Christmas Tree

Look to the tree, its coloured lights
blazing as if night's stars have fallen;
the branches cradle them
and reflect the faces that search
each pinnacled scape
for some glimpse of a more bearable side. Paradise

beneath, and among the fashioned Summered mosses, lay
the dreams of children, small hopes
pinned below a tree, fifty feet high. Boxes
gaily wrapped and ribboned, gifts
with sharpened edges and soft, beckon
to be touched, gently shaken. Soon,

all too soon, the blessed morning
arrives and delight surpasses
yesterday's wondering. Lights dim
against a backdrop of smiles and laughter.

Nine charms

Hanging from twisted wire
coloured glass baubles dangle -
a necklace, chain laced beads
a no nonsense, no bounce
style. The only quirk, a catch
not halfway, drawn back
into a waterfall of links
holding space in each loop.
A rosary of disjointed emptiness.

San Francisco's wrought iron and Alcatraz

Among the screams for release
are the wrought iron gates
painted pink and pretty
in the curves that carve
the line between the jailed
and the free.

They are oddities,
out of place pieces
that really belong on the houses
that line the streets
of San Francisco.

They are there too, in the city,
painted black
and I wonder at the quirk,
the tease,
and which will stand longest
in a city to be flattened
by earthquakes.

What will be seen...

There will be craned necks,
stiffened from searching
concrete walls, spires
that pierce the sky
and spoil the promise
that would have arrived
with the first blessing
of dawn. Birds,
perched on facades gilded
with the fake reckoning
of a city that hides
the unpleasant
under layers of dark and duty,
will sing a morning prayer,
a welcoming to a new land
bereft of the familiar.

Well below

It is not like you aren't up there,
wandering the sky beyond
those high clouds, lighting
the heavens with our dreams

of peace on earth, and goodwill
that we pray won't fly out the door
with those other hopes we've voiced
recently. I wonder

if you're always listening, if
you really want to hear
all the prayers that we send
constantly toward the stars

when the night reminds us
we should be on bent knees

before you. I kneel in the dark,
know you are above
and am aware I am well below.

Out back in the garden

Out back in the garden
beyond the footed path
lay the corpses of snails,
silver trails washed away
with last season's windswept fury.

A few lifers remain hidden
up under ledges,
beneath rocks. Yet still
they peer out, intent on crossing
Summer's shadowless cobbles.

Dear God,

Thank you for the joy you bring
for the struggles you share,
thank you for the friendships,
the love and the losses.

Thank you for letting Jarry's path
touch mine, for without that event
I never would have known the friendship
of a group of extra special people

who know the value of friendship,
the worth of giving, the cost of loss,
nor would I have learnt the prophet
of love. Thank you, Lord

for leading me to here,
for enlarging my family
with people whom I would share
my blood.

Please keep them all safe
and healthy and happy, give them no more
than they can handle,
and let them know they are loved.

Amen.

The Ringing

There are silent bells
in the room and they ring
to fill the air with the space
between words,

those gaps of hesitancy
that we relegate
into yesterday's journal.

There are bells ringing
and they remind me
it is time to sit up and write,

to pour onto the page
letters that will not form
on my lips, tears
that will not tumble down my cheeks.

They remind me to stop
to listen
to remember as only I can

the wisdom passed on
carried from kernel to crop
from thought to story,
from beginning to an end

that only I will see, in silence.

Angel Song

Sometimes in the sad-heavy seconds
around midnight, I pace
the carpet bare foot, looking
for your golden-haired head
and your sleep-laden smile, that miracle
that guides me back from the dark
dank places that beckon,
looking for your face that leads me
with the promise of light
and laughter into a new dawn.

Outside smells like rain

warm soil, wet road,
random scents, and sounds
of birds, beaks filled
with wriggling dirty worms
they have plucked from the ground.

Leaves drip tears
for lost Spring sunshine, drip
down to the weeds that rise
through the steamy forest floor.
Outside smells like rain.

