Wych Elm
Green is the wych-elm
Torn is the tiding,
Ghosts in the old country
Surely are riding,
Deep lie the shadows
On dull days in waiting,
Trace the old harmonies
Long in creating,
Sharp is the memory,
Dark is the will,
Lost for all seasons
In some rippling rill.
Long did he wander,
He that in I
Took to the meadows,
Gazed at the sky,
Rambled by rivers and
Rolled in the corn,
He that in I was
When we were new-born,
Fled by the wych-elm
Where age and old sin
Awaited his passing
That he would come in.
He that came in as
The I that went by him
Smiled in some greeting
That caught my tongue tying,
Reached for the reins of
His dapple-grey gelding,
Rode through the seasons
That never had ending,
Squandered the meadows
And trampled the corn,
Serving the wych-elm of
Both of us born.
Now I return with
The lines in our faces,
Searching for shadows of
Both of our traces,
Hoping for comfort or
Words of some kindness,
Lost in the echoing
Creed of my blindness,
Shadows of him that I
Tore from within me,
Left by the wych-elm
To steal that he lent me.
Green is the wych-elm
Torn is the tiding,
Ghosts of the old country
Surely are riding,
Out by the meadow
A child that waylays me,
Speaks to me once, and that:
‘You have betrayed me! ’
Turns at the river to
Gaze at the sky,
Rides away slowly,
He that was I.
Nothing is left for
My bitter eye brightly,
Nothing but shades that
Return to me nightly,
Seasons that flickered, that
Galloped and fled me,
Schemes and ambitions that
Always misled me…
But no-one could ever do
More to dismay me
Than he that was I, saying:
‘You have betrayed me! ’
5 April 1978
poem by David Lewis Paget
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Grim Seasons
The sea shore is the gods lap
Where the timeless meet,
The grey ditch by the hedgerow
Is my heart’s slow beat,
The dark sky and the crow’s cry
And the gulls, slow wheeling,
Are sleep’s shroud in a gold cloud
On my eyes, drawn stealing.’
She turned, splintering crystal
In the dawn’s brisk chill,
The sharp scatter of silence
By the rook’s slow trill;
‘I left you for the grey day,
For the cliff’s grim seasons,
For the crisp breath, or a life’s quest
Of my own small reasons.’
‘The long shade of the sundial
For a day’s lost thought,
The moon, beamed in a cold room
Where a shadow’s caught.
I took flight for the still night
And the earth’s slow turning,
For the green hills and the clear rills
And the dream you’re torn in.’
21 February 1978
poem by David Lewis Paget
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Stone Cottages
You built your stone cottages
Without any windows,
No light for your memories
No doors for your soul;
You’ve long kept your pillages
Deep-dug in foundations
Your meadows and villages
Too far from your home.
The shadows of verities
Loom large on verandahs
To strut at the terraces,
Assault your grim walls;
But all of your sureties
Are locked in your cottages
And all your serenity
In dark, airless halls.
Your lines cross your messages
In treks round old workings,
Your mind lines the precipice
That quickens your pride,
Your darkness is born of
Young dreams and old wreckages,
Short schemes and long yearnings
You’ve always denied.
23 May 1978
poem by David Lewis Paget
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Imagination
I have come to indecision
Someone is pushing me
All the cities, subways, rivers
No direction left for me
I have lost my way home early
I dont care cause I wont stay there
All I hear is this silent whisper
Will you be here again
Imagination takes the shadows away
Everyday Ive been without you
Imagination keeps the shadows away
Everday I stay without you
Too many times, without you
I have seen your eyes in purple
I have seen your eyes in blue
All the flowers, tears and faces
All the days I spent with you
Again and again Ive been escaping
Ive been lost in the dark I fear
Can you hear this silent whisper
Will you be here again
Imagination takes the shadows away
Everyday Ive been without you
Imagination keeps the shadows away
Everday I stay without you
Too many times, without you
Choose and change you say
How can you let this run away
See the storms through your broken window
See the beauty of the falling rain
Everyday Ive been without you
Everyday shadow follows me
Cant you see you left your traces
In too many faces
Imagination takes the shadows away
Everyday Ive been without you
Imagination keeps the shadows away
Everday I stay without you
Too many times, without you
song performed by by Xymox
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Beautiful Boy
beautiful boy
he was born such a beautiful boy
but born of a mother who's soul is
drugged and dead
and the rumbles of a fix not fed
dont care for beautiful boys
born of a father unknown
product of a quick piece of ass
a beautiful boy
growing on torn floor boards
wearing dirt and broken glass
familiar to the sounds of blasts of gun shots in the air
there is evil in the shadows
and shadows are everywhere
and they dont care for beautiful boys
when one shot proves too much to take
he gives his mothers empty shell a shake
hoping that his cries and pleas will get her to wake
but the grip of death doesnt care for beautiful boys
abandoned to be shipped from place to place
a beautiful boy
such a beautiful boy with such a cruel world to face
a beautiful boy born into the fiery shadows of hell
where the demons dwell
where the people
they prey
where the shadows will fight to steal him away
but he fights to stay
a beautiful boy
lost in the shadows of his surroundings
he lives
but he still is a beautiful boy
such a beautiful boy.
