Dream of Dawn

This poem is about a Mother's love for her child. That archetypal pull. Unspoken, unseen, immeasurable, unrelenting.

For @piontkatoro who desires peace for her and her son. I have written it from the perspective of her talking to her son.

Dream of Dawn

My heart aches

To soothe yours

Both find peace

Mend the flaws

It will come

Not in the night

That black drape

Shading our light

The dawn reveals

Awakens inside

A Mother's love

Will always abide

Breathe, be stedfast

After this hour

Tranquility will allow

Our souls to flower

Christmas Greetings

OK folks. Listen up please. I have seen posts on here, where people have said that they don't intend to send Christmas cards. There are many reasons for this - personal choice, financial, rather give to charity, to name a few. I fully respect their decision. 

I like sending cards. This year, I have sent all of my family, friends and acquaintances a card. That includes all of my Facebook and Twitter friends. They were posted seven days ago. 

However, please remember that a million postal items go missing each week. If you don't receive a card from me, I would of course like to know, but you should also contact Royal Mail Customer Services on 08457 740 740, 8am–6pm Monday to Friday, 8am–1pm Saturday. Tell them I definitely posted them. 

Merry Christmas

Fallen

Written on Armistice Day, 11/11/2013.

For all those that served and two special people. For Sam, who loves the Autumn and Katie, who served, so that she can.

Where I say men, I include women. They were all heroes.

Fallen

Fallen Autumn leaves

Fallen youngsters, a nation grieves

Enemy's wrath

A Cenotaph

Young men, turned in to old men

Same now, same then

Bloody barb wired fence

A minute silence

History in place

Wish I could salute you, face to face

My Poppy

Your Poppies

Happy Birthday @LoganTinaLogan

This is a birthday poem for a lovely tweeter, one of my angels on Twitter:  Tina, @Fabfrankiee and @PiontkaToro.

A little while ago, Tina and I had a discussion on a rainy day. I told Tina that I think that the rain is liquid sunshine.  I love the rain, walking in it. It makes me feel alive. When I walk through the rain and reach my destination, it always seems to heighten the beauty of what I then see. The way we think about things can change our lives. Each day can be a birth day. This poem is called Rainy Birth Day, written for a birthday. As I wrote it, the rain was pouring down...

Rainy Birth Day

I walked into the rain

Gloomy, wanting to turn back

Reject the pain

Feel the comfort of the fire

Then I stood, waited

Felt the water of life

Fears abated

I thrived, rejuvenated, flourished

Birth, today

Rebirth of thoughts

My mind finds a way

Excuses to smile, live, love

Now, I relish the rain

See, clearly what it brings

The colour, pleasure and gain

Fill my soul to overflowing

John Burroughs

Oh, how I wish I could remember this every day:

The lesson which life repeats and constantly enforces is, “Look under foot.” You are always nearer the divine and the true sources of your power than you think. The lure of the distant and the difficult is deceptive. The great opportunity is where you are. Do not despise your own place and hour. Every place is under the stars, every place is the centre of the world. 

Aedh - Wishes for the cloths of Heaven

This is my favourite poem. By WB Yeats, the words are pure gold.

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half-light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

©

For @PiontkaToro

This lovely tweeter is writing a love story.

Like all writers (I don't include myself in that), she has days where words and ideas flow. Others, where they will come with difficulty, to be changed, over and over again.

But when one writes of love, there is a reason for this. I have tried to encapsulate why, below:

Writing of love
Doesn't come easy
Each word is a gem, elusive, fragile, precious
To be treated with tenderness and care

Chosen from many
So that you will know, truly know
That love is in every breath
A seed, in every action and reaction

My love story is love, only surrounded by fiction
Love can never truly be fiction
I write with love
Love has to be nurtured and tended

So when you read my words
Read them with love
You will love more
And be loved more

Arabian Days

This poem is for @LoganTinaLogan

Christina owns an Anglo/Arabian Palomino horse called Paddy.

