Cat fur and itchy crumbs,
The soft and milky
Spell of films and laughter,
Salty tears the blanket took,
Stretchy holes and threads
Pulled loose by happy claws –
The ecstasy of dribbling jaws –
Bobbly bits I want to pull
(Pigtails on the girl in front)
And dingy bits from god knows what –
Old friends –
Do not wash my yellow blanket.
Paint me with a thousand stripes
And let my life heal in my face
Cold now are the fires that smoked real
Lives to choke sweet forest air.
Still the rancid taste of human
Cruelty fills the buildings there.
Terrified, we turn away our
Thoughts, or blindly stop and stare:
Helpless in the gaze of haunted
Children in tough soldiers’ care,
Sick to tears to think that those who
Stoked the flames had human hearts:
Human hearts and minds and bodies
As they pushed the dead in carts.
Chimneys puncture clouds and scream
Of school kids taught to hate,
Masking acts of humbling kindness
Bravely hid behind that gate.
People gave their only warmth, their
Last crust, or a smile,
Just to help another to
Survive a little while.
Even in the deepest horror,
Love found ways to sing her song,
Urging us to speak with courage
When we feel that things are wrong.
Auschwitz holds a mirror to the
Worst and best of human ways,
Standing tall and calling us to
Kindness: now, and all our days.
Every inch of everyone
Became, from baby softness,
Tough and marked by times to come.
But, if we treat each one with love
And treasure their uniqueness,
Then all will grow the legs to run
And heart to love their weakness.
To those who cannot be themselves,
I ask you to listen:
(Not to those with certainties
Or clear cut ways to be)
But to the place your eyes reach;
Wild paths your feet long to tread;
And the call and leap of
Rhythms you have not heard.
Close your eyes and go!
For many also dance
To their own song.
And, in your lost exploring,
You will find
Hands outstretched in love to
Hold your own.
Need the words today;
The space that aches in my chest
Is calling for words
To hold the hurt.
Pressing the page:
Paper stretched to translucence
By feelings too big.
Feelings to carve on slate
Or skin
But certainly too big
To keep within.
Paper wins and so I build.
Sinking into the deep unthink
Of curving ink.
I burst the inner bubble:
(The one I thought was full of
Wolves and stretchy screams)
To find a flood of
Paint and song and dance
That needed me to give it only
Half a chance.
Crackle spit heat
That frazzles fur
And blisters paws
Raging through the
Homes of tamarinds
And bright macaws.
Crouching cats are
Gripped in
Death’s fierce jaws,
Whilst world-wide
Leaders fight with
Kitten claws.
So we slouch
Towards flames
Fuelled by our flaws.
We cannot fail to act;
It must be done,
To wrench free
From the web
That we have spun.
Why the fear
Of Not Being Here?
Scuffed and tightly-filled, keeling
Over, heels propped up to support
Bags on knees, screens, tapping fingers
Nails bitten to white jagged cliffs
Or long and smooth: rendered strange
And cold by time and money.
Sandals play glass slippers: cracked,
Betrayed by earthy brown between
Caked, painted gold. And, in thick air, the
Hiss and click of headphones plays a
Nuanced soundtrack like an itch.
Urban heat: dark rounded veins shout
Angry calls and foreheads weep.
Holding sticky rails, old friends have
Happy rows and, with sweet noise, earn
Bitter gazes from the tired. Foot
Squeezed rucksacks, grin like thirsty
Dogs and jostle handbags: over-friendly.
Rocking to and fro, stumbling,
Graceless in our work-creased day clothes,
We are held together: jumbled
Bits and pieces in old drawers. But,
Like keys and crayons muddled:
Each, when found, will open doors.
Out of nowhere, magic phrases
Whisper stardust in my ears
And the days of growth and study
Flood my mind despite the years:
Books, that long ago forgot to
Hold their pages close together,
Still possess that spit of youthful
Fire that casts a spell forever.
My value is innate.
I know I cannot lose it.
I will not give it up.
It is not mine to give.
My worth is at my core.
I do not need to prove it.
I cannot give it up.
It is not mine to give.
So I can look you in the eye
And hold your gaze across our tears,
Across our differences and years.
For every person holds from birth
A rich, unchanging,
Human worth.
Roots crushed by asphalt, Iris stands her ground.
In everything hopeless, hope can be found.
We saw humanity itself,
Cut into flesh and bone,
Of young and old:
That love and love’s self-righteous fire
Ignite the icy flame
Of hatred cold;
That cowardice and bravery
Alike can end in tears,
Or beauty hold;
That jealous rage and parents’ love
Are sibling seeds to sow
The end of days.
Competing vanity of gods,
Like clouds in still water:
Our mirrored ways.
The tide is changed by whim, or turned
By heartfelt quest for truth,
But wet it stays.
In Homer, just as now, we live for show,
And miss the mad adventure as we go.
The richness and the poverty of all
Is in the savage beauty of her fall.
