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Rich Moment

~ distilledvoice ~ Leave a comment

The sea beeeze is thick

With the moment

As if time

Were the grains of sand

On the beach,

Granular beneath our feet

And somehow transmitting silence.

–

This moment feels pregnant

With the ocean,

Speaking through the surf,

And the traders

Shutting down their stalls,

Heeding the encroaching night.

–

The tea, served in paper cups

Is as warm as the moon,

And tastes as good

As if it wasn’t just the tongue

But the skin and the tide

And wild dogs on the beach

Which tasted it.

–

What exactly is this rich moment

In which the body feels

As if the sea had invaded.

Perhaps it’s the heart

Or the sun

Still invigorating the skin,

Or the mind’s relinquishment.

Perhaps it’s the echo

Of the argument

And truths spoken

That leaves us empty

And tinglingly receptive.

Argument

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What is the waves’ opinion

Of the couple’s fight?

For before, during and after

The sea slid landward

Then slid back,

And white noise rolled

From left to right

Along the long shore drift.

–

And what is the breeze’s opinion

Of the argument,

High in the rustle-top palms

And blowing from the horizon’s depth

Where the sunset,

Kaleidoscopic in the clouds,

Breaks apart in hues of molten orange.

–

And what is the sand’s point of view,

Shifting and flat

With each sluice

And slap of the waves,

The sunset oranging

The mirrory film

Exposed at the ocean’s call back

And salty in-breath.

The Cow Shed

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She goes to the lowing,

Rustling, cud chewing shed

To absorb a bovine energy.

From their eyes she drinks

A liquid stillness, breathes

Their heavy succulent breath

And observes their due drop snouts

Nuzzling and inquisitive.

More than anything

She finds them quite, satisfyingly quiet.

Despite the constant chewing,

Neck rubbing, hoof stomping

And fidgeting on their halters,

They exude

The deep silence of the soul,

A calm watery expression

Of grass transformed

To sweet clover thoughtlessness.

She drinks this in,

Finds resonance,

Matches their quality,

Becomes equally

And sublimely still.

Walk With Me

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Walk we me a while;

The night is sweet with honeysuckle

And fragrant shrubs breathing out

Their gifts for nightjars

And moths intent on the moon.

We’ve walked this path

In times past,

Many times;

We are kin

Though perhaps you’ve forgotten.

Never mind,

For arm in arm

We remember our love,

The warmth of our hearts,

The friendship

Of warm human bodies

Strolling side by side.

See, with each step upon this magic

We are closer.

To what? You ask,

Still forgetting.

To the Now perhaps

Or the tangible moment

Filled full with the moon

And dark-eyed moths

Feeding on the celestial beams

And heavenly night-shrubs.

See, up ahead, the Seeker’s gate:

It has a powerful magnetism.

But do you not feel the lushness of the

Creeping vines around us?

Do you not feel the cool

Of night shadows

Seeping between the trees

Holding earthen scents,

Sappy grasses bleeding

Into the cradling gloom?

You wish to go through the gate, I see.

I understand.

Do you wonder at what marvel lies beyond,

What treat you could be

If only we could muster the key

To enter?

No, beautiful friend, no!

Go that way

And find only endless dissatisfaction

In search of the elusive end

That never ever comes,

Always a horizon distant.

No, we are here already

For we walk arm in arm

In moonlight,

Our bare feet touching the cool stones

Of a pathway wending between trees

With waxy leaves,

Fluttering in ever so soft breezes.

See, there is enough in friendship.

Do not seek to open the gate

But look into my eyes instead,

Savour the scent of the moon

And the flavour of a wood

Enshrined in shadows,

Ever calling the nightjar and the moth.

Be here with me

In this savouring

Of the life in which our hearts beat,

A savouring of the space

In which we inhabit,

And the love

That gathers and glows

Between us

In the lush garden of ourselves.

Single Eternal Note

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I won’t go into the day save to say it was grim as an overcast sky, hungover and car sick. But now, on a beach polished golden by late afternoon light, two cold beers – my companions, refreshment beading bottle-green glass and glugged so thirstily, the whole of reality is changed, altered.

