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144 · Apr 2018
Foldings
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
How many foldings hold my name
Leave out who I am
Fold me and fold me
Till I can't be seen
Stored away in a drawer.

A fold is a crease
A link drawn
You folded me
So now I can't stand.
How many foldings hold my name
Leave out who I am.

Love Mary x
144 · Jan 2019
Grey.
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2019
As soon as the light turns grey
I begin that same journey
Knowing the night will be unsettled
A repeated wakfulness
Winchingly carried out near to tears
For the exercise so carnivorous.

Love Mary xxxx
144 · Feb 2018
The juggling balls.
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
Daddy , daddy you can see I'm a girl
By my wonderful curls
When wearing a dress I look such a splash
Especially if it's in blue.
I know you like cars
But we've been playing for hours
And the juggling *****
Don't bounce anymore
Even the hoops are bored.

You call me Flimmy
I think I am a cat
But can't get through
The door flap.
The house is strange
With lots of weird names
And screens bright
With bionic mice
Whilst dinner comes in tubes.

But when you hold me tight
I know I'm just right
Growing up like you.


Love Grandma for Alex and Evelyn.
143 · Jan 2019
Swanesdown
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2019
The road lay like swansdown
under a light leaflet of snow
The corner a curvaceous cut
Stright towards the stars
Beauty bearing truth
Nature has its own.


Love Mary ***
143 · Mar 2019
Where?
Mary Gay Kearns Mar 2019
Where do we meet?
Can it be said
You have the same words
In your head
Or ideas reframed
Do your eyes drop tears
And your hands reach out
To touch the soil
Do we ever meet?
Different voices in the wind.

Love Mary **
143 · Feb 2018
Being read to.
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
I loved it when you read to me
Sitting together on the orange settee
Babies  fed and in their beds
Your words in my head
Images fill my mind
Travellers on a roof top climb
Comrades gathered around
Against evil to find
Gandalf was my superhero
Reminded me of you.
Now nearly seventy-two
It really has come true.



Love Mary **

The Lord of the Rings by Tolkein

My favourite book
Read to me at 16 , And again and again by my dear Roger
143 · Jul 2020
Pruners
Mary Gay Kearns Jul 2020
Out in the garden is the place to be
Cutting and pruning the old oak tree
Edging the grass to where it should be
Hoping the sunshine will again be me.


Love Mary
142 · Feb 2018
Retrousse .
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
We define people by their shape,
How they sit upon a chair
Twist as they turn to go
Open a door
Place one foot before the other
Cross over legs
Slouch or sleep.
These idiosyncratic behaviours
Are the way we fall in love
Remembering an ear or nape of neck.
My mother was a number eight
Softly outlined with loose curls
And a retrousse' nose.
Shape is how I came to Art
Moved by a silhouette
Roundness of heads
The downturned oval
Elongated by position.
Art is shape in love.

Love Mary ***
142 · Feb 2018
Gregariously plain
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
I pick my friends because they don't need me
For like the flower and bee
It is a passing arrangement .
Not tainted by a smothering gasp
If unavailable.
Never wanted to be hugged
Other than by words
Beautifully written in letters
I am a contradiction.
Gregariously plain.
142 · Aug 2019
Flickering fingers.
Mary Gay Kearns Aug 2019
To be loved to death
Is a remarkable saying
Its meaning, meaning
More than any card
Any bunch of flowers.

The lifting is divinities
Holding out anniversary
Slight flickering fingers
Touch flaky, silver skin
And love breaks the sky.


Love Mary **
For Roger.
142 · Apr 2018
Ordinarily attributed.
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
I wonder if I said nothing would you know
Could my name be drawn out along a lane
Cut- out stencils for an autograph
Hardened plasticine creating the frame.

Maybe the more that is said, the less heard
So sit beside what is not my poetry and
Remember in the grains of time what I am
All that is ordinarily attributed to a friend.

Love Mary x
142 · Apr 2018
little mummy
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
I think of you little mummy
When the snow gathers round your gravestone
Creeping up the sides of the white marble
Touching the words with its soft hands
Covering the overturned urn
As the last flowers lay like a fan
Uniting you and daddy
Under the lightest eiderdown.

Love Mary your daughter .
Christchurch Totland with the lamb sculpture on the front wall.
142 · May 2018
He painted my pots
Mary Gay Kearns May 2018
A little white *** grew a blue smile
It sat on the shelf
Thinking for a while
Opened popped two blue eyes
With a bewildered frown
And inside a figure moving around.

So the painter propped him up against a wall
Deciding on position, balancing it all.
After many years sitting with him
Watching the paint brushes
Applying thin
The artist put down his brush.
Just sat and looked at Little ***.


Eventually the painting got sold
Found itself in an Art show.
A lady bought him to put on her wall
Did *** feel happy, I’m not sure.
He liked his owner who made him
So sad and small.