I want you to be more

I want you to be more
but choice no longer mine to make
has let you become no more
than an item on the list
in my bag.

eggs

banking

library

Joe Blogg

And there you are
at the bottom, not even
top. It is as if some other time
has taken over, some other
life belonging to she who stares
out from the gilt-edged frame
on the side board. That old photo
a reminder that I am nailed
to this time, this place
where I am forgotten and left
to hold the silken web of dreams.

Your Word


As if there is not a enough of a muddle
down here to deal with, when I look up
I see spirals in the clouds. I wonder
if for once you struggle,
if you cannot fathom
why people have begun to spin
the wrong way, why
your grounding is withering. Perhaps
it is time to bring on another flood
to re-fashion a land in waiting,
to re-create the old guidelines
of your word.

for Jarry, and for me

It's been a year
since you left
and often I've wondered
if you've been watching
my struggle,
those dogeared days
when I've picked up pen
in anticipation,

and put it down again
when thought has not
followed through
to words plied into poems.

I remember your questions, designed
to work me to that red point
of realisation, of knowing
what I want to say, and how.

I wasn't ready for you to leave
but now, a year later, finally
I accept it, this loss

and the empty silence

that is not filled
with you. I accept the space

and the challenges you left.

No longer hesitant

It is there in the reflection
of sunlight on your pupil, the intent,
your purpose. You

are here beside me
hand on shoulder, that gentle squeeze
letting me know everything is okay,
that it is all normal, relative.

I've waited for some sign, a direction
you point and I walk
and now I know
I'll take the step first.

No longer hesitant.

I grew up

I grew up without alleys
to avoid. The only dark shadows
were stored under my bed,
or in the corner of the room
where they would come out
every now and again
during the night to remind me
there was a difference
between dark and light.

Back then green was my stable, blue
resided above, never slipping low
or stealing into my mind
and raping my thoughts thoughtlessly.

Yellow was delight, sunshine,
or daisies that sometimes seemed
like fallen stars on the lawn. Lazy
days on holiday and Christmases
where gifts overflowed from boxes
too numerous to count.

Red was something those kinds of women
wore, and black was for funerals
I did not attend.

What your body remembers

Skin remembers
the warm kiss of sun
chasing away night
and its cold, stiff memories
banishing them until later.

Palms remember
the crush of hearts
as they hold them tight
balancing their give
and take for tomorrow.

Soles remember
the cling of sand grains
hot, dry and black underfoot
like dreams and nightmares
that return in pieces in the dark.

The Wooden Pier

It can not be walked, the wooden pier
that once gripped land and stretched far
out into the sea carrying the weight
of young children and fathers, fishing. Now
fog claims its end
and battered boards repel footsteps.
Some misplaced timbers turn pleasure-walking
into land locked distant viewing. Perhaps
it is better this way, watching the water lap
the wharf, seeking the image
between fog-filled drapes, better seen
from the shore, better as our memories
embellish unforgotten moments.

Spring wind

The petals to and fro in answer
echoing the need of the breeze
and the psalmy lightness of Spring.

The whip of the wind stirs them
until the pink mix twirls
in the curl of unseen breath

and are whisked away to land,
to rot back into the land
as food for the future hungry.

Weeds

The weeds stand tall, stiff in death
after the spray as worked its slow way
from grounded root to sky-raised vein,
not swaying with dawn's gentle breeze,
not relishing the moisture the air carries.

There is no life among them, no green bud
promising to bloom, no seedlings bursting
from seed pods. Even the birds have left them,
knowing brown cannot mean feasting.

