Time blew away like dandelion seed
Smashwords Edition
Copyright © 1997-2011 Thomas Thurman
For Riordon
Poems which are still being
considered
by journals are not included in this chapbook.
I always appreciate criticism and feedback:
www.thomasthurman.org
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Sonnets
Song of Easter
When I was young I feared my growing old
lest, being old, I should want youth again,
or lest the growing old should cause me pain;
I knew the worth of silver less than gold.
I tried to hold the sun and not the moon,
I asked the clock to stop— it paid no heed!
Time blew away like dandelion seed,
as sure as day, the evening came too soon.
This road I cannot tread the other way.
The ages passed, and age has come to me.
Yet still asleep I dream, awake I see,
as sure as day brings night, the night brings day,
youth, sun and dandelion seed, and why?
They cannot have new life unless they die.
Song of All Souls' Day
I saw the bindweed curl about your tomb
Whereon I set a rose, now short of breath,
And marked the similarity of death
Between your chance to live, its time to bloom.
For though your maker overflowed your hours
Yet still upon your blossom climbed the weed;
You noticed but did nothing; thus its seed
Cast round the earth, and choked your budding flowers.
But brazen trumpets round its conquering green
This bindweed blossom, in the rose's stead;
Just so, before you took this rosy bed
You sometimes woke and showed what might have been.
But now your chance is gone as chances go.
I've learned your lesson. Let me find the hoe.
Song of New Year's Eve
Look to your Lord who gives you life.
This year must end as all the years.
You live here in the vale of tears.
This year brought toil, the next year strife.
For too, too soon we break our stay.
The end of things may be a birth.
The clouds will fade and take the earth.
Make fast your joy on New Year's Day.
When dies a friend we weep and mourn.
When babes are born we drink with cheer.
But no man mourns when dies the year.
When dies the age, may you be born.
Your death, your birth, are close at hand.
In him we trust. In him we stand.
A lamp to my feet
I heard there was a secret metric foot
that David knew was favoured by the Lord,
and when he penned the psalms he'd often put
this pattern the Almighty best adored
amongst the endless praise and imprecations;
unstressed, plus stressed, suffuses through his pages,
though hidden by the English of translations;
pentameters still echo down the ages.
The spondee's spurned, and has been from the start;
an anapaest's anathema, and grim.
Though trochees may be near the Maker's heart,
you'll never hear a dactyl in a hymn.
There's only one the Lord thinks worth a damn:
the sacred, the unchangeable iamb.
Shattered
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said... (I couldn't comprehend his speech;
he spoke a tongue I didn't understand.
It might have meant “a statue's on a beach”...
at least, he let me see vacation snaps
and there was quite a lot of sand about
and one old statue, African perhaps,
or Indian, I'm in a bit of doubt.)
So anyway, I saw the statue's face:
its nose was crinkled, like a lord who sniffs.
And then there was some writing on the base;
I couldn't read it. It was hieroglyphs.
It all seems kind of strange, and far away,
but must have had some meaning in its day.
Netherlands
If anything should happen to The Hague,
if someday they abandon Amsterdam,
philosophers will take these strange and vague
descriptions, and derive each tree and tram
by mathematical necessity:
should nations shake their fists across the seas
with words of war, it follows there must be
a middle ground, a people loving peace.
And is this scrap alone a netherland?
Not so: we spend our nights beneath the sky,
and every country's low for us, who stand
a thousand miles below the lights on high;
if only I could learn to live as such,
and count myself as kindly as the Dutch.
Mother of trees
I know a tree whose apples are more sweet
and nourishing and fair than any other:
a person it's a privilege to meet,
a maker, a maintainer, and a mother.
Her branches bring delight to every day
from each repeating month that I remember:
we lie beneath her blossomed boughs in May
and eat her rosy apples in September.
Yet as she gives, she lives as more than merely
a giving tree, that spends itself in giving:
for still she's not consumed, though shining yearly
with ever-fiercer fires of joyous living;
her roots in earth, and sunlight on her brows
and every blessèd child beneath her boughs.
Thomas
They named me for my granddad's father's father;
they said he'd caught consumption in his youth
and left his son an orphan. But the truth
I learned on reading registers is rather
more horrible, but easy to explain:
his wife had died. And Thomas, left behind,
drowned deep in pain, drank gin, and lost his mind,
died sobbing in a home for the insane.
And in my brain, statistic turned to story:
a broken heart, and lovers dying young,
beyond the brittle lies of broken lungs.
But, grandpa, may I hope we'll meet in glory,
and over soda, on the other side,
I'll let you know I bear your name with pride?
Some folk are born with knowledge of their goal
Some folk are born with knowledge of their goal.
I've met them, though I'm not like that myself;
I'm wandering through life, a placid soul,
content to leave adventures on the shelf.
I've loved and lived without a way to know
the field where I should strive to be the best:
to pan for gold, or be a CEO,
or cure disease, or conquer Everest;
and likewise, you're a Poohstick in the stream:
you drift through life, without an end in mind.
We came together, neither with a dream,
both happy with our futures undefined,
our hoping open-ended; yet it seems
our life together's fashioned from our dreams.
* * *
For and about my friend Mary Mactavish and her husband Casey.
On being incompetent in Welsh poetry
My Welsh is just not good enough for verse.
My dw i'n hoffi coffi's lacking fizz;
cynghanedd is pedestrian or worse;
I wish it wasn't so, but there it is.
My struggle's still to learn, as yours to teach,
and so my englyn's still in English sung,
and aching awdls cower out of reach,
and English shows the thinness of the tongue.
But here's my goal: some month the Gorsedd meet
so many miles ahead... I may be there
to share my bitter words, my verses sweet,
at common table. Never mind the chair.
But that's a dream, and not what's on the card,
and much as I might dream... for now... I'm barred.