©Copyright 2011
poem by Regan Mackenzie
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Success
Did you see that man riding past,
With shoulders bowed with care?
There’s failure in his eyes to last,
And in his heart despair.
He seldom looks to left or right,
He nods, but speaks to none,
And he’s a man who fought the fight—
God knows how hard!—and won.
No great “review” could rouse him now,
No printed lies could sting;
No kindness smooth his knitted brow,
Nor wrong one new line bring.
Through dull, dumb days and brooding nights,
From years of storm and stress,
He’s riding down from lonely heights—
The Mountains of Success.
He sees across the darkening land
The graveyards on the coasts;
He sees the broken columns stand
Like cold and bitter ghosts;
His world is dead while yet he lives,
Though known in continents;
His camp is where his country gives
Its pauper monuments.
poem by Henry Lawson
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April A Song Lost !
April has lost its songs
on unpleasant seasons
of time and its extended
faces of invisibles.
Past a catastrophe
Present a catafalque
Future a satellite mission
April a song lost on seasons.
April 5,2010
poem by Rema Prasanaa
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The Circle Game
Yesterday a child came out to wonder
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar
Fearful when the sky was full of thunder
And tearful at the falling of a star
Then the child moved ten times round the seasons
Skated over ten clear frozen streams
Words like, when youre older, must appease him
And promises of someday make his dreams
And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
Were captive on the carousel of time
We cant return we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game
Sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone now
Cartwheels turn to car wheels thru the town
And they tell him,
Take your time, it wont be long now
Till you drag your feet to slow the circles down
And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
Were captive on the carousel of time
We cant return we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game
So the years spin by and now the boy is twenty
Though his dreams have lost some grandeur coming true
Therell be new dreams, maybe better dreams and plenty
Before the last revolving year is through
And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
Were captive on the carousel of time
We cant return, we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game
song performed by by Joni Mitchell
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Enough Just To Know!
what is change?
a radical move to
the right or left?
a leaving of the past,
and all its baggage?
a fresh coat of paint?
a new lover?
the death of a friend?
seasons pass to seasons,
and then return...
changing, or evolving?
maybe an endless cycle!
where are we going?
do we know?
do we have to go?
will it be better or worse
when we arrive?
what are we looking for?
are we the picture,
or the paint not yet dry?
whose hand holds the brush?
and who is the painting for?
is it change we seek for?
or a return to something long forgotten?
must we create again and anew?
or is something there that we have lost?
does the wind know or care
where it came from,
and where it is going?
or is it enough just to know,
just to be, the wind?
poem by Eric Cockrell
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Ghosts
Writers: leo sayer, les nicol & frank farrell
Ghosts
People that I left behind
Wondering lonely in the night
All in my memory
Dreams
Long forgotten flights of time
Flashbacks flooding through my mind
Of all the things you said to me
In the shadows where I walk
In the silence
The wind talks of you
Like a ghost
Haunting the night
So you wander through my life
Ghosts
People that I dont believe
Just what theyve got to do with me
Oh -- I cant see it
Ghosts
Long forgotten -- in time
Look at those flashbacks
Flooding through my mind
Of all the things youve said to me
In the shadows where I walk
In the silence
The wind talks of you
Just like a ghost
Haunting the night
You know you wander through my life
song performed by by Leo Sayer
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Ballad of the Black-Sheep
A black-sheep, from England, who worked on the run –
Riding where the stockmen ride –
He sat by the hut when the day’s work was done –
Lone huts where the black sheep bide.
“I’m tired of my life!” to his lone self said he,
“My girl and my country are both done with me!”
“I’m tired of my life!” to the wide scrubs said he –
“My girl and my country are long done with me!”
He took from a packet a portrait and curl –
Such things as the exiles keep –
And sadly he gazed at the face of the girl –
Lost girl of a lost black-sheep.
“I’ll go where there’s fighting and die there!” said he;
“My girl and my country are well rid of me.
“I’ll go where there’s fighting and die there,” said he;
“For heart-break and country that’s well rid of me!”
