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SONNETS
I
What matter that I work from nine to five
Then, weary, come home to an evening's toil?
Some say: Be glad! Be glad to be alive!
Be glad you're here and not beneath the soil!
For is it yours, they say, to reason why?
And is it fair to prosper, while some wail?
Damn right it is, I say with angry eye
When into insignificance I pale.
A few will have success to be their bride;
A few will show the way, will be there first.
And what of other men, are they denied?
For ever doomed to hunger, doomed to thirst?
Nay, trees that flourish feed the soil about,
So smaller plants beneath can blossom out.
(19.10.76)
II TO THE MEMORY OF C S FORESTER
A great debate, on Luck, is in full swing,
And mindless fools with words are parrying,
"I am a lucky man, I win at cards,"
The gambler doth declare with careful words.
"Good fortune smiles on other men, not me,"
The pessimist replies, almost with glee.
The optimist says softly, with a smile,
"The Lady Luck I know how to beguile."
There's talk of black cats, seeing moons thru' glass,
Or walking under ladders, bold as brass.
But, failing to define the rules of fate,
For someone else to speak they all await:
"The lucky man," the wise man doth announce,
"Is he who knows how much to leave to chance."
(6.1.77)
III ON DRINKING AND DRIVING
Consider you a motorist who drank
And, once upon the road, ran down a child.
Imprisonment ensued, and there he sank
Into remorse, and shunned by all the world.
Months later, now he's free, he goes back home,
Where those who were his friends now turn away
In rightful condemnation, to a man,
Of what he did that awful summer's day.
He tries to start his life again, fulfil
Ambitions, maybe even think of love,
But whispers in the street come to him still -
There, that's the beastly swine who drank and drove.
It is no use his leaving, for he knows
He'll take his hell with him, where'er he goes.
(6.1.77)
IV
April she comes and goes, and May as quick,
And wetly follows June to find me ailed,
And thinking of days past, when I was sick,
That into insignificance have paled.
My present sad demise is stemmed from lack
Of knowing where to go, or which route take;
Of pausing, wondering if to go back
Is unpropitious. My foundations shake.
Many things do I which slow my purpose,
And other things do I which rake my health,
They drain me like some dam across a course,
But they cannot be solved by wit or stealth.
I would not be different in my brain,
But would I had my life over again.
(19.6.77)
V TO A PRIEST
I have as much faith in men from 'out there'
As you have in the God you hold most dear;
If they are advanced, we know they care,
And therefore we have not a thing to fear.
For aeons, men have looked up at the stars
And wondered if we were the only ones,
Yet we can see those distant, lit cigars
Which are more than a hundred thousand suns.
If we are here, then why not life elsewhere?
Are we so arrogant to think that we
Alone are chosen by some mystic flair
From one of a billion galaxies?
If God exists then he is Time itself,
Not effigies which sit upon a shelf.
(29.8.78)
VI ATTEMPT TO DESCRIBE THE MATURITY
OF MANKIND
Gurgling baby, clambering up the cot,
Giggling toddler, climbing all over what
He's not supposed to. Laughing youth, wild hair,
Building a tree house, castle in the air.
Student designing buildings, driving cars,
Lover, seeking destiny in the stars.
Young man, scaling mountains, conquering all,
Learning to fly, and the joy of free-fall.
Engineers, building silver, sleek spacecraft,
Minds no longer on the Earth, but aloft.
From cradle to maturity, we strive
Like chicks, to leave this Earthly nest, alive.
Mankind is adult now, and he must leave -
Leave this old Mother Earth, alone, to grieve.
(11.9.78)
VII SECOND ATTEMPT TO DESCRIBE THE MATURITY OF MANKIND
Ancient man, like the infant, looks on high,
Wondering what it means; who made the stars.
Modern man, charting the worlds in the sky,
Wondering: when will we stand upon Mars?
Mankind grows, matures at gradual pace,
Ever struggling upward - first the steep stairs,
Then the tree, then the rugged, cold cliff face,
Then the air, gliding, flying, losing cares.
But men still fight like children, play with knives,
And they still play with matches, and get burned,
But ever outward gaze and spend their lives
Shunning the world which taught them all they learned.
But what more natural desire than this -
To give the nest - the Earth - a goodbye kiss?
(11.9.78)
VIII BEAUTY
Beauty, it is said, is no true story,
Just the way the light reflects in moments
Of meditation. All the sun's glory
May illuminate it, but it laments
Beauty without a human being's eye
To deem it thus. Such is the way of things.
