stonepoem : 365

I looked
to the funeral trees
and they looked dead like me
naked in this winter breeze
I turned
to the funeral trees
and they seemed black to see
wretched lost and born of thieves
I walked
to touch the funeral trees
and they stood firm in sombre creed
with sacred bond to spite the freeze
I fell
to lie among the funeral trees
and watched them change
and saw them grow
and soon I slept -
how gentle were
their pleas.
I dreamed
a hymn of funeral trees;
Come summer, come now please -
and time was then,
to unfurl
leaves.

A man
needs a shed
takes the clutter
from his head
lays it down
on musty beds
tight against the edge
stained but only
partial red
a man
needs a shed
it takes away
his heart of lead
a place to dwell until
the world is pure
and nearly
bled
with creosote
and sodden pine
with scattered pins
on earthy weathered twine
all friends within
a secret place
to mine the mind
a space where men
have always fled
and every man
deserves
a shed.

And the cells
in my eyes
are twitching
like flies
and the wells that
now rise
sink constructed
disguise
and the yells,
thin like ice
and the wails
and the lies
are you feeling like I?
can you bother
to try?
the cells
in your eyes
are twitching,
like flies.

You took the path
and I rode the motorway
in comfort got there quick
driven not by me
You shook the ashes
and I switched on the T.V
feet up late night squinter
sofa fugged and beat
You looked the way I did
and I looked back
creak neck creased
money almost spent
threadbare slack and given in
I once mistook you - I’m sorry.
Remind me how
I used to be.

Happy new year!
Said the new
But what of the old
Thought I.
Isn’t it great?
We’re never late
And so felt the few
But nought
felt I.

Bring ash of dawn
Where honour has no moon
As Lunar marks the heart
Of rising dust and crack’d lawns.
All sing in cached yawns
All shake our greying swans
On hiving rust and stack’d pawns,
We stare on days gone far
Too soon.

Watch now before you blink
Don’t miss the twinkling shards,
The spin against the water’s cloak -
No number counts these thoughts you think.
Catch now their roaring chains of light
Afore the smudden dull of winter night
Before the afterwards of summertide
Such ancient thrills that now evoke,
Must fade like silvered ink -
Return these borrowed hours
Masking season’s interlink.

Beds not made,
and dusty sills,
the washing-up and
headache pills.
The harshest words
for smallest ills -
like huff and puff
on trundled hills.
The words not spoke,
the things undone
from plans not won,
and songs unsung.
The wasted time
like chastened sand
that falls on hands,
or clutched sunshine,
and two-few smiles
not feared of miles.
And all of the above,
is not enough.

My heart was a sea-cracked harbour wall
Where once young legends lept and fell
In macho dare and banished care
In acrobatic grace and boastful tell
That knew not well of rocky layer
Below the lowest touch of tide
Below the coldest shock of blue
Still hearing shouts of youth
Amidst the seagull cries
That circle old men’s eyes
I watch for catch of sea
And sigh.

Like
needles spun
from north to south
talking circled hope
and pushing on
like rivers run
from fount to mouth
discarded ropes
below the sun.
And all things done
when we were youth
on scattered slopes
now end before
they have
begun.

It started,
with a cursor kiss
and keyboard strokes
before they clicked.
Then whispered nights
became the safety net
that fixed the breath
of teasing swoon
and furtive sighs.
But these,
weren’t young fools
or sweat-soaked youth.
No, these souls
had already learned
the dance before -
a thousand times in fact
it should be known.
And every step
was shared.
So they danced.
They really danced.
Not just in notion, nor theory -
but like fiery molecules,
rolling in energetic flux
like downhill streams
rushing to sea,
in synchronicity.
Treading dreams
of flowered sway and
waltzes in the shadows
behind St. Wenseslav’s horse
they whirled and flitted -
not wondering where hours
roam or care to go.
And that was that.
And they both knew -
the moment when
the dancefloor
moved.

When all your words are voiced outloud,
And every leaf is sketched and proud,
With every nod amongst the crowd
As shuffled air inside a cloud.