Margaret
They never told about the cold, cold morn,
the painful blue and cheery winter sky;
the friendly warm embrace of toothy yawn,
the reeking of its breath; its marble eye;
the dragon gets a mention in her tale
but just that Margaret entered its insides:
another hero trapped inside the scales,
but nothing of the dragon's life, besides.
They say the beast was Satan in a glamour,
but that's all nonsense, since the virgin matron
who made her crucifix a makeshift hammer
is ever since considered childbirth's patron;
because it gave her birth, and spared her bones,
she'd visit every week for tea and scones.
Mary
Her soul proclaimed the greatness of the Lord
who dwelt within her belly, and her mind.
The light shines on, the humble are restored,
and food and mercy given to mankind.
That day she saw the everlasting light
she memorised, and treasured up inside,
investing for the fading of her sight
the hope that living light had never died;
till hope itself within her arms lay dying,
a frozen journey, ready to embark,
and nothing more is left for her but trying
to comprehend the greatness of the dark;
yet somewhere shines the light, in spite of that,
and silently she sighed magnificat.
On first looking into an A to Z
My talent (or my curse) is getting lost:
my routes are recondite and esoteric.
Perverted turns on every road I crossed
have dogged my feet from Dover up to Berwick.
My move to London only served to show
what fearful feast of foolishness was mine:
I lost my way from Tower Hill to Bow,
and rode the wrong way round the Circle Line.
In nameless London lanes I wandered then
whose tales belied my tattered A to Z,
and even now, in memory again
I plod despairing, Barking in my head,
still losing track of who and where I am,
silent, upon a street in Dagenham.
Two poems
With mind in neutral on the train today
I thought about a poem that I'd seen
ten years, four thousand miles, a life away
inside a cheap religious magazine.
The rhymes were forced, the metre was a sham,
the metaphors far-fetched and rather trite,
the feeling shallow-told, yet here I am
remembering the words again tonight.
I wrote another poem, as a kid:
another paper bought it for a prize.
Ten thousand pairs of eyes saw what I did.
I wonder if, from all those pairs of eyes,
still, somewhere on this planet, I might find
some reader with my poem in their mind.
Oliver's eulogy
It saddened me to know you from afar:
I never heard the whimpers that you gave
when scratched beneath the chin, or saw you save
your mistress from a cat, or passing car;
you never barked as I approached your door;
you never licked my face; I never heard
your nails on wood, or saw you chase a bird,
and now you're gone, I cannot any more.
You know, it makes me wonder, Oliver:
I've usually dismissed as pious lies
those tales of rainbow bridges in the skies
where faithful friends will wait as once they were
to meet us in the lands beyond the light.
But since you've left, I find I hope they're right.
And so I ask to share your thunderstorms
Here as I sit and number pretty jewels,
the colours small and shining as they stand
arrayed or strewn, in lines as though unplanned
and re-repeating words of other fools
anew, to show my more pedestrian mind
reminders that I still can think anew,
just on a whim I look across to you
and in your eyes and on your page I find
eternity, infinity on earth,
the rainbow stretched to where the planet ends
the thunderstorms themselves your willing friends,
the rains that drown the land to bring its birth...
my petty counters fade: your rain transforms,
and so I ask to share your thunderstorms.
Finals
I knew an undergraduate at college
who spent his days asleep, or drinking beer;
he never needed academic knowledge
until the day of reckoning drew near,
when, as he found his time was growing short,
he'd borrow books, or photocopy them,
and, downing frantic coffee by the quart,
he'd burn the midnight oil, till five a.m.
It puzzles me a little when I find
the ones who press conversion at the end
expecting atheists to change their mind
in panic, like our coffee-drinking friend,
with fingers crossed and hoping for the best
in case this life's continuously assessed.
Pittsburgh
This moment, I am God upon this town.
I compass every window spread below:
each pinprick point in total looking down
a pattern only overseers know.
I feel the human flow and ebb each minute
perceiving both with every passing breath;
each lighted room has home and hoping in it,
each darkening a sleeping, or a death.
And nothing, nothing makes it wait to darken;
had I the power it should be shining still.
Some other one you have to hope will hearken,
some other on some yet more lofty hill—
whom priests and people plead to, not to be
as powerless to hold these lights as me.
Thomas Cantilupe
I have no patron saint. But if I should
I doubt that Doubting Thomas would be him.
Though well he worked with what he understood,
I cannot emulate my eponym:
too squeamish still to press your bloody palms,
too cowardly to bear the cross you bore.
too blind to fall and sing believing psalms.
With other saints called Thomas, all the more.
But then there's Thomas Cantilupe's career,
So concrete: he was born in 1218,
was chancellor of Oxford for a year,
gave countless counsellings to king and queen
and years of selfless service to his see;
and lives today recalled by God, and me.
404
So many years have passed since first you sought
the lands beyond the edges of the sky,
so many moons reflected in your eye,
(familiar newness, fear of leaving port),
since first you sought, and failed, and learned to fall,
(first hope, then cynicism, silent dread,
the countless stars, still counting overhead
the seconds to your final voyage of all...)
and last, in glory gold and red around
your greatest search, your final quest to know!
yet... ashes drift, the embers cease to glow,
and darkened life in frozen death is drowned;
and ashes on the swell are seen no more.
The silence surges. Error 404.
Among those born as humans on the earth
Among those born as humans on the earth,
within their mind the mirrored planet lies:
the universe contained behind their eyes,
more tangible with every day since birth.
Within, each place you love is held for you
perfected; every friendship dwells therein;
and if you dare, a thousand tales begin,
and if you close your eyes you'll see it's true.
Within that place a forest lies, more real
than all on earth, and all you count as dear,
wherever they may be, you'll find them here,
just as in life of sight, of sound, of feel;
there you and I will stay, and always be:
and when you need a hug, come visit me.