Love to Little *** .

From Mary **
142 · Apr 2018
The Fool
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
A painting, an orchestration
A trembling anxiety, enhanced
By chance.
No trace of description
A ratio in space
Flat on a surface
Embedded in spool
A mood outstanding
The sobbing of a fool.

Love Mary x
Each colour caresses it's neighbour
142 · Jun 2018
And I watch you.
Mary Gay Kearns Jun 2018
In the window frame there is room for you and me
The garden always overgrown still a child’s delight
Pushing wheels along uncemented paths of grass
Those blowing clocks filling the sky with your breath
And I watch you, for hours, golden rounded limbs
Moving the air, swirling dresses, petticoats, a dolly
In spotted blue and a new mother growing into
Herself.
I watch silky chestnut hair, float, pulled by the wind
Over red knitted cardigan and an upturned nose in a
Smile as you see me there at the window of love.

Love Mummy xxxx
My daughter Katharine in the garden with her doll’s pram
Me at the window watching love.
141 · Mar 2018
Sometimes in the city
Mary Gay Kearns Mar 2018
Where the birds never sing
You come across secrets
That you've never seen
And this is what I say
And doubt not my words
But finding you all
Brought joy into this world
You come from every race
And touch every space
Have wisdom in your bones
So I am never alone
Sometimes in the city.

Love Mary **
141 · Jan 2018
Paper bag
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2018
Paper Bag .

In a cupboard above the fridge,
Containing dinner plates,
And useful letters,
Stamped with dates,
Was a shelf,
Deep and wide,
With hidden things,
Kept inside.
The cupboard had a door,
And a shiny latch,
Not actually forbidden,
To open that catch.

And so it fell on a Summer's day,
That mother peeped inside,
Feeling as she often did,
For the bag of sweetiepies,
And all the day she nibbled,
Tempted by the taste,
The nearness of the sweetness,
She could not erase.
By four o'clock she worried,
The bag was getting thin,
Better go out shopping,
To replace the toffees in.
And so it was that father,
With his generous heart,
Offered in the evening ,
The sweeties,
Without remark.

I too ate the sweeties but never let the bag get too thin.
Love to my dear parents Grace and Bill  from Mary **
141 · Feb 2018
Early Risers
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
On the platform as the sun rises
Bald heads crowd into carriages
Girls with glasses and painted lids
Hold onto iPads and ear phone hoods
A half awake baby feeds at the breast
Of a working mother hurriedly dressed
And scratch chews biscuits on the floor.
Meanwhile in the corridor of time
Millie lifts up her jumper
To show Tim her chickenspot spots
Now crusted over with calamine
No longer contagious.
Before entering Euston
The train waits ten minutes
At a red light.
And for the rest of the day
Nothing goes right.

Love Mary x
141 · Jun 2018
A necessity.
Mary Gay Kearns Jun 2018
Darling daughter, Victoria, I think we both know
That staying away from each other was the best.
For the suffering I have to bear is not for you to
Witness and rather joy sit in your lap and be near.

I have no regrets and privacy is a necessity now
So I might slip away leaving a glimpse of sweet
Memories and a bundle of cardboard boxes for the
Children when it comes to opening time.

Bring beautiful Arlo to see the garden I made
And dad has another grandchild to cuddle.
Sad for the time we never had but glad of what
We did together over the years .Bye Bye Birdie .

Love Mum Grandma ***
141 · Jul 2020
Two birds
Mary Gay Kearns Jul 2020
It had not been easy
The storms were blowing
I turned in bed gently
Hoping not to be dead.

Stages of terror crossed
The heathland; I came
And sat beside your head
You tried to give me strength.

We flew up to the mountains
Two birds with golden wings
And hid our heads in the foliage
Of darkness without sin.

Love Mary **
141 · Dec 2018
Socrates
Mary Gay Kearns Dec 2018
‘True knowledge exists in knowing
you know nothing’.

Love Mary ***
140 · Mar 2018
Boy from further ed.
Mary Gay Kearns Mar 2018
Meeting off the road where grass doth grow
Not far from the number ten bus stop
We together unsure of what
So I stretched out on this bench
The night was dark and wetly damp
You in your new boy clothes
Handsome but already chose
I didn't want to marry you
Or even spend much time
Just for half an hour or so
Sweep you with my arms
And so we tip-toed round the hour
Stroking things we should not
Until the street lights began to fade
Then, separately, we left that spot
Goodbye was not necessary
We never came again
Knowing this was not
Lovers' knot
But just experimenting.


Love Mary
Boy from further education
Don't know his name
140 · Aug 2019
Besieged hope
Mary Gay Kearns Aug 2019
I never thought
It mattered
All those years
Ago.

Knowing he was
Mad
At twenty-five
It glowed.

