Mother

You are stronger

Than the bay that is beaten

All day and all night, you

Are cleaner and brighter than

The cool fragments of matter

That cake round our toes,

Softly absorbing their heat.

 

You are wiser

Than the ache of oak creaking

As the bark is baked, you

Are livelier at heart than

The leaves that crackle round

The edges of the hazels,

Crisping autumn into nuts.

 

You are kinder

Than the caves that are hidden

Away from cats who play catch,

Safe nesting for runny eggs

Impatient to hatch wet wings,

Your ledges echo with the

Quiet drop of Peace on stone.

 

You are better

Than the ravens at keeping

Watch lifelong through the

Woe and the weather, the

Sheets of fog and the pain, your

Sweet call is the plain truth

That feeds hope through to your young.

 

Thank you.

Saint Valentine

Good, glorious, unashamedly

Victorious in joy day in

Joy night in sight of the

Way, inspired by the light

Riding cupped in the

Knowledge of Love from

The outside in and the inside

Out, the rivulets running round

The heart and trickling down to

Soul to fill it up pleasantly, coolly

Calmly with a lake that will last

A thousand years and watch

Stalactites congregate in the

Caverns above, jewelling the ceiling

In unimagined decadence, imagined

Into real, as light and clear as the

Sound of each new drop topping

Up the lake that feeds the well of

The world that is me and the time

That is mine to drink at my leisure,

No need for thirst. Thanks be to thee,

Wide Universe.

　

　

A Man Trapped, Now, Outside

Dew drops came

Thick, sticky

Things in the mist,

Gone as soon as

Seen, washed

In the morning rain.

Inside,

His sorrow bled his

Soul and gauged

The pupils deeper

Through his eyes,

Bored through brain.

Pain pools welled

Round these holes,

And bounced

The light back, blue,

Ungrateful at the

Interrupted shade.

Thoughts welled up

Inside his head,

Of loved ones

Crudely detached,

Cords severed,

Mid-flight.

The restaurant

Dimmed, she,

Opposite, receded

Into Silence, as

The Past caved

In, confining him

To Memory’s passages,

Flickering, beckoning,

Grim.

Occasionally, sounds,

From above,

Outside the cave,

Her voice, something

Trivial, no guidance

Through these tunnels,

Only proof of Present

Beyond his prison,

Past.

　

Neanderthal Hero

 

An inlet four foot wide

Was made inside

A cave,

Dug out from coal

Black granite,

Hard as hail

Stones against slate tile.

 

For days he carved

And Hacked, blush

Sweat it dripped

Between the cracks

And creatures

Of the floor:

Dull bats dislocated

And snakes woken ,

Sensing strangers.

 

Soft down the road

Came she, to see

What he had done

Where hewn, the

Niche that he

Had made-

No spade or

Trowel, bare handed

He’d shovelled

Out the nook

For her to use,

A perch rescue

From the snakes

Bats and cracks

With whom they shared the cave.

 

[July 31^st 2009:]