I know that's how death will come,
Suddenly flying into another orbit when I am photographing flowers
It's not a gentle transition.
No-one will know where I've gone.
One step wrong and I'm off the high wire
And plunging into the no safety net.
Flying for a while
Jumping into hyperspace,spinning electrons
Startle my wide eyes.
Transiting the new black sun
I'm on a double gold helix,
Spider on her web,
Knitting furiously
Into the future heaven on gossamer wings.
Butterfly goodbye,
I'm off to see the stars.
And the black holes.
No one will come with me.
I'm shaking off,evaporating into mist.
I'm a flying saucer on a circus mission.
I can't say no to a new invitation.
Make it fast and break with tradition.
Time is passing smoothly till that break In the music,
I've been transmuted into a different key
someone else will play me on their violin
I'm a tune, I'm a thought, I'm a whisper in your vision.
Goodbye,darling.
I'm under orders Ready to leave for my performance
On the electric carpet.
Death dancing to a tune on a violoncello,
Arpeggionne sonata
I'm playing your words upside down
In a new foreign translation,
Accompanied by solo artists,ice cracking
I'm going in.
It's too sudden.
I'm flying.
Spinning faster to amuse the clowns,
too many ups and no downs.
I'm going right out of orbit
I've broken the pull of gravity,
And fly with pure equanimity
Into my future life,
I'm off at some moment
An instant,a crack,a loud smack
That was me passing
v
Category: emotion
Then I shall upend causality
The image was made by Katherine
When true love’s gone and doom hangs overhead
When life runs like a sewer to the sea
Then shall I take new lovers to my bed.
And with their carnal touch consoled be?
When my love lies and breaks my woman’s heart
. When life seems grey and rocks bestrew my path
. Then, shall I my life of evil start
And on the world shall I bestow my wrath?
When true loves lie and wreck all loyalty.
When puzzlement makes all the world seem mad.
Then I shall upend causality
And let myself do deeds which make folk glad.
When puzzlement makes all the world seem mad.
Then I shall upend causality
And let myself do deeds which make folk glad.
For I have love’s own child inside my soul
I shall care for her until she is grown
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Underground
On a whim I went to Downing Street
They charged me fifty pounds for both my feet
Then no-one anwered when I rang the bell
I looked in through a hole, the penny fell
I claim I saw the tide was coming in
Riding high with whales, oh they were thin
What next , a golden galaxy implodes
Stars shoot out like sparks from other worlds
Jonah rode a whale to London Town
Still in shock, he did not hear a sound
All tongues will dry until we see the flames
The burning bush, the prophecy, the Name
For Sophocles I spent a million pounds
My credit card’s still bouncing underground
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Love will need no trick
In my despair I felt that I was stuck
Paralysed by grief and guilt I failed
By the end I had tried every trick
From prayer unthought to deeps of logic black
My life, my engine ,juddered off the rails
I hated God and of “his” Church was sick
Starving and alone I was in shock
The death of one I loved had made me frail
By the end I had tried every trick
I felt Love’s arms around me, death was blocked
I knew this goodness, why else would I wail?
I thought I hated God but Love had struck
Warm and golden light that did me hold
Where are you now when Evil has grown bold?
Kind despair that made me long time sit
By the end I learned Love needs no trick
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THE MEMORY LASTS
midsummer days evoke the trancelike past
where children played in joyous, daisied fields
with buttercups so bright the memory lasts
a freedom that our conscious growth will steal.
those stones and leaves and many coloured flowers
were gathered into images that glow
yet later we forget those treasured hours
when for a while we lived in life’s deep flow
we did not look and see,but felt at one
we lived as did the birds high in the trees
now we write , experiencing has gone
we cannot live like flowers filled with bright bees
to lose ourselves in nature is a joy
which to our adult selves we must restore
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A crack, a loud smack
I know that's how death will come,
Suddenly flying into another orbit when I am photographing flowers
It's not a gentle transition.
