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Category: sonnet
Henne
Hennetwistle has a railway stop
The name is Viking now it’s usually spelled
Entwistle, where reservoirs fill up
Manchester wants water , here it’s held
Too Thirlmere is an artificial lake
For tea in Manchester, those thirsty folk
How much more d’ye think that they will take?
Hamlets drowned, dull cypress trees that cloak
I once passed through Darwen on a train
On the way to Ilkley with my aunt
No memory of bliss with me remains
Except the flowers so wild, their ghosts still haunt
Yet nowhere else gives me the feel of home
This landscape is my body and my soul
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What we don’t want to say
There’s something in the faces of the old
Transparency, the seeing of the soul
A little light that shines out from within
A candle burning through the flesh so thin
Everything is taken but their bones
A little flesh is stretched out to atone
Till after death the skeleton lies bare
A challenge to the young whose eyes close there
Now in Lockdown we learn that we are lame
We live upon the cliff edge of our pain
Nothing seems secure, we can’t defend
We see the naked truth that all will end
Forced to see what we don’t want to say
We fall upon the ground , our knees give way
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Whatever suits your heart
Am I an idolator today
For to St Jude I have been known to pray
Patron of the Hopeless, the Outcast
I call on him to find my shopping list
I call on him when I have lost my phone
And long to hear my husband’s mobile groans
If this ignites distress I am to blame
The fires of love are what keep women sane
I call on him while homesick though at home
Without my love the house feels empty, lone
Does God detest me when I pray for aid?
For these years, with suffering I have paid
Say or sing whatever suits your heart
We never gain the end if we don’t start
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God, at last
Human sacrifice had disappeared
Would God bring it back to strike with fear
The hearts of children washed in Jesus’ blood
His heart so sacred died, does that sound good?
Why stress the Cross, the crown of thorns, the fear
As if God is a sadist, cold yet nuclear
Who might wish to propagate this myth?
In Eden dwell to hear the snakes that hiss
Jesus, kind and brave, had no cruel wish
To feed a crowd he conjured loaves and fish
He walked on water, perhaps he loved to tease
No Caesar he, his stories were decrees.
And in the night, he wept but never cursed
God, at last, knew humans at their worst
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Who commands these viruses like flu?
Who commands these viruses like flu?
Consternation makes our hearts feel blue
Do we have a lifeboat or an Ark?
The situation does feel rather stark
Who decided we could work while sick?
Our energy depleted , brains feel think
Decisions so important need clear minds
Not one both unravelling and blind
We travel round the globe, a virus ride
Our garments are as louche as fratricide
We snap some photos of the Golden Dome
Then jump on a plane and turn to Rome
Why not stay in Britain or in France?
The piper plays but only demons dance
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We don’t see what is there,we see ourself
The eye is not a camera taking shots Our mind affects the aspect we perceive And what it feels important it will spot Give grace or hatred,cause us all 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 don't see what is there,we see our self To learn ,we must employ all human wealth |
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Green flowers
The bowling green, the clack of ball on ball
Across the grass as perfect as the dawn
We sit down on a bench,new painted too
Lumpy paint but good enough to do
Round the edge, the dahlias bloomed like suns
No irony was meant nor overcome.
Goldenrod, geranium were bold
The earth was hot and rich in summer’s hold
Past virgin rhodedendrons , children played
Swings and see-saws, all somewhat decayed
Painted with the same paint as the bench
I saw my father fall, I felt the wrench
Where shall we sit, my sweetheart, by the lawn?
I have lost your face. my heart lies torn
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Choice
Shall I be one of those who get no care
The framework of the doctors’ thoughts lies bare
Who can say migrainous hearts are weak
Who has got a heart valve which might leak?
Since I see the world throught just one eye
Will that be enough to let me die?
My thyroid gland is fading as I age
I do not have the energy for rage.
We have no rights from God [ is he a lie?]