When you count totals of the days,
And mark the notches in your ways,
With charted limits to your gaze
As mitred pace in things you say.

When all goes back into the box,
And wheels spin against the blocks,
With silence before the aftershock,
As melting ice amongst the rocks.

How will you know?

Wind,
that dulls.

A selfish air
that doesn’t care.

Rattling me.
Knocking bones.
Cooling heart
like ice sirens
smiling before
the freeze.

Am I so empty?
So… spacious inside,
Why let these fronds
of discontent
take fingerhold
within?

Such spiteful things
thrive in unbound air,
and clutch and ride
on doubts we leave
behind.

Was it you
that started this?

Was it you that passed
through me?

Only when the glimmer ends
Will we pine for shinest moon
Then gone will be the argon sky
And footprints in the light.
Only when the clouds contend
Will we wrestle grey cocoon
And gaze in open barreleyes
At fortitute of atoms bright.
Only when the stars descend
Will we soar yet soul marooned
As tethered flashes leaping high
Like lost balloons in age’s flight.
Then alone, and only then,
Will we know friends.

Poorly fish,
gravel stilled as he now is.
Despite the occasional flurry,
the current that used to buoy
now pins his tired body down.
Flat-finned and waiting, he lies
patient for the quietened sand -
perhaps, remembering sparkle
and bubble rise of leaping youth.
And I too, recall this golden flash
amidst the world it swam within.
And we both now wait for the end
as I watch and will him to the rise,
to fight for food and light -
to health and extended life.
But now, all he knows is this;
A fish that does not swim,
cannot be a fish.

It is time to re-arrange the coats and shoes
For it troubles us there are some we never use
Especially now, we’re on the cusp of sunny days,
Gone should be Wellingtons and brolly stand ways.
Soon, it will be time of evening birdsong chime
Of horizon jaunts and hushed marvels at the climb
We will sit outside with beer instead of rain,
Watching people flower in saunters up the lane.
It is time for naked sleep in moth-kissed breeze
Eventide pored with souls that race like bees
Towards wide-eyed ecstasy of resonant dawn,
And barefoot tip-toes over dewsoaked lawns.

There is a place
of windless sails and wing-clipped wails.
An airless space of slackened time
like old corroded twine
tethering heartbeats and nobled spirit.
A place where muted calls of fate
becalm the soul embalmed by ancient fronds
of ice-dipped hope that mystify the telescope
on age’s sky - where once white lions
pounced and played and roared
to memories and shores
of a youth that never
could be yours.

How
many
heartbeats
are we allowed?
How many ticks and tocks
of nature’s arms will subdivide
the days and nights when we collide
to ponder beats of life that mark
the turnaround to end of dance and song?
No answer for you now, my friend - I have stopped the count.
And as the final levers fall, within I come to realise;
It - won’t - be - long.

Bear the ills of weary world,
Know the creep of quiet rage,
Feel the smudge of youth to old,
And smooth the grain of age.
Carry high past ways of youth,
Raise smile-worn weathered flag,
To shoulderhold the uncouth gale,
And navigate the rocky crags.
Know well this turn of time -
Hold each minute like a tiny jewel.
Begin again the spring and wind,
Then win prize of age’s tired duel.

Time is the leak you cannot fix
Seeping over meniscus edge
Like muddied ice in stubborn push
Slowly notching marks of us.
Plucked like frets and string
Scratch-scretched and resonating
As waves that flow through sky
In search for sands of you and I.
Shorter than a newborn’s thumb
Curled and clutched like tiger frond
Mewed to world and catching dew
Time falls slow on me and you.

Young for five minutes.

How do you know

how to stand?

Unsteady feat.

What do you know

of the land?

Calmed for us.

How can we begin

to understand?

Balanced on cotton thread
with arms aloft - struggling
to catch each word
wishing for the night-latched birds
of tissue bed and sleeping soft,
and back to life normality.

She says;
“Come, fly to me”.

In the unlit tunnel of your thoughts;
stuffed to the joists with memories,
piled high like mildewed dominoes
or musty blankets under the stairs.
Buckled buttresses struggle, like
tangled roots in cracked terracotta,
bulging from the squeeze and huff
of loose unlabelled circumstance.

