"voyages" poems
J’ai regardé devant moi
Dans la foule je t’ai vue
Parmi les blés je t’ai vue
Sous un arbre je t’ai vue
Au bout de tous mes voyages
Au fond de tous mes tourments
Au tournant de tous les rires
Sortant de l’eau et du feu
L’été l’hiver je t’ai vue
Dans ma maison je t’ai vue
Entre mes bras je t’ai vue
Dans mes rêves je t’ai vue
Je ne te quitterai plus.
In English :
I looked in front of me
In the crowd I saw you
Among the wheat I saw you
Beneath a tree I saw you
At the end of my journeys
In the depths of my torment
At the corner of every smile
Emerging from water and fire
Summer and winter I saw you
All through my house I saw you
In my arms I saw you
In my dreams I saw you
I will never leave you.
Oct 12, 2015
Oct 12, 2015 at 6:23 PM UTC
A Saturday, slow and sleepy
Unfolds like old attic linens
And drifts along
Like pipe smoke through the reeds
On a Saturday, bleak and weary
We just can’t get our act together
With hollow talk of book nooks
High seas back road voyages
And pints of Casey’s best bitter
On a Saturday, slow and sleepy
Taking action is hard to do
So slip into a daydream
And meet me out on the fringes
Where the sun and the moon fade from sight
And time is no longer real
Sep 18, 2014
Sep 18, 2014 at 12:35 AM UTC
Moored to the same ring:
The hour, the darkness and I,
Our compasses hooded like falcons.
Now the memory of you comes aching in
With a wash of broken bits which never left port
In which once we planned voyages,
They come knocking like hearts asking:
What departures on this tide?
Breath of land, warm breath,
You tighten the cold around the navel,
Though all shores but the first have been foreign,
And the first was not home until left behind.
Our choice is ours but we have not made it,
Containing as it does, our destination
Circled with loss as with coral, and
A destination only until attained.
I have left you my hope to remember me by,
Though now there is little resemblance.
At this moment I could believe in no change,
The mast perpetually
Vacillating between the same constellations,
The night never withdrawing its dark virtue
>From the harbor shaped as a heart,
The sea pulsing as a heart,
The sky vaulted as a heart,
Where I know the light will shatter like a cry
Above a discovery:
"Emptiness.
Emptiness! Look!"
Look. This is the morning.
8.4k
You brave heroic minds,
Worthy your country's name,
That honour still pursue,
Go, and subdue,
Whilst loit'ring hinds
Lurke here at home with shame.
Britons, you stay too long,
Quickly aboard bestow you;
And with a merry gale
Swell your stretched sail,
With vows as strong
As the winds that blow you.
Your course securely steer,
West and by South forth keep;
Rocks, lee-shores, nor shoals,
When Eolus scowls,
You need nor fear,
So absolute the deep.
And cheerfully at sea,
Success you still entice
To get the pearl and gold;
And ours to hold
Virginia,
Earth's only Paradise.
Where Nature hath in store
Fowl, venison, and fish;
And the fruitfull'st soil,
Without your toil,
Three harvests more,
All greater than your wish.
And the ambitious vine
Crowns with his purple mass
The cedar reaching high
To kiss the sky,
The cypress, pine,
And useful sassafras.
To whom the golden age
Still Nature's laws doth give,
No other cares attend
But them to defend
From winter's rage,
That long there doth not live.
When as the luscious smell
Of that delicious land,
Above the sea that flows,
The clear wind throws,
Your hearts to swell,
Approaching the dear strand.
In kenning of the shore,
(Thanks to God first given)
O you, the happiest men,
Be frolic then!
Let canons roar,
Frighting the wide heaven!
And in regions far
Such heroes bring ye forth
As those from whom we came,
And plant our name
Under that star
Not known unto our North.
And as there plenty grows
Of laurel everywhere,
Apollo's sacred tree,
You may it see
A poet's brows
To crown, that may sing there.
Thy voyages attend
Industrious Hakluit,
Whose reading shall inflame
Men to seek fame,
And much commend
To after-times thy wit.
8k
So I may have to give you up.
I will give you up
Unless you tell me how you want to be with me.
If lovers need not be together to love each other then Together transformed into truth and luck
And I would give you up
Perhaps say, do not ever take him away.
