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Marshal Gebbie Oct 2010
Evening in her slippered feet
Approaches from the heat of day
Shadows in the molten light
Lengthen as they have their way

Silence in the hovered moment
Stillness in the mote of time,
The glow within a sunbeam's ray
Ensnares the warmth of joy as mine.

Drifting insects float on bye
Suspended in the evening light
Against the lace of silver birch
With gnarled trunk of speckled white.

In the dark  blue, far azure
A gosshawk glides on high, aloft
A predator surveying late
For living things in farmer's croft.

A waterfall of children's laughter
Cascades through a field of green,
Overtones of golden shadow
Fills the air with love unseen.

Earthworms in their darkened tombs
Are wriggling for the coming night,
Rabbits stretch and move to grazing
Anxious for the closing light.

The chill night air descends as dew
The picnickers depart the scene,
Starlings flock to perch and roost
Whilst velvet silence hangs serene

Vaulting high above the foothills
Crowned with purple alpenglow
Taranaki's snowclad grandeur
Last to see the day light go.

Contemplation be my friend
For deep within contentment's breast
The joy of living sings it's song
And sooths my happy soul to rest.

Marshalg
Taranaki Evensong
23 October 2010
Marshal Gebbie Sep 2011
(Quote by Spike Milligan)

One very wise man sat and said
That, long before this world is dead
This planet’s problems won’t be solved
By reasoning which, though now evolved,
has got us, where we now do sit,
Afloat neck deep in mankind’s ****.

There’s SARs, Ebola, AIDs, Bird flu
And in the woodwork, West Nile too,
Each replicating viral spat
To mutate, (at the drop of a hat),
To complicate enviro’s stew
Of global degredation’s brew.

Urban spread and over stocking
**** deforestation’s shocking,
Depletion of aquatic life
Intrinsically creating strife,
Industrial pollution’s goo
Ozone depletion... ALL FOR YOU!


Environmental degradation
Means the world’s a weaker place,
Susceptible to malady
Wide spread across the human race.
Those animals in corn fed stalls
Who never get to see the sun
Or graze green grass where honey bees
Are vanquished by varroha’s fun.

Too late to save the Hector’s dolphin
Conservation’s lost it’s tools,
Rastafarian hootchie smokers,
Save the whales to **** the fools.
Governments sell the carbon credits
Everybody smells a rat
Restorations for the birds
And social conscience creamed the cat.

****** greenies own the airwaves
No one gives a flying ****
That good artesian water’s poisoned
By good farmer’s leached out muck.
CO2 in global warming
Sings it’s song of fast decline
Glacial retreat a-roaring
Bass relief in blood *****.

I guess the little children’s future
Most depends on lady luck,
Humankind in mass denial
Most don’t give a flying ****!


Marshalg
In retreat to Taranaki’s green haven in the gales of the equinox.
21 September 2011
Marshal Gebbie Jun 2013
(Quote by Spike Milligan)

One very wise man sat and said
That, long before this world is dead
This planet’s problems won’t be solved
By reasoning which, though now evolved,
has got us, where we now do sit,
Afloat neck deep in mankind’s ****.

There’s SARs, Ebola, AIDs, Bird flu
And in the woodwork, West Nile too,
Each replicating viral spat
To mutate, (at the drop of a hat),
To complicate enviro’s stew
Of global degredation’s brew.

Urban spread and over stocking
**** deforestation’s shocking,
Depletion of aquatic life
Intrinsically creating strife,
Industrial pollution’s goo
Ozone depletion... ALL FOR YOU!


Environmental degradation
Means the world’s a weaker place,
Susceptible to malady
Wide spread across the human race.
Those animals in corn fed stalls
Who never get to see the sun
Or graze green grass where honey bees
Are vanquished by varroha’s fun.

Too late to save the Hector’s dolphin
Conservation’s lost it’s tools,
Rastafarian hootchie smokers,
Save the whales to **** the fools.
Governments sell the carbon credits
Everybody smells a rat
Restorations for the birds
And social conscience creamed the cat.

****** greenies own the airwaves
No one gives a flying ****
That good artesian water’s poisoned
By good farmer’s leached out muck.
CO2 in global warming
Sings it’s song of fast decline
Glacial retreat a-roaring
Bass relief in blood *****.

I guess the little children’s future
Most depends on lady luck,
Humankind in mass denial
Most don’t give a flying ****!

Marshalg
In retreat to Taranaki’s green haven in the gales of the equinox.
21 September 2011
Marshal Gebbie Oct 2015
The little towns near Egmont
That nestle on the plains
To gather close the winding roads
The homing trails and lanes,
The little towns near Egmont
That sleep the whole night long
Cooled by the scent of mountain breeze
Lulled by the sea wind’s song.

The little towns near Egmont
Will ever seem to me
Like stars that deck the evening sky
Or isles that dot the sea,
Like beads that sprinkle here and there
On Taranaki’s gown
Like figures in a rich brocade
Of yellow, green and brown.

The little towns near Egmont
Seen through a summer haze
How fair and fresh and free they lie
Beneath the golden days,
Not crowded in deep valley’s,
Not buried in tall trees
But open to the sun, the rain
The starlight and the breeze.

The little towns near Egmont
What busy lives they hold
With happiness and health to keep
Secure from heat and cold,
The comfortable homesteads,
The park like lands so fair
God keep them restful, clean and pure
As Egmont’s snow peak there.

Hanna Hair
Dawson Falls Lodge
Mount Egmont, Taranaki.
January 1926

This poem, hand written and forgotten, was written by a guest of the house, in a thick, ancient tome of comments and articles, secreted in a dusty corner of the beautiful and quaint Dawson Falls Alpine Lodge, nestled comfortably in the dense, high podocarp forest, far up the snow clad slopes of volcanic Mt. Egmont in Taranaki, New Zealand.

From its high vantage point on the mountain looking out toward the curving coastline of the vast Tasman sea, the lodge affords magnificent views of the sparse settlements and farmlands spread widely on the lowland plains before it. By day the smoke rises from farm house chimneys, by night the warm honeyed glow from scattered windows dot like an expanse of fire-flies amidst the velvet blackness extending out to the luminosity of the line of breakers pounding the distant coast.

This delicate work captures the sparse beauty of this magnificent rural place, it further affords a snapshot of that particular era and of the pioneer spirit and rugged endurance of the settlers who made this isolated land home.

Marshalg
Dawson Falls Lodge
26 October 2015
Marshal Gebbie Dec 2009
For Basil@Egmont

Old school hotelier, conservationist, mountain man.


Festooning drapes of weeping moss
Hang damply from the trees
Cascading lengths of dripping fern
Bring wetness to your knees
The clutching boughs of gnarled branch
The olive greens and damp
The winding path meanders up
This mountain's rocky ramp

Grey boulders in the river bed
The rush of torrents fast,
The song of falling waters
Plummeting into the past.
The flash of brilliant plumage
A  blue kingfisher in a dive
And the tragic death of this field mouse
Means other creatures stay alive.

The mammoth mountain hangs above
The snow is clean and white
The cornice shadow aqua blue
Ridge ice is sunlight bright
The summit wind is blowing hard
The snow is curling round
To recreate a billowed crown
Atop that seaward mound.

A dancing *** is eyeing me,
Impossibly it clings
Inverted from a totara trunk
With rapid flitting wings.
Exploding from it's hiding place
A ponderous pigeon *****
And weaves it's way between the boughs
With noisy wing tip slaps

The magic of this secret place
Is the drama in the air,
The solitude of teeming life
In green-ness everywhere.
The hardness of the freezing night
The harshness of the wind,
The grandeur of it's wilderness
Paints splendor as it's sin.

Taranaki's goblin forest
Is resplendent in it's garb
Of emerald green and turquois-ness
And rugged rocks and shard,
Cascading rivers, waterfalls
In sweeping walls of trees
Where pools of still transparency
Bring you breathless to your knees.

Where Egmont's goblin forest
Will make your spirits sing
And the urge to climb another mile
Will reward you with something
You had not bargained for in visiting
This remote and splendid place,
......It will reward you with a warm,
And knowing smile upon your face.

Marshalg
Dawson Falls Romantic Hotel
Mt. Taranaki
15th September 2008
Marshal Gebbie Aug 2013
Back to my land of verdant green
To feel the bite of winter chill
To know that while all this is so
That far off land enthralls me still.

That far off land of granite peaks
Of crystalline white massif high,
Of conifer which scale the *****
Of rocky outcrop to the sky.
The baking heat of desert mesa
Spread as far as eye can see
Sage bush in its fragrant aura
Tumble **** soon rolling free.
Squirrel dart on shale cascade
Of green grey slate on alpine flank
Bright blue birds in curious hover
...For this, my reeling senses thank.

Fishing boats in bright array
Adorn the West coast sheltered lee,
Crab and mackerel brim the bin
Of bearded fishermen with glee.
Pounding surf of North Pacific
Carves the rock of bastioned coast
Embryonic currents cold
Do modify the climate most.
Redwoods huge clad coastal ranges,
Bright geraniums do sing
From earthen pots outside the cafe
Hot coffee fragrant from within.

Hilarity as laughing people gather
Watch as yelling Serbs do sling
Huge silver fish across the stall
Amid Seattle's Pike's Place din.
Colour paints this market place
Flowers stacked in every hue
Noisy vendors bawl their product
Creamy ice cream cone for you.

Streaming dust in streaming hair
Scree slopes avalanche past for thrill
Mountain crevasse yawns aloof
As ATV's roar up the hill.
Wild terrain of wilderness
On mountaintop of forest fir,
Cougar, grizzly bear and wolf
In pack are found herein astir.
Atop the very precipice
We view the everlasting peaks
Magnificent in summer sun
Embalmed in snow when Winter speaks.

Freeways snake from coast to mountain
Clover leaf in junctions pile,
Forty ton trucks pull big trailers
Endless day for endless mile.
Barrel straight these concrete tarmacs
Stretching far as eye can see,
Headlong surge huge pickup trucks
But cautious eye for Sheriff be.
Roadside diners loud and raucous
Selling burgers, selling beer
Neon flashing through the night
Old ***** waitress' toothless cheer.

The years have clad our friendships well
Familiarity's warming hand
Allows resumption of our words
Despite the 40 year gap spanned.
Houseboat floats in crowded wharfage
Swimming through a clear cool lake,
Californian wine with friends
Hot chilli food and fresh bread bake.
Eye fillets grill on barbecue
See the distant mountain peaks
Summer snow endures aloft
Glows indigo as sunset speaks.

Endless skies of cobalt blue
Cloudless in the summer sun
Gracious denizens do offer
Generosity unsung.
Graciousness across the land
Across these people so diverse,
The wondrous gift of ready smile
Friendly hand and open purse.

History tells these people spoke
Electing leaders for their time
When sanity's quiet need arose
It was promulgated on the line.
With Washington and Lincoln
Through FDR to JFK,
The Presidents who bed-rocked
This Foundation for the nation's day.
Astounding, that exceptional men
Have carved this face from stone,
Have caste the global presence
That Americans call home.

I understand the feeling now,
Of pride and patriotic stance.
I understand the inner strength
Of America's great, true romance.

This poem bequeathed to our good friends who inhabit this land... Big Rich, Suzie and Mike, Our mate Stevo and Ian, Heidi, Wyatt and Cooper, Dear old Greg and his elegant lady, Holly.
But most of all, with gratitude and love, to our marvelous son Boaz and his lovely lady, Angela.

Marshalg & Janet
At "Foxglove", Taranaki... In the Southern hemisphere's mid winter.
2 August 2013
Marshal Gebbie Jun 2012
Greetings Sissa,

Sunday morning early we walked along the wild black sand beach at the bottom of our road at Taranaki. For once the sea was quiescent, tranquil even. A gentle surge but the air was freezing. A heavy white frost cloaked our pasture at home and the grazing cows were snorting eruptions of hot breath from their nostrils. Over our shoulder old Egmont loomed, whiter than white with a heavy mantle of fresh snow, the foothills just behind home had a good coating too.