You used to dutifully lay down
this priceless cargo of recollection -
comfort-stacking against the wall
the dusty happenings within your life.
Now, shoved-in - no weave or industry;
life payloads crushed and buckled,
shapeshifted by the pressure shove.
Torn by the strongarm pull of age

Listen!
You are too young to touch the stars.
They’ve been put beyond our reach
to keep them clean from naive grasp.
Tissue origami in the space wind
should never be unfolded.

The squeaking wheels
Are sluggish as they rust
The stamp of age scratched
On pitted path that’s wandering.
A line that can’t be thread or cut
Like the tin-dented rings of seasons
Marking joyous turn of the sun
Laughing when I hadn’t heard the joke
Or looked inside the strongarm jar.
In a bleached picture of unglued frame
Naked and kinked with over-use
Glasscracked in the prang and crash
Of hoisted eyes and start agains.
Once again, fresh cotton pressure creased
Smooth cornerered in turn and rough
But now in permanent tuckaway fold
Knowing that I am more than old.

—– withdrawn———

I wanted to write
for someone I know in distress.
I ended up writing about them.
That’s not fair.

I’m not,
looking after myself.
Feels like my head’s been turned
inside out. One eye glued and
squinted like a drawstring bag
staying up until the late time.
I’ve been sleeping like a juggler on call
with fumbling hands that drop the ball.
Seeing steps to come but not gone by
auto piloting through the chore of day
This weariness now comes as standard
for these dry bones who need to rest
just can’t seem to concen ——–
——-trate.

Some days,
it’s just great
to tilt your head and
let the thoughts drop out.
Listening to the hollow
thud of your own ideas,
tumbling aimless to
the floor. It’s nice
to contemplate the joy
of mindlessness, befuddled
for awhile in a break from
knowing. Every now and then,
taking time out to let all
puddles of intellect drain
from the dome of your mind,
just so you can floss inside.
Embrace the vacumned logic
of perfect dumbness and taste the
sweet soma of its purity. It’s OK!
There’s something wise to be
learned in the beautiful blankness,
and somnolent stupor - the timeless
cleanhanded truth of saying;
‘I just don’t know’.

Be by my side for seasons roll
astride the years of timeworn hold
you are the handmade measure of my way
moth eared wise but sometimes frayed.

Threadbare in the dogged scuff of life,
your comforts molded from familiarity
are the very things that calm and settle me
through step of many weathered days.

Our strong stitched path across these years
has formed the jagged shape and fold
of how we cleave this journey made.
For we are old companions in the ride.

From the footprints of where we’ve been
through the stumble of the here and now,
to the strides of what we may become,
my feet are chained without you.

We yearn
the warm flicker
of her anodyne way.
Between tomorrow
and today - she is,
the sopor to ease all.
She carries us over
deep tribulation thrall,
helping us rise above
the sluice of discontent.
She comes to tighten the
night hatches of our eyes,
with their ever hopeful
hinges of slumber,
so we may look
within.

Here I lie in patient’s well.
Twixt the weal of the hammer,
and the woe of the nail.
Wary of rust stained leaf
and dusk cold ground,
between my restless slumber,
and this shadow’s tail.
The rush of life slowed,
brings forth an other companion,
timeworn through dark eyes,
all dormant torpor stilled.
It is true - he does not come alone.

Tired in the bones of life,
every breath a sigh released,
the traveller journeys on,
no step, a stride decreased.

Mired in the wet sand,
footfall etched in memory,
only recollection’s path,
marks his lost trajectory.

Waymarks of a shadowed fate,
conspired against an open route,
a weary compass held, required,
to heed his map of doubt.

But though navigation end adjourned,
and passage studied slow,
this noble traveller, remains content
to tread the earth below.

Hands of leather, iron strong,
white wire haired and always tall.
Map-faced wise and joyous in the new,
wind spirited, yet quiet,
of the old.

Oh knowing gardener of souls,
patient of storms distilled.
You are deep blooded,
noble eyed,
all seeing all.

No more.