No-one will know where I've gone.
One step wrong and I'm off the high wire
And plunging into the no safety net.
Flying for a while
Jumping into hyperspace,spinning electrons
Startle my wide eyes.
Transiting the new black sun
I'm on a double gold helix,
Spider on her web,
Knitting furiously
Into the future heaven on gossamer wings.
Butterfly goodbye,
I'm off to see the stars.
And the black holes.
No one will come with me.
I'm shaking off,evaporating into mist.
I'm a flying saucer on a circus mission.
I can't say no to a new invitation.
Make it fast and break with tradition.
Time is passing smoothly till that break In the music,
I've been transmuted into a different key
someone else will play me on their violin
I'm a tune, I'm a thought, I'm a whisper in your vision.
Goodbye,darling.
I'm under orders Ready to leave for my performance
On the electric carpet.
Death dancing to a tune on a violoncello,
Arpeggionne sonata
I'm playing your words upside down
In a new foreign translation,
Accompanied by solo artists,ice cracking
I'm going in.
It's too sudden.
I'm flying.
Spinning faster to amuse the clowns,
too many ups and no downs.
I'm going right out of orbit
I've broken the pull of gravity,
And fly with pure equanimity
Into my future life,
I'm off at some moment
An instant,a crack,a loud smack
That was me passing
v
Share this:
Dream like memories
Hollyhocks,delphinium and phlox
Foxgloves,cat mint, nettles,near by docks
The blind man breathed in air full of wild scent
His daughted named the colours now absent
High up on the Kentish cliffs we sat
Capel-le -Ferne I found it on a map
We listened to this girl, we did not speak
Absorbing by our senses,proud and meek
Now I recollect the details very well
In those dream like memories I dwell
Snapdragons growing just beside my chair
I smell the scent as if I were still there
I may be blinded by the tears of loss
But I remember, love, our happiness
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Stitches in my face
On my face you see the surgeon’s scar
You see the holes where stitches were put in.
Above my eye, blue bruises decorate
And yet the work is sacred, is no sin.
The blood hung from my jaw, its skin a bag stitches connected my new face
Jagged stitches joined up my new face
My eyes were black as ink, what have they done?
Where is that fine embroidery, where the lace?
25 injections were my fate.
To let the surgeon do his kindly work.
I’d rather be a postman or a nun
And yet to take the cancer knives must hurt.
Mother,father where are you, I sigh?
Oh brother sister husband, down I lie.
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Marbles
Rolling marbles made of coloured glass
Skipping rope and learning ancient rhymes
Filling inkwells , polishing the brass
With dip-in pens we wrote upon the lines
Licking out the bowl where cakes were mixed
Running wild with brothers and their friends
Wonder at those fireworks Daddy fixed
Catherine wheels rotating, transcendent
Mother smiling in her flowery dress
Little rocking chairs where we placed dolls
Daddy saying,Good night and God Bless
Teddies with no fur left, ask our Paul
Little sisters, brothers’ cricket balls
Hot coal fires where kettles used to boil
Old gas cookers, scabbed knees from our falls
Fuses blowing, making light bulbs fail
In our bed , we whispered little tales
In the morning feeling warm and dazed
Love was in the air, the baby wailed
Dad so pleased with Mother’s happy face
I see the cobblestones all hot with sun
The Street Party , the Coronation
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Love will need no trick
In my despair I felt that I was stuck
Paralysed by grief and guilt I failed
By the end I had tried every trick
From prayer unthought to deeps of logic black
My life, my engine ,juddered off the rails
I hated God and of “his” Church was sick
Starving and alone I was in shock
The death of one I loved had made me frail
By the end I had tried every trick
I felt Love’s arms around me, death was blocked
I knew this goodness, why else would I wail?
I thought I hated God but Love had struck
Warm and golden light that did me hold
Where are you now when Evil has grown bold?