But things themselves if seen or no by I -
The rock, the bold flower, the bird that sings
Exist, are real, and in no way are false,
Despite subjective reasons which may claim
That, as the rough is not unlike the coarse,
So beauty and truth are one and the same.
But, though no truth in beauty is there seen,
Beauteousness in truth there's always been.
(11.12.79)
IX AFTER SAMUEL BUTLER
Things are not what they seem, you've heard it said -
Poems, like music, should be heard, not read;
It is not talent upon which art feeds
But energy, and nothing else it needs.
Face value is dangerous, we well know,
And yet where we look is the way we go;
Our world is in numbers, our lives in fear
From the horrors we see or bad news hear,
And still we look outward for the answer,
When it's here in our breasts like slow cancer.
Things are not what they seem, so look again
At the contents, and not the price or name,
For a hen is only, to tell I beg,
An egg's way of making another egg.
(11.12.79)
X
Nothing kills dignity quicker than pain,
Nothing's more boring than leisure, to some;
In an optimist's eye, flowers like rain,
To pessimists, there's a soaking to come.
Contradictions abound in this strange world,
Progress happens without people, I know;
As the facts of life are slowly unfurled
We pay censors to read them, row by row.
In Rome, we must do as the Romans do -
We relate as we want others to see,
And all this comes back to me and to you,
When natural we want our lives to be.
So come all ye faithful, give it a try,
Bathe in a day or two's sweet honesty.
(11.12.79)
XI
Love is not blind; that lack is in our eyes.
Love sees all, knows no boundaries or skies.
Love comes to those who ask for love by name,
And only those who ask can feel its flame.
Only mankind it is who made up rules
To say that love is blind, or fit for fools;
Only people liken love to flowers,
Or blame love for the passage of the hours;
Only people say to love is divine
And love for life, with them oh yes, that's fine,
But then they say to err is human, too,
So I can't love anyone else but you.
And yet love feeds on love, that much is known,
Like crops which on last year's stubble are grown.
So why not love as love was meant to be -
Clean, compassionate, for all, and for free.
(19.12.79)
XII
I don't believe in heaven or in hell;
I don't expect to live after I die;
My maker was the Earth and I know well
That on my end in dust you can rely.
Now, on that pedestal of awful fact -
The truth that this one life is all we have -
I can begin to plan and then to act
Without a single need for me to brave
The abyss of despair to help my friends,
Or lend a hand to strangers in a mess.
So why do them then? Not for my own ends -
There is no God who I need to impress!
I do them for the gratitude that knows
The smile is ten times sweeter than the rose.
(11.1.80)
XIII
Love is a story, waiting to come true,
Waiting to give, and to receive anew,
Saying au revoir, but never adieu.
(When August hears the cuckoo's plaintive note
Or July sees the jasmine's yellow coat,
Then will I cease to love you so, he wrote.)
Love cares nothing for character, or state,
None too remote, no creed inviolate
When love's chariot flies, steered by blind fate.
(Though she may never know he loves her smile,
Her eyes, and all her airs which so beguile
Him, he knows nothing can his love defile.)
Love, as we are oft reminded, is free,
But love and loving worlds apart can be.
(14.2.80)
XIV MUSIC OF THE SPHERE
The plink of rain into a silver pool;
The song of the thrush, clearly in the cool
Air after the storm; the chirping cricket;
The mild bee, droning in the gorse thicket.
When the day dies, and the splendid sun yields
And night, like rain, makes black pools in the fields
The owl, from a dead elm, hoots once, twice - stops,
Awaits the ghostly answer from the copse.
Far off, 'neath white cliffs, waves are restless, too,
Embroidering with white the endless blue,
Murmuring, whispering, until the dawn
Breaks to the lark, our unfailing alarm.
Hear the music of this silver sphere - Earth -
More than a hundred thousand Steinways' worth.
(26.3.80)
XV GOODBYE WATERLOO
Goodbye Waterloo, your grimy blocks tell
Of a past where men suffered living hell
To bring up the carbon that smokes so well.
Diddle diddle dee, the rhythm is set,
I can see the Post Office tower yet,
And the snake winds on with me in its gut.
It has two heads, this metallic mamba,
A face at each end, colour of amber,
One with a brain, the other in slumber.