I hope to capture the unique bond between horse and human; and the feeling, like no other, with the wind in our hair.

Paddy

I will carry you

Your history, your dreams

On tight, golden sinew

Gentle, warm, creams

Ride 

With me, not on me

Leaving our mark, as one

Nature's perfect recipe

Borne, out of love

Emotions, crystals in the air

Surging, racing, being

Free, without care

Passionate Arabian ardour

See, be, with me

Forever yours

Paddy

For @InspJulietBravo

This very pleasant tweeter asked me to write a poem for her.

She likes photography, art and music. She is driven by a desire to help others and to make a difference, but I think, not just at work. I have never met her, but from a glimpse, these are the words, from me, about her:

Coloured Dreams

Blurred focus

Tuneless words

Abstract, subtract

From me

Re-focus, re-tune

Collect, gather, see beauty

Project light

Imagine

Chase dreams

Relentlessly

Whilst smiling

Sharing

To me 

Bring colour

Vibrant

Reflected

Back to you

For Julia @joools70

This is a poem about helping and how that can only happen with a good heart. Empathy is hugely difficult to describe, yet when you experience it, it is as real as a beautiful sunrise and never forgotten.


Sits
Open gestures, open heart
Listens, helps
Silence, a start

Reshapes
Pain and regret
Carries the burden
Nature's debt

Repaid
Changes gaze
Beautiful flicker
Sun's haze

Props up
So walk tall
She'll catch you
If you fall

Train

Recently, I was on a train. It has been such a long time. I had to catch it early, which isn't a problem, as I don't sleep.

Before I reached my destination, the sun came up, allowing me to view lots of 'old style' railway stations. Just like those ones we used to watch as a kid, on a Sunday afternoon film. The ones where lovers and soldiers said goodbye, in bygone years, as they stepped on to the steam train.

Trains always make me feel nostalgic. Nostalgia's not what it used to be :-).

Sometimes I hark after that slower pace of life, where people wrote letters, using a fountain pen; where the only tweets were from the birds in the trees. Families used to eat together and stay together.

I used to hate travelling. Couldn't wait to get there. Wished my life away. Now, I see it as thinking time, where someone else takes the strain.

I think that nostalgia has a part to play when life catches you up and sometimes overtakes you. But, for me, to become too reflective, too introspective, seems to counter my resilience. It is a very personal view and is most certainly a question of degree. However, I think that resilience is hugely underrated by those who help others.

There is value in going back to visit a bad place, to re-jig it, to help it fit today, but to stay there is a different matter. 

So, back to the train. I saw this a long time ago (unsure where) and adapted it, when I tried to be of help to others (and myself).  I like it because it is simple and easy to remember. When life is hard and complicated; and you want to turn back, jump on the TRAIN....

T – Talking

Talking helps – it is cathartic and leads to solutions

Positive self talk

The power of affirmation and visualisation

Positive mental attitude

R – Relaxation

It helps

It takes practice – take time for your self

A – Activity

Plan to take exercise on a regular basis

It is a stress ‘buster’ and has many other health benefits

Try and go for a walk most days

I – Interests

Have a life outside work and home

Try and meet other people and let them meet you!