Kind despair that made me long time sit
By the end I learned Love needs no trick
Share this:
A crack, a loud smack
I know that's how death will come,
Suddenly flying into another orbit when I am photographing flowers
It's not a gentle transition.
No-one will know where I've gone.
One step wrong and I'm off the high wire
And plunging into the no safety net.
Flying for a while
Jumping into hyperspace,spinning electrons
Startle my wide eyes.
Transiting the new black sun
I'm on a double gold helix,
Spider on her web,
Knitting furiously
Into the future heaven on gossamer wings.
Butterfly goodbye,
I'm off to see the stars.
And the black holes.
No one will come with me.
I'm shaking off,evaporating into mist.
I'm a flying saucer on a circus mission.
I can't say no to a new invitation.
Make it fast and break with tradition.
Time is passing smoothly till that break In the music,
I've been transmuted into a different key
someone else will play me on their violin
I'm a tune, I'm a thought, I'm a whisper in your vision.
Goodbye,darling.
I'm under orders Ready to leave for my performance
On the electric carpet.
Death dancing to a tune on a violoncello,
Arpeggionne sonata
I'm playing your words upside down
In a new foreign translation,
Accompanied by solo artists,ice cracking
I'm going in.
It's too sudden.
I'm flying.
Spinning faster to amuse the clowns,
too many ups and no downs.
I'm going right out of orbit
I've broken the pull of gravity,
And fly with pure equanimity
Into my future life,
I'm off at some moment
An instant,a crack,a loud smack
That was me passing
v
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The gift of sight, fine flowers, blue butterflies
In my hedge of beech mixed into yew
The wrens have nested,now they learn to fly
I felt my heart grow lighter at this view
When the heart is lifted,that’s a clue
That symbols of new life are coming by
From my hedge of beech mixed into yew
Keeping vision clear,look out and bow
What lives now must shrink and one day die
I felt my heart ache taking such a view
With many gifts we humans are endowed
The gift of sight, fine flowers, blue butterflies
By my hedge of beech mixed into yew
The gift of tongues, creation of the new
From sweet Joan Baez to little babies’ cries
I felt my heart swell in my breast anew
Conception, growth,maturity,goodbye
Like the flying star we shall go far
By my hedge of beech mixed into yew
I felt my heart beat stronger than I knew
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A little peace
One damaged cell divides until it kills.
For in the end we pay the rich man’s bills.
The air polluted ravages and maims
Now it’s cruelly late to curse and blame
Oh sister how we played with our dolls’ prams
In our industrial town there were no lambs.
No sheep could safely graze in smokey streets.
No lark would rise amazed, the dawn to greet.
For you my sister breathed in that bad air
We hear the tread, the foot steps on the stair.
So patient still, I wish that you would shout.
From your eye I see one tear fall out.
My single sister I can see your pain
Your lips are dry you cough and cough again.
Your mouth is hurting so you cannot eat.
And on the telephone you barely speak
In the world some million others groan
Yes we’re fragile, merely flesh and bone
Even so the tears run in my sleep.
Into my face these tears will slowly seep.
I didn’t grasp at first that she would die
And leave me here alone to curse and cry
Hold me in your arms my kindly friends.
From your touch a little peace descends
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Please teach me how to cry
Daddy, how we missed you when you died
I had not been told when I was five
Come back,Daddy,miss your smiling eyes
We were told that we must never cry
When the cancer took your earthly life
Daddy, how you suffered ,then you died
When you wanted company, I tried
I was too articulate to thrive
Come back,Daddy,miss my Daddy’s eyes
By the flower beds, you wanted a guide
You wanted me to talk.I really tried.
Daddy we fell down a black hole, why d’y die?
You slept all alone, the pain arrived
We slept with our mammy, on your side
Come back,Daddy, don’t you miss my eyes?
I always hum like you did though I’m shy
You are singing through me, close and wise
Daddy, we still miss you and your pride
Come back,Daddy, teach me how to cry.
