Poem: Foot Fall

high angle photo of person wearing shoes
Photo by Valeriia Miller on Pexels.com

Our feet fall where the leaves fall,
a season’s growth shed
without fanfare, soon forgot.
And who remembers last year’s leaves,
raked, composted or burned,
mere sheaths of life discarded
like our own lives, one day.
Only morose acceptance of decay
allows this annual admiration of colour,
where minor arpeggios play
through lands in the thrall of winter

copyright Francis Barker 2019

 

Haiku: Grandma’s Birthday

black-and-white-coin-design-731164
Photo by Srikanth Popuri from Pexels

Eighteen ninety nine
On a chilly All Saints Day
Gran – I remember

copyright Francis Barker 2019

Poem: Halloween Spirits Abroad

person wearing red hoodie
Photo by sebastiaan stam on Pexels.com

When I was a boy there was no Halloween.
We knocked on doors for a ‘Penny for the Guy’
to buy bangers and rockets
and set them off where we liked,
young boys running amok
along twilight roads
through those endless stubble fields
under watching skies.
But then someone opened that box
and the spirits escaped;
the warped tales of our history
replaced by phantoms of trick and treat –
in an age of deceit.

copyright Francis Barker 2019

Tanka: Maps

white ceramic cup on map
Photo by Filippo Peisino on Pexels.com

He pores over maps
joys in relief lines and lakes
the old village names
So much history compressed
Hidden gems to discover

copyright Francis Barker 2019

Poem: The Victory of Halloween

woman with a face and body painting holding a halloween pumpkin bucket
Photo by Projeto Equality on Pexels.com

The spirits have driven out the saints:
The eve overshadows the main event.
The dead and their cohorts come out once more,
to frolic and to taunt, to dare you to deny
that the old world of the one God is gone.

copyright Francis Barker 2019