"scythed" poems
SLOWLY the Moon her banderoles of light
Unfurls upon the sky; her fingers drip
Pale, silvery tides; her armoured warriors
Leave Day's bright tents of azure and of gold,
Wherein they hid them, and in silence flock
Upon the solemn battlefield of Night
To try great issues with the blind old king,
The Titan Darkness, who great Pharoah fought
With groping hands, and conquered for a span.
The starry hosts with silver lances *****
The scarlet fringes of the tents of Day,
And turn their crystal shields upon their *******
And point their radiant lances, and so wait
The stirring of the giant in his caves.
The solitary hills send long, sad sighs
As the blind Titan grasps their locks of pine
And trembling larch to drag him toward the sky,
That his wild-seeking hands may clutch the Moon
From her war-chariot, scythed and wheeled with light,
Crush bright-mailed stars, and so, a sightless king,
Reign in black desolation! Low-set vales
Weep under the black hollow of his foot,
While sobs the sea beneath his lashing hair
Of rolling mists, which, strong as iron cords,
Twine round tall masts and drag them to the reefs.
Swifter rolls up Astarte's light-scythed car;
Dense rise the jewelled lances, groves of light;
Red flouts Mars' banner in the voiceless war
(The mightiest combat is the tongueless one);
The silvery dartings of the lances *****
His fingers from the mountains, catch his locks
And toss them in black fragments to the winds,
Pierce the vast hollow of his misty foot,
Level their diamond tips against his breast,
And force him down to lair within his pit
And thro' its chinks ****** down his groping hands
To quicken Hell with horror-for the strength
That is not of the Heavens is of Hell.
8.3k
Brigid was born on a flax mill farm,
Near the Cavan border, in Monaghan,
At Lough Egish on the Carrick Road,
The last child of the Sheridans.
The sluice still runs near the water wheel,
With thistles thriving on rusted steel.
Little's known of Nellie's early years;
Da died before she knew grieving tears,
They'd turn her eyes in later years.
She's eleven posing with her class,
This photo shows an Irish lass.
Her look is distant,
Her face is blurred,
But recognizable
In an instant.
She was schooled six years
To last a life,
Some math, the Irish,
To read and write.
Her Mammy grew ill,
She lost a leg,
And bit by bit,
By age sixteen,
Nellie buried her first dead.
Too young to be alone,
Sisters and brother had left the home.
The cloistered convent took her in,
She taught urchins and orphans
About God and Grace and sin.
There were no vows for Nellie then.
At nineteen she met a Creamery man,
Jim Lynch of the Cavan clan;
He delivered dairy from his lorry,
Married Nellie,
Relieved their worry.
War flared, men were few,
There was work in Coventry.
Ireland's thistles were left to bloom.
Nellie soon was Michael's Mammy,
Then Maura, Sheila and Kevin followed,
When war floundered to its end,
They shipped back to Monaghan,
And brought the mill to life again.
The thistles and weeds
That surrounded the mill,
Were scythed and scattered
By Daddy's zeal.
He built himself
A generator,
Providing power
To lights and wheel.
Sean was born,
Gerald soon followed;
Then Michael died.
A nine year old,
His Daddy's angel.
Is this what turns
A father strange?
Francie arrived,
Then Eucheria,
But ten months later
Bold death took her.
Grief knows no borders
For brothers and sisters.
We left for Canada.
Mammy brought six kids along,
Leaving her dead behind,
Buried with Ireland.
Daddy was waiting for family,
Six months before Mammy got free
From death's inhumanity.
Her tears and griefs weren't yet over,
She birthed another son and daughter;
Jimmy and Marlene left us too,
Death is sure,
Death is cruel.
Grandchildren came, she was Granny,
Bridget, Nellie, but still our Mammy.
She lived this life eduring pain
That mothers bear,
Mothers sustain.
And yet, in times of personal strain,
I'll sometimes whisper her one name,
Mammy.
