Sunday, January 27, 2013

Icefall

The hard colour,
ribs of slow shivering
and glacial stone
It does not  move,
such a still and unshakable presence
as if time rested a while,
a breath to take in winter

It is unmoving for the eyes,
for the senses that become ice-bound
and arctic
I could not move my boreal limbs,
no will to look away
It wanted me to know its presence,
its moment

But how could that be?

And then the ice broke away above me,
fell, tumbling shards – a sound of beads
on a tile floor
Then I knew what is existence,
what is a moment

Nothing lasts - snowflakes die in the wet streets
and the sun bursts above the horizon
 in a singular instant for Chris Hadfield
above the Earth

Nothing lasts
Nothing lasts but the awareness
of ice and the thawing days








Sunday, January 20, 2013

January

for Mark



All is raw and cold slices,
uphill against a distant sun
There is no respite from the pagan dark
but the seeker will not be idle

I have found the secrets
in the coastal gardens, snowdrops
shivering in their daring blooms
and flowering cherries undaunted
and reckless pink

I know where they are, old friends,
 hazel with its yellow tassles
 and nearby the wooly grey heads
of willow inform the waxing days

You see, there is life, ever present
pushing a common will
We are the steady ones born under
a heralding spring, early perhaps,
but someone  has to break the good news