Forsythia large and darker,
Birds shelter  wisely

Neither hot nor cold the day came by
I admired  bright  jasmine at its  peak
Grey  the air  and darker still the sky

As warm as spring but not the time to lie
Brexit hangs above , yet who can speak?
Neither hot nor cold the day passed by

Polititicians, paranoid  or fey,
Noone trusts them , will we even look?
Grey  the air  and darker still the sky

No great man  or woman waits nearby
If Hitler came again, we´d sell his book
Neither hot nor cold,  a life passed by

At this moment there  may be tense spies
Hoping to write Putin´s alibi
Grey  the air  and darker still the sky

Is there any sense in babies’cries?
We must believe or all infants will die
Neither hot nor cold the day went by
Grey  the air  and darker  the  night sky

I am a kettle made of stainless steel
I am a saint,  for tea  is brewed to heal
And , unlike kettles on an old  coal fire,
I am not dirty nor do I perspire.

My mirrored sides reflect you as you cook.
Look at me and read me like a book
I’m  full of love and hotter than a man
Oh, dear lady, love me while you can. 

 Superior mother,  yet inhuman  I;
Even electric kettles sometimes lie.
I shall never punish you, my dear
For perfect love like mine shall wield no fear.

All I ask is that you polish me.
For  in between your handsI  yearn to be.

It is too often forgotten that the gift of speech, so centrally employed, has been elaborated as much for the purpose of concealing thought by dissimulation and lying as for the purpose of elucidating and communicating thought.

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/waystationinthewilderness/2019/01/904/#comment-4284483348

Mary went upstairs to the bathroom to wash her dirty hands after she had been repotting two spider plants. When she looked  at the pale blue sink, she could see a bar of soap but she could not see the nail brush.
Mary felt   cross because Stan did not like nail brushes and he would hide the nail brush in different places so that Mary could not find it
In fact they now had 13 nail  brushes but despite that, Stan had  managed to hide all of them.. Stan himself did not care if his nails were clean or dirty, although Mary  cared a great deal .He could not seem to understand the connection between using a brush and having clean nails
Of course there are other ways of getting clean nails; for example handwashing your underwear in detergent or shampoo would also get the  nails clean at the same time. however Stan did not wash clothes by hand very frequently. In fact the whole subject of washing and cleaning seems alien to his mind
He said to Mary one day, “my jumpers smell funny”
That is why we have a washing machine, she told him kindly
All clothes get dirty either from sweat and bodily fluids or from dropping tomato sauce onto one’s lap while dining.
She could have said “if your jumpers smell funny, why don’t you laugh ?”  but she was no longer a school girl unfortunately.
We may not like being school girls,  but when we look back we realise that playing with balls and mercury in the physics lab was  better than cleaning the kitchen floor or even one’s nails. If you are a school girl you’ll probably have someone at home who will make your dinner for you and maybe wash your blouse  while you concentrate on writing an essay on the uses of the past irrational tense in Hamlet ,that great play by William Shakespeare.
Mary looked round the bathroom, where is the nail brush she cried to Emile her cat
Why, Mother, it’s on the window sill next to your deodorant
My deodorant ; how do you know that’s what it is, can you read?
Not yet   purred Emile  but I saw you putting it underneath your arms I mean in your armpit mother
I don’t think that you should come into the bathroom when I am getting  washed, Mary told Emile in a kindly tone of voice. Why I never even knew you would have heard of deodorant
Actually I have also heard of antiperspirants, Emile  told heer graciously but I would not like to use an antiperspirant because the sweat or the odour from our bodies is what attracts other cats to us for mating ;well actually, it’s using a female smells lovely and then the male cat is attracted by this beautiful scent and with a bit of luck they might mate and a produce a family of kittens
So see what you are missing ,mother
I don’t want to smell beautiful and then have 6  kittens to look after.
No you would have human babies to look after
But would I have to have 6  said Mary I don’t think my body is big enough to carry 6 innocent  babies.
Well you seem we cats are superior because we can have 6 or even 8 kittens  at once and we can soon build up a large colony of cats in any neighbourhood and it’s all down to  sweat, really
That is fascinating  muttered Mary as she took the nail brush and put it under the hot tap before getting the soap and applying it to her fingernails
Do cats have nail brushes? the cat asked her
What, you don’t have nails!
Could we have claw brushes?
I suggest that when Stan comes home you ask him to give you a bath and put some fairy snow into the bath and then your talons or claws will be cleaned as you soak without you exerting any effort
I want to make an effort,  cried the cat ,I want to look very good tonight
Why asked Mary ,it will be dark when you go out so the female cats will not be able to see your claws
I’s a bit like you cleaning your teeth before you go out in the evening I know it’s not just for hygiene it’s in case you want to kiss somebody and you don’t want them to taste your Weetabix from your teeth
Good heavens, are you into French kissing, Emile?
I’ve never heard of it ,he said. I didn’t know there more than one way of  kissing. You see cats don’t kiss very much so we don’t know a lot about it
You should consider yourself lucky said Mary as there are very unpleasant men who will offer me a lift home in their car after a meeting and then before I can get out they plump their large and ugly lips on my lips   and seem to think I will enjoy it
Yes it must be very difficult so then especially as you can’t scratch them because they will probably call the police
I doubt it now ,muttered Mary they will be afraid of being accused of sexual harassment
My goodness that’s another thing that cats don’t have, we don’t have much choice really  our Feelings come over us and if there’s a willing lady cat nearby then we will enjoy ourselves no wonder there are so many cats in Knittingham  how many of them are you the father of?
I have no idea
Just think that if I walk down the street and see 6 cats they could all be your children Mary told him
And on the other hand, they could be the children of any  tom cat within 5 miles
Yes you are right said Mary it’s a pity that you can’t write and keep a diary so that you would know roughly how many female cats you may have impregnated in the last 6 months
Why, is that what you put in your diary, the cat asked her with a naughty expression in his eyes
You know perfectly well what I put in my diary