Quite often janet & I will bolt out of the sack, just before dawn, have a quick cuppa & drive up to Pukeiti for a walk through the gardens & the bush. We get the beautiful dawn chorus of the birdlife and it is SPECTACULAR!

We planted out some flowering “Companionata” cherry trees..great for the visiting tui’s in spring. They get highly territorial…my tree!..and have ding **** battles, chasing each other at high speed through the bush. Amazing aerobatics. We’ve got dozens of these trees scattered around the place now…in ten years the spring blossom show will be amazing.

Had a bit of bad luck with the vehicle lately, blew the core out of the radiator & cooked the motor, fixed that, drove 24ks down the road and the motor computer died. These things are like hen’s teeth to replace. I found there is a national waiting list of 11 owners sitting on dead landcruisers waiting for 2nd hand computers for the 93 auto model!!! And the 2nd hand computers here are selling for $3000!!
I even wrote to Greg in the States to see if he could pick one up for me…. Then I happened upon this little Asian bloke, just around the corner, who said”Oh I can fix that for you”!....cost me $196….I nearly kissed him!
Anyway mobile again and the old crate is running ,once again, like ****** clock!....but expensive when she stuffs up.

We are both working like automatons….you and your old man would know ALL about that!
We work 12 hours /day, 6 days/week then we jump in the car and launch off to Taranaki, 5 hours distant, to work our arses off, down there all Saturday, then, the next day, Sunday, pack up and barrel off 5 hours up the road back to Auckland… just in time to ****** a few hours sleep before the coming weeks work!....*******!

Sometimes I wonder what the hell it is all about.

Quite enjoying the new job, I’m the “Plant Coordinator” for the Waterview Project.
I keep track of all the plant scattered over miles and miles of construction site, tabulate plant movements, keep the hire companies honest and keep our operators operating! Involves constant driving from site to site, constant computer entries in my trusty laptop and a hellava lot of vigilance because every ******* is trying to beat the ****** system. Much more interesting than the Storman’s job, much more vibrant, much more confrontational!

Just the thing for an adolescent 67 year old.

That’s it from me…. Hope you are happy and keeping it all together. Hope the kids are doing well… mine are all pretty busy and happy with their lot…. Got a lovely call from Boaz at some unearthly hour on Sunday morning… Looks like he will be back in godzone during August.
Obama’s government is giving foreign workers a hard time in the States….too many Yanks out of work in their own country…so he is awaiting his Visa renewal and is doubtful that it will eventuate. Incredibly, his boss just told him that he would like to keep Boaz there, (In the States) for another five years of the projects life!!
Pretty ****** good for a country boy from National Park!

Gotta go, luvya Siss, love to Royboy & a big smootch for the girls.

M
Marshal Gebbie Dec 2010
Well my old Mate,
The sands of time have slipped between our fingers, you and I are not the spry young things we used to be. Gone are the expansive days of limitless horizons, gone are the great aspirations.
We live now in a time of quiet satisfaction. We have lived our lives as best we can. We have our achievements and our failures, our moments of despair and delight, the highs and the lows of a lifetime well spent.
What magnificent moments we have had... both of us! Moments of love and triumph, moments of roaring laughter, occasions where we have both felt... that our cup does indeed.. overfloweth.
We have watched our children grow from helpless little bubbles to striving creative people with urgencies and points of view and imperitives.
We have both found partners who have shared the pain and the hardship, the joys and the agonies. We are the lucky ones friend.. these women are the rock of our lives without them we would be substantially less.
Despite the fact that we have rarely seen each other since the ****** days, I want you to know that I have always regarded you as a brother.  Something quite indefinable there, but special.. you will always be my brother.

Speaking of brothers.. ****** old Johnson has married himself a young Chinese lady, they are living quite happily in southern China, used to be Changsha but I think now elsewhere..
He is coming back to New Zealand next year.. about March.. which is very timely because then we will be able to accommodate them in our new rural retreat in Taranaki.
Janet and I have built a lovely little donga atop a high hill overlooking the magnificent green, South Taranaki foothills and the wide blue Tasman sea.
The place is about 50% built right now. In a few days Janet & I will travel down with a truckload of stuff and spend the summer break and Christmas working our bums off on the property.
We camp out under a sky full of the most brilliant stars.. more than I have ever seen before. Every morning we awake to the glorious dawn chorus of the native birds in the forest around us.
We have two particularly curious, enormous wood pigeons who follow us around all day from job to job and a chorus of beautiful, irridescent tuis who entertain us with their song and antics flitting between the flowering tree fuschias.
This place is paradise.
We will have two guest bedrooms... so sometime, in the not too distant future, I want you and Suze to take a little break.

Boaz is returning from New Mexico for Christmas, Solomon is driving him down country on Christmas eve so we will all be together with Grandpa Bell, Janet’s dad, for the festivities. I can’t wait!
Have bought Janet a beautiful oil painting by a local artist.. Of geraniums in a rust red ***.. and a glorious light emanates from it. Will be just the thing for the wall in the new kitchen.
That’s it!

Love to you and Suzie and all the tribe.
Have one hellava good Christmas mate
Luv M

Hold your hand aloft in light
Feel the blood run through your veins,
Know that you have lived a life
Loved a love and held the reigns
Of something..so worthwhile and good
That friends will well have understood,
When you have long passed from this land,
...Your Cup hath Overfloweth.


MERRY CHRISTMAS

Marshalg
Mangere Bridge
18 December 2010
Marshal Gebbie Oct 2018
Shot a rabbit two days ago, it was a good shot taken at distance from height. The rabbit died instantly, it had been digging holes in my lawns, it had to go.

I watched it die and I had cause to ponder the death from a religious angle, where believers say we go to another place when we die?

I know where this rabbit went, he went into my vegetable garden, buried deep with all the other varmints and critters that have crossed my path.

Over the years we, (my wife and I), have turned that patch of barren volcanic ash into a wondrous source of lettuce, potatoes, onions, rhubarb, tomatoes and leek..by adding the carbonaceous remnants of not only these creatures but of composted vegetation, seaweed and selected fertilizers. We also grow the most beautiful roses and deliahs and crysanthemums you will ever come across.

And do you know...in the dark of night other little rabbits and bugs and things come out and nibble those very creations...unaware that they are completing the circle of being.

This is the true spirit of creation, as I see it, where deep in the garden, the motes of nutrition transmogrify beneficially from one entity to another, eventually, for the common good of all.

This is the basis of my belief. Feet on the ground...
What is....most definately is!

M.
Taranaki NZ
Marshal Gebbie Dec 2013
There’s a sense of something really good this Christmas,
There’s a feeling in the air that it’s OK
The anticipation’s there about ….a happiness out there
And the weather outlook’s brilliant for the day.

Mother’s planning a big roast for Christmas dinner
There’ll be sparkles and bright spangles on the tree,
Underneath there’s quite a pile, gaily wrapped to bring a smile
And a kiss beneath the mistletoe for me?

Spare a thought for all poor souls who have nobody
Gift-wrap a parcel or two for the disowned,
To make some unknown person smile advances Christmas by a mile
And really brightens up the prospects for the un-homed.

It’s a day to gift good wishes to your loved ones
Share some cold beers in the sunshine on the deck,
And when we’ve eaten to excess and helped mum clean up the mess
There will be time to take a snooze…and what the heck!

So to all our friends, across this world, aplenty,
May we take this opportunity to say
We hope your Christmas be as good as we know it really should
And may Santa gift you happiness ….to stay!

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Love from Janet and Marshal.
“Foxglove”
Taranaki, New Zealand.
Marshal Gebbie May 2011
Rain on me
In the cold clear Taranaki air,
waves of rain across the field, pelting down.
Saturating, pouring down my face, glasses fogged.
Every item of clothing on my body drenched and clinging.
The little red ride on mower spumes rooster tails of wet grass skyward
And I exult in the sheer brilliance of wetly getting this huge green swathe mown.

Marshalg
Laughing in the Taranaki rain
22 May 2011
~
December 2023
HP Poet: Marshal Gebbie
Age: 78
Country: New Zealand


Question 1: We welcome you to the HP Spotlight, Marshal. Please tell us about your background?

Marshal: "My name is Marshal Gebbie and I write under "M" or "M@Foxglove.­Taranaki. NZ". I am 78 years old and a native son of Australia. I came to New Zealand for a looksee with a pack on my back and a guitar under my arm, intended spending six weeks but absolutely fell in love with the Kiwi people and this magnificent little jewel of a country nested deep in the waves of the great Southern ocean of the South Pacific. I've now been here 54 years and counting. I married darling Janet back about 35 years ago and we produced two fine sons, Boaz and Solomon both of whom have great careers, wonderful partners...and in Solomon's case, produced a delightful granddaughter for us to love and spoil to bits.

From ****** agricultural college I went to the darkest, deepest wilds of Papua New Guinea as an Agricultural Officer, returned to Australia two years later to become a secondary college teacher in Ag Science. Easily the most satisfying profession of my life in that I succeeded in drawing the pearls of enlightenment from within the concrete mass of the, then, recalcitrant, brickheaded studenthood to realise the wonder of discovery, involvement and engender, within them, a genuine spirit of endeavour. Stepping off the boat in NZ I took a bouncers job in a rough public bar, three months later I started my own brand new tavern @ the Chateau Tongariro in the skifields of Mt Ruapehu.

Seeing a unique opportunity and with no money of my own I bought a derelict motorcamp in the small country township of National Park, named the place "Buttercup Camp" and set about making the enterprize one of the very first destination holiday venues in New Zealand. I pioneered paddle boat white water rafting on the wild rivers of the North Island, commercial adventure horse trekking in the wilderness trails, guided adventure hikes across the active volcanos of Ruapehu, Nguarahoe and Tongariro. Cheffed three course roast dinners and piping hot breakfasts for up to 150 house guests daily and initiated an alpine flightseeing business and air taxi service to and from Auckland and Wellington International to the National Park airstrip, a long grassy, uphill paddock liberally populated by flocks of sheep and/or herds of beef cattle.

Somewhere along the way I earned myself a Commercial Pilots Licence and owned, through the duration, 7 different aircraft. With the sudden fiscal collapse of tourism in the late 80s along with several inconvenient local volcanic eruptions, I divested myself from "Buttercup", moved my young family to Auckland and took up a 20 year lease of a derelict motel in Greenlane. Within three months I had converted the business into Auckland's premier truckstop providing comfortable welcoming accommodation, piping hot dinners and early breakfasts with the added bonus of a pretty young thing serving drinks in the bar....Super service with a smile for the nations busy truck drivers.
It worked like a rocket for ten years then the local matrons objected to the big rigs starting up at 4am and the Ministry of Transport and the Local Authority shut me down.

I worked the last 12 years of my serious working life as a Storeman and Plant Coordinator for a major construction company building motorways and major traffic tunnels in and under Auckland city and in rural Hamilton. I loved every minute of it all and objected furiously when they retired me at age 75.

Now I'm happily a Postman Pat in a little rural country town on the coast called Okato, have been for three years and shall continue be, gleefully, until they put me in the box. It has been a helluva run....and I wouldn't have missed a minute of it all."



Question 2: How long have you been writing poetry, and for how long have you been a member of Hello Poetry?

Marshal: "Poetry started for me when I wrote a beautiful ditty as an exercise at high school.....and the caustic old crow of a teacher said, publicly,...."You didn't write this!" That got the juices flowing and set me off on the tangent of proving my worth as a writer....and I have never stopped."


Question 3: What inspires you? (In other words, how does poetry happen for you).

Marshal: "Falling in love for the very first time kick started the romanticisms....it took me years to mollify that. Since then and throughout life Poetry has hallmarked discovery, achievement, white hot anger, combat and delight!"


Question 4: What does poetry mean to you?

Marshal: "It is the medium of expression which allows the spirit to enhance and colour my world."