My love, I want to say (Can I say) don't roam so far away from me
A moment without you is a year to drag aching shoulders with long fingernails
A sleepy guest unwelcomed after midnight, that is your goodbye.
Because, you are part of the forgotten voyages made of strawberry seas and orange trees
But I have to give you up like how trees give freely our breathing.
What was given, returns and arrives in your speak drifting, steps gliding, search farwinding, slow stroll, such is your gaze.
The way you have lingered is mine, how you looked at me is also mine.
Tears you gave me are diamonds that fell lost deep under the earth nobody else knows where to find.
Time for you to seek a love like mine, the seeking of an adventure.
An old fashioned romance historian love
Rivalling of an old century over the millenium.
Only you (in this moment) know my contribution to this world that which is only you.
May 9, 2018
May 9, 2018 at 11:14 PM UTC
.
'*pon your voyages through my mind
mingling with memories cruel and kind,
amongst the shattered dreams that do lay
'neath darkened clouds so distant away.
Amidst the chaos of random thoughts
strands of discord forged and sought,
chasing nightmares you must flee
the ugliness deep inside of me.
Be you close or be you far,
Please think of Me,
wherever you are.*
© Pagan Paul (20/03/18)
Mar 20, 2018
Mar 20, 2018 at 4:57 PM UTC
*Our many voyages
of desert and sea
the harshness observed..
smooth cushioned water
becomes raging storm..
a splitting violence
this external turbulence
kindles jolts of anger
then fear and supplication..
finally the Question..
tumult and danger
seem forceful prompts
suggesting surrender to
veils of indifference..
yet some find now
new possibility arising
to trace one's journey:
jagged roaring storm
stimulates and brightens
fading light within..
in these extremes
depths awaken heights
new sisterhood appears..
in one's journey log
a backward look
records hidden leaps
of courage and faith..
real awareness
of one's precarious
life String...*
Feb 23, 2013
Feb 23, 2013 at 8:08 PM UTC
*that’s that area
the right distance
from the host star
where life is possible
and water will not disappear
or be locked in
and there’s a planet
and it’s just right for life*
Goldilocks wandered
into the cottage
and she found
the first bowl too hot
another too cold
and - yum! – one just right
Goldilocks wandered
into the living room
and she found
the first chair too big
another still a little not right
and - oh so comfy! – one just right
Goldilocks wandered
into the rooms
and she found
the first bed too hard
another too worn out
and - zzzzzz! – one just right
*Ah, lovely Goldilocks
Itinerant Goldilocks -
see we’ve sent you now
on inter-stellar voyages
and you’re now in the just right zones
You’ve gone places, Goldilocks;
You’ve gone the distance -
the little girl who’s made it to the stars*
Jul 2, 2013
Jul 2, 2013 at 8:21 AM UTC
(This poem was discovered etched/burnt into the interior woodwork of a viking ship of around 800AD, discovered in the north of England in the '60s. Quite possibly from the northernmost islands around the area now referred to as Archangel, and originally written in what became known as Runic/Russo Scandinavian, it nevertheless resonates clear Saxon/German tonality. Given that it is one of the first examples of early Runic, and indeed that the actual letter-shapes are unclear, the poem has been reproduced below, using broad phonetic license.
As far as can be determined, the content appears to be a somewhat ribald message from the ships leader to his wife. It was not uncommon for women/wives to accompany their men folk on long voyages. Given cramped conditions aboard, the conditions were likely to be insanitary and it is this condition that informs the subject). WJL
Das andrs zu-almen su-cara
Archezum des hafta confagra
Der ecra zu alpe
En pecra nachte schalpe
Viel ondra der zulpa te bag-ra
Und zortem pur ordour cloabera
Eh-min-te ah solbra schactarar
Sul-phereth zum tinctum
Abroath ah den penk-tum
Bai anthe con anthe ebactah-ra
Zorbuhr genkst canke zer vilk-um
Solginster zep ecra der nep-ehlcome
Calmen-de ser paarte
Eh zin bah die faarte
Confide ah can-de zum schtinc-tulm
Nov 5, 2012
Nov 5, 2012 at 5:23 AM UTC
tattoo ourselves in electric ink memorializing calendars,
diaries of observantional digits, black on white, no gray,
birthdays, anniversaries, dates of passing, starting lines,
occasional achievements, departure dates, even glaring failures,
sundial mundane records of diurnal habitude…even
defining self by, bye, byte marks upon flesh, upon our calendar
*not my first trip-tracking, he ruefully rues, wry smiling,
many voyages of indeterminate measuring length,
leaving litter of arrays of hopeful estimations & destinations,
each unequal, any or all possibilities, each day notated,
without critique or commentary, the numbers are the
gaols (jails) of goals, target, indeterminate determination,
terrific, horrific, introspections, inverse images resolve, resolute*
a year ago, +/- a few days,, new travelogue commenced,
notated but not annotated, just numerical truths,
(sans comments for the divine nature of numbers don’t lie)
and today my calculator app informs, that I am now
19.4 % lesser, but that clarifies less than expected
naturally this provokes a natty,
spirited, self-inquiry, lessened,
lessor, for better or for worse?