The wind moves constant through the pines, and unseen birds twitter: Vibrating needles hum a single eternal note.

The tide is in, lapping gently in the push of cool waters. Oystercatchers shrill low over the glistening brine, every wavelet capturing the blinding sun.

Moored sailboats jostle anonymous, swayed by tide, current and breeze, their lanyards chink, chink, chinking, tolling a finger-tapping rhythm, a morse code of freshness.

The wind moves constant through the pines, and unseen birds twitter: Vibrating needles hum a single eternal note.

The sun is on my back like a hug from behind. I look up, and the beach is near deserted. My companions are spent and silent, drunk.

The sunbathers have packed up, leaving but a memory’s shape pressed in the sand. Only a lone young woman remains, sitting on the wall, reading. There is a deep silence inside her, a peace made of the ever-flowing wind.

The wind moves constant through the pines, and unseen birds twitter: Vibrating needles hum a single eternal note.

Behind the woman is the row of trees from which the birds twitter. Their trunk-bodies are sculpted by the air; their faces swept clean; their hair creaking; their needles vibrating with the sound of reality.

I can taste the world, the whole world, brought by the wind and the twittering birds, constant in the fronds of the trees, creaking gently.

The wind moves constant through the pines, and unseen birds twitter: Vibrating needles hum a single eternal note.

I can feel the world, the whole world, called by the wind and the bird’s constant twittering, and the oystercatchers cutting the sunlight from the waves, and the chink, chink chinking of lanyards drumming on aluminium masts.

I know the world, the whole world, found in my broadening heart’s cool waters and the sun’s hug from behind. I know the loving world contained in the constance of silence as the wind moves through the pines and unseen birds twitter; Vibrating needles humming a single eternal note.

You Call My Name

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You call my name

With the music of your voice

And now I am falling……

–

Falling into your voice,

–

And……

–

I am….

–

Lost in the falling,

Adrift in beauty’s placeless place;

In love with love…

–

Oh, I am….

–

Speechless ………..and wordless

–

Stripped of my meaning

And brought to my knees

Before God….

–

Oh, I am

–

Silenced

–

Silence

Cool Breeze Beneath The Plane Trees

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London is sweet

In June’s ownership.

Roses billow

From front gardens

In to quite, shady streets.

There is a cool breeze

Beneath the plane trees,

And reality flexes

With a deep breath

And a mind expanding.

I read in the paper

That rare orchids had materialised

On a green roof

Among towering edifices –

An astronomical improbable chance!

Someone was quoted saying it was miraculous.

It made me wonder

What other miracles

Are yet in store,

Idling just off stage,

Unseen in the formless realm,

Unexpressed possibility

Awaiting only

A nod of our head

And an invitation to be.

A Dove Coos

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A dove coos

In the the bell tower,

Soft and throaty

And warm

For the chicks

Loved in to the nest.

–

The Scots pine,

Lofty in the graveyard,

Stands still and magnificent

Exuding presence,

Shining with silence

And oblivious of time.

–

The woodland,

Dotted with ewes

And skewed graves stones

Chatters

In warble and whistle.

In the canopy

Birds flap and flutter unseen.

For The Politicians

~ distilledvoice ~ 3 Comments

Your incendiary words

Are the kindling

In the pyre

In which you stand.

Your hatred

Are the sparks

Falling into the hot oil

Smoking at your feet.

Excite the crowd with an inciting speech,

Encourage the rage of the rage-full

Until they are hot for blood and vengeance.

But ready yourself,

For what you give out

You’ll receive in measures multiplied.

The wounds you inflict

Are both the wounds on your soul

And the wounds

Your enemies

Will flay you with.

Good Morning

~ distilledvoice ~ 2 Comments

The morning is sweet

With the bird’s high ether,

Trill, and as full

As their abandon.

The air is warm and fragrant,

Infiltrated with wood smoke

And the earth’s low savour.

In a faraway glance,

The distance fades in to mist.

The morning in the breath is sweet.