Poems
I have from time to time written a few poems. I have no pretensions as a poet, although I have many books of poetry and have set several to music. These are some of my efforts - each title here is linked to its poem, and by clicking 'Index' you can return here:
Index
"and"
little bird
split infinity
Actaeon i
Actaeon ii
the Weather of her Soul
Love's Passage
disappearing
"is your reaper grim?"
I Am My Little World
Rain
new year carol
The Season for Loving
The Buccaneer
I cannot lie
Regeneration
fragments
these fretted deeds....
Night's Canopy
Love
memories
Silly stuff
Birthday poem for Sally
My father's face
Her Father's Ghost
The English Schoolmaster in China
The grumpy old man
Finca Fever
West Walks [oil pastel]
"and"
This is a poem describing people and mini dramas passing by the bench in the park where I had taken my m&s lunch bits to eat in the sunshine. I love people-watching, and am an innate nosey-parker busy-body. And I love ideas and words - always too many! - as much almost as I love my music, and my notes! - too many notes! [as the emperor said .... ignorantly].
The park is the Borough Gardens, so close that it is like an extension to our own little garden. The picture is of West Walks when the old railings had been removed, prior to the restoration.
"and”
and you’ll be able to stay with dad
some times
says the fat non-mum to the sulking
unloved child
whose sun was hidden grey
nowhere else to go
poor girl divided
by the ignored wisdom
of solomon the so-called wise
and I start to eat my
sun is shining
here in the friendly park
the flowers and
sleepy lazy
to be yet not two bees
but dying wasp on dry wood
and four girls eight legs
saunter thigh by my
averting gaze each pair
fatter than the last
crisp in the packet
and I eat my vegetable
25% fat and obese
one-pound-skinny-
belsen-boy-samosa from m&s
and the little girl is cross
and screaming sad inside
the prison of her care-less
family that is the question
whether tis nobler to stay
together for the
sake of the
kids who have no say
and I drink my
friend’s fear of
daughter’s pulmonary artery
op to come
bless southampton
general fruit smoothie
again from m&s
in the friendly
and not-so-friendly
park my ideas
of life of death
of dying wasp
and of me. me and dying.
and the pain. and the rest.
and two tall
too tall for me
boys-yet-men
one with squashed ear saunter
bye bye and from lunch break
bach to work
in my mp3 in a funked-up way
and the kaleidoscope of
nursery rhymes too
fill my world with joy
less the parky pain
and not at all the pain
the pain
of the unloved
inconvenient
little girl
and the fat non-mother
and the 25% fat-stat
and the earlobe-less man-boy
and the fate-fearful dad
and I bin my thoughts
and rubbish my bits
and my bobs
and wander
neurologically speaking
back to base to work
and
rumination post samosa
and my picnic in the
friendly yet
maybe not so friendly
park
This is a poem describing people and mini dramas passing by the bench in the park where I had taken my m&s lunch bits to eat in the sunshine. I love people-watching, and am an innate nosey-parker busy-body. And I love ideas and words - always too many! - as much almost as I love my music, and my notes! - too many notes! [as the emperor said .... ignorantly].
The park is the Borough Gardens, so close that it is like an extension to our own little garden. The picture is of West Walks when the old railings had been removed, prior to the restoration.
"and”
and you’ll be able to stay with dad
some times
says the fat non-mum to the sulking
unloved child
whose sun was hidden grey
nowhere else to go
poor girl divided
by the ignored wisdom
of solomon the so-called wise
and I start to eat my
sun is shining
here in the friendly park
the flowers and
sleepy lazy
to be yet not two bees
but dying wasp on dry wood
and four girls eight legs
saunter thigh by my
averting gaze each pair
fatter than the last
crisp in the packet
and I eat my vegetable
25% fat and obese
one-pound-skinny-
belsen-boy-samosa from m&s
and the little girl is cross
and screaming sad inside
the prison of her care-less
family that is the question
whether tis nobler to stay
together for the
sake of the
kids who have no say
and I drink my
friend’s fear of
daughter’s pulmonary artery
op to come
bless southampton
general fruit smoothie
again from m&s
in the friendly
and not-so-friendly
park my ideas
of life of death
of dying wasp
and of me. me and dying.
and the pain. and the rest.
