Thursday, December 31, 2015

Course


Yet we the fighting pacifists
Struggle for calm in the swell
It is the way we are defined
We did not make the world
Nor induce sadness upon it
Sleep now and wonder no more
To where the river may flow
We will sail its fluid course
Sail along the gentler in hope
For see how it slows in force
The mountains are long behind us
Gone the swift streams
Waterfall tumbling to memories
And only the sea awaits us now
But ere we go to its briny vastness
Let us feel sun upon us once again
This is not yet our time to sloth
We must gaze all about us
See sunrise ascend behind us
Follow its path over blue skies
And then sink into night
For the lady of the heavens comes
And we remember everything
As we unfold along this fluid way
And we were not misled
For hope is the salve of man
And see the solace of New Year
That comes like fresh rain
To water our self-belief
And make a better river
For those to come after




Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Increase


Our days rise again
The clock of instance slips forward
We ascend a time of increase
While the southern globe dims
And as their days fade like spent insight
Our famine of brightness ends
Above the equator
It is a globe of two half's
One rises; one falls
Symmetry in opposition
It is perfection
And we call it a chaos
And if this is chance
I would not wager
Upon its odds
When green flames
Spring out kindling
Thinking it is spring

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

Shapes


And then there were none
But their shadows linger
Dance upon the corona
Of the depthless greyness  
Whispers of troubled instance
Empty souls without form
Lost to resonance and sight
But they walk among us again
Reanimate as ghastly shapes
Supernatural marching soldiers
Across the plains of existence
Searching for forgiveness
Or new battles with destiny
They come as unwelcome guests
To disturb dogs* and sleep
They watch us for weakness
From the shadowed corners
And they come only in winter
When the dark holds sway

* I wrote this last night because the dog came running upstairs, jumped on the bed and after waking me up began staring into a corner of the room whimpering. It was all a bit unsettling so I picked up my pad and jotted down my thoughts whilst calming the dog. Perhaps dogs sense things we cannot, but in the end I went downstairs and let him out. Because to a dog a call of nature is more important than any ghost. I swear if he became any cleverer he would install a bell and ring it for me to come.

Monday, December 28, 2015

Flood


We are breached; undone by abundant time
And we live so briefly we are apt to forget
Nothing pulls us back from significance
From our science we belittle point of nuance
Upon the noxious produce of our endeavours
The ice was freed from its polar servitude
It now warms its vapours with disdain
And we still call it elemental aberration
This water unleashed quenching the fire of man
But if mother earth sheds but even one tear
We are besieged for a hundred years
In soft, fluid eulogies of chance made real
And all waters drain and run to the sea
And still this is not yet accounted disaster
For this is no great flood we see here yet
Tis but hypothesis that dared speak its name
That our mother earth is no puppet in man's show
If this is chance who would wager now on its odds

Thursday, December 24, 2015

Christmas


Holly wreathes and smokey fires
Carillons ring from sleeping spires
Santa's stand upon every square
Turkeys roast with meat to spare
Ivy garlands drape every wall
Mistletoe hangs within the hall  
Santa wakes and takes his sleigh
Makes the whole night bright as day
Reindeers fly upon the nights chill
While chimneys cool and houses still
Candles at windows at close of day
Everybody waits for Christmas day
For now there is a joy upon the air
Soon is Christmas; a hope we share





Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Winter Spider


Where are the snows?
Iced recoating of a world to white
Upon the muddy grass of solstice
Where are the greedy frosts?
That bite upon our fingers
With sharp fangs of chill
Winter spiders in white spun webs
You are late in approaching
But you will arrive nonetheless
Till the rains of spring come
With lemon tears that fizz
Upon this sugared winter

Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Dreams


And I take my leave of day
Close my eyes and senses
Retire to vales of languor
Where only thought prospers
Or if it does not; it ought
This is a world new as birth
Amplified nuances of perception
Swans upon water still as dawn
Gliding white guides across oceans
Images reflected in infinity mirrors
Endless and ever decreasing
Clowns and spiders in shadowy corner
Dragons that blaze upon tempests
While wizards and elves come for aid
The world of nightmares may await
Or the joy of a first love undimmed
And time is lost to sleeps command
And where do we go in our small death
This world none recall or explore
Where its duration is but a heartbeat
Or as long as the age of the world
In the static of a dreamless night

