Uncertainty just entered the ring

It’s a Smokey old theatre, 

For the sport of boxing,

Fluorescent lights, 

Murmur of crowds,

Spilling of beers,

And the opponent we all hate, just 

Swaggered into the hall,

Down the aisle glaring at all,

We shrink back as Mr. Uncertainty

bounces over the ropes, 

And lands on the matting with a 

clunking sneer,

He   can    smell    the   fear.

[Hesitation denial , how did I get here?]

He looks v e r y big from my corner,

where I cringe from

cuts and bruises of previous fights,

Of fancy and where hopes had been,

Now the threat of what must happen

Is as foggy and wet as my brow,

Sauna’d with sweat..

[Is there an subsitutue? an escape ?]

The bell howls in this cavern, and

rings in my head bringing,

me to my feet and my face to my foe,

Mr Uncertainty standing proudly centre ring,

I approach, yet he looks not at me,

But calls to all the audience !

Who rolling back in revulsion and fear,

Thinks he’s about to eat me right here.

[Time slows to a misty forlorn crawl?]

Cold clandistune Déjà vu, 

Now I am not so sure,

as I’ve Heard of his type, they’re big in the press,

and report a good fight,

Perhaps as I come closer now,

He’s a bit thin and grey and looks,

squeamish and lucent and hollow ,

The look on his face is changing back and forth,

His legs bulge and then wane,

His skin looks aged weary and coarse.

[Breathe deep rememeber love and resilience ?]

It begins,

There is no choice.

Forward downward onward upward ,

I’m in the ring with uncertainty and only

Hollywoods Poet Philosphers know 

the meaning,

Chalky dust floats in the light ,

Pondering the unknown outcome.

T. Poe

September 19 2001

Oxford

Unfinished as yet.

Remembered and edited at CV19  

Mosaic

Pattern

interpreted,

Pattern 

Misunderstood,

significance sought,

a shadow that finds night,

truth of where we are,

lies in the concrete cracks,

the heat bakes,

the cold freezes,

in between we find a moment,

of our joy,

look out,

look in,

but most of all lets look,

ponder,

and take all in.

the days, the weeks,

the life of now,

called to account,

what will the measure be,

yes again lets hear,

Donne's bell,

calling, for me and ye,

incessant reminder of the edge,

adjust your set and lets,  see it as it is,

not how our 'morals' wish,

Truth above all else,

plunge into her and 

Etches Penmen

Oxford 5th April 2020

our minds desire to find patterns and attribute post hoc meaning is a deception we find hard to be awake to and cast aside when not useful.

Prophecy

(two poems side-by-side - Thomas on the left, Etches of the right)

hard times will return mans poets at night

retribution                                     hunger for the 

hard times are at the door classic line

no one sees him coming alone

knock knock a limerick line

He is here ‘how did we get here’?

gone is the cat whilst seeking better we

missing the dog destroyed the

the cold creeps in hope

the colours wash away and now our every breath

now we are grey is laboured 

once the laughing fond memory of

once a family cherished hearts now unwillingly 

now we too are Syria abandoned

and the Isis floods as if ignored by all of nature alas

us all crushed humanity

hard times will return reality at days end, at the setting of the sun.

Etches Penmen 

Oxford 

25/10/19 & 17th March 2020

Thomas and I worked on a rewrite here over several versions.

alas to know the future is not an answer to life, for now 3 months after version 1 of this indeed hard times have returned, friends to no man or woman,  and we are yet to see the 

true consequences, and understand our true position; we are not in control.

Acidic Breeze

Acidic Breeze,

I feel the breeze blow over me,

I speak not of wind,

Not the wind as we have known it,

In the Winter,

In the Storm.

I feel now the breeze of time,

I speak of its etching passions, 

Of ever changing of motion,

in Directions,

Untold,

It blows me across the plain,

from young boy to sapling tree,

surely, 

soon to glowing ember,

I hear it speak of blowing out the wick.

And then,

dispersing my memory,

unrelenting, 

into space itself.

Thomas Poe

December 30th 2019

another wave washed over me

fully I feel 

foam and blue and wonder

Time cant see itself, else it might stop a moment and consider 

what lies behind and what lies ahead.

How to Be

How to be gently,
How to sing Softly,
How to whisper a word,
that fills in blank   ,
of another souls life?

Brash & loud & Orange,
I love,
Greens & Blues & Yellows,
Dancing to steel drums,
with all the energy of a teen.

These two live together,
spin, spinning around an axis.

He is with me - right now,
How each day & minute & hour,
Walk with this delight,
He chose me.
So I can

Gently, softly, whisper a word
that hopes to fill hope,
in another soul's life.


Etches
The White House
Jan 19th 2020

Reality

Reality

We know what reality is! 

but as we dance,

down the roads of hopes,

to creativity,

to answer life's phone call,

there is, there becomes, there arrives, 

a shimmering blur of silvered light,

the dawn 

the gestalt-ed moment

o my loved ones 

we can pretend our life away

reality in fact a play

[trying to describe the behaviour that wallpaper over the reality of our creativity]

how to describe the roles we know

‘there is nothing new here’

but we can invite words, words that illuminate a ballroom dance

and wake the sleepwalker 

even for a moment

12/11/19

Thomas Poe

TWH

Version b - I blanche as it almost sounds like advice, whereas I want the 'reader' to see (hear) the light on their own, to ascend perhaps, to truly stop the merry go round and understand the truth of our situation, terminal singular chance, to speak into being as Aslan once did , call me fashioned but I believe in truth, in colours bright and of children’s laughter - as pure as the first waters of the first spring,

gestalt; “a configuration or pattern of elements so unified as a whole that it cannot  be described merely as a sum of its parts.”

Acknowledge

the sadness is,

built in.

locked away, perhaps but,

soaked through,

permeated permanently into,

my being.

the Lion King might shout,

‘He lives in me’,

look see that sparky frosted shaft of light,

Is true,

I now acknowledge.

still there is a path,

I walk alone, His words of wisdom,

absent

His strength and fierceness 

epicure’s of the mist

[grasping this reality & walk on]

father reach down and take my arm

let us walk together

this journey to complete 

He who knows the way

March 3rd 2020

Etches Penmen

The White House

I am not alone, I am not alone

He will go before me

I am not alone, I am not alone

He will go before me 

He will never leave me

(Kari Jobe)