Month: July 2014

Imagine A Hug

Imagine, if you will, for a moment,

Soft feathers alight on your heart,

Like a balm to skin when it’s broken,

Soothing, by touch, to impart.

 

Imagine their strokes, almost fleeting,

Whispers of breeze blown within,

Tendering comfort and easing

Scalded and blistered of skin.

 

Imagine a cloak made of feathers,

Down of the fluffiest fleece,

Enfolding and holding together,

Protecting and giving you peace.

 

Imagine a hug made from heaven,

Lined by all angel wings,

Inviting, with arms always open,

Embracing relief that it brings.

I’ll be on the ferry by now, off to Ireland for a week or so for a family holiday. I’ve been rushing around like a maddy getting bits and pieces organised so my reading has been scant at best. This is the only post I have scheduled and I’m going to have a break away from all things techy – well apart from my kindle and maybe my phone! Hugs to all you lovely people and see you on my return, God willing.x

Inhale The Heights

Now, I’m actually fine, so no smart-arsed comments about losing the plot. I had a wee conversation in the comments section with John over at JMC813. He wrote a fabulous poem called Silent Scream which rather put me in mind of a time I wanted to…well, never mind what. If you want to know, visit John’s. It’s all there in the comments.

Unspeak the words.

Unwrite.

Return to underground passages,

cavern deep,

where echoes scream

for certifiable silence.

quieten then

voice

into

nothing.

No asylum

in complacent,

knowing

nods.

But fear and terror

where madness breeds

among misunderstood.

So write then.

Speak the words.

Climb to the mountains,

unstrangle the scream,

heavy air freed

to thinning ether.

Inhale the heights,

expunging darkness

with light.

First Meal of the Day

Up since five a.m. today exploring

others’ words.

Your dreams and hopes, fears and tears,

stirred into my coffee.

I take it black,

unsweetened,

not bitter.

I drink it down in earnest

appreciation of the full flavour,

picked and gathered

from plants

nurtured

around the globe.

Each bean picked

to give a mix

flavoursome

to my palate.

I inhale from leaves too.

First meal of the day.

Two drugs

with the words

makes three.

Nicotine and caffeine

coursing through

bloodstream

with words fed onto pages.

Sad words,

hopeful words,

words that speak of deepest feelings and thoughts.

They touch me.

Nourishment

swallowed and inhaled

with coffee

and cigarettes.

And appreciated.

Addictive manna,

nectar to my needs.

Nicotine,

coffee

and soul connections.

I rinse my mug, stub out my cigarette, close my kindle and begin my day.

It’s almost seven now.

Two hours of addiction satisfied.

But they will invite me back

for lunch.

‘No’ to Arrested Development

See how she sits in her high chair,

Obedient child to the last,

See how she sups up her porridge,

Flavoured with history past.

 

See how she spits out the spoonful,

Proferred by patronage hand,

See how she picks up her own now,

Infancy making a stand.

 

See how she learns from endeavour,

As natural an act as can be,

See how she grows to an adult,

Independent, self-nourished and free.

 

See how some children, retarded

By parents who will not let go,

Develop arrested behaviours,

Damaged by some who don’t know

 

That nothing is worth being stuck there,

Harnessed in chair like a child.

It breaks under pressure from fairy tales,

Sometimes we’re born to be wild.

 

Wild as the woad on our faces

When history wrote out our path,

But timing is now, and with courage,

Freedom not given, we grasp

 

The spoon from the parent who knows not

A whit of development’s way.

Our children are free as a nation, come

September 18th, ‘Yes!’, Independence Day.

Matins’ Bell

‘I’m tired now’, he said, by light of darkness,

mumbled into night his waking thoughts,

a plaintive sort of fatigued exaltation,

no defeat but crushed by earthly knocks.

A glimmer in the darkness listened keenly,

spluttered into life to ease his pain,

descended on his forehead as he struggled

pasting joys in desiccated pains.

In dreams he saw a dancer up above him,

then dancing on the parquet floor of hairless pate

and, in the gentle tapping of her footsteps,

he traversed back in time through all life’s gates.

To childhood days that merged with church’s bell ring

and infant hands so soft within his grasp,

sunshine holidays and harder times when

they’d pulled in belts and wondered if, perhaps,

the work and want, the endless, restless passage,

fraught with cares and doing all he could

were worth the love of all that gathered round him.

He sighed in sleep and smiled at all the good.

The dancer danced and then lay flat upon him,

impressed herself, as light, into his mind,

bestowed the recollected visions of his voyage

and whispered tunes he’d carried deep inside.

His breathing eased and slowed to mellow movements,

shallow sighs belied the deeper well,

exchange of life, the price became apparent,

sleep on in peace or ring aged matins bell.

Light maintained its presence in his mindset,

centred on his soul when he awoke,

he smiled at love that lay asleep beside him

and whispered thanks to angels when they spoke.

Reunion

Cry gently, my love, in parting,

loud tears mar the time we shared as one.

 Weep softly, to music,

errant chords plucked at only just begun.

Tread lightly, my sweetness,

fragile heart may break at one more tap.

Embalm me, my angel,

fly to me, wing’d aura be your guiding map.

 Know nothing need part us,

no distance, time, nor space created in between.

 Be ready, alert to

my sighs arising, soft slowness pitched to keen.

 Stand steady, my fortress,

strength of Everest to your scaling feet.

Awaken my dreaming,

shift silken drapes, in dawn’s rays we meet.

 

 

In The Cloisters

One of my nieces graduated yesterday from Glasgow University, a beautiful young woman now independent from the hallowed halls of a structure of sublime architecture. My camera phone does not do the cloisters justice but I hope my words may. There were tears of pride and happiness as the 100 or so new graduates from the Veterinary School took their Hippocratic Oath and tears of familial love as the sworn-in veterinarians applauded their family and those who had guided their path for their five years of study. It was very moving. I slept for 10 hours straight when I came home!

 

The cloisters

 

Under shelter’d walkway ’round the courtyard of my soul,

In custom-built protection I may stroll

Some time or two, meandering in seclusion,

In contemplating fragments of the whole.

 

Colonnades supporting covered arches, portico to all that lies beyond,

Finger’d thoughts meander deftly, softly, touching swaying ferns and synapse’d fronds,

Face uplifted to the filter’d breezes,

Spirit sails on sun-streaked golden pond.

 

Arcade where columns peak to vaulted vantage, background buzz of bees and dulcet drone,

Nestled hemisphere of hermit’s haven, causes sought beneath a hallow’d dome

Where intersections advocate for essence,

Intercede and plead my way back home.

 

In teardrops’ rain a moment of calm capture, the briefest sort of pleasant reverie,

Infused prayer, exhaled from central solstice, length of one, eternal brevity,

Whose hush of rapid rapture leaves me breathless,

Gasping for source-poured liquidity.

 

In quiet cloisters fit for pensive purpose, open galleries portray their ancient frames,

Past and present catch up to the future, in cathedral’s mind where echoes may be tamed,

Till tumult teems again ‘mid errant pedestrian,

But solace sought in silent space still reigns.

 

Rebecca’s graduation coincided with her dad’s – my brother –  34 years ago and the Independence Day celebrated by Americans everywhere. I hope your day of gratitude for liberation was as special as that of my niece’s. I hope your future shines from cloistered thought.