Sunday, December 20, 2015

Signs



Ancient glazed, unmoving glaciers
Glassy sheets greeting frosty mornings
But see the illustration winter paints
Watercolours of undiscovered dreams
Ice delineates of crystal ferns and flowers
Opaque and mysterious as imagination
And I see a veined story unfold intact
It is my story on my windows with my rules
And then the sun rises and they are gone
But I see the signs and then I see the world
The whole of the world that waits outside
Locked inside the thorny maze of midwinter
The robin nestles deep in the holly watching
Red breast and glad song amid scarlet berry
It sings of spring and waits in anticipation
And see the lustrous trails of auburn rainbows
Autumn leaves wind and seething rain claimed
Thrown down as leafy meanders to lie on hardness
Glimmering jewels burnished into imaginings
Aerial lawns brought low to earth in repayment
For all that has grown before this Christmas Eve
And we; we are like old logs hazing and sparking
Till they still and ember slow in the dust of change
And yet we see always our hopes reborn in the flames
Glimpsed like anticipation and renewed as a phoenix
And we may burn anew in wonder for a coming year
For Christmas is coming close and we see atonement

Thursday, December 17, 2015

Believe


People can be made to believe in anything
Except themselves
Tenderness is at odds with rage
We are conquered first
And only then do we see it all divided
Fragility is the price of our compassion  
We are made well till we are undone

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Story


So comes the new story
And you will write it
I lay down my pen
Its ink is now all but dry
Write for the soul
Never for the money
A body at ease flounders
Think only of other wonders
The pen is not mighty as the sword
But it is every bit as sharp
We are the wielder of a weapon
Warriors ennobled with words
Frères of the oppressed
Or guardians of dictators
And what we carve upon minds
May change the world to good
One wondrous letter at a time

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Past


Why do we worry so much?
About the future
About the present
But never the past
To never learn, nor slow
We should learn to walk
Upon a slow path of peace
Then wherever we may go
We will be content
And history can sleep
Without this constant waking
From the dreams of yesterday

Monday, December 14, 2015

Climate


But the womb of mans progress
Breaks its waters upon us
Utopia labours upon our greed
And so it delivers of its progeny
And comes an infant swaddled in sorrow
The fertility of the earth is failing
By the industry of its children
This unquenchable population of man
And all the midwives panic
As they huddle around a Parisian bed
But still a concord they name it
And hope with it the earth can be saved

Saturday, December 12, 2015

Present


There is one present left
It is still under the tree
And I wrapped it myself
It is a very special gift to me
I know exactly what's inside
I placed it in there with care
It is all my dreams and fears
That is lovingly boxed in there
Dreams of everlasting peace
A world where we all are free
Where only love matters, not who
That is what Christmas means to me
But for now it is only a dream
Even if I wish it to be true
I'll keep it one more year and hope
For a better world for me and you
I hope and pray it will all be ok
But life's unfair with no simple way
Some thrive on conflicts and exploitation
For them Christmas is just another day

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Light


It started off first with a little tree
Then garland and wreath for all to see
Simple decorations as in days of yore
But humans; well, they always want more
So then the neighbours began a race
Now the lights are seen in outer space
A manmade object of brightest light
Strong enough to disturb the Martians night
It is a wonder they plan to visit en masse
For even they feel the power of Christmas

Monday, December 07, 2015

Outside


And I would sleep again outdoors
When night is shot into the day
The loosed arrow from sunsets bow
But where may I sleep now?
Except under a forest of bones
Sylvan bodies flayed by the wind
Stripped clean in these fading days
I would lie upon the sloughed skin
While the winter moon hides
And only the owl watches and asks
"Prince where doth thy go?"
To reply, "I go to remember summer"
Though it be halfway across the world
And under bony canopy wait its return
And thus I will dream evermore
In earnest of all the promises
A world makes to us at this eternal sleep
Even though I should not wake again

Thursday, December 03, 2015

Cadence


Overexposed in a cadence of failure
Is a soft inflection I could be wrong
It creeps into this slowing wheel
Penetrates a soft serenity of a comfort
Comes the idea things are still possible
And time; unwelcome guest, now begone
Calm you temper with no brutish logic
Upon the stretched nights cast to frost
And paint me instead a picture of hope
Weak images merging light and shade
The irresolute focus of every dream
Smear oil on life's canvas into spheres
Rolling stones stopping among the moss
And see how much may cling upon us now
Once we are content with inevitability
Life is unfair; but not as unfair as death*
 
*William Goldman

Tuesday, December 01, 2015

Rhyme


To make our words chime
We try to write in rhyme
But please tell me why we feed
This childish, syllable need
Make end sounds match
With poetical roofs of airy thatch
For to me it seems quite absurd
Harmonising each end word

Or this Twitter version

End sound match
Crow in airy thatch
When writing rhyme
Our words chime
We feed
A infant need
But it seems quite absurd
Rhyming each end word