Category: Poetry

  • Victory

    Victory

    I see passed the twilight

    Through the dense cover of cloud

    Ere break of Sun at dusk’s parting

    Horns, horns, calling clear and loud.

    They said there will be no cavalry,

    No mystery-man turned saviour,

    Naked, I face the charging enemy,

    A stillness hangs, the faces gravior.

    Fallen, I most certainly have my pet,

    Five and twenty times at least,

    I may yet fall a dozen more,

    But rise I shall to slay the beast.

    Let them come forth then,

    These fiends from a time in yore,

    Familiar yet disguised a-new,

    Like an oft-repeated tale in lore.

    In this story, victory is nigh’,

    The tides have turned at last,

    Those grievous days are now behind me,

    Banished to a forgotten past.

    Forth to Victory! To Victory, my King!

    Ride the coat tails of legends pre,

    Flay the enemy to bone and teeth,

    For Victory, my King, is my creed.

    <Stalemate

  • Stalemate

    Note: The essence of this poem is “agree to disagree.” It’s the kind of relationship I have with my father, whom I love dearly.

    Game poised for a stalemate

    Where’s your check mate, son?

    Think I don’t recognise the eyes

    Beneath the ugly man bun?

    We’ve been here for two hours

    Pawn to E4 now E5

    You took my rooks and bishops

    I hold your queen and knights.

    But neither of us can call time

    We both still crave the win

    Have neither of us realised

    True victory is but within?

    Sixty six are my years now counted

    Thirty six is your cosmic debt

    Even through that smug composure

    You’ll likely lose this bet.

    Reality isn’t played out on a board

    It’s in how we’ve used our time

    You went your way, monsieur

    And I? I surely went mine.

    Yes you found youth’s fountain

    And drank from the purest spring

    No decision thus failed you

    Like clear pearls on a gold string.

    The path I chose is murky

    No pearls adorn my neck

    Mistakes abound a plenty

    On this long and wayward trek.

    Yet here we are united

    Over this rancid game of chess

    Strangers not, nor friends

    Each striving to come off best.

    And now at last I concede

    There will be no winner hence

    I’ll take your leave and go my way

    Accept these, my tuppence.

    <Boy Wonder

    Victory>

  • Boy Wonder

    Boy wonder residing within

    How long it’s been since we spoke

    Your laughter breathes weight off my shoulders

    Your innocent smile shifts the world’s boulders.

    Many are the given paths

    To those who wish to seek

    But he who follows all roads laid out

    Follows none to want and to need.

    In days long gone, you were jubilant

    Spirited, strong of will, carefree

    Not a care in the world for her darker recesses

    Not a worry to stomach or plead.

    Yet here you are, boy wonder

    In this hour that pivots

    Moving the needle closer to our goals

    A Unicorn horn for life’s favoured foals.

    Boy wonder show me the way

    Naive and fickle you are not

    Brave, resilient, a combative soul

    Our hour comes upon twilight’s toll.

    <Precipice

    Stalemate>

  • Precipice

    I’m sat on the edge of a precipice

    Two months shy of thirty-six

    Where have the last thirty-five gone

    Will there be sixty-five more, my son?

    At ten I dreamed of dead poets

    Twice that I read thrice the stoics

    Then on the stroke of the big three oh

    I stood and let my shackles go.

    Now the hand holding the pen

    Is withered and worn, what then?

    The lyrical passages of time draw nigh

    My pen tip bends, leaks ink as I cry.

    Now here the lad he’s just turned three

    To my mind he’s utterly free

    No shackles will bind his legs henceforth

    His every question will find its true north.

    For while there is life in me still

    Nowt shall hamper my iron will

    My pen will write again with flowing ink

    To bring books back from the brink.

    <Metamorphosis

    Boy Wonder>

  • Metamorphosis

    Chrysalis ablaze

    my limbs untangle

    a window opens

    it’s time to mangle.

    Tear first a strip

    peel away the fore

    skin deep this pain

    much more to gain.

    This next layer of hide

    tougher than boar

    will I push through?

    will I finally soar?

    I see the Cosmos,

    I see it swirling

    trapped in my own skin

    trapped deep within.

    Will this my best self

    will he at last emerge?

    or is it a dead-end

    a submarine perpetually submerged.

    Long have I waited

    for his imminent landing

    Mighty warrior-cum-scribe

    of the highest standing.

    <Belief

    Precipice>

  • Belief

    Dedicated to Bill Crandall, who made me believe again.

    Silent, long have I been

    But forgotten I have not

    I still feel you close by

    Whispering wisdom to naught.

    Reasons there are aplenty,

    For the predicaments of time

    Reasons known to you alone

    To be revealed at nigh.

    In you I continue to trust,

    Thus far I’ve not been led astray

    Momentary this feeling of pain is

    A moment that will soon wash away.

    Through this crucible I must pass

    To emerge stronger beyond

    Every nerve been tested thus

    Closer I get to striking the gong.

    But now your words have landed,

    I will pay them good heed,

    I will continue down this path hence

    Until my inhibitions have been freed.

    <Stillness

    Metamorphosis>

  • Stillness

    Pebble dropped at water’s edge,

    Ripples come to form,

    Distorted my reflection is,

    Uncertainty thus is borne.

    A face it swims in hazy waves,

    Two eyes they turn to four,

    Lips curled in an upwards smirk,

    That shakes me to the core.

    Stillness abound, the surface stops,

    It mirrors now the sky,

    A face it shows now clear as day,

    No more a man who tries.

    The eyes now two, they’re firmly set,

    A man who’s paid his due,

    No more caution to the wind,

    To uncertainty he bids adieu.

    Pebble dropped at water’s edge,

    The face distorts no more,

    For though it swims in hazy hue,

    Its stillness at its core.

    Belief>