and two tall
too tall for me
boys-yet-men
one with squashed ear saunter
bye bye and from lunch break
bach to work
in my mp3 in a funked-up way
and the kaleidoscope of
nursery rhymes too
fill my world with joy
less the parky pain
and not at all the pain
the pain
of the unloved
inconvenient
little girl
and the fat non-mother
and the 25% fat-stat
and the earlobe-less man-boy
and the fate-fearful dad
and I bin my thoughts
and rubbish my bits
and my bobs
and wander
neurologically speaking
back to base to work
and
rumination post samosa
and my picnic in the
friendly yet
maybe not so friendly
park
little bird
La Gaverie, St Germain sur Ay, par Lessay [Normandy]
little bird
you, little bird
who measures out time
in swoops,
dives,
chattering
and song
that fills the space in which we both belong,
in which I heard
none of the pain -
it is the song which you and I
rehearse and improvise
each virgined day,
we bring it on and on again
to nullify
the truth -
that emerging from this clay
we are the same
dulled molecules of dust -
rehearse this scene again -
do not disturb
the tramp asleep,
nor restless muse
who races dawn in creative urgent lust
vaingloriously to lose
the sense of noun
or verb -
your soulful song
and my manufactured phrase
come and go and multiply -
the same dulled molecules make our days:
for you to fly,
for me to sigh -
we do not stay for long -
you, little bird
whistling in the wind
whilst I temper time’s mortal coil
with sweet music of the mind -
in the final silence no song is heard
your song and mine mix their atoms in the soil
10 may 2009
you, little bird
who measures out time
in swoops,
dives,
chattering
and song
that fills the space in which we both belong,
in which I heard
none of the pain -
it is the song which you and I
rehearse and improvise
each virgined day,
we bring it on and on again
to nullify
the truth -
that emerging from this clay
we are the same
dulled molecules of dust -
rehearse this scene again -
do not disturb
the tramp asleep,
nor restless muse
who races dawn in creative urgent lust
vaingloriously to lose
the sense of noun
or verb -
your soulful song
and my manufactured phrase
come and go and multiply -
the same dulled molecules make our days:
for you to fly,
for me to sigh -
we do not stay for long -
you, little bird
whistling in the wind
whilst I temper time’s mortal coil
with sweet music of the mind -
in the final silence no song is heard
your song and mine mix their atoms in the soil
10 may 2009
split infinity
Life is but an album-ed span
whose final page, the end of all,
without plan
Marks a pilgrimage, whose shadow
Every day of life is a leaf in history
No purpose to call
Save a wonderful mystery
no gold at the foot of the rainbow
And within this span
Of Nano years, months and days
Which split infinity
And prise time apart
Lives hopeless man
Measured twixt daytime haze
And dark night’s counterpart
A mortal Trinity
Of life,
As we draw life's sweet breath
To blow out the candle of each new year
And watch the smoke drift up above
We listen for the dreadful sound
Of endless dark.
We've seen it all before
As one by one our loves and lives
Exit for ever from our stages
Each brief mark
Fading on the forest floor
Our scripts the painful wages
17.jan.2009
whose final page, the end of all,
without plan
Marks a pilgrimage, whose shadow
Every day of life is a leaf in history
No purpose to call
Save a wonderful mystery
no gold at the foot of the rainbow
And within this span
Of Nano years, months and days
Which split infinity
And prise time apart
Lives hopeless man
Measured twixt daytime haze
And dark night’s counterpart
A mortal Trinity
Of life,
As we draw life's sweet breath
To blow out the candle of each new year
And watch the smoke drift up above
We listen for the dreadful sound
Of endless dark.
We've seen it all before
As one by one our loves and lives
Exit for ever from our stages
Each brief mark
Fading on the forest floor
Our scripts the painful wages
17.jan.2009
Acteaon i
Actaeon, felicitous youth
Unblushingly fresh,
Did not choose his awful, final truth,
Unwitting in his sight of godly flesh.
But Diana,
Rising from the waters whence
She bathed, with nymphs attending,
Blushed full, and more, in naked shame,
Bold Actaeon her privacy offending
When into her glade he came.
Angrily she cursed his mortal innocence.
Twixt his surprise and her displeasure
Diana mutated his natural make
Into a stag, whose swiftest measure
Actaeon’s own hounds delight to subjugate
For lust’s hungry sake
To satiate their appetite,
He with grevious recognition saw his fate,
Started up in desperate flight.
Diana, Goddess now, rode as Huntress of the Sky,
Saw poor Actaeon’s hopeless plight
Submit
Within her cruel sight;
Enjoyed his piteous pain,
Waited as he struggled yet, in vain:
His knowledge of her dying with his soul.
She in her heaven, set on high;
He below in hell, by his own hounds
Devoured in bloody whole.
Her vengeance knew no bounds
But Death:
And innocence no more
A thing of Beauty on the forest floor.
Cae Rhedyn 13/14.viii.98
Unblushingly fresh,
Did not choose his awful, final truth,
Unwitting in his sight of godly flesh.
But Diana,
Rising from the waters whence
She bathed, with nymphs attending,
Blushed full, and more, in naked shame,
Bold Actaeon her privacy offending
When into her glade he came.
Angrily she cursed his mortal innocence.
Twixt his surprise and her displeasure
Diana mutated his natural make
Into a stag, whose swiftest measure
Actaeon’s own hounds delight to subjugate
For lust’s hungry sake
To satiate their appetite,
He with grevious recognition saw his fate,
Started up in desperate flight.
