Tuesday 1 May 2012

Poems from Poland



Hi, I'm on holiday in Poland at the moment. Hope everyone is fine. Amazingly, the sun has been shining and I'm forgetting Britain's downpour of an April!! I won't be posting much this week, so here are some of my poems. They have been published in Kaleidoscope and Travelling Light. Hope you enjoy one!



We ride in cars

Slow to ride
Our comic days
All drowned in wine
In the stifling heat
We ride in cars
With windows down
Singing to strangers
Who cannot sing
Hold the tune
Against the summer breeze
With the dog’s head bobbing
He laps it up
The speeding cars
And the lingering lights
The ripped out trees
Shouting our sights
We ride in cars
Chase the tyre tracks
From dawn til dusk
We hold our fire back
And we scream and laugh
In the silencing
As the dark draws near
And we pretend to sleep
Keep the fires burning
As the dog nods on
In the piercing light
Of the summer sun



Rain

She sits and dreams of making rain
In the dark, shadows dancing mimic
Colours of the aghast
Sights and sounds and murmurs
Still breathing
Watching over the edge
Of everything
The glass splinters into a million shapes
Cast in a myriad of lights
Bright and sparkling, dancing
In the spring sun
And she dreams of making rain
That tears and crashes
Washing away the shards of glass
Splattering the colours rent
With droplets of ice-cold nothing
Cuts and caresses
Shards of grass peeking through
Clouds gathering
Dust.


Moon beams

Distancing the days
In her fragile accolade
The moon reaches down
Towards coloured boats bobbing
Twinkling she shines
Lighting the way
For every stranger passing
And old friends returning
She travels the skies
In a silvery glide
Always remembering
The shortness of time



I don’t mind

I don’t mind
If you stare
Or paint the room in blue
While I sleep

I don’t mind
If you walk a while
Or smile in your style
And mimic your expression

I don’t mind
If the urge to be is too much
Or the strength to see is gone
While I dream

Mother 

Mother, I called in the summer
Remembering a picture past
You were dressed in red
Hair glistening in the sun

You laughed so easily then
You felt no passing of time

I twisted and pulled that day
Wriggling to play in the sea
But you held on tightly
You wouldn’t let me go

Warm hands protected me
Against the wild elements

Today I remember that summer
How the sun shone so bright
The seagulls whooped and screamed
In their crazy delight

I wanted so much to swim
To leave you and play
You wrestled my independence
Urged me just to stay

Now I live so far, far away
In a city built for strangers
I work in a grey building
Dressed in a greyer suit

Even my skin feels grey beneath
In streets littered with figures
Speed is of the essence here
Substance was cast adrift

As I sit here, memories flood
Seeing you in this photograph
That red dress daring me
To pick up the phone and say hello

Mother, I’m remembering you
Pulling this struggling little boy
So he’d stay just a minute more with you



So we go

Into the night we go
Free as birds
Soundless and unseen
Trivial and green
Unknowing, unthinking
With no boundaries
No obstacles –
With wings, groundless



Ballerinas

Ballet dancers painted by Degas
Bright sweeps across a canvas
Lithe bodies captured in movement
On tiptoes, a fleet of lace

Swan Lake shimmers in snow
White tufts of hazy dew
Tap-tap tapping across the stage
Soaring then to sink and fly

Leaping skyward full of life
Jumping in motions eternal
Over again in a silent curve
Showering the empty stage

Danced out and spent
They sit and wait chattering
Dizzy with a bright energy
That leaves them laughing

Painted with a sharp compass
That scrapes across the skin
The model suffers for her art
But marvels at the result

Captured for an eternity
She shares an enigmatic smile
Standing tall and straight
As still as a porcelain doll



Moonlight

Moonlight remonstrance
Of a twilight dance
Sends shivers through winter
Blessing in disguise
Chills the epoch of time



Uplifted

Breathless I conquer all
Neither big nor small
Everything that the day reigns in
I envelop in the mist
And the love of unravelling
Until my own self is but an imitated sound



The picture

When she breaks
She dances in the mirrors of a sea of broken glass

A myriad of colours burns the fire in her tomb

She breathes in silence the warmth of summer
The sparkle of daylight upon expressive hands

And it shimmers so like developing film

This memory of mine
Fails to tear my eyes from imagining her

She dances on, alone, entombed

My selfish skin closes in again
Where the shape shifts into a swirl of colour

In my arms she plays for me alone

When she laughs
She dances in the mirrors of a shattered, broken dream

Silent now like so many others

Running naked in the night
Pausing to escape the words I never said



Gothic

Gothic glimpses of golden ages
Stricken dumb in unseen places
Giddy up the days in faces
Come and see the wilder traces
Of days once lived and glances
Back.

Journey into the darkest hour
Murder wrapt and bloody sour
Into arms of grim dark ardour
Come and see the wilder fervour
Of days once lived of dusty glamour
Dead.

Scan all the yawning faces scowling
Poor and cold in the daylight yearning
For food and shelter in the dawning
While night unravels winter’s drowning
Of sorrows in ales and dark prowling
Woe.

The fine woman in furs slips her mask
In the light she regrets her one task
That night brings with a single cask
Forgetting numbness come here fast
Lest morning remembers this time past
Hell.

Gothic glimpses of fallen ages
Trembling across unwritten pages
Lived and dreamt on wooden stages
Fuelled by fire and unlocked cages
Come and see the magic of mages
Gone.



War

Acorns in the sand
Grow into bullets in the hand
Wedged still and deep
Bringers of eternal sleep
Smashing a world of hate
That reaps a many splintered fate


Copyright Vickie Johnstone

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