Winter

Rage, Rage 20

Rage, Rage
20

Words emerge
from the silence 
of blood and bone.

They break that silence
the day they are born.

Silence, once broken,
cannot be repaired
and a word once spoken
cannot be recalled.

The greatest gifts –
knowing how and when
to sink into silence,
knowing how to be alone
in the middle of a crowd,

So many word-worlds
smothered at birth
and those worlds, dismissed,
forgotten, still-born,
their names never spoken.

Comment:

So, are you paying attention? Did you notice anything? Has something gone missing? Moo tells me that he doesn’t think anyone will notice what I have. Can you prove him wrong? Good question! Whatever, as they say, or “So what?” as Miles Davies plays. Or, as Buddy Holly once sang “I guess it doesn’t matter any more.”

Moo wants me to tell you that he painted this painting last night. He calls it No More Blues. Guess what? There are no blue shades in it. Cunning, eh? And daylight hours are back up to 9:30 – 9.5 hours sunlight on this cold, wintry day. And it is cold at -14C. On the other hand, Moo’s painting is toasty warm and you can hold up your chilled fingers and warm them on his painted fires.

As for me, I am having great fun preparing my writing for competitions that I never win. I am also paying to enter them. But I choose carefully nowadays – so many publications and competitions want so much money just for sending them a manuscript they will possibly never read and probably (nay, almost certainly) reject. I am so happy that I do not have to live off my earnings. I have 17 books on KDP Amazon and guess what? I received $3.61 in earnings in 2025. And I must declare it on my tax forms. I hope it doesn’t send me up a tax bracket!

I guess it’s a case of Fly me to the stars and let me see what writing pays on Jupiter and Mars. Not much probably. I bet they don’t read poetry in any of those Mars Bars I am always reading about. That said, I wonder what language Mars Barmen speak? And do they have Mars Bar Flies, like we have Bar Flies here on earth? Oh the wonders of language and the Joy of Words. The Joy of Six, as well – and that’s Sex in Latin. Get the joke? Oh, to be multilingual, now that spring’s a coming. Easy now. Don’t get too excited. And look at all those little white angels flying in Moo’s painting.

Ice Storm

Ice Storm

This month and my life
are nearly done.

Sun strengthens in the sky
but birds ice up
in spite of feathers,
fluffed like eider downs.

Man alone,
within warm walls,
can bravely laugh
at winter’s squalls.

But oh, if the power fails,
if wires are tumbled
by winter’s gusting gales,
man’s heart no longer
fills with ease.

He sits at home
in the cold and dark
while all around him,
ice covers the land
and even fire dogs
freeze.

Rage, Rage 10

Rage, Rage
10

My body’s house
has many rooms
and you, my love,
are present in them all.

I glimpse your shadow
in the mirror, and your breath
brushes my cheek
when I open the door.
Where have you gone?

I walk from room to room,
but when I seek,
I no longer find
and nothing opens
when I knock.

Afraid, sometimes,
to enter a room,
I am sure
you are in there.

I hear your footsteps.
Sometimes your voice
breaks the silence
when you whisper my name
in the same old way.

Comment:

Rage, Rage – and still I rage against the dying of the light and, like Dylan Thomas, ask the ageing of this world not to go gentle into that dark night. Yet, as my beloved and I age, we watch day’s shadows growing longer, and night stealing steadily along. What can we do?

Well, since the winter solstice, we can start counting the minutes as each day adds a minute or two and gifts some more light and strength to the sun. Sunrise today – 8:03 AM. Sunset today – 5:09 PM. That means 9 hours and 6 minutes of sunlight. Well, it would, if it weren’t cloudy, with a cold wind, and a dropping temperature. My guess is that it will get dark much before it ought to. And that’s not nice – no respect!

Of course, my beloved is a sun bunny and a Leo, and she perishes in these shortened days. I was born in them and they don’t affect me as badly as they do her. But I can still Rage, Rage, because there is so much to rage about – icy streets, the usual potholes, roads that hide ice beneath a thin covering of snow, some strange drivers who don’t seem to have bought winter tires. Oh yes, I love them. One came twisting and turning down the same side of the road as me only this morning. Luckily he hit the snow bank before he hit me. But, I ask you, what was he thinking?

So there’s Rage, and Rage Rage, and also Road Rage. Way to go! I think we should call a national rage day and all stay home for 24 hours, just to cool us all down for a bit. Oh dear, that might lead to cabin fever – and that would be an out–Rage.

Carved in Stone 61 & 62

Carved in Stone
61

Water through the water clock,
water off a duck’s back,
the waters of life,
continually flowing,
trapped in our children
and their children,
and the love we create
never lost, just circling,
like the hands of the clock,
like the planets and stars.