Diana, Goddess now, rode as Huntress of the Sky,
Saw poor Actaeon’s hopeless plight
Submit
Within her cruel sight;
Enjoyed his piteous pain,
Waited as he struggled yet, in vain:
His knowledge of her dying with his soul.
She in her heaven, set on high;
He below in hell, by his own hounds
Devoured in bloody whole.
Her vengeance knew no bounds
But Death:
And innocence no more
A thing of Beauty on the forest floor.
Cae Rhedyn 13/14.viii.98
Actaeon ii
Actaeon
fresh faced innocent
away with his dogs
not possibly averting his gazing fate
sees Diana naked
sees her moistness
sees her angry
frozen flesh
crimson flush of shame and rage
rising
dripping waters from perfect form
and glistens in sunlit glade
virgin nymphs astonished
in unclothed disbelief
of bold and beauteous youth
entering
such privacy
awesome majesty
fearsome paralysis
transfixed
Diana
crimson enraged disgrace
on with her gown
not possibly avoiding her wounded pride
sees Actaeon hapless
sees his chaos
sees his distress
sees his fearful
frozen form
bronzed build of mighty sinew
mutating
shaggy features of witless stag
and quivers in this scented space
virgin nymphs bewildered
in obvious disbelief
of bold and beauteous youth
enduring
such exchange
petrified creature
fearsome paralysis
transfixed
Hounds
pack-trained hunters
up with the trail
not possibly eluding their basic urge
see Actaeon helpless
tear him down
tear his flesh
tear his eyes
bloodied meat
torn limb from limb torn
dying
fading spirit of fated boy
and expires in bewildered
virgin nymphs astounded
in apparent disbelief
of bold and daring youth
suffering
such slaughter
innocence nowhere
found again
on the forest floor
Cae Rhedyn 16.viii.98
fresh faced innocent
away with his dogs
not possibly averting his gazing fate
sees Diana naked
sees her moistness
sees her angry
frozen flesh
crimson flush of shame and rage
rising
dripping waters from perfect form
and glistens in sunlit glade
virgin nymphs astonished
in unclothed disbelief
of bold and beauteous youth
entering
such privacy
awesome majesty
fearsome paralysis
transfixed
Diana
crimson enraged disgrace
on with her gown
not possibly avoiding her wounded pride
sees Actaeon hapless
sees his chaos
sees his distress
sees his fearful
frozen form
bronzed build of mighty sinew
mutating
shaggy features of witless stag
and quivers in this scented space
virgin nymphs bewildered
in obvious disbelief
of bold and beauteous youth
enduring
such exchange
petrified creature
fearsome paralysis
transfixed
Hounds
pack-trained hunters
up with the trail
not possibly eluding their basic urge
see Actaeon helpless
tear him down
tear his flesh
tear his eyes
bloodied meat
torn limb from limb torn
dying
fading spirit of fated boy
and expires in bewildered
virgin nymphs astounded
in apparent disbelief
of bold and daring youth
suffering
such slaughter
innocence nowhere
found again
on the forest floor
Cae Rhedyn 16.viii.98
the Weather of her Soul
|
She peers into her glass
a toad stares back She steers her wooden stare through bosky grey to fields of furrowed clay shared and scored anew each uncalled-for day With roughshod care time’s rivelled hack reflects through her etched weatherglass She peers into her glass and sees beyond the dullish stare stares back from ash veneered opacity She holds the stare and starts to float guides her ancient sonde across the pages of her almanac to the crowded footnote of her existential vast extensity She peers into her glass and passes through floats through the black lights of her eyes and humming a tuneless barcarole drifts into the inner void The faintly azure blue stares back in thin disguise and brushes past the membranes of her soul vibrates the familiar schizoid Here she sees another face reflecting in a room of glass whose panes touch at the darkness without Whose edges of infinity reflect in truth the greater keenness of her space Whose focus seeks an edge on which to shout but never sharpens its ephemeral mass nor matures its sallow youth That wretched soul of hers whose heart is filled with rarest art lies wrecked on the low-tide shore midst wrack and mortal ruin waiting for the reaper’s cart The journeyman whose stealth avers the artless truth of life’s assassin The nevermore of evermore 6th March 2008 |
glass - mirror
bosk – thicket, or little wood shared – ploughed [ploughshare]; also shares the image score – notch, gash, scratch; also as in music roughshod – provided with horse-shoes with projecting nails to afford extra grip rivelled – wrinkled [OE] hack – a horse, esp. one in a sorry condition. Also a gash, a notch weatherglass - barometer sonde – [Fr] device for obtaining information about atmospheric or weather conditions at high altitude existential – relating to human existence extensity – massiveness or spatial quality in sensation from which perception of extension is derived barcarole – gondolier’s song, or similar azure – of a faint blue, sky-coloured schizoid – one with schizophrenic personality – introversion, tending to fantasise, duality keenness – sharpness – also as in having an acute or penetrating mind; also intense ephemeral – short-lived - ie the mayfly whose adult life is very short – often lasting but a single day. sallow – pale yellow [of skin] wrack – seaweed cast ashore, stranded; also wreck; also vengeance aver – declare to be true journeyman – a hired workman, one hired by the day; also one who is competent at his trade [no longer an apprentice] artless – guileless, unaffected, simple; also inartistic |
Love's Passage
Willed yet not controlled by will
I was lifted to a great height
Onto a vast and grass tussock’d hill
Up into the yearning light.
