I have published a poetry book (over 200 poems) on Amazon ~
”Walking in Between” by A.Gouedard
Available internationally on Kindle
Also available in a paperback edition
You can find it on my Authors Page at
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=a+gouedard
bedtime stories are a door
between day and nightly dreams
a door held open by a voice
swinging in softly imagined breeze
that blows in from a magic land
scented sweet with jasmin and juniper,
and roses for summer warmth
they lull a child to gentle sleep
on banks of woodland flowers
and keep them safe to wander there
until the sun returns
when we are grown the stories fade
our troubles follow at night
in corridors we search for doors
shadows swallow the light
but now I will return again
to find the forgotten tales
that lead us to the faerie glades
where pleasant dreams are made
her voice
a scraping blackboard scratch
of lies
manipulating lives
twisting facts
with rhetoric
her purposes disguised
her bitter lips
drip insulting venom
her corkscrew mind
drills all opposition
medusa
politician
spinning subtle schemes
subverting all our dreams
what fools she thinks we are
My first true love was earth, dry earth and water mixed, piling dirt in mounds, trying to shape the mud. Digging, digging, digging, squatted on the earth, pouring water in to make a captured pool. I watched it soak away.
Broken finger nails
Scrabbling at resistant earth,
Burrowing with worms.
Alone I worked day after day, shaded by the Yews, until the puppy came, near as old as I, and just as keen to dig. We worked on side by side, driven by curiosity, searching for the truth or an ancient bone. The earth flew out behind us as we dug the hole.
When would water rise?
Could we find the fearsome fire?
Could we reach the source?
Stopped by tangled roots.
Water ran between my palms,
Mud sucked at my feet.
We ran off to play,
Covered head to toe in earth.
We’d dig another day.
On Cadair Idris, close by to the bottomless lake of Llyn Cau, I spent the night on a Rocking Stone, with a youthful desire in my heart, to be a Poet Bard. Legend has it that a night on Cadair’s cold flank gives the curse of madness, or the blessings of Seer or Bard. I knew the risk to my mind and the risks of the rocking stone, the balancing of the stone, a balance to be held on a dark night, high up and all alone. I sat and prayed in silence to the moon and stars above, looking up with eyes wide open, alert to the mountain, the rock and the wind that blew in that desolate spot.
The night was long. I came down with the dawn as nothing; an empty vessel waiting to be filled. No-one, nothing at all. Aware that I was very small.
Ten years later, or was it five, and does it matter how old I was, I spent the night on a rock atop a Tor, looking out across a wide open remote moor. I saw the creatures of the night as they scurried about and eyes shining and blinking in the dark. I heard the song of the wind through the rocks. Nothing more. It was enough.
The night was long. I came down feeling I belonged to something though I knew not what. I became a journey begun.
The night I spent on the cliff edge where the wind sings in the grass above granite rock, the waves beat on the rocks below and seven hours became one. Time slowed, or the stars and the moon sped by, who can tell which, the night I sat high on the cliff edge, the moon path spread across the sea, glimmering on water, reaching out to the a far horizon.
The stars, with the moon at the centre of all, moved in a slow ballet of curved motion across the sky, the constellations shone out from the web of night, a rotation eternal, a moving wheel. Beneath me the tide rolled in an out, fast. Time did not stop, it slowed or the world sped up while beauty shone out high above.
Seven hours became one.
If I can, by a shift of my mind, alter seven hours to one could I change one hour to seven and make life longer or can I pull seven hours into one? What is time but illusion? The days of a child are long, a summer an eternity. Seven hours could easily be as seven decades to a shorter lived creature than me. Does a butterfly live six score years and ten in so short a span as a day.
The earth is a rocking stone held in place by the moon while the sun brings it life. Time does not exist. Life and death is all we have and are but we are not bound in time.
We are all finely balanced on the stone. We either fall off or we balance.
This is all I have learned on the Rocking Stone. This is not the end of my journey, a journey I make alone.
You tell me of bad weather news
And how the price of food went up.
You quote the words of politicians,
I agree they’re open lies.
