Tag: beauty

Dials and Bells

Dials and Bells

looking up skywards
   we can't fail to see

      dials and bells
      on a tower face


   marking time
sounding alarms

   as our lives tick by
chimes ringing out


      we can yell
   we can scream
whisper or shout

dials mark time
   in a visual way


      but now we find
   we may not know
   or even understand


      what time is
or how it flows


   what really matters 
with the time we have
      is how we grow
and what we grow into

Spring by the Lake

the water's cold
   although the 
      ice is gone.

   we know icy water 
from almost before 
      we were young .

   stick your toes
in springtime's 
      chilly water. 

your toes went in
      to the ankle;
you know cold water
for long as you live.


      deep chill, 
      down deep
to where light fades

into featureless
      blurry shadow

      diffuse light
seems to come
from every place.


interesting days,
      we still survive:

      icy weather,
   cold spring water
chills our toddler toes.

Rose Habitat

i grow them
in the garden:
roses, aphids,
ladybirds.
an entertaining
world, a place
to rest,
relax and think

roses are red
or pink,
yellow
or white.
aphids are
nasty things,
farmed by ants,
ladybirds are
carnivores and
save our plants

therapeutic:
gardening,
hands scooping
up the soil,
so rewarding
as we tend
green things,
blessed by
beauty and
fresh foods

i’d like to
share the
beauty,
lighten up
your day,
so someday,
when your world
comes back,
you can come
out to play

meanwhile,
we chafe
and weep
and wail.
it is
no fun
at all,
watching
the sun
cruise east
to west,
all the
stinking day

nothing lasts,
we might
survive
this plague
living in
cages we
create,
we stay away,
in case
you’re sick,
or i.

i grow them
in the garden:
roses, aphids,
ladybirds.
an entertaining
world, a place
to rest,
relax and think

 

Peace Lily, March 2020

Peace Lily, March 2020

Impossibly
graceful
in white,
she gets my
attention
and I
cannot
merely
walk past.
She makes me
stop and look,
I make
a photograph.

Serious,
her beauty,
it occupies
my thought.
But just
because
I see her,
that doesn’t
make her mine.

Great gentleness
might be
required,
should I
ever try
to touch.
Already
she has
suffered,
suffered
all too much.

Translucent,
with the light
behind,
white on white,
I know
I’m blind.
There’s subtle
beauty I can’t
even see.
My eyes
are not
enough
for me.

I know
there’s more,
much more
to know,
but my
poor eyes
see her
just so.

Tiny

Tiny

Flowers so small,
they may
remain unseen.

They stand
oblivious
before me,
unaware I
may have
crushed them
underneath
my large and
clumsy feet.

We miss
so much
under the
pressure
of our
frantic lives.
We walk
our walks,
unseeing,
past so much.
So much beauty,
so little time
to see it.

A time may come
when I will seek
her friendship
if it’s there
for me.
But now we walk
unseeing past,
mired in
gruesome
realities
we dare not
truly face.

After the Storm

After the Storm

Once the
storm passed,
shaken
a bit by
imminent wreck,
(adventure
avoided)
we watch
others, as
we all
walk back
to refuge,
huge ships.

Storms happen,
whether we
insulate
ourselves,
or not.
They landed
us at
the nearest
safe haven,
the boat
tossing
us about.
And then
our feet
on rock
solidity.

We all have
our storms.
Our lives
are lived
in unknown
danger.
Out in
darkness,
deadly surprises
sometimes lurk.
We cannot
know how
to prepare.

Such beauty,
in those
skies, her
dark and
secret eyes.
So much
to know
and still
no way
to understand.
A man is
such a small
and feeble thing,
out in
those storms.

Broad View

Summer brings beauty,
green tones
like a special heaven.

Afternoon heat
bakes tired eyes.
Its easy
to forget.
Breathe. Breathe.

Doze only
in safety.
Predatory creatures
may appear.
Some of them
could be human…

Treetops provide
refuge
from predators.
When time
becomes non-linear,
a secret story
can not be told.

Two wide photographs
make a panoramic scene.
Houses on a hillside,
hundreds of years after
el Greco’s Toledo.

 

The way we live,
these days.
Separated by fences,
each in our own
private space.

 

Summer brings beauty,
green tones
like a special heaven.

Tomato

All these things
we never see,
all joy and wonders.
Close up,
things become,
in some ways,
clearer.
Yet, we see
even less.

All in a family,
there can be
so many variations,
potatoes, tomatoes,
and poisonous cousins.
Nightshades can be deadly.

Potatoes and tomatoes
are such favourites,
the poison
is bred out.
So nothing’s left
to fear.
And life continues,
to ends
we cannot know.