"oaken" poems
Just off the swirling sea,
There's a lighthouse,
Bigger than an aged oaken tree,
Thicker in the base,
And lighter on it's face,
A homing beacon,
For the ships, just off the shore,
A warning, to be cautious of the waves and more.
Jun 30, 2015
Jun 30, 2015 at 9:46 PM UTC
in the year 2462 those with nails protruding from their palms
will talk in ancient tongues
& sway the tribes of men to eternal love,
& endless ammunition
of the soul.
spiritus.
kin, galactic
& the golden fire.
throb the saga of man,
into hip ****** illusions and combustive color schematas.
we bury our dead in flower clippings
or skull bits.
[skateboarding rises as the highest form of intellectual sport]
thrum and plum-bum the sewers of electric babylon.
hive city reaching past gasp and wasteland,
her lips ruinous.
cement slabs and coils of fault with
vast artistic possibilities.
these skate-lords from their heaps, their clans, augmenting
& rattling bone masks
grinding themselves into meat-bit heroics
& death.
their teeth are yellowy awoken.
this is all seen globally,
via tele-cast-com-core-mind-warp-tech.
or video.
dreams impact reality
impact dreams
in such
that the cathode cortex filter, invented circa 2222,
evolves into a demi-god, a solar charged demon of unlimited knowledge.
& it mutates the psychosphere of our mainstream public mind
with countless projected memories.
[streamed alternate realities]
fills the belly and the brain,
but all those unhooked are skating.
sweet meat market.
ghost harddrives.
poor leftovers called children of the once-was-men
& their poolside parties.
they leap the rubble of centuries old plastic icons,
their boards, their weapons, their seeds and spit.
they hang chains from their necks
& spew black flame from their sunshaded boot-click
lickings.
they drink from large bottlesof elixer distilled
on old flowers
& worship archaic cassettes.
cults of cyborg women with gem-tipped-blade-additions
carve wooden planks from
groves of great oaks.
great oaken powers.
their creators chew gummies and bend time
to uphold
a proposed history of perfection.
they master pong from their crystalline towers,
& hire mathematicians to write
conceptual skate-deck algorithms,
solely for fun.
non-profit.
Jul 18, 2014
Jul 18, 2014 at 5:49 AM UTC
A bridge is a curious thing to cover.
mile after mile of naked road -
then a wooden box over stream or ravine.
Why not cover the road instead
leaving the bridge unclothed?
But where's the charm in that, you say?
So perhaps it was fashioned for Currier and Ives
or to embellish the music
of iron shod hooves on oaken planks.
Or maybe was built as a kiosk
for fading feed and carnival posters
and jackknife glyphs of amorous initials.
No, all our covered bridges, imagined or real,
guide our passage over deadly waters -
holding us fast on the road
and safe from drowning.
March, 2007
Aug 9, 2013
Aug 9, 2013 at 4:17 AM UTC
[From Fragments, The Following...]
... so it was that the Urth bled less. The Birch Moot was becalmed by the Anvil Cloud of Impending Deluge.
The Young Gods made sport of Their Names, and aimed to Oblique the colony of clever flesh
groping at the tender roots of an insipid devastation. The First Ones had vanished.
But Time was born and the Mortal Whirl released the Hounds of Change. Transition fused -
with the Eternal; and the offspring of unloved Spirits, roamed the Tangible. All Suffering was amplified
in the diamond lungs of a divine corpse, dreaming.
... for when the iron heart of The Cast Out was retrieved, the Legion of Heaven poured unseemly Grace upon the Fathoms
and the High King of Doubt, forced his blade ' Nimue '
into the soft palette, of the First Mouth. The Stars were born and The Void overheard the First Naming.
A solid drizzle of enchantment cloaked the oaken Yggdrasil
and The Pattern unleashed the folly of Pattern
to mask the virtue of succinct Chaos. The Children of The Lower Sky ate their Masters and thereby swollen -
gathered in the underbrush of the Fecund.
They came to Know Regret by Answering Prayers. The Kingdoms of Wane were waning in the fearsome riot of Creation
and not a boy, a man from no woman
and no woman
a man.
... the siege lights of the petty stars, babbled in the wake of yawning eruption and nullification. the ****** theater of blood
was made Holy by way of forcing camels into eyes of needles in constant dystopian joy.
... and that's how the rain gets in.
[ From the ' Kingdoms Of Wane ', a Lost Tome from Antiquity and Dada ]
What ?