Carmen
Your poetry holds picnics in the places
where some would say that words should never go;
there's strange delight in passing through those spaces
where nouns are tame and verbs are safe to know
to kingdoms where you colour past the lines,
where adjectives and adverbs long to tread—
the other side of do not enter signs
where rulers cannot reach the words you said.
Yet nothing's for the sake of mere transgression:
your words below, your metaphors above,
with every part of speech in your possession
together make a verbal kind of love;
conceiving thought anew, and giving birth
to cast and recreate the very earth.
For Fin
When your creator took her crayon box
That day she thought to draw you all alive,
She found a certain green to sketch your locks,
Another green to show you grow, you thrive;
A green of richest thought unlimited,
A green to match the green of your creation,
A green to go, to boldly forge ahead,
A green for lands of peaceful meditation;
The Greene King, standing proud with all his queens,
Jack-in-the-green, surrounded by his trees;
A thousand other shades of other greens;
The greenness of the deepness of the seas;
And I, I fall and marvel at the light,
A million greens, like fireworks in the night.
For Fin — ii
That day she thought to draw you all alive
She drew your outline, sketched you, and refined
And shaped your eyes, that surely saw arrive
The laughing people in the frame behind,
The humans, dogs and kittens, trailing plants,
Who fill your background; all you love are here
Around you in the middle of the dance,
And as you watch, still more of them appear
Beyond your face within the frame advancing
Children and relatives and loves and friends
Holding their merry hands in merry dancing
Extending off beyond the picture's ends;
I know your other folk would say the same:
It's such an honour dancing in your frame.
For Fin — iii
She found a certain green to sketch your locks,
A deeper green, a perfect green attaining;
And now another from her crayon-stocks;
Refreshing and repeating what's remaining:
She bleaches it and tries another shade
Then leaves it for a while and grows it out,
Returns it to the colours that she made
Begins to work again, and turns about;
And why this careful labour to provide you
With perfect colours captured in your hair?
She knows your colours mirror what's inside you,
Eternal greens within you everywhere;
And still beneath, the ever-growing you
Shall dye, and yet shall live with life anew.
For Fin — iv
Another green to show you grow, you thrive;
Out from the snow the snowdrop breaks in flower.
Who could have called this sleeping bulb alive?
Yet buried patiently it waits its hour,
Counting the snowflakes slowly settling
Their weight upon the heavy earth above;
One day its Winter changes to its Spring.
Who can predict the power of life and love?
Hope that at last the final frost is dead.
Faith that the Winter dies and Spring shall rise.
Love for the life that up through blades has bled.
Joy to a hundred children's waiting eyes;
For every hour it slept beneath the ground,
A thousand wondering eyes shall gather round.
For Fin — v
A green of richest thought unlimited.
I try to say I love you every day:
I know I keep repeating things I've said.
Perhaps I'll try to phrase another way:
Suppose I counted all the money ever
From now until when Abel risked his neck
With my accountants, who were very clever,
And wrote it on a record-breaking cheque...
It wasn't half your empathising, was it?
Your thoughts are treasured more than bank accounts;
The bank won't put your loving on deposit.
And could they take it, given such amounts?
The jealousy of cash makes misers blind,
And who needs money when you have your mind?
For Fin — vi
A green to match the green of your creation!
She took her time in sketching out your features,
Shading you well, and, drawn with dedication,
You took the pen she gives to all her creatures
And set about some drawing of your own,
Filling the art with arc and line and shade,
Showing your work the care that you were shown,
And making them as well as you were made;
And much as life your drawing hand was giving,
Another life from deep within you drew:
A life, not merely likeness of the living,
So separate, yet such a part of you:
Who finds your baby-picture on the shelf
And smiles and finds you, showing you yourself.
For Fin — vii
A green to go, to boldly forge ahead,
Should shine on traffic lights for every person.
If you should find a colour in its stead
That stops you— not an arrow for diversion,
To Edmundsbury, Hatfield and the North,
Or any other place that's worth the going—
But rather reds that block your going forth;
If traffic signals freeze your days from flowing,
Your life is green and you deserve the green.
And if you try to go about your day
And greens are coming few and far between,
And reds and ambers blare about your way:
If so, I pray your days to hold instead
All green, and never amber, never red.
For Fin — viii
A green for lands of peaceful meditation.
You call: Come stand upon my sacred ground,
Come sit and breathe the peace of contemplation,
Come feel the grass beneath, the lilies round,
Come sleep, come wake, and drink the quiet waters,
Come to the maytree, blackbird, waterfall;
Come know yourselves the planet's sons and daughters.
The people pass and pause, and still you call:
It's waiting for you when you ask to try it:
Peace (and the air) cannot be bought or sold.
You'll never gain it if you try to buy it:
It's not an asset crumpled fists can hold.
All that you have is nothing you can lose;
You stand on sacred ground. Remove your shoes.
For Fin — ix
The Greene King, standing proud with all his queens,
Guarding a land of oaks and aches and cold.
It's not a normal place, by any means,
This island of the oldest of the old,
Where bow the ancient oak and ash and thorn
In homage to a figure on a hill;
Deep in the hills where Wayland Smith was born
You stand, an English body, English still.
For odes and age and air and ale have filled you,
Made you their own and promised you belong;
And since their homesick longing hasn't killed you,
I think you'll be returning to their song;
Come, take your time, and sit and drink with me!
What say you to another cup of tea?
For Fin — x
Jack-in-the-green, surrounded by his trees,
Had given birth to leafy life aplenty,
He'd introduced his firs by fours and threes,
And sowed his seedling cedars by the twenty;
The field was filled with trunks and twigs and roots,
The soil was sound and fertile, and the fall
Would fill the forest floor with growing shoots,
And none but Jack was there to watch it all
Until you came to wander through this field,
To walk within the ways within the wood;
Your mind was brought to peace, your spirit healed,
The forest given form and blessed as good;
Jack-in-the-green will wonder all his days:
your presence never ceases to a maze.