I see rows of houses with lace-lidded eyes,
A thicket, a field, and to my surprise,
Some trees don't yet have their summer disguise.
So Goodbye, Waterloo, with your steel thread.
I can't stay with you - I'd rather be dead.
(30.4.80)
XVI
Does love cure all, does love reach across fear?
I want to be loved, but won't let it near;
I want to give love, but who is to hear?
I am long gone on the road to the wise;
No knowing how far, or under what skies
It is. Or if they hear my failing cries.
I want to turn back, to know what is real
Again. To know whether what I now feel
Is enough for some sweet peace to reveal.
I am tired. Have I not journeyed enough?
Have I forsaken the smooth for the rough?
I didn't know you had to be this tough.
Let me go back through philosophy's door;
Let me be ordinary, ever more.
(2.6.80)
XVII
Chant Polonai opens like a flower,
Singing of spring, and yet I still despair
For, in those eyes which haunt me in each hour,
There lives more truth than I can surely bear.
Her phrases touch my heart and make me weep
And, echoing among my thoughts of love,
Are promises I know I could not keep,
And mountains that I know I could not move.
I cannot turn my back on her and go;
I cannot twist her words to save the pain
That she would suffer would she ever know
The imperfection of my poor soul's reign.
Some day she may know all this to be true:
Some day, some dark day, when the moon is blue.
(23.9.80, inspired by Chopin's Op.74a, arr. Liszt) Re-written 1982:
Chant Polonai opens like a flower,
Singing of spring, and yet you still despair
For, in those eyes which haunt you in each hour,
There lives more truth than you can surely bear.
Her phrases touch your heart and make you weep
And, echoing among your thoughts of love,
Are promises you know you could not keep,
And mountains - those you know you could not move.
You cannot turn your back on her and go;
You cannot twist her words to save the pain
That she would suffer would she ever know
The imperfection of your poor soul's reign.
Some day she may know all this to be true:
Some day, some dark day, when the moon is blue.
XVIII
Somewhere in the universe is his mind
The teeming void enriching ev'ry sense
And on the Earth his body waits, some kind
Of Library, though not confined by tense,
Whereto all information is passed back,
Filed away from uneducated eyes,
Shelf on unclassified shelf, rack on rack
In both subjective and objective guise.
And who knows how this rich store may be reached -
It steadfastly refuses to hear pleas
From those with problems to be solved or breached,
For there are no wardens, no doors, no keys.
Is he still primaeval man; just a store,
A cache of information, nothing more?
(10.11.80)
XIX
No adolescent yearning, this my love,
No idle wager on a fancied horse
But, though I'd sail the ocean this to prove,
She will not lend me charts to set a course.
And so by subtle means (and some not so!)
I drop a string of gentle hints by word
Or gesture, hoping wildly each will go
To link with those before. But how absurd!
What idiotic games are these I play,
Balancing a life in my shaking hand? -
Risking everything on what I say
Being easy to quote, and understand?
While soft, romantic mood may please the ear,
Those plain words oft are what they need to hear.
(13.5.81)
XX HARTLAND
The moaning wind whipping away sadness
The heaving wave creaming along its crest
The gull screaming its thin song of madness
This is Hartland, stark and free, at its best.
But what is it, just rocks and weed and sand
And churning rollers of grey and white sea -
Is it all just for the good of mankind -
Was Hartland - Earth? - put here for you and me?
Yes. For through the earliest expression
Of life - the crawling, seething Earth was made
A nursery for people and passion -
People who lived, died, fell in love and prayed.
And when we stand here, bent by Hartland's storm,
That history around us keeps us warm.
(Winter 1981/2)
XXI SEARCH
They came at last, came down to the tired Earth
Still spinning, a faint blue beacon of hope;
Set soft shoes upon our myriad graves,
Saw then a civilisation's stillbirth -
A race which, once stepping on the steep slope
Of war, slipped, died, heedless of love which saves.
Sad decay tells what befell thereafter.
Visions of events here in their minds burned
Nightmares which would, could, never be erased.
There had been sweet life here, yes, and laughter,
And now, nothing. How sad, they thought, and turned
Their backs, sought their ships and on their way blazed.
Perhaps they search still, out among the stars,
For others who found the way to end wars.
(Completed 3.5.82)
XXII THE COMING
Like a traveller in time you have crossed
A gulf of centuries to become lost
And here find us, like a good ship, storm-tossed
Finds a haven amid Nature's fury.
