I’ve the whole world at my feet

I’ve the whole world here at my feet

I’ve the whole world here at my feet
As I sit in the hospital ward
In my mind I can see the heavens
I can also travel the stars.

Content with my lot and my nurses
Feeling no anger or pain
Unable to walk or to wander
My world is right here in my brain.

Long gone are the days of my travels
My travel’s done safely in bed
To the whirr and whoosh of the monitors
Who faithfully follow my end.

Soon this bed will belong
To another who travels my way
I don’t mind being helpful and nice
As I slip into my final day.

I wish more than trust what then follows
Is the final return to the fold
When I yield to a point of ecstasy
In a dimension beyond infinity.

To awake in the company of family -
Maybe.

The doomsday clock counts down

The doomsday clock counts down

The Doomsday clock counts down
God forbid we ever hear it gong
The last sound heard by a race
That lost the race to last.

The tolling of the midnight bells
Calls not to prayer in a cemetery
 Where coffins lie unburied
The last loved of this century.

We can turn this round you know
If we pull together and somehow
Apply the breaks to this runaway show -
If we bravely lead, others will follow.

We will banish arms and make some peace
That future generations may enjoy
Birdsong at the break of day
We’ll press right on no matter what they say.

What they say doesn’t interest me
Put food on table or finish misery
If it’s going to start let it be with me
I’ll ride ahead on a purebred steed.

Not looking back like Lot’s poor wife
Salt of the earth but no celestial sight
We’re aiming high we’re hoping higher
To prove this doomsday clock someday a liar.

I stood by the cold graveside

I stood by the cold graveside

I stood by the cold graveside
A misty afternoon at end of year.
Life and death were hardly separated
A thin film was all that lay between
The living and the dead.

Birds sang, inviting Spring,
The hearses now made way
For quiet visits and silent grieving
That lasted down the decades
With flowers and memories afresh

The tidy graves beside forgotten ones
Some neatly kept with flowers new
Gravel raked and marble polished
A silent rebuke to abandoned graves
By those who came but once , never more returning.

The balance sheet of life exposed
Of those who loved and love grown cold
The granite tells the story of a life
In three short lines, no more.

Who will come and visit by your grave
When the world has long forgotten you
Who will bring flowers for your tenth
And fortieth anniversaries?

Lying two feet apart the great and humble
Two feet apart the poor and wealthy
The doting father, the grieving wife
The tiny toddler, all left this life.

I’ve the whole world here at my feet

I’ve the whole world here at my feet

I’ve the whole world here at my feet
As I sit in the hospital ward
In my mind I can see the heavens
I can also travel the stars.

Content with my lot and my nurses
Feeling no anger or pain
Unable to walk or to wander
My world is right here in my brain.

Long gone are the days of my travels
My travel’s done safely in bed
To the whirr and whoosh of the monitors
Who faithfully follow my end.

Soon this bed will belong
To another who travels my way
I don’t mind being helpful and nice
As I slip into my final day.

I wish more than trust what then follows
Is the final return to the fold
When I yield to a point of ecstasy
In a dimension beyond infinity.  

To awake in the company of family -
Maybe.

Alba de Tormes 1975

Alba de Tormes 1975

I saw your relic that they kept 

One sleepy Spanish afternoon

When the sun chased both man and beast

From the torrid streets of Alba. 

The year was nineteen seventy five

And we were twenty five

Young Legionaries of Christ

Herded inside the dark church walls

Dressed in black soutanes 

With shiny hair and shiny shoes

And bright white smiles 

Young innocents of God. 

During our twelve month stay 

In proud and fusty Salamanca 

Whose academic reputation lay baking 

In the scorching heat nearby. 

We gathered round Teresa 

Or what was left of her

We who had hardly seen a female ankle

Were left gazing at her heart. 

But the memory never left

The image that was etched 

The presence of a saint

In a hot and blasted landscape. 

A strange and noble place

Where history seemed to freeze 

And time stood still

Where history turned few pages. 

The black soutanes unchanged

For decades and for centuries 

Til change came sweeping through 

The year that Franco died.