have the physical alterations
accompanying this reduction
mean exactly what,
if, it should be, a greater lesser?
here is the hard part.
your have always been a mirror~poet,
laughing, bemoaning the unvarnished, unshaven
AM sightings of a human perpetual dissatisfied,
the external never denying the interior “less~than,”
a J Peterman catalogue of weathered ****** expressions,
counter-parted by multiple Venn diagram intersections,
of experiential labeled bits & pieces of emotional empirical
less than good, not even close to perfect, so now that I am
*gaunt, spare, lean, grayed, narrower, again ruefully rue,
the even more visible truth reflection eye~hidden:*
I,
am the sum of the weight of my history, my deeds,
my disbeliefs, murderous deeds, weak choices
and that hasn’t changed nary an ounce, no matter
many times examined, indeed I am forever a lesser man,
there, internal infernal
too…
Apr 9, 2023
Apr 9, 2023 at 2:12 PM UTC
one foot in every world
one foot in every word
prophetess of yore,
foreseeing farseeing,
recoding recording
mundane supermarket voyages,
become paradoxical
holy lover spats
for all of us
become her
become her poems,
travelogues, snippets
of marvel at the DNA
each thinking
wanting to think
tween us and no other
she does not know me
but she has felt my
foolishness here
connecting like no other
in a long time,
have listened to each record
in the Queen-bee's collection,
she unknowing, mine,
her favor returned
verbal scientist
she uncovered discovered
a small gate on the edge
of the map of her brain,
that led here her her here where
t her e
am amazed
she sees me
like no other
voyageur ******
but I cannot
Write like Deborah
no but I can
Write of Deborah
Feb 6, 2015
Feb 6, 2015 at 7:08 AM UTC
I cannot sleep, thinking:
I cannot give you short, bittersweet, sad, delighting, whimsical love poems.
I can give you short, bittersweet, sad, delighting, whimsical life poems.
In cold, rushing spring and river waters,
ash and water-borne soil mix.
A voyage endless.
We too, our voyage.
Endless. End less.
Examine the crevices and ravines that
are the map of your hands.
Your voyage's log, memory storage.
Indestructible.
In the clouds's moisture,
ever recycling, it is all kept, stored.
Your hands well recall
the very first caress,
the softness of the baby skin,
the sweet of the lips,
thirty some long years after.
Dare to dispute?
The original animus,
the anima and the persona combination
the byproduct of blood and tissue,
some call spirit,
some call soul,
is matter that cannot be
destroyed,
nor created.
It only voyages on,
the conservation of mass,
our body, our enlivement,
our spark.
In cold, rushing spring and river waters,
ash and water-borne soil admix.
From this natural brew, renewal.
The voyage is the resurrection
Life ever after.
Life even before.
Life for ever
lasting.
Our voyage is without destination.
Our voyage is our destination.
Our voyage is our resurrection.
Endless. Perpetual.
Eternal.
