How like a monster is my fear of pain Expanding to fill all my heart and mind Swelling like a giant sponge left in rain, This fear begets new feelings more unkind. For humans beings chased by lions fierce, Fear gives us the strength to dash away. But when by inner turmoil we are pierced We cannot run yet need not be its prey. Most strange ,we need to do what we most fear; Walk towards the pain with curious calm. As else we may be maddened like King Lear With no Cordelia to bring us balm. To feel in proper ratio to our pain. We need perception,grace and all their gains.
Category: sonnet
Almost good
The last time that he fell he broke our lamp;
The lamp which we had bought on honeymoon
I often sketched it, to my brain it clamped
Enduring sleepless nights in cardiac room.
The canula had torn my vein unseen.
I never knew my sheets filled up with blood;
Saturated by the god,morphine;
Had I died, such end felt almost good
Though why go to such lengths to get a high?
A paralysing pain ran down my neck.
I can rise just staring at the sky.
Without enduring such a savage wreck
The lamp is broken,shade propped up by wall
A painful memory of his fatal fall.
The lamp reminds me of his humorous love
Now my bony hands wear his dear gloves
The eye is not a camera
The eye is not a camera taking shots
Our mind affects the aspect we perceive
And what it feels important it allots
Gives grace or hatred ,causes us to grieve
. When we are afraid ,we see the worst
We see disgrace or ruin as our fate
As if our self for horror has a thirst
So all the little details we collate
Yet when we love we see before us joy
The flowers sing, the birds dance in the air
We see no evil nor with hatred toy
All aspects of our world appear more fair.
We see not what is there,we see our self
To learn ,we must employ our own mind’s wealth
That in this world there is an empty space,

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Underneath the weight of knowledge learned For a moment, we may often ask That in this world there is an empty space, I feel inert like marble on a beach |
What God endowed the owl with such excess
The owl can see with wide and narrow view
Focuses both poets and artists knew.
The broad sweep on the canvas makes a place
Where details and designs can have their space.
What God endowed the owl with such excess;
When all her progeny enjoy such bliss?
I think, where is the snake with frightening hiss?
What startling accident created this?
Eagles,hawks and owls must kill to eat.
No blandishments nor kindness make them sweet.
What God could make an Eden this deceit;
Where lambs are snatched up while their mothers bleat
So God himself destroys to fill his leisure;
Such fearsome revelations show his measure.
…
No woman
No woman ever can be what he dreams Nor can they give comfort,not a goad Yet every night he plots and thinks and schemes. And rarely does he ever go abroad. No food he eats will satisfy his tongue. The best wine is as naught to mother’s milk. He grumbles and will not admit to wrong. I‘ve known more men than him of this same ilk. No bed can be the right one for his sleep. No sheets and pillows suit his wary skin. He often has made gentle maidens weep Crying out they’re too fat or boney thin.’ Beware the man who never can adapt For in own lone wishes he is trapped
As if my heart’s been stung by monstrous bees
I wish to live despite my love has died
And I have nothing but a cat to feed and stroke.
In memory, my love will long abide
Though as I write I feel my spring has broke.
My grammar and my spelling are perverse
I used to make religion out of these.
But now I feel that life is getting worse.
As if my heart’s been stung by monstrous bees
In such a state my words may get confused
My sentences are senseless as they’re writ
And as for syntax, it is now abused
As round this room the ghosts of lovers flit.
My grammar is not perfect yet it be
Sad ,I can say just the same of me
I will taste divine
Already it is minced and lies estranged
My enemies insult me with their lies
And my last will and testament is made.
An onion and a carrot chopped up fine,
Saute with these my heart till all are gold
With herbs and spices, I will taste divine
A mashed potato will a rooftop mould.
Do not forget my blood to use as sauce
Though now it’s cold, with garlic make it boil.
For what is gravy but the blood of choice
With sliced onion in ethereal olive oil?
O foes and devils eat me and you’ll be
Transformed into this self, your enemy
So you are gone
For that phantasm conjured in your mind
For onto me you brought down from above
A torment bitter and sharp words unkind
.Used to friendship from within your books
Irritation grew the more you looked
You threw your poisoned arrows at my heel.
