high praise indeed. Thank you.
lp
For My Lover, Returning To His Wife
written by Anne Sexton
She has always been there, my darling.
She is, in fact, exquisite.
Fireworks in the dull middle of February
and as real as a cast-iron pot.
Let's face it, I have been momentary.
A luxury. A bright red sloop in the harbor.
My hair rising like smoke from the car window.
Littleneck clams out of season.
She is more than that. She is your have to have,
has grown you your practical, your tropical growth.
This is not an experiment. She is all harmony.
She sees to oars and oarlocks for the dinghy.
I give you back your heart.
I give you permission -
She is so naked and singular.
She is the sum of yourself and your dream.
Climb her like a monument, step after step.
She is solid.
As for me, I am a watercolor.
I wash off.
Such achingly beautiful words. The highlighted phrases are just gut-wrenchingly profound. Oh to not empathise.
Merry-go-round
Where am I bound
With my love and feelings?
Merry-go-round
Who wants to kiss me?
And hug me and kiss me?
Yes, who wants to do it?
I wish that I knew it.
yes , I stole it, but it reflexs my feeling today.
3 WORDS
Eyelash grazed satin
Holding me close
Feel my pleasure
Slip slowly away
Over the sheets
Claw your back
Pulling you deeper
Faster slipping under
Eyes glazing over
Building higher quicker
Undenying I grasp
Breath on cheeks
Tenderly stroking breasts
Pushing you up
Not holding back
Feeling you shudder
Weight upon me
Pinning me down
I * you
ZoeRose (C) 2009
'You took away all the oceans and all the room'
You took away all the oceans and all the room.
You gave me my shoe-size in earth with bars around it.
Where did it get you? Nowhere.
You left me my lips, and they shape words, even in silence.
Osip Mandelstam (1891 - 1938)
translated by Clarence Brown and W. S. Merwin
When your soul shows through
Are you proud of the display?
Is this who you meant to be?
When your soul shines through
Other people judge and see
what do you intend to be?
When my soul is on view
I pray you see beauty in me
and reflect happily
When our souls ignite
the possibilties are infinite
do not dispair - we will always be there
Epithalamion
Singing, today I married my white girl
beautiful in a barley field.
Green on thy finger a grass blade curled,
so with this ring I thee wed, I thee wed,
and send our love to the loveless world
of all the living and all the dead.
Now, no more than vulnerable human,
we, more than one, less than two,
are nearly ourselves in a barley field -
and only love is the rent that's due
though the bailiffs of time return anew
to all the living but not the dead.
Shipwrecked, the sun sinks down harbours
of a sky, unloads its liquid cargoes
of marigolds, and I and my white girl
lie still in the barley - who else wishes
to speak, what more can be said
by all the living against all the dead?
Come then all you wedding guests:
green ghost of trees, gold of barley,
you blackbird priests in the field,
you wind that shakes the pansy head
fluttering on a stalk like a butterfly;
come the living and come the dead.
Listen flowers, birds, winds, worlds,
tell all today that I married
more than a white girl in the barley -
for today I took to my human bed
flower and bird and wind and world,
and all the living and all the dead.
Dannie Abse
Profligate to the point where generosity becomes moot
The hightide moon floods decade empty sidings with light.
Geese call, a gull mews its mockery of a lonely child
And beyond the old pit stables small paws scramble.
It's a day for the high embankment, the sleek dog nosing cold warrens
For rabbits not yet born who'll flee
On summer mornings from his hopeful bark
Leaving teasing twisting scents through long grass not yet grown.
Soon enough St Cuthbert's sea is at our back, otter free but
Rich with fish and energy and the promise of history.
The sun glinting off the fence a friend once posed naked against
Points the way home in the colours of a St David's daffodil
And I resolve to write these words; tomorrow becomes today
i wonder in the space of time
will i ever be able to speak what i feel
for the answer is there, yet the courage is not
i pray one day that the words will be spoken.
from the sweet lips that i have come to adore
and from the deep blue eyes that sparkle like the ocean
from the touch that leaves me wanting more
and the whisper in my ear that leaves me breathless.
i wonder in the space of time
will i feel the way i feel for him with another
i am happiest when i am with him and yet i know
it will be no more than it is now i still think of the what ifs.
with his hair like sunshine bringing light to my life
and his hands are always cold but i love to warm them
he has an amazing smile, when he smiles, but that is not too often
he is a joy to be around and i steal every moment i can with him.
i wonder in the space of time if i love him.......