Feb 12, 2016
Feb 12, 2016 at 5:09 PM UTC
Bridget was born on a flax mill farm,
Near the Cavan border, in Monaghan,
At Lough Egish on the Carrick Road,
The last child of the Sheridans.
The sluice still runs near the water wheel,
With thistles thriving on rusted steel.
What's known of Nellie's early years?
Da died before her grieving tears,
But burn her eyes in later years.
She's eleven posing with her class,
This photo shows an Irish lass.
Her visage blurred,
Her eyes look distant,
Yet recognizable
In an instant.
She attended school for six short years,
The three R's, some Irish,
And a Doctorate in tears.
Her Mammy grew ill,
She lost a leg,
And bit by bit,
By age sixteen,
Nellie buried her first dead.
Too young to be alone,
Sisters and brother had left the home.
The cloistered convent took her in,
She taught urchins and orphans
About God, Grace and sin.
There were no vows for Nellie then.
At nineteen she met a Creamery man,
Jim Lynch of the Cavan clan;
He delivered dairy from his lorry,
Married Nellie
To relieve their worry.
War flared up, and men were few,
So the work in Coventry
Left Ireland's thistles to bloom.
Nellie soon was Michael's Mammy,
Then Maura, Sheila and Kevin were carried.
When war floundered to its end,
They shipped back to Monaghan,
To work the flax mill again.
The thistles and weeds
That surrounded the mill,
Were scythed and scattered
By Daddy's zeal.
He built himself a generator.
And powered the lights and the wheel.
Sean was born,
Gerald soon followed;
Then Michael died.
A nine year old,
His Father's angel.
(Is this what turns
A father strange?)
Francie arrived,
Then Eucheria,
But ten months later
Bold death took her.
Grief knows no family borders
For brothers and sisters, sons and daughters.
We left for Canada.
Mammy brought six kids along,
Leaving her dead behind,
Buried with Ireland in familiar songs.
Daddy was waiting for family,
Six months before Mammy got free
From death's inhumanity.
Her tears and griefs weren't yet over,
She birthed another son and daughter;
Jimmy and Marlene left us too,
Death is sure,
Death is cruel.
Grandchildren came, she was Granny,
Bridget, Nellie, but still our Mammy.
She lived this life eduring pain
That mothers bear,
Mothers sustain.
And yet, in times of personal strain,
I'll sometimes whisper her one name,
Mammy.
May 7, 2016
May 7, 2016 at 2:49 PM UTC
sweet tree
raised from
tropical
earth
to grow upright
and out
to sprout
from trunk
a bunch of
pink and
pointed pods
or perhaps
crimson or
yellow
aubergine
tangerine
green
scythed clean
from host
and hacked
in two
for getting at
seeds a-pulp
in white
and slimed
and spreading
them out under
the sun
to get hot
in their own
juices
to ferment
wild
to bake
dry
poured tinkling
by the
thousands into
sacks of hessian
for sending
‘cross seas
to furnace-cracked
futures
winnied and
conched
sweetened
melted
and hardened
into shapes
of other things
© 2017 Adelaide Heathfield
Feb 21, 2018
Feb 21, 2018 at 8:27 AM UTC
My sleeping mind cannot contain
{the horrid images of waking life}
All that my waking mind soaks up
{sponging filth from gutted city streets}
Dreams turning into lucid experiences
{the hypnotic effect of being drawn closer to a blade}
All colors, sensations too intense to categorize
{molded into a colony of unthinking, unearthing drones}
Wind down inside of me
{boiling tornadoes raging from the depths}
Concentrated awareness of my subconscious obliviousness
{the benefits of obsidian isolation}
I wish that I could weave them all together
{the stitches at the seams are wearing thin}
Like tall grasses woven into baskets
{like scythed grasses cut down by rampant Monsanto}
Strong, unbreakable, able to withstand the heavy weight
{pressure baring down on fracturing ribs and shoulders}
Of my spirit
{i feel alone}
Instead I leak through the seams, tear through edges
{leaving me tattered in a massacred pattern}
Five am cannot keep me
{six am will never know me}
My thoughts scatter
{my mind dances with madness}
Drifting in and out
{drifting in and out}
May 5, 2012
May 5, 2012 at 10:27 AM UTC
FROM off a hill whose concave womb reworded
A plaintful story from a sistering vale,
My spirits to attend this double voice accorded,
And down I laid to list the sad-tuned tale;
Ere long espied a fickle maid full pale,
Tearing of papers, breaking rings a-twain,
Storming her world with sorrow's wind and rain.
