THE ADDER

Little Adder, much maligned
by human minds unrefined,
your fate's decided by their fear.
For you I often shed a tear.

To see you slaughtered mercilessly:
so brutally and thoughtlessly
by those who in total ignorance dwell,
prompts me to your story tell.

For as the only poisonous snake
upon Albion Isle, your place you take
within the Tradition of this land -
oh yes, my little friend, you're grand!

As prime totem of Morgan, you are
the most important player by far
in the Battle of Camlan's tragedy:
but also in it's remedy.

As Arthur with Mordred in uneasy truce
attempted to the threat of war reduce,
you suddenly darted into view
so a soldier his sword instinctively drew.

The rest is legend - Arthur was slain,
bringing upon us the wasteland and pain.
Then Morgan bore him to Avalon
where your venom revived him from oblivion.

So, fellow humans...
please give me your word that from this day
if you see an Adder you will not slay
this symbol of the Goddess' darker phase,
or you'll surely set Her wrath ablaze.

IDENTITY CRISIS

For Monika...my friend and fellow misfit! ;)


My nature is dual:
I am of a land of ice and snow
that freezes the blood,
yet also of a country of drizzle and mist -
a green place, temperate and overpopulated.

I was conceived beneath Finland's midnight sun,
then planted in England's fertile plain.
My duality linked two lovers
barely able to speak
each others language -
except through my genes.
I cannot tell whether
I am dark or fair.
Should I wear chunky knits
or delicate silks?
Will I tan easily
or burn to a cinder
in a rare English heatwave?

They call me British, but
these crowds frighten me -
prompt a craving for the vast open spaces
of my maternal land:
those barren wilds that endlessly call
through ancestral echoes
to my evolutionary Soul.

An identity crisis looms
like a lengthening winter shadow:
Who is this person in the mirror
whose feet leave imprints
in British soil?
Has she any right to be here?
She is certainly no thoroughbred,
so is she mongrel?
Perhaps...
for I do speak English
while thinking in Finnish.
Does this, then, deem me impostor?
Or simply a cultural conundrum:
identity unknown?

RAINBOW'S END

The sun is shining
             through torrential rain.
At the rainbow's end
             a latter-day Adonis,
dark eyes flashing.
Entranced, I stare...
             into emptiness.
Where am I in life?
             I am lost.


Drowning in the pouring rain
that mingles with private tears.
Tasting salt on icy lips,
I think of a man.
He
spurns my love, crushing my Soul.
Who is to blame?
Ah, the insubstantial dream.


Drenched and bedraggled,
             the pain cuts far too deep.
The rain is cold
             and frozen his heart
whose compassion I fail to reach.


Oh what joy to thaw that heart!


Forget him!
             Please Gracious Lady
                                         let me forget him.


Falling asleep
             I dream
                   of dark eyes flashing.
For a glorious instant
             I touch his essence:
writhing in rapture,
             Heavenly bliss!
Intense is the agony as I awake
                  to find myself alone.


Weary of chasing shadows,
I take a tangible love.
But in a hot embrace, I find
I'm screaming for the ice
and that tousled hair, black as night
                    and a single sullen stare.
Oh how my female passions aroused
are craving him, body and Soul
and those sensuous dark eyes flashing,
whose gaze I cannot meet,
             lest into a whirlpool I be sucked
                           and swallowed by the sea.



Yearning to be lost
             forever in his tears.
Tasting salt on waiting lips,
             I'd give him all of me...
But
face the truth:
             my love he must abhor.
Within his silence lies the proof -
             to him I'm less than nought.


Wandering through the ruins
             of a castle made of air,
searching for a rainbow
             that simply isn't there.
Whilst dying of a broken heart,
             they ask the truth of me:
"Why do you weep so endlessly...
             Why can't your heart be free?"
No answer can I give them
             to this suffering inside.
But
      gazing through yon window,
                           I whisper my reply:


"The sun is shining
             through torrential rain..."

THE UNKNOWN SAILOR

                                

                                    The Sailor's Stone, Hindhead, Surrey, England.