5:46 AM
May 15, 2015
May 15, 2015 at 5:50 AM UTC
The Real Poets Here
are small craft
sailing between the narrows of crack'd lines,
employ the spyglass and luck to you,
for them to find
their voyages do not widen the chasm of waste,
yawning greater now by propped up boasts of
ugly shipowners who sin by commission,
national ***** crowing of the greatest length of their prow,
thinking that is a measure of prowess,
their tubs,
all but empty wordy new container ships,
that are forever lost at sea,
even before leaving port
they,
the real poets,
are the quiet lost lot,
a troop of forgettable ordinary Marines,
the sailors in the engine room toiling,
exploring cartographers ***** from the ****** crafting struggle,
looking to discover unmapped,
invisible poles,
East and West
opening up new passages,
within us,
with new passages
when called to arms,
the real poets
spill fresh ***** fluids from within the heart and mind borne,
upon the blank spaces,
they stain us with the grasping gasps of their sight insided
fertile are the pastures
where they lay low modest lay thinking,
amidst the splendor in the grass
of them
I
proudly will ever boast,
hold them close and ever nameless,
but deep inscribed inside of me
*Ah,
the real poets keep me
whole within the
ever smaller white purity of this narrow space
that has lost the struggle
to contains the
unceasing ever spawning black letter'd oceans and navies of
repetitive sad, sadly repetitive,
puerile singsong cant
that never sings,
can't never please,
but trends to the masses madly
dewdrops of tears,
are my own trees felled,
an acknowledgement that
when I read their unintended homages to humankind,
that when realized,
they speak with great respect,
all quietly scream this whisper...
all this,
that I have written,
and will yet to write,
this is all,
to give
greater glory to all human ability
whose
sole purposed to fill us,
wrench us from our lackadaisical comfort,
or urgently comfort us when none else can,
these are my friends,
the real poets here*
god keep you well
my trite words insufficient
so I gift you
some words worthy from
Wordsworth
Jun 12, 2014
Jun 12, 2014 at 3:29 AM UTC
Moved by the guiding hands of the wind,
While avoiding the living room box's trend.
Although fixate with this generation's iPad,
Or impulse to explore the Xbox's dungeon,
And glimpse the pages of the Forbe, the Facebook, and the likes.
Make time to be in the moment of solace,
A time to dream to explore ideals,
Like floating in nebula avoiding the all powerful black hole.
Navigating the void of the sense of inner torment,
Or charting the boundries of the next voyages of personal task.
One does need to depart from disparity of news,
Or lose sense of humanity by deprived reality TV,
For satirical movies like Idiocracy prophesied seem realized.
One does need to regroup in personal cocoon,
Meld by the silent melodies of beating chest,
Like metronome syncing the keys of the piano to Bach,
While breathing upon the horizon of rebirth,
And find your enshrouded foggy path by beacon of self enlightenment.
Nov 25, 2015
Nov 25, 2015 at 8:41 PM UTC
Peter never understood why Wendy was meant to grow up
why she had to leave the blissfulness of Neverland
If there's an answer to his questions it would be that
she was dreaming of castles and voyages and someone to love
while he was mischieving pirates,chasing a never setting sun
I often wander if I'm more like her,
sincere, gentle, a duchess-to-be
a young girl who dwells in stories
or like the boy who wouldn't grow up,
nonchalant, full of lovely wonderful thoughts,
Peter Pan,the one who could fly
But what did he do when she left?
Is she a beautiful memory in a child's mind,
why didn't he abandon immortality for love?
Here's Wendy, back in Kensington Gardens
a lady asking herself what if I had stayed
why couldn't he abandon youth for her love?
And she will forever remain in his mind as a little girl,
who played family with and dreamed
but Wendy will be married and will be kissed
but not with him.
And Peter will always be a chasing dream,
a fairyland with pirates and ships,
a world of villains, mermaids and the boy who
didn't return her kiss.
I read, imagining his crooked smile growing up
or her staying forever
and none of these feels completely right
In the end, I am another lost boy who went to Neverland,
and flew and fought with a sword, and swam with mermaids
and danced around fire with the eyes of Tiger Lilly
Sometimes there I return, finding him lost in her thoughts,
but there again everyone's forgotten among the things we never say...
