A crocodile on a log.
I sat. My dog nearby
And thought
Perhaps
I ought
To run away
To live another day
As the creature might be starving –
But it was merely carving,
A log,
Me, and my dog
On a spring day
A crocodile on a log.
I sat. My dog nearby
And thought
Perhaps
I ought
To run away
To live another day
As the creature might be starving –
But it was merely carving,
A log,
Me, and my dog
On a spring day
¬
These flowers
Are fading now.
This vase
Which stands so stable
On this wooden table
May not break
In my lifetime.
But hours pass.
Glass breaks
And this rhyme
Composed as I sit
At this wooden table
As the clock ticks
May remain
When all I see
Is gone from me.
But this grain
Of truth
Will stay
When my mind
Can no longer play
With time.
Walking to the pub to meet you
On a warm afternoon in summertime
The rhyme of Richard Corry filled my mind.
I remember well
How the water fell
Into the pub’s pond
Recycled again and again.
Few things last long
And all things must fall
In the end.
Still I recall
Meeting my friend
And discussing Robinson’s rhyme
One summertime
Long ago.
The same rain falls
Again and again
And seasons return
But men …
Dull spring morning.
Another day
Of work
In a contemporary play
Of temporary things.
Soon the afternoon
Will come.
The sun
May shine –
How many moons
And suns
Will I see?
My mug of tea
Grows cold
Next to me
I saw a square
Of sunlight fall
On my study wall.
It is no longer there –
We all borrow
Each joy and sorrow
Until our square
Vanishes into empty air.
I feel the wind
On my skin
And hear him
Whisper in the trees
Reminding me of you.
I go in
And face my darkening window
Were I to die tonight
I would go happy –
Yet tomorrow will probably come.
I will walk in sun
Or rain.
Then, returning home again
I will face my window
But not the same
One as tonight
The scent of new-mown grass
Catches me as I pass
By graves in spring.
I take delight
In this brief light
As birds sing
Over tombs and grass
When I take the short walk
Through the churchyard, my thought
Often turns
To lessons not learned
And chances spurned.
And then I turn
To my so ordinary day
And say,
“I will learn!”
Yet still my way
Remains the same
Treadmill of pleasure and pain.
But my demons will stop
When the devil knocks
Eleanor Rigby played
As I sat at the table.
She was lonely.
Nothing stays.
I too am lonely at times
But rhymes
Keep me company.
We all must die
Lonely or Otherwise.
Makeup on girl’s eyes
Will not keep
Them from sleep.
And poetry has saved
None from the grave.
Yet later that same day
A child greeted me
In the cemetery
In early spring
Early March.
Winter’s last blast
Tries to deny
The spring