Question 5: Who are your favorite poets?

Marshal: "Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Emily Dickinson, WL Winter, WK Kortas, L Anselm, Victoria (God Bless her), and a character, sadly long gone from these pages, JP. All favourite poets of mine."


Question 6: What other interests do you have?

Marshal: "With the slowing of my battered body these days I commit myself to my darling wife, Janet, our kids, now grown and living out there in the big wide world, and in growing and nurturing the truly magnificent gardens of "Foxglove" ......following the All Black rugby team and enjoying the serenity of a cut glass noggin of Bushmills Irish whiskey (neat), sitting in my favourite chair, watching the sun set in golden array over the grey waters of the distant Tasman Sea, far, far below."


Carlo C. Gomez: “Thank you so much for giving us an opportunity to get to know you, Marshal! It is an honor to include you in this series!”

Marshal: "Greetings Carlo and thanks for the opportunity to unload on my fellow poets."



Thank you everyone here at HP for taking the time to read this. We hope you enjoyed getting to know Marshal better. I learned so much about his fascinating life. It is our wish that these spotlights are helping everyone to further discover and appreciate their fellow poets. – Carlo C. Gomez & Mrs. Timetable

We will post Spotlight #11 in January!

~
Below are some of Marshal's favorite poems and links to each one:

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/1620867/windwitch-of-the-deep/
Windwitch of the Deep by Marshal Gebbie
Click to read the poem and comment...
hellopoetry.com

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/1274911/running-the-beast/
Running the Beast by Marshal Gebbie
Click to read the poem and comment...
hellopoetry.com

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/386523/so-wetly-one/
Once, so wetly one. by Marshal Gebbie
Click to read the poem and comment...
hellopoetry.com

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/435103/perchance-in-a-bus-shelter/
Perchance, in a Bus Shelter by Marshal Gebbie
Click to read the poem and comment...
hellopoetry.com

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/389195/white-foggy-days/
White, Foggy Days by Marshal Gebbie
Click to read the poem and comment...
hellopoetry.com

https://hellopoetry.com/poem/266893/cheetah/
Cheetah by Marshal Gebbie
Click to read the poem and comment...
hellopoetry.com
Marshal Gebbie Jan 2014
Greens and gold of lattice work cascading down the tree,
This epiphyte, so infinitely, delicately free.
A lattice work of green finesse, a miniature Cezanne
With exquisiteness of spiky bloom embellishing it’s charm.
Cascading down the grizzled trunk of gnarled and twisted hand
The hosting ancient Kamahi looms loftily, so grand.
Looms aloft with leafy bough so softened by the show
Of ruffled, pinkish bottle brush amassing high and low.
Hordes of buzzing, bumble bees so clumsy in their way,
Tumbling from flower to flower collecting nectar’s day.
With afternoon the waning sun lies hot on sultry air
And little girls in pretty frocks skip by with not a care.
Summer grasses long and dry stand statuesque and straight
With sweet laburnum’s perfumed heads a nodding by the gate.
Young heifers graze in clover in the dell down by the brook
And the fantail dances daintily seeking insects in the nook
There’s a special, quiet majesty pervading here, so fair
With the thistledown afloat, so still with golden motes in air.
Fills my soul with gentle feeling and a rolling tear, unplanned,
For this blend of quiet ambivalence through my beauteous rural land.

Marshalg
“Foxglove” Taranaki.
NEW ZEALAND.
19 January 2014
Marshal Gebbie Aug 2023
Everything is BIG here.

Meals are big, bums are big, cars are huge and the skies are a million miles wide.

Janet and I are travelling in the Northwest of the United States of America, spending time with Boaz and Lisa in Idaho, Steve Yocum in Oregon and Greg and Linda in Washington State.

The trip is a "quickie" in that we are fitting one helluva lot into just three weeks duration.
Never in all my days have I seen such huge quantities of food served up in restaurant meals, plastic bags discarded, American flags fluttering and all the young, blonde girls in tattered, impossibly short cut offs and sleeveless tops talking loudly, incomprehensibly at a million miles an hour ......Just blows you away!!
Monstrous pickup trucks, Rams, Broncos, big V8s travelling the freeways continuously. Sheriffs, troopers and Road cops all wearing firearms on the hip, in their souped up pursuit vehicles parked on the roadside shoulder, eyeballing everyone as they pass, with a mean, accusatory glare.
Out on the range there is a million square miles of nothing but sage brush and basalt rock....and searing, baking heat.
114 degrees in the painted desert of Moab. Beautiful though with vaulting red sandstone cliffs and rearing stone arches against the blue-est of blue skies.
Standing pillars of ancient sedimentary rock born in depositions laid down in vast oceans of bygone eras, millions of years ago.

History is painted vast in this immensity. The gigantic and abrupt catastrophic inundation of a vast and deep inland sea, swelled suddenly by floodwaters of rivers diverted by lava flows from subterranean fissures....Unimaginable torrents abruptly released, gouging out ancient lava beds to create gigantic waterfalls and deep, sheer sided chasms.

Cascades that constituted the biggest river flow ever known in the history of the planet, washing away everything from the epicentre of the continent in Utah through Idaho to the Pacific ocean in the rugged coast of Oregon. Such was the Bonneville flood of 12,000 years ago illustrated today by the gigantic chasms created in the beds of basalt and rhyolitic larva throughout Idaho and the fields of massive, round, house sized boulders strewn from the floods origin near what is now, Salt Lake City in Utah to the coast in Oregon, a thousand kilometers away.

The two weeks stay with Boaz and Lisa just disappeared in a flash. They took us down to Moab painted desert, Zion National park, the Craters of the Moon, Monument National Park and up to Stanley and the Sawtooth mountains by the mighty Salmon river. Janet and I took advantage of a couple of push bikes hanging in the garage and spent most days cycling the local trails and visiting Starbucks for a celebratory cappuccino or two....Those bikes saved our bacon, walking trails in that heat was ******. Great hospitality enjoyed here. watched reruns of Sopranos on Boaz's 70 " SmartScreen TV and enjoyed Arnie's escape from postwar Austria to Mr Universe and fame and fortune @ Hollywood with Boaz whilst enjoying chilled margaritas in the hot tub.

The camaraderie of meeting an old mate of 45 years past, Steve Yocum of Oregon  a fellow writer and author. Both of us intent on shooting the breeze, putting the world to right. In some ways a sad exercise in that no longer can either of us make things right for with age upon us, neither has influence. We can huff n puff n blow the house down....but it seems, nobody pays the slightest bit of attention. The penalty of age is invisibility. The relief in it all is that, really, nobody actually gives a hoot!

Just two Old Dogs letting off steam..... it's rather cathartic actually! Thanks to Stevo, Ian and lovely Heidi for the accommodation, great hospitality and warmth.

The cool atmospheric relief of the serene and calm, Puget Sound in Seattle, Washington state gave welcome respite from the intense heat of the interior and the serenity of our cottage accommodations and startlingly beautiful garden surrounds. A forest of conifers and deciduous trees harboured gardens of blooming roses, hollyhocks and multihued cone flowers, emerald lawns carve swarths of sunlight in avenues of deep, green shade....a delight for the sunburnt brows of yesterday's heat.
Woken by the bassoon blast of the passing early morning ferry out in the waterway, to stroll out to sit at the very edge of the sandy, pebble beach and gentle surge of the deep, clear saline waters of the magnificent Puget Sound.
The peace of early morning crisp cool air, a seascape of moored fishing boats on mirrored waters, the distant Olympic range rearing to its' full 7,000 ft against a powder blue sky left us quite breathless with the utter beauty of it all....add to that a lovely breakfast offering of fresh berries, kiwifruit slices and yogurt and a chilled glass of fresh squeezed orange juice...and we absolutely, couldn't want for anything more. To Greg and Linda our love and thanks for giving up your beautiful bed, travelling us around beautiful Seattle and being our airline coach to and from Portland. We shall return the warm hospitality next time you hit NZ and Taranaki.

Vulcanism has dominated the terrain in Idaho, Montana, and Utah. Continental drift westward of the land mass has brought about a steady transference eastward of the massive geothermal hot spot which currently lies in Yellowstone park and which is the source of all volcanic activity within the park..
Idaho, in ancient times, wore the volcanic mantle of the region in having truly gigantic rhyolitic ash and magmatic eruptions. These cataclysmic eruptions emptied deep cavernous, subterranean magma chambers which collapsed under their own weight leaving vast circular calderas in the landscape. Subsequent plate tectonic activity caused deep faulting allowing huge flows of sticky magma to surge to the surface like searing hot black toothpaste, spreading across the plains obliterating all evidence of the rhyolite caulderas, surfacing the state, to this day, with millions of acres of hard black basaltic rock.
Here and there, rhyolite has wormed its way to the surface building gigantic domes, over the centuries these have weathered leaving statuesque, dramatic flat-topped mesa scattered across the landscape.
Altogether a truly unique and enthralling terrain for visitors to behold and one which reveals a dramatic insight to the volcanic and tectonic violence of the recent past and gives a definite air of mystique to the beholder.

In a land of 360 million people, supermarkets are downright huge...and they contain the spoils of the nation's plenty.
Acres of dazzling variety... and cheap by international standards. The very best of prime beefsteak, sides of pork, Alaskan cod freshly caught and displayed in rows of chilled enticing exhibit. Every possible vegetable and fresh picked fruit known to man in piled pyramids of brilliant, colourful display. Beautiful ornate furniture, beds, mattresses, tiers of car tyres of every conceivable brand and size, wheelbarrows, fertilizer, fresh flowers in mountainous display, ***** in barnlike chillers. Supermarket trolleys for giants..... and gird yourself for a marathon hike in collecting your basket of groceries...and give yourself half a day....you'll need it!

America has momentum, huge momentum. Across vast tracts of country lie networks of highway. Multilane concrete that tracks mile after mile carrying huge trucks with 40 tonne loads. Incessant trucks, one after another,  thundering along carrying the lifeblood of America, merchandise,  machinery, infrastructure, steel, timber and technology. Gigantic mobile freezers hauling food from the grower to the markets. Hauling excavators, harvesters,  bulldozers and giant Agricultural tractors. Night and day this massive source of production careers across the nation transporting the promise of America, the momentum which drives the Stars and Stripes onward, ever onward.

On the margins of the cities of Portland and Salem the unhoused gathered in squalid tent communities. In the beautiful city of Seattle I saw many down and out unshaven, untidy individuals with hopelessness in their eyes, pushing supermarket trolleys containing their sparse possessions. I drove through rural communities, some of which, reflected hardship and an air of despair. Run down dwellings in need of maintenance and repair, derelict rusty vehicles adorning the **** strewn frontages.
Not 20 kilometers away in Ketchum and Sun Valley Idaho the homes were palatial in grounds tended by gardeners and viticulturalists. Porsches and Range Rovers graced the ornate, rusticated porticoes. Wealth and privilege in evidence in every nuanced nook and cranny.
America is, indeed, a land of contrasts, a land of wealth, privilege, and plenty..... and yet a land that, somehow, tolerates and abides a fragile paucity which emblazons itself, embarrassingly, within the national profile.

On a hot day in Twin Falls, Idaho, I walked into a huge air-conditioned sporting goods store specifically to look at guns....and in the long glass cases there were hundreds of them. From snub nosed revolvers to Glocks, 38s, 45 caliber even western style Colt 45s and the ***** Harry Magnum with the long, blue gun barrel and classic, prominent foresight.
In the racks behind the counter are hung fully and semi-automatic rifles of myriad types...all available for sale providing the buyer has appropriate licensing.
In a land where mass shootings proliferate weekly, I ask myself....does this availability of lethal weaponry make sense?

The aching beauty of the mountain country in Northern Idaho, Oregon and Washington state cannot be overstated. The Sawtooth mountains, the Cascades, Mt Ranier, Mt Hood and the Olympic range. Ridgelines of towering conifers as far as the eye can see, waves of green deciduous running down to soft grassy clearings with boulder strewn, rushing streams and the cascade of plunging waterfalls. The magnificence of the natural beauty of this rugged, heavily timbered mountain country just defies description being far, far isolated from the attentions of man.