She and I ran hand in hand in love
On endless summer’s days
Protected and immune up there above
We happily lay together till dusk’s haze
Willed again; as time drew on we ran as one
Toward the edge of the unknown
And plunged headlong into the dying sun
And over the abyss! And there our spirit has flown
Into an ageless clime, the kiss of Spring
Gives our love in timeless bliss its fling.
I was lifted to a great height
Onto a vast and grass tussock’d hill
Up into the yearning light.
She and I ran hand in hand in love
On endless summer’s days
Protected and immune up there above
We happily lay together till dusk’s haze
Willed again; as time drew on we ran as one
Toward the edge of the unknown
And plunged headlong into the dying sun
And over the abyss! And there our spirit has flown
Into an ageless clime, the kiss of Spring
Gives our love in timeless bliss its fling.
disappearing
an appearance demands
a physicality, whose balance
both demands and exudes purpose
and the stage is salty wet with lamentations, curses,
the unfairness of it all
the choppy swell
of the level playing field drowning
in its own tears
the hopes, the aspirations of this single chance
of life
and all its borrowed abundance.
no choice, out of nothing but no choice.
creatures of the moment, trapped in a brief instant,
prised out of the enormous enormity,
no purpose here
no selected team today
to complete the mindless relay
under starter's orders we writhe,
crawl, totter, walk, amble, run
blindly leading the blind
with erudite emptiness
and learn-ed philosophy to ease the pain
of physicality,
whose balance still
both demands, seeks and manifests purpose
on the slippery stage.
as we tire, urgently breasting the end tape,
we writhe once more in pain
lamenting the loss and counting the gain,
ship the oars and unfairly drift
at the mercy of the fading dream.
some life! some death!
a transient nothingness disappearing,
the parting waters departing
with the drowned, whose wet memories merge
merge and are lost
into some vast ocean which knows no depth
and flows into itself
over and over
and never knows the pain
of the tears
which are its eternal spring.
such sick physicality appears --
endlessly appears --
and just as endlessly
disappears
for life and death are one
5 April 2009
"is your reaper grim?”
“is your reaper grim?
and does he greet you with a smile?
does he sing a calming hymn,
gently take you by the hand,
and like some old acquaintance, like a friend,
with subtle assurances beguile
with promise of a greener land?
“then does he gesture to the end
that previously you did not see?
do you struggle, try to flee?
or do you place your trust in him
to lead you to some better place?
does he have a kindly face?”
we all, we all alike do ask,
we all would want to know
how brutal is his thankless task.
does he divert or stop the flow
of love, of thought, of life, of entity?
where does the lively stanza go
that sang with such sonority?
what lies within his wooden cask
he does not deign to show;
neither his face behind the mask.
“so, is he grim, your reaper,
and are you sure he has a smile?
the beating of your pulse keeps detailed timing;
Time marks out each step, each yard, each mile.
you are Time's slave, he is your keeper,
his the strike that sets the knell a-chiming.”
well might we laugh in drunken glee,
well might we fill our days with joys;
well might we hope or pray we do not see
or feel the fateful blow
that shatters hope and fells our mortal frame,
the ghastly strike the enterprise destroys
of rich, of poor, of old, of young,
of all alike both high and low
to this assassin are the same.
he wanders constantly among
the sick, the dispossessed, the lame.
his crooked smile is with us from our birth,
and waits awhile until we leave this earth.
Feb 2016
I Am My Little World
I am my little world, said he,
And round about my soul
unfurled for all to see
The pennants of my lifeline flutter helplessly
In the silent hurricane of this other me
Tattered, unravelled
seams of my humanity
Trailing in sparkling threads
of bright mortality.
There, there for all to see, he said,
Save by the sighted blind, who have no tear to shed.
I am my little world, said he,
A willed and willing player
yet a hapless refugee
Unsewing pennants' seams creatively
Unpicking threads of fragility:
Wrapping new lines round sense
to help me be
Inured to life's nonsense,
and its keen insensibility.
