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Posts Tagged ‘landscape’

SMALL LAND

Small islands that float in the sifting blue:
Prayers, memories, wishes once hoped for.

Clear bounded, unto themselves,
Harvesting thin birdsong
And tumps of long grasses singing.

Fragments of heaven remaining,
Never lifted, never fallen.
Salt-washed, self-rooted.
Rock black and rock red
And the twist of serpentine,
The healed scar of whited quartz.

A skirl of wind,
An ululation of gulls.
Warmth in the lee
Of the byre,
The soft scent of hay.

A hymn, a verse each is.
Inhabited by angels,
Their messages forgot,
Dreaming to the sound
Of long tides.

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This day

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I would wish this day,
Its singing silence,
To remain untarnished.

Its silver stations
Engraving motions of peace.

Unhurried, unabated
Tidal coolness.
Translucent vessel
Of breezes.

Unholy, unbound,
Unassumingly radiant.

Exhalant vapour,
Winter’s breath.

—-

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ONE MOMENT

Falling, tumbled dreams,
Wisped, fragranced,
Catch, spin and fade.

Morning is white and still
With frost and fog.
Sparrows motionless, huddled,
Await the sun, on elder, on elm.

We are sustained only, it seems,
By our forgetfulness,
By our obsession to measure time
And watch it passing.

To fit and shape the minutes,
Assigning usefulness
Rather than joy.

Sad creatures,
Longing for the real,
And missing it.

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INSTANT IN SILENCE

How many this night
Will not see the dawn?
Will turn away
And in an instant, forget?
In silence, or with a sigh
One by one release the senses,
Taste the fragrance
Of every memory
Then let them scatter.

We are a drift, a chord,
Bound and loosed,
Spun strong and thin,
Too thin for even strong words
To hold for long.

Release this dream
To find another.

Solace and grace,
The scent of pine needles,
Birdsong in the morning,
A familiar voice
Calling from nearby.

Turn away,
Turn away.
Dawn can come at
Any time.

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POUR

The air is cool and still
Unmoved by the threaded rain,
Weighed straight and fast.

A roar upon the roof,
Laughter in the gutters:
A gurgled drunk descent,
Spun down to dark earth.

A balance of letting go,
A balance of remaining.
A slow exhalation.

FALL

Leaf fall
Thought fall
Heart fall.
Red, bruised,
Lip curled.
Nothing,
But to seek
The peace beneath joy,
The peace beneath sorrow.
This cold, empty sky.
This wordless depth.

—-

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NO QUESTION

This is it:
The reflection
Of your being.
This room,
Quiet,
morning bright.

This window,
Filtering sound,
Slowing light,
Holding colours.

This view:
Veils of sun and rain,
Small birds blustered by.

Something special
In its commitment to itself.
But unremarked, unremarkable.

This patterning of storm cloud:
Unimaginable, dissipating,
Casual omnipotence.

This sequence of days:
Rosary of heartbeats,
Rosary of tears.
A meditation on dreaming
And waking.

Seeded by other’s autumnal self-reflections, particularly Masqua’s Art…..

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HARVEST FESTIVAL

Cloud rests, winged.
Feathered, these upland mists.
Green grey the day along
Swathed and shrouded hills.

The still, one prayer, arcs
The scooped valleys.
(Pitted the stones,
Time-pocked).

A bell, a peal:
A gathered fruitfulness,
A hymnal of sunlit days.
In sainted, beached ship,
Sails of praise turn tides.

We become indwelling,
Folded,
The promise of rain,
The blackbird’s quiver-
Heart arrowed, liquid.

——

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Flying West

FLYING WEST

The slow resounding chasm
In the raven’s deep voice.
Deep as sky, deep as
Heartbeat, as kept a secret
As cold hearth.

Flying west, slow
Wingbeat, mate-calling,
Wedge cracking open
Winter time, cold time,
Clear time.

Home at the centre
Of its view, air
Constellated as matter,
Matter weightless.
Bluff exaltation.

—-

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As it is almost Autumn Equinox, here are two short seasonal pieces that arose recently.

FLICKER

He cools the air, calling crow,
A rasp of drift, the crisping leaves.

All things desire to sink earthwards
Towards a fitting sleep.

The sky left more void, blue, vast,
Scraped clear – the circling cry of buzzards.

It gutters, flares and flickers:
The nub of summer.

We become atmospheric, vapourous.
We are tumbled down, crumbled to autumn.

Made old, aged again,
Circumscribed, hemmed in
By hours of darkness.

—–

RETURNING

Light pushed at day’s end,
A cold, blue edge.
All hearts, filling, emptying, filling.
The year grows small again,
Summer’s passion eases.
We can go home,
Look inside,
Light fires,
Dream dreams.

—–

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INVISIBLE FRIENDS 6

Time for a new batch of scribbles inspired by other’s words here, webbed together catching jewelled flies, eating or storing them for colder, frosted mornings…

OBIT.

Terse words
for a long peal of time,
a good,
an only, place ,
for such as he to rest.

—-

GIFT

Even so,
beautiful writing,
a dove released,
vanishing into cloud.
Knowing emptiness is,
at least, knowing something.

ASANA

My tongue,
a bookmark,
syllabub syllables,
sutras,
plough with brows furrowed,
let us lotus,
pray pray away,
body buddy bodhi,
enlonged lungs,
a crack of knees
( not a new noise, yknow).
A sound stretching out.


CASTLE WALLS

The draw of ruins!
What is it?
The harsh past crumbled back,
mulch,
earth music…..

—-

GHOSTS, FLEAS, A MUSE.

We,
Ghosts
Of poetry,
Stumbling lines,
Echoed,
Staring far off:
The effort
To recall.

—-

HAY BALES

Wheels fallen off the sun wagon.
It falters and droops
towards a fall.

——

COMPOSITION, DECOMPOSITION

A dance in slightest sound:
first mind rolling mutters,
then quiets as pen flows scratching,
the silence between words,
a rush of voices.
Silence is not an absence of sound..

—-

THE GREAT WORK

Selecting or not selecting,
wearing a mask,
choosing a mask,
revealing, hiding.
Dipping in a toe,
how deep these black waters of self?
How fast,
how airlessly drown,
out of depth,
no one watching.

—-

AS WELL

As well as can be.
When we fray thin,
with time or weather,
it’s only a sign, perhaps,
to deepen roots
and not mind the storm winds,
nor the thoughts
circling laments in empty skies….

—-

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