To happen upon this country from the far distant reaches of the South Pacific is a culture shock, to be suddenly exposed to the extreme largess. It is difficult to calibrate, hard to encompass, impossible to assimilate....but the people encountered warmed us with their generosity of spirit, their willingness to welcome travelling strangers into their homes....and, of course the invaluable time we spent with our family….and for these factors alone together with the huge magnificence that is this........
GRAND AMERICA.
We are truly, truly grateful.

Janet & Marshal
Foxglove@Taranaki.NZ
Marshal Gebbie Nov 2018
Hear the languished drip of water
See the velvet grass in glade,
Beech trees stilled in chill of morning
Textured blend of contrasts made.
Still, I crouch, in rough tweed jacket
Brown brogues scuffed and fern in hair
Whiskers twitch as rabbit pauses
Rifle aimed at bright eyed stare.
Moment freezes animation
Breathless in the misty pall,
Shocking bang as bullet flies
Blue smoke masks the writhing fall.
Silence caps a deathly moment,
Crunching steps retrieve the game,
Swinging for the breakfast kitchen
Roasted rabbit in the frame.

M.
Foxglove farm
Taranaki
Marshal Gebbie Oct 2020
The demon fly hath landed now intent upon it's task
**** Demon in its valedictory explorations grasp.
Embedded deep in kidneys, to cause me some concern.
A painful path to endgame and a Hellish lesson learned.

I pause a moment, think it out, it's one way or the other
I lost a mate the other day and last month, lost another.
Seems it is the season for the cataclysmic time
I'd rather it be elsewhere but I fear this one... is mine.

I've run a rough and winding track these rugged years of yore
Pulled the Dragons tail in jest and sought, yet, for more.
Rafted mighty rivers and flew the heavens high
And lifted my perception winging vaulting, clear blue sky.

I've known the velvet touch of love, the softness of her lips
The crash of waves on sandy shore caressing fingertips.
The swelling joy of childbirth, the pledge of mothers milk
And rock like bonds of marriage binding all within its ilk.

With thoughts a million miles away I've trudged this country lane
Pondered why, with voids approach, it engenders me no pain?
Wondering why it matters that the children shed a tear
When saddened, glancing passing eyes, are never really near.

Regret I'll never get to see my grove of rhodos bloom
Or sip the soothing whisky as I tap my toe in tune.
Or launch into the crazy surf and splash out to the rock
Nor lie in sun on baking sand admiring talent flock.

Meat pies with sauce at football with a cold beer in the hand
And the repartee with kindred minds in poetry unplanned,
That flash of inspirations' alliteration sprung
Brings the joy to mind of comradeship in Shakespeare's realm, unsung.

.....And then there's all that's left undone, the words, now, left unsaid
The notes of tragic violin hang in the air...unbled
And you there with the swimming eyes, what do I say to you?
It's all been grand, I kiss your hand....Adieu , my friend.... Adieu!

M.
Foxglove, Taranaki
New Zealand
20 October 2020
Marshal Gebbie Oct 2012
Thought about the way my kids
Will judge the world I’ve left behind,
Wondered how perception’s eye
Will shade the tones of what they find.

Worried that the work undone
Shall disappoint the judgements made
And sway perception’s jaded brush
To paint the memories in shade.

It matters that regard is there
To render recollection’s sound,
To pluck the gems of warm regard
From detritus of earthly round.

To look upon my megre works
As worthwhile in the scheme of things,
To nurture somewhere in the soul
The song which satisfaction sings.*


Marshalg
Pondering in the dead of night beneath a hallowed frozen moon.
Foxglove, Taranaki.
7th October 2012
Marshal Gebbie Jan 2013
She sat astride the stool in silence
Watching how the mayflies flew,
Symmetry in chaos painting
Colour’s gentle strokes anew.
Felt the touch of evening breezes
catch the tendrils of her hair
Watching mayflies rise and fall
through symmetry, without a care.
Promise fills the moment’s magic
Hope is pounding through her breast,
Mayflies rise and fall in sunlight
Love’s anticipation best.
Scattered light intrudes through leafage
Casting sunspots in the shade,
Mayflies rise and fall in sunshine
Tranquil peace of mind is made.
Softly a guitar is strumming
Melding with the lakeside air,
Rendezvous with him a-coming
Mayflies rise to empty chair.
Mayflies rise and fall in sunshine
Rise and fall...and they don’t care.

Marshalg
‘Foxglove’ Taranaki
3 January 2013
Marshal Gebbie Feb 2013
Manacled the hands
Which intertwine with one another now,
Hands that come to grip with issues
Locked within the soul, somehow.

Manacled, the hands that hold her
Manacled in blood and bone,
Hold the baby’s head so gently
Veined and scarred with love intoned.

Hands of strength that strike the anvil
Shape the shoe to fit the hoof
Hold the stallion’s head commanding
Strong control to stay aloof.

Hands that wield the sword of vengeance
Hands that feed the wood to fire,
Work the field with ox and plough
Stroke her body to desire.

Veinous hands, so strong and calloused
Locked within his every day,
Hands that clap to merry music
Hands that to the piper pay.

Hunter hands to snare the rabbit
Catch the carp in yonder lake,
Pen the words of love to paper
Knead the dough of bread to bake.

Quiet hands that rest in evening
Sitting by the fireside,
Listening to the snoring hounds
Which on the mat, asleep, reside.

Manacled, these hands, he ponders
Locked within the ways of sin,
Reminiscent recollection
…Quiet smile on whiskered chin.

Fingers cooled in fresh spring water
Feel the rays of rising sun,
Stride across the purple heather
These hands, a goodly day begun.

Marshalg
FOXGLOVE, Taranaki.
4.20am 17 February 2013

© 2013 Marshal Gebbie
Marshal Gebbie Nov 2013
Forthright in my chosen stance
Deliberate in the steps I dance,
I seek to make my time fulfil
Attainment, while I wish no ill,
To others who would tread my path,
(though this may cause some friends to laugh),
“Uniquely” is the phrase I use
To walk the walk of life I choose.
So different from the milling herd
To make some other choice….absurd!
Forthright is my chosen stance
Therein, I dance the dance…. I dance.

Marshalg
“Foxglove” Taranaki NZ.
16 November 2013
Andrew M Bell Feb 2015
Have you ever stood,
craning your neck to look up into the canopy
of the ancient kauri, Tane Mahuta,
while peace and birdsong permeate your soul?

Have you ever felt
the crusty spray and the satanic whiff
as the Pohutu geyser shoots aloft
while a dozen languages bubble through te reo?

Have you ever shivered
in the receding darkness,
standing in the china-white sand as you waited
for the first sunrise over Makorori Beach?

Have you ever sat
on the summit of Mt Taranaki
and eaten a well-deserved sandwich
while cows grazed far below on the lush, volcanic-rich pasture?

Have you ever experienced
that mixture of fear and awe
as an orca’s dorsal breached beside your too-fragile kayak
in the shining waters of the Abel Tasman?

Have you ever paused
atop a ski run on Coronet Peak
and reflected on the reflections
of sunlight dancing on snow and water?

Have you ever felt sorry
for tourism chiefs and advertising creatives
trapped in offices in the Auckland CBD
dreaming up “100% Pure” and “Clean and Green”?
Copyright Andrew M. Bell
Marshal Gebbie Dec 2022
Read the words upon the page
Depicting how was such an age
That, then, ensconced in everyday
In truth, permitted Hell to play.

Where age with all it's wisdom gleaned
Should logically be rightly seen
As guidance for emerging youth
Where past mistakes impart as truth.

Though tragically, bereft as seen,
The actuality now doth scream
For youth doth relegate to grass
Aged wisdom's pearls.... as shattered glass.

Dispersed amid the flotsam tide
Lies that which salves salvation's hide,
Lies that which wreaks of God's works, twist,
Dispersed through cold, Alzheimer mist.

The waste of ancient eyes at rest
Expelled, devoid of life, at best
But should a crisis start to burn
Old minds may co-opt young to learn?

History makes the paradigm
That thumps the lesson home, with time,
In squandering the wealth of age
We burn the story, tear the page.

Now delegated to the shelf
Immersed in indignation's self
Old wallow in blue pity's taint
Inhibited by self restraint.

But then the moment comes around
When happenstance, by chance compound,
When youth, of clear complexioned face,
May stumble into mute disgrace....

Thence whilst the Angel trumpets grace
Whence in that vacant, silenced space,
Then flows of wisdom tumble thine
From lips that spake in ancient time.

Knowledge held in Holy Grail
Empirically forth then, when regaled,
As pomp and circumstance decreed
Should all, combined then, .... be agreed?

M.
9th December 2022
Foxglove@Taranaki,NZ.
Oh! the frustration of the aged at being sidelined by the arrogance of emergent youth.
The impertinence of the transfer of power and influence from one era to the next and the ever present wastage of invaluable lessons learned and priceless experience, gained from the labour of the travails of time.
M.
Marshal Gebbie Apr 2013
By amber light we sit here in this scintillating evening
By amber light we wonder at the treasures of the night,
Enraptured by the shimmer of the highlights in the wavelets
Across the bay the music plays to thrill us with delight.

Moving to the rhythm of a tango in the moonlight,
Feeling the sinuating warming run inside
Start the steps in synchro to the pulsing of our swaying
Roll the eyes in fun as we let our bare feet glide.

Shimmer on the wavelets in the balmy air of evening
Kaleidoscope reflection of refractions of the night,
Titilating trumpets to the pulsing of the conga drums
We meld our hips together in our tango's rich delight.

By amber light  luxuriate as long as night’s forever
We’ve felt the brush of loving in a tangled, close perspire,
We’ve danced the dance of romance in these luscious shades of evening
To be happy and  exhausted in a bubble of desire.*


Marshalg
In the magic of the peaceful night and the waters’ beautiful, shimmering shades.
Manou’s Harbourside Restaurant
Port Taranaki, NZ.
9pm 1 April 2013
Marshal Gebbie Feb 2016
I’ve strode this road of war and love
And born it’s bile and spleen,
I’ve wept at death and laughed at birth
But nowhere have I seen,
A sweeter place to live and die,
To quest for things supreme,
Than to forge these days of hard forays
In the Land of In Between.

Candied apples hang from boughs
Like jewels bequeathed by Queen
And silver sounds of bubbling brook
Cascade to tumbling stream,
Parakeets in vivid hue
Fly by with shreeking scream
In forest’s green majestic light
In the Land of In Between.

Paint no man black or vivid white
Whilst points of view be gleaned
With race and politics ignored
Then manifest, obscene.
Where labour be a man’s reward
And filthy lucre screened
As noxious be a spider bite
In this Land of In Between.


Where hate be strangled to the end
Then with a keen blade ,sheened,
Be put to death with avarice
No guilt or guile redeemed.
Leaving in the pristine wake
A countryside so clean
That God be queuing up to live
In this Land of In Between.


All ****** love be sacrosanct
And soft endearments seemed
As normal as the light of night
When by the moon dust preened.
And that laughter be our currency
Affection always seen
As bonding in fraternity
At the Land of In Between.

M.
Foxglove, Taranaki NZ.
30 January 2016
Marshal Gebbie May 2011
A line of trees in massive form
Encroach along a ridge of stone,
Gnarled, bent and weather worn
Their clinging roots call granite home.
This ancient wood has weathered time
Felt the freezing gales of snow,
Has witnessed birth and death by day
Through life's kaleidoscopic show.

Oh the stories they can tell
When sunshine in the heavens ,warm,
When rivers run in merry tune
And safflower honey bees do swarm.
Oh the stories they can tell
When fillies kicked their heels in grass,
When whippoorwills did sing their song
And rampant stallions vied for class.

