A Charmed Life
When very young,
life was a fairy-tale.
Magic abounded.
But there were dark corners,
harbouring hobgoblins which pursued
and persecuted,
even into dreams.
Nightmares grew.
But then sun glinted on water
and stars sang
and life was a poem in glowing runes,
that predicted great things.
Then came the popular songs,
so intense,
bare-flaying emotions and nailing them out
in the wind’s way.
Or beautiful,
promising love and revealing enchantment
in a friend’s face, or the glance of a stranger.
Next was the passage of hard prose,
concerned with facts and figures,
defined by shopping lists,
enlivened by slogans
which imposed a sense of rhythm.
Later,
popular songs were replayed,
sounding from shadows where ghosts were.
The shadows frame the light
and sometimes,
most unexpectedly,
the sun glints on water
or the stars sing
and life is a poem again
revealing magic in a friend’s face
or even the glance of a perfect stranger.
05/02/2009
Still Life
My memory creates the glow,
paints in the shadows.
Masses of green and blue
emerge from an unfocused mist,
darken and seek shape.
Light splinters through branches,
scatters on the ground
like silver leaves.
Light, shadows, colours move,
kaleidoscoping on the mind’s canvas,
blur iridescently
then stay.
No future is suggested here.
A still life.
Life
still
in a silent summer,
sounds dumbed by distance
- time.
I have found the purpose,
made the form,
the reality, which is you.
The negative space defines you,
positive,
eternal,
not ageing but being.
17/09/2006