Upon her head a platted hive of straw,
Which fortified her visage from the sun,
Whereon the thought might think sometime it saw
The carcass of beauty spent and done:
Time had not scythed all that youth begun,
Nor youth all quit; but, spite of heaven's fell rage,
Some beauty peep'd through lattice of sear'd age.
Oft did she heave her napkin to her eyne,
Which on it had conceited characters,
Laundering the silken figures in the brine
That season'd woe had pelleted in tears,
And often reading what contents it bears;
As often shrieking undistinguish'd woe,
In clamours of all size, both high and low.
Mar 10, 2014
Mar 10, 2014 at 1:56 PM UTC
Mother! Mother! You doubt my senses
I have barely lived two decades
pulling thorns off my heart's delicate petals
I am scythed around the stem
and smothered deep in the roots
Riding these tidal waves of breath for survival.
O senses!
O senses!
Darling! You said my love was irrelevant
but to this day I celebrate it, watering
dried daffodils on the green outskirts of your shirt
to savour your scent of six months ago
Each drop of sweat on your face
as you dug a tunnel into my very soul
and took over this fleshy frame
O irrelevance!
O irrelevance!
I have trudged a dozen miles in the horizon
barefoot, bareskin, bare minded
Bathed at the gracious hand of sun
in the endless sea of love the earth sold
at one heartbreak per drop.
O earth!
O love!
Feb 26, 2020
Feb 26, 2020 at 11:11 AM UTC
Yester' I stood by the lagoon
The air was fair at that dry noon
Oh and my heart grew dearly fond!
Of that sight just next to the pond!
A bush of lavish strawberries
Just as sweet as my ripe cherries
Young like a bunch of chaste ladies
Dart'd I to harvest some berries!
Sang I 'till spill'd the dazzling snow
Unlike the frightened tomorrow
White and holy its shine and glow
Felt I how it smeared 'long my brow!
That moment my legs but grew still
As snow streamed downwards like a shield
'Tis got me scared gave me a thrill
As I stood pale right on the field!
The ragged plants the mirthless clouds
Haunted abbey and reckless shouts
Tore my sights into 'nother world
In some music and wan long chords!
I was 'fore a dark corridor
When you're 'bout to walk out the door
How your scent's just what I adored!
And yon black jacket that you wore!
But suddenly in sprang the wolf
In the blink of a thunderbolt
Scythed you in a terrific howl
Left you lifeless in bitter jolts!
I screamed I called you out in vain
'Cos you could no more hold the pain
Blood swarmed your wrist as it grew weak
I was the last to hear you speak
That you loved me and needed me
Said those praises undoubtedly!
I kept wailing I couldn't think
My whole love would go in one clink!
I buried my head in your chest
To embrace all but its last breaths
I rubbed my tears upon your breast
'Fore you went to eternal rest
I wailed for ho'rs till came the night
No-one to help me was in sight
I was desp'rate and torn by fright
When I caught a dim gentle light!
The light was no-one else but thee!
Thou graciously sat there by me
Amongst the snow beside the tree
'Twas a dream but I now was free!
And bending thy face onto mine
The snowfall's no more but sunshine!
Wedded my keen love into thine,
to other loves would I be blind.
Dec 27, 2012
Dec 27, 2012 at 1:34 PM UTC
Seven Scythed Fathers split this Growing Bond
Yet befriended by Common Dives respect
For Growth the Appled Fortunates abscond
And reap your Good Harvest in circumspect
Such Loyalty though Honest in its brew
Hoping for his time may notice and drink
I in my Honour base mixtures in stew
Never up-polled to what he may re-think
Bless, specially, the Welsh in Cat's Charm
And slap my Donkey to walk-up and run
I found the Barter; Whose tweet's harness farm
Smiles of the Tanner and revive his fun.