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Dream like memories
Hollyhocks,delphinium and phlox
Foxgloves,cat mint, nettles,near by docks
The blind man breathed in air full of wild scent
His daughted named the colours now absent
High up on the Kentish cliffs we sat
Capel-le -Ferne I found it on a map
We listened to this girl, we did not speak
Absorbing by our senses,proud and meek
Now I recollect the details very well
In those dream like memories I dwell
Snapdragons growing just beside my chair
I smell the scent as if I were still there
I may be blinded by the tears of loss
But I remember, love, our happiness
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Some shelled shore
Walking to the bus stop from our door
We fell into a subtle harmony
Like little children dawdling on the shore
No haste, no chiding, wanting nothing more
Like swimming in a balmy pale blue sea
Or walking to the bus stop from our door
Who is known and which one is the knower?
What is here and what is yet to be
For little children dawdling on the shore?
Setting aspirations ever lower
No competing, rush nor victory
Just walking to the bus stop from our door
Though human who gave us creative power?
Who has loved and who evoked in me
The feel of dawdling on the sea, the shore?
Who hears the sorrow, plangent , of the sea
Where earth and stars reflect so rhythmically
Walking with you touching nevermore
Oh, that I were with you on some shelled shore
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No defeat
Letting go of all my self defence
As if I might touch all of you at once
I opened up my body to the winds
And covered you by lying skin to skin
In the cradle of my being held
Like an infant needing mother’s aid
I did not move to break the chysallis
Both of us were melting in that space
Whose the hand and whose the mind that work
Metaphors may guide and also hurt
Remorseless is the process that goes on
Until the new forms break this one to one
At last the work is done, the task complete
Dead or living, this is no defeat
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Love will need no trick
In my despair I felt that I was stuck
Paralysed by grief and guilt I failed
By the end I had tried every trick
From prayer unthought to deeps of logic black
My life, my engine ,juddered off the rails
I hated God and of “his” Church was sick
Starving and alone I was in shock
The death of one I loved had made me frail
By the end I had tried every trick
I felt Love’s arms around me, death was blocked
I knew this goodness, why else would I wail?
I thought I hated God but Love had struck
Warm and golden light that did me hold
Where are you now when Evil has grown bold?
Kind despair that made me long time sit
By the end I learned Love needs no trick
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Bill,Bill,my mother’s dad
Bill.Bill.my mother’s dad
Down the coal mine he did dig
When he was but a young lad
He was never very big
He spoke in the old dialect
He had a dog, a pipe, no cig
Silent,smiling, starving wrecked
He sent kids to a soup kitchen
Learned to read, but knew few facts
Went to London,saw Big Ben
Still angry from the General Strike
Aye,he were a silent man
He walked at night, he had no bike
To the coal mine with his cat
The cat sat waiting till first light
Then they walked, he did head maths
His wife had died, the son was born
When he got home, he had a bath
His father worked in fields of corn
Peasants on the Chesire farms
The pay was poor, were up at dawn
He himself were on good terms
With his neighbours, Irish, torn
He went to Mass,so Latin learned
My mum was th’eldest of those born
She had me,my own dad died
She went mad, she was forlorn
Lost her mother, then she tried
To help her Dad with all her heart
Never wept and never cried
Then she made a different start
Met my dad and married late
So I am here with my own charts
Is it destiny or fate
Why am I down here, d’you ken?
I see you grandad, is it late?
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Love will need no trick
In my despair I felt that I was stuck
Paralysed by grief and guilt I failed
By the end I had tried every trick
From prayer unthought to deeps of logic black
My life, my engine ,juddered off the rails
I hated God and of “his” Church was sick
Starving and alone I was in shock
The death of one I loved had made me frail
By the end I had tried every trick
I felt Love’s arms around me, death was blocked
I knew this goodness, why else would I wail?
I thought I hated God but Love had struck
Warm and golden light that did me hold
Where are you now when Evil has grown bold?
