A HEARTBEAT LOST

For Peter Benson...in memoriam

My heart sank when I heard
of your sudden passing. This was
something too final, too hopeless to bear -
the certainty I'd never, ever, see you again.
I was (and am) grieving even more
than your adoring public, a grief
unexpressed yet so profoundly felt.
Still, I can smile at the recollections, though,
of your wicked sense of humour
and such touching vanity - in which
year did you claim you were born??
But smiles are soon ousted by bitter tears.

There is only your alter ego to cling to now:
Bernie Scripps, frozen in time
within a treasured collection of videos
resting on a special shelf. And those post cards
you sent from Goathland and New York
have taken on new significance.
Their images and words are stuck in my skull
where they evoke so vividly
each separate memory of you in life.
But your future was obliterated by the thunderbolt:
our distant friendship, your stardom - all
are consigned now to memory's sombre tomb
and I, at this moment in time, am nowhere.

Oh how I wish I could become as stone,
unable to feel,
for this agony of loss
catches so in my throat... 

TRANSMUTATION

Sometimes, the observer can become the observed:
my head encircled by scarlet petals,
leaves in place of fingers, tongue a mute stamen.
And all those characteristics

that hitherto defined me as human
are unrecognizable now.
Unbelievable sense of liberation!
Time, finally,

to just be,
to flirt with the insect kingdom.
Day rolls into night,
that mosaic of shimmering orbs.

Fireflies.
Their entrancing patterns
messing with my awareness:
is that truly the Flower Queen I sense before me?

Incredulous, basking in the morning sun
I'm suddenly whole,
at one with all of my kind.
And in the glittering ethereal

sprinkling of summer dew,
where my roots reach deep
into the soft moist soil,
I draw nourishment for my green cells.

Two bees
competing to make me reproduce,
their legs heavy with yellow pollen.
My sap rising,

now flooding in anticipation.
Ah, such blissful metamorphosis:
in this sun drenched meadow
I have found paradise!

I smile inwardly. Beautiful butterflies dancing on my petals.
I am everything
I have ever dreamed of being -
how astonishing is dehumanization!

The nucleus of the scarlet poppy,
intoxicated by it's own essence,
exists in a state of utter bliss.


I am taking a break for a couple of weeks, so will "see" you again soon.
Happy Blogging! :))

THE SURFER

The rich glow of sunset rides the restless waves.
He glides high on a crest, sure of his balance
and then soars like a gull. And landing is just as graceful.
He slides into the beach. Soaking, dripping wet.

He tells me it's California next year, as the *Strand
no longer challenges. But he's said it many times before,
always at summer's end when the lengthening nights
begin to deflate him. Touching the deep battle scar
on his thigh: "The Strand can be lethal!"

When he kisses me it's like drowning at sea.
But I find I'm developing gills.
It's daunting though, such fanatical enthusiasm,
and my slightest hesitation infuriates him.
Huge decision. He's asking me to sacrifice so much.
I am no groupie...but those gorgeous golden curls!

I plug in the Beach Boys. He drives the Volkswagen
into the night. The entire Universe is us,
sunshine and surf - and a peculiar kind of togetherness
that depends on lots of time apart and no firm commitments.
Approaching headlights pick out the blonde in his curls

and a picture-perfect bone structure.
Here, is my life.

*Trebarwith Strand, Cornwall, England.

PIPEDREAMS

You were a diminutive form among the sprawling ferns
between Peggy's house and the tennis courts
that aren't there now, all aglow with puppy love.

The Down has altered drastically: our woods replaced by houses
and Wilson's store is now a private dwelling. Painful nostalgia
yanks me back to '69, with exquisite delusions

of being thirteen again and us being together
and carefree: me choking on a stolen cigarette
while you fumble in vain with the catch on my bra.

Oh how grown-up we felt then, our adventure just beginning.
Hard smack back to earth. Reality check:
a drugs overdose claimed your life in spring nineteen-eighty.

But in my inner Headley, you've never really left me. We
are still together. The old houses and dirt roads
surround us like a comforting blanket

wrapped around us in childhood: that precious,
precious sense of safety and nurture
that prompts joyous laughter on sunny days,

while idling on Ludshott Common and watching
the bees collecting pollen, as we peruse our joint future:
our wedding, a home, four children...

aah, such rapturous pipedreams!

6 a.m. on DINAS EMRYS

Something is moving in the bracken,
it's presence is betrayed by a rustling
in the dew-drenched ferns nearby.

You can see for miles from here,
majestic sunrise and silver river winding through the valley.
The mountains of Snowdonia

reach up into a boundless sky
enshrouded in morning mist, and the magic
of myth and legend emanates

from the very ground beneath your feet.
Half-disbelieving, did you really just see
Merlin emerge from that hawthorn tree?

THE TROUBLES

Oh go on then - be a sacrifice,
throw your life away on your futile cause!
But first, let the hypocrisy go:
burn your Bible...
Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not kill.
Catholic Angels must be covering their eyes.

Following blindly in Father's footsteps:
ah, such bitter contempt for Protestant mores
and flouting the other Commandments nine -
for what are these
if not deliberate concoctions to keep you subdued?
Oh never underestimate enemy tactics.

Disregard the Holy Days next, and kill the Vicars
in cold blood beside the British soldiers
who came here to steal your territory.
You see only red...
the fury, the blood running in rivers
that carve up the heart of your beloved Belfast.

Blow the pubs to smithereens.
Shoot them all in their own homes.
How does it feel to wield such power -
to be able to choose who lives and who dies?
But what do you think you're teaching your children?
Only yesterday, little Johnny lost a hand while making a bomb.

Now graveyards overflow with the innocent dead
who meant you no harm, only got in the way
of your frenzied fanatical doctrine.
And then distorted perceptions of nationalism
became an obsession that turned within
to create a this vengeful Angel of Death.

In the burning wreck of a fire-bombed car
lurk shocking images of the holocaust.
Oh what's it all for -
this hatred, this bloodshed born of intolerance?
You're human, for God's sake.
We all are.
So let's work together to end these troubles.
It's within our power.

Oh please,  please...? 


Lines written in 1974, after I narrowly escaped being blown to bits in the Guildford pub bombings.

SUMMER OAKS

Summer oaks dressed in vibrant green.
In their meadow of wild poppies, these trees
could be Van Gogh creations:
beauty composed of Nature's own hues,
a series of exquisite masterpieces.

They have no capacity for greed or hate -
unlike the ego of man,
and they live in harmony with all Creation:
filtering the air and generating oxygen
so we can live and thrive.

These beings are noble, utterly vital,
so where is our reciprocal respect?
What do we do but cut them down
just because they block our view...
the earth's lungs carelessly excised.

Soon
we'll all be extinct.