For Fin — xi
A thousand other shades of other greens:
“Leaf”, “emerald”, “sea”, “bottle”, off the cuff;
“Viridian” (uncertain what it means),
But there's so many. Names are not enough.
Yet, in another life, your maker might
Have picked you out among primeval glades
To work as keeper of the rainbow's light
And in another Eden name the shades;
If so, the planet's poets will rejoice
That, given life together with a name,
The colours sing a stronger, clearer voice,
And every hue will never seem the same:
Each of the shades looks loving back to you,
Its namer and the one who made it new.
For Fin — xii
The greenness of the deepness of the seas:
A home to fish of many a scaly nation.
Follow the shoals; the smallest one of these
Swims as a fishy summit of creation.
Yet every one's indebted to the shoal,
All subtle in their difference from the rest:
A fish of friends, a member of the whole,
A mix of traits, a taking of the best.
So you and those of us you love so well
Will grow along with other friends' increase,
Required ingredients in the living-spell:
Each person brings a necessary peace.
The level-headed people mix with mystics,
And both are living mixtures of holistics.
For Fin — xiii
And I, I fall and marvel at the light,
This changing light that grows throughout the years,
Extinguished not by hardship nor by night
Nor foolishness nor sadness nor by tears.
When we were separated by the sea
I wished myself amidst your myriad days.
My wish was mirrored in your missing me;
Your maker joined our wishes, joined our ways;
She placed our hands on one another's heart,
And you and I began a lifelong learning
Of one another, like a magic art
Whose telling grows with every page's turning,
And holds our friendship as a growing bond
Till seventy years old, and still beyond.
For Fin — xiv
A million greens, like fireworks in the night.
I fear this sonnet never can be done.
So many colours burst upon my sight
I cannot tell the tale of every one.
But I can tell how vast excitement fills me
When all the flying sparkles fill the sky;
I want to tell the world how much it thrills me
To hold you close, reflected in your eye;
I want to tell in all my earthly days
And yet beyond, of what you mean to me;
I want to say I love the myriad ways
Of what you are and what you'll grow to be;
These counts combining made the building-blocks
When your creator took her crayon box.
Crossing a bridge in fog
I see for miles, yet all upon my sight
outside my carriage are the endless seas,
the shifting clouds of fog, the tops of trees
that rock a simple path through poisoned white.
And at their feet, some sodden deep in mire?
Some sunk Atlantis sleeping 'neath the weight?
or but a borough innocent of hate,
Not well in hearts, but dead of hope and fire?
A dormitory town? Or have you died?
Though built by stone, your pulse is nearly lost;
though faint your breath, your bridge is still uncrossed:
return before you reach the other side...
O land so drowned in dreams beyond a doubt
dissolve your heartfelt fog, or be spat out.
May
The autumn leaves an ill-defined unease
that (while the summer flourished) I’d ignored.
The litany begins. We can’t afford
the oil we need to buy before the freeze;
they’ve forecast snow: we need to fix the tiles
that blew away before the summer came,
fit plastic shrouds on every window-frame;
there isn’t any salt in stock for miles.
Yet soon I’ll wake, and March will fall behind,
and though the winter’s dark was death, it’s done,
as every tree salutes the sudden sun
with leaves that bring the healing of my mind:
a spring to clean away the winter’s dust.
My will returns. May will return. It must.
* * *
First published in 14 by 14, July 2010.
If Lady Gaga wrote sonnets
How do I love thee? In a way that's bad,
by which I mean so bad it's almost good.
I need you, and you know it drives me mad.
I want you more than any other could.
And we could write romances, you and me.
I want to hear your Hitchcock movie schtick.
I want your everything. I hope it's free.
I want you in my window, and you're sick.
And yet you know my raving is a sign
I'd rather we were paramours than friends.
You're outlawed from the moment that you're mine
Until the day our bad romancing ends;
I'll love you in a leather-studded bra.
Rah gaga gaga roma ooh la la.
Sans everything
Remember all the old familiar faces?
Helvetica's the nicest of the lot.
Gill Sans and Johnston take the second places;
It seems as though the serif has been shot.
Verdana has its own intrinsic glories;
The fairest text that ever left my desk
Was set in these— for essays or for stories.
But using them for sonnets? That's grotesque.
And gravestones are a special case as well:
A mortal lack of serif fonts would be
A certain kind of typographic hell
With Comic Sans for all eternity.
In death, the Roman lettering is best.
May flights of serifs sing thee to thy rest.
We had it tough
We had no sonnets when I was a lad.
Well, none of us could run to fourteen lines.
We stuck to ballad form. And we were glad!
As if we gave a damn for such designs!
(Though when I went to college, I heard tell
about some PhD extravaganza
researching something called a villanelle,
and even they were short the final stanza.)
My tutor, Dr Rhymer, used to say
“The ballad's coming back; we must allow
the quatorzain to have its little day.”
Still, catch me writing sonnets, even now;
Perhaps I'll fill a ballad with my scorn.
You modern poets hardly know you're born.
For Alex
Within this world, there waits a patient wood
that longs for recreation by your touch
to fall, be sold, be sawn, and seen as good.
Its oaks have pinned their hopes to suffer such;
its maples dream as much as they are able,
and every aspen whispers to itself:
they pine for you to bring them to the table,
or give them self-assurance as a shelf.
Then there's yourself. The elements essential
within the raw material of you
are scintillating stock, with star potential;
still, steadily you work, and make them new.
And beauty's born, no matter where it lies,
for all the world reflects behind your eyes.
Requiem for an oak
I thought I saw an execution there.