Jan 27, 2013
Jan 27, 2013 at 7:07 PM UTC
Especially when the October wind
With frosty fingers punishes my hair,
Caught by the crabbing sun I walk on fire
And cast a shadow crab upon the land,
By the sea's side, hearing the noise of birds,
Hearing the raven cough in winter sticks,
My busy heart who shudders as she talks
Sheds the syllabic blood and drains her words.
Shut, too, in a tower of words, I mark
On the horizon walking like the trees
The wordy shapes of women, and the rows
Of the star-gestured children in the park.
Some let me make you of the vowelled beeches,
Some of the oaken voices, from the roots
Of many a thorny shire tell you notes,
Some let me make you of the water's speeches.
Behind a post of ferns the wagging clock
Tells me the hour's word, the neural meaning
Flies on the shafted disk, declaims the morning
And tells the windy weather in the ****
Some let me make you of the meadow's signs;
The signal grass that tells me all I know
Breaks with the wormy winter through the eye.
Some let me tell you of the raven's sins.
Especially when the October wind
(Some let me make you of autumnal spells,
The spider-tongued, and the loud hill of Wales)
With fists of turnips punishes the land,
Some let me make of you the heartless words.
The heart is drained that, spelling in the scurry
Of chemic blood, warned of the coming fury.
By the sea's side hear the dark-vowelled birds.
5.5k
.*
The burden I bear is more heavy than lead.
The physical weight is a thing that I share,
but the loss that I feel will not leave my head.
Why did you have to die? Why is death so unfair?*
I am close to you now. Yes, touching my hair
the flag with its lions of gold and of red
that wraps round your coffin. I know you are there.
The burden I bear is more heavy than lead.
My comrades move with me in slow, solemn tread.
Our eyes are all fixed in an unseeing stare.
Our shoulders support you in your oaken bed.
The physical weight is a thing that I share.
As I feel the world watching I try not to care.
My deepest emotions are best left unsaid.
Let others show grief like a garment they wear,
but the loss that I feel will not leave my head.
The flowers they leave like a carpet are spread,
In the books of remembrance they have written, 'Somewhere
a star is extinguished because you are dead.
Why did you have to die? Why is death so unfair? '
The tears that we weep will soon grow more rare,
the rawness of grief turn to memory instead.
But deep in our hearts you will always be there,
and I ask, will I ever be able to shed
the burden I bear?
.
Aug 31, 2017
Aug 31, 2017 at 12:14 AM UTC
I'm making a pub pilgrimage,
A malted Mecca trip;
I'm leaving all I love at home
Crusading with the Picts.
I'll be alone with all my thoughts,
It's what must needs be done,
To keep the demons off.
Publicans meet me on the steps,
On Sundays by the side;
This trip of three thousand miles
May **** should I survive.
My altar's elbow worn,
The finest oaken wood;
I'll climb the stairs on knees,
Hear bells, raise cups of cheer.
There's games of chance,
Some romance,
With songs and several fools;
It has trappings of Canterbury
In pubs all called O'Tooles.
There's Highland mead,
And broken bread,
With harps from inner rooms,
I'll have dispirited spirits
And revel inside tombs.
My cave awaits on my return,
It's dark and hard and cold;
But I know the light's within my sight,
If I move this granite stone.
I'll bring with me a scapula
To make those visions stop,
The relics that I sought,
Those demons of a sot.
Sep 25, 2015
Sep 25, 2015 at 9:16 AM UTC
i.
impressionist,
where the grey
clouds and the blue
ice of winter
gather their ghosts,
winter, too cold,
too white, the
woodland hollows
dent,
summer love
discarded in
the frost,
the sky oaken,
the moon’s forget-me-knots
silvery dream.
ii.
clouds like wintery steel,
sunken, in a night pool,
the golds of my heart,
the lodestar gathers
moss and rook,
glimmers in a sky
of woven cloth,
her leaves, the trees
of winter,
her leaves, the dark
breath of the storm.
iii.
winter and quiet stars
brooding emperor
sleeping in the twilight
hour,
winter dreams of
strange ice caverns
where ice ghosts
dance with twisting
hair.
iv.
pond of ice,
snow bear,
snow dream,
sleep unwraps
wide avenues of
trees,
sleep, the dark girl,
the falling tide.
v.
twig breaks under foot,
earth’s thrones
settle in the lizardy light
the moon rises in the sky,
soft centuries of sky.