LOVELIEST of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.
Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.
The Cat and the Sea
It is a matter of a black cat
On a bare cliff top in March
Whose eyes anticipate
The gorse petals;
The formal equation of
A domestic purr
With the cold interiors
Of the sea's mirror.
R S Thomas
You came at a time when I needed escape
Some space from reality without the red tape
I went into a dream when I stepped through your door
And played out a fantasy, it had a great loure.
I wanted to dream it again & again
But I wasn't careful & then I caused pain.
But only for me cos I crossed that line
Walking out of the dream for making you mine.
I should've known dreams belong in my head
And left you right there but my greeds to be fed.
So I opened myself up to you for all time
But you turned me down, not to be mine.
I shook off the hurt & it carried right on
Bein the fantasy I doted on.
But time it was cruel & wouldn't let go
My heart it cried out, it wanted you so.
No matter how much I felt, wanting you whole
You wanted my body but never my soul.
I'd never felt, the pain that it bought
Not bein the one that you really sought.
I cried many tears feeling worthless & used
Why couldn't I walk when my heart felt abused.
As years passed I heard that you'd found another
Someone to date, to treat special, a lover.
I may not be perfect but my soul was pure
It loved you intently & still had no cure.
I never chose to fall wholey in love
I believe its a callin thats so far above.
But knowing my feelings were just not returned
I worked on these issues and feelings were burned.
Something kept drawing me back to you though
Not of my doing.. I just didn't know.
We met, again fallin through fantasy doors
Why can't we just stop this not just have a pause.
We both loved the dream of what was at the start
But it was only me with the loneliest heart.
In time I accepted you'd never be mine
But Im now to scared to go look or find.
And though I no now that I love you no more
I remember the pain, what was it all for?
Why did we happen? what lesson was learnt?
Don't fall in love? You'll only get burnt?
You never once told me what you felt at heart
Or what my fault was, why you kept us apart.
It tore me to pieces just not knowing why
And why I fell in love with my wrong type a guy.
When you wern't my type in almost every sense
Why did I choose to sit on this fence?
All that I know is what I felt was true
I was deeply in love & that love was you.
I came.
I was sore.
I recovered.
When a white and red dragon entwine
They burn hotter than a star
There elements form a molten iron bar
To explode, sending ripples out into the heavens
to mingle with others
Blimey Kaz - what's next - all 42 stanzas of the Eve of St Agnes?! ;)
I eat my peas with honey.
I've done it all my life.
It makes the peas taste funny.
But it keeps them on the knife!
BARCELONA
.....
A cultural vitality not new
The Columbus monuments birds-eye view
Gothic and Romanesque art
Of this diagonal maze are only but a part
A beautiful harbour and miles of beach
Every captivating glimpse in reach
.....
LOVE?
.....
The abandonment of ones emotion
A romance a beautiful thing to care
Sincere and right it is a devotion
Love and warmth expression without fanfare.
A terrific presence yes you will feel
Togetherness and harmony you share
It's an experience a gourmet meal
A genuine affectionate affair.
.....
why does sleep always elude me
i rarely wake up full of glee
tossing and turning,thoughts churning
it wouldnt be so bad, if only i had
the recommended hours of eight
instead with only a few i wake up irate
Nightmares
.....
Lost souls they roam my dreams at night
My subconscious an open door
Tossing and turning I take flight
Waking sweating on the floor.
.....
Celebrity Culture
.....
The community ethics and the land
The need to justify an existence
Sensitive soul aware of resistance
Scarred by the critics so unfair and bland
Celebrity culture so in demand
Duty and tradition an insistence
Scrutiny unjustified persistence.
.....
Forever Mine
.....
Through the branches sunlight cascades
On a Willow tree riverside
Between the bark nature parades
Scented flowers wildlife abide.
The wind it gently serenades
The fauna and leaves are dancing
The picture no it never fades
The beauty it's so enhancing.
I lay on grass so soft and sweet
Yes the feeling is so divine
I'll stay and rest put up my feet
For this place is forever mine
.....
Golden disc
clouds weeping
shine on me.
Finger tips gliding
So soft to the touch
Hands stroking nylon
Desire is too much
Glorious Contours
The feel of pure silk
Smooth creamy body
That's been bathed in milk.