Although, it would be nice to just confess
And sharpen your Profile to know at best.
Mar 20, 2013
Mar 20, 2013 at 2:15 AM UTC
Sometimes I conjure
the after after the end:
our plaster cities bent and broken,
entire skylines scythed as flowers,
skyscrapers rent into oblivion,
lofty hotels and office towers
leveled to dark flatline—
the monotone of a final
wind barreling down,
inexorable, with no one
to hear its elegiac howl.
I picture myself ensconced
in an underground parking
garage scrounging to survive,
dismantling abandoned cars
piece by piece to pass the time, or
curled on an improbable mattress
remembering how I once watched
two birds quarreling over a piece
of pizza crust on the sidewalk
as I walked home from work
and thought to myself
as they startled into air
this is not the end.
Sometimes I conjure
the after as it ends:
when in an instant
every last bird rises
into the sky as one—
a cloud of feathers and bone
devoured by a heartless sun.
Dec 15, 2016
Dec 15, 2016 at 3:53 PM UTC
The French peasant monk
scythed the tall grass
by the drive to the abbey
he spat
on his creased palms
before work,
Dio è lontano
ma vicino
the Italian monk said
after Mass
clearing the items away
and I aiding him,
deep bell tolling
from the tall bell tower
echoing across
the surrounding area
down
to the seashore,
sans nous Dieu
ne nous sauvera
pas sans Dieu
nous ne pouvons pas
the French monk said
quoting someone religious
from some book,
incense
in the air
mixing
with baked bread
and cold stones aged,
I gazed at the cloister
felt along
the waist high
orange brick wall
musing on the flower bed
where a monk
on his knees
weeded,
la confiance en Dieu
et non votre
propre faiblesse
the French monk
chided me
as I peeled potatoes
for lunch,
silence after Compline
deeper than an ocean's depth
more profound
than Plato's musing,
pale moon
casting shadows
in the cloister's hold,
I hugging myself
during Vespers
against the harsh cold.
Jan 11, 2017
Jan 11, 2017 at 1:41 PM UTC
Blue eyed secret keeper
He held me and was still my reaper
Tequila scythed, taking life with needy fever
I wanted you to love me.
but the broken cannot see.
It's turns out that love is not the only thing I need.
Nov 18, 2014
Nov 18, 2014 at 6:57 AM UTC
Sometimes I mine for echoes
Ghosts of sounds within me still
Cicadas and the clash of boules
Soft voices from the hill
Two young boys tongue-tied in the sun
Barefoot on summer's shore
Soft feet licked clean by freedom's whim
With oceans to explore
My mother nurtured flowers
Drowning shadows out with paint
The brightness of geraniums
The patience of a saint
My father cut the grass too much
And ran to clear his mind
Until the echoes of the Angelus
Beseeched him to unwind
My brother lined his time with books
He tore through Willard Price
And towed me just behind him
Through the fronds of paradise
Marauding hornets launched their raids
From castles in the attic
While Stanley mined for longwave gold
From seams deep in the static
And all the while
My granny kept her patience in the shade
Her deck of cards adorned with birds
Their feathers slightly frayed
The swallows scythed through open skies
Back home where they belonged
And like Narcissus, swooped from height
To kiss the surface of the pond
The wasps built paper palaces
The geckos froze on sight
And midwife toads woke from their doze
To tune up for the night
As daytime took its leave
We sought out satellites and stars
Then lay in quiet contemplation
Watching Venus waltz with Mars
I remember cowboys’ breakfasts
With my father by the lake
Freewheeling with the moon roof open
For freewheeling's sake
We wore our bike tyres paper thin
Climbed castle walls unseen
Dived into lakes to race for ducks
And ruled the world at just thirteen
We fashioned bows and arrows
From the saplings in the wood
Sprung ambushes from chestnut shade
And fell dead where we stood
We roamed the dust-filled houses
On the back streets off the square
An ageless band of soldiers
Feigning death without a care
We raced around the wood yard
Sometimes scuffled in the dust
We traded glances with the neighbours' girls
And felt the nascent tug of lust
We sought out mischief in the hills
Stole naughtily from shelves
Smoked roll-ups in a Dutch girl's car
Unclipped our wings and helped ourselves
Jan 25, 2017
Jan 25, 2017 at 5:42 PM UTC
Myth
by Michael R. Burch
Here the recalcitrant wind
sighs with grievance and remorse
over fields of wayward gorse
and thistle-throttled lanes.