Aug 30, 2014
Aug 30, 2014 at 2:08 PM UTC
Alabaster Archipelagos
Benevolent Beauty Beaming
Constructive Contradictive Creative Contemplations
Dante's Darling Dances Deliberating Denominatives
Effervescent Escapisms Endearingly Emerge Elusive Edens
Fantastic Flamboyant ******** Flamed Fabulous Fiery Flickerings
Gorgeous Garden Gim'memores Gaudied Garnishing Gasps
Heavenly Hues Humming Heart's Harmonies
Immortaly Impregnated Inspired Ideals
Jessamin Jargon Jacuzzi Jams
Know-how Knacking Knurls
Light-spirited Lovers
Merge Magnificent
Naked Nocturno Nights
Omnipresent Ousia Over Odeons
Palpitations Perfect Peaks Pi Paws
Quintessential Quality Quarrels Question Quarks Quietness
Rododendron's Richameters Rescued Raw Reeling Ruby Realms
Sentient Syllabic Sapfo's Splendidly Spirited Semantics
Turning Turner's Timeless Timeless Twinklings
Unified Undulatory Unsolved Unicorns
Velvety Venice Voyages
Wanton Wantings
Xsylophone Xsantiphas
Yearnin' Yuki's Yen
Zed's Zealous Zen-it-hall Zeppelins
Aug 16, 2015
Aug 16, 2015 at 9:26 AM UTC
Blue sky, green sea,
hands of wind tickling
the coconut trees,
in the catamaran,
afloat the rolling waves,
a love smitten pair,
he and she, loosing themselves
in each other's eyes.
White spray from high waves,
rain on them, they gleam.
afternoon sun, fizzes down,
air is filled with laughter and joy,
pure magic of love,
the kind one experiences
when nature extends its hands,
to love for a dance of exuberance.
A shoal of colorful fish, swimming too close,
jump up to amuse them,
bringing much cheer.
Swinging on the waves
the sea keeps company to their craft.
**That day flew away and joined the repository of memories.
He and she scampered through the arches
waves after high waves erected,
took voyages far, through troubled waters.
But never, could they forget,
the laughter and joy that day represented,
when they stood together,
or went on to their separate ways.**
Mar 25, 2013
Mar 25, 2013 at 9:16 AM UTC
Perilous voyages of small watercraft at sea , amphibious landings on well defended beachheads , Clipper ships whaling on distant oceans , military vessels in armed conflict , night of relentless cannon fire , explosive reflections across shark infested waters , treasure maps and chest laden with gold , rubies and pieces of eight , the cry of Viking warriors on the rugged coast of Newfoundland .. Pirates just off the shores of the Carolinas .. Forts Pulaski , Sumter and Jefferson on the Dry Tortugas ..
Oil platforms racked by ferocious winds on the Gulf of Mexico ..
Union and Confederate battles on Mobile Bay , Riverboats traversing the Mississippi ..Tending barges along the Ohio ..On high alert through Georgia's intracoastal waterways ....
Nov 19, 2015
Nov 19, 2015 at 12:39 PM UTC
just before never...
*my last performance,
the words came original
and easy, unlike all its
predecessors; someone
drew me a map of my
life and times, cities,
countries, and roads
well travelled and a few,
not too. Mountains, each with
a woman’s name, who carried
care, until she couldn’t, didn’t, and
time’s weathering returned us
individually into hillocks, and then
rain eroded us back into old soil.
the broad highways and back roads,
always snaking away, fork-forcing
directional choices, usually taking the
wrong way, the easy and safe one,
and how I have come to hate those
words: easy and safe, for they
are the pill combo that leaves you
for dead, dulling the questioning
one inquires of oneself, late, reluctantly.
But there is always the unexpected.
Today I saw a sunset on the Hudson
River with a humpback whale blowing,
running beside a river ferry, plowing the
waters back and forth tween two states.
Lived by this river for s e v e n t y years,
and have seen the whales in many places,
but here, in my city, in the river of my youth,
never.
and I got the sign, message received, there
are still sights and poems to behold, arms to
embrace, youngers to guide if they’ll permit it.
so this title, these two, just before,
this day, poem, came to remind me, the
days map remains unfinished, there are lands
and voyages and poems still awaiting drawing,
and it is tomorrow, and just before tomorrow, that
recording insistent demands, and a map is just a
moment in time, until just before...never*
5:28 AM Thu Dec 10
2020 (a year deserving
of its own line and ending)
Manhattan, between two rivers.
