his path strewn with sink holes and driftwood
took him to the edge of fear and utter despair
and perceptions often mislead more than they guide
until he chose to be more than a mere survivor
love had brought him incredible satisfaction and joy
yet impermanent suffering shadowed his rainbow
for a while painted in anthracite charcoal and ashes
black on dark canvas ghastly grim and forlorn
depression reeked its ugly head as a stark reminder
that life owed no happiness but he beheld himself
in courage hope faith and the hard labour of searching
for grasping the meaning of pain and thorough rebuilding
on the verge and crisis near the abyss and valley of death
he came upon the crossroad and decided to forge a third way
went to the beach and gave thanks to good things to come
What at times truth linger
How we wish lies slumber
As some do pounder
Yet many never baptise slander
While envy remains an anthracite
Vilification may tarry to alight
The Eden apple; enough a device to highlight
Unity's drag race lying in twilight
Criticism flourish in relentlessness
To define the best soul's vividness
Thought it acts of wickedness
Truly; contrary, a wholesome blessedness
Fires precise courage
Yielded to rid bondage
She took a stroll one moonlit night
in search of lumps of anthracite.
She knew that coal could soothe her soul:
one moonlit night, she took a stroll.
Insomniac, anaplasty
coal soothed her soul: but she knew she
would need, to get her nostrils back,
anaplasty. Insomniac,
obsessed with smoking magic weed,
to get her nostrils back, she’d need
a plastic surgeon – but the best!
With smoking magic weed obsessed,
she’d need a reconstructed nose.
The rhinoplastor whom she chose
loved coal, and gave her, quick as thought,
the reconstructed nose she sought.
Drops on anthracite curls
Are glistening and slipping off.
A light breeze craves a touch
And cautiously blows on them.
But you, indifferently, don't even play with heir .
The sun sank lower
And by refracting the rays,
It lit you up like gold coins.
Well I, nearby froze as a brass,
Take me as the many of amulets.
Wait for the shutters to be closed,
we will enter an enclosure
in complete silence,
like a deep cave
which I don't know the way.
My eyes will ignore all of the lights;
there will be no more words
just the presence of your body
and your breath.
I will choose a landscape
with anthracite clouds,
a plain stripped of its green mountains;
I will ,then ,bend down
to offer you coal flowers,
of those who keep a little hope
and glow in the dark
without being seen.
---
translated from french
-
Attends que les volets soient clos,
nous entrerons dans une enceinte
au silence plein,
comme une grotte profonde
dont je ne connais pas le chemin.
Mes yeux ignoreront tout de la lumière;
il n’y aura plus de mots
juste la présence de ton corps
et de ton haleine .
Je choisirai un paysage
aux nuages anthracite,
une plaine débarrassée de ses montagnes vertes ;
je me pencherai alors pour t’offrir
des fleurs de charbon ,
de celles qui conservent un peu d’espoir
et brillent dans le noir
sans qu’on les voie.
In the sadness, we just won’t let go off the
darkness in our souls.
They glow in the night, like anthracite
coal.
It’s best to let go of this most dour power.
And live in total joy and full sunshine shower!
2/3/2022
once more the rainbow paints in anthracite colour
graphite expressions of grave charcoaled remains
the lost beauty of obscure pastels is shadowed in pain
the horizon threatens rational geometry in obtusion
bursts cohesion and kindness at all angles and seams
refuses to square the cycle of life flattens its resolve
yet the philosophy of love prevails over all illusion
perspectives are formed in the heart-mind of souls
painters are mere reflections of palettes and canvas
24th October 2021
Here comes the train, chugging its way,
time after time, each working day.
Squeal of the wheel, scraping the rail.
In worst weathers, blizzard and hail.
Serpentine twist, tortuous turns.
Hissing of steam, anthracite burns.
Onto the points, clickety clack,
over cross-hatch, changing of track.
Up the valley, on long incline,
Make up minutes, on faster line.
Leaving green space, enter tunnel,
clattering along, echo rumble.
Out into town, in smoke and grime.
Destination, and right on time.
“If a tree falls.....?” No, there is no sound
Without an ear to hear.
If light shines on....? No, there is no sight
Without an eye I fear.
