Poem ‘Witness’

Witness

Deep in the darkest place
we feel a faint memory is
lurking unbound like a freeze
on the fast spinning world
a rare sight for we strangers
from the far flung parts
of tenuous space

We must have strolled
those ragged shores
leaving no footprints in the sand
and breathed in deep
the unbreathable air
before sentient life could
crawl out from the sea

We saw the infant sun spill
his light over jagged horizons
and a shattered moon
ascend into sparse skies
to ride across that curious
scatter of stars

Was it us who fostered
the mortal pain of eons?
And did we sanction suffering
from simplicity to sublimity
all borne through this weary flux?

That we were witness
when it began – is true
We will persist to its end
to see star stuff blasted out
when it all starts over again

* I’ve had a version of this poem hanging around since I was about 17. This is the latest incarnation and I’m still not satisfied.
* The ‘painting’ is a ‘photoshopped’ adaptation from another painting.

New Poem ‘April Promise’

April Promise

Full of April promise
so many times we’d disappear
to where the canal boats moored

make-believing one of them ours
a gypsy craft laden for a simpler life
We’d found our own place to dream

saw the naked sun step down to play
to dance on daisy-strewn fields
leaving us to lay by a twisting stream

cradled by heavy blossom trees
unable to face an unpalatable truth
The holes it burned in our maudlin minds

like never-healing wounds
more vulnerable than the blossom
which fell into torrents below

So it is that a few fine April days
are quickly gone
They never presage a fine summer to come

Unseasonal, I know, but those of us entrenched in the northern hemisphere might want to think of spring.

New Poem ‘Apparition’

Apparition

Standing by the patio doors,
an early sun was shining through
I thought I heard a gentle tap
no – I didn’t expect to see you

But I asked you in, made us some tea
and we sat in that warm rear room
Said you’d been away, started a book
Just didn’t think I’d see you so soon

When the sun went in I looked again
Somehow you weren’t quite the same
You hadn’t touched the cake or your tea
and now I couldn’t recall your name

So I took the pots through, confused
Nearly went outside for some air –
it was then I began to remember
but when I got back you weren’t there

New Poem: ‘Windows’

Windows

we admire the window’s
fine proportions
giving out
onto bare trees
a grey sky
those pervading
stillnesses of space

and the coffee
is good and strong
good enough to take black
to sit back with
and to savour

and listen
can you hear the
crows calling?
they’re telling of
eastern winds
bringing on the winter
which arrives tomorrow

but against
this crackling fire
our comfort is fixed
by your hand in mine

New Poem – ‘Friend’

Friend

you’re not restless
like me

my day must be filled
the thirst of my mind
quenched

set free

and you are the space
between

the silent moments

a day dream

my closet friend
always there

never seen

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