What once you loved then you began to hate
If not ideal ,intolerable I must be
And then you cursed me with this sorry fate
Our child was born and him you’ll never see.
Premature and born in desert grey.
I carried him alone from death’s dark way.
The Fall spread across the world
When you struck me,I vibrated like a kettle drum
then as smaller percussions and repercussions
echoing from all the glassy surfaces
creating a balletic geometry of sound tracks
in space and time.
When you knocked me down,
I fell against her and her and her;
we were like a row of skittles
and we all went down with the lifeboat;
the infinite chain of being is.
When you hit me,the Fall spread across the world
Now there is no Vertical
All is undivine and graceless.
By the Rod it’s ruled
When you left me,I left myself,the world,the rocks,dry land
I weighed down sank to the ocean bed
with coral eyes
gazing.
When you struck my mind
I became an instrument of a foreign power
Singing a song I didn’t kmow.
When the glass was smashed
the splinters flew into all our hearts.
You didn’t know what we couldn’t see.
I lay on barren ground and gave birth
To my own Creator in the desert.
Butterflies can light upon a rose

Butterflies can light upon a rose
And sparrows miss the prickly holly leaf
So thorns deter most larger, useless foes
Bring safety to small birds instead of grief
The butterfly is symbol of the power
That weakness has in entering Sacred ground.
A butterfly can fly through hail stormed bowers
Their wings send waves across the world by sound.
A cat too has its claws as well as fur
Yet cats do have a a modicum of choice.
For those of us for whom they have a care
Claws are held ; miaows or purrs are voiced.
Am I a holly tree or fragrant rose?
Am I the cat who may unsheath her claws?
Trying to glimpse another through their veil.
I embraced the ambiguity like a bride
Who fears disclosing that her face is fake
And while we’re on the subject, I take pride
In stealing water colours from the lake
Ambiguous in intentions we don’t know
We send out signals full of first class news
If this rebounds an artist might then show
Our vision rests upon our point of view
Seventeen types of clarity are mine
Fifteen from my mind and two from pride
From this glass I make a view divine
Though Sunday someone said they thought I lied.
Ambiguously ,we hover by the scales
Trying to glimpse another through their veil.
But now it is what McCall Smith calls “late”
Sometimes when bereft I’d love a snail
Though it might wet my bed with silvery trails
Would snails be lonely living in my house?
Shall I be but fit to love some louse?
I hugged a rowan tree and now it’s dead
The council said they’ll give me oak instead
It stood upon the pavement by the gate
But now it is what McCall Smith calls “late”
I wonder if self massage is the thing
Some perfumed lotion stolen on the wing.
I stroked my arms with Cream E45
Now they say I’m not allowed to drive!
I was sad but now I am at peace
All I needed was a plate of eggs and grease.
We feel our love absurd
Art though my own and may I now love thee?
Art though my own and shall I thy wife be?
As waiting long lays waste to love and joy
Art though mine, or with me do’st thou toy?
O treat me not like stuff disposable
O treat me not as one intolerable.
For if thou touch then thou hast made a claim.
And from the heart, to lose is to be maimed.
For women are not like to sheep or goats
We have hearts to feel what thou hast wrought
And if thou come to steal then thou’rt a thief.
One of many , causing women grief.
Do not touch with hand or with sweet words
For if thou lie, we feel our love absurd
The cheque book
I got a cheque book after you had died
With only my name printed on the page
I lost this new one even though I tried
To keep apart from life, my grief and rage .
I do not like that statements come to me
They emphasis what I’d like to forget
There is no “us,” it’s sadly” I “not “we”
These little signs, emotions sad beget
Though I hate arithmetic and rules
I always cooked the finance and the meal
You didn’t want to suffer as at school
Mostly you left me to do these deals
I rarely use a paper cheque today
I find impersonal,nameless ways to pay
How like a dream
How like a dream this world appears to me
My mind unfocussed spreads itself about..