Come Home

It is with promise that I write to you. Bright
Spring sun on a cloudless morning cheers
the heart, lifts the soul to soar silently,

serenely beyond reach. I want you to know
the purity of the golden hour, how it caresses
tree bark, encourages cherry blossom petals to arch

under its touch. I know
you are wind-swept, swallowed by great sands
that wash your sky. Your gold

is nothing like this. Harsh to the eye,
a tainted turning of richness to greed, a yellow dust
that settles and rots like rust on a land

that doesn't want you.
Come home, return here to where water
runs crystal clear and cold, where green

is trampled underfoot, where fire kills
to breed new life, to give it pause, not penance.

graffiti

We drive by
and it's not the letters
that catch our eye, but
the curves and colours
of lines. Black
fills the gaps, shadows
the highlights, the greens,
the blues. They began
with yellow, now buried
in the darkness, hidden
as spray cans swarm
the wall, smothering,
until black is the new white
and daylight puts them on top.

graffiti

I would like you to

lay on the grass
sunshine on your skin, while I feed
you stars and moonlight,
watch you pet rainbows
and straddle mountains
you can ride until dawn
tomorrow. I would like you to sleep
and dream of whirlpools,
sparkles scattered on your fingers
that you spin into a necklace
I can wear when you are gone.

Keep looking up

Between the first floor pilings,
sunrise strikes the water. Oddly
orange, it casts an inner glow

into a home gutted. A solitary fish,
searches for food, finds a floating doll
still smiling with empty blue eyes.

It's lighter, the dawn, eerily calm
only the water rushing through the streets
belies the last lazy summer days.

If we keep looking up, we can believe
the day will improve.

The wake of Ike

The seat came from the coast road, concrete
mounds still stuck firmly to its legs. laid
on its back it looked like some star struck cactus
dragged through hay and netted in brown mesh sludge
the sea donated. It must have been some ride
to have washed three miles inland and settle
against the roots of the 100 year oak, a grey coffin
at its side. If the seat could talk,
would it ask to be put back, or to be left
on the roadside snuggled tight to people's possessions?

Paused

We are paused here, halfway
between heaven and hell
clinging to the landscape
like leeches, sucking the life
from the earth, unable
to stop the earth
from sucking the life from us,
pausing to take joy
in the smile on a child's face,
to pat the back of a friend
who's unsure which path to take next,
pausing mid-step to avoid
the pull of reason.
We are paused here amid the chaos
of choices and changes
that chain us to some other hot place
we can not escape.

Waiting

I remember you laying and listening
to the squeak of rubbered footsteps
as they walked the wide white halls,
remember your eyes moving to see

who it was that strode along
with such purpose, who entered
with such poise. I remember
the water held there, in your eyes

when the nurse lifted the blankets
and checked to make sure
your feet were warm, to make sure
that the skin that sagged over your bones,

was warm. I remember wondering if you
could feel their touch, their caring,
if you knew that they loved you too.

A more gentle era

I once looked at castles, wanted
their cool strength

that withheld the fight of swords.
I find the win, now, in the rise of steam

from my teacup, the smile
that a golden leaf brings,
the birth of praying manti.

Ike's visit

He raged and ranted,
deluged the shores
tossing trees and trash
this way and that, muddied
the streets, stormed
his way into homes
without so much as a by
or leave to rip roofs
from walls. He ravaged
a State but did not scratch
the surface of true
Texan souls.

A gathering

I don't know
if the hunch of distant clouds
will drift forever, aimless
wanderers crossing plains
where no mountains
ease their weight.

Blessings

Surrounded by storm clouds
I thanked Him for the lambs,
the calves that grazed
on green pastures. Looked
for the first Spring bulbs
and up to the sky to ask
how much longer
would I have to wait and there,
in the clouds, a heart graduated
from pink to red, from dead
to pumping, a blessing
to remind me that waiting
was part of life.

Girl/Woman

She has the drive
to join countries, the ambition
to walk from one to another
without looking back
and pondering those
what might have beens
that set pathways for others.

She thrives on joy
sucks it out of people
and spits it back
on pavements slick with oils
of previous past times.

I can see her painting rainbows
on the sky, no point waiting
for God to dip his brushes
she wants vibrant stripes
and she wants them yesterday

strong and unyielding and
it doesn't matter
that there are no shower clouds -
she will paint those too.

4th day of Spring

Soon there will be blankets spread
on paddock grass, buttercups
to place under chins.
Dandelions will stand tall
in the fast growing grass
of Spring and blue sky
will blatantly bless our land.
Soon warm Summer noons
will caress the ground
and fattening buds will explode
to give shade once again.