Sadly sandust
Besieged hope
Now in poverty
We *****.

Love Mary
Xxxxx
140 · Apr 2018
Same sight line.
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
You paint pictures of small ceramic bowls,
Copies of tree trunks from George Seurat,
A single Plane tree in the local park and
A red apple which use to be two.

I read you my poems over the mobile
The one about the boy on the beach
You liked as it recalled your childhood
Its mood is wistfully sad, we share that.

Love Mary x
For Woolly Bear who turns my ceramic bowls into painting .
Thank you love Mary x
140 · May 2018
Syrian child.
Mary Gay Kearns May 2018
He holds the gun with crooked hand
Close to the sun in lonely lands
By fear encircled stands the child.
The blistered bricks about her land
A bulletin so breaks the sky
You gave the child no reason why.

Love Mary x
140 · Apr 2018
In a room made of glass
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
To the words of Cat Stevens I sing
Wailing about in front of the glass
You are my everything.
140 · May 2018
Stock Phrases
Mary Gay Kearns May 2018
‘What shall I tell them?’
Asks a junior doctor.
‘Consultant ‘,
‘Old age’.
Can we accept this
Simplisticity?
Lying has become
Medical heaven.


Love Maryx
140 · Feb 2018
Connie is upside down.
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
Connie is upside down
Head between her knees
Feet flaying in the air
Two bunches in her hair,
Connie just likes to be
Upside down
Between her knees.

( for all to see) alternative .



Love Grandma ***
140 · Jun 2018
Loose
Mary Gay Kearns Jun 2018
She stood at the window
Hoping for rain
The sleeves of the cotton dress
Loose
And her shoes muddy.

‘Why’, she thought,
Sitting down at last
Did the world have to be so
Forgettable
Loose strands of grass.

Love Mary
140 · Jun 2019
Stabilise.
Mary Gay Kearns Jun 2019
Stabilise the sinking grass
That gives the hills their shape
Stabilise the hinges
On the old wrought iron gate.

Letting in the way we see
Please stabilise me.

Love Mary x
139 · May 2018
Death row.
Mary Gay Kearns May 2018
I have become a bird of travel
Bearing winter’s grey and snow
White.
Living my mother’s journey
Later each night.
Youth took me carelessly
Between a row of fools
Threw me back against a wall
With no impunity.


Love Mary x
139 · Jul 2020
July
Mary Gay Kearns Jul 2020
Now we find
The garden
Sweet with lavender,
The roses giving out
Their perfume,
Still air after the storm;
Scorched pavements
From sun's shining;
Hollyhock coloured stripes
Horizontal laddered stems;
Quietness in the afternoon hour
Before the coming home
Begins.

Love Mary ***
139 · Jun 2018
Let’s Play
Mary Gay Kearns Jun 2018
Let’s play dear brother
As we never did before
But with an understanding
Together once more.

Out in the garden
Climbing the trees
Drawing and painting
Just you and me .

Love Mary x
139 · Apr 2018
My Sweet Roses
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
Oh my roses you bloom so gently
Turning your palest petals down
And the raindrops roll off you
But no words not a sound.

How I love you as your moving
My sweet roses taking turns
Holding out for each other
As the day twists you round.

Then to take you to my lips close
And your fragrance breath it in
Filling my soul with your perfume
From your stamens on my skin.

Now to evening and the light fades
Delicate roses you come down
Scattering all your tenderest beauty
Silent petals lay on the ground.



Love Mary ***
138 · Feb 2018
Woolly Bear
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
Woolley Bear did not like computers
For every time he put one on
He forgot what he had to do.

Love Mary
138 · Jan 2018
Painting pictures
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2018
PAINTING PICTURES.

I spent my last day
Looking at pictures
Paintings of a friend
We tried to decide
What was finished
And found it hard in the end.

How long does one continue
When a subjects found
Does one plod on regardless
Or learn to live underground.

Love to Ian for his friendship from Mary ***
138 · Sep 2019
Poems to write
Mary Gay Kearns Sep 2019
The pottery shop at Freshwater
Glassworks at Freshwater
Touching glass
For Nuska
138 · Feb 2018
Say goodbye
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
Say goodbye for me to the window cleaner
And the people who empty bins
The man who delivers the papers
And all those parcels for my sins
Give a kiss to the tree cutters
And the people who pass by
And don't forget my dear friends
The ones who were too shy.
I've had enough of all this stuff
The pain and dragging on
My family, too, are tired of the veiw
And even the letterbox moved.
Phone calls I make
Are just a mistake
As the answers I get are insane
The best I've known are the artists
Who all have an open heart
They know there are no answers
That's why they do art.
So leave out the platitudes
Let's get down to the truth.
Say goodbye for me to the window cleaner
He's made my vision great.