Jan 3, 2017
Jan 3, 2017 at 1:57 PM UTC
*if only I knew how to love...
for my Victoria
winces-grimaces, that these words even leave my fingertips,
reminiscences, a chrome bookmark tab full of decades of near misses,
instances, subway sideway stolen daily glances of she who would be the only, the one, but one day failed to appear, left to dream peer,
and/or
decades long of romanced lasses, flying spectacular super crashes, when my heart-blanched, lanced, and the lawyers danced, poems shriveled as dried ink crack'd and words rusted shut,
cut by so many p'raps, and ugly motives, beautiful covered up, disguised as synapses of sin and insincerity, and I,
the sad man,
both the sinner and the sinned against,
totalities, of shoulda-woulda-asked/kissed-her-gallantly,
activities, when kisses were doorways to trap door rooms
and an over decorated monte cristo prison cell
ah well
the 'and yet,' the 'but for,' a single finger, sealing silenced lips,
passions mourned and irrevocable sensations, frittered, fractured,
all that I calmly called love was sprigs and broken branches,
cut flowers destined to shrivel,
not of what I believed in, something akin to a tree rooted, an oaken strong unbreakable love
of this certain, all approximations, all failed incantations,
for surely, if but only one escaped, could have been saved,
and if truthful love it was,
I would have known it,
for would I have dared to let slip away?
Jul 14, 2017
Jul 14, 2017 at 6:05 PM UTC
Out on the marsh on a lonely night
The wind soughs through his rags,
The hat that’s pinned to his painted face,
Flutters and soars, then sags,
His eyes are wide and his mouth is grim
As an owl is put to flight,
And nothing but shadows will venture there
For the Scarecrow rules the night.
And back in the manse in a window seat
The Parson’s daughter sits,
She stares at the fluttering coat-tails, but
In truth, is scared to bits,
She watches the sails of the windmill turn
And creak and groan in the gloom,
As clouds come stuttering over the marsh
In the rays of a Harvest Moon.
The father is out in the donkey cart
To tend to his aging flock,
He’s left Elizabeth waiting there
By the tick of the hallway clock,
But out on the moors and beyond the marsh
There rides one Highway Jack,
A frock coat topped with a bunch of lace
And a gold trimmed tricorne hat.
He’s whipped the horse to a lather
In a retreat from a new affray,
For the magistrates have gathered
Vowing to ride him down that day,
The redcoats wait in the village Inn
For the sound that they know too well,
When the curate sees the approaching horse
He’s to toll the old church bell.
But the curate lies in a drunken fit
On the floor of the old church nave,
And soon, by matins his soul will flit
From life to an early grave,
Elizabeth sits in the window seat
And thinks of the coin and plate,
As the highwayman dismounts, and ties
His horse to the manse’s gate.
He beats on the door, ‘Please let me in,
I’m weary and faint, that’s all.
I wouldn’t abuse your person, but
I fear my back’s to the wall.’
She leaves the seat and she slides the bar
For bracing the oaken door,
‘I dare not, sir, I fear for my life,
You’re safer out on the moor!’
Their voices echo across the marsh
Like fear, distilled in the night,
And something shudders out in the gloom
And lurches to left and right,
It seems forever, but now a sound
Tolls out, like a final knell,
For something, out in the church tonight,
Is tolling the steeple bell.
He barely makes it back to his horse
When the redcoats stand in line,
Their muskets fire a volley of shot
And his coat turns red, like wine.
They go to the church when the deed is done
To say, ‘You have done well!’
But the curate lies on the cold stone floor,
The Scarecrow tolled the bell!
David Lewis Paget
Jul 30, 2013
Jul 30, 2013 at 10:30 PM UTC
** In An Old Cathedral**
She knelt upon a plank, plain oaken
(sable cloak, her mourning guise),
and sensed the breath of distant sighs,
pale shades of pain behind blue eyes…
While clasping close a cross-like token
(holding hope for those in need)
she prayed her Lord "please intercede,
my woes be washed, my soul be freed"…
Archangels, in the skies evoken
(candles flickered, shadows shivered),
through the panes, the moonlight quivered,
summoned forth, the wish delivered…
Forgotten words he once had spoken
(dimly echoed ’neath the dome)
swept sweetness of the honeycomb
o'er distant realms they used to roam…
At midnight's knell, in dreams awoken,
memories of love unfeigned…
Though loneliness of grief remained,
she still held hope… hope hadn't waned…
And when the dawn had early broken,
by the font, in peace, she lay…
As sudden as a sunset ray,
the light of life had slipped away…
Mar 27, 2014
Mar 27, 2014 at 4:06 PM UTC
...