Kant’s Imperative deserves a try
If I’m looking pale or even sad
That does not mean I wish that I were dead
Austerity was hardest for the poor
Now the Graveyard waits, there is no cure.
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Words or sin
The paradox of praise is that we’re judged
Yet how can judgement place us on a dot
The eye is wet, the dropped tear is a smudge
A line in-finite, dense with its own spots
Whether beauty of the body-mind
Or depth of thought, now hanged by awe
Where many alien eyes look out unkind
And noone knows what we each saw
How can we be ranked on things long passed
Yet not forget the lessons we took in?
We sat matric in school while Jews were gassed
With children backward, queers and gypsy kin
We learned to read the maps we now live in,
Forget the world is more than words and sin
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Wallflowers,wild as eyes are when sincere
I remember Charmouth and the cliffs
A piece of land had broken off and tipped
On this island rabbits sang and danced
We stood high above.amused , entranced.
We walked the Devon side and came to Beer
Saw wallflowers wild as eyes are when sincere
On the cliff mixed in with weeds perfumed
Above the sky hung silent like the moon
The Baker’s shop. the little stream the path
The innocence of love,unknown the wrath
The hope of being healthier and strong
The hope that my own heart had not been wrong
O beauty, where are you when I am old
My husband in his his grave, why am I cold?
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Ecstasy can’t last,can’t be pursued
Maybe Meghan knew we’d have a storm
A hurricane of doubt, the leaders scorned
She’s back in Canada, I wish I were
Seeing Leonard Cohen every where
A thousand kisses deep may be too much
Especially for those who’re unrehearsed
The tower of song is just a maisonette
Joan of Arc burns as she pirouettes
Suzanne bore his children then she left
She fell out of love, he was bereft
Poets need their time alone to muse
Ecstasy can’t last,can’t be pursued
We still lose the space to enjoy dreams
While up above our leader stands and screams
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A cruel hill
We measure walls and windows and the rain
But not the patterns painted on the pane
We measure flour and butter and the tin
But not the love with which we mix them in
There is no linear scale in human minds
Where you are up above and I’m behind
Complexity and wisdom intertwine
No measure seems quite apt for those who’re blind
There’s something Nazi in the way we rank
The industry of measurement now stinks
Every human is a unique world
Yet into the abyss , they might hurled
We do not get perfection as we kill
The Christs who stumble up their cruel hill
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Make my heart into a cottage pie.
Make my heart into a cottage pie. 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 lamb With sliced onion fried in olive oil? O foes and devils eat me and you’ll be Transformed into myself, your enemy
Continue reading “Make my heart into a cottage pie.”
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This treasure
Absenting ourselves from presence in this life
Glued onto the pictures in our minds
It neither matters if we wish for strife
Or whether they fill needs of better kind.
We know that wish fulfilment comes in dreams
And also in our fantasies by day
When anxious worry fills our mind with schemes
Guilt and shame impede us from our play.
Creative thought requires the loss of self,
And needs our empty soil to plant its gifts
So throw out selfish fancies for this wealth
We’ll let ourselves go slow, so minds can shift
To waste our days in suffering or false pleasure
Will lose for us this vital, vivid treasure
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Then opening like a smile
Forsythia hangs ,oh flexible and flowered
A wig of natural hair by breezes stirred
A budded branch has caught my face and eye
While squirrels laugh from woodpiles yet unburned
We are sick but garden flowers will come
Pushing shoots into the mad March air
So eager to find light, to patterns grow
Then opening like a smile its flowers to share
Now my friends are all awayI’m sad
I see the falls by Buttermere in dreams
Not the mills and dirt of my home town
In Buttermere we first saw those clear streams
Silence has its joys and lets us hear
The still, small voice, the whisper. the blessed ear
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I wonder who you are and feel for you
So many people read on WordPress blogs
Many write their own words down as well
From different countries all across the world
What the effect is nobody can tell
But is it so surprising that all words
Written with a true and thoughtful heart
Can bind together those of us who care
And so from cruel Wars we may depart
From Vietnam and China from Finland
From Maryland,Brasilia,Peru
From Rome, from Jordan and from Palestine
I wonder who you are ,I care for you
The mystery is the goodness we can share
Yet always there’s a darkness in the air
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Fear of illness
The wasted years of our uncivil war
Continue as we fight for toilet rolls
All too soon will come the blood and gore
The bulls escape,we trained no matadors
Tins of soup and packets of dried meat
Fly from shelves to baskets as we queue
Fear has grasped our throats with its deceit
The faces of the old are turning blue
Still there is a palace on the hill
A forest where the princes ride each day
Doused by rumour,fear that watchers kill
What worth is there in turning now to prayer?