went to the dentist with a broken tooth

went to the chemist to buy a nail brush

Went in  coffee shop and had a cup of tea

struggle to the bus stop and onto the bus

crossed on the zebra crossing

came home and  burst into tears

Yes I do understand this,mewed Emile,lt is very difficult for you now with all the pain you suffer but you are very brave and you don’t complain a lot but when Stan comes home I shall tell him and ask him to buy you a beautiful silk scarf and a necklace from the Royal Academy gift shop like he used to do in Times Gone By.He must have forgotten lately

So he must , murmured Mary

What a very  lovely man Stanley is.

Yes but we haven’t seen him for a while ;has he gone on holiday?

Well that’s one way of describing at st. Mary . We never know whether he might be on his way home or  if there’s someone else  who has a prior claim on him

It puzzles all of us!

Soon the bulbs will burst out into flower
Whether I am living  or am dead
The sun will shine before and after showers

Life may be a minute or an hour
Remember what the  prophets ancient said
Still  the bulbs will burst out into flower

The cruel Assad in Syria has his power
No doubt he delights himself in bed
The sun will shine and then will come the showers

Donald Trump’s  bright face does not allure
Destroying truth so even Satan’s mad
Regardless bulbs will burst out into flower

Bibi builds his walls, says that’s the cure
Yet hang gliders from hills  might  hit his shed
The sun can shine   precisely as rain pours

Walls and wars with guns and gas ahead
Bombs will  break the boredom of the dead
Soon the bulbs will burst out into flower
The sun will shine  regardlesss , it’s not ours.

He lived to see his little boy start school
Even to beget another child
But child unborn, he’s snatched by  relapse cruel

The  lows and highs , the  treatment by new tools
Drive even saints  to  desperate states of mind
Yet he lived to see his little boy start school

Do we think our losses make us fools?
That we should keep ourselves in temper mild
When child unborn, he’s snatched by  relapse cruel?

