In the quiet time
Before I go online
I see the sunshine
Fall on my office walls.
If I could stay
And watch the sunlight play
I would be happy,
Temporarily.
I have seen another January
Come and go
And trust I will see
The coming spring
Bring flowers to me.
But man’s hours
Are brief as flowers
And I may go
And not know
January or spring
In the early morning
Before the birds are heard
I think on light
And dark
And how the human heart
Makes art.
For we are light
And dark
Birds
In early morning
Sing
Of coming spring.
Cats
Have no cruelty
Yet we condemn in them
The cruelty of men
While the birds still sing
Of spring
And my heart responds
To birdsong
I open my window
And listen to bird calls
As rain falls
To the garden below.
This is the timeless time
Of nature’s passing rhyme.
But work calls
And I must go.
Yet the fall
Of the rain
And the bird’s call
Remain
The cold takes my breath.
I kick a branch away
And think of death.
Winter will not stay.
The wind through branches sighs
Then dies away.
And I will lie
As that bough
Lies now
While birds sing
In spring.
Tired.
Not inspired
To write tonight.
Light
Grows dim.
Seconds pass.
Pub and friends beckon.
The cheerful lights
Shut out the night.
But all dims
And the dark descends
In the end
Yet I laugh
And pass my time
In rhyme and friends
No-one can stop
The ever present clock
For Time’s halter
Holds us all
In thrall
Yet still we pretend …
Sometimes I dash
Along the churchyard path.
But those who sleep
Have no appointments to keep.
And I pass by
The graveyard plot
Until I do not.
Yet I must
My final appointment keep
With worms and dust.
And the earth
Will continue to turn
Without heed or need
Of me
Walking along the familiar street
I meet
A lady who asks me
For £1
So that she
Can get to bank.
I give her the pound
And laugh at her story.
I receive no thanks
But get asked for £5
(Which I deny I have).
I go home
Thinking on philosophy,
Lies,
And the fickleness of charity.
But who
Exploited who
I wonder
As I sit alone
At home
Writing poetry …
(Note: “Bank” refers to bank station on the London underground).
Standing in the cold park
I heard the birds
Sing in early January.
I will hear them in spring.
And think I see
Cold birds.
Yet I know that the winter
Lives in me
And poets sing
Of what is true.
You padded around my flat
Silent as a cat.
I strain
To remember your name.
Then it comes back.
And I recall
You wanted something else
And I, wanted you,
And fell from grace.
A few years later, you called my name
In the street
Were intimate strangers
By mischance meet.
You were no old flame.
Yet the memory remains
Of a girl, perhaps half there.
And your friend in the street
Who knew it was true
But claimed a mistake
Had occurred.
Yet, I knew you –
A sleek black cat
Who lost her fur
In a gentleman’s flat.
K Morris - Poet 