Kind despair that made me long time sit
By the end I learned Love needs no trick
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The walking frame and the smile
I saw you struggling with your walking frame
Guessed that you must suffer too much pain
I smiled because you caught my sidewards glance
Then your face too by smiling was enhanced
So often older people are ignored
Lost and lonely hidden at the core
Once this man fought in a major war
I hope by some fine friend he was restored
I saw him disappearing down the road
His posture more erect, his back less bowed
And in my heart I felt the smiling too
Enchanted by the essence , by the cue.
I got on a bus, ignored my phone,
Smiling still I pushed the door key home
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The walking frame and the smile
I saw you struggling with your walking frame
Guessed that you must suffer too much pain
I smiled because you caught my sidewards glance
Then your face too by smiling was enhanced
So often older people are ignored
Lost and lonely hidden at the core
Once this man fought in a major war
I hope by some fine friend he was restored
I saw him disappearing down the road
His posture more erect, his back less bowed
And in my heart I felt the smiling too
Enchanted by the essence , by the cue.
I got on a bus, ignored my phone,
Smiling still I pushed the door key home
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When after death I lie deep in the earth
O happy worm that of my flesh might eat
When after death I lie in deep in the earth
My bosom,hands and eyes become your meat
You have no sun as you enjoy your feast
And none is chosen as we were at birth
O happy worm that of my flesh might eat
All of us are equal in defeat
None are high or low , what are we worth?
My brain,my hands,my eyes become worms’ meat
In the soil, we rest in comfort sweet
Let us all be blessed,God make no curse
You made the happy worms who will us eat
O remember the deep ash from Auschwitz’ heat
The little children killed without Kaddish
Those hearts ,those hands, those eyes no worm could eat
,
Why should we be satisfied by wish
When people burn or starve beside our dish
O Godly worm that of my flesh might eat
Let my very self become your meat
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And on the world shall I bestow my wrath?
When true love’s gone and doom hangs over head
When life runs like a river to the sea
Then shall I take new lovers to my bed.
And with their carnal touch consoled be?
When life runs like a river to the sea
Then shall I take new lovers to my bed.
And with their carnal touch consoled be?
When my love lies and breaks my little heart
. When life seems grey and rocks bestrew my path
. Then, shall I my life of evil start
And on the world shall I bestow my wrath?
When true loves lie and wreck all loyalty.
When puzzlement makes all the world seem mad.
Then I shall upend causality
And let myself do deeds which make me glad.
When puzzlement makes all the world seem mad.
Then I shall upend causality
And let myself do deeds which make me glad.
For I have love’s own child inside my soul
And I shall tend her till at last she’s whole
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I remember everything
I can see you in our house
In the kitchen, on the stairs
I see you playing in the street
And on your rocking chair.
I see you in Saint Patrick’s church
Were we went on Saturday
And when you were in hospital
You held your beads and prayed.
You had to use your fingertips
Before I bought the beads
I half wish I had died with you
It hurts inside, I bleed
I have got a photograph
It’s us three girls and Mam
Now you’ve gone away with them
My sister,oh my lamb
My Mother and my Father
my sisters and one boy
I remember Christmas Day
Happy with our toys
One by one the people go
Till one is left alone
I remember everything
It’s written in my bones
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Coming in my direction
I’m waiting for it to hit me.
It’s far away but it’s coming
It’s a dagger with a sharp point
Thrown by some errand angel
It’s a flat pebble thrown by a fisherman
It’s a stiletto heel broken off someone’s shoe
It’s flying through the air and its destiny is my heart.
When it hits me….. the shock will be unmeasurable.
Don’t go don’t go I can’t believe you’re going to go.
Now they say you’ve gone but it was only in a text message there was no phone call.