July 5th 2010
Rain
we form our state high
high in some shapeless vapours
immeasurably refined and redefined
from past wetness now washed clean
and raised expectant shy
we grow newly redesigned
with vibrant sheen
our drop drops roundly from the sky
begins the folly of our freefall capers
some float as mizzle
some sting as driving rain
some from a huge and frowning height
dive headlong earth bound
in joyous pain
most from the dullness of some grey drizzle
touch ground with silent sound
with empty gain
all fall in vain
few shine resplendent bright
in glory of sun’s refracted light
most lost in viewless blight
in numbness of endless night
high in some shapeless vapours
immeasurably refined and redefined
from past wetness now washed clean
and raised expectant shy
we grow newly redesigned
with vibrant sheen
our drop drops roundly from the sky
begins the folly of our freefall capers
some float as mizzle
some sting as driving rain
some from a huge and frowning height
dive headlong earth bound
in joyous pain
most from the dullness of some grey drizzle
touch ground with silent sound
with empty gain
all fall in vain
few shine resplendent bright
in glory of sun’s refracted light
most lost in viewless blight
in numbness of endless night
new year carol
and the waters singing shall wet the stage
on which we tread
on which we lately tread
there on storied pebbles fresh immersed
washed on riverbed
washed clean on riverbed
reflecting slippery time whose yellowed age
when done and said
when all done and said
makes its exit finally offstage
no curtain call
no scene change
no props to rearrange
no sounds at all
save rippled water coruscating over shallow stones
and new laid bones burbling their sweetest tones
to gently soothe our hapless quicklimed yearning
its flowing thread
intently binds our weak and helpless rage
now stranded dry – such parched and brittle learning
entirely unrehearsed
its calm and flowing thread
intently weaves a new and endless age
entirely sans script unrehearsed
when we are dead
we all are singing unversed
songs of pebble-washed time
which will become immersed
one unsuspecting day
in lime
or clay
over which will run the ever running stream
smoothing out the pain
smoothing forever the awful pain
singing softly of a pebbled dream
our new year carol strains the air
in sad lament
as the melody of one so fair
is spent
19.i.10
on which we tread
on which we lately tread
there on storied pebbles fresh immersed
washed on riverbed
washed clean on riverbed
reflecting slippery time whose yellowed age
when done and said
when all done and said
makes its exit finally offstage
no curtain call
no scene change
no props to rearrange
no sounds at all
save rippled water coruscating over shallow stones
and new laid bones burbling their sweetest tones
to gently soothe our hapless quicklimed yearning
its flowing thread
intently binds our weak and helpless rage
now stranded dry – such parched and brittle learning
entirely unrehearsed
its calm and flowing thread
intently weaves a new and endless age
entirely sans script unrehearsed
when we are dead
we all are singing unversed
songs of pebble-washed time
which will become immersed
one unsuspecting day
in lime
or clay
over which will run the ever running stream
smoothing out the pain
smoothing forever the awful pain
singing softly of a pebbled dream
our new year carol strains the air
in sad lament
as the melody of one so fair
is spent
19.i.10
The Season for Loving
Now is the season for loving;
For the days are long,
The nights warm,
And the sun rises each day
On a timeless holiday.
I've reached this dubious maturity,
Sweated my tears,
In dismal places,
And in those dread days
Each hour was an eternity.
And after each eternal day,
Another; yet as I look,
Look back on hell,
I am as far removed from then
As then I was from now.
Each moment flashes swiftly by,
Some savoured,
And some hated;
But I am changed and older now,
Impervious to their mood,
No more afraid of living,
Longing but to love;
And hell long since gone,
Replaced instead by a timeless void,
Timeless season for loving.
For the days are long,
The nights warm,
And the sun rises each day
On a timeless holiday.
I've reached this dubious maturity,
Sweated my tears,
In dismal places,
And in those dread days
Each hour was an eternity.
And after each eternal day,
Another; yet as I look,
Look back on hell,
I am as far removed from then
As then I was from now.
Each moment flashes swiftly by,
Some savoured,
And some hated;
But I am changed and older now,
Impervious to their mood,
No more afraid of living,
Longing but to love;
And hell long since gone,
Replaced instead by a timeless void,
Timeless season for loving.
The Buccaneer
My Dad
The Buccaneer
In the weather of his dreaming
A dull grey mist
Blends the edges
Of the above
And the below
His horizon no longer
Sharpened keenness
Where once the clinched nails
Held fast the full-ribbed clinker
Planed and skimmed
To the finis terre
And made battles
With the monsters of the deep
Where once the smooth-oiled planks
Of seasoned oak creaked
In the high sun’s radiation
Now groans with agued age
And splits the splinters of wisdom
Into brittle sticks of parched sinew
Smiling with confused emptiness
Redundant in thought and deed
Just as now the proud
Proud jutting prow
Is blunted
No more the wave slice
Synergy of winded cloth
And sheeted tension
Dividing the waters
In pursuit of gems
That boyhood treasure
Plundered in eternal leisure
Is now spent
Linen sags today
As yesterday
Listless and heavy cheeked
The contraband was spent
The open chest full empty
Cutlassed spoils dispersed
Vacant and sallow-cheeked faces stare
From dark recesses everywhere
And he himself in skull and bone
From deep in a spray-damp chair
Which was not always so
When strutting the decks
Visioning through the prophetic glass
The shortened view
And the long range investment
Riding aloft the crests
Tearing through time
Amassing considerable wealth
Crafting imagination with fire
Jewelled and crafted fire
And objects of great beauty
Ripping through the Roaring Forties
Into a cascade of rich abundance
Until the distant years drew near
And gleaming metals gathered rust
And riming reason turned to dust
And
And memories forgot themselves
Forgot themselves and
And
Fragmented time and space
The old buccaneer yawned
And the chasm yawned too
Tales displaced doing
Stories found their summaries
In the hold
The gold is tarnished
What is old is withered
And encompassed with an acrid mould
The eyes that smiled grow grey
Deep blinking confusion
Non-thought nonsense
The glimmer of who are you
And hopeful of a deeper well
Of cognition
You are who
Who are you
You are you
How do you do
Not too good
These days
Bless
Bless the shadow
The like of which inhabits me
Bless
Bless the blessed memories
The dreams of which possess me
Bless
Bless the man
The seed of whose being made me
The old man falters unbalanced on the edge
Still dancing on the dancing ledge
His canon defiant
His cannon silent now
And at the edge of the world
He drifts helpless
Over the eternal waterfall
With monsters
Me and all
[me and my Dad]
16 July 2010
I cannot lie
I cannot lie, I see him there,
death waits by without a care.