You find us happy, at first unwary,
Then you explain (though you are full weary)
That far, far beyond those distant white clouds,
Farther even that the grey mist that shrouds
These high peaks, your people live in vast crowds,
Dwelling like ants, speaking in accents terse,
Having no time to speak like us, in verse,
No time to seek, or muse - what could be worse?
Back to your people we fear you will go
And tell; forgive us for what we must do...
(Completed 3.5.82)
XXIII WITHOUT YOU
Long live the night, when I can hide my head.
Banish the day; the sun shines on the dead.
In the dawn I remembered what you said.
Don't come calling for me - not any more.
To hide emotion, that's all words are for.
I lie amongst your words, here on the floor.
You may not know I'm dying here today.
I seem to you alive, typing away.
But inside, my heart is in sad decay.
No longer will I cheer the morning light;
No, nor no longer let charm strike my sight.
For I will dwell in my own darkest night.
Compared with the dread darkness of our fears,
Night is light as day; aeons short as years.
(29.6.82)
XXIV
Afternoon sunlight on a broken glass;
A raging torrent through a mountain pass;
A child asleep, fingers locked round a toy
Could it be a girl, or is it a boy?
A darkened stage relives a thousand plays;
A clock, telling the time to a blind man;
The indecision of a thousand ways -
But who on Earth can tell? Only time can.
Time is remorseless, time never ceases,
As hard as stone, as soft as lambs' fleeces
Time drips on, and the wheels of life greases,
Bringing crumbling down our edifices.
Whatever we build, time tells it to end.
Perhaps, while there's time, we can quarrels mend.
(3.1.85)
XXV YOU
You have opened my tired eyes to
the light
Of your wisdom. You have opened my mind
Which was closed. You have guided my wild thoughts
Into reason, helped suppress those false "oughts",
Allowing my "wants" to be redefined,
Allowing me unblinkered, loving sight.
Doubt not our love's victory in each test,
Our passion's energy to conquer fear;
Forgive me when I make the same mistakes -
It's my anxiety which moulds the lakes
In which I flounder, hurting her most near
Who reaches out to save the one distressed.
I trust myself; if I can trust you so,
In peace together we will older grow.
(28.3.85, 1118)
XXVI
Your face is fading with the passing days
My heart remembers, but my eyes are blind
You left me 'you' in many thousand ways -
Our lives are inextricably entwined.
When you return, will you be just the same?
Or will your heart have moved at restless pace
Towards another me that will declaim
That you have dreamed when next you see my face?
You have to make a choice between two lives -
The one of comfort, but the other full
Of tenderness and love, where beauty gives
You reason to proceed towards some goal.
The choice is hard; each is the steepest slope:
One down to luckless fill, one up in hope.
(May/June 1985)
XXVII
It was so hard to leave you there asleep;
Hard, knowing that I must my kisses keep
Until the hands upon the clock have turned
Full circle thrice and one more hour returned.
The crumpled bed I left behind still warm -
A barren seascape, tossed as in a storm,
Is captured as a sculpture, fixed by light,
A sad memorial to one more night.
I wanted you to know how much I longed
To wake you, to embrace you with the day,
To bathe you in my thoughts of hope that thronged,
To take your hands in mine and softly say:
'The day will dawn when there'll be no goodbyes
To punctuate the language of our eyes'.
(15.7.85)
XXVIII CIVILISATION
What kind of civilisation, this, where
We destroy what we do not understand,
Hate the systems for which we have not planned,
And parry with a sword the proffered hand?
What kind of world is this where children die
From bullets aimed by fathers of the same?
Every day I wake and wonder why
It goes on, this unbelievable game.
When the old woman told me, at the fair,
In her cracked voice, that I was stronger than
I thought, and wiser than I know, the man
In me took to his heels and ran, and ran.
And the question from which he ran was this:
Where to start to change such a world as this?
(20.4.86)
XXIX INDECISION
Like the rumpled sheets on an unmade bed,
Disordered feelings whirl round my head,
And half-remembered phrases someone said
Come back like echoes in an empty shed.
I only have to find a place to start,
Like the end of a tangled piece of string,
And then I can unravel all my heart,
And to my woven thoughts some order bring.
In truth, I know there's a greater pleasure
In wandering the maze at my leisure
Than a tedious attempt to measure
The weight of my words, for that is censure.
Two lines on a single thought is holy -
To decide not to decide is folly.