But who will wind up
the clockwork universe,
and tend the mechanism
that balances planets and stars?

What will happen
when the clockwork
finally runs down,
the last candle is snuffed,
and the water clock dries up?

62

Whoever, whatever remains
will be left to contemplate
Ozymandias with his two vast
and trunkless legs of stone,
standing in the desert.

“Look on my works,
ye mighty, and despair.”

Commentary:

“Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.” Well, Moo does have a sense of humor after all. I thought he did. From Ozymandias to the meaning of “works” to the destiny of the work we did. What a journey. It goes from the joy of the children who build a snowman to the warm spring wind that melts him to the crows and the dog who do what crows and doggies do. Intertextuality – the links between verbal and visual and think about it – such strange things happens in Moo’s creative mind.

But what do we leave behind? Think about it. Only the wake of the ship in which we sail. The wake – that white trail we leave behind us, on the surface of the sea, slowly vanishing as we also vanish, pulling away into the unknown that always lies ahead. Moo is right – so many things disappear out of the frame of the painting. “There are no pockets in shrouds” said the preacher in the hospital where I took my father, so long ago for treatment.

And even if there were, how would you fit a snowman, several crows, a cardinal, and the rear end of a dog into the pocket? “Contemplate Ozymandias with his two vast and trunkless legs of stone, standing in the desert. Now contemplate the fate of the snowman. Now look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.”


Carved in Stone 10 & 11

10

Firelight dances,
bringing things back to life.

Each morning,
I take time to empty my mind
of those restless cats
I herd at night as they shimmy
through my troubled dreams.

By day, each cat
throws a different shadow
that parades before me
in the sweetness of soft sunlight
where a honeyed sweetness reigns
and no bitterness dwells.

My own cat haunts me,
purring for butter,

sitting there, staring,
eyes wide open, hypnotic.

What, I wonder,
does she really want
as she turns her back,
walks away,
and stalks a different prey
among my books?

11

Does she hear the clock’s dry tick
and sense the Roman numerals
marching round, left – right – left,
always in step
with the pendulum’s sway.

Does she recall migrating birds
or those gaudy summer butterflies,
fanning their wings
as they perch on Cone Heads,
Bees’ Balm, Black-eyed Susans,
generic butterflies,
specific flowers,
planted by my own hands?

I often ask myself –
“What does she know
that I don’t know?”

Commentary:

A strange thing knowledge. I have learned the hard way that “the more I know, the more I know I don’t know.” Just look at today’s second stanza. I would love to know more about, and understand better, migrating birds, summer butterflies, especially the lovely Monarchs that fly at Mexico and back, the flowers themselves, the way language substitutes the generic (butterflies, flowers) for the specific (Red Admirals, buttercups), and as for that cat, I really would like to know what she knows that I don’t know. I have never been able to train her, but she has certainly managed to train me!

And I would love to understand humor and laughter. Slapstick aside, humor is one of the cultural secrets that travels least in translation. Jokes in French or Spanish just do not translate well into English. It takes a deep cultural and linguistic knowledge to grasp foreign humor at first glance.

Take today, for instance. I drove the car to the garage to change the tires from summer to winter. I asked the garage guy, my friend, if he would drive me home, and he said he would. He got i the passenger side and I drove home. Then he drove the car back to the garage. He opened the garage doors, drove the car in, turned the engine off, hoisted the car up, and changed the tires. When he’d finished, he tried to start the engine. No luck. He called me – “Where’s the key?” “In my pocket!” I replied. We were having such fun chatting we never thought to offer or request the car key when we exchanged drivers. Well, we are all still laughing about it.

When I got into the house, even the cat was laughing, and as for that cat, I really would like to know what she knows that I don’t know. Maybe, it’s just that we humans, especially as we age, aren’t as clever as we sometimes think we are. Some things, I guess, I’ll never know.

October

October

… and the wind a presence, sudden,
rustling dusty reeds and leaves,
the pond no longer a mirror,
its troubled surface twinkling,
sparking fall sunshine,
fragmenting it into shiny patches.

It’s warm in the car, windows raised
and the fall heat trapped in glass.
Outside, walkers walk hooded now,
gloved, heads battened down
beneath woollen thatches.

A wet dog emerges from the pond,
shakes its rainbow spray
soon to be a tinkle of trembling sparks
when the mercury sinks
and cold weather closes the pond
to all but skaters. Then fall frost will turn
noses blue and winter will start to bite.

Comment:

I was the first to like Moo’s painting, and indeed I do.
I hope someone likes my poem, too.

Lost

Lost

I took a wrong turn along the way
and got where I didn’t want to go.
Oh no! But there I was, stuck
in a land I didn’t understand.