He rode with a thousand, he rode with the best –
Riding as bushmen ride –
Who’d ridden alone on the wastes of the West –
Wide wastes where the drought-fiends bide,
They rode as they’d ride to an up-country ball,
And the laugh of the black-sheep was lightest of all!
The road was a shambles, the hill was a hell –
Red rosed where the reckless ride –
And he with the foremost lay torn by a shell –
(Die hard where your father died!)
“the death of a rebel!” he laughed as he groaned –
“for the land that adoptee – the land that disowned!”
the death of a black-sheep! – they laugh as they groan –
for the lands that adopt and the lands that disown!
poem by Henry Lawson
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Circle Game
Yesterday a child came out to wonder
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar
Fearful when the sky was full of thunder
And tearful at the falling of a star
Then the child moved ten times round the seasons
Skated over ten clear frozen streams
Words like, when youre older, must appease him
And promises of someday make his dreams
And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and dawn
Were captive on the carousel of time
We cant return we con only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game.
Sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone now
Cartwheels turn to car wheels thru the town
And they tell him,
Take your time, it wont be long now
Till you drag your feet to slow the circles down
And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and dawn
Were captive on the carousel of time
We cant return we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game
So the years spin by and now the boy is twenty
Though his dreams have lost some grandeur
Coming true
Therell be new dreams, maybe better dreams and plenty
Before the last revolving year is through.
And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
Were captive on the carousel of time
We cant return, we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game
song performed by by Joni Mitchell
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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I Can't Stop Lovin' You (Though I Try)
Leo Sayer, Les Nicol & Frank Farrell
ghosts
people that I left behind
wondering lonely in the night
all in my memory
dreams
long forgotten flights of time
flashbacks flooding through my mind
of all the things you said to me
in the shadows where I walk
in the silence
the wind talks of you
like a ghost
haunting the night
so you wander through my life
ghosts
people that I don't believe
just what they've got to do with me
oh -- I can't see it
ghosts
long forgotten -- in time
look at those flashbacks
flooding through my mind
of all the things you've said to me
in the shadows where I walk
in the silence
the wind talks of you
just like a ghost
haunting the night
you know you wander through my life
song performed by by Leo Sayer
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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My Autumn
My hair turns grey
and my friends have left
to stay in the USA,
Australia and Great Britain
and life is just rolling on
and the beginning of winter
is nearly here
and the summer forever is gone.
Shadows appear like ghosts
from the past and memories fade
like the shades in the sun.
Life was sweet and painful at times
and I have loved and lost and of the battles I fought,
I have won some, but what good has it brought?
poem by Gert Strydom
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Rill From The Foot Of The Mountain
The rill from the foot of the mountain that joins the river to the sea
It has babbled on downhill forever by hedgerows in the high
Country
It has witnessed the birth and death of millions of Seasons even before the first Human was born
In the upland wood where it flows through the birds sing at dawn of the morn.
The rill it is truly immortal something that will live forever more
Forever 'twill flow to the river that flows to the great ocean shore
To it there is not a time limit it is as old as father time
It has inspired the long dead poets to glorify it in their rhyme.
The rill from the foot of the mountain towards the river ripples along
And sometimes above it's quiet babble the dippers can be heard in song
The dark brown white breasted waterbirds of Human kind they do seem shy
By the water-way they were born and in the water-way they will die.
The rill from the foot of the mountain downhill to the big river flow
The ancestors of the upland farmers who lived by it centuries ago
In the old Village graveyard it flows by with the long departed they lay
As on for to join the big river it babbles on it's downhill way.
poem by Francis Duggan
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The Passing
The change, it comes so slowly
Like the winter of our lives,
It encroaches while we're playing,
While we're laughing with our wives,
As the children wave goodbye
The first brief chill will still the air,
And that silence settles on us
As they turn, and close the door.
Then we stare long at each other
But we find no words to say,
You have been the faithful mother
That I married, back some way,
But I see your smile has faded
With the passing of the years,
And you turn your face away so I
Won't see that trace of tears.
Are you thinking of that moment
When you held that new born child,
Of the joy of those first steps, or of
The day your baby smiled?
And the schooling and the learning
And the knees they brought home skinned,
Or the pride you took each time you watched
That graduation film.
While I find my own thoughts turning
To those days before we wed,
To your awesome, breathless beauty
As you passed, and turned my head,
Of that first-time kiss I savoured
Out beneath the apple tree,
When I took you to my heart, and you
First said you wanted me.
Now we're grey, and more like shadows
Since the lust in us has died,
And we rarely touch each other
Since we turned to ash inside,
For the years of work and struggle
Took their toll on you and I,
And I hear you every evening as
You go outside to cry.