Oh the stories they can tell
When ancient armies trod this way
When clashing steel rang loud and clear
And good blood flowed in battle fray.
Oh the stories they can tell
When faceless horsemen galloped by,
The stench of putrid fear's lament
When populations bled to die.

Oh the stories they can tell
Of mountain peaks succumbed to fire,
Where ash removed the very sun
And panicked people fled the dire.
Oh the stories they can tell
Of black and white and good and bad
....But immaterial, perhaps, to trees
Who root in rock and seem so sad.


Marshalg
Taranaki dreamin'
26 May 2011
Marshal Gebbie Nov 2013
Stone of massive solidness, shards of gemlike flint
Crystalline refractions flash in noon day's sunshine glint,
Obelisk in grasses green, immense in grey repose
Has lain in place for centuries here, how long, nobody knows.
Created in the hellfire deep and ****** up from below
Molten in its’ infant form to flow with orange glow.
To work its’ way down mountain flank to plunge to cascade’s grasp
And tumble, grinding river stone, worn smooth in torrent’s clasp.
Rolling swift in flooded flow to beach by river’s edge
With grasses green against it’s’ girth in shade of leafy hedge.
Seasons come… cold rain and snow with baking heat in summer past
Millennia doth flow on by to leave untouched this boulder, vast.

Until this day I happened by, perchance beneath a clear blue sky
To rest my bones upon this rock, remove my boot and empty sock.
Admiring, in the midday sun, the snow clad peak and river run,
In wilderness of debris strewn from high volcano past it’s noon.
To notice with discerning gaze the rock, on which I sit, is glazed
With crystals of refracting fire to capture, now, my eye entire.
What secrets lie within this stone that lies so massively, alone?
What history has passed it by beneath its centuries of sky?
What stories could this boulder tell should I remove its silent spell?

Bemused, I tie my boot and yield,this obelisk to chosen field…..


Marshalg
On the timeless bank of Taranaki’s wild, wild Stoney River.
25 November 2013
Marshal Gebbie Jun 2020
Rain pelting,
Sky shredding the hills with grey.
Chickens invade the yard for pellets, sodden, accusing and noisy.
Tussock leans over heavy with raindrops and the grass lawn grows greener.
Yesterday the tussock performed in the stiff West gale, bowing in howling unison amid wet, moss boulders, a symphony of grass in thrashing tune with wild wind whipping.
Today it just hangs in wet exhaustion, dripping.
Puddles reflect the white light falling and the sparrows shelter and complain among themselves.
She, wants to go shopping at Manaia for particular biscuits for her ailing sister way up at Lake Rotoma...it's her day off, you see..so whatever she wants...and anyway, it's raining.

M.
Wet week in Taranaki
29 June 2020
Marshal Gebbie Nov 2010
Crashing surf on roiling sands
Bouldered with volcanic might,
Westward storms howl from the sea
Battered seagulls shriek in flight.

Pale dune grasses thrash to leeward
Scattered shafts of milky light,
Wild and storm caste portraiture
Of cruel sea's eternal might.

Searching eyes across this tumult
Reaching gaze amongst the foam,
Sodden gown to clinging body
Frantic eyes in cold waves roam.

Desperately she seeks the lover
Hauntingly she calls his name,
Writhing seas consume her words
Crashing surf dispels the blame.

Sad solitude in loneliness
Outstretched slender arms so frail,
Yearning for that tender kiss
And for his cold, dead features pale.

Rain soaked ******* lonely outcrop
Railing at a raging sea,
Lost within unfeeling vastness
Unobserved by all...but me.


Marshalg
On the wild & remote, black sand beaches of Taranaki
20 November 2010
Marshal Gebbie Sep 2011
Sweet Sister,

I feel the sanguine-ness of age upon me.
I feel I understand the things which confused me in youth.
I have a sage satisfaction in being pleased to have reached this juncture,
In being able to look out the window and see the beauty of a desolate beach of dunes with the course grasses snapping to windward.

There is immense pleasure in seeing my children find their place in life, maturing with the years and the travails of work, love and responsibility.
I miss old friends...but such is life.. we all move on.
Colour and texture and sound mean a lot to me, they are the patterns of pleasure which paint each day.
And the steady warmth of love for an enduring wife who is the shining light in, my otherwise, subdued and essentially, muddy existence.

One thing which does **** me off is the penchant of the Inland Revenue Dept’, to lean on developing young businesses to pay for the sloth and layabouts
Of our society who have no endeavour. This is a travesty of social justice and an unnecessary retardant to the progression and advancement of our struggling young nation.
I think the Chinese have the right answer here...You don’t work.. you starve.... You bend your back and produce... you prosper!

As I grow older the shades of gray diminish, things are more definite, more black and white.

My work in construction, is constant and demanding...and ****** enjoyable!
Like a cat, I seem to have fallen on my feet once again??

The pleasure of the written word is my pastime and interest, I rejoice in the creativity of my fellow writers and bask in the glow of their company.

The Eagle’s Nest at distant Taranaki is looking green and tidy, landscaping is progressing and the rhododendrons are about to burst into flower.

Life is pretty ****** good!

Love to you and yours
M

Marshal Gebbie
Storeman
Andrew M Bell Feb 2015
I do not remember my father as a demonstrative man,

but, hobbled though he was by a pre-war psyche,

we never doubted the depth of his affection for us.

His love of nature shaped our own perceptions of life

and his love of sport showed us the path of true competition,

that the essence is not to better others but to better oneself.

He transfused the ocean into us so thoroughly

that we will go to our graves with salt on our lips.


At all the painful pinnacles of growing

my father was there like a crampon you know will not fail you.

A towering lighthouse in his hat and dark suit

as he led me through the convent gate on my first day

and gently cut me adrift in the cruel seas of education

where the nuns patrolled the playground like killer whales

in search of seals.


He went ahead to each new town to make things ready for us

when I started boarding school he let me go in confidence

he bailed me out of scrapes with the law,

he was as certain as the mountain of his beloved Taranaki

and as solid as the beams of a whare runanga.


When I returned from overseas

my father and I found a space in our lives

where we could really get to know each other.

Through a winter that sparkled

he led me on odysseys into his soul

through the walkways, forests, rivers and coastline

of the city of his birth

which will, one day, witness his death.


If I were allowed only one memory of my father

it would be this: seaweed expeditions.

The northeast winds blew a bounty for his garden

onto the reefs around Belt Road

and at low tide we descended with our gumboots and sacks

to gather the fleshy harvest with its nitrogen-rich pods.

He had a system.

We heaped the seaweed on a number of high, dry rocks

then bagged from first to Iast to allow time for the seawater

to drain and the burden to be lessened.

I watched him as he moved around and about as deliberately

as a crab,

gathering the morsels,

bending to scoop the necklaces from the sea,

the sun's purple fire in the white, white, white of his hair.

He had seaweed in plenty at home,

it was the experience he craved.
Copyright Andrew M. Bell. The poet would like to acknowledge WA Ink (an anthology) in whose pages this poem first appeared.

For international readers, a "whare runanga" is a Maori meeting house.
Marshal Gebbie Jul 2013
The wood room door was opened wide
I closed it firm last night.
I woke at four and felt it's breath
It gave me quite a fright.
I felt it's chilly, gentle breath
Exhaling on my brow
And upright in my skinny bed
Roared "Get thee gone ghost,
******* now!"


With naked shanks I padded forth
To set and light the fire
Whilst outside in the wilderness
I could hear the specter's ire,
It moved about deliberately,
It stalked outside my room.
I warmed my *** by fires heat
And cursed to dispel doom.


That icy feeling permeates
It reaches to the bone,
It is far to early for a call
Yet there's the ringing phone,
I listen to the vacant hiss,
There's no one there of course
So I bellow forth obscenities
And hang up with a curse.


Old Basil told me of the time
He watched with open mouth
Whilst a faceless man in hounds tooth coat
Glided past him from the south.
The housemaids tell with fear filled eyes
Of depressions on the bed
Where something sat and rested there
Laid down it's weary head.
Except the house was empty then,
Unoccupied by guests.
No cat nor dog nor friendly hog,
Nobody playing jests.


Some nights I walk the corridors
To see what I can see
And I fancy Thomas Dawson's ghost
Is quietly watching me,
For he only shows his bearded face
At the darkest witching hour
And it's usually in the dead of night
To the echo's of the old clock tower
When the mountain looms above the lodge
Enshrouded in the mist,
And the morepork calls its haunting sound
And the snow is moonlight kissed.



Marshalg
Dawson Falls Lodge
TARANAKI,New Zealand.
18th August 2008
- From Watching the Ripples Radiate
Marshal Gebbie Mar 2020
Jottings from David Bagerow's "Quickie"

Shame on she, the selfless *****
Who caused your temperature to fire,
caressed your sandy, sweated brow
To rivers of desire,
Tho she fled at poignant time
To leave you in the lurch.
Best you weave your magic touch
And promise her, the church.
Then woo her and caress her
In your happy, carefree way
Then at that moment of exultance,
Laugh and run away.

David Lessar's "To an Unread Poet"

Dave, You are right ,of course, once committed you raise an expectation and once that expectation is released to the world you are obliged to maintain face...but that damnable thing called "Life" intervenes and totally stuffs up the programme. Take the current interlude of coronavirus...the whole world has been taken by the scruff of the neck and jammed, inconveniently and complaining, into seclusion, all systems ground to a halt, production lines vacated, malls and city centres deserted, blown newspaper cascading across the deserted pavement...a testament to mans ultimate frailty when his house of cards collapses, without a whimper.
So you see, as life intervenes...we are excused from maintaining face.
But fear not, like McArthur, we shall return.
Cheers mate M.

Fawn's "Happy Trails"

Were it not the touch profound
That doth caress my feathered ear
Would thou wish a thousandfold
That I should shed a tear?

A glistened tear suspended there
in iridescent light,
While you, my love, with parted lips
Await, the ruby night.

Victoria's "Wherefore Art Thou"

Strides, he does, through corridors of lust bound lessers,
through forests of small penised dwarfs, through canyons of would be's who could be.....just to countenance the promise within your words....Dear Vix!

Terry O'Leary's "Sweet Butterfly"

You enter the portals of entomology where bugs, flies,butterflies and moths are the true rulers of the planet.
A world vastly magnified by compound eyes, of lightening lifetimes and vivid, saturated colour. A world where life and death are synonomous with the culmination of a single ****** union and the reproduction of a batch of precious pearly eggs. Yea Brother thee hath entered the portal...rejoice!
M.

Fun with Terry O'Leary

"Buried in the Sand" by Terry O’Leary

A beggar clump adorns a dump, his pencil box in hand -
With sightless eyes upon the skies he’s lying there unmanned.

He’s fallen down in Shantytown, his knees too weak to stand,
With no relief and bitter grief too dark to understand.

The Bowery blight is hid from sight, it’s covered up and bland,
And Robin Hood and Brother Hood lie buried in the sand.

"A Rebuttal" by Marshalg

So Hood lied low, despite the show ensueing without help,
One would have thought a British sort would spring forth with a yelp!

Would spring ***** to help deflect contusions which occurred
When beggar Clump adorned the dump confusing all deferred.

Whilst sister Ant, attired in scant, ran forth on spindly legs
And brother Frog with shaggy dog said "****" and drank the dregs.

It all became too much, as such, a meelee did ensue,
So all called HALT and as one did BOLT...to the local for a brew!

Phew...that was FUN & hard work!
M.

Singing the Devil's Song*

There is no Makers formula
This life depends on chance,
The way you play your given cards
Depicts your daily dance.

Oh dogma flows in utterance
From pulpits far and wide
From those who claim to understand
Eternity's vast hide.
From those who hold damnation
As a weapon from on high,
From those who claim a judgement
As their finger points to sky.
The good, the bad are absolute,
The right bedevils wrong,
Redeemed shall live eternally
The bad shall singe for long.

Old men stand in pulpits
Across this Sunday's land
To threaten with damnation
If you should cross God's hand.
"Belief" is now their catchword
Abomination's wrong
Is to seek to proffer proof of claim
....to Sing the Devil's Song.