['ärbədər']
ar·bi·ter <noun>
*Winter's favorite judge.
Trial is held with the witness.*
⌭ ⌭ ⌭
⍤ Trustworthy ⍤
"Do you know what month it is?"
December growls in seven octaves
"Growls?"
In demon tongue
"About who?"
The she wolf of porcelain night
"The She-wolf...?"
Can't you hear it?
"Hear what?"
The ashes on the walls
"What ashes?"
Sinful choices that need to be cleansed
"Why do they need to be cleansed?"
They drunk my last cup of gold
⍤ Confession ⍤
"What happened to the wolf?"
She chased the seventh house of Cancer
"Cancer?"
The traitorous stars in heaven
"Why?"
She loved him more
"Who?"
The man who could talk the sun into setting
"So she left you?"
Among the valley of mirrors and chess
"Mirrors and chess?"
So I could see I was a pawn
⍤ Treason ⍤
"Did you lover her?"
Down to the wreckage in my bones
"I don't understand."
My soul has fallen ill
"Are you sick?"
Of that blue sink
"What blue sink?"
Look over there, in the corner
"What about it?"
My reflection on blood is quite frightening this evening
⍤ Rectify ⍤
"Do you understand why you're here?"
Father winter needed a suicidal witness
"How did you know?"
The oaken spider prophesized it
"A spider...?"
On the lips of candor and death he spoke
"What was his prophecy?"
Three treasures summon the ill-spirited wolf
"What do you mean?"
One bite from the golden fruit is tragedy
"What tragedy?"
Two drinks from the fountain of youth is treason
"You're not answering me."
Do you know what the third treasure was?
"Enlighten me."
The last breath of the moon
⍤ Final Judgment ⍤
"Do you regret anything?"
The pity screaming from those volcanic eyes
"Pity..."
Her apologies left marks on my willow tree
"Are you ready to accept her punishment for her?"
Yes, I owe her a favor
"Any last words, Alunakira?"
Tell her to never forget
"Forget what?"
How the truth killed me
⌭ ⌭ ⌭
*Execution; Successful.
Mark the wolf's sin as resolved.*
['ärbədər']
ar·bi·ter <noun>
...
Dec 19, 2015
Dec 19, 2015 at 11:26 PM UTC
Alone but together
over the Christmas days
time was not running out
for once the kitchen clock
had stopped looking at him
meaningfully and she
today a thing of beauty
of gathered curves
flowing in and from
that special frock
bought for an opening
(and perhaps worn once?)
she was lovelier then
than any woman
he had known or seen.
Earlier that morning in place of falling
ever falling towards passion’s state
he had lain peacefully beside her
and from his pillowed space in bed
had gazed . . . instead
They did the usual things
but with an unusual care
taking time with presents’ paper
savouring wine between sips of water
cutting into that well-iced cake
and sensing from a distant room
the scent of candles glimmering
On St Stephen’s Day
they’d upped and offed
into the glen that rose above the town
that held her world of work
of children house and home
walking up through bare winter trees
where far below a stream rushed valley-ward
undrowned for once by the traffic’s noise
and the sudden rush of the railway's train.
About to turn for home
he saw her stoop
to look to gather to pocket
Some sixth sense told him then
an idea had formed itself
when as between her fingers
she held five acorns from the path
not squirreled-perfect shiny ones
but damaged and in need of care
these cups and fruit garnered about
with slivers of broken oaken bark
Later she left them lying
on a sheet of card
their winter colours
true but hard
in the kitchen’s light
objects suddenly
removed from all disorder
of a woodland way.
An hour or so perhaps later
still with her small fingers
she had stitched until . .
no not stitched she said
darned with blue and red
and silk-golden thread
in between and then around
these fractured acorn shells
picked from the path with
the cracked and shattered
broken bark now made
good as new and mended well
Her smile expressed a triumph
and a joy of a doing done
and from laughing eyes
and heightened voice
he sensed something
stretch into time’s distance
something wholly private
she would guard
and hold and own
to be only hers
and only hers alone.
Dec 28, 2013
Dec 28, 2013 at 11:48 AM UTC
Lucid dreaming, I sit
in a downtown lounge,
swirling ice in my drink, listening
to tiny 'bergs creaking and cracking.
