.
A month of Sundays intrudes darkly
upon a beautiful soft new Spring.
Casting the shadows of confusion,
growing hope for what Summer may bring.


© Pagan Paul (06/04/20)

.
To hold my heart in delicate fingers
is to hold a fool's rose in your hands,
shed no tears upon its brittle petals,
cry not for the fool that notice demands.

Let it flow like water from your soft palms
to scatter and fall through holes in the dream,
free diving in the space of emotions,
the fool's rose once cut exits the last scene.

So take care next time you happen upon
a fool's rose betwixt the lines of a song,
handle with love for if you hold it wrong
it will take your heart and be quickly gone.



© Pagan Paul (01/04/20)

.
Smoothly is an utopian dream
and therein lies the troubles,
we are all set upon our paths,
all individual bouncing bubbles.

Each and every one of us
has our own journey to tread,
and the differences in our bodies
are matched by those in our head.

So accept the person you are,
into your being melt and immerse,
ignore smooth, embrace the rough,
revel in the beauty of being diverse.


© Pagan Paul (16/04/20)

.
It builds over time,
weeks and months go by,
the wave rising higher.
That urge to run run away.

To leave all behind and flee
from what is to come,
from what cannot be controlled
from the darkness
that threatens to overwhelm,
and drown the unstable stability
of exiting this time and space.
The necessity for escape
growing from a panicked seed
shivering in the mind,
unaware of the root of danger,
yet perceiving something.
Something that is really there
but intangible in mist,
waiting in the shadows to consume
the logical and the rational,
promoting the need to withdraw,
to isolate with stark completion in chaos.

If you cannot see the sense in senseless
then you are missing the point.
But when the point of reference shifts
then the less sense the sense makes.
Disassociation and detachment occur
driving before them a storm surge
of discord and confusion,
crashing through the thoughts of order,
losing perspective to a dark aftermath.

Trapped within a nervous disposition,
an out of kilter anxiety
and gambolling out of control
towards a stillness of vaccuum.

And then implosion.
The big bang on time lapse in reverse
as self- absorption takes hold
and the isolation task is completed,
pleasing greatly that urge to run run away.


© Pagan Paul (07/04/20)

.
The orb sinks below an horizon,
through a ***** window
bowing out with all grace,
concluding another day
and I write.
A stream of conscious falls
and fills a page with woe,
my heart cradled in dark
as another wave of nausea
interrupts a pleasant dusk time.

The pen rests but itches to scrawl.
The words are counted there,
the order somewhat confused.
And slowly, slowly, cautious,
they flow with random airs.
The darkness of day's end
seeping into every phrase
without prejudice.

The number 2 in relief
inscribed upon a brass disc
reflects the dullness of evening,
styled like a swan
in a maudlin funeral pose.
The day scurries away,
grey clouds tumble above,
another quiet night beckons.
I taper light a candle
welcoming the flame as company.
The pen still lays silent,
abandoned.
The itch to scrawl spent,
dreaming.
Dreaming in the mist.

Horns call from the ether
floating through the mind,
as a quill dips ink
ready to be born and flourish
in a better world.
As the first word
is inscribed across the page,
the rest tumble race
to be arranged in neat rows,
to entice the eyes of readers.
The continue to flow
with increasing agony
in a far-seeing mind-scape.
The memories of time rise up,
breaking the fragile surface,
and over-run the quill pen.
Words fighting to get out
and be immortalised
upon a crisp white leaf page.
The fine strokes go on
until the thread ends.
But instantly picks up the next
and starts to weave and sew,
stitching another stream of words.
The tapestry starts to form,
an image for a story.
But the mist returns and coils
and the pen sleeps on.
Its dreams just wisps of smoke,
a candle snubbed and extinguished.

I stare at the redundant pen,
a white feather waiting.
I think of another story,
a white feather waiting.
A call to tickle the pages,
a white feather waiting.
But there is a spectre also,
the black ink of nightmare.

The pen dreams of eloquence,
I dream in the dark.
The pen wishes for permanence,
I wish for the spark.
Ignite me! Ignite me!
Don't try to fight me.
Ignite me! Ignite me!
Take words and write me.