So gather all ye faithfull
Go listen to your man,
Sing the Gospel loud and long
And pay your tithe, as planned.
...But should you find you're dying
From cancer's frozen claw
And the the Godly fail to sweep you
To eternity's gold door?
Remember my clear message
Your life depends on chance,
You live within your own good sphere
....There is no Maker's Dance.

Marshalg
After an overdose of Pulpit hogwash.
10 March 2013

Singing the Song of Angels:
A Response to Marshal Gebbie's "Singing the Devil's Song"
By Luca Anselm
There’s a church in the city with pillars of stone
And windows like sea-glass, still and alone,
A fountain, and cloisters of ivy, away
From the noise of the street, and the hum of the day.
There my father would tell me of Christ, how he died
Surrounded by soldiers and thieves, crucified,
How he wept for the women, and fell in the sands,
And loved those who hammered the nails in his hands.  

Marshal, dear poet, you have heard the priests tell
Of a god who left heaven to walk into hell?
Of a god who wept softly for men he had known?
Of a god who dripped blood in a garden alone?
Of a god who sent men with book and with sword
With eyes bright as fire for love of their Lord,
With limbs dressed in black, on altars of stone
By windows of sea-glass, still and alone?

So they give up their lives for a lie, as we say,
And toiled for centuries, long as each day--
And our money built palaces, lofty and tall
With frescoes and candlesticks, gold on the wall--
They preach with words awful and deadly and free,
Of gorgons and hell-fire, worms and the sea,
Of the last day of judgment, and mankind amassed
By the wailing of angels and bright trumpet blasts…

But Marshal, they preach something sweeter and kind--
Of a mother’s soft love, of a father resigned,
Of a still, soft voice, that comes with a light,
And gives hope to the hopeless, and conquers the night.
Of charity, piety, sweetness and love
Like fiery ***-cakes, but soft as a dove,
Spicy as Christmas, solemn and grand--
(Like throne-rooms or magic or the roar of the strand)
Then you wake, and the house smells of peppermint-pine,
And a child is laid in the crèche, now a shrine.  

And all that I long for, dear Marshal, you see,
Are the gold-blooming gardens that soar by the sea,
The mountains and dragons, the prophets and kings
And Icarus falling with fire-fraught wings,
The grey-shifting sea-lanes, the flutter of sails,
Temples on mountaintops, graves in the vales,
And Dido who bleeds from her breast as she cries
For her Love, and stares helplessly into the skies.
But more than the shadows of worlds that might be
Of fairies or phantoms or rocks by the sea,
Dear Marshal, I long for who made me a man.
And would love and give glory as best as I can.

But these days oh! sad days, the loss and the shame
In which all of my loveliness falls into flame--
Where gardens have withered, and sails have been furled,
And kings plodded off in the dust of the world.
Our cities rise higher, and burn through the night
And rear into heaven with noise and with light,
The palisades echo with horns and sound
And the churches with voices and quarrels resound.
But the statues sit silent, and some say they cry
For the shame of the sins against children. Oh! My God, Why?

And those old men—well—they taught me the loveliest things
Of my gardens of gold, and the sunsets of things,
They told me of kindness, and honor, a way
That winds to the West, where the end of the day
Breaks bright like fresh bread, and crimson like wine,
And the sun sets to purple and green in the brine.

And still I remember their words and their songs
And the churches which taught me so well and so long--
Though I’ve turned my head, to the lands where the sun
Will rise again brighter when starlight is spun,
Somewhere fresher and pale, where the cold and the air
Spreads the dew like a lawn paved of crystal, and there,
In the meadows of silver, with light in my eyes,
I will honor my god in the dome of the skies.

Marshal Gebbie's poem "Singing the Devil's Song" inspired this. It's in anapestic tetrameter, for you metric buffs. If you haven't, you should absolutely check out Marshal's stuff--it's awesome and poetry-inspiring--seriously amazing. Thanks again, Marshal!

Sepia Sown

Sepia sown as best it can
Where you and I, as one, once ran
Across, beyond a savored sea
Where lust became reality.
Where spiraled lust, entwined, entrenched
Left you gasping, pale, en benched...
a figment of a thought, now lost
Forever..at what cost, what cost?
M.

Addenum to "obituary" by V

So no one notices, at all
When golden greys of aged fall?
Except perhaps, for those who stay
To blend with every ordinary day

Plus you and I as time flies by
And too, those starlings flocking high.
That old man loitering in street,
Who eyes the million passing feet.
And she too at corner store,
Toothless face and wrinkled maw,
Exchanging cigarettes for coin
(With surreptitious scratch of groin).
Mailman, fat, long, loop mustache
Complaining long and rather harsh,
That they, gone, without a word,
Should vanish into air...absurd!

Someone in their every day
Feels the absence in the way
Details don't fall into place
And warmth is absent from the face.
M.

The Kraken Arises

From blue tranquillity where turquoise waters wash white golden sand, where brilliant fish school in myriad colour and shape, where magnificent squadrons of sleek tarpon and barracuda dash in perfect formation, grazing schools of silver mackeral through diamond flecked deep green shallows, to plunge vertically down to the depths of the black abyss and security.

Calm tropical waters which shimmer like aqua blue glass in the mid day heat and turn to simmering,red fire at the setting of the enormous, ovate, orange sun.

Sea birds flock above wind blown waves, their sharp cries a symphony of the sea, to suddenly wheel and dive en mass, to dine amidst teeming schools of flashing, shiny minnows.

The idyllic picture of a calm blue infinity of ocean framed, in brilliant sunshine, by white sands and gracefully bowed coconut palms.....and suddenly, at the horizon, a thin black line appears, It approaches with steadily, mounting speed, the coastline surf recedes dramatically seaward leaving exposed coral, mountains of seaweed and frantic flapping, beached fish everywhere. A sudden, oppressive silence becomes a distant roar. The sea birds, as one, take panicked flight... and a massive wall of water rears up and rises like a giant beast, to rush headlong, raging, at the coastline.

What once was blue and serene is now a huge cascade of violent black death and destruction, gigantically it destroys the coast, snapping huge trees like twigs, surging ashore, a tsunami of unimaginable violence it obliterates, housing, streets, bridges, vehicles, shipping, aircraft and people, thousands of panicked, helpless, struggling people, killed in a titanic, black, swirling maelstrom of inexorable violence. The wave is followed by another...and another, extending right along the coastline and beyond. Each wave larger and more violent than the last...surging inland for miles  until defeated by the accident of gravity in rising land.

Those who have survived, on high land, on tall buildings, in treetops....cling to each other and look on in horror and utter helplessness. They can only wait, in fear, for the monster to retreat before venturing down to the devastation below to render help where ever they possibly can.

Twice in the space of the last forty thousand years the Kraken has awaken and risen from the depths of the Tasman Sea to the west of New Zealand. It has risen to gigantic proportions and driven right across the Auckland isthmus to the Pacific Ocean. It has twice flattened gigantic primeval Kauri forests laying them waste, all lying in one direction, each time beneath twenty feet of debris and black mud.

Born in innocence from a natural tectonic adjustment of the earth plates, the Kraken doth arise at any time, in any place to wreak it's dreadful work upon we, who reside in our comfortable, seemingly secure and beautiful coastal idylls.

Marshalg
Dedicated to all the coastal population exposed to the threat of inevitable tectonic induced tsunami.
JAPAN. WEST COAST, USA. WEST COAST, SOUTH AMERICA. ALL PACIFIC ISLANDS. NEW ZEALAND. INDONESIA. AUSTRALIA. SOUTH AFRICA. EAST COAST, CHINA. MALAYSIA.
KOREA. THAILAND. PAPUA NEW GUINEA, VIETNAM. PHILIPPINES. TAIWAN. BURMA.

Part of My Job (A love Poem) by Nat Lipstadt

A little embarrassed by all the attention but great to hear from you Sweetheart...all fine and dandy, here...except for being forbidden to go to the beach and the park..and anywhere else except in cases of dire need..(And on punishment of prison time if caught out!)...but hey, I'm not really complaining...All for he common good, aint that right?
M.

Bridges Burnt....

Bridges burnt in Winter rain
Holds a saddened felt refrain,
Holds a touch of muted horn
Blown in passion unadorned.
Blown away in errant winds
Where no truthlessness rescinds,
Where a lie begat the night
Interceding lost love's plight.

Bridges burnt in Winter rain
Sacraments of loss remain,
Sacraments fragmented drift
Redemption clad in bloodied shift,
Redemption worn as wrong slays right
Till wrongfulness blots out the night,
Till no return this path can be
Until they torch eternity.

M.
SE Reimer's words float before me in his impassioned poem "Bridges"
allowing me to wallow in this, my own dark tangential refrain.
M.

Perchance, in a Bus Shelter

Here I sit amidst the ruin of a white winters' day
Convulsive rain and harsh wind outside, contribute tumult.
And in here, in this small shelter, there is a tension in the air.

We two sit apart, uncommunicative, remote and quite detached.
Not for any reason other than the fact that we are strangers,
We have never met, nor are we ever likely to.
She has an elegance and a stylish angularity whilst I am bald, bearded, unfashionable and somewhat overweight.
She is singularly indifferent to my presence, whilst I am uncomfortable with the circumstance that placed us in this small proximity.
We would, in truth, rather both be elsewhere.

I break the ice in throwing her a small smile and complain about the weather,
Her eyes flick across my face and immediately resume their distant focus on the rain,
She adjusts her seating to face,ever so slightly, askance.
Her choice of course, to assume an air of indifference or superiority...or adopt a measure of defense..or perhaps a combination of a bit all three.  
Regardless... I wipe my backside in exactly the same manner as does she, I  am definitely no less a person for my dumpy demeanor and friendly overture
And I really feel that I don't have to share my space with coldness and impertinence,
Better, I think, to be wet and content with my own company
..So, donning my cap and jacket, I stride out into the deluge to leave the remote and uncommunicative young woman alone and dry with her thoughts.

And then....
Howling rain and shards of wind
Pelt me as I walk
Along the foreshore wild and white
As hovered seagulls squark.
When all at once she's by my side
Walking pace for pace,
Her linen suit a sodden mess
Hair plastered to her face.

"Thought I ought to make it right"
She told me with a smile
I threw my coat upon her back
And walked another mile.
We called into a coffee shop
And sat down by the fire
And sipped a steaming latte
As she told her story dire,

"The cancer's all but killed me
My husband's left the home,
The baby's gone to mother
And I'm facing death alone."
We quietly spoke for ages
I held her hand in mine
Then suddenly she stood to leave
And thanked me for my time.

I sat there in a stupor
Recalling how it played
And felt the guilt impact on me
For judgements I had made.
Those callow, shallow judgements
Made in ignorance, my friend,
Will haunt me as she girds herself
To boldly meet her end.

Marshalg
On a bleak and blustery cold winters day.
Titirangi
5th September 2010

The Old Café by Steve Yocum

It's my go to place,
has been for years,
The Wildwood Café,
an eclectic tiny place
with a mix of old dinette
tables and mismatched chairs.
the cutlery also unmatched
and well used, old photos
and signs adorn the walls
and there is usually a line
of people waiting patiently
on benches outside.

Best of all there is this pleasant
girl, always wearing a welcoming
smile, who seems to know us all.
She knows my order by heart,
Ham and eggs over medium,
a half ration of potatoes, home baked
slice of bread, well toasted, well buttered,
home made salsa on the side, a cup of
"hot" Black English Tea. Tall water no ice.

If I arrive between the busy times, she may
sit down at my table and we talk a while,
It's not a big thing, just chitchat, I'm old
enough to be her grandfather, it's the
dessert before my meal served with genuine
friendliness and unforced civility, not often
encountered in these strange days and times, it's a slice of small town America at it's purest best, she and folks like her help sustain my belief that basic human decency is far from dead.