No details, just an outline I can see.
And this vague dimness fills my mind with doubt.
The early sun made joy rise in my heart
As I looked out upon the gardens gold.
Of nature and each season we’re a part.
As with patience we let all our self unfold.
We are as nothing in the vast space of this sky
Where stars send light from deeps of long ago.
And yet despite my nightmares I shall try
As fears make fences if we don’t say “No.”
We have to make our dreams a home on earth;
From there creative thoughts are given birth
Then we shall learn the limits of our will
When soft winds blow and air strokes our bare skin.
When days are long like melodies of youth,
when light wakes up the soul from out her sin
Then shall we know when this sweet life is truth?
When flowers droop and leaves are dried and brown;
When water’s short and all plants are forlorn’
Then do not meet disaster with a frown,
For out of heartfelt sorrow new life’s born.
When winter’s here and all is quiet and still
And nothing seems to move or grow or speak
Then we shall learn the limits of our will
for through the soil the first green shoots will break.
For seasons change and actors come and go.
Yet through such changes, life is what we know
Can we find the space between the words?
How like a prison is this cubicle
So small I’m like a fish inside a net
My heart beats with a rhythm unmusical
As with sharp terror, I am now beset.
–
We humans were not made to be en-walled
Our ancestors were gatherers in the woods.
Now industry demands freedom be stalled
For production and consumption of their goods.
And executives in advertising work
In offices where they combine their words
Religiously like members of the Kirk
Yet envying the freedom of wild birds.
Can we be ourselves in such a world?
Can we find the space between the words?
The uncanny is a space which I avoid
The uncanny is a space which I avoid
I do not wish to meet with spirits vile.
Though with a man ,it’s true that I have toyed.
I dropped them all and sane was I the while.
Yet when I met your eyes so dark and strange
A force more strong than my own pulled me in.
A premonition that my life would change,
Before I knew your double,your dark twin.
In dreams and in my nightmares he will come
To capture me and take me to his land.
I do not know what choice to make of man
Nor how to count infinity by hand
The double is an augury of death
Yet in this space uncanny is a path
If I no longer love you
And quickly fill your space with a new man
Then perhaps my claiming love was but a lie
And I can fill you place with anyone.
When death pulls them away to darker shores?
Yet we will love each one despite the cost.
And when we weep, is this not what life’s for?
A pattern from the infant to the sage
So joy and pain and joy and pain remain.
Who knows what is inscribed on the page?
Will open up to show us Heaven’s door
And, absent kindness, nothing has much worth
And yet the chains which bind me can’t be seen.
But my greed and envy is indubitable
I am dumb and cruel and also very mean.
My cubicle’d be mansion to the poor.
Yet to me it ‘s small for I am used to space.
No doubt my wealth has made many feel sour…
But do not envy me for I’m disgraced.
No longer am I free in heart and soul.
I’m trapped and it is by my own hand.
i am fractured ,I am broken I’m not whole.
I live and yet I nothing understand.
Live benignly for we live but once on earth
And, absent kindness, nothing has much worth
The memory lasts
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midsummer days evoke entrancing pasts,
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 we did not look from faraway, but felt at one to lose ourselves in nature is a joy |
I gave my heart away
I gave my heart away to a false love
By his strange stories ,I had been beguiled.
He whispered such sweet music like a dove.
He charmed me with his words and with his smiles.
I was a fool and so I paid the price
For I was hoping for real love to come.
But now I know desire made me unwise
He needed power, his love was but a sham.
We must beware when for such love we seek
We must see clearly or we’ll love a ghost.
We must not assent when we’re feeling weak.
For then mirages manifest the most.
Remember, too ,that love is called a game.
And do not answer when they call your name
Images that first alarm the mind
A painting by Paul Klee connected us
I’d never seen the abstract use of space
I felt myself more open and unearthed
All beings floating in this spaceless gaze
Perhaps they float like we did in the womb
They pass across like fish pass in the sea
The more ,I looked the more it touched my depths
And knew this was a place where I could be.