Scribe my name across your heart and read,
words my pen writes and my mind bleeds.


© Pagan Paul (28/03/20)

Eyelids flicker, close again.
Then slowly part allowing focus.
The morning welcomes sleepy eyes
and a window beckons.
Light streams through
and the view is of Spring.

The sun up in the sky
brilliant and ablaze with life.
From one horizon to another
clear blue light hangs,
lazily draping the world
and not a vapour trail in sight.

Silence is no longer a pause
between bursts of open noise,
rather, noise is an intruder
hectoring the moments of peace.
Until the sleep dirt clears
and the chorus of birds singing
is in harmony with serenity,
complimenting the absence of sound.

Different light in hidden places
shine a hue of emerald green,
flecked with orange and yellow,
single rays of playful sunshine.
The streams of brilliance persist
like the radiance of a palette,
if the painter is Mother Nature
and the picture is crystal clear.

And sleep though only minutes gone
is a forgotten rest memory.
The dreams faded and passed on,
given free, as a gift to the night.


© Pagan Paul (25/03/20)

.
Watch the morning tide
wash them all aside,
my castles by the shore
are gone forever more.

A billion grains of golden sand,
the remnants of my dreams,
float suspended in the current
and I drift along with them.
They in their watery solution,
me in the spaces of my mind.
Drifting.
The grains of sand sink and fade,
replaced by neon chain linked stars
and the sense of being completely empty,
not at all devoid. Just .. empty.
Drifting.
The floatation tank of loss
clasps the dreams with frigid fingers,
shrieking to be given its toy,
threatening never to open again.
But the Suns call from faraway skies
heralding to opine freedom,
release the fragments to individual broadcasts,
reaching out, out, out to the deep.
An umbilical tether for a fragile boat
is slipped to play adrift in a storm.
Letting go. Letting go.
Watch the morning tide wash them all aside.
Letting go.

I cast a mind spell,
wish them all farewell,
my castles in the sea
are evermore set free.

And my mind though now it be thought less
has no need of castles, for it is a fortress.

© Pagan Paul (15/03/20)

.
A speck on the horizon grows,
dark grey, foreboding and cruel,
stunting the sun's warm rays,
eclipsing the sky's perfect jewel.

Roiling clouds gather their skirts,
spewing across the azure blue,
spreading threads of droplet rain,
morphing the light into different hue.

Static is just the anticipation,
the excitement before the wonder,
the throb as high overhead
peels a belly roll of thunder.


© Pagan Paul (17/03/20)

.
You stand alone in a crowd,
fully clad and yet naked,
open to the scrutiny of others,
a target for acceptable prejudice.
Do you look like them?
Do you act like them?
Do you think like them?
Does your conformity make you like them?
The group, the herd.
Is their outer vanity enough
for you not to care what they think?
The truth is that vanity
is not tangible.

The outward manifestation of thought,
thought that nibbles at the edges of reason,
invading and undermining confidence,
an acceptable target for prejudice.
Do they like me?
Am I of their kind?
What are they thinking?
Does my confusion make me like them?
Part of the crowd.
Is my inner vanity sufficient
for me to not care what they think?
The truth is that vanity
is transitory.


© Pagan Paul (29/02/20)

.
Last night
she said I was cold.
Unreachable.
Surrounded in a halo of frost.
It burnt her fingers
as she dared to touch,
but there was little there.
Just … frost-bite,
and the sense
that she was alone in the room.
In body I was there,
but the Boat of Millions of Years
was sailing through my eyes
to the intended destination,
my lost mind.
She called to me
but I was to far to hear.
Down her soft cheeks
the tears did stream,
as she screamed my name
over and over.
She screamed until
the screams turned to sobs,
as the slow realisation
that I no longer knew her,
knew me, knew anything,
hit her like a wave of grief,
freezing her emotions dead.
Last night
she said I was cold.
And I was cold
because I knew that it was
our Last Night.

© Pagan Paul (16/02/20)