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Mary Braithwaite Poem
This poem is written in the sonnet form,
And yet I have my doubts about its shape
Though nearly to that structure it conforms
There may be holes where nightmare faces gape.
It looks and speaks just as a sonnet would
And talks of metaphysical concerns.
Do we conclude, as poets and readers should,
That in our schizoid age we cannot learn?
For humans may be decked in clothes of wolves;
And lambs be dressed in lion’s fearsome furs.
Thus, sense is tricked and problems are unsolved.
Landscapes etched, yet details seem quite blurred.
It looks like one,it feels like one,it speaks;
Yet from these words, does human feeling leak?
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2018
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
The Bedouins, refugees from other times
The places were they live are still the same
But other people founded States and took
The deserts where they roamed ,ancestral nooks.
Ther little tents of black on the hillsides
Have not changed from Mediaeval times
But now they are like flies, unwanted guests
Who will know the tremor in their breasts?
Cruel is the heart of humankind,
The Commandments spat on daily by men blind.
The Bedouins of our spirit need to be
Allowed their space, allowed their deserts free
Nomads of the desert,Jesus Christ,
Nomad of the darkness in our minds
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2018
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
No-one ever told me grief was fear
Or did they speak but I refused to hear?
Like cancer, blindness, suicide and hate
The words describe the folk of foreign states.
Vigilant and wary as we weep
We feel the loss of God and then our sleep
The world no longer has a solid floor
The foot is hesitant, the head is more.
The rudeness of old friends can hurt like knives
They rush to tell you, you are no-one’s wife.
Though we know we must meet God alone
The status of our soul is overthrown.
And yet we see new visions and new ways
Lying with the worms , as beetles gaze
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2018
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
The spaces once held sacred are destroyed
Like Salisbury plain where sheep could safely graze
Now for soldiers use and practice Wars
The Bedouin who inhabit deserts cry
The Negev is no longer a free space
The places for creation are destroyed
Before the birth of Christ, they wandered by
Their little tents and camels no disgrace
Deserts are for practising new Wars
To shepherds and their flocks we say,Good bye.
The land is used for shooting, so debased
The places for creation are destroyed
The Lamb of God is fined and unemployed
Search for peace, be treated with distaste
Deserts are for practising new Wars
Of the Spirit, is there any trace
As the Lord God turns away his Face?
The spaces once held sacred are destroyed
Now for soldiers use and Final War.
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2018
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
The fields that once held buttercups are gone
Giant furrows pattern that long land
Made by huge machines whose time has come
Precise as old account books , now forlorn,
As moving as are waves on desert sand
The fields that once held buttercups have gone
Nothing human-sized remains untorn
Nowhere for dear lovers hand in hand
Killed by huge machines whose time has come
But young folk do not court, they hurry on
Annihilating what we elders understand
The fields that once held buttercups have gone
All too rapidly our world’s undone
To the deserts of the heart we’re sent
Dragged by by huge machines whose time has come
Can no passion change the way nor lend
Creative means to pacify and mend?
The fields that once wore buttercups have gone
Ground by huge machines,death times have come
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2018
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
I’m a bohemian girl
I wear my hair in curls,
I wear maxi skirts
And denim shirts.
I wear long earrings
And black stockings.
I like folk songs,
And pierced tongues.
I like Wittgenstein,
And Melanie Klein.
I had psychotherapy,
But it was given to me free.
As I am so interesting,
And so infinitely trusting.
My unconscious mind
Is an analyst’s find.
I have such wise dreams,
On intellectual themes.
I see all my lives
From new perspectives.
I was an Egyptian Queen,
Feeling extremely mean.
I loved Mark Anthony
His touch was a symphony
Written by Schubert,odd,
Because Cleopatra was long gone
When Schubert composed his songs
And his symphonies too.
So time has got all curled up,
Like a snake in a drinking cup.
Now I have woken again,
I want that dream all over again.
I want a Roman Emperor
To be a sexual tempter.
I shan’t mind at all,
If I hear him call.
I’ll be excitedly glad
When my hormones go mad.
I’m a Bohemian girl,
I’ll make any man’s hair curl
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2022
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
Affect matters more than numbers do
Reason without love ,so blind to ends
Rational means were used to kill our Jews.
Searching Europe’s “haystacks” for a clue
Reason makes its wondrous, obscene blend
Affect matters more than numbers do
When Belsen was relieved, who bought the glue?
The bones of suffering dead might,did offend
Rational calculaters tortured Jew
Was Jesus rational, what the end he knew?
See his mother Mary, weeping,kind.
Affect matters more than numbers do
By the Christians, Jesus was abused
His brothers and his sisters barred, disdained
Factories were used to gas his Jews.
How to see what matters in the end
Hate outweighed by Love, controlled not blamed
Affect matters more than numbers do
Rational calculations ,G-d, oh G-d, Jesu.
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Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2018
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
The empty canes of raspberries hang low
Red maple leaves are mashed up in the mud
Nature seems to hover by death’s door
Animals and humans drained as whores
No feeling ,no green sap,no flowing blood
The crackling canes of raspberries hang low as
What can we say un-cliched, metaphored?
At dawn the sun will burn despite the Flood
Nature did not force us through death’s door
Can the death of God mean this and more,
Though love and hate are fractured, life is good?
The chuckling canes the berries sang below
Can a life with heart not be restored?
End retaliation