The fascinated public gathered round.
The cheerful hangmen stripped the victim bare
And built their gibbet high above the ground.
The rope was taut, my wildness filled with fear.
I saw him fall. I heard his final cry.
Yet when the hangmen left I ventured near
To find my fault: I'd never seen him die.
In fact, I think he'd died some years ago.
There's blackness of decay in every breath.
The sound of flies was all that's left to grow,
Now free to come and feast upon his death;
Prince of the trees, I have a simple plea:
I will not die till death has come to me.
For night can only hide, and not destroy
When once I stop and take account of these
that God has granted me upon the earth,
the loves, the friends, the work, that charm and please
these things I count inestimable worth;
when once I stop, I learn that I am rich
beyond the dreams of emperors and kings
and light is real, and real these riches which
exceed the worth of all material things...
when thus I stop, I cannot understand
when few and feeble sunbeams cannot find
their way into that drab and dreary land,
the darkness of the middle of my mind.
yet darkness cannot take away my joy,
for night can only hide, and not destroy.
I always tried to write about the light
I always tried to write about the light
that inks these eyes in instant tint and hue,
that chances glances, sparkles through the night,
fresh as the morning, bloody as the dew;
the light that leaves your image in my mind,
that shining silver, shared for everyone,
that banishes the darkness from the blind,
the circle of the surface of the sun.
And when your light is shining far from mine,
when scores of stars are standing at their stations,
we'll weave our fingers round them as they shine,
and write each other's name on constellations;
and so we'll stand, and still, however far,
lock eyes and wish upon a single star.
Here from the hilltop down towards the dell
Here from the hilltop down towards the dell
I'll wander till this evening, I don't care.
An afternoon all fertile with the spell
Still calling me: be still and drink the air.
And so I'll pause, and ponder as I hike,
I'll take my time before the valley floor,
And meditate, and maybe, if I like,
Climb back again and walk the path once more.
Full twenty years I've walked this hillside trail,
And every time it makes itself anew;
Unveiling as I head towards the vale,
A flower unseen, an unexpected view...
Again I lose my footing with a scream,
Fall forty feet, and drown beneath the stream.
Sleep
They say my future follows on your past,
Commanded not to love you by the wise:
They say he never truly lives who lies
A captive still, and by your charms held fast:
Your warmth was torn by chilly morning air,
through daytime heat your image in my eye
would ever grow, would wane, would never die,
and with the night, you'd once again be there.
You took my life, and took away my breath;
You took my world, and left your words untrue.
No dreams are left I haven't left with you,
And still you keep reminding me of death.
I've abdicated kingdoms for your sake:
And yet, and yet...I wish myself awake.
Transfiguration
What's seen is seen, and cannot be unknown;
and so he turned my soul, and turns it still.
We'd walked a while, just him and us alone;
we'd wandered up some ordinary hill.
The air was cold. The conversation died.
I wondered if I'd left the stove alight.
The curtains of the world were torn aside,
and naked glory overwhelmed my sight;
and oh, the voice, that called to him by name,
so comforting, so terrible to hear:
that man I knew, the same, yet not the same,
touches my arm, and tells me not to fear;
but as I raise my eyes, the light is gone,
and life, and something more, must carry on.
* * *
Written as part of a Lenten meditation series at Christ Church, Pottstown.
Robert Dennis Thurman
This day we lay the universe to rest:
behind this pair of eyes that lived and died
a mirror-image, faithfully expressed,
reflects a mirror-universe inside
all memories. This day we thank the Lord
for all these shining moments held within
this mind where human memories are stored.
And this shall be the moment they begin
to shatter, to become ten thousand stories
reflecting human life in all its beauty:
each smile, each poem, every sunset's glories,
that call to those remaining of their duty
to see this story speaks and never fails;
to call, recall again ten thousand tales.
Attention
Perhaps I have forgotten how to read.
I mean, I haven't lost the alphabet
but more and more I'm starting to forget
the way to focus in the form I need
to read a novel; more and more I find
my mental structures seem to fall apart
before the end, before I even start,
with only wrecks remaining in my mind
that sink, or blow away in gales, or burn;
I long for clarity, and for the power
to concentrate on reading for an hour.
If only I could read a book to learn
the way to build a house that won't collapse.
I have forgotten how to read, perhaps.
Song of Lent
O Lord, withhold your wrath against my wrong!
Be merciful to me— I faint and fail.
My vision draws to darkness, and I wail:
How long until you rescue me? How long?
Still groaning, since my strength is spent with groans,
By night I weep until I drench my bed,
My sight grows dim from sorrowing and dread,
My pains absorb my spirit, sleep and bones.
My Father, turn and save us as you said!
Display your love declared to us of old:
No hearts or mouths can praise you once grown cold,
Nor any man remember you when dead.
Away! The Lord has heard me call his name!
And all my foes shall surely fall in shame.
Too many sonnets
“Too many sonnets”, growls the curt rejection.
Too many sonnets? Can the news be true?
This polished work is workshopped to perfection,
a classic form recast to something new.
But still, I'll keep them coming while I'm living,
and when I'm old and sinking into death
I'll write a final sonnet of thanksgiving
and gasp the sestet in my final breath.
And then in death, what nightmares may inspire?
Within the circle of the realms infernal
reserved for sonneteers, I'll write in fire
to send to Styx Review, or some such journal,
and if there's surplus sonnets there in hell...
well... then I may compose a villanelle.
Villanelles
The day I die
My inside's on the out, the day I die,
Though (here and now) my inside's on the in.
Spread out like spirit butter on the sky,
the sunrise flaunts its colours in my eye
like all I'm not, sequestered here in sin.
My inside's on the out, the day I die,
yet here the world's outside and I am I,
divided from the cosmos by my skin.