Reality, yours or mine

I follow the path to your door
on the map with my finger,

crossing land as if it were boulder free
crossing seas as if they were nothing more
than shallow puddles easily jumped.

Reality acknowledges the distance
but my mind sees each house,
checks each street number, each garden
and searches for your vehicle,
your footprint on the grass.

It is as if I stumbled headlong
into some new world that resembles
my own, reality seeming similar

and yet different because in yours
I am new, not caked with age
nor remembering less
than perfect sunrises.

The peace within

The days inside my head
are not the same as those outside
they don't contain the constant clatter of rain.

Inside, it's calm and quiet, that special peace
that falls just before dawn and
in the golden hour just after.

In there it's not hard to breathe
there are no tired limbs or
frustrations that create chaos. In there

the sun shines on a meadow
where an ice bucket and blanket wait,
a cool breeze the only concession
to winter allowed.

Given time

My lamp is lit at midnight
and you drive by, wondering
if my dreams keep me up.

I store them close by,
don't let them go
the way of nightmares
that curse me in some darknesses
and kindle my nerves in others.

When you see the light
it takes me time to untarnish
the silver it sits on, to polish
the dreams until they gleam.

Beyond the pen

Stacks of papers, collected
dreams piled on tables, beside
the bed, in drawers. white

monuments standing still
as if in proof of living skill.
All those drills, those exercises

that stretched muscles,
printed on paper that will burn
just as easily as memories.

The stacks grow. A mirage
of memories dedicated
to reaching a point

beyond the beams
where we all look
at least once in a lifetime.

The old house down the road

The walls of the house still hold
the roof, though their peeled skins
lay bare wood to the elements.
I wonder if history leaks
from those exposed boards,
if with each rain, a little memory
is washed away and lost
among rivers that race to the sea.
Around one corner, where
two walls almost join, a creeper crawls,
holding the boards together, green
leafed and purple flowered, a pretty
palette punctuated by the sun's arms.

Older Trees

It only took one strong storm
to uproot the hundred year trees.

Three stood, together
against the elements, the westerly
whipped their branches

and thinned the weak and dying
leaves from their limbs.
They stood in murky water

barren boughs swaying
and then they were laying,
roots lifted, limbs straight up

as if asking to be rescued
from this drowning.

The power above

You top off one storm
with another, and riding them
becomes second nature. Lightening
and thunder war above
and below the rain fights
in rivers to race to the sea.

Winter

Children are the only ones left
who find joy in the rain, who splash
in puddles that great streams of silver
poured onto the earth.

Strain shows in the wrinkles
between brows on mother's faces,
shows in the clenched knuckles
on steering wheels, shows too
in the lack of smile and
shorter tempers.

The children don't care for sunshine
not when rainbows are simply
something else that can not be touched,
they prefer making mud pies
to the music of bare boughs scratching
and the empty coke can that rattles
its way down the street.

An Embrace

i
Words, images that flip through
like a cartoon replayed in the '70s,
reminders of why it wasn't good
to go to war, and
why it was. A stage of mind
playing songs and the scream of sirens
clearing sidewalks, the hiss of rain
silencing boots in swamps.
Words and images that needed burying,
memories picked up and shaken
until all the loose bones fall
to the ground, exposed
for a son temporarily blinded
by his own China Beach.

ii
All knowledge passes
through fingertips and palms
to the father, to the son -
the good and the bad.
Curved fingers tell of love
given and received. One
has grown, is enlightened,
the other begins a journey
with an embrace to remember
late at night.

iii
Mother started a scrapbook
entered images, goodbye
embraces. One day
your children's children will hold
the book, flip through its pages
and wonder at the strangers within,
the slightly familiar faces
that are a strong facade
for the leaking souls beneath.

iv
More words are withheld than spoken.
The air carries them, a soft embrace
that couples with ours, remembers
the firm touch, the pride, the fright,
and the fight that will bring the strength
to stiffen two spines. Both
will grow, will learn how to stand tall,
learn how to lean, to bend
to the will of others, to bathe
in the beauty of birthright.

v
It's not forgotten after the leave-taking,
the embrace will be remembered long
into those dark nights when scurrying insects
remind you, you are not the only living creature
on the planet and as the black wraps us
we will not forget the comfort we stole
in each others' arms, that brief moment
when we put all stoicism aside
and shared heartbeats that know
the sound of fear, the footfall of silence.

