poem

Believe what you like

/ A. Gouedard / Leave a comment

this is a game of consequences,
angles, perspectives, attitudes
pitiless, clear
nothing less, nothing more
there’s a futile dead end to thought
the pathos filled path to no place
that wide open sceptical door
to self pity, the pit, no mercy
making us less than we are
a shard of ice in the heart
the manacled fire of the mind
where life becomes paltry,
feeble, flawed
into the darkness we walk
drowning our sorrows
dying for water
parched

caught from an earlier rain
a droplet on a dark leaf
reflecting a light that gleams
a shimmering fragile globe
it mirrors the tree, growing above
where wide open branches reach to the sky
if we ever looked up we would see
the way they turn to the sun and grow tall

nothing can make us small
nothing will stop us from standing again
except the belief that the sun doesn’t shine
and the clouds will never bring rain

Galeforce

/ A. Gouedard / 2 Comments

woods on the hilltop groan and sway
gale blows in wild from the raging sea
pools of leaves whirl at my feet
branches crash down, world lifting up
drunken sailor riding a roundabout

stumbling, i cling to a creaking oak
this wind whips the world inside out
at the edge of the wood, mad scarecrow i stand
close to the cliff edge, mouth open wide

i swallow the ocean, breathe with the sea
facing the wind, words swept away
shouting, screaming, into the gale
Take me! Lift me! Let me fly!

lungs expanded, triumphant I rise
above the woods, tumbling in flight
blown with no sail, nowhere to fall,
dark clouds, hidden moon, stars spin in the sky
i grin, like a loon,
ecstatic fool

The Hidden Ones

/ A. Gouedard / Leave a comment

Our people were warriors, they journeyed far.
They followed the sun, the moon, the stars.
They honoured their dead who dwell with the living.
They left their mark on hilltop and moor.

They farmed the land to suit the seasons,
Skilled in crafts and rejoicing in song.
They sailed the seas and carved the stones.
They run in the blood, remembered in bone.

In spoken words, with no need of books,
Their stories passed from heart to heart.
Power and land they may have lost
But their thoughts and truths were not overcome

They have no followers yet are followed still,
With origins lost but stories repeated,
In the great glories of poetry that still lives on,
They are amongst us here, the hidden ones.

Bountiful West

/ A. Gouedard / Leave a comment

Bountiful West

The cup gleams gold in the light
Golden liquid overflowing
Round bowl on a slender stem.
On the table beside it are apples.
Red, yellow, glowing,
Globed sunlight bursting with juice.
Outside in the meadow, the cows
Brown and white, gentle eyed, lowing,
As the calf pushes and pulls on the teat,
Staggers a little and suckles.
Warm milk for the jug.
A blue and white bowl holds the cream.
Blue and white is the sky above
Brown and deep the buzzing of bees
Making the foxgloves bend and bow
Under the coolness of trees
Where the earth holds the richness of leaves
And the bones of the ancestors rest
In the land of the ever blessed.