And she is the myth of the scythed wheat
hewn and sighing, complete,
waiting, lain in a low sheaf—
full of faith, full of grief.
Here the immaculate dawn
requires belief of the leafed earth
and she is the myth of the mown grain—
golden and humble in all its weary worth.
I believe I wrote the first version of this poem toward the end of my senior year of high school, around age 18 in late 1976. To my recollection this is my only poem directly influenced by the “sprung rhythm” of Dylan Thomas (moreso than that of Gerard Manley Hopkins). But I was not happy with the fourth line and put the poem aside for more than 20 years, until 1998, when I revised it. But I was still not happy with the fourth line, so I put it aside and revised it again in 2020, nearly half a century after originally writing the poem! Keywords/Tags: sprung, rhythm, myth, gorse, thistles, wheat, mown, grain, sheaf, faith, grief, golden, humble
Apr 8, 2020
Apr 8, 2020 at 5:21 AM UTC
She blew in as a broiling wind
chocka with sharp sanded beauty
and scythed the jelly of the eyes.
Jul 15, 2013
Jul 15, 2013 at 10:03 AM UTC
Beautiful paradise draping in wanton vain
Men and women visage in pain
Storming the Homeland with sorrow's wind and rain
Laundering the beauty of morning's eyne.
The carcass of Country men blown by the wind- identity.
The Clamour of torment soul of Fellow man to despair- scythed the sanity.
Tears in woe as thy'd watch the Homeland in ash
Threaded in enduring the shrieking of Homeland.
Jan 24, 2019
Jan 24, 2019 at 2:24 AM UTC
My windows point East
The first touch of soft light
Heavy darkness
Caressing me while still ******
Mist sways in ghost like swirls
Across the scythed field edging the yard
I am thankful
Deer play, eating the harvest lost by machine
Tie dye Tuesday with assorted colors
Stains on cement
Waiting
A robin's nest squatters are ready for flight
New wings shake nervous feathers
I am healing
As the leaves unfurl
Warm breezes skate through every crack
Soaking up the sun with sable pelt
Side by side
Both hearts radiating love
Her gentle purrs reassuring
All is well
Summer reinforcing my frame
I am
Jun 24, 2014
Jun 24, 2014 at 9:29 AM UTC
Brigid was born on a flax mill farm,
Near the Cavan border, in Monaghan,
At Lough Egish on the Carrick Road,
The last child of the Sheridans.
The sluice runs still near the water wheel,
With thistles thriving on rusted steel.
What's known of Nellie's early years?
Da died before she knew grieving tears,
But her eyes will burn in later years.
She's eleven posing with her class,
This photo shows an Irish lass.
Her visage blurred,
Her eyes look distant,
Yet recognizable
In an instant.
She attended school for six short years,
The three R's, some Irish,
With a Doctorate in tears.
Her Mammy grew ill,
She lost a leg,
And bit by bit,
By age sixteen,
Nellie buried her first dead.
Too young to be alone,
Sisters and brother had left the home.
The cloistered convent took her in,
She taught urchins and orphans
About God, Grace and sin.
(There were no vows for Nellie then.)
At nineteen she met a Creamery man,
Jim Lynch of the Cavan clan;
He delivered dairy from his lorry,
Married Nellie
To relieve their worry.