(20.4.86)
XXX
No day goes by without I think of you
You are to me as one who cannot fade
It seems with each day's passing we renew
Our hopes of sharing still the road we made.
I would not find you false if, through the strain
In which we lived, you tired, and went alone
To start the road to happiness again
To find the place whereon the sun still shone.
For I am weary, too, of being drawn
Down paths which I have no desire to walk
To obstacles for which I've nought but scorn
To fences at the sight of which I baulk.
But if accompanied I travel there
It is with none but you I'd rather share.
(12.6.86)
XXXI
When I see you, can I forget the past?
The hours we shared, exposing both our souls?
Those memories of ours will surely last
Until to the equator drift the poles.
We came together in unspoken grace -
To set out on a journey, charts forsworn,
And though the tide has brought us to a place
Of shallows and of rocks, we still hold on.
What bond is it that lashes us to life
And to each other, keeping our love safe?
Is it the hope that saving winds will drive
Us to the open sea, away from grief?
I pray the journey's end is coming soon
So you and I can once again be warm.
(12.6.86)
XXXII
What madness represents this world of locks
When everything must in a safe or box
Be placed, to see that no one pinches it
To use it for their own in greed or fit
Of coveting? Where have we gone astray,
When nothing sacred is but we must say
This thing is mine - my name is scribed upon't
In letters of uncopiable font
And rare design? I can't believe it's true
That you would take what don't belong to you
Just simply for the reason that it's there
And not locked up, or guarded. Just take care -
While you are looking out the other way
They do not come and take your soul away.
(12.6.86)
XXXIII
Will you look up and let me see your face
And hear you say you would not harm a soul
And will you walk among the human race
And let me see that hate is not your goal?
We daily see upon our screens the fate
Of those in peril, and of those who starve
We shake our heads and blame it on the State
Who would from human flesh an empire carve.
We see that protestations are in vain
The perpetrators in their ideals hide
We hear the name of God invoked again
The power of the people's on their side.
When will you say enough - we are not blind
It's time to leave the crying to the wind.
(12.6.86)
XXXIV
No one can say you did not do your best
When your compassion was put to the test
No one can say you did not take the hand
That reached out from some dry and stricken land.
And when you drove to draw the money out
With music blaring, did you hear the shout
Of hungry voices in your neighbour's street
Or slapping on the footpath of bare feet?
You passed the peeling posters of the cause
That tries to put an end to twenty wars
Your thoughts turn to holidaying abroad
To Africa this year can you afford?
Your Rolls went past a Mini; you mocked it
When you parked outside the bank you locked it.
(12.6.86)
XXXV
The day will come when you and I will part,
Be it by death, or reasons of the heart;
Be it by night, or in the bright of day,
There are some thoughts which I would give away:
If I have laughed, it has not been to mock;
If I have cried, it has not been to rock
The boat in which we sail into the sun,
Just my response to things thought, said or done.
I've wished no harm to any living soul;
I've found good in the deepest, darkest hole;
I have indulged and, doing so, have erred,
But man am I, and judgement be deferred.
Although we part, forget not that my ire
Blocks temporarily more lasting fire.
(13.8.86)
XXXVI
What value faith to those who won't believe?
What value life to those that love abuse?
Rebuke me not for taking time to grieve
For those for whom life's nothing to amuse.
For all we take from life, so we must pay;
Forgive me, then, for counting up the cost
Of what, in innocence, you gain this day,
Of what, in pleasure spent, I see I've lost.
Can we be wrong, convinced that we were right?
Can we deny that love's most sacred bloom
Can wither and, in dying, cast a light
That brings a blush to one more empty room?
If I have loved and lost, at least I've learned
That in this heavy heart, once passions burned.
(13.8.86)
XXXVII NOT LOOKING BACK
Softly shifts the sand of past endeavour,
As I essay my thoughts to turn aside
Slowly from the clinging past, to sever
My false obedience to fear and pride.
Whence came she to haunt me, I know little,
And where I drove her onward, I felt less;
She was never willed to test my mettle
By offering me recall, or redress.
If the ghost is laid, it leaves a shadow
To fall upon my thoughts when I relax,
Leaving unthawed patches in each hollow
To work in silence among the cracks.
Forces that cause me to dread I follow
Will always blow the sand to fill my tracks.
(1.4.89 0100)
XXXVIII TODAY
The rain is falling from the autumn sky -
This is the time when all the leaves fall down,
Carpeting the ground in red, gold and brown.