©K. Sweet

(photograph received from Texas T, thank you for the inspiration. my prayers are with this young man, and others who work to make our world a better place.)

Distant Friends

A long way from home
they may be, but if we reached
out we could touch them,

curl our fingers around their hearts
and hold tight so they know
they are loved. We pray

they don't forget,
that they carry us with them
along each road, around

each boulder, that they realise
our thoughts and prayers
are with them, giving them support

and quiet strong love.

I take a tonic of darkness

once a week to dispel
the notion that days
are not always filled with sunshine
that sometimes happiness
does not pervade every square inch
of our world. It serves
the purpose. Places my feet
more firmly on the cobbled walk,
my head more squarely on my shoulders,
and gives me a reality I can rely on.

Drift

I know the bottles
and potions that stand at the edge
of worry, know the spills of flawed skin
the scratches of unseeing, and
unhearing, the pull of lost memory.
I know the dull corners
of green glass, the temporary drift
that sets reality apart from dreams.

I know all these and succumbed
to each, feel humbled
but not hollow. I live.

I watch the sun creep over the hills
spread its fingers across the valley -
dropped spores bleeding and belching light,
puddling and pushing the edge of night
back beyond sight. Gold spills, pooling
at the roots of ancient pines, needles
stacked on the ground, a blanket
staked out ready
to nurture dreams. A pause
in the morning.

Myrtle

Every town has one
a crazy Myrtle who staggers
a little as she walks, and chatters
like the parakeets
that fly over in summer.

She'll mumble to herself,
stop you in the street
with a mad wave
and a shout or screech
guaranteed to sear your ear.

She wears long baggy socks, earrings
that dangle into another world,
red rouge on her cheeks
that doesn't go
with the purple striped cardi
tied around her waist.

She'll save a smile for you,
drag it up from somewhere
we'd forgotten existed, smile
and brighten your day
without thought.

Nelson Sunshine

Blue shot with cream, carries a dream
that today skipping ropes will come out
daisies will be chained to the sun,

that we will star in comedies
and cry at soppy movies.
Where the world revolves around me

and you, and the stars sparkle
especially bright for us.
Today we will smile
and be smiled at, today

we will lap the cream
and swim the blue
until we are marooned.

Dreams

Every one of us dreams, carries
a thought to a happy end. Even
the woman in heels, white satin bag
held to her face as she breathes
the glue through pain that strips
her legs of the ability to walk straight.
She might dream of sandy beaches
and sunshine where the waves
wipe away loss, where the sea breeze
blows in a new day of fresh
promises. She might long
for a lost lover, mourn his beauty
conjure him up through the fumes.
Dreams might be all she has, the
only other thing she can hold.

you

i walk on you when
i walk along the hall
unlit, it is as if you
are the blue in the carpet
as if the darkness in the hall
is your thoughts, dreams
having fled before sunrise.

The Elderly

We cradle them in our arms
as they cradled us, carry
them when their legs
no longer give them strength.

We feed them, their hands
returning to that delicate stage
where reaching does not mean
touch, where grasping
does not mean to hold,

where carrying
does not mean to clear a path
for footsteps.

Missing You

It is as if you never left
as if your eyes still cast glances
over my shoulder,
as if you continue
to pass on your wise counsel.
On days like today

where the bushes burn bright
against the green and blue, I think
of you, wish yet again
that you had not gone
before I was ready to say goodbye,
and wish again for one more smile
before the tears flow, unrelentless.

