The Lodge

I followed the leafy by-way

Autumn’s offerings smeared my feet

Time of year and time of day

Connected where the dead ends meet

 

Smelled the rain and felt the night

As fading light stretched the sky

As every colour descends from white

A shelter’s entrance alit from high

 

As gales raged and terror struck

I half slept in half light shadows

The lonely lodge imprinted with muck

Framed the first ray of morning glow

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An Old Diary

I looked in an old diary

And laughed very hard

What I took for certainty

Was folly stuck in lard

 

How impressed by error

I thought others should be

Embarrassment the terror

Reflected back to me

A Willow At Patmos

I sat below the blooming willow

As the midday sun suggested reverie

Decaying bark upholstered pillow

Shapes and shadows loomed in tapestry

 

A vision formed of an ancient great hall

Golden ornaments reached down from high

Lower reaches trashed and disfigured all

Athena’s statue moved to utter sigh

 

I saw a lion cower in a cage

Saw an hourglass empty of sand

Dreamt of books without a page

On the pinnacle, saw desolate land

 

I spoke with a slave without a master

Who said that doors were made to close

Dreamed his head turned to alabaster

Taken to factory for processed pose

 

A child sacrificed on makeshift pyre

To wild laughter and gaiety serene

I felt electric on the wire

Heard the gentle’s throttled scream

 

A tattooed thug in flowing robes

Pronouncing law with mocking spite

The decent trudge on endless roads

Bow their heads to spittled might

 

Wise men watch a great library burn

Preserve some scrap torn in haste

Wheels of toil forever turn

Spoiled product of automated waste

 

Among the ruins children dance

Without a melody or a role

In bare castles the princes prance

And blind scholars loudly extol

 

Meadows fill with poison air

Paths all lead to whence they came

What once was common now is rare

What was singular is all the same

 

I turned away from unwanted dreams

Evading horrors which scream and stare

In waking hours I search for means

I know not what, I know not where

An Ocean Drop

A donkey drags around the rut

Without the rope that now lies cut

A free man holds his wrists shut

Minus manacles that made him mutt

 

Into what ocean flow these streams

Into what pit go all these dreams

Open space, in free air seems

Yet a desert as death would deem

Without Scale

A pebble thrown in hidden creek

I dip my shoe in shallow water

With quiet sound it flows sleek

Upon the stones I ungainly totter

 

Day upon day as a bottomless well

It seemed the stream would endless wait

But like the tortoise loose of shell

I left my home and shut the gate

A Walk Along The Beach

Steps that wind down to shore

Sand that shimmers unto eye

Swims the tide to wet the dry

Conquer and recede once more

 

Calming sound that gentle roars

In steady time to reassure

In modest height waves can lure

Swimmer meek or boatman’s oars

 

Fine particles stick to fingers

A tiny portion of the vast

Warming sun absorbed to last

Bare feet do not long linger

 

Footsteps trace in gentle print

A course followed at remove

Increasing gaps serve reprove

To cloud covered sun’s mere glint

 

Haze obscures encircled horizon

Wind dances to unheard tune

A valley sheltered by a dune

Shadows towel a woman lies on

 

An intimate joins taking the air

Disrupts routine in shared experience

Making treasure of rare appearance

Lending colour to internal lair

 

Wind swirls in unruly direction

Blows and whistles, caress and still

Fresh to the sea, waking the will

Balancing chill for fair complexion

 

Here time slows almost to stop

No mechanics churn the day

Leisure’s accident is not to stay

Thoughts of work, the sun drops