Spread out like spirit butter on the sky
the clouds reflect my soul, the lights on high
are macrocosms matching what's within;
My inside's on the out. The day I die
is creeping slowly closer. By and by
will freedom of my captive self begin,
spread out like spirit butter on the sky.
And separated out, I still may sigh,
The waiting's brief, the barrier is thin;
My inside's on the out, the day I die,
Spread out like spirit butter on the sky.
And yet you show surprise
The world's so queer, and yet you show surprise
to find him solid in the midday light.
He looks at you with strangely laughing eyes.
You told yourself you're sure to recognise
the green-clad arms, the ring upon the right;
the world's so queer, and yet you show surprise?
His name won't pass your lips. You know…
those guys.
You know his name. At least you think you might.
He looks at you with strangely laughing eyes.
The happy folk? And after many tries
you force a smile, a single smile, polite.
“The world's so queer, and yet you show surprise…
You've seen me here before, contrariwise;
You can't pretend you don't recall the sight.”
He looks at you with strangely laughing eyes.
(Your sister's outer clothing all of lies.)
(Your brother was a changeling in the night.)
The world's so queer, and yet you show surprise.
He looks at you with strangely laughing eyes.
Gods
I have a friend who doubles as a god.
I'd seen the tell-tale signs I can't deny
for years before I realised it was odd.
A greener grass is growing where he's trod;
his bitter is immune from running dry.
I have a friend who doubles as a god,
a silent friend, who'd smile at me and nod;
I'd known him, and his one remaining eye
for years before I realised it was odd.
You're staring at me, thinking “silly sod”.
But no, it's not just him: I don't know why.
I have a friend who doubles as a god:
her flesh is stars; with storms her feet are
shod;
I'd noticed she was goddess of the sky
for years before I realised it was odd.
These people give my mind a gentle prod.
“The least of these you comfort: it was I.”
I'd had a friend who doubled as a god
for years before I realised it was odd.
Metaphor
A metaphor’s a gentle curse
that darkens life with soft implying:
or so I learned from reading verse.
A blanket is a woollen hearse.
A lover’s word is widows’ sighing.
A metaphor’s a gentle curse.
And sex is just a human purse
with prices, goods, and people buying,
or so I learned from reading verse:
transactions made we can’t reverse:
a one-way street, a kind of dying.
A metaphor’s a gentle curse,
though dying is a friendly nurse
with copper coins to ease your crying,
or so I learned from reading verse.
I’m left to wonder which is worse:
to hear your truth, or see you lying.
A metaphor’s a gentle curse,
or so I learned from reading verse.
* * *
First published in Tilt-a-Whirl.
A ghost complains about blackberries
And I have nothing else to do again
but walk these halls and wish I wasn't here,
but picking berries in a country lane.
A shadow is my face, the dust my brain,
my voice is but an echo in your ear.
And I have nothing else to do again
but counting every pace to keep me sane.
Dead as I am, I've nothing else to fear.
(But, picking berries in a country lane...)
Within me lives the spectre of a pain,
the ache of endless summer, yesteryear,
and I have nothing else to do again
but live in memory without my chain
and walk an aimless autumn Cambridgeshire,
but picking berries in a country lane.
Each universe must reach its long refrain.
A moment all my chains must disappear
And I'll have nothing else to do again
But picking berries in a country lane.
Angels
This wall you build around angelic things
to keep their halos shiny-bright, instead
you'll never hear the sound of downy wings.
These Precious Moments smiles and
wedding-rings
(for mixed-sex couples only), when they wed,
this airtight wall around angelic things,
a thousand miles from where a seraph sings
God's love for hated folk and underfed;
you'll never hear the sound of downy wings
unless you break the prejudice that brings
the boundary where angels fear to tread,
this airtight wall around angelic things
that shutters out angelic visitings,
or when you too are dying on your bed
you'll never hear the sound of downy wings.
You never know with whom they'll break their
bread,
or so the writer to the Hebrews said;
this wall you build around angelic things
will never hear the sound of downy wings.
A small hotel
If life should ever leave you left behind
just take a holiday. I'll stay with you
within a small hotel I call my mind.
A quieter place to stay you'd never find.
I'm hoping you'll remember what to do
if life should ever leave you left behind;
remember me, if you should be so kind.
And though I sometimes decorate in blue
within a small hotel I call my mind,
in every room I've written and I've signed
a note reminding you my love is true,
if life should ever leave you left behind;
and every evening finds us intertwined;
and every morning finds the bed as new
within a small hotel I call my mind.
A week becomes a century or two;
and when you're checking out, I'll follow too,
if life should ever leave you left behind
within a small hotel I call my mind.
Song against Twitter
I tried to say: you make my life complete,
you put my puzzle pieces into place.
But then I tried to send it as a tweet.
It didn't fit. I thought I could delete
one part, about the joys of your embrace;
I tried to say: you make my life complete,
but still it was too long. I thought I'd cheat
ByMergingWordsAndUsingCamelCase.
But then I tried to send it as a tweet.
It failed again. I must admit defeat.
Like Fermat's margin, Twitter lacks the space
to let me say you make my life complete.
It makes the longer forms seem obsolete.
But even Petrarch's work would meet disgrace
if cut and scaled to send it as a tweet!
And somehow public posts seem indiscreet.
I think I'd rather whisper to your face
the message that you make my life complete,
and far too full to post it as a tweet.
Triolets
In depths of darkness out of doors
In depths of darkness out of doors
in thunderstorms, in pouring rain,
the kisses on my mind are yours.
In depths of darkness, out of doors,
I'll bide my time until it pours
and lose myself in you again
in depths of darkness out of doors
in thunderstorms, in pouring rain.
For all the words I mean to say
For all the words I mean to say
that I can squeeze inside a book…
I've written them, another day.
