Category: villanelle

Oh, gentle Light

I ‘ll try to get it right just one more time
You did not converse with me in words
You were simply present with your Light

Nowhere did I feel your power and might
You were no eagle, but a little bird
I ‘ll try to get it right just one more time.

Who made our language with its subtle rhymes?
The ancient people  had their well trained Scribes
You were always there,oh gentle Light

You  gave me warmth, you  changed my too fixed sight
A comforter , a Spirit, how describe?
I ‘ll try to get it right a final time.

The agony inside me lost its bite
I wanted to go on, to be alive
You  do not always show your golden Light

We do not know  when we at last arrive
We do not reach this  meeting place by strife
I ‘ve tried to get it right this final time
I never saw such  Gold until that night

No words existed in its welcome hold

Struggling in the black of sinking sands
As I heard of when a little child
I gave up hope and let myself descend

My garments as a mourner I did rend
Death itself was shown me and beguiled
Struggling in the black of sinking sand

Far away from loved ones ,with no friend
The suffering of the past seemed almost mild
I gave up hope and let myself descend

I felt from every heaven I had been banned
With demons  of the Nazis  in exile
Struggling in the black of sinking sand

I am not inclined to make demands
Yet then  a mystic light caressed my soul
I  had lost my hope and feared  the end

This  golden light  enwrapped me like a stole
No words existed in its welcome hold
Struggling in the black of sinking sands
I was lifted out by  unknown hands

 

The edge of sight

The impatience of a hunter, keen,intent
Will miss small movements at the edge of sight
Will miss the sacred spirit’s new descent

Relaxing when in danger,insolent,
Will throw a wider beam of golden light
Curb impatience, excess of intent

Slowness is a sign we can present
That’s enough for heart to speak to heart
We see the holy spirit’s new descent

Can we from our eagerness dissent
Lean back, let the other play their part
Curb impatience, excessee of intent?

For my narrow vision,I repent
How I’ve missed the whole with graphs and charts
Now I see the holy spirit’s spent

Scanning with a wider gaze unvites
Calmer ways of living with less spite,
The impatience of a hunter, keen,intent
Will miss the gold of spirit’s new descent

Love’s victory

Turn back, live again, he asked of me
Do not wander in this darkness anymore
One false step might give death victory

We are each connected to that tree
The sunlit top, the roots hid in earth’s floor
Come back, live again, he asked of me

While we live, we’ll live with dignity
Not scrabbling for the gold in blood and gore
One more lie will give sin victory

The kindness of the golden light was clear
And left an image in my mind’s deep core
Come back, live your life, he then soothed me

Do not wonder now why you are here
We’re here to live and living shall restore
What our suffering self has found so dear

I had never seen the Light before
Only Christ the Tyger with his roar
Come back, live through pain, he asked of me
One right step will give love victory

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 to block
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

Soaring soul

A  robin came in after you had died
The little bird is missing you like me
After hopping round, away birds fly

You sat there in the kitchen looking kind
The birds were eating crumbs left from our tea
The  robin looked in after you had died

Should I see it as a  subtle sign?
Once a bird tapped on the window here
I  knew   the meaning as I sadly sighed

After hopping round, away birds fly.
Their delicacy, their size haunts me like fear
The  robin looked in after you had died 

I wish the  bird  had stayed a little while
I wish I were up North near Windermere
On a  boat that sails  till my heart smiles

Oh, for another  one to  share , to steer
I miss your hands so warm and once so near
A  robin called by after you had died
With your soaring soul the small birds  fly

Daddy, is it far?

Seems like a  dream, I’m riding in this car
He’s kind; he’s bright ; he likes to drive and chat.
We’re intellectuals; ha ha ha ha ha!

I wonder if the house is very far.
I’m happy not to map read; I sit back
In my dream, I’m cosy in this car

The motorway is salted, frost  to clear.
In the fields, looks like they’ve emptied sacks.
The cars spin round; so merry, like a fair.

I like the softened meadows’ silver stare
M25, I thought I’d not be  going back
In my dream, I’m  flying but to where?

This  frosted  grass has beauty debonair
Once stubble used to burn and make skies black
Crossing Essex, flames would fill the air.

The dear child sits behind me, tra la la!
I like his magic and the way his marbles clack.
He likes to hear me humming,  fah la la

Oh, how  he drives well in the fierce sun glare.
He never swears nor  shouts; he brings good luck
The sun lights boldly trees with branches bare.

I feel relaxed, enjoy the comfy car.
His little boy asks, Daddy is it far?

My Wedding Dress , my eyes, my shining hair

I remember riding in that car
Through unknown Essex.Suffolk to the sea
Oh Aldeburgh,Dunswich,  where we were

The fields  invited love  with yellow stars
Beguiling buttercups, and you and me
We got lost in Braintree in our car

Framlingham, we saw  wild primrose there
Mary Tudor  unimagined  flees.
Ah, Aldeburgh, fishing boats and tar

History  so poignant  and bizarre
Bloody Mary’s heretics, the siege
They might have got away inside our car

Southwold Harbour, walking on the spur
Rowed acrosss the  tidal river  clear
Then Walberswick where Freud’s descendents  smirk

As death came down  was I  the  wife  you chose
Your pretty one with  cheeks of  peach and rose?
My Wedding Dress , my eyes, my  shining hair
Your flowered shirt, your  eyes , your humour rare

 

 

 

A poet can fly

Try writing nonsense, you will be surprised
I have used a comma, that’s the end;
How hard it is to know a poet can lie.

Unless you have a calling,shut your eyes
Do not break where you can also bend
Try writing nonsense, you be surprised

When I read a villanelle, men cry.
Ask the poet never to 1pretend
For cruel it is to find a poet who lies

Triolets bear sadness to the wise
If your aim is cruel, do not send
In learning nonsense, we’ve been ill advised

Rubbish is not nonsense,realise.
Lewis Carroll’s Alice was no friend
How hard it is to know where poets lie.

Sense and nonsense travel in a blend
So it is that fiction can offend
When writing nonsense, you must be composed
How hard is it to learn a poem transposed?

  Thoughts annihilate

Postmodern poetry has no formal shape
No sonnet,villanelle or rondeau there
Nor is it true or false that we are apes

A sentence made from curses aggravates
Makes   even slight hurts something we can’t bear
Postmodern poetry has no formal shape

This very poem’s ironic , it emotes
Glares with total rage at  you who care
If it’s true or false that we are apes

This poem,alas, will offer no escape
If it has no rhymes  then I have flair
Postmodern poetry has no formal shape

The forms are hung until we get to break
We shatter and we crack the poet’s lair
I think it’s true and false that we are apes

For a metre I will hang in here
Waiting with no patience for a jeer
Postmodern poetry has no formal shape
Nor is it true  that  thoughts annihilate