Poetry

It's been awhile since I last waxed poetic, and I hadn't realised how long until I reconnected with an old friend a few days ago and he asked "are you still writing your poetry", and I had to admit, sadly, no, not in many months.

It's kind of sad as, for many years, poetry was my outlet for an array of emotions, for pain and loss, for tribute, for joy, for faith, even some humour. I often "thought" in rhyme, even though not all of my poetry was written in that form. I often wondered whether the cockney rhyming slang of my childhood had somehow programmed my brain into that way of thinking. As I get older, I believe it must, because as I lose many cockney words from my speech, I also seem to have lost that immediate poetic reaction to everything. Occasionally it still pops up as if to say "I'm still here!" but for the most part, it lies dormant.

Some of you may not have been aware of my poetry, some may read it and dismiss it as "not quite right", but that's ok, as over the years, it has given pleasure (and in some cases, comfort) to many, and some of the sillier has just caused friends to shake their heads with a smirkish grin, and rolling eyes.

I figured today, I'd share a couple of my favourites. This first is called "Where Is The Young Girl". Others who write have critiqued it's changing cadence, mentioned that it's like 2 halves of different styles, advised me to change it. I have read this poem on the QE2, in a passenger talent show, and was feted by the audience, they loved it, as it was. As do I.

This poem "wrote itself" one night as I sat at my computer and I realised later it was about an older woman, maybe suffering from Alzheimer's or paralysed by a stroke, from the view of a caregiver.

When I look into your eyes  I see the pain from deep within,  the confusion and inner turmoil  of an active mind  in a body which frustrates it.  I catch glimpses of an earlier twinkle,  when life was good  and your manner gay;  now, in the twilight of your life,  the copper hair is silvered  and a mist falls over your eyes.  Where is the young girl who ran on the clifftops,  paddled in oceans, picked shells on the shore?  Where is the maiden who courted the young man,  resplendent in uniform, bound for the war?  He who returned to her, shell-shocked and wizened,  who took her to wife, and whose children she bore?  And where is she, that mother, who gave birth to two children,  but whose love had no boundaries, and who craved even more?  She is here, in your mind,  in the pictures that play there,  the memories of all that you've seen and you've done,  and I see her sometimes, in the looks that you give me,  with your mind ever active, and the body you shun.  I feel for your sadness, your independence long taken,  and wish I could grant you, strong limbs, straight and true .  But all I can offer, is respect and assistance  in this twilight existence, I'll stand beside you. I have a friend who has told me I need to record a reading of it, so that the intended cadences are heard, and seen to fit with one another despite appearing as though they would not. This next, I wrote in early 2004. Randy was my grandson for a few years, when his mother married my son. Sadly, we lost him in 2000, and I have written other poems about him, over the years, but this one just sticks with me as my favourite of my "missing him" ones. It's called "Possibilities". A poem about my grandson who died just after Thanksgiving in 2000. The last two lines say it all. Sometimes your memory just comes to mind  and I wonder how you'd be  if you'd been given a chance to live  to be a man of twenty three.  Maybe you'd be married  have a son to call your own,  drive a truck, maybe fly a plane  and we'd chat on the phone.  And you'd tell me all your good times,  I'd commiserate with the bad,  give you a shoulder to lean on,  and listen when you felt sad.  But this is all wishful thinking  as I'll never again see you smile,  only in the pictures  I look at once in a while.  Three years ago you left us,  in fact it's almost four,  sometimes I really miss you  and others, I miss you more.  A few years ago, a beautiful wooded area near us, was cleared and I was both saddened and angry, at the same time. I wrote this at the time. It's called,"Bemoaning The Destruction of Trees". Inspired by the sight of a beautiful woody copse destroyed to make way for a housing development. Regal trunks, strewn,  scattered like bodies on a battle field.  Once majestic providers of shade,  leafy statuesque reminders of God's power.  Gone.  Hewn down.  Forest ravaged by man and metal.  Woods no more,  just rotting limbs  and earth  and sadness.  Soon beauty will be replaced by houses,  tarmac will cover the red earth,  money will flow.  Gone the life giving oxygen  to be replaced by  destruction,  pollution.  Gone the silence of the  cool, damp shadiness.  Gone the birdsong  and woody scents.  Gone forever,  destroyed for mans greed.  Soon,  no one will remember  that once trees stood here,  majestically holding court.  Soon  there may be no more trees.  In the words of Bugs Bunny and his merry band, I'll say "That's all Folks!" and leave you to enjoy your day. I'd love to get your views on my writings. Let me know whether you like them, dislike them, whatever. They're just my thoughts, my emotions. If some like them, I'll share more.