The food is always good, but it's the comforting embrace of familiarity and
simple warm kindness that assures my frequent return.
It's the little things in life that make living
wonderful, small moments in time felt and
recorded, this is but one of those.
written by Steve Yocum

It's the little things in life that make living
wonderful, small moments in time felt and
recorded, this is but one of those

Marshal Gebbie
  That old world touch suits you Stevo,
When I come visit your beautiful state of Oregon, We shall partake this delightful repast in the company of your fair maid.... and we shall tip her well!
M.

Scoot the Streak
One must believe in something be he misanthrope or gambler
In tomorrows omniscience or the future proof of God
The penance in a drunk's decay sets self destruct's imposer
Wether speaker phone's on disconnect or cellphone's in the bog.

Conveyance of a threat to adherents of St Selfwise
Show atheist's are proof here, in belief of disbelief,
Haunted by the images painting painful retribution
Picture sympathetic **** star's allocated hand relief.

A moments allocation of a syllogist abstraction
Shows perspective of the caliber we now reserve for Saints
A paradox regarded as autistic fascination
In a one act play of living disregarding all restraints.

Deliberately indicative of fraternal heat's expression
Notebook at the ready and deep frowning at the brow,
Question definition's collage of confusion's contribution
Do we sit it out pretending or just catch the late bus now?

Marshalg
13 February 2014
© 2014 Marshal Gebbie
Marshal Gebbie
Written by

victoria  Intriguing work...so I search the comments for help... Ah
0
Feb 2014
Terry O'Leary  Marshal, I kinda like this (I read it several times since yesterday)... but I'm still not sure what it says... maybe I'll down a shot tonight and try again... ;-)) Terry
0

3 replies

Feb 2014
Marshal Gebbie
Marshal Gebbie   A confession Terrance.. I was half cut when I wrote it!
I have no idea what it means.
Feb 2014
Terry O'Leary   :-)) Great... I'll be back in a bit... T
Feb 2014
Terry O'Leary   Well, in the meantime I've had a few shots... now I think I know what it means... hic°°.... hope I remember in the morning... ;-)) Terry
Feb 2014

Pradip Chattopadhyay
Residues
By the night one long dark road
the houses are deep in slumber.

Lucky I'm alive and awake,
can see the stars
in their vast magnitude of silence
gentle and not drunk
have love to count upon
filled with a will to live
feeling I'm almost done.

Having a life is a great reward
and with the residues
gets more valuable.

I won't cry over the lost years
would rather think
have been blessed with enough.

The stars grow blurry dots
as I slip into dreams.

I had a once upon place
and I'm grateful.

With dewy eyes
I hurry to the warmest space
beside her.

You slip into your years well, Pradip.
Your woman must relish your peace, your contentment.
Cheers mate
M.


Tony Grannell
Autumn's Sonneteer
Behold, upon yon ivy bunch, my darling blackbird sings;
I know not why nor shall I try to understand such things.
For born this morning on a song, pray hark, her sweet refrain;
to chance a sigh, oh, dare not I, for this is God's domain.

Out of the night the art of song in tuning in the day;
unknowed afore or evermore such music on display.
'Tis love begad, a lover's song, a diva, I declare,
in soaring o'er both vale and moor, this morning's love affair.

In wonder's charm, this precious bird in song to comfort me.
Alone I stroll, no proffered soul to share my company.
Yet rare this morn, in splendours all, true love like none afore;
let passions roll, in song extol, in verse the morn's rapport.

Be succour in such music found for autumn ails me so,
when summer's run, the harvest done, to rest my scythe and ***.
Of idle lands and nowt ado, to wait without employ.
Yet, hail the sun, my kingdom won, when sings that bird of joy.

Behold her charm and charmed, I am while autumn leaves still fall.
'Tis life anew, a sweeter brew when hear the songstress call.
Though winter’s nigh, with strength and will, we’ll bear our pain and fear;
'tis all to do, good hearts and true, sings autumn's sonneteer.

Written by
Tony Grannell  62/M/Spain

Marshal Gebbie  I stood out at the rock wall and gazed at the splendour of Autumn in Taranaki, as I read, aloud, your sonnet.
...and my heart sang.
M.

Dr Peter Lim
When?
When is the when
of when?  
rampant still is the ravage
which will not relent-

the claustrophobic shut-in
hearts toward gloomy moods they bend
no happy voices of kids heard outdoors
the green fields do not comfort lend-

the downcast look, the sinking feeling
are the joys and delights of yesterday years all spent?
the spectre of pain brings bitterest tears
in the faces of every continent-

oh, when is the when
of when?
such a wash-down
we could never comprehend.

Marshal Gebbie:  But isn't that the way, Dr Pete? Mankind builds his castles in the air, thrusts out his chest and proclaims himself, King of all!
...to be decimated, in an instant, by a microbe of infinitesimal stature. Oh! the fragility of it all.
Life cometh, life goeth....but somewhere, down the track, life shall come again.
M.


Al Drood
The Merman of Orford Ness

So long ago in King Hal’s time, our nets we cast upon the wave;
and drawing in did stand a-feared at what we’d caught in Orford Bay.

Entangled ‘midst our dripping catch, with eyes that stared all hellish green,
enscaléd like some creature deep, a Merman writhed as one obscene.

All webbéd were his hands and feet, his body dripped with ocean bile;
upon his head the ****-wrack grew, green-bearded was this demon vile.

Fast to the shore with awful haste we sped before the wind and tide;
Lord Glanville for to summon forth, the Merman’s fate all to decide.

Upon the quay his Lordship stood with men at arms and shriven priest,
and all did cross themselves in fear before this strange unholy beast.

“Enchain it,” cried Lord Glanville loud, “then to God’s Kirk with all good speed!”
The shriven priest prayed long and hard as to the church we did proceed.

With Holy Water, cross of gold, with candle and with testament,
the priest then exorcised the beast, who knew not what was done nor meant.

To all’s dismay he would not bow before the Host on bended knee;
and so to dungeon was he dragged to dwell upon his blasphemy!

The silent Merman beaten was, and hung in chains in for seven weeks,
and fed was he on fish and shells, yet never did he sleep nor speak.

And so at length his Lordship said, “Across the harbour tie a net,
and we shall see how he shall swim, but by his ankles chainéd, yet!”

The net a-fixed, the village folk came down to see the Merman’s plight;
into the sea they threw him then, with foam and wavelet flashing white.

He vanished ‘neath the waters like some seabird in pursuit of prey,
then surfaced laughing, chain in hand, and to his Lordship he did say;

“You thought to make me such as you, who walk in blindness o’er the land!
You’d punish me for difference!  You thought to treat me like a Man!”

So long ago in King Hal’s time our nets we cast upon the wave;
and drawing in did stand a-feared at what we’d caught in Orford Bay.
Al Drood
Written by
Al Drood  M/North Yorkshire

Marshal Gebbie:  Tones here of the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner.
An original work in time honoured rhyme and metre.
I devoured every syllable..Bravo!
M.

G Alan Johnson
Kafka's Bug

When I shed the last skin
last year
there was left a hardened shell
protecting a patched up heart
and a petrified husk
of a soul.

You can throw your bombs
if you wish
and they will hurt inside
but I will just eat them
and **** them out
flushed and forgotten.

Sometimes my antennae
come out in a social setting
and people look at me
with an odd expression
or look off into space
a kind of awkward acceptance,
(the ones that know me).

My mandibles will at times
spit out a divine stupidity
a slacker kind of opinion
and no amount of saliva
can dissolve it
so it sits in the heavy air
stinking like a butterfly corpse.

It was an attempt
at transformation
that failed
(I'm too weak with ego),
and I'm glad that I tried
otherwise I would always wonder.

Vincent Price in a cheap suit
and a lost puppy daydream
a world full of flies, wasps and failed caterpillars
patient spiders and polished leeches...
and all I can do is write.
Written by
G Alan Johnson  65/M/USA

Response by Marshal Gebbie

Pelting rain adheres to soil
As spiders sprint and earthworms roil,
World in turmoil stinkbugs, stink
And Satan beetles disgorge ink
But thee, my budding, sodden flea,
Hath entertained quiescent....me.
M.

Nat Lipstadt
Pandemic Poems: Unclaimed bodies, There’s ain’t no anonymity in heaven.

There are more poems inside me, but I intuit it is longer fair to impose on you by sharing more.  The deep seeded infection of my spirit waxes and wanes, and there is no antidote, and unlike the virus itself, there never will be, a future cure, an inexpensive replacement cost for the spirit spent, the time and futures spirited away.

Perhaps you recall I was one mile away from Ground Zero on September 11th.  Rarely do I walk there.

The coronavirus poetry inserts itself unaided, never asking permission, a like minded, but a contra-cousin to the coronavirus.

I live in New York City, the epicenter where now, close to 800 die daily.

Normally, about 25 bodies a week are interred on Hart island, mostly for people whose families can't afford a funeral, or who go unclaimed by relatives.  In recent days, though, burial operations have increased from one day a week to five days a week, with around 24 burials each day.^^

Each dies with no last words, no Kaddish recited, Last Rites, too late, no Ṣalāt al-Janāzah or Om Namo Narayanaya.  Each one, a numbered pine coffin, and each one will have at the very least, a poem of their own, so help me god.

Buried side by side in large trench, room plenty for new arrivals,
I hear the banging, protesting, resisting, this is not the way, I was promised, my ears left pounding!  Hillel, the great scholar in this dream, reminds that “the time is short, and the work is great.”          

He paraphrases, though, “the bodies many, the poems too few.”

There ain’t no anonymity in heaven, but I’ll reconfirm that with you later.

Written by
Nat Lipstadt

Marshal Gebbie
God! It's harrowing to feel the raw spirit in a New York City man's soul.

You speak for the dead, the ailing and the fearful.

You speak for beggar in the street, the broker, quaking in his plenty, imprisoned on the 14th floor.

You speak for the cop, in face mask, on 24th and Vine, doing, as always what he must, with authority.

And you speak for the White Clad Angels who carry the dead to Hart Island and who forgive you, your fear and safer seclusion.

You speak also for we, who watch and sorrow from afar your agony, in our own fear and seclusion.
M.

Nat Lipstadt
raw is the word, oft need to lie down midday to escape the the viral infection of every outlet we use to pass these days. don’t know when i’ll go outside again, because the virus kills and wounds in horrible ways... thank u MG for the kind appreciation natty

Sally A Bayan
Conduits
In distance and in proximity...in despair
and joy...in existing and in dying...in the
bliss of love reciprocated, and in the pain
of love unrequitted...verses dance and call,
awaiting......

poetry has its own pulse, its own heartbeat,
it calls, taps the shoulders any moment,
awake, or adrift, it just can't be ignored...
even in a tangled, or weird circumstance,
it sparks like a bulb or a comet, curving
in a rainbow...riotous some days, teasing, fleeing,
then, turning up at unexpected times and places.

in every bit and breath of life, in every seed,
in every drop of dew, in every ember burning,
there is poetry birthing, growing...

deep within us flows green, purple, red,
glum gray, darkened inspirations...fleeting,
but, when time is ripe, they linger long,
giving us time to capture them all
.............................................
we sense them...we give space
we speak them, or we write them,
:::::::we are conduits:::::::


Sally

©Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
February 11, 2020

Marshal Gebbie

  A touch, so light,
So sensitively slight
As to be caress,
In dead of night


Don Bouchard
And then
We become old men
And old women, and

We look back wistfully, and
We look forward hopefully, and

We wonder....


Written by
Don Bouchard  60/M/Minnesota

Marshal Gebbie
  Slipped betwixt the then and now
Methinks, with finger on the brow,
Thee needs a shot of earthy ***
And a wanton ****, to rub your tum.
Thee needs a cheery pick me up,
Some hairy mates to help you sup
Elixir from the joy of life
To salve tomorrows' threat of strife.
Cheers mate M.
0
Tommy Randell
From a young man's parlance, tripping from an old man's tongue; Right On, brother, Right On!
Marshal Gebbie Jan 2013
Worry taxing vindication
Deep lines score a harried brow,
Hooded eyes reveal the torment
Green of bile consuming now.