Stupid and corrupt we miss our lives
Our children cry, our heartfelt anguish writhes
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Where God’s in hell
The sadness of the television world
Where actors have no character to share
Where all is flat and perfect but unreal
Where God’s in Hell, and yet it is concealed
The sadness of a toddler with a phone
Eyes near focussed like he is alone
Where he can see a Zoo in Montreal
Or hear hyenas as they make their calls
The sadness as we toss out ancient books
And never teach our children how to cook
The imaged food is perfect in young eyes
But when we live on that I think we die
The sadness when our neighbours have blind eyes
The sadness as our culture slowly dies
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Over burned spaghetti and red wine
God has made men suffer making me
As beautiful as morning by the sea
Because I’m only interested in maths
I have long since left the garden path
I never look in mirrors or deep ponds
Narcissus eat your heart out in ferns’ fronds
I never used to wonder how I looked
When my eyes were glued on a textbook
What irony that men would love me so
I thought myopia would make them shy
I thought they’d like to talk of Wittgenstein
Over burned spaghetti and red wine
But now I’ve learned how beautiful I looked
Lying on the sofa with a book
Alas it is too late for any more
I see the edge of Heaven by the door
God may seem ironic, it’s a test
I may kiss you once if you insist
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Touching
I let my entire being take you in
Surround you like it were second skin
I made an astral cloak to give your peace
Where I could share the burden and release
How hard it is to find the words that say
How we live and die afresh each day
When we get a foothold on the hill
We must not hurry , pressed on by our will
Every instant,every time we breathe
Eternal life is here, we’re not deceived
God appears and disappears ,he flames
The Burning Bush, the prophet and their rage.
Enlightenment comes after we have crossed
The avenues of suffering and the cost
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The churchbells shuddered
When God came down , the rivers overflowed
Great trees were floating ,angled and exposed
The houses broke up like a loaf to crumbs
The hearts of humans trembled till they hummed
The winds deceived, the gusts unmeasured stung
The churchbells shuddered then untimely rang
The power was cut and all our screens were dark
Where were the rulers, where the saving Ark?
The women giving birth were paralysed
The babies in the womb took ill and died
Their cradles rocked the world, they swung so fast
And in a moment all of life had passed
In the void, God started his new world
Rich and strange, the grit and then the pearls
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No words
If we had no language,we’d be good
No communication but by sense
What devil conjured up the demon word
Made our dealings complex and intense?
No Tower of Babel, nothing but mud huts
Caressing,kissing,kicking, real contact
Boxing,wrestling,killing the unjust
No law except the fist. no guilt.no wrack
No religion but a sense of awe
The rising sun, the moon, the distant stars
Oh,bow before the Cedar and the Oak
Anything that is taller than we are
No books, no news no media,no war
It makes me wonder what live words are for
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Banal to hide the strife
Wandering roung the local brancb of Boots
Shall I buy a moisturising cream
Maybe Astral, or E45 ?
Many choices, who can bear to dream?
Shall I wear red lipstick dye my hair
Boots or shoes, a skirt or velvet shorts
Trousers of black wool or sky blue tights
Shall I keep the baby or abort?