I raise the glass to my lips and
imagine the taste of Shackleton's whisky, after those
100 years in Antarctic ice, assimilating a tinge of penguin, a pinch of
blubber, the turbulence of the sea, the still of the frozen mountains across the tundra, the desolation, the tenacity of survival, the bitter numbing cold, mixed in with
the warm peaty oaken goodness of Scotland at the other end
of the world.
Through the soles of my boots I sense the
thin surface tension keeping my body, the table and chairs
from plunging into the frozen deep that
lurks somewhere beneath the Lower East Side, black and still,
waiting
waiting.
The band starts up in the
next room.
A curtain parts and a blast of brass escapes, a great honking
sound that
reverberates in a molar,
before
a female voice lifts me from my chair, drawing me toward
the source.
Pushing across the floor like Nureyev on ice, I slide deftly between amorous
couples, skirt the co-ed queue at the toilets, dodge the woman at the curtain collecting the cover charge, nod at my pal the bouncer returning to his post and finally
glide/float/fly through the velvet drapery,
focused on the rising soprano.
It's just a dream, I think. Why pay cover?
*Ode to the Living Room
Jan 29, 2013
Jan 29, 2013 at 10:29 AM UTC
*Weathered oak of ancient age
Sandblasted by Sirocco storm
Ribbed and dry and redly sage
Deep corrugated graining, worn.
Grown on hillside far away
Far, in England’s verdant land,
Hewn by artisan of old
Hewn by axe and sinewed hand.
Hauled across a raging sea
By barque of seaman’s sail and hope,
Washed by salted wave and gale
Lashed to deck by weathered rope.
Dragged across hot dunes of sand
To a land called Galilee,
Hauled by He, betrayed by man,
Upon the hill of Calvary.
Hoisted high by Roman hand
Stark against a leaden sky,
Red blood stains on oaken cross
On which His Crown of Thorns shall cry.*
M.
Easter Sunday 2014
Apr 20, 2014
Apr 20, 2014 at 7:32 PM UTC
A carpenter found driftwood
From a wreck upon the sea
He looked at it with interest
What kind would it be?
He found that it was oaken
Mighty, strong and hale
But it had been broken
By tempest and by gale
He was building houses
From such sturdy oak
So he took the driftwood
Upon it for to work
He carved with sharpened chisels
He began to sand
He had red, raw cuts of pain
And splinters in his hands
He worked with it patiently
Imposed on it his will
It will be something wondrous
He's working on it still
He loves that piece of driftwood
He salvaged from the sea
For the Carpenter is Jesus
*And that piece of wood is ME*
SoulSurvivor
(C) 6/23/2016
Jun 23, 2016
Jun 23, 2016 at 11:44 PM UTC
When the buds began to burst,
Long ago, with Rose the First
I was walking; joyous then
Far above all other men,
Till before us up there stood
Britonferry's oaken wood,
Whispering, "Happy as thou art,
Happiness and thou must part."
Many summers have gone by
Since a Second Rose and I
(Rose from the same stem) have told
This and other tales of old.
She upon her wedding day
Carried home my tenderest lay:
From her lap I now have heard
Gleeful, chirping, Rose the Third.
Not for her this hand of mine
Rhyme with nuptial wreath shall twine;
Cold and torpid it must lie,
Mute the tongue, and closed the eye.
2.1k
Gleaning of the Owl.
Gimbal eyed and shrugged
on Oaken bough
before the bluffing of the Crow
before Rook caw and Raven croak
before the shriven threaded dawn-
to glean a silent measure.-
thrawn.
Jan 7, 2012
Jan 7, 2012 at 1:25 AM UTC
Mint spreading in elegance.
Some divine blanket of taste in the soft vert.
What meadows of limestone growing
tusks and a peppermint hair!
Verdent tastes of beaming echoes,
Bouncing off the walled caverns,
Body and soul.
Radiating vieled ripples.
The mountain's roots in caverns carved,
the speech of silent wind within,
inscribed on the hollow shell
of a white turtle from the deep lakes.
Waves form energy suppressing noise,
leaving keratin quiet.
Coral growing body soul,
maintaining vibrations of mossy
touch and taste.
Rhinestone tongue of night
Diamond sky.
A granite vineyard in the clouds, and
pitch shaped into a tower,
the glassy eyes of dawn and dusk.