Someone far away fired a shot
The bullet’s not found me yet but it’s got all the technology needed to find it’s true destination
So I’m like a dead Man walking
It must have hit me already but I haven’t felt it yet but one day this numbness will wear off
You see I’m dead already but my legs keep moving my hands still floating in the air
Still breathing and then the slow collapse
It was only a few minutes but it seems like hours,.
Then I’ll be with her again
I knew she would die but why did she have to shoot me right at the end like that?
The world itself has cracks across
Infinite the drop between one step and the next.
Is it better not to look down?
We can’t control everything.
There’s a crack,a smack a loud thwack.
It was just me passing
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The river in flood
Cold from storming rain and full of mud
The river Lea in winter turns to flood
Across the Abbey Meadows rings the bell
Brings back the ghosts, bring back the holy spell
King Harald lost his crown and all his land
The Norman Vikings, men with bloody hands
Share this:
Dream like memories
Hollyhocks,delphinium and phlox
Foxgloves,cat mint, nettles,near by docks
The blind man breathed in air full of wild scent
His daughted named the colours now absent
High up on the Kentish cliffs we sat
Capel-le -Ferne I found it on a map
We listened to this girl, we did not speak
Absorbing by our senses,proud and meek
Now I recollect the details very well
In those dream like memories I dwell
Snapdragons growing just beside my chair
I smell the scent as if I were still there
I may be blinded by the tears of loss
But I remember, love, our happiness
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The dreams, the metaphors of the mind
I wish we were in Alston steep and fine
The Pennines all around, the lakes nearby.
We walked the Pennine way in our own time.
Your heart was in the hills, to teesdale chained.
You didn’t like the urban sprawl, the blight
I wish we were in Alston now and then
The time has passed we find our memories fade.
I miss you,miss you, miss you, I can’t lie
I wish that we were near high force, that air.
And our;United Kingdom’s in decay.
We saw an eagle but it did not fly
0h every breath we took was like a prayer.
I find it hard to walk without a crutch
I can see but I can’t feel your touch
You would hardly know me now I sigh
I wish you were in Alston by my side.
The dreams, the symbols memories combine.
This is how you’re with me for all time
I am very proud because I’ve tried
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We call it love
I run my fingers tentatively down your cheek,
asking you a question
with my eyes.
looking at each other,
you touch me too.
This is my skin
my boundary.
Yours is thicker,
like rubber.
I run my fingers down your chin.
what is this little bone?
I like it.
I like your skin
I like your bones.
I like you.
you please me.
you are tasty.
I like your taste,
your skin,your eyelids.
I like your eye here,
and your other eye .
Nice one!
I like the hair on your head.
May I touch your hair?
do you like hair?
Hair makes me laugh.
I have a fondness for laughing.
I love to laugh.
I enjoy laughter
I love your laughter.
If not, smiling is good also.
Or a gleam in the eyes,
showing the inside smile,
the smiling heart.
I like your inside,
Outside
and possibly
your backside.
your upside and your downside.
your side sides.
I snuggle you all around with soft wool.
I knit you into my scarf.
I’ll have to wear you round my neck now!
How unusual
How flexible.
How charming.
How alarming
How creative
How interesting.
What an idea!
what a notion
but you are too big for me to knit
So I’ll just touch your hand
with my fingers.
and you touch my hand
with your fingers.
What good hands we have
with such fingers.
fingers are for touch.
fingers are keen to touch.
I like touch.
what would we do
without fingers?
I like your skin.
skin is good
We love skin
We love.
I want skin to be ours
and yours
is mine
and mine
is yours
where is the edge of the world?
skin has no end
it’s infinity
au naturel.
what order!
what design!
What wonder.
what awe.
where is the world’s skin?
tenderly we touch the world
as the world embraces us.
We call it love.
Love.
We call it love
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The river in flood
Cold from storming rain and full of mud
The river Lea in winter turns to flood
Across the Abbey Meadows rings the bell
Brings back the ghosts, bring back the holy spell
King Harald lost his crown and all his land
The Norman Vikings, men with bloody hands
How my heart sings 