His rasping breath marks out his time
and I wish him dead
I cannot lie, I see his stare,
behind closed eyes his skull laid bare.
His stubbled face plays out the mime
and his life is bled
I cannot lie, I hear his prayer,
from deep within behind that glare.
His starving frame begins the climb
and his mind has fled
I cannot lie, I shape despair
to ease my pain I stroke his hair.
Beneath my hand his paradigm
and now his words unsaid
This time the lesson is for real
his ancient primer finally laid down.
I shut my eyes and try to feel
the syntax of his verb and noun.
I cannot lie, I know not where
to find him now I am his heir.
His very presence now sublime
a ghostly maidenhead.
2.1.12
Regeneration
The trunk is felled
we branches thrown to earth
are now the root.
The man that I once held
like as he held me from my birth
was resolute.
I saw him go
and heard the last drawn breath:
I bid farewell.
My fragile embryo
is now enfeebled by his death
his cell my cell.
My once child form
held strongly in his arms
in case I fell
was sheltered from the storm.
He was full watered with love's charms
from holy well.
I watched him die
and felt his wounded life
come grasp my soul.
I would it were some lie
that now confounded death's midwife
and left him whole,
but hope in vain.
This breathing is his last,
his frame now still.
I mould my burning pain
into the stillness of his cast
whose dream I fill.
Rick Birley
24.2.12
fragments
the mighty daytime gale becomes the night breeze
blows dust and debris from the floor
to cloud the fullness of my moon
becomes a passing breath
a gentle sigh too soon
calls death
heaves
lies still
breathes and breathes no more
through the twigs and branches of my trees
my dad
in shards of things he said
he did
he moved
he penned
he laughed
my dad
gave to me, now deep
within, organic in my dark
feeding my heart, light
my dad
shines on my footsteps
shades my voice and
sweeps my soul, bless
my dad
4.1.12
the mighty daytime gale becomes the night breeze
blows dust and debris from the floor
to cloud the fullness of my moon
becomes a passing breath
a gentle sigh too soon
calls death
heaves
lies still
breathes and breathes no more
through the twigs and branches of my trees
my dad
in shards of things he said
he did
he moved
he penned
he laughed
my dad
gave to me, now deep
within, organic in my dark
feeding my heart, light
my dad
shines on my footsteps
shades my voice and
sweeps my soul, bless
my dad
4.1.12
these fretted deeds....
which of these fretted deeds
that lend purpose to my soul
and vision to my heart
and in part and in whole
sustains and feeds
with priceless art
and fills my cluttered head
with tender sounds of glory
lending compass to my tread
and direction to my story
which, which fretted mark
will wither slowest on the posthumous stalk
and which will float in endless dark
and which will run, which walk, which talk
to those who are not yet here?
which others will move to weep
strangers born to some future sun
which of my present pain eke out their tear?
and which to lose, and which to keep
and who will take the pick
when all is literally said and done?
who and which and why and when
as carbon dust comes round again
and all that’s left is silent word and empty sound
who will choose those bits of me?
the bits that swam, or those that drowned?
with which small fretted deed
will those who are not yet, yet see
the soulless think of one now freed?
[the fretted deeds of rick…
… birley]
26.vi.09
Night's Canopy
Gazing at some distant star
so small, so slight, so delicate in light,
I feel the coldness of a blinded night
shiver my flesh. This thing so far,
so far, so delicate a sight,
is maybe as our own.
And as I blink, 'tis lost
amidst a blackness all alone,
pierced with tiny shining shards,
so many countless milliards
of living light embossed
with mysteriousness unknown.
20.ii.16
Gazing at some distant star
so small, so slight, so delicate in light,
I feel the coldness of a blinded night
shiver my flesh. This thing so far,
so far, so delicate a sight,
is maybe as our own.