Oh why, oh why, do they all have to die?
Do they not die to grow again in spring?
Hard to explain such a mystical thing -
The wind plays its part, and cold does the rest,
Trying so hard to do its very best.
Then spring follows winter, the Earth is green,
Thousands of blossoms I have never seen,
Because I am blind and have a white stick,
I can't see the clock, but I hear it tick.
So passing seasons will pass despite me
Unaware of the fact I cannot see.
(1990)
XXXIX ALL IN A DAY
Oftimes I think myself to be quite mad
When I recall the chances I passed by
Or passed me by because I felt so sad
That all my life seems as just one short day.
The morning - all my youth - was wasted dreams
A self indulgent lunch was feasted on
The afternoon has hardly come, it seems
When twilight draws the curtain on the sun.
Can I undo mistakes I made this morn?
Can I repent those thoughts which haunt me now?
Can I revive the gifts I have forsworn
And those I have in spite withheld from you?
Would that this were a dream; I could awake
And of the day a wiser, new start make.
(23.11.90)
XL GRANDMA
If I have grown accustomed to your face
As Fran sketched you, yet I have not forgot
How you would smile inscrutably at me,
Willing me to read every wise thought
Ruled in those lines that tracked your age and life;
Reminding me of your many roles - wife,
Daughter, mother, grandmother and yet friend
And Friend again. Living in the long past,
Looking, with sea-grey eyes calm, to your end
Yet seeing in the future our dies cast,
You smelled of wisdom while you loved us all
From your armchair - turn right, just down the hall.
I loved you then, I could not love you more
But how I wish I'd had more time to care.
(Olive Elizabeth Briggs, 23.11.1894-27.6.1988)
(23.11.90)
XLI EARLY IN THE MORNING
Rain. Beating on the window, telling me
To go to bed. Wind. Howling at its height,
Bending trees, shaking fences, and wildly
Rattling the door, like a shivering mite.
The elements are up when I should be
Asleep. But I am up, working the night.
Love. Beating in my tight breast, telling me
To go to her. She. Tugging at my mind,
Bending will, shaking confidence, strongly
Rattling my conscience, with a sting unkind.
My emotions are up when I should be Asleep.
But I am up, feeling, but blind.
Better the bed that welcomes than the one
Which just postpones my fears when rise the sun
(23.11.90)
XLII MRS DE WINTER
I could not bring myself to hate the ones
Who could not love; who could not turn the stones.
I cannot tell the dream to go away;
I did not say to come again so soon;
I cannot live for fear of Mandalay,
Accompanied still by that chilling moon
And images of fire. Let drowning crowd
My mind instead of agonising flame,
Let me awake so I can cry out loud.
Let me implore him just to speak my name.
Dear Daphne, why did you create me thus,
When power such as his was bound to deal
Me such a hand that ruined only us
And made it certain that my dreams were real?
(27.5.94 0100)
XLIII POETRY IS DEAD
No longer speak of dreams, nor love, nor soul
You may not rhyme nor reason, nor be free
To speak of o'er or ne'er - such words are foul
In these decades' sad, formless poetry;
To do so seems to mean impiety.
And that white dress upon a summer's day
Is turned to ash on anger's cruel flame
The smoke by winds of zeal is torn away
To where the punctuation takes the blame;
To where blank verses howl to find a name.
Some people say that poetry is dead
Now lovers watch Eastenders while they grope
For something that they lost beneath the bed -
Its dying breath, dismay, its spilled blood, hope.
(27.5.94 0100)
XLIV
I don't know why I don't want to make love.
I just do my best, but your reply is
That what I do for you is not enough.
Shame what you do for me has such a price.
Yes, we had a good day - five hundred pounds
Will be reward for all those hours of work -
Early morning, making the fewest sounds,
And late at night when only sluggards shirk.
Yes, you could go elsewhere, and if you could
(I would not blame you - you can't see the end)
Or feel you ought to, then maybe you should -
You wouldn't lose a lover, just a friend.
Perhaps I'm wrong to put feelings beneath
Success. 'Til then I have to hold my breath.
(3.6.94 0010)
XLV REALITY, POOF!
The stars shine only for me - they're not real
They may be points of light behind velvet
And everything I see and/or feel
May be just as illusory, and yet
Even if they just exist in my head
There must be some reason for that plain fact
For they would not exist if I were dead -
There would be no mind to keep them intact.