For all the words I mean to say
I'll say them in another way
and give my love a second look
for all the words I mean to say
that I can squeeze inside a book.
For it's late in the night
For it's late in the night
and you're heading to bed.
And I'm sure that you're right
for it's late in the night
but I wish that I might
be with you instead,
for it's late in the night
and you're heading to bed.
Circadian rhythm
I'm not at my best
when the morning is new;
when the sun's in the west
I'm not at my best;
and most of the rest
is a crappy time too.
I'm not at my best
when the morning is new.
15th February
Today's just a day
That's not Valentine.
No roses, no wine.
Today's just a day
I still want to say
I'm glad that you're mine.
Today's just a day
That's not Valentine.
Since the day doesn't store
Since the day doesn't store,
and the seconds can't stay,
each moment's no more.
Since the day doesn't store,
when you're seventy-four,
I'll kiss you good day;
since the day doesn't store.
and the seconds can't stay.
The echoes of an amber god
Electric sparkles in your touch,
the echoes of an amber god.
You fill my batteries with such
electric sparkles in your touch,
that Tesla would have charged too much
and Franklin dropped his lightning-rod:
electric sparkles in your touch,
the echoes of an amber god.
For you are the sun
For you are the sun
and you are the thunder.
In sunlight I run
for you are the sun
that fills me with fun
that fills me with wonder
for you are the sun
and you are the thunder.
But how can they hear?
“How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in him whom they have not heard? How will they hear without a preacher?” — Romans 10:14
But how can they hear
if you don't go and preach?
The judgement is near,
but how can they hear?
They're drowning, I fear;
with you, I can reach...
but how can they hear
if you don't go and preach?
As the drawing shall tell
As the drawing shall tell
and the paper responds,
some enchantment just fell,
as the drawing shall tell…
in a paper for spell
with your pencils as wands,
as the drawing shall tell
and the paper responds.
Before the sun begins to set
Before the sun begins to set
we'll share another cup of tea;
the kettle's never settled yet
before the sun begins to set,
and every morning since we met
you've shared your joyful life with me;
before the sun begins to set
we'll share another cup of tea.
Water
My health needs are few,
but water comes first.
I tell you, it's true:
My health needs are few,
And water is you.
I'm aching with thirst.
My health needs are few
but water comes first.
To sleep next to you
To sleep next to you
when the weather is cold
is trusted and true.
To sleep next to you
is decades from new
yet it never grows old
to sleep next to you
when the weather is cold.
More deep than my heart
More deep than my heart
or the roots of my brain:
the smiles you impart,
more deep than my heart,
pull me back to the start
and I'm falling again,
more deep than my heart
or the roots of my brain.
Reality checkpoint
Is this my home ground?
We'd lived here, it's true.
But what I have found
is this, my home ground,
is town all around
full of empty of you.
Is this my home ground?
We'd lived here. It's true.
Fin
Where poets tell about a Fin,
her mind is where adventures are.
Adventurers may well begin,
where poets tell about a Fin,
to seek, to find, to stand within
the sunlight of her burning star;
where poets tell about a Fin.
Her mind is where adventures are.
I'd write you a verse
I'd write you a verse
like the moon in the dark,
like a muttering curse.
I'd write you a verse
from better to worse,
from muffled to stark,
I'd write you a verse
like the moon in the dark.
If the world is your stage
But you're clutching a script
if the world is your stage.
You've mumbled, you've slipped,
but you're clutching a script
and the binding is ripped
and you're missing a page;
but you're clutching a script
if the world is your stage.
I heard this tale about a queen
I heard this tale about a queen
whose anger rose against a cliff
she coloured crimson, shade unclean.
I heard this tale about a queen...
I think I'd cleanse it back, with green
and live with you beside it, if
I heard this tale about a queen
whose anger rose against a cliff.
May our minds overflow
May our minds overflow
to the seas of the soul
as we love and we grow
may our minds overflow
from their riverbeds, so
two halves become whole.
May our minds overflow
to the seas of the soul.
As I love you anew
As I love you anew
for the rest of my life,
I haven't a clue
(as I love you anew)
what other folks do
without you for a wife;
as I love you anew
for the rest of my life.
Minimal pairs
For you
my dear
anew
for you
all through
the year;
for you
my dear.
The fall
The fall will unwind
the shrivelling day,
the works of my mind
the fall will unwind,
the key left behind
and longing for May:
the fall will unwind
the shrivelling day.
More love's in your eye
More love's in your eye
than I can remember,
than stars in the sky.
More love's in your eye
than blackberries, high
in lanes in September.
More love's in your eye
than I can remember.
The smoke of your hair
Asleep in your bed
with the smoke of your hair
where dreams lie unsaid
asleep in your bed;
the fires in your head
who create and prepare
asleep in your bed
with the smoke of your hair.
The smoke of your hair
in your sleep, in your bed
is strewn through the air.
The smoke of your hair
from the fires within, where
new worlds will be bred:
the smoke of your hair
in your sleep, in your bed.
Ballades (and attempts)
Dear Sir…
Dear Sir:— This application form,
from one potential employee,
will tell you how I should perform.
I have a first-class B.Sc.,
ten years of writing ANSI C,
some Java; Perl with DBI;
and tendencies to wander free
and gaze, all wordless, at the sky.
I know perhaps it's not the norm
to mention this on one's CV.
I wonder if you'd just transform
the job I'm asking for, to be
not writing code, but poetry.
Do ask your boss. It's worth a try.
He'd sing, himself, when he was three,
and gaze, all wordless, at the sky.
I'd stay till ten beneath a warm
duvet, and then I'd climb a tree,
my face upheld towards the storm,
or paddle barefoot in the sea.
Perhaps a friend comes round for tea.
Perhaps among the corn we'd lie
in silent solidarity
and gaze, all wordless, at the sky.
