Tag: time

• the waiting room (excerpt)

  rain falls now in silver shafts
  and I wonder
  as I always wonder
  when reality will make its entrance
  as in a doctor’s waiting room
  or the waiting room
  of a rural branch line
  some sunny day
  so many years ago
  I can’t remember

  dust on the old shelves
  in the old place
  the silent space I once inhabited

  the books I took from room to room
  lie yellowing in boxes
  and all the while the minutes pass
  the paper peals from sodden walls
  a curling shroud of roses
  leaves the scent of putrefaction

  the waiting room is dark

  17/09/2016

  futility, time, waiting room

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• arpeggios

  hands open
  hands close
  hands give expression to the soul

  and if I lose the use of mine
  what value then will be my life

  so I shall play arpeggios while I can
  broken chords
  like spokes upon a wheel

  none of these notes mean a single thing
  but bring me joy

  if temporary
  all things are temporary

  except for one

  06/08/2016

  arpeggios, disability, hands, music, Parkinson’s, time

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• obtained by digging

  experience flashes over us
  like the morning shower

  the more intense it is
  the more difficult to grasp

  for one whole second
  let alone an hour

  if I could only hold a moment
  from that wellspring of joyous giving

  but all I have are these
  dull memories

  like casts and molds
  no longer living

  so long ago it seems
  intangible as dream

  but for these cold fossil forms
  obtained by digging

  05/03/2016

  age, digging, dream, fossils, love, memory, time

  ---

• slip knot

  the day slips by so fast
  I wonder what the point is

  so I fix a point
  gather the day

  breathe

  pray

  and soft falls
  the wall clock

  time ties
  a slip knot

  18/11/2015

  prayer, time, transcendence

  ---

• headland 1

  there will be time for reading books
  and time for sitting on the grass
  time for looking at the shadow cast
  by the house
  we lived in as children

  there will be time to pick up pebbles
  by the sea
  and if that is not enough
  for you and me
  time to wander further out than that
  over to the headland
  where there are flecks of light flickering
  and people gathering on the beach
  to look at the fallen man

  but now time is upon us
  and things must be made ready

  02/08/2015

  cliff, fall, headland, sea, time

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• Pictures

  The flat was in Rue Montmartre as I recall,
  a sequence of pictures hung upon a wall
  that explained the meaning of time;
  photos in black and white of geometric shapes,
  unusual shapes that held the eye, disturbed the eye.

  I sat in a corner café much concerned,
  ran back to find a tenant now installed,
  a face I barely recognised at first,
  to whom I would explain once and for all,
  the meaning of those pictures on the wall.

  I failed to make him understand a thing
  of how as a totality all exists,
  and screamed: ‘Just let me see them one last time’,
  ran into the room to find them gone
  and in their place instead, but lately hung,
  the portrait of a mother holding child.

  ‘Too late,’ I said. ‘I’ve come here far too late.’

  Now in my head I tread forever more,
  the dingy inner stair, first up, then down,
  in vain, not getting anywhere at all.

  The flat was in Rue Montmartre as I recall.

  18/05/2015

  consciousness, poetry, time

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