In our minds emotions can fight duels
Till we ‘re caught between  our love and bile
How did his little boy  get on at school?

Give his widow  strength to   bear their child~
Her life is  hard   and her complexion pale
Her child unborn, her man lost,  panic rules.

We women cover up with long dark veils
To hide the hardships of our life’s travails
Toby’s   little boy has  started school
Another child is coming ,  love is cruel

From Counterpunch:

Hannah Arendt, an émigré from Nazi Germany.
“The result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth,” Arendt wrote in her classic volume The Origins of Totalitarianism, “is not that the lie will now be accepted as truth and truth be defamed as a lie, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world—and the category of truth versus falsehood is among the mental means to this end—is being destroyed.”

Once she was alive and seemed quite real
She  lived on earth as we do every day
But accidental death came from the spinning wheels

The secrets of that marriage long revealed
Men  write stories when they ought to pray
Once she was alive and seemed quite real

Vital virgin, starving,on the heel
She bore children, smiling as they played
But savage death came from too rapid wheels

Nibbling only  at her Royal meals
We  began to feel a grey dismay
Once she was alive and seemed quite real

As the layers of  her story peel
We only hope that someone, somewhere prayed
When  chased  and smashed up , death was  but a deal

Lord save teenage girls from  market place
Where they are captured  without love  or grace
Once she was alive and she was real
Till silent death came from the  spinning wheel

When we die we cannot fantasise
The body seems tranlucent  like a flower
We must confront the truth, we cannot lie

In strange times we daydream  and surmise
We float with butterflies through coloured hours
When we die,  what use is fantasy?

In the end our will is poor ally
We’re owned by forces other and their power
Oh, can I take the truth as stiff I lie?

Like red leaves from  the maple trees we fly
Undone by autumn wind and sudden showers
When we die we  need no fantasy

The good  imagined is not   in our minds
We babble like the infant in her tower
We choose the truth,  the  dead must  never lie

The choices once so strident  miss the hourera
The still small voice   oh hear  like Jeremiah
,We must admit the truth with open eye
God is not  quite dead nor elegaic

Cleveland Hills  on  the edge of cliffs we lay
In heather deep where bees   flew fast as flames
And the  wild, wild flowers and the butterflies at play
In  Cleveland Hills  on the edge of  cliffs we lay
If I could go back  would you come to stay
Where the scents’s  so  rich it pulls  love down again
Cleveland Hills  on the edge of  cliffs we lay
In heather deep,  in love we burn like flames

Why does the New Year start at the darkest  time of all?
When the stars are gleaming  more than the sun can  shine all day
And the heart lashed to the lost and loved  resents death’s wall
Why does the New Year start at the darkest  time of all
When the speedy Tees from High Force  frozen  falls
When I see in dreams   your  face as the  white flowers  down I lay.
Why does the New Year start at the darkest  time of all?
When the stars are gleaming  more than the sun can  shine these days

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/geoffrey-hill

Extract:

“Known as one of the greatest poets of his generation writing in English, and one of the most important poets of the 20th century, Geoffrey Hill lived a life dedicated to poetry and scholarship, morality and faith. He was born in 1932 in Worcestershire, England to a working-class family. He attended Oxford University, where his work was first published by the U.S. poet Donald Hall. These poems later collected in For the Unfallen: Poems 1952-1958 marked an astonishing debut. In dense poems of gnarled syntax and astonishing rhetorical power, Hill planted the seeds of style and concern that he cultivated over his long career. Hill’s work is noted for its seriousness, its high moral tone, extreme allusiveness and dedication to history, theology, and philosophy. In early collections such as King Log (1968) and Mercian Hymns (1971), Hill sought “to convey extreme emotions by opposing the restraint of established form to the violence of his insight or judgment,” according to New York Review of Books critic Irvin Ehrenpreis. “He deals with violent public events… Appalled by the moral discontinuities of human behavior, he is also shaken by his own response to them, which mingles revulsion with fascination.””