So what is reality then, you ask?
(If in fact you exist to ask me this)
It would be a fairly enormous task
Without any help or an accomplice.
In fact, it's impossible, because - damn! -
Although I think, it doesn't mean I am.
(2330 3.10.98)
XLVI
A child might think, on going back to school,
Loaded with holiday ideas and schemes,
That Teacher had waited, alone and stern,
There at her desk, examining her rule,
Twiddling her fingers and dreaming her dreams,
Just as she was at the end of last term.
A child might think that - until it grows up
And finds that its own life is not unique,
The sadness it brings us is hard to bear,
But the cub, the cygnet, kitten and pup,
All have to realise that selfish streak,
That innocent time, that freedom from care -
Is paradise lost, gone into thin air.
Why do we have to grow up - it's not fair!
(0030 4.10.98)
XLVII GRAND-DAUGHTERS
Rebecca, Rebecca: she knows a heck
of a lot about most things, if not she
will check a grandparent's brain until it
is heartily sick of the words "But why?"
Nicola, Nicola: don't try to tick-
le her - she'll be as cross as a Frenchman
who's lost his best tricolour; there's no one
that I know who is nearly as fickle.
Nicola Rachael, Rebecca Louise:
As quick to change as a flying trapeze
Laughs one minute and sighing another
Then stamping a foot or cuddling mother.
If they were my children, I would be proud
Not just to whisper, but shout it out loud.
(10.98, finished 10.04)
XLVIII AGINCOURT REVISITED
A cold October night, nineteen fifteen;
Shaking the ground: the enemy, unseen;
Five thousand Englishmen, marching in trance;
Scarcely knowing how - why - they came to France.
But tramping across this strange landscape, they
Live to see one more dawn, St Crispin's Day;
This tired, not so merry band of brothers,
Marching in mixed hope and fear, as others -
Their weapons as deadly, their feet as raw -
Did, to the day, five hundred years before.
Today, many will die, entombed in mud
Their names to be inscribed on stone, in blood.
But who will ask: What is the force that sealed
Our young men's fate forever to this field?
(0030 5.10.98)
XLIX
What shall we do about poor little gran?
She will only eat baked beans from the can
And she keeps repeating "I need a man
To do a few jobs, and drive the old van".
Gran's quite beside herself without a bloke,
He needn't drink spirits, sing, dance or smoke
And even the Friday evening poke
Could be foregone, so long as he's not broke.
We called up an agency for advice,
In fact, we had to telephone them twice
The first time they couldn't stop laughing, nice
They said they'd send a man round in a trice.
They did. She floored him with powerful fist
"He's the same as last week, and he's still pissed!"
(6.10.98)
L 50, AND STILL WONDERING
Is there anything at all I'm good at?
Mediocre poetry, average
Stories - somewhere, somehow, the old adage
Springs to my mind, at the drop of a hat
A jack of all trades, and master of none.
I don't want to be remembered as one
Who was a dab hand at correcting text
On product labels. I want to stand next
To the giants when it really comes down
To who's who. I want to have some renown.
I don't expect to be rich, just a man
Who's done the best with his talent he can,
But what talent is it? Not art, for sure,
Nor business, nor sport, but then what? Death? War?
(6.10.98)
LI THE MERMAID
I thought a twilight swim would do me good.
I did not wake my love; I thought it would
Be simpler, naked, just to cross the beach
To where the lazy tide's soft lapping speech
Called out my name, it seemed, and bade me in.
The water's warmth enclosed my sleepy head,
My fingers touched the soft and sandy bed,
But then a slight caress across my face
Transported me to quite another place
Where mermaids play and fantasies begin.
Entwined, we kissed, then on her velvet swell
Of bosom laid my heart. Now I know well
It may have been just weed that quenched me so
But 'til I die I'll never surely know.
(28.6.04)
LII SONNET ON SONNET
The sonnet is the perfect way to say
Whatever's on your mind, by night or day;
The problem is to neatly wrap the verse
Without the split infinitive, or worse,
In fourteen of those ten-syllabic lines,
The whole just right in its entire confines,
Without repeating or omitting thought
You must to page secure as ship to port.
What quality of loneliness is this
That holds me here in hope of rhyming bliss -
What academic arrogance, what nerve
Drives me to that from which I cannot swerve
Until it's set, this jewel in the crown
Of my emotions, in which I may drown?
(8.7.04)
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