All those dreams that ended shattered,
All those hopes that turned to tears,
Here we sit, both disillusioned
With the tolling of the years,
And we pass our friends unseeing
As we wander in the street,
We are ghosts, a long time passing
Now our story is complete.
We are like the leaves of autumn
That have fallen from the trees,
Blowing through our days unspoken
With each passing, gentle breeze,
We will fade and be forgotten
In the long term way of things,
But we'll cling in desperation for
What each last moment brings.
25 November 2012
poem by David Lewis Paget
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Born To Lose
Ill play your game
But if you lose youre gonna have to pay the price
Broken chains, like a prisoner free at last
The fear inside just up and died
Time will tell if I am wrong
It wont be too long
You thing Im chasing shadows
In the dark
Well Im not born to lose
Im not born to lose
You curse my name, as you turn and walk away, from view
It wont be too long
You dont scare me cos youre
Hard to see and its time
That you were gone
It wont be too long
You think Im chasing shadows
In the dark
Well Im not born to lose
You think Im chasing shadows
In the dark
What you gonna do about it now
What you gonna do about it now
It wont be too long
It wont be too long
It wont be too long
You think Im chasing shadows
In the dark
What you gonna do about it now
What you gonna do about it now
Aint nothing I can do about it now
song performed by by Black Sabbath
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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An interplay of images, a commotion of emotions
I like shadows, silent shadows busily moving
Touching shadows on dim lights on the meadows
Silhouette of trees and slender figures aligning
On a path that I, this voice, shall tread upon
In a minute, the hushing wind from the sea
The changing of hues, the disappearance of shadows
In the meadows, the entrance of slits of lights
From the shutters of the skies, spills of orange and
Yellow and reddish glow turning to crystal clear days
Welcome the sun, choose warmth and bathe
Another day has come, you sit by your window
Nature unfolds itself to you, and you marvel
Emotions collide and explode, you are deep
You are silent, you are carried away like a leaf.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Fields Of Flanders
Last year the fields were all glad and gay
With silver daisies and silver may;
There were kingcups gold by the river's edge
And primrose stars under every hedge.
This year the fields are trampled and brown,
The hedges are broken and beaten down,
And where the primroses used to grow
Are little black crosses set in a row.
And the flower of hopes, and the flowers of dreams,
The noble, fruitful, beautiful schemes,
The tree of life with its fruit and bud,
Are trampled down in the mud and the blood.
The changing seasons will bring again
The magic of Spring to our wood and plain;
Though the Spring be so green as never was seen
The crosses will still be black in the green.
The God of battles shall judge the foe
Who trampled our country and laid her low. . . .
God! hold our hands on the reckoning day,
Lest all we owe them we should repay
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Magdalen Walks
THE little white clouds are racing over the sky,
And the fields are strewn with the gold of the flower of March,
The daffodil breaks under foot, and the tasselled larch
Sways and swings as the thrush goes hurrying by.
A delicate odour is borne on the wings of the morning breeze,
The odour of leaves, and of grass, and of newly up-turned earth,
The birds are singing for joy of the Spring's glad birth,
Hopping from branch to branch on the rocking trees.
And all the woods are alive with the murmur and sound of Spring,
And the rosebud breaks into pink on the climbing briar,
And the crocus-bed is a quivering moon of fire
Girdled round with the belt of an amethyst ring.
And the plane to the pine-tree is whispering some tale of love
Till it rustles with laughter and tosses its mantle of green,
And the gloom of the wych-elm's hollow is lit with the iris sheen
Of the burnished rainbow throat and the silver breast of a dove.
See! the lark starts up from his bed in the meadow there,
Breaking the gossamer threads and the nets of dew,
And flashing a-down the river, a flame of blue!
The kingfisher flies like an arrow, and wounds the air.
poem by Oscar Wilde
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Cassidy
I have seen where the wolf has slept by the silver stream.
I can tell by the mark he left you were in his dream.
Ah child of countless trees, ah child of boundless seas.
What are you, what are you meant to be?
Speaks his name for you were born to me,
Born to me, cassidy.
Lost now on the country miles in his cadillac.
I can tell by the way you smile he is rolling back.
Come wash the nighttime clean, come grow the scorched ground green.
Blow the horn, tap the tambourine.
Close the gap on the dark years in between.
You and me, cassidy.
Quick beats in an icy heart, catch colt draws a coffin cart,
There he goes and now here she starts, hear her cry.
Flight of the seabirds,
Scattered like lost words,
Wheel to the storm and fly.
Fare thee well now, let your life proceed by its own design.
Nothing to tell now, let the words be yours, Im done with mine.
Fare thee well now, let your life proceed by its own design.
Nothing to tell now, let the words be yours, Im done with mine.
song performed by by Grateful Dead
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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