War flared up, and men were few,
A Coventry move would surely do.
(and thistles bloomed as they grew.)
Nellie soon was Michael's Mammy,
Then Maura, Sheila and Kevin were carried.
When war floundered to its end,
They shipped back to Monaghan,
To work the flax mill again.
The thistles and weeds
That surrounded the mill,
Were scythed and scattered
By Daddy's zeal.
He built himself a generator.
And powered the lights and the wheel.
Sean was born,
Gerald soon followed;
Then Michael died.
A nine year old,
His Father's angel.
(Is this what turns
A father strange?)
Francie arrived,
Then Eucheria,
But ten months later
Bold death took her.
Grief knows no family borders
For brothers and sisters, sons or daughters.
We left for Canada.
Mammy brought six kids along,
Leaving her dead behind,
Buried with Ireland in familiar songs.
Daddy waited for our family,
Six months before Mammy got free
From death's inhumanity.
Her tears and griefs weren't yet over,
She birthed another son and daughter;
But Jimmy and Marlene left us too.
Death is sure,
Death is cruel.
Grandchildren came for Little Granny,
Brigid, Nellie, her names are many.
She lived this life eduring pain
That mothers bear,
Mothers sustain.
And yet, in times of personal strain,
I may invoke her one true name:
"Mammy."
May 10, 2025
May 10, 2025 at 9:55 AM UTC
Please don’t ask me about the
Shake in my hands,
The kicks of my legs
The pain behind my eyes.
What keeps me
In these beds, these chairs...
What made me scream in my sleep
In those first years...
Ask me how I feel
When I see a buzzard fly low
Scaling the fields with its beauty.
Ask me how I feel when I see a kingfisher
Trail blue beauty on a grey day.
Ask me how mossy rivers
Still weave a path
Around my heart. I
Feel their flow still, from here.
Ask me how I feel
When my fragile body
Sits beside them
In those precious moments
Held high against the grey.
Ask me how I feel
When blackbirds
At dusk promise beauty
Scythed feather calls
From the dark.
Ask me how I feel
When the shadows move the hills
When light shapes the dark
When the old gods call in
Winter winds.
Ask me how I feel
When I capture their image
On a sensor, when my
Heart soars with the swallows.
Feb 13, 2018
Feb 13, 2018 at 1:34 PM UTC
I have not the words
For my lines, they have evaded me.
Sometimes I feel them slip
Under the horizon
Out of my eye line
Alive in the cracks
Like the edge of a mirror.
I imagine them, on the edge,
Their horizon, being lit by
The moon and the sun
Day and night, passes and scythed letters
I cannot remember, sink deep in the
Earth, my words, slip
In this fog.
I hope I can reach them soon,
Lit by the years, and the moon and sun,
My lost words under the horizon.
RB
Nov 20, 2015
Nov 20, 2015 at 7:52 AM UTC
I opened the shutters
to my window
in the abbey at 5am
and smelt the fresh dew
on the grass of
the garth below,
Deus in omnibus,
touched the old crucifix
on the wall above my bed
felt the pierced feet,
Dio in noi e con noi
the Italian monk said
as I helped him
in the workshop
cleaning brass fittings
for the church,
I kissed her soft fruit
but it was no apple
like Eve's and I no Adam,
there are some
who want knowledge
for the sake of knowledge
but that is Curiosity
and there are some
who want knowledge
so they can be known
by others that is Vanity
and there are those
who want knowledge
so that they can serve
and that is Love
St Bernard said,
I watched as Hugh
walked to the refectory
grim faced and *********
his rosary with an angel
at elbow and demon
at foot or so seemed,
à la fin du péché
de jour est le péché
the French monks said to me
as we scythed the grass
by the long drive
to the abbey,
I climbed her peaks
as we lay in her bed,
I opened the book
by St Augustine which
a priest in London
recommended along
with the poet Hopkins
and I remembered being
served tea and cakes
by a nun who worked
along side him,
George swept the cloister
as the hoover
had packed up
dat is beter
het is rustiger
a Dutch monk said to him,
she spread her legs
like a butterfly and said
take and have your fill
so I did,
nolite iudicare
ut non iudicemini
so it said some place
in the Gospels,
the price good men pay
for indifference to public affairs
is to be ruled by evil men
Gareth said quoting
from Plato as we sat
in the novice room
awaiting Dom Joe,
I wanted to sense
God's breath on my neck
as I bowed my head to pray
but sensed only
a cold wind in the church
on a 5.30am dawn
and doubt was born.