You worry there will be a drought.
I think about the falling rivers
And how the willows give it shade.
My mind begins to drift.
I know my eyes are far away.
I try to hold on to your words
Like broken branches floating by.
I sense a sigh you’re holding in.
Yes,
I’m doing it again.
I smile and look in your eyes,
Signifying my return.
You speak about the greater issues,
How your life is troubling you.
I nod.
You know I understand.
It’s true that life is problematic.
It’s true I’m tired of being strong.
I wish to tightly grasp your hand
And take you through another door,
The door that’s slowly opening now,
That leads into another land.
I hear your words,
I hear a song,
That echoes in the depth of pools.
There’s only one place left to hide.
The leaves are growing up our walls,
There’s mud and ash across the floor.
The wind that’s blown the window wide
Brings a scent of woodland paths
And bluebells by the flowing stream.
I can hear the blackbird now,
It signals that it’s time to leave.
My heart is very far away.
I dream of other worlds.
I’ve seen.
I offer air and dust
a gift not lightly given
sealed tight inside a beating heart
and gathered by my eyes
dust is dust of mother earth
the ground you stand upon
with the very air you breathe
that bears an angels wings
disguised against the sky
this gift I bring
has never cost me anything
but a wandering mind
that haunts my nightly dreams
to find sweet beauty in the dark
and plays at hide and seek
through real, unreal and in-between
to find a spark divine
the words are never mine
they’ve all been used before
that’s how a poet lives
our store is hand to mouth
like beggars on the street
whose worth comes with no price
we search to find our sight
the work is not complete
did we survive so long in hardship
with arrow, quiver, toil and song
to reach a place, where all’s forgotten,
no honour held in memory,
of how they worked to make us strong?
I remember some of them
my family fought for generations
for a cause we know is just
we rose, we fell, we rose again
our banners both of air and dust
the tales i know will pass away
unwritten in the ancient books
were our dreams so misbegotten
that we face a future here
where nature’s treasures are befouled
and horrors rob this lovely place?
virtue’s lost and hides its face
in sorrow for a world held dear
dust is dust
air is air
dust floats on the air
the unwounded self, at the heart, is still
in response to circumstance we turn
between the worlds we move as one
chased along by thrusting time
only surface changes
perhaps forever
as i will be
as i was
i am
now
gone
and dead
if you are
in cold despair
i am alone here
we turn it round in faith
life runs like a salt hour glass
hours and days pass us by with speed
which world is real is a mystery
there is an open door between two worlds
there is an open door between two worlds
which world is real is a mystery
hours and days pass us by with speed
life runs like a salt hour glass
we turn it round in faith
i am alone here
in cold despair
if you are
dead and
gone
now
i am
as i was
as i will be
perhaps forever
only surface changes
chased along by thrusting time
between the worlds we move as one
in response to circumstance we turn
the unwounded self, at the heart, is still
Sharp-tongued, bad-tempered,
Baleful with knowledge,
Ambitious witch,
A fervent desire burns in her eyes.
With charms written backwards,
She gives us long tasks.
We perform.
It’s her will.
We sit at the cauldron stirring dark liquids
As moons chase sun after sun from the hills.
The cauldron is split.
She screams in her fury.
Vicious elixir spills out on the land
Poisoning horses,
Parching the lake.
All of her wishes taken from her.
Disappointed, tyrannical mother,
Who spurs on her children, as if to their ruin,
Giving, by this, the magical spark
The three precious drops
Bright knowledge and wisdom
Three drops to shine in the pitiless dark.
For this she will chase you.
Chase you through dreams.
There is no escape from her dark self-esteem
Turning to meet her, tired of the race,
Looking the dark hag straight in the face
My eyes newly opened
I see there another
A goddess
A mother
Spinning a wheel and harvesting grace.
Beneath her dark robes is a glimmering brightness,
A fire that transforms, ignites and inspires.
Her curse marks the path to all of her blessings
And opens the way to visions of light
At the heart of this beautiful chalice of night.
The Dreaming Path 