In our life of feeling ,seeing true
Matters more than IQ or high speed
It’s judgment,taste ,and feeling all refined;
Perception and response to others’ need
So images that at first alarm the mind
Transform our souls till we are humankind
The weight of knowledge learned
Underneath the weight of knowledge learned
I seem to be reduced and paralysed
For I had thought the painful loss would turn
And fill me with his love unpetrified.
For a moment, we may often ask
When sudden shock invades the unarmed heart.
But “give me years” makes tangible the task
For some , the mourning ends before it starts
That in this world there is an empty space,
Never to be filled but lived beside
Makes some feel angry, and afflicted by disgrace
Makes the themes of grief and pain elide.
I feel inert like marble on a beach.
Light and absence will my sad heart breach..
Imprisoned spirits
How like a prison is my cubicle;
A prison,a trap, a cell,a place of fear.
For humans,this is truth indubitable;
We need to roam ,to see,to smell,to hear.
Yet in the bureaucrat realm , we must observe,
The rules laid down by generations gone.
And from their ancient code ,we cannot swerve.
Even if by rules we are undone.
Did Archimedes sail boats in his bath?
Did Moses fear to see the burning bush?
Did Einstein follow someone’s else’s path?
Did Socrates give voice to utter trash?
Imprisoned spirits are to revolution called.
Unless by Ariel they would be mauled.
IF THIS BE LOVE
If this be love,then let me have your hate.
If you be true then let me hear your lies.
For this, my heart, your message comes too late.
For now my need is for the thoughtful wise.
If this be marriage,let me have divorce.
If this be holy, hasten I to hell..
For love comes in its time without such force.
And of its message ẃho am I to tell?
If this be love,then let me dwell alone.
If this be love, I will be forever chaste.
Your love is like a bomb. that breaks my bones
A love that lays your world and mine to waste
.
Love can shake us to our inner core.
Hence of your love I wish to hear no more
Artificial
Diagonal streams now stripe the windowpane
And in them, tiny insects drown and die.
Unexpected ,sudden rain has come.
Those escape who have the wings to fly.
No angels were seen peering at my room
No doubt they have their Sunday wings to press.
No camera ,even with psychotic zoom,
Can catch an angel while she is undressed.
Now the rain has dried and all is sweet
I tend to houseplants standing by the door.
By good luck these houseplants never bleep.
Only in the real world do they flower.
Bleeps and pings are not a natural sound.
But to the artificial we will bound.
Till the logic’s heard
This form of poetry is beloved of me.
As Shakespeare wrote so I like writing too.
Free verse I like but with this, I can see.
And as I wrote thus, well my writing grew.
Thus and hence in mathematic’s shared
Are also used in sonnets when I write.
They make connections till the logic’s heard
The logic of the heart makes love feel right.
To imitate the poets who’re well renowned
Is impudent yet I refuse to stop.
I do not ask to get a golden crown
Such satisfaction I get from my work.
If you think I’m conceited you are blind
I’m humbled by the treasures of the mind
Now it turns as rapid as dismay
The sky is now pale lilac edged with dark
The trees where small birds sleep are almost black
A mystic may enjoy a vivid spark
Through having senses other mortals lack.
The sky’s more pale than it is darker grey
I see a pink, a blue in clarity
Now it turns as rapid as dismay
Until devoid of such variety.
And darker still ,in grey it edges down
Until it’s less distinct from those large trees.
But with my words to keep me from a frown
Darkness comes and so my words must cease.
A mirror to the outer world in verse
May save us all from wintering with a curse.
Who thinks of death as weakness, is a liar
The sun sinks but it burns like a great fire;
All the sky’s aflame with fierce intent;
Who thinks of death as weakness, is a liar
Before the end our glory must be spent.
The graphics of the branches look Chinese
As blackened brush is drawn across red silk
Infinite yet countable my days
Running like a river without silt
Thus I am not transcendent in myself
But joined to all that lives I feel I am.
So in conjunction we will find our health
Ambivalence contains both lion and lamb.
The fire of orange leaves me with a glow
As into night I with all creatures go