Jul 1, 2016
Jul 1, 2016 at 2:01 AM UTC
Carelessness
His large toolbox fell with a crash from the car
Spanners and wrenches and nails spread afar
But he gathered them all as best as he could
And piled them back into the boot as you would
Then he started the engine and set off down the road
Feeling quite weary from the day's heavy load.
It hadn't occurred to him to look under his car
He was tired and his journey was really quite far
But a large six-inch nail had got caught in the tar
And it punctured a tyre in a fast moving car.
The driver of that was too reckless that day
And the speed he was going was so fast they now say.
The car made a lurch and spun out of control
Then it veered to one side as it started to roll
It spun as it rolled and hit the side of a coach
The glass in the sides smashed like a cheap five-bob broach
But the damage was done and some passengers fell down
Right into the path of the car spinning round.
It scythed through their legs in a horrible way
The sounds of the screaming just wouldn't go away
And six folk lost their lives as the carnage went on
Imagination strained it was something beyond
The driver of course he was one of the dead
As the car wrapped around him and damaged his head.
The other man arrived at the end of his trip
Grabbed his box from the boot with a good grip
And set out to do the job he'd come her for
But could only find three six-inch nails not now four
He was sure he'd purposely put four of them in
He'd just have to and get another one again.
Joe Wilson - Carelessness...2014
Many years ago I witnessed a similar accident to this. As with most accidents it didn't need to happen.
Sep 5, 2014
Sep 5, 2014 at 6:44 PM UTC
Extra Ecclesiam
Augustine said no salvation,
a cobweb hung in the cloister
between the corners
and over coloured glass,
orange brick caught by sunlight
seemingly yellow,
for it is in giving
that we receive Francis said,
I washed dishes in the sink
by the kitchen of the abbey
Gareth dried talking of Wittgenstein,
let us imagine she said
that we are making love
as my husband walks in,
Dieu voit tout
the French monk said
as he raked the earth
by the vegetable bed,
bring me a handful of cabbages
Dom Thomas said so I did,
the bell chimed from the cloister clock
a quarter in God's time,
Hugh spoke of footsteps
before Matins go by his door loudly
not me I said,
the bell tower Heaven pointing
it seemed from the path,
the peasant monk scythed
the tall grass with his slow
but firm motions
cracher sur vos paumes he said,
I spat on my palms
but still blisters came,
shaft me to the bed she said,
George and I tolled bells for Mass
he smiled with joy as he pulled,
for the sake of silence
we are to abstain even
from good talk Benedict said,
Dom Joseph sat and eyed me
and smiled and said
God understands more than we think,
I sipped wine as she stood
**** naked singing
at the kitchen sink.
Jan 6, 2016
Jan 6, 2016 at 2:26 PM UTC
I thought at first it was a dream,
A figment of a hope starved mind,
When through the darkness scythed a beam
And with it voices warm and kind.
A narrow band of pure white light
Shone down upon my squinting soul,
Illuminating left and right
The human squalor of the hole.
I felt my heart leap in my chest,
A flood of tears streamed down my face,
Too many days I’d been a guest
Trapped in this god forsaken place.
With heavy legs I tried to stand,
My half clothed body stained with blood,
But failing strength forced me to land
Head first into the thick black mud.
I crawled on all fours screaming shrill,
My hellish ordeal almost done,
Please do not end this rescue till
You find my boy, my captor’s son.
Apr 10, 2018
Apr 10, 2018 at 12:41 AM UTC