Sacred Love
Sacred Love Once I dreamt that I was a photon travelling from the sun to the earth and being drawn into a green leaf. How happy I was to be passed along a membrane in a thylakoid from one phospholipid to another; a heavenly chain in a chloroplast. The mechanism was divine. I was ecstatic […]
Night Fishing
In the obscure dark of night river, poised on rock, the shag preens itself; head tilts this way and that, beak catches gold from a streetlamp.
Candle-power
Candle-power Strike a match, flares into flame. Light the wick, glows into life. Illuminates our faces, gleams in our eyes. Gilded within our magic circle. But a spell with a strict time limit. Even Cinderella’s expired at midnight. Reduced to a stub, gutters and dies. A wisp of smoke in a pool of wax.
All Souls
i Starlings rumble the morning; dark clouds constantly moving. Wren mute with their bantering. They are potent. I breathe and think of friends who walk softly beside me even though they are dead. ii Your light kindles my light and my light kindles another and suddenly the darkness is ablaze with lamps of gold.
January 2017 Challenge
In these short days (but getting longer, hurrah) here’s a poem by David Morley about light. More specifically, artificial light: http://www.poetryarchive.org/poem/way And here’s a completely different view of light from Dannie Abse: http://www.poetryarchive.org/poem/o-taste-and-see Artificial, natural or imagined – Light.
It always starts with a trickle;
a drip from the gutter, a splash from a road puddle. droplets cluster and procreate; a lake ripples over grass. Waves froth and rise up; crunch pebbles and bones. Water floods in from above. A dream re-stitched and recycled. Torpedo slashed the old packet. Empty eyes passed him in the water. Ocean filled the radio […]
Voodoo
Voodoo Inscrutable presence the red and black mask on our wall. You can sense ancient wisdom within the curve of its brow. Eye holes dark voids through which it watches what’s going on. Shell earrings dangling on both sides pick up every sound. Slab of a nose all the better to sniff things out. Finely […]
December Challenge 2016
Here’s a poem by Les Murray… He introduces it by saying “I keep a picture of my favourite phobia on the door of my study. It’s a fear of a road with a drop on one side, a corniche. And this poem is taken from that picture – it’s called ‘The Annals of Sheer’.” […]
Cat and mouse
Cat and mouse Sun bed, shorts, sun cream. Another chance to top up his tan. A cloud smothers the sun. Temperature plummets. Sticks it out as long as he can. Finally, pulls on his sweater. As if on cue, the sun re-emerges. Hotter than ever. All morning: sweater off, sun in. Sweater back on, sun […]
Habit
Every time a charity bag is posted through my letterbox I think ‘this time I’ll let it go’ But then I stroke its fine velour, admire the red silk lining of its jacket take it out to dust it down, put it back and close the wardrobe doors again. I cannot bear to let it […]