Shall I take an M.Sc. in Art?
What about my car,shall I replace?
Which man shall I marry or repulse
Will the baby now have grown its face?
Underneath the common wastes of time
The real concerns are pushed out from the mind
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Happiness was like a golden shawl
The pebbled beach on which we walked at dawn
The sun was dancing singing stone to stone
The sea was pale as silk and gently ran
The tide was coming in, the day began
Why is my memory so deficient here?
I remember little but you near
I remember Portland Bill at dusk
The sea was wilder then with many thrusts
Happiness was like a golden shawl
A world like Eden, man before the Fall
Today they say, illusion, I say, no
What matters is where this insight makes you go
The fruits of meditation are its test
May we be generous, may our souls be blessed
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The astral body
Tenderly I held him took him in
As though we touched each other skin to skin
Dying is what everyone must do
Even when it splits the Me from You
What we took for granted every day
Had its end like any mortal’s play
The length of life is just enough to lie
It’s not here forever, don’t you cry
We are on no plateau but a slope
Slight at first, so we don’t see and note
Gently we are led to where it ends
Beautiful and foolish like ourselves
How can we be split when we are one?
In deep darkness dies the winter sun
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Like babies
Sunday dinner. roasted spuds and meat
Yorkshire puddings, gravy,pepper,salt
These are what the English like to eat
Though microwaves may bring it to a halt
Roly poly,syrup sponge and cream
Apple dumplings,marmalade on toast
Men adore hot puddings gently steamed
Though who will have the time to be a host?
Now we buy sponge puddings ready made
Bread and butter custard ,raisins,hot
How did women manage in past days?
Spotted Dick, brown sugar,that’s the lot
We seem to love the sweet yet we are rude
Still like babies, ignorant and confused
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The labour and the hurt that life will cure
I found a pair of knickers on the chair
They must be mine,oh dear, that is bizarre
I did not take them off,I am quite sure
They make the entire room seem quite impure
Yet why are knickers thought to be like porn
When they adorn the place where life is born?
If you hung the washing out to dry
You might see an angel in the sky
Most of us traversed the holy path
We suffered pain but hope it did not last
Mothers too have struggled and endured
The labour and the hurt that life will cure
The simplest items, pretty, well designed
Tomorrow I shall hang them on the line
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Beyond
Of Genocide. who could sing or write
Just silence,impossible and stark
Yet was transmuted in a poet’s mind
Into a dance of final light and dark
Walking to their death by Mozart’s sound
Their special prayers were offered,what great trust
In Cohen’s mind the source of love engraved
Like Job before, he knew the sacred dust
Mysterious is the Lord with his demands
Christians went to Mass, reviled the Jews
Few of us will suffer, understand
Past pure reason ,feeling…God help who?
Beyond that flickering candle flame called God
We see the shadows lost, we see the Dead.
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Awesome now means medium at best
Rubbish is just something we don’t need
Or something not worth mending we believe
Where nonsense may be foolish talk or jest
Or English humour at its lethal best
There is no Judge, it’s people who decide
Whether it is nonsense to deride
The message of the media online
Which like the Consecration, is divine
Awesome now means medium at best
That is, you have barely passed the test
What a lot of stupid people say
Appears on someone’s T shirt the same day
Nonsense can give pleasure,make us loose
Sometimes it can make us feel confused.
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O wounded heart
O wounded heart,I cannot heal your pain
I shall bear it as it still remains
But why should I forgive the one who broke
My tender heart, my love and all I wrote/
The pride of men, the anger soon provoked
The cruel emails and the words he spoke
Why can’t we be kinder, more aware
Yet God himself was killed, who can compare?
The sadist drawn to those who seem less strong
Will find a dozen reasons to do wrong
They know their own pain not the pain they cause
Some will kill despising land and law
We choose life despite these cruel acts
We ‘ll do well if we can live with tact