And as I blink, 'tis lost
amidst a blackness all alone,
pierced with tiny shining shards,
so many countless milliards
of living light embossed
with mysteriousness unknown.
20.ii.16
Love
Love flows from its eternal spring
the stream becomes a river;
the water's torrent has its fling
and waterfalls deliver.
Such freshness endlessly renews
the body and the soul;
and hand in hand continues
to the vibrant ocean's whole.
Here ripples turn to waves,
and waves to tidal races
whose music fills my staves
with tuneful airs and graces,
which silently evaporate
into the azure sky;
to fall once more into the spate:
Love's spring will never die.
14 February 2011
the stream becomes a river;
the water's torrent has its fling
and waterfalls deliver.
Such freshness endlessly renews
the body and the soul;
and hand in hand continues
to the vibrant ocean's whole.
Here ripples turn to waves,
and waves to tidal races
whose music fills my staves
with tuneful airs and graces,
which silently evaporate
into the azure sky;
to fall once more into the spate:
Love's spring will never die.
14 February 2011
memories
my fragile memories are your fading dreams
these make the fabric of our world
flutter in the sunlit breeze
like sea that coruscates at dusk
before the beckoning darkness
of universal night
the very sun that wakes your day
wakes too my brittle dream
and spills its soul into
the vapour of my shallow breath
and the tracings of my stare
but through the dulled greyness
of eyes now weak and strained by looking
glimpse half-shadowed living figurines
play out these fragile memories
in song and dance and silent mime
deep inside the strumming sinews of my soul
my fragile memories fill my inner void
and gently strum the membranes
of my very self, my very inner self
which play out in the autumn gale
until the Winter freeze
binds them to the hard earth
in thin coatings of glistening light
see how your heavy footprints press
the precious glories of my frosted glaze
see how your sad feet journey through my past
and how their searching wakes the dream
my faded dreams are now your fragile souvenir
diluted into the thinness of my absent stare
which once you loved
I loved
I deamed
I lived
what was is gone
Silly stuff
We are such silly, minute stuff,
clinging to this spinning lump of clay.
My notes are writ, yet not enough
to comfort me.
The pains of each new day
are shared. But who will see
the unrecorded myths my muse
no longer yields to liquid song,
nor rhyme?
Enfeebled now, I somehow lose
that urgency, my very time,
that sense of who I am, where I belong,
I am so singularly remote.
That none cares
nor comprehends my stiff decline,
misinterpreting my stares
they know not if I sink, or float,
this chafes my soul. For love I pine;
just intuitive love
to fan the still warm coals
which heat the last few stanzas of my air.
When present push succumbs to final shove
and I am gone, then who is it unrolls
the tuneful legacy of me? My disrepair
the abstract coo of turtledove.
March 2015
Birthday poem for Sally
The tides flow in, the tides ebb out,
We celebrate another year,
In laughter, joy, we raise a mighty shout
For you, my love, so wonderfully dear.
And near the water's edge we dip our feet
To sense the heat or cold of what's to come:
The mysteries of the life we wait to meet,
The sights so incredulously dumb
With wonder; for these we wait,
Our blood quick coursing through our veins.
For, although none knows what Fate
Alone dictates, who holds the reins,
We can still swim against or with the tide,
And would not know what waters lie ahead
Beyond the spume blown crest. May I confide
With you, my love, that I, when all is said
And gone, will love you 'till I die,
My breathless calling is the sea-bird's cry.
17.ii.16
My father's face
[i] 27.v.15
Such stillness, such straining silence,
such gentle sun rising through the mists
of my awoken soul,
ascending with the lark
to the warm-remembered dreams
of supernatural child,
held in time's embrace,
reflected in the wild laughter
of my father's face.
I hear his voice, and suddenly rejoice
as there across the table in that chair
his eyes meet mine.
And in the blinking of his whiskered eye
his impish smile imparts the gift
of his enduring love.
And my heart sings with the lark,
up there, above.
[ii] 27.v.15
My dad rose early with the sun
and descended daily to the rocks
below the house.
Without least element of fun
he dives straight in! And flocks
of oystercatchers take flight
below the house,
wondering, surely wondering
at the sight.
For brief while beneath the waves
my dad is gone.
But reappears! - and from the caves
burst forth rock doves in wild alarm.
In urgent flight they disappear.
And in my mind I still can hear
my dad returning from his swim.
I am not now the half of him....
[iii] 27.v.15
I never knew the child
my father oncetime was.
I never saw his boyhood face,
nor heard the treble of his voice.
Yet in the stillness of this place,
this hallowed house,
this ghost-filled holy space,
why, here I am that child,
the son I oncetime was.
I feel once more the freshness of my face,
and hear again my little childhood voice
raised in laughter,
innocent and free.
The child my father oncetime was
is me. The groaning age
is only what dull strangers see!
[iv] 28.v.15
There came a day, a slate-grey day,
when light grew light
without the morning sun.