Dec 10, 2020
Dec 10, 2020 at 5:48 AM UTC
Mediocre Flow (Spoken Word- Freestyle-Dramatics)
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
==Mediocre Flow ==
by
SassyJ
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
(Copy the link below to your browser)
https://soundcloud.com/user-367453778/mediocreflow
In the woods I get lost, arrays of green specked by the rays of the sun. The wind blows but its swift in measure. I get lost my body in the breeze, as the time runs faster I breath slower. Lost in the wonder of the nature. I lay it all down, the worldly desires, disused contributions… all in the mediocre flow.
The grounds feels so alive, alone but never lonely. The trees talk to me, they journey my vulnerabilities. A hug of the branches goes far beyond. The only lean over that drives me to ecstasy of …….my mediocre flow.
All done with expectations and chasing the unending mazes. We become the mistresses of the earth, arching and protracting with emotions, lotions ……looming greyed blues. Hold this packet of stars, I pass it to you to touch, to overflow in it’s magic and fantastic voyages of the. …..mediocre flow
Feel the greenness patched on the muddy grounds. Have the enliven nature of the flying bubble. See the flow of the waters, the contraction of the streams to the lakes. Touch the drops….the raindrops, nurture them as they sink below your feet. Feel the life, feel alive….. the mediocre flow
Mar 25, 2016
Mar 25, 2016 at 7:42 AM UTC
it all feels like disease and i want to strip my bones raw; manic
(sugar rush deity)
what am i to you… what are you to me, aside from endearing silhouettes; pixie
(mumbling shy songs)
in an ocean of violents in bloom we speak artificial prayer; dream
(cloaked in starry-eyed acapella—thats what they think, no?)
i surrender to your clarity and intensity and charm and beauty that my hands are too numb and dull to touch; girl
and then comes wrath: a dewy vileness teetering on the brink of your 9th life
now hell has harnessed my chest, for it is with deep regret and shaky sobs that every opening and crack in my body emits rotten remains of our silent war…
but there are still heartfelts i never mustered up the courage to let go of:
thank you for tip-toeing around broken strings to reach out once more, twice more
thank you for enduring my futile voyages through resentment
thank you for soaking all my insanity in like sunlight and excreting back out a gentle rainfall
May 24, 2018
May 24, 2018 at 6:57 PM UTC
her voice a fragile thunder
her thoughts gossamer wings beating on
the thick summer air
her awkward gestures a lovin embrace to
the eyes that haunt her histories
dawns intensity begins
its silent fire consuming more and more of
the spacious turning heavens
a star falls
she reaches out one unconstrained hand
fingers tracing its path across the pale blue skies
a word of worshipful sorrow on her lips
till it fades into the sea
extinguished with loves kiss no doubt
no doubt
she floats upon the wind
no sand or tree in sight
she floats upon the sea
back and forth across the deep night
seeing the world breath
seeing the mechanics of the star strewn heavens turning
how beautiful the stars
how desolate the sun
silence had finally taken her
her parched eyes now forever closed
her hand on the tiller
till doom strikes its hour
alone on the sea
her life slowly ceases
extinguished with loves kiss no doubt
no doubt
her dusty wings folded
the breached purity of her heart
leaves her a silent figure forlorn
with her eyes forever looking distantly
with longings painted vividly on her face
a desolate angel
of sea and sand
to greet the lost sailors
and thouse who wander the sea
at the end of their voyages
end of their days
Aug 3, 2014
Aug 3, 2014 at 11:40 AM UTC
Something forgotten for twenty years: though my fathers
and mothers came from Cordova and Vitepsk and Caernarvon,
and though I am a citizen of the United States and less a
stranger here than anywhere else, perhaps,
I am Essex-born:
Cranbrook Wash called me into its dark tunnel,
the little streams of Valentines heard my resolves,
Roding held my head above water when I thought it was
drowning me; in Hainault only a haze of thin trees
stood between the red doubledecker buses and the boar-hunt,
the spirit of merciful Phillipa glimmered there.