Love Mary ***
138 · Jan 2018
Que
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2018
Que
Farewell to an idea
In a way
We are just this
Concepts, imagination and sound
You see me but I can't be found
I think I know who I am
But the I evades the me
Leaving a collection of hours
Somewhere between the stars
I lived a life with you
Happily we made a crew
In a random,spectacular Que.

Love Mary , Mum , Grandma xxxxxx
138 · Jan 2019
Evening is still.
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2019
Coming to my door
In coat and hat
You bring me food
And this and that.

We try so hard to find a smile
We talk a bit just for a while
I love you more than I can say
Stay with me darling
Till evening is still.

Love Mummy ***
138 · Jan 2018
Tasman
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2018
What do I say to you
Blonde clipped hair
Twinkle in your eye
Not yet shy
Politeness always
Abides in that wise style
Ages older than your time
Mischief gentle
On your mind
Friend of intelligences
Known
But in your own
Tranquility
Tested life's experience
With a king's crown
Love you for your wit
And candour
For the loving heart within
Be you happy in your hour
May your life
Always sing .

To Tasman love Grandma xxxxx
137 · Mar 2018
The returning
Mary Gay Kearns Mar 2018
As her feet left the ground
She found the tree
So positioned that its asymmetrical
Form filled out all her yearnings
For perfection.
Above, as she climbed, casting
A little shadow on the grass below
She thought how much beauty
Had been made by just this one thing
All on its own with only the sun and rain
And changing seasons for company.
It was her tree, it had found her
Lying, in her pram
Its leaves giving protection
To her heart, their movement
Taking away all fear.
Since that time she had returned
And thought of the wonder of
This tree, standing alone,
As she did now on the edge
Of wisdom.


Love Mary ***
137 · Feb 2018
My good girl
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
My good girl.

Shining brown hair with a hint of chestnut
Straight and silky and a sharp cut fringe
Sometimes in black beribboned plaits
Or two bunches showing your ears.
An elfin face cupped in my hands
Slenderly graceful you are still
You are my good girl.

Embracing life joyfully, you smiled
Through days of schoolwork
Touching the world with sunshine
Making all seem bright and clear,
Loving daughter, my first of three
You came to start our family
This is my good girl.

And yet you are many things
Other than my good girl.
You mind an encyclopaedia of answers,
Your heart a lover of nature,
A social activists,
You crochet beautiful blankets
Teach and make ceramic pots
And love to curl up with a book.

Love and thank you My Katie .
From Mum ***
137 · Jun 2019
I know.
Mary Gay Kearns Jun 2019
When I sit and look out to sea
I know I have always been loved.

Love Mary x
137 · Apr 2018
Black Tulips
Mary Gay Kearns Apr 2018
I can't take my shoes off the road
Verbally swimming me out
On the surface I see all the words
Gliding over each other, waiting.

Choosing is the reason for living
Placing and position another
My purpose gigantically impossible
But the errand earnestly strong.

It takes from infested waters
The dark black tulips of Spring
All that has covered me over
Until the last swim begins.
136 · Feb 2018
Peace
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
Sitting in this room with me,
Resting on leather seat,
Is the partner of my life,
A gentle man at peace.

I love you my darling
Roger from your Mary
XxxxxX
136 · Feb 2019
Soften.
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2019
On high ground through narrow entrance
The allotments opened doors to pickers
Of fruits that of which freedom allowed
Bushes dotted in the sunlight, touchingly,
Where the wasps and flies buzzed around
And the excited voices of children called
To harvest the ripe blackberry as it dropped
I loved my mother’s blackberry and apple
Pie with top of the milk to soften the pastry
With all that love.

Love Mary xxxx
136 · Feb 2018
Cocktail sticks
Mary Gay Kearns Feb 2018
Summer has arrived,
I see you dancing in the rain
Outside a Soho Bar
Gorgeous woman
Humour sharp as ice
Heels longer than cocktail sticks;
It's five  in the morning
And your shopping
Food to start the day.
The train rattles
Jangling the wrist bands
You uncross your legs
Unlatch the carriage door
The children  are dressing
Bags scatter the worktops
You grab two hands
To walk the half mile
To school.


Love Mum **
136 · Jul 2018
Testimony to failure.
Mary Gay Kearns Jul 2018
Why did they let me die
Not even try
Incompetent errors
Written on letters.

No excuse can ever
Be made for their say
One day they may
Pray.
Unlikely I must say.

Love Mary x
136 · Mar 2018
Lovingly goodbye.
Mary Gay Kearns Mar 2018
If I could I would hold you all
Tucked hands into yours
Close eyes together
Finding lashes brush
And where you move
I will stop you
By a loving more
Penetrating and
Unbearably beautiful
Than imagination
Can predict.

Love Mary ,Mum, Grandma ***
I have to go alone as I was born alone .
Thank you each and everyone for your love Xxxxx
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