Have a balance in your life

Do something, just for you

N – Nutrition

A healthy body helps achieve a healthy mind

~~~~O~~~~

I hope this is of some help. Take good care. 

Nicola and Fiona 18/9/12

You drove by
Never caught an eye

Wanted to talk to you
Two of the few

So purposeful, full of joy
Then you met that boy

Fell, but we've caught you
Remembered, each morning dew

Every day
Especially today

You shine bright
Never out of sight

A silence, a thought
How hard you fought

To serve, preserve
The peace we deserve

Our debt
Will never be met

We will remember
Every September


RIP my fallen colleagues

Hope

Soft skin
Soft smile
No barriers
To a war that's vile

Press of a button
Squeeze of a trigger
Mum's dreams
Destroyed with vigour

Cried
That gas in your eye
Gasped
Hope won't die

One day
We will throw
Seeds and love
And watch you grow

Lonely

figure in the Park

Sun is out, but he feels dark

Swans, but he sees vultures

Self-imposed stranger, in all cultures



He wants to engage

But can't turn the next page

His pocketful of dreams

Fell apart at the seams



Spare him a thought

He's well and truly caught

In a spiral of demise

Inward, loathing and despise



Will you stop and take a chance?

Move forward and lance

Paper walls he's put in place

To hide all he's had to face

Invictus

I love this poem by William Ernest Henley. Invictus means 'unconquered' in Latin. I dedicate this, (through the author, of course), to all those who continue to struggle in the face of adversity....



Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.


In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.


Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds and shall find me unafraid.


It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul.

The Futility of War....

Eyes, Heart, Soul

Perhaps, one day, someone might look into my heart and see that I am a good person. Full of love, peace and light.

How will you see that? By looking into my eyes. My eyes tunnel to my heart and soul. They show you a glimpse of who I truly am.

Perhaps, nobody will ever take the time to really look into my eyes. To look deep and long. Perhaps, I will be on my own, forever.

I won't. I am never on my own.

Despite the horror, burnt and scarred, my eyes have also captured the beauty around me. I will carry those jewels always. They can never be separated from me. From who I am. Nor from you and who you are. They are a constant, glinting, even in the longest, darkest night.

Perhaps, one day, two people will look into each others eyes and see the same thing.

Whoever you are. You are not on your own. You might be by your self, but you are not on your own.

Peace

I am not a religious person, but readily admit to being a spiritual person.

I really like people passionate about what they believe in.

This site inspires me  http://www.peacepilgrim.org/

I wish the world had fewer soldiers and more people like her in it.


"This is the way of peace: Overcome evil with good, falsehood with truth and hatred with love."

Cream Soda

Last night, as like most nights, I had very little sleep. I was still awake at 0430, despite trying to get to sleep in every position known to man. Tonight is a repeat performance.

I am wondering if I am pregnant. Not by the size of my abdomen, but by an overwhelming desire, a pathological need for cream soda! I haven't drunk it since I was a kid. I remember when I first tasted it. Ice cold on a scorching hot day. Simple pleasures. Memory makers.

So, up I got, walked a mile or so, to Asda. Good old 24 hour Asda. On the way, I was divebombed by gulls. It would take more than that to stop me. On arrival, I hurriedly asked a worker if they had cream soda. They're coming down with it. All shapes and sizes. They must also sell it to people who aren't insomniacs, as the place was empty.

Anyway, I got my six pack and started the walk home. As soon as I was outside, I popped one. Pure nectar satiated my thirst. Perhaps a thirst for the comfort of years ago. Childhood memories that make us feel a bit gooey, like when arms are wrapped around you; and all feels okay in your world. Or when someone stands beside you and you know you're in it together, no matter what.

I hate the fact that some children don't have that. Some children have horrible lives. Unimaginably horrible lives. Cream soda isn't going to fix it for them. Neither is a pair of arms around them. Some of them won't ever want arms around them, or bare to be touched at all.

But metaphorically, we need to embrace them, to protect them, to let them shine again. To stand beside them and say 'enough'. Otherwise, it's not only going to be me wandering the streets at night; and its unlikely that they will be drinking just cream soda from cans.

PROTECT CHILDREN. DON'T JUST TALK ABOUT IT.

My Dad

Born to be a soldier. Nobody could bull boots like him. He's the one in the middle. Sorely missed....

This was taken in Germany, where we lived.  They don't make them like him any more.  He was quiet, yet funny. A gentleman, who would help anyone, but if you're a bully, best to avoid him. Later in life, every kid in the place used to bring things to him to fix. Always a smile.