I speak to you with words
of Forever, and Always; call
to you, using splashes and dashes
of light, pulsing beyond any
common obscurity...but there is no
code to my caring – beaming
slip-less slides, and raging currents
of timeless affection; I am
the contrary boy boring holes
in dikes – though we live
at a sea, often confused and
seemingly slammed by encroaching
depths, but, yet, I remain buoyant –
my sole focus on you – you, my only
meaningful surface...you, my
sextant and compass.
My three quarter earth. All land.
My sky. My Forever and
Always. Happy Birthday!
The boys sat on the bridge, dangled legs above the water,
a tractor crossing that lifts and rattles, loosely laid with sleepers,
rut tracks between the marshy fields as rough wheels slowly pass,
crossed with bankside bullrushed dikes and scattered lonely sheep,
dagged bottoms up, all black heads down,white teeth to wetted grass.
Fifty’s cotton printed frock skirts mother’s seated lap.
Her hair is tightly bunched and tied in cotton farm scarf wrap.
Her arms enfold and hold me there, as I am quietly sat.
The boys are pulling tiddlers, quick flashing in the sun.
Excited shrieks and sudden shouts drift down the weedy dike.
I see their makeshift rods and lines pull fish up one by one.
I hold my cane with cotton thread and watch my bobbing cork,
and wonder why the boys have fish, and why this boy has none.
Uncle made the fishing gear, made safe for one so young.
Uncle made the fishing gear and thought it would be fun,
so hook and bait were missing, for safety, there was none.
Morning cartoons
Grassy hills at noon
Moss covered dikes
The 30 foot slide
Drive through the mountains
Catch the clouds in a bottle
Tie it to my back so I can fly
Nothing was impossible
Oldies playing their nostalgia
Freshly brewed java
Peanut butter strawberry toast
The Saturday morning ritual
Waking to rain drops
The patter of leaves
The gentle voice saying
What shall we do today
The Water lives and rushes through
Mighty water flows as the earth breaks into pieces
earth’s rocks and trees surge as this asphalt land tears and releases
There is a sound of the earth moaning as she is torn apart with
winds and rains wrapped in her mouthy white foam
this new creature a living cyclone breaks apart the wood and clay
dikes and dams roar as she creates her wild storms
I wonder how often this has happened due to the hand of man
Is it Mother Earth sending her forces to destroy the greed and
neglect used for mankinds larger wealth and castle homes
was this once called Noahs flood, eons ago as an ark that roamed
through the roaring waters keeping her planet creatures living
now as then in her belly she fights for life and groans
crushing the living soils, rocks, human and animal bones
giving it back to the Mother to feed her earth as she intends
taking back her resources to begin it all again.
Neptune
The king sits on a wooden throne on a turf of
dry land, his country has been swallowed up
by the sea, turns to his premier and says; why
didn´t you ask the Dutch for help, their flat
country has been beneath sea levels for many
years... and as a result they have grown to be
the tallest people in the world, this so they
look over dikes and keep an eye on the ocean.
The king takes off his green wellies and asks
for dry socks, a flunky puts them on, but sees
the king has webbed feet and wonders why.
The monarch knew his country would sink,
and was prepared, his kingdom will be big and
limitless.
Massil with Carn Mor Dearg
you rear up in massive bulk
Devonia volcano with collapsed dome
proud you stand against darkening skies
Many to your summit climb
wary of your cloud chambers
us mortals tremble at your storms
forked lightening flashing deadly bolts
Venomous mountain your Gaelic name
at your summit a series of ring dikes
your slope longest and steepest in this Isle
wide open your vast plateau, nay shelter here
Dropping to Glen Bennis Nibheis as you descend
be sure to visit the Glen's distillery for a dram
savour Usige Beatha" a taste of heaven for sure
Look up and wonder at the beauty of Beinn Nibheis
originally written 03/09/2013
As most of you will know Beinn Nibheis is Ben Nevis which in Gaelic meaning venomous
or malicious mountain, in a 5 year period responsible for 13 deaths. Usige Beatha means
water of life in Gaelic Massil means twinned with
There's gonna be a Freaker's Ball,
tonight at the Freaker's Hall.
Everyone's invited one and all,
so come on ladies grease your lips
grab your hats and swing your hips
and don't forget to bring your whips.
I'll take you to the Freaker's Ball.
Blow your whistle, bang your gong,
roll up something to take along.
It feels so good it must be wrong.
Freaking at the Freaker's Ball.
All the fags and the dikes are boogying together.
Leather freaks are dressed in all kinds of leather.
The greatest of the sadists and the masochists too
screaming "Please hit me and I'll hit you!"
The FBI is dancing with the junkies
and all of the straights are swinging with the funkies
across the dance floor and bouncing off the walls.
We're all freaking at the Freaker's Ball.