Vespertine.
Translucent dreams.
Bamboo chins translucence,
Escalating moonstone shadows,
fingers spread in wide stretch,
ephemeral hollowness,
of everlasting happy spices.
Fingers locked in thin ligaments,
stones nestled in the crabgrass burrow,
moles' eggs in the nutmeg painting.
Luscious browning melange.
Quartz upon the wave-struck ridge.
Puffs of gray magical,
escaping cavern's entrance,
filling the air with
a fragrance uncompared
and bringing to the stomach,
a funny, fuzzy, filling feeling
called munchies!
Written by: Simon and Lotus
May 27, 2012
May 27, 2012 at 4:09 PM UTC
our sky is spectrum
there is the peace of
a lake’s night-face
in our presence,
the ratchet of a thousand
orbits encircled-
wholly intersected through the palms.
a collective vibrato.
this unmasked, awesome wave of
silent happenstance
gathers kneading masses
to lay deadly beneath
oaken inscription,
cast about the heavens
in splinters of light.
our shaken, fevered dance
does not separate the halves
we are corpus callosum,
a passing stab embodied,
writhing jazz rhythm
untouched from pre-production.
so slice us into maps.
paste our highwayed bodies
in the grinding gloom
we will be your compass rose
when the pedals
are no longer smooth.
we will grace the dirt
when oceans are no comfort.
the palm-lines of healers
and street urchins
are the same.
child,
this anthem is your name.
if blood runs black,
a frame collapsed,
will we sing over your grave.
Mar 1, 2013
Mar 1, 2013 at 10:13 AM UTC
we are losing in a gulag
of our choosing
the un-predict-
ability of liberty
an extraordinarily poor
rendition of a system
where oaken-ed cloaked
murderous crows caw foul
jumping at every
shadow of a shadow of
a shadow nears to turn to turn
to turn the clock back years
election day is tuesday
- rue the day sweet liberty.
r ~ 11/1/14
much at stake
Nov 1, 2014
Nov 1, 2014 at 7:38 AM UTC
ALL the heavy days are over;
Leave the body's coloured pride
Underneath the grass and clover,
With the feet laid side by side.
Bathed in flaming founts of duty
She'll not ask a haughty dress;
Carry all that mournful beauty
To the scented oaken press.
Did the kiss of Mother Mary
Put that music in her face?
Yet she goes with footstep wary,
Full of earth's old timid grace.
'Mong the feet of angels seven
What a dancer glimmering!
All the heavens bow down to Heaven,
Flame to flame and wing to wing.
1.9k
Mounted in Ulster Mausoleum
you greet me with your rotted smile,
with oaken bones splinted into pose
with cloven feet riveted to the floor.
To the side your cratered eyes
that tunnel down to your cage
that watches of how we feed,
that recognises skin, fur and hair.
that will keep to see,
waves crash on mountain peaks
and we, holding hands in barren fields
and no one finding fossils in the mud.
Jun 19, 2013
Jun 19, 2013 at 11:53 AM UTC
When I forgive the monsters among the trees, my petals will grow dusted pink--
These days, I have become a skeleton made of thorns,
An unbloomed rosebush stark against the gentle green.
Sometimes I see sunlight beyond the thick-leaf canopy,
Splintered by branches and trunks more mighty than I may ever grow,
And I recall the sweet and far flowered days, wet with morning dew.
The monsters came in summer heat with clouds for tails and roots hard as stone--
They trod rough on my leaves and stole my roses with grinding teeth,
And left me naked among oaken giants.
Six flooded springs have passed, though every dawn breaks cold,
A suffocating haze, thick as if the sky itself fell to weigh me down,
How slowly fog burns under the rising sun.
Jan 15, 2015
Jan 15, 2015 at 10:59 PM UTC
Boots were all we had in winter,
Wellingtons made of a slice of rubber;
Turned down to show initials,
That bled upon the snow.
Between skin and cold,
Coarse wollen socks,
Sometimes they matched,
They'd criss and cross.
In from the boys' yard,
The slide and frost,
The boots were heaped
In backroom closets.
The sting of chilblains
On sock-soaked feet,
The line of footprints
Led to our seats.
We had one pair at school,
No other cover
Sliding across the oaken floors.
Drying on the radiators,
Our pungent odor,
A synaptic recall,
The unschooled smell
Of winter schoolyards.
Feb 9, 2016
Feb 9, 2016 at 5:01 PM UTC