Sir, I enclose an S.A.E.
I wonder if you might reply
and leave your desk to run with me,
and gaze, all wordless, at the sky.
Stations of the Cross
I watched from Farringdon as Satan fell;
I've battled for my soul at Leicester Square;
I've laid a ghost with Oystercard and bell;
I've tracked the wolf of Wembley to his lair;
I've drawn Heathrow's enchantment in rotation;
at Bank I played the devil for his fare;
I laugh at lesser modes of transportation.
I change at Aldgate East because it's there.
The Waterloo and City cast its spell;
I watched it slip away, and could not care,
the Northern Line descending into hell
until King's Cross was more than I could bear;
he left me there in fear for my salvation,
a Mansion House in heaven to prepare:
so why return to any lesser station?
I change at Aldgate East because it's there.
Three days beneath the earth in stench and
smell
I lay, and let the enemy beware:
I learned the truth of tales the children tell:
an Angel plucked me homeward by the hair,
to glory from the depths of condemnation,
to where I started long ago from where
I missed my stop through long procrastination.
I change at Aldgate East because it's there.
Prince of the buskers, sing your new creation:
the change you ask is more than I can spare;
a change of spirit, soul, imagination.
I change at Aldgate East because it's there.
Ballade of Adventure
Go north. Go east. Get lamp. Get food. Get key.
Get sword. Examine sword. It's glowing blue.
Say plugh. You watch the world around you flee.
You're standing near a boulder marked Y2.
Put Auntie's thing in bag. It doesn't fit.
(By Infocom. Wherever games are sold.)
Such antics are the price for us to sit
where Thorin sits and sings about his gold.
You're standing west of house again. You see:
a robot and a door. The door sees: you.
You're carrying some fluff, some shades, no tea;
Be careful. You'll be eaten by a grue.
Oh, now you've gone and fallen in a pit.
You're carrying as much as you can hold.
In Bedquilt. You see shadows through the slit,
where Thorin sits and sings about his gold.
But Activision's little shopping spree
had turned the world to wanting something new.
It's sad, but still, I think we'd all agree
the Z-machine's demise was overdue.
The day when all the world went sixteen-bit
the era died. I think they broke the mould
when pictures took the place of words and wit,
where Thorin sits and sings about his gold.
Prince of the numbers, worlds have watched you
knit
the memories of processors of old;
you've made a better planet, I submit,
where Thorin sits and sings about his gold.
I measure out my life with kitten toes
A dozen years, the length of feline days:
compared to human lives it may appear
the cats lose out. To be a human pays.
I think on this, and on companions dear:
Successive cats whose whiskered lives touched mine
Have lain upon my lap... do you suppose
Their tiptoe through the years is but a sign?
I measure out my life with kitten toes.
As they and I pursue the hilly ways
that fill our lives, “Beware! The end is near!”
“Your death is nigh!” or some such friendly phrase
will tell me that it's all downhill from here.
And soon the slope more steeply will incline,
And drop away as quickly as it rose.
You trace the arc? My life is on the line:
I measure out my life with kitten toes.
Though now, my cat, we feel the sunshine's
blaze...
your windowsill is warm, the skies are clear...
yet still I feel the sun's all-seeing gaze
remind me of the coming day, I fear...
the coming day I cannot feel it shine,
and on my face the smiling daisy grows.
I only have the one, where you have nine:
I measure out my life with kitten toes.
Prince, lord of cats, may endless meat be
thine!
O grant that thine immortal princely doze
may evermore upon my lap recline!
I measure out my life with kitten toes.
Odds and ends
Here deep in the city it is always night
Here deep in the city it is always night.
As I walk each street it is always night.
The men in their mansions drink their delight.
For those in the streets it is always night.
Those in the doorways step out to fight.
They slip to where it is always night.
Each plays a game to increase his might.
Each keeps his brother where it is always night.
We laugh, and lie about the lands of light.
I still light candles where it is always night.
The Caller
“Is there anybody there?” said the Caller,
“Six ten eight oh one two four three nine?”
And his ears attuned to the empty hum
Of the long-forgotten line;
And an LED on the handset
Flashed, for a moment, red,
And he dialled the number a second time:
“Is there anybody there?” he said.
But no one replied to the Caller,
No sound but the dialling tone
Came drifting into his waiting ear
As he held that haunted phone;
But only a host of phantom listeners,
Of spectres weak and strange
Stood hearkening to that human voice
That echoed around the exchange;
And he felt in his heart their strangeness,
And his heart was afraid and nervous,
With his hand on the final digit
Of that number not in service;
For he suddenly tapped the receiver
And spoke on that line of dread:
“Tell them I called, and no one answered,
That I kept my word!” he said;
Ay, they heard him replace the receiver,
And his mumbled cursing later,
With the usual subdued but enthused delight
Of the switchboard operator.
* * *
After The Listeners by Walter de la Mare.
Storytelling
A dragon was the beast to fear,
With shining, perfect teeth,
And deadly spines upon its back,
And scaly skin beneath.
You'd see them fly across the sky
With dreadful wings unfanned,
In far-off days of long ago
When dragons ruled the land.
And as they flew they'd watch the ground,
With eyes devoid of pity,
They'd follow humans to their homes
And breathe upon their city.
The dragon's breath was instant death,
No houses still could stand,
In far-off days of long ago
When dragons ruled the land.
Then someone had a wise idea:
King Arthur and his Knights.
They travelled round the countryside,
And held great dragon-fights.
Each dragon's heart was split apart,
So triumphed Arthur's band;
And now no dragons linger
Any longer in the land.
* * *
From Not Ordinarily Borrowable.
Storytelling — ii
When Merlin looked upon this land,
he knew by magic arts
the anger in the acts of men,
the hatred in their hearts:
he saw despair and deadly things,
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