Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
 Mar 2018 Emma Pickwick
grace
salt burned knees
trying to stand still
when the ocean licks back its sand
eating away at the ground

and i love you
or what's left of you, anyway.
Are we to blame for what we do?
Can we help what we do? Can we?
Maybe, maybe not, we would suffer,
Oh yes, you think you miss me now?
You never know love, not really,
Until it is removed, forbidden,
Taken away far beyond reach,
Only then do you see, finally see,
Once you have lost that which you had,
Or even imagine you have lost it,
Only then do you understand,
How much you cared, cherished,
Adored, depended upon, needed,
That illicit love, that yearned for love,
The kind of love that is so rare,
It comes only once in a lifetime,
If one is lucky, very lucky,
So, even though, we do what we do,
Have changed who we are, irrevocably,
I doubt we will ever stop, not ever,
And there is no blame to apportion,
No disgust, no reprehensible behaviour,
There is just us, us, and how we feel,
Are we to blame for what we do?

©Paul M Chafer 2016
This is the middle part of a much bigger poem, but I deplore reading long lengthy poems  on poetry sites, so refuse to post the whole thing. I will share the whole thing with any who message their email address. The poem is about love, how we love, in the 21st century - and it has changed with the advent of the internet and mobile phones - why we love and who we love and why. Is there any choice? Is there? If not, then infidelity must be a thing of the past, either that, or some folk need to climb of their pedestals and accept that the human spirit is not something we can ever control: it just is.
Purring, the big cat, prowls though the city,
Her grace resonating in the words of youth,
The rhythm of life beating within her heart,
Pulsing in the melting ***, of cultural truth.

Unwholesome disenchantments; dispelled,
Crushing obsolete views of old generations,
One World, concepts, sweeping all before,
Welcoming the progress of mixed relations.

A Bohemian feline of change, so constant,
Wisdom, truth, acceptance, riot in her roars,
New wave embracing, all colours, all creeds,
Bigoted ignorance fearing sharpened claws.

The multi-faceted face, of free London now,
Don’t hate those who sneer, offer them pity,
Their time disperses on Thames ebbing tide,
Purring, the big cat, prowls through the city.

©Paul M Chafer 2016
I recently performed this poem in the Chocolate Poetry Club In London and it was warmly received. (They are kind people.) It is how I view the city whenever visiting, how it makes me feel.  - I am writing poems, just not good enough to post, but thank you to those of you for your support, novel writing is going well, third book published this summer, hopefully.
Where are you, perfect piece of writing?
I read of you when I was a boy, long ago,
Naked youngsters on horseback, waiting,
Hidden in shadows at the meadow’s edge,
Then they go, aware of danger, scared,
Moonlight dancing upon their skin, cool,
Nightjars and bats swoop low, hunting moths,
And the youngsters ride, he observing her,
So beautiful to describe, and yet, you are gone,
Long ago, lost in my mind, yet I remember,
And I wonder, what you are, if you are,
And will I ever read you again, savour you?
Where are you, perfect piece of writing?

©Paul M Chafer 2016
This writing to which I refer is from a story in my youth, that I enjoyed, but cannot recall the story or the author. Anyone know?
In the morning red hibiscus flowers
yesterday's petals have fallen to the ground
a hummingbird briefly hovers
in flashes, green iridescent feathered
soon the silver sun comes from behind clouds
reflections, in spectrum colors
of painted sky, brush strokes
in watercolors of dawn
the heart, a lotus flower
center of the soul
that opens.
 Feb 2016 Emma Pickwick
r
Sundancing
 Feb 2016 Emma Pickwick
r
When the distance between us
 is measured in light years -

I hold her at arms-length
and step quiet like a shadow -

dancing with the sun
until night is upon us -

she draws down the shades
and we bathe in her glow.
I am not sure
If I am an artist,
But I like to watch
The way your mouth
Creeps into a smile,
And how your laugh
Crawls deep from the bottom
Of your belly.
I like the way your eyes
Glisten
When you first pry them open.
I like the way your hands
Hold onto me,
As if I'll float
Up
Up
And
Away.
No, I don't know
If I am an artist,
But I can recognize a masterpiece
When I see one.
Next page