No larks rose, no songs begun,
no flight to heaven as only a skylark may.
No oystercatchers probing in the bay,
and no choughs
grubbing in the clay.
No swifts slicing through the dampened air
with scything wings. No 'daws
riding high the clifftop drafts
with skillful flair.
No noisy rooks, nor black crows' raucous caws.
The day stood still and waited.
Thus came this day, ill-fated.
On the rocks again, my dad,
those rocks below the house.
Now vacantly insane, quite mad,
he dived once more and vanished
from my sight
into that dark that is forever night.
Such stillness, such eternal silence
in my house above those rocks,
those rocks below the house
from which my father leapt.
Yet in this aching stillness,
my senses sharpened by the night,
I feel and touch his presense
still.
In this house above the rocks
where I such anguished tears have wept
I see him in the blindness of my sight
as I, my father's lonely child,
have lonely vigil kept.
Once more he blinks his whiskered eye,
once more his impish grin imparts
the gift of his empowering love,
and my heart sings, again,
my soul rides high
with morning lark,
so high up there in dazzling blue above.
[Cae Rhedyn - end of May 2015]
Her father's ghost
She is her father's ghost,
for he was in this very place
where she is now.
She is in her father's space,
he was and is her very host -
she knows not how.
In the noisy stillness of this rain-soaked night,
where thundering darkness blinds her feeble sight,
she sees his weathered face.
and the mischief in his eye
coruscating sparks of silver sea-cloaked light,
each flash a memoried trace
of frozen heat that passes by, strumming
the chilled and tender membranes of her soul
and out of sight, gently humming.
She is in her father's ghost,
she is in this very place
where he is now.
She is her father's space
and now he is her very host -
she knows it now.
31/7 - 2/8 2016 (Cae Rhedyn)
She is her father's ghost,
for he was in this very place
where she is now.
She is in her father's space,
he was and is her very host -
she knows not how.
In the noisy stillness of this rain-soaked night,
where thundering darkness blinds her feeble sight,
she sees his weathered face.
and the mischief in his eye
coruscating sparks of silver sea-cloaked light,
each flash a memoried trace
of frozen heat that passes by, strumming
the chilled and tender membranes of her soul
and out of sight, gently humming.
She is in her father's ghost,
she is in this very place
where he is now.
She is her father's space
and now he is her very host -
she knows it now.
31/7 - 2/8 2016 (Cae Rhedyn)
The English Schoolmaster in China
(apologies to Oliver Goldsmith)
Beside yon Chinese Wall that skirts the way
With border'd parapets keeping all at bay,
There, in oriental mansion, skill'd to rule,
The English Master drills his little school;
A man laid back he is, and tall to view,
I know him well, the Chinese students too;
Well have the slumbering backrow learn'd to trace
The day's translating in his morning face;
Full well they laugh with adulatory glee,
At all his jokes, for many a joke has he:
Full well the chinese whisper, circling round,
Conveys the pain of baijiu that he'd down'd:
Yet he is kind; or if severe in aught,
The love he bares to learning is in fault.
The Natives all declare it [but in Wu];
'Tis certain he can write. And sporting too:
Grids he can measure, trivial pursuits presage,
And e'en the story runs he is a Sage.
In arguing too, the Chinese own his skill,
For e'en though vanquish'd he can argue still;
While words of learned length and thund'ring sound
Amaze the gazing students rang'd around;
When Ben said "Fuck" t'was meant as 'kung-ho' praise,
This English mandarin for sure continues to amaze.
And still they gaze and still the wonder grows,
That one small head can carry all he knows.
Rick
7.xii.10
The grumpy old man
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Has captured time
In well-rehearsed and
Regular trembling
Each movement marking its painful passage
To the blackness
Of a think-free night
Of a dreamless void
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Laughs silently now
In disowned mirth
Each soft guffaw
Pulsed with shaking
Laced with timorous tears
And fears of lone
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Feels his aching limbs
And feeble gait
And slumps and slumps
Under the crushing
Expectation
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Cries silently
Love love he cries
Cling to love
Still he cries
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Sighs without
Breath he sighs
With clayed breath
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Of life
Of death
Lies
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Trembles
Still
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Weeps
No more
The grumpy old man
With the claustrophobic pictures
Was a father once
No more
Rick Birley
2008
Finca Fever
(with apologies to John Masefield)
I must across the road to Finca again, as the time for a coffee draws nigh,
And all I ask is a cup of the best, and some bars from next door's wi-fi,
And the caffeine's kick and the CD's song and the white cup's shaking,
And a warm smile on the Don's face and a Ricchiato making.
I must cross the road to Finca again, for the call of the other side
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
All I ask is a double shot with the white froth lying,
And the choc'late spray and the silver spoon, and my taste buds sighing.
I must cross the road to Finca again, to the fragrant coffee life,
To the Don's way and the Marti's way where the wit's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And some cake or some toast to go with the roast, and cold water to drink when it's over.
RB 28.10.14
