ONLY SHE WAS THERE
A remote deserted beach somewhere
no footprints in the sand,
peace and silence broken by the crashing waves,
the screeching gulls,
and I was contemplating her in all and every different form,
. . . and yet, only she was there.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, loss,
Form: Free verse
A STAR FELL
. . . later that evening, under the yellow lamplight
I saw you again, you were on the veranda,
you looked . . . expectant
as if waiting for something to happen
with an anxious look upon your face,
could it be I wondered,
could it be that you were lingering behind
waiting for me to pass by,
dare I hope that you would cast a fleeting glance my way,
. . . then our eyes met
and a star fell across the night sky.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, night,
Form: Free verse
Into the depths, the heavens high,
the floating spinning worlds,
upturned a thousand fallen leaves
to find another woman’s love,
all I could see,
your lovely beauteous face.
. . . . and then I looked,
and then I searched inside my self
and there I found in wonder and in splendour
a love which has no gender.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, gender,
Form: Free verse
All through the long winter
I went looking for you,
I searched all the old familiar places
but you were nowhere to be found,
at last, weary of the search I sat in the silence
and there you were, inside my own heart..
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, absence,
Form: Free verse
MY BIRTHDAY PARTY
Once,
I invited some special friends
to my tea party,
I made cheese, cress and tomato sandwiches,
blueberry yogurt and a pot of jasmine tea.
I spread a white linen table cloth I’d embroidered with flowers one evening when
I was alone,
I placed a blue vase covered with purple flowers and bluebirds
on the table,
. . . prepared some words for a poem to read to my friends,
I waited by my window all evening, then waited some more,
. . . but nobody came,
I died a little more that night.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, birthday,
Form: Free verse
I remember too the countless times
I brushed my lips softly across your tired brow,
. . . but that once before you left to journey home
I kissed your lips, and there in my heart it remains
like a fluttering moth on a red leaf.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, loss,
Form: Free verse
Beloved,
I had written your name on the walls of my heart,
pasted your invisible image on the core of my being,
deep, deep in the depths of space and time
everywhere I searched for you,
I looked for you on the underside of willow leaves,
inside the bubbles on crystal mountain streams,
amidst the wild-flowers on the meadow
and all that I found was my Self.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, loss,
Form: Free verse
IT COMES TO ME
What would you have me do with these my tears,
shall I gather them together in a tiny bottle and keep them
on a chain close to my heart,
or shall I scatter them over the dying autumn flowers,
shall I walk with them over the meadow
and let the wind carry them away
or let them fall to the earth with your ashes.
. . . for I have seen you there
amidst the trembling leaves on the sycamore trees,
in the crystal pearls on the tips of marsh grasses,
and when the meadow-lark rises on the breeze
I hear you whispering my name in the flutter of its wings,
. . . then it comes to me and to my understanding
that you are not gone, you are everywhere.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, miss you,
Form: Free verse
ONE BUTTERFLY WING
In deep distress she damaged her wings
in her endless struggles
beating them against our bedroom walls,
in her last days she made haste
and flew through the ceiling and then,
she flew free,
at first I did not see
that the sun and the moon
were shining on her face
when she lay still and at peace
till her beautiful soul opened its wings and ascended
to live far above the clouds,
now, her spirit encompasses the earth
in all the six directions
casting no shadows,
and as I lay and watched her ascent
one butterfly wing like a sycamore seed
spiralled down and landed upon
my pillow.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, butterfly,
Form: Free verse
She came . . .
quietly, secretly
to my lonely bed last night
and from a hidden pocket in her robe
she took a ring,
a circle forged of gold,
and whilst I blushed a deep rose-red
she placed it on my finger,
and whilst I wept
she pressed my trembling hand upon her heart
and whispered in my ear,
“My love, my dearest dear,
weep not, for you and I are One.
Tom McFerran.
Categories:
mcferran, marriage,
Form: Free verse