Pergo Park knew me, and Clavering, and Havering-atte-Bower,
Stanford Rivers lost me in osier beds, Stapleford Abbots
sent me safe home on the dark road after Simeon-quiet evensong,
Wanstead drew me over and over into its basic poetry,
in its serpentine lake I saw bass-viols among the golden dead leaves,
through its trees the ghost of a great house. In
Ilford High Road I saw the multitudes passing pale under the
light of flaring sundown, seven kings
in somber starry robes gathered at Seven Kings
the place of law
where my birth and marriage are recorded
and the death of my father. Woodford Wells
where an old house was called The Naked Beauty (a white
statue forlorn in its garden)
saw the meeting and parting of two sisters,
(forgotten? and further away
the hill before Thaxted? where peace befell us? not once
but many times?).
All the Ivans dreaming of their villages
all the Marias dreaming of their walled cities,
picking up fragments of New World slowly,
not knowing how to put them together nor how to join
image with image, now I know how it was with you, an old map
made long before I was born shows ancient
rights of way where I walked when I was ten burning with desire
for the world's great splendors, a child who traced voyages
indelibly all over the atlas
, who now in a far country
remembers the first river, the first
field, bricks and lumber dumped in it ready for building,
that new smell, and remembers
the walls of the garden, the first light.
1.5k
It's the age range that strikes me, sitting here in the semi darkness, in Norfolk, in the Show Ground.
It's the age of the sky - the view consistent with years past, but fresh each day, each minute, ever changing and ever moving through star-scapes which shift as we speed through created space, spinning and moving on on voyages into the unknown, through brave new skys created for us to stretch our legs: us little space people, tumbling with nothing holding us up or down.
It's the age range - the trees standing for centuries, the insects breathing their last before tea time, and human kind, kidding ourselves that we're in control of all we survey, when the truth is quite different.
It's the age range - the kids in their first year fascinated by all they see; school age children, waiting to be amused and vocal when parents fall short; teens fascinated by themselves and curious about boundaries; young adults finding what lies beyond is just as amazing and just as laborious as they imagined;
and then the middle (and not so middle) aged, sporting practical footwear, factor 50, and voicing their conviction that they've moved the facilities further apart this year.
It's the age range of the new day generation - stretching from nought to mid eighties, all under canvas or luxuriating in caravans that, like their occupants, have arguably seen better days.
It's the age range and God's infinite patience with all of us, as he guides our paths, through space, through fields and through our years seeking him and through what he has prepared along the paths yet trodden - whether in practical boots, flip flops or crocks.
It's the age range that reminds me that we're all one generation as far as Father is concerned, cos we're all his children with no room for grandchildren in this family of God, in this field, under this sky that he created for weeks like this.
Aug 3, 2022
Aug 3, 2022 at 2:20 AM UTC
~For Pradip~
*who reminded me:
We are all God’s Trial & Errors*
tender is the tendency,
so finitely human,
infinitely foolish,
to overlook the
obvious,
let us not delve into our
particular peculiar idiosyncratic knots
in our hair and personalities,
all natural,
inherited or ill begotten
in voyages to far away,
like our childhood
***Thus,
we are all mistakes of a sort***
with natural fault lines,
accumulated dings, scapes, bruises,
furrowed crinkles that took us
years to perfect
We are flawed like diamonds,
valued by these natural flaws
by graders with loups who uncover
our flaunts, our clear air bubbles,
the more flaws the better,
because these attributes make us
most interesting!
you may be blonde,
you may be exotic
perhaps a lovely shade of
iridescence,
but lucky you whose scars speak
out and others wonder why,
they are so interesting
let us design a large animal,
seemingly ungainly, yet keystone to
their environment, so others may
profit thereby,
yet insanely quick on lumbering feet,
no hands, fingers, but a long snakey thinge
that multiple functions for
breathing, drinking, feeding grabbing, smelling and
trumpeting their presence
to foolish beings in their neighborhood
let’s us not debate
whose design is
an efficacy par excellence
so we be
ungainly, too tall, too
this or that,
even too flawless,
a specialized curse of sorts,
we are the product of
a sophisticated design laboratory
that makes many models,
each variegated, always different
so get down on your knees *********
and praise the design engineers
who created you to be
full of
& by elephantine trials and elephantine errors,
thereby making
us each,
a special pronoun,
an I
blessed
by definition:
though not in any dictionary:
unique,
flawless!
**
**^you are the most
flawless poem
you have ever written
and will ever ever
write***
Dec 7, 2024
Dec 7, 2024 at 3:59 PM UTC