Tag: poem

Essex cornfields

Saturday was shopping then a walk Epping,Ongar,Finchingfield by car

Reading book reviews and chewing stalks

Buttercups and meadows,Henry Moore

Driving back from Chelmsford, cornfields flamed

Smoke and fire and earth, the sun dismayed

Farmers working hard, a harvest, grain

The sky through mist a cobalt blue displayed

Standon with its fords and wandering cows

Little rivers,Essex, flowing down

The Stort joins with the Lea,a gurglimg sound

Water for the Thames and mossy ground

The earth feels like my body sacrificed

The artist’s canvas stretched ,a matricide

The sun in North Norfolk

In Wells North Norfolk looking to the east

I saw the sun rise like a ball of fire

I loved its glory on this holy day

 Yet we’re endangered it may be our pyre

In the evening looking to the west

The sun was falling to its bed,the sea.

From Dawn to Twilight, we could see its path.

And to all the world  its vision’s free.

We were in the attic looking out

The sea was hot,love is a noun

The unplanned lanes, the hollyhocks, The birds

Seeking new perspectives of this town.

We saw the sun roll east to west that day.

I would like to kneel, what do I say?

Swimming in a sea of words

I’m swimming in a sea of words

Some may find this concept absurd

Is it metaphorical at best?

How is reality expressed?

The poets and the novelists must play

In the sea of words everyday.

But some of us have made our own small pools 

Where we control the words by rigid rules.

I like floating idly by

Lost in my own  sweet reverie.

Laziness is really hard to learn 

Willpower has to take its turn

I’m smiling in a sea of words

Causing consternation in the birds.

I’m floating in the warmth of Shakespeare’s spell 

Why don’t you come in with me as well?

In the end, the truth is where love lies.

With foresight, we may see  where  problems lurk
And  root them out before they start to grow
Yet often life’s mysteriously dark
And what we reap is what another sowed.

In hindsight,  this seems obvious and plain.
But some can  pick the  true out with no pain
Yet others choose  their fantasy again
They amble down a cheerful sunny lane.

Though what is real may not be what we wish
Better truth that hurts  than lies  that charm
Reality is not an easy  choice
Yet falsehood will mislead and even harm.

Insight grows with patient watching eyes
In the end, the truth is where love lies.

I’m pre-dead and so are you

Image

I wrote this as a protest against the fashion in medical circles of making everything either a disease or the precurser to a disease.I have not included mental health here but I think it’s used there as well.If you are happy you are pre-mad or pre-neurotic.If calm you are pre-panicking or pre-stressed.
If beautiful you are pre-aged

I went to the doctor.He said I’d pre-flu..
I said “My dear doctor what shall I do?”
Next time I went, he said “It’s pre- shock.”
And then I had pre measles,pre mumps and pre-pox
I ran to the doctor,he said ” You’re pre-well”
I said “Are you sure it’s not just a pre-quel?”
Next time I turned up,he’d gone out for a walk
It’s hard for a doctor who wants to pre-talk.
I went to the optician, who said I’m pre-blind
I thanked him for being so intensely unkind.
I went back to the doctor,and these words I said
“I’m pre -blind, pre-deaf,pre-ill and pre-dead!

Love was,oh,so long ago.

 

Waxy flowers poking through
Snow so white
Flowers bright.
Made me think of you.

I see once more yoursweet white hair,
Soft as snow
On pillow.
Now my bed is bleak and bare

,
Face alight,flower to sun,
I loved you.
Love so  true.
Fear by love was overcome.

Cyclamen in  the snow,
Pink and red,
Now frozen,dead.
Love was,oh,so long ago.

But never gone from in my mind.
Thoughts so deep,
Upwards seep.
Love was gentle,love was kind
And always in my mind

That village Street

Standon church, the village and the ford

How the eye will wander as it stares

Lazy cows stand idly by the gate

How deep silence holds and melts our cares.

The heavy load of work, the children’s gaze.