Snow fell all around. No sound.
The forest silent. Trees asleep.
Snow rising higher. Ankle deep.
Obstacles. No path around.

I tried to speak. No sound came.
I couldn’t sing. I couldn’t hum.
Silently, I cried, but no help came.

I saw so many things I couldn’t name.
When I tired of playing this lost soul game,
I knew I was the one to blame.

Comment:
And yes, I have been lost. Absent without leave for a whole month – 11 November – 11 December. Where did I go? I still don’t know. I owe the above photo to my friend and Beta reader, KTJ.

First Snow Blow

First Snow Blow
4 December 2023

A dry old stick of a man
I hang a warm coat
on my scarecrow frame
and don thick mitts
to keep out the cold.

Gripping grimly
the snowblower’s handles,
and hanging on tight,
I plod my wobbly way,
working the gears as I go.

The snowblower, this year,
is a recalcitrant shopping cart
with me, the shopper,
frantically pushing, pulling,
forcing the machine along
a narrow aisle of snow.

Out of breath, I stop,
breathe deep, and try to
regain control, first
of my heart and lungs,
and then of this machine
that so frustrates me.

It seems inanimate, but
some spirit must dwell within
and force me to follow
its devilish whim, instead
of going the way I want to go.

Comment:
Just the one snowfall so far, but there’s more on the way. Winter in New Brunswick, Canada, is never complete, without multiple falls of lovely snow. Lovely to look at, but not so much fun when you’re getting old and the snowblower snorts into life meaning that it’s time, once more, to go outside and clear the snow.

What is the greatest gift someone could give you?

Daily writing prompt
What is the greatest gift someone could give you?
View all responses

What is the greatest gift someone could give you?

The greatest gifts that anyone could possibly give me have already been given. Greatest of all, this life I live, this body I inhabit, given to me by my mother such a long time ago. Without that gift, and blessing, all other gifts would be meaningless. The second gift, chronologically, was the education that they provided for me. This included time on the continent during the summer and the school year to develop, in France and Spain, my knowledge of the languages and cultures.

The third gift has to be my meeting with Clare, and her decision to stay with me as her chosen partner. This includes my moving to Canada to study at the University of Toronto, and her decision to follow me here. Then, we got married, on Christmas Eve, and she became my greatest gift, giving me, in her turn, the gift of a child – our daughter, who in turn gifted us with a granddaughter. This last group of gifts includes the gifts that keep on giving, year after year.

So, a life viewed through rose-colored spectacles? Yes, in some ways. We have had our ups and downs but the gifts of life, love, and laughter have carried us through the difficult times when the winds blew, the sea rose, and we rowed on into brighter weather. There have been other gifts, of course. They include the gifts of family and friendship bestowed upon me by so many people in Wales, England, France, Spain, Canada, and Mexico. The gift of friendship, in later life, and my meeting with like-minded people who have walked with me, some for a little while, many for a lot longer. And we must never forget the gifts of adoration and love, bestowed upon us by our four-legged friends, the dogs and cats who have entered our various homes and enhanced our existence.

Having said all that, one moment, one gift, a much more recent one, does stand out. We lost power for three days, seventy-two hours, just before Christmas this year. At the start of the fourth evening, we were looking at temperatures of -10C to -15C. Our house temperature had descended to +53 F and we didn’t know whether we could face another cold night, or not. Then, at 7:15 pm, the exact moment when we had lost heat three days earlier, with a click and a whirr, the lights came on, the heating started again, and we received, from anonymous people, who we will probably never meet, the gift of power restored and the return of light and heat.

So, to the linemen of NB Power, those anonymous workers who strove to bring the light and spirit of Christmas to the dark homes of the cold and lost, we send our thanks. You gave us, without even knowing us, one of the greatest gifts that living things can receive – heat and warmth and light at Christmas Time, in the bleak mid-winter. Thank you, men and women of NB Power. You were the bearers of great gifts and you and your devotion to duty (under the worst of the weather), and the gifts you brought us are all truly appreciated.

Pilgrim

Pilgrim

“We think in eternity
but we move slowly through time.”

My daily duties nibble and gnaw.
I slowly shrink beneath their onslaught.
I feel myself diminishing, gradually,
hour by hour, disappearing into myself.

Even sunshine and silver-lined clouds
weigh heavily upon me, some days, when
my legs grow weak, my strength fails,
and my frail and feeble mind seeks out
a simpler way to continue my journey.

I favor those paths that gently slope,
downhill, preferably, and I avoid
rough, stony ground. Pilgrim through
this barren land, close to my journey’s
end, where footsteps are perilous,
stumbles lead to tumbles, I cannot risk
 a fall, for if I fall, like many who have gone
before, I may fall to rise no more.