There wasn't a living Soul could fix
nor even hope to allay
the atrocity of seventeen-eighty-six
on that grey and misty day,
when with the soil his blood did mix
as his life force ebbed away.

He did not die a natural death,
the unknown sailor, that night.
It was footpads who stole his final breath
as he traversed the lonely height
of Hindhead's sandy heather-bound heath
with the Devil's Punchbowl in sight.

In his own defence he struck no blows
for his assailants came from behind
to batter him where the thick gorse grows -
a place they considered no one likely to find
his corpse when they left it to decompose
beneath weeds and ferns entwined.

They ran off with his few possessions:
his clothes and a guinea or two,
without a thought of how such transgressions
might affect his relatives, who
would be condemned to deep depressions
because of the greed of these two.

Well, they believed they'd got away with it -
and they surely would have done too,
if it hadn't been for the Guardian Spirit
of this poor sailor in the guise of a yew,
who had witnessed it all and by means of wit
made sure the authorities knew.

So these two were hanged on Gibbet Hill
on a cold and frosty morn.
Although protesting their innocence still,
guilt-ridden they died forlorn.

                           The Gibbet Hill Monument, where the robbers were hanged.

BRACKLESHAM BAY IN JANUARY

This is not how I remember it:
last summer both sea and sky were blue
and children's laughter filled the air
like morning birdsong, while grownups in swimsuits
lay on the beach toasting their fair skin
to a deep shade of raw.

Today, there's just one man
walking his dog. He stares through me,
his heavy boots crunch, crunch, crunching by -
at least, I assume it's a he - I can see no more
than a pair of eyes peering out
from beneath hat, balaclava and overcoat.

All I can smell and taste is salt.
At my feet, the freezing weed-bearded sea
seems to reach out to me
in waves that long to share secret memories
of bygone days and forgotten lives.
Ssh! Are those hoof beats I hear thundering along the shoreline

above the sound of the restless surf?
My heartbeats race to catch you up.
A time warp engulfs us both:
suddenly, I'm riding behind you on your grey mare,
my arms wrapped tightly around your waist, as I watch
your white linen shirt billowing

like a spinnaker in the balmy wind
and the horse's hooves throwing up clumps of wet sand.
I'm gripped by an ecstasy of anticipation.
The sun dancing on the surface of the water is dazzling.
I close my eyes and we touch Souls...
across a chasm of ninety years.

THE GREAT MISTAKE

Please do not believe me a fool,
Nor that you'll later think she was an easy conquest;
Or it serves her right for being so gullible;
Nor laugh about the things I didn't say:
No, I'm not interested; out of the question;
You're not welcome; stay out of my affairs;
These things are private -
For my knowledge only.


And please do not believe you caught me
On an off-day and took advantage
With a glib tongue that wheedled from me
The Great Mistake:
My downfall; sacrifice of future comforts;
Independence; everything I've worked for -
In fact, my very identity...


When you convinced me you were calling
From my bank and elicited from me
My personal codes.


And finally, do not believe for one moment
That you have got away with it.
Oh, no doubt you think yourself clever
And now rather well off with your ill-gotten gains:
But, boy, do I have news for you.
Let me formally introduce myself:
I am Detective Inspector Lucy Lane.
I have been tracking you for months...


And now you, my friend, are nicked!

A GRAVEYARD IN WINTER

The air is sombre: ancient Yews,
darker now than in summer, murmur sad elegies;
and frozen grass seems trapped in time
like those who lie beneath it's emerald haze,
their tongues now stilled and silent in death.
No dead men's wraiths frequent this place,

only memories of the living:
of winters past and moments shared
in love, with these now unpicked
to bare bone by worm and insect,
their tender touch long gone, yet craved still
in the endless spiral of grief.

Silence grandiloquent inner dialogue for a moment
and through half closed eyes, stare
into the depths of  wreaths and bouquets:
can you not see the millions of tears that glitter
between each leaf and petal, not feel the agony
of the bereaved heart that howls

in living damnation, it's black veil
flitting shadows across the edge of vision?
Feel the shivers running down your spine.
It is for these we should weep - these mortals unable to see
the loved ones their starving hearts mourn
in the haunted spaces of home.