I till my fields, cull the weeds
until I am left with stark skeletons
and it is only when you nudge me
as they stand shivering,
I realise they hunger for warmth. Now
even the wind has left me,

and on days like today
when the sun has forgotten to smile
I practice acting, nod, listening
to all, still wishing you had not left
so soon.

Every Day

You have become predictable, every day
collecting the wind between leafs,
tumbling rays to daisy petals
raindrops to puddles. Every day

I gather you close, use your shoulder
or your ear, for my sounding board.
Every day you listen, and guide
in silence.

You have become predictable,
and I believe.

In dying

..........you lay almost flat,
mirroring the bared boughs
of long sleep
staging the last lonely stance
between aired veins
and empty.

..........You lay,
eyes unfocused locally,
mind fastened to a schoolgirl
in braids and braces,
one whose fast-paced dreams
would forever be
partially filled.

..........You lay
quietly waiting
and watching something
we can not see,
some promise
yet to be chosen.

Promises

Lazy smiles and smokey eyes beckon
from the glossy covers of tomorrow's mags,
print promise on my eyes
and repaint my blood red.

I watch them drape, curve
skin across fold-outs touting
cheap perfume that stinks boardrooms
and makeup that masks
blemishes deep as the soul.

I turn the page, leave them
waiting like the dreams and hopes
in my handbag. I want
world peace, and I want
the promises too.

Seven Lives Lost

The river swallowed their tears
just more drops to swell its sides
as the churning of seasons
begets freak storms that steal lives.

The river swallows them
takes their thoughts
and tosses them from it

in splashes. Rejection catches the sun's eye
before returning to its silver
arterial view.

It is there

It is there in the weight of unshed tears,
that understanding of parting,
the knowledge of permanent separation
that will be the peace of growth. It
is there in the Christmas smile
of a toddler, in that moment of delight
when one more gift
is placed in their hands.
It is there in the holding of hands,
in clumsy, squeezy hugs
that remind us friends and lovers
care, that they are only as distant
as our eyes see them
and as close as our beating heart
feels them. It is there in special memories,
the flashbacks of good times
when the sun rose with each dandelion,
and in challenges when we worked
alone walking in the footsteps of no other.
It is there, in the weight of yesterday.
It is there, in the eyes.

A cooler breeze

A cooler breeze catches in the space between leaves
turns them out, sets them whispering, flying,
caught on the bow of Autumn
pushing the warmth towards the tropics
where the sun embraces palms and white sand.

Here in the south, birds fluff chests,
peck sparingly at the cabbage tree berries -
great star-burst flowers that poke the grey
from the sky. Black birds fall

to the ground to break their fast
among weed and worm,
stretched worms
reluctant to leave the arms of the earth.

The breeze is cool, and the sea slips
across the beach, laps the land
that dawn sifts in light, cleans the track
where footprints walked to the sun.

The Morepork


The morepork calls
after dusk sets the day.
Night trails open for snails

to make their way, silver threads
their map, outlines their journey
from lawn to moon-glazed window.

Beyond the wind
where lack of sleep twists
the sheet of night, binds
us beneath the roots of day, beyond

the spider webs cast across black trees,
beyond the crush of waves
that turns rock to sand,

the morepork gives life
to the coffined edges of night.

San Francisco - Treasure Hunters

Rubbish plies the street edges,
spills from the bins
and they work it over

quickly, thoroughly,
collecting any useful object -
half a sandwich, or

a Starbucks cup
they can shake two copper coins in
when the theatre crowds
move in for the evening.

They move on to the next bin,
and the next,
and drag their shopping trolley
hope chests with them.

click to view

San Francisco - the newspaper stand on the footpath


In a round room sits a man
surrounded by daily newspapers.
He doesn't smile
and I think Christmas
cannot be carried
on his shoulders.

I ask if he would mind
my taking his picture
and he grunts 'No,
too many have taken it.'

So I smile, and thank him.
But I have taken
the memory of his carved face,
a frown with weariness in eyes
that have read enough,

a body bent to fit
the tiny round room
lined with its new thousand words
each day.