Years compile the load endureth
Weighted soul with quilted guilt,
Bowed is back and shoulder bendeth
Round and bound imbued as built.

So laboured by the leaden deeds
Weighted by the tomes of greed,
Cloistered with the avarice
Of omnipresent want and need.

Oh to see a mote of sunshine
Beam between the felted cloud,
Oh to feel the right of light
Emerge unhindered from the shroud.

God! To witness ordinary
Moments from this sea of pain…
To capture the exquisite joy
Of freely given mirth again ?


Marshalg
‘Foxglove’, Taranaki
31st December 2012
Marshal Gebbie Apr 2012
Tiny things that strike your fancy
Any verse which hits a note,
Messages from all and sundry
Extracts from your favourite quote.
Moments from a treasured movie
Recollections from the past,
Sunday roast from Grandma’s oven
Sights and sounds and smells that last.

Memories of moonlight saunter
Arm in arm with newfound love,
Barefoot where the sand meets water
Lost to all... but stars above.
Walking in the hills at daybreak
Crispness of the frosty verge,
Feel the pounding pulse of living
Feel the joy of being... surge.

Tomatoes from the garden plot
Rich and biting, acid red,
Delicious on hot buttered toast
With liberal salt and pepper, spread.
Gazing at your baby daughter
Softly pink in muscled arm,
Wondering what future holds
For her in love and wealth and harm.

See the grasses thrash to windward
Hear the pounding surf cascade,
Lines of gulls in steady hover
Thunder breaks at lightning fade.
Old friend’s letter, unexpected
Tells of hardship over time,
Loss and sadness unconnected
To good fortune, found in mine.

Tremor in her frail, white fingers
Dancing of her rheumy eyes,
Sharing yesterday’s good tales
To bring a joy to aged disguise.
Lavender in gentle velvet
Serves the honey bee her gold,
Nodding in the balmy breezes
Reminiscent perfume, old.

Cup of tea for all the Aunties
Dear old Fred has passed away,
Sadness... but we all agree
He made the most of every day.
Sun ball on the far horizon
Melting orange, richly gold,
Sinking to the seascape, gone
To let the moonlit night take hold.

Marshalg
Sitting on the Taranaki sand with my love, with nibbles and a glass of wine
Watching the enormous, Autumn sun melt into a flat, flat sea.
April 2012

© 2012 Marshal Gebbie
Marshal Gebbie Jun 2013
Splendour surrounds with exquisit-ness found
In the coo of a dove and the worm in the ground,
With the look in your eye when you smile at my face
The lift of the brow as penny drops into place.
Exquisit-ness found in the phrases you write
And the softness of shadows when day turns to night,
The touch of your fingertips touching my brow
The wonder engaged when you show me how.
The love of the feeling of being alive
And the buzz of the bee at it's honey filled hive,
The taste of tomato, acidic with bite
And the roar of the laughter when joke telling's right.
The scent of the lavender, colours of rose
And the joy of the tones in a violin's prose,
Pink cheeks in the frostiness, dancing blue eyes
And the look on your face when I spring a surprise.
Hot bacon for breakfast with two poached eggs
And I've swallowed my coffee right down to the dregs.
Such splendour surrounds on this beautiful day
I'm at the top of the world in a wonderful way.

Marshalg
Taranaki bound in an hour or two
27/6/13
Marshal Gebbie Feb 2016
A curling green tendril climbs from its’ birthing nest of rotting bird ****
The creeper wends its’ way up round and around the stalk of its’ slender tree host. Leading vigorously ever upward, it climbs toward the light of day. Upon bursting through to the sunshine, it explodes into a huge and suffocating dominance. Wrapping its’ leaders tightly together, writhing skyward, smothering all else. Blotting out the sun. Inhibiting its’ host tree, ultimately killing it ...and every other living plant located below it.

In late summer the creeper produces bunched, masses of frothy, green, seeded florets. Clouds of green plumed waxeyes flock en mass, to flutter, competing ravenously to feast on the banks of seed heads.
Once replete, with full crops, the tiny birds fly off to distant shaded woods there to indiscriminately drop their ****, unknowingly further spreading the insidious creeper pestilence.

I trudge through my wooded glades,
Indignantly I sever taproot after taproot with my trusty sharp blade
….and watch that creeper limply sag and die
With a glint of satisfaction in my grim and vengeful eye.

M.
6 February 2016
Foxglove farm, Taranaki, NZ
Marshal Gebbie Aug 2012
A sadness has come over me
As I pass this corner bye,
A junction on the highway,
A lonely cobalt sky.
A sodden pale blue teddy bear
Stands pinioned to a cross
And the glassy glint in Teddy’s eyes
Transfix a sense of loss.

The traffic whizzes past this point
Most people fail to see
The sadness manifested
In his glassy stare at me.
The sadness of a lost young soul
Who failed to take the bend,
Who with his motor cycle crash
Did meet his Maker’s end.

I know not why he died so young,
I know not why he sped.
But know I do, the child like love
He felt for his blue Ted.
The sadness of a pale blue Ted
When pinioned to a cross
Stands sodden on a lonely road
Invoking tears of loss.

Marshalg
At Blue Ted Corner
Highway 20
Taranaki
14 August 2012
Marshal Gebbie Apr 2014
Thunder's Rolling drum
Across the churning heavens,
Lightning’s mighty discharges
Flash across the waves,
Illuminating torment
Of a momentary vision
In portraiture of Hades,
A kaleidoscope of craze.

Hard rain horizontal
In howling gale of deluge
Revealed momentarily
In silver sheets of rain,
Writhing tongues of lightning
In jagged forks a-searching,
An instantaneous funeral
Through a million volts of pain.

Standing at the cliff edge
In the drenching after midnight
Fearful pulses racing
In the violence of the storm,
Spectator to the vastness
Of Devil’s work unleashed here
Spectator to a fearsome sky
Where the Gods of Wrath were born.*

Marshalg
Witnessing the most spectacular, violent lightning and thunderstorm immediately adjacent to my hilltop front door in Taranaki @ midnight..
11 April 2014
Marshal Gebbie Jun 2015
An ode to hospitality and the magnificence
of New Zealand’s majestic South Island.*


Pale Granite massif plummets down from snowline to Kaikoura coast
Where white waves seeth in ocean rage atop the green of dark abyss,
Below subducts Pacific plate to buckle mountain mantle’s boast
Titanic forces ****** beneath the wheeling flock of sea-tern’s hiss.

Cold winds blow from seaward swell of glaciation far to south
Where blue whales hunt the clouds of krill and ply this ocean’s constant roar
Through icy currents rich and deep resourced from white Antarctic mouth
Whence icebergs blue shall calve and drift, where seeking albatross do soar.

Frosty on this Winter morn, green rolling hills caress my eye
Deep shadows creasing valley clefts, round sunlit pastures highlit, mound.
From coastal dune transitioning to snowy mountain crags on high
The splendour of it all, my friend, entrancing me in sense-surround.

Blown red tussock streams to windward, ripples in concentric waves
Ripples in the mountain’s flank surmounting to the alpine pass.
Bastion of high country shepherd, striding forth with dog he braves,
The loneliness of isolate in isolation’s clawing grasp.

Tempest in the black beech forest thrashing leafage falls like rain
Rain in sheets cascades from clifftops, waterfalls in grand parade.
Hellish clouds embrace the fiords in hellish lightening flash refrain
Fiordland in majestic style in vaulting might of storm’s charade.

Grey light in the estuary, reflections in still water stand
Of fishing boats at wharfage in a timeless moment’s instant gaze,
Riverton in midday mode as fisherman’s coarse calloused hand
Prepares to launch beyond the spit to brave the sea, to snare the crays.

Comfort in a welcome smile, welcome in a warming fire
Luxury in the steaming sting of shower water piping hot.
Blue cod baked so perfectly with pinot noir to my desire
The sanctuary of “Land’s End”, quaintly, the very best New Zealand’s got.

Marshalg
“Foxglove”, Taranaki
25 June 2015

*“Land’s End”… An exquisite find, a very English bed and breakfast hotel located, remotely, at the very tip of southern lands end at Bluff.
A delightful discovery to complement, perfectly, the utter charm and grandeur of New Zealand’s wonderland....
The magnificent South Island.

M.
Marshal Gebbie Apr 2022
This crystal Autumn morn, where the dew sparkles on the fresh cut lawn, where the stillness of the cold air lends an absolute clarity to the
alpine vista before me.

The old Kaitake volcano with its vaulting flanks of Kamihe forest with outcrops of massive Rimu and Miro, Tawa and giant, towering Mamaku tree fern. Deep dark ravines tumbling down to fast flowing, clear water streams and moss covered, black boulder waterfalls.

Everywhere the sound of the Dawn Chorus, birds of every description voicing their celebration at the start of the new day.
The honk of the Paradise duck marking his turf in the cattle paddock, Two magpies perched on the very top fronds of a giant tree fern, warbling their unique song to be answered by another pair off in the undulation of the crisp green hills in the middle distance.
Tiny wrens and fantails flit amid the branches uttering their contribution to the swelling music of the morning.

The rapture of the song in the crystal silence and the golden light of the dawning sun throwing the  profile of the mountain ridges and the forest into a glory of deep dark shade and glowing gold contrast.

This moment, this magic moment swells my heart with joy.
The wondrous beauty before me holds the innocence of the key to my utter happiness.....I throw back my balding old head and roar with laughter with the complete  joy of it all.

M.
Foxglove@Taranaki, NZ
8th April 2022
Marshal Gebbie Dec 2016
Sarah and Solomon married at Foxglove in verdant Taranaki…a magical time for everybody at that beautiful, beautiful occasion.

Dear old Grandpa Verne Bell passed from this mortal coil and went on to the next with his typical strong eyed fortitude and open curiosity.

Major earthquake shatters the top of the South island and is felt with trepidation from one end of the country to the other.

Trump hauls votes from the impossible and manufactures an improbable US Presidency…. Much to the embarrassment, alarm and discomfort of the majority of the thinking American population.

Oceans continue to rise and atmospheric temperatures climb…..and nobody really cares enough to try to do anything much about it.

Russia and China flex their military muscle and snub their sabre rattling noses at the West.

Interest rates and the price of gas started to escalate upward again.

Friends and relatives have been rocked by ill health, hardship and misfortune.

Key calls “Enough” and passes the Prime Ministerial gauntlet to a (thankfully), very capable Bill English.

Janet and Marshal both reach out and find new jobs, fresh horizons & new avenues to explore.

Syria slides into chaos and anarchy with absolutely no regard for it’s ordinary, civilian population languishing in the dreadful ruins of East Aleppo.

The Hectors dolphin numbers dwindle to 87 living animals, surviving  globally.



But….We, friends, live in a peaceful oasis…forgotten at the very end of the earth.

We live in a land of plenty and opportunity, a land of rare green beauty where individuality is prized and freedom valued.



May we pause for a moment this Christmas…and appreciate just how ****** fortunate we all actually are?



MERRY CHRISTMAS FRIENDS

M.
Hamilton, New Zealand
20 December 2016
Marshal Gebbie Mar 2017
Anticipation hovers in the gentle light of dawn
With birdsong chorused to night
Where satin striates to prismatic effect
Radiating gold sunbeams alight.
A mirrored reflection from lake front to reed
Through tumbled refraction to trees
And cattle in pasture are lowing with joy
As green clover extends to the knees.
Autumn erupts with her jubilant song
And the colours turn russet and gold
As she flings her skirt with seductive allure
Letting feeling, now reeling, take hold.
Alive and wondrous, skip we two lovers,
In laneways of tangerine leaves
And the magic of moment overflows in a foment
Of happiness flung to the breeze.

M.
Glorious moments of Autumn in the downs of Taranaki, New Zealand.
2 March 2017

— The End —