Braids
All thumbs,
I can manage
two bunches,
one on each side.
But now,
with her mother gone,
it’s much more difficult
to part my daughter’s hair
neatly into three.
I work hard to perfect
that one thick plait
she loves down her back.
As for fish-bones
and French braiding…
she begs me to try
and I promise
that when my thumbs
turn into fingers,
I’ll give it a go.
Thursday Thoughts
8 March 2018
An old song
… an old song, words and tune wrapping themselves around your neck, a loose scarf, brilliant in the sunshine, and oh so warm, flapping as you walk the streets, and people see the scarf’s frayed ends waving in the wind, so they wave back at you, and then they see those same ends tucked back in your jacket, hugging you tight, a pair of arms borrowed from your lover, and oh the light in your eyes, and the sun picking out the gold spots in your hair, and all’s well with the world …
… or left, left, left, right, left … it’s a marching song and the world falls away as you walk to work or to play and every day is a new day with blood stirring and this call to arms, to alarms, to alarums, and everything up for grabs, and you, marching in tune to the tunes in your head and the words wrapped around you, warming you, comforting, as you sing and stride along …
… or maybe it’s a sad song, and there’s rain in the sky, small drops gathering, a heavy mist, or a light mizzle, and you walk as if through a cloud, and yet you are still dry and warm and comforted and the words wrap themselves round and round you, and yes, you are sad, but you are comforted, as if in a verbal comforter, and the sun breaks through and hugs you and the raindrops radiate the brilliance of that sunlight, winking off your tears, as they gather at leaf’s end and spread sun’s twinkle from the radiance of flowers …
… and today it’s a Nor’Easter … snow in the air … on the trees … on the ground … a steady accumulation … you know how its is … and a fire in the fireplace … warm heart … warm heart … no travel today … books and the computer beckon … a time to read and write … to remember the old ways … the old days … those memories … a warm scarf wrapped around the neck … and the comforter … comforted … and comforting … so much to wrap around you … so much to wrap your head around …
Nobody’s There
Reality:
a red brick
sitting on the master’s desk
in the ivory tower
of a Cotswold Manor.
The history master enters,
sees the brick,
sizes it up,
seizes it
and, without looking,
hurls it at the window.
Summer term:
the days are warm.
The windows are open.
End over end,
the brick tumbles
through blue air
to land with a thud
on the quad’s black tarmac
right at the feet
of the school pastor.
He looks around.
There’s nobody there.
The brick must have
materialized
out of thin air.
The pastor shrugs,
stoops down,
picks up the brick,
puts it in his briefcase,
and carries it away.
“Here endeth
the first lesson:
Book of Brick.”
Sun Worship
Worship the sun
as it rises over the hills
from whence cometh
its golden glory.
Trees and their forest,
forces older by far
than this Christian god,
walk in darkness
until touched by the sun.
Worship the sun ropes
that tie you to your daily work,
rejoice in your bondage,
for no man kills
to glorify the sun.
Sun, my father and my mother,
sunshine that floods my spirit
and enlightens my world,
here, before sunrise,
I raise my voice in a song
praising you, and your strength,
the life you give, the death
you will one day bring.
Mysterious Mist
Mysterious mist,
how I have missed you
wrapping and unwrapping
your gifts of seashore and sand.
So delicate, your will o’the wisp touch,
your fingers dampening my curls,
a delicacy of delight your butterfly kiss
laid upon forehead and cheek.
A distorting mirror in a circus
or a sideshow at the fair,
you twist things round your little fingers,
complicating our simple lives,
shape-changing them with dreams
and visions conjured from thin air.
Now you are here again, in my garden.
I welcome your presence among the trees,
your spirit enveloping the bees’ balm,
your crowning gift, soft-toned cone-flowers
where Monarch butterflies drift and reign.
Torticollis
A sudden crick of the neck and I am back in the chalet at Perines with Trini.
“Torticollis,” she says, raising a hand to her neck, except she says it in Spanish, ‘tortículis’.
She offers me tea, very English, from the Wedgewood tea pot I brought her, all those years ago. Beside her, the Pirate with the Parrot on his Shoulder, my Toby Jug, still stands on guard, and protects my memories.
Orphaned, I was, from England, abandoned on that Spanish shore, and left there all summer to learn the language. Trini taught me how to eat, speak, choose my books and my friends … she had lost a son, same age as me, just after the Civil War, and treated me like her son, returned, like the Prodigal Son I was to all who had sent me away from home to improve my lifestyle and my manners.
Wanted? Unwanted by my family? I wouldn’t know the difference.
In that far-of land, in time and space, I only knew the loneliness of being lost, marooned in a foreign land, feeling my way, day by day, among foreigners, still foreign, although they took me into their homes and hearts and loved me as I had never been loved before.
Back home, drowsing at the kitchen table, I doze into my dreams, only to be woken by that beloved voice.
Wistful, I turn my head and glance backwards into that past of sunshine and beaches, where the sun sparkled on hill, sand, and sea and the table cloth was spread on the family table, pure and white, with a dozen of us sitting, talking, smiling, drinking wine, that bottled sunshine that still adorns my dining room table.
“Trini? Is that you?”
Her name slips from my lips as I snap my head towards her voice. As I turn, I twist my neck and raising my hand to the sudden pain, I hear again that word: “¡Tortículis!”
Thank you so much, Deborah Carr and the WFNB, for inviting me to write about the KIRA Creative Experience. I appreciate your kindness and interest. Here, for my regular blog followers, is the link to the appropriate page.
Two Dogs and a Deer
(Cherry, Hanna, Jasper, and Lucinda)
Two dogs and a deer:
the deer, heart in mouth,
bounding away from the lawn
seeking cover in the trees.
The gold dog bounding too,
a rocking-horse bounce,
from back to front, lurching,
falling behind the black dog,
the latter, smooth as a train.
The enemy having fled,
shoulder to shoulder they return,
across the green grass of the field,
the victors, side by side, panting,
sides heaving, triumphant, grinning.
What heartbreak as these memories
fade and fall behind. Long may they
linger in my dreaming mind.
Life
A champagne glass
bubbling to the brim,
your voice over the phone,
sparking and sparkling.
“I’ve got a new job,” you say,
and fresh horizons
open before my eyes.
I see your ship sailing
towards undiscovered lands.
A better life beckons:
more responsibility,
higher pay, a move away
from the routines, once fresh,
now boring, that hold you back.
“Well done. Congratulations!”
I hear you start the car.
“Take care. Drive safely.”
You accelerate away
driving into the unknown
dimensions of a newer life
beyond this life,
a life I will never know.
Kingsbrae 25.3
25 June 2017
An Angel at Jarea
An angel moves through the room
in the silences between our chatter.
He fills the interstices of speech
with the wonder of feathers
enlightened by rainbows.
Tranquil his footsteps
as we sense his presence.
He places his hand on an arm,
his arm around our shoulders,
and now, commanding silence,
a finger on his lips.
We sit here
scared by our intimate inadequacies,
scarred by the fierceness of his immanence
as we sense the vacuum
of his soon-to-be absence.
rogermoorepoet 