The weight of coppers spoils the father’s clothes

The cake stand gleams, sadistically exposed

The cat sleeps on,while BarclaysBank is closed

We left the car beside the butcher’s shop

Climbed up to the church his mother moaned

She enjoyed the view down this long Street.

Despite the aching of her twisted toes.

Now they’re gone and I stand here alone

I see your face, your eyes,your smiling bones

Down the other side of the mountain

From the high peak of the middle years

We walk downwards slowly but it’s clear.

We lose our parents siblings other kin

Who will now agree we are born to win?

Our bodies stiffen while we’re yet alive

Who will die,atone,does God decide?

From the man he takes the caring wife

The heart itself will harden in the strife

Last Man standing is a bag of bones

In his grave the king decays alone.

Wild Geese

Leaves have gone so suddenly
Small birds float on the wind
Like boats astride a choppy sea.
Their swaying soothes my mind.

Wild geese fly past at dusk again,
They head towards the North.
The holly berries glow in sun,
Nature gives joy birth.

I gaze intently at the sky,
The clouds hang dark and low.
If I too were a mere wild goose
I’d know which way to go

But I am left with only words
To find my destination.
Yet words do carry down to us
Wisdom from past generations

We use old words in unique ways.
We structure them to form
A new design not seen before
A new sentence is born

I send my words with love to you
I hope you safely catch them.
Give me answers from your heart
And I’ll do my best to match them.

Memories of childhood

My sister oh my sister do not die

I feel that I still need you in my world

And Rivington we saw the larks upfly

Anglezarke the reservoir still swirled

Fresh water for old Liverpool’s

supply

I cannot go to Rivington alone

Nor Scotchmans Stump to see birds little bones

Once we lit a fire by a stream.

I’d like to go there now my love my queen.

Sturdy and determined she would climb.

Take the bus to Horwich it’s nearby

We saw ripe elderberries full and fine

In the distance Winter Hill stood high

The highest hill about so high austere

I won’t take you there sweet Eileen dear

Houses built of gold and sin

Ante mortem let us trust
For in the grave we turn to dust
Yet in life the poor are cursed
Our treatment post mortem is just.

The worms and beetles care no more
For the rich than for the poor.
They are happy to devour
Bankers,despots,every hour.

Ante mortem, greed does win
Houses built of gold and sin
But God,who lives in each within,
Cares no more for gold thann tin

If post mortem we are judged
Why does the rich person grudge?
Why do we refuse to budge
Up until the final nudge?

Throw away your heavy goods
Live like daisies by the woods..
Fear not hurricane nor floods
As daises grow even in mud.

More dependent on all power
We trust in madmen’s city towers.
Yet God told us to live like flowers…
To enjoy life for an hour.

Perception is no privilege.
We each have the wits to judge.
See and note where you have smudged
What your creation would allege.

Post and ante, even now
The currents of our hearts allow…
The inner sea which has its flow
To take us where we need to go

Which direction?

A day of sudden changes.Clouds

cross the sky

like whales swimming North in rows.

The sun was bright,dazzled my eyes

with gold and silver.

Wind cut across my face

like a slap from an angry father..

Those who love can also seem to hate us too..

The lure of that small childish body

tempts them to divert their anger towards it.

When the ones who hurt you

are also the ones you love,

it’s hard to know which direction to run in;

but it usually turns into a circle.

Retreating turns into a new arrival.

Straight lines might be better. though

On a spherical earth

difficult to find.

Even parallel lines meet

In their Riemannian geometry.

So we can never get away

Sometimes the best we manage

Is to increase the circle’s radius.

Though how is hard to know.

Do you love me or hate me?

Do you want me to stay or go?

What do I want?Do I have a me?

The memory of warmth draws me back

Like a cold lonely beast leaving the jungle

To lie down with a what appears to be a lamb,

Surprising the farmer up early to milk his animals

Finding a strange new one

Looking with tender,puzzled eyes

into His Human Face.

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