Footsteps are not heard upon a stair.
Nothing that can be heard is heard there.
There - is as still as night before dawn,
Like waves with no shore to break upon.
Images do not appear where we peer.
Nothing that can be seen is seen there.
There - is as pitch as anthracite,
Like flint with no steel to strike.
Just as a candle lit upon a spirit boat
We flow through our dark world afloat
Thinking the world bright, but the light
Shines only within, all else is midnight.
There - everywhere - is dark and muted,
The senses are but energy transmuted
By neural lobes, without which life is stark;
An amoeba oozing silently through the dark.
Copyright 2021 Paul Thomson
Industry stole those splendid hills
By taking fields and building mills.
Down in each vale man's cauldrons brew
Spewing out soot and see-o-two.
But even worse was vile venom.
The days of acid rain had come
As brimstone coal made sulphur fume
That in the raincloud formed a plume.
And back-to-back by chimney stack
Defined the world in shades of black.
The jet, the soot, the anthracite.
From all black bright there shone midnight.
The taproom is a crush.
You slide between heaving shoulders,
squeeze between pockets
of overheated laughter
to a small room set aside,
a place closeted in smoky isolation.
Here the barmaid appears on the half hour or sooner.
Mostly she’ll let the ‘snug’ be,
while a clot of patrons nurse their dark brews.
Grey mustaches puff in the stuffy fumes, noses drip.
In a cast-iron frame, a sooty anthracite smolders.
A fat creamy dog stretches on the scuffed linoleum;
as you step over it, it bares yellow teeth and farts
garnishing a long lingering funk.
There’s a rain-coated woman sipping in a corner.
You consider a few pick-up lines.
The plump barmaid arrives.
Calling for another you scurry to the counter.
Behind your back, the woman leaves.
When, with your foaming ale, you turn back to the room,
the locals are smirking,
as if they’d known all along
you would be leaving the snug - alone.
Twas a lovely day in May.
A red-haired Grandmother, with her daughter and
grandchild strolled the soft, still grass.
Under a large pine tree, she unwrapped a beautiful pot of flowers.
In the center~ a flag waved softly in the gentle, Midwest winds.
They proceeded to a marble headstone with a gentle walk.
Not one of them had the need to talk.
Kneeling at the headstone~ she placed her head upon it.
Telling her husband, his family was all here for a visit.
Assuring him that they missed and loved him.
She then spoke....angelically:
" Brian, thank you for keeping our country so wonderfully free!
But alas at breakfast now, it's only me!
Brian, my Airman and eagle of my soul.
I miss your dark eyes that sparkled like anthracite coal."
She kissed the headstone as if herway to say,
She would be back soon~another day!
May 30, 2020
7:30am PST
Poem# 1,306
she showered the sky in anthracite crimson and sepia
eclipsed broken pencils and crayons moulded together
took a fading snap shot in memory of what’s yet to come
a soft touch surpassed clawed grips of splintered sorrow
outlined peripheral beauty on the transcripts of passing
rescued cinnamon and ultramarine from darkness of night
as she climbed past the pinnacle of rational composure
fresh mysterious shades surpassed stark intentional hues
compounded tapestry of magical sketches into her truth
when the moon waxed in slow motion to a tune of innocence
doubts waned as evaporation dried the canvas and pattern
of unrepeatable capture of reason to emotion’s delight
she took another sip from an overflowing fountain of measure
repainted the scene from scrap books of subconscious mind
unaware of translucent epiphanies moistened on parchment
18th May 2020
Santa gave Donald Trump a big sack
That he thought Trump would never unpack
But to Trump's great delight
It was all anthracite
(Donny loves to burn coal 'cause its black)!
Norfolk attracts bone-chilling winds
So cold that no matter the cost
Men sold their soul for anthracite coal
Or a glimpse of Martha Grix Frost
Henry Fuller lived to sell coal
Though it never warmed up his heart
But once he saw Martha Grix Frost
His heart pumped hot blood by the quart!
48-years the heat was on
And 23-children were born
The love that they shared among them
Eased the pain of those deaths they mourn.
Henry died at age 69
An old Norfolk hero was lost
The tombstone bears his final words,
"Henry Fuller melted the Frost".
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