Tag Archives: Poems

Angels Shriek

Confusion of days and nights

Twisted sheets tumble across flickering sky

Darkness thrown across the wind-wrecked barley

Martins and swallows prematurely gather

Uncertain in this unsettled time

When waxing moon throws out more brightness than day can muster

The star-full firmament clashed by raw, untrammelled fury

Full throttled fire-powered flight

Claws at the clouds, turns them to drums

Unceasing cacaphonic clamour

Enough to make the angels shriek

Metal made to shatter Thor’s anvil

Screams at the ceiling of Valhalla’s vaults

Wakes the gods who are not pleased

To be stirred up so

By Eurofighters on night manoevres

Above Avalon and its hippy bourgeosie

Where talk of energies

And peaceful contemplation is ripped asunder

Below the warplanes’ oil-driven thunder

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n.b. They’re shipbuilding again; Iran the place and oil the focus. ‘Shipbuilding’ is a song about the Falklands Islands / Islas Malvenas War 1982.

n.n.b. The title here is an echo of the anglicized title of a beautiful novel, ‘Night Flight’ (‘Vol de nuit’) by Antoine de Saint-Exubéry. It was published in 1931 when the horrific potential of aircraft as weapons was in full development, despite the romantic views of a man on the wing amidst the elements.

CLP 11/08/2019

The Test

Welled up through chalk; clear and bright

Mixed with floodplain mud

Strained through reeds

Her gentle curves

Restrained, contained within lines

Corsetted by stone, steel and concrete

She spills down the neck of Southampton Water

Runs to the welcome arms of the silent sea

Washed clean again on the double tide

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n.b. The port at Southampton has developed over the centuries at a site that enjoys a double tide. 17 hours a day of rising water have long made it a home for commercial shipping.

The top of this coastal inlet is fed by two rivers, the Itchen to the east and the Test to the west. Both originate in the chalk downland and have stretches populated by rainbow trout that have historically thrived in the clear water.

https://www.nci.org.uk/stations/solent-tides-and-currents

CLP 10/08/09

In A Vacuum

You hear what you want

Without dissenting voices

Everything is true

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n.b. If we only connect with those we agree with we learn nothing. How do we connect with those we stand opposite to in opinion and belief?

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CLP 09/08/2019

On Relection

Glass mirrors times past

What is new that you see there?

Open the window

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n.b. El Presidente visited El Paso and said to the press corps, “I wish you could have been there to see it.”

What did he mean, the appalling damage caused by a single young man with a rifle? No, he meant the respect shown to the Office of President of the United States of America. Sad.

CLP 08/08/2019

Under A Cloud

Wind chimes resonate

With whispers from weary leaves

Tears flood the desert

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n.b. Texas has a complicated history; a place of moving people, territorial disputes, economic and political upheaval. More than 10,000 years of identifiable settlement, a piece of land with an ever-changing cast and shifting borders.

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CLP 07/08/2019

Lost in the Supermarket

They just went shopping.

Tell me, what is wrong with that?

May they rest in peace.

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n.b. There are at least 150 gun manufacturers in the USA according to Wikipedia.

Every mass murder leads to more gun sales, as people driven by fear, arm themselves just in case they need to defend themselves when they decide to nip down to the shops.

n.n.b. I have taken this title from The Clash album, ‘London Calling”.

CLP 06/08/2019

All At Sea

Alarmed, startled awake

Essential items fumbled for

Grabbed, stashed and stowed at first light

Bleary drive to the port for the morning ferry

Relief at reaching the queue steadily being consumed by the ship’s jaws

A necessary pause at the UK Border Force barrier

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“Sorry, sir, but this is not your passport.”

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She had died

Five years past

Yet here she is

Handed back to me

Fixed face, impassive as required for the officious photograph

Eyes bright

With me still

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02/08/2019

In the Bus Queue

A one act play for three voices in 17 syllables.

Oh no! It’s raining!

Yes, after such a bright dawn.

Really? I slept in.

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CLP 04/07/2019

On Misunderstanding

(A one act play for two voices in 17 syllables)

You misunderstand.

I am not missing the point

You are. I am not.

CLP 03/08/2019

In the Mist

August, not autumn

Yet heavy dew at sunrise

Cows float on carpets

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CLP 03/08/2019