Wednesday, December 16, 2020

Year end 2020

 There is a truth


There is a truth that only poetry can spell

While solemn theology rests in silence. 

God and dogma sit uneasily

In the library corner

Til politely God gets up

And slowly takes his leave 

To drink coffee with the poets 

And the dreamers in the corner.  


We find God later with the busy mummies

Attending babies in the changing stall 

And later still in the smokey pubs

With epic whiskies on the ancient walls

While old men’s eyes grow bright again

Remembering tales both short and tall. 


Tonight God sits with lorry drivers 

Leaving ferries in far off ports

Heading along the lonely roads

Bisecting France, bisecting night. 

He joins men in their cabins

When they pull off to catch some sleep

In cold laybys on foreign soil 

As hauliers pass them until dawn. 


Then God assists an ancient priest 

To open weathered doors of an older church

In central France while nearby on the motorway 

The lorry driver runs his solo run

As a handful of the faithful

Come stooped and bowed

To answer Gods other call. 


The call to stand where time and history merge

And gaze into stained glass and see

The eternal and the almighty 

Coming to a point above the altar

Seen better from afar

From the entrance to the vestry. 




The Laneway snakes down to the sea 


The Laneway snakes down to the sea

Between bushes jostling for light

It’s a fine free for all in the country

On the old road that ends at the coast. 


Nettles and thistles in combat

With tall grass and sallies as well

With each year that passes 

The bushes grow taller

As natures reclaims her lair. 


A laneway once busy with workers 

Now rarely sees a soul

Sea breezes gambol and run

Along the green corridor for fun. 


Away in the distance a cottage

Pretends not to notice or care

The kettle is boiling 

The WiFi is working

With hardly a moment to spare 




Their voices 


Their voices lay silent

Under the carpet of snow

In the silence of winter

Even as snowdrops grow

While peeking up from below

The crocus will try to show

Hope is arriving at last

Longer days lie stretching ahead 

Earlier dawns tiptoeing past. 


How long do we lie in a grave 

Til we hear the call to revive?

To rise up from the coffin we made

Home for the years and the centuries?

Until at last we come back

Some silent January morning

When the world which long has forgotten 

Is witness to our returning. 


Returning like Christ after three days 

No less surprising, no less surreal

That the good God should continue to care

To gift just another rising today

If not in body but it spirit 

Revealed on a springlike day. 


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