Hard hats and long hairs are kissing each other,
mother with daughter, son with mother.
Smear my body up with butter
and take me to the Freaker's Ball.
Pass that roach and pour the wine.
I'll kiss yours if you'll kiss mine.
I'm a gonna boogie till I go blind
freaking at the Freaker's Ball.
A Sea Dirge
I once saw, where the horizon ends,
a ship ploughed the sky.
White tears on pale blue,
I saw the waiting darkness;
I knew, before any others,
it would be a starlit night.
Look, I said, but it was too late,
the ship had cast anchor
behind a cloud loading mist
for Dogger Banks,
and take onboard discarded dreams to plug
the dikes of Amsterdam.
Sunflowers on mythical sea
and red flying fish,
my ship is bound for the Saragossa Sea with
cargo of old sailors,
here they come to stalk in fog of the forgotten.
On the sea breezed side of the mountains
in my share of the Land of the Free,
you will find me midst beautiful flowers
beneath a grand evergreen tree.
In winter- time it seldom freezes,
and our summers are cooled by the sea.
With soil that is richer than Midas,
it’s the life of a farmer for me.
The wonders of nature surrounding
are abundant and varied and wild.
We’re shaken now and then by an earthquake.
So far they’ve been modest and mild.
In the past our rivers have rampaged,
bringing riches from out of the sea.
We’ve tamed them with dikes and taught them
more hospitable neighbors to be.
The orcas swim up to the shoreline
and then go right back to the deep.
That I live in northwest Washington State,
is no longer my secret to keep.
By: Joyce Johnson
RAINS
Rains connotes many things
Rains from heaven is a blessing
A natural phenomenon
It is God’s wish that keeps us from drying
Rains is life giving.
Why does one tears, perspire and urinates?
Why do we produce artificial rains?
To survive
For an Ophthalmologist, tears from the eyes
Is the simplest form of cleansing body temperatures
It comes naturally to cure.
Rains are like tears from the eyes
Rains make lives live and alive
Rains are like tears console the heart, mind and spirit
Suppressing our feelings long subdued
If not allayed the worse comes to worst case.
Rains make the environment fresh
Rains wet the barren sand and dampened forest
It brings new beginnings of lives
Another contract of lease
As after the rains come the sunshine.
However, rain, rain go away come another day
As it swells the heart, the sea, rivers and lakes
It looses the mountain rocks to slide
Fills the canals, drainage and dikes
And causing floods and drowning men and nature.
Could it be God’s wrath because of our abuses? The scientists think otherwise!
Many times the ocean
has saved Nippon, pearl of the sea,
an oceanic symbiosis a speck in a fecund see.
The dikes of man such miniscule plans to hold back the tide.
The throngs, each and all crawl across the thin skin of volcanic soil
or rise with in the hump-backed alps of remnant cones.
Yet, the sea rises to reclaim its own
scour the pallet of man, refine, burnish melt, reform.
With pen and sword kanji drawn, samurai born
with knife and bone entrails torn, honor tested
tested by the hand of He,
tested and found worthy.
The children of the Divine Wind
rise above the tsunami, as one, unbowed.
The crimson hue in the dusk.
A girl with nasturtiums.
And the streets are starting shaking
like dikes.
The sea is tiptoeing.
A picture of a Golden Age.
And of my heart.
Sedimentary and metamorphic rock
From earths mantle or crust
Host of tungsten granites and diorites
Intrusive extrusive and hypabyssal
Of batholths sills and dikes
Eruptions of subaerial volcanoes
Continental crust
A pacific ring of fire
4030 million years old
Stinging sensations dancing across my staring globes.
Unable to blink.
The deep brown of the mud puddle
may reflect my aching heart,
oozing pain,
but I can’t see.
I don’t know.
A lead weight thumping away
longs to be free of its prison.
Why does it feel so heavy?
Why does it seem so full?
As if all the sorrow in a 5’4 frame
could be centered in that one little organ.
What is a heart
that it should wish to fly like a bird?
No,
leave soaring to the winged, freedom
to those who are free,
enrichment to the rich and give
the pitiful their pity,
nothing more.
A treacherous thing, this heart:
it does its job with a grumble and a sigh-
but conspires to drown the townsfolk
in their beds.
For it has some strange connection with the holes
in the dikes
that keep the ocean,
keep emotion,
tucked away.
I live in the land
where seas are high
and soils are low
where dikes and dunes
are border posts of
safe and sound
I live in the land
where sea levels rise
and soil levels sink
where boats look down
on red tiled roofs
and tops of trees
I live in the land
where sand and clay
replace the rock
where houses on piles
stand straight and strong
in shrinking peat
I live in the land
where poets have sung
of slow moving rivers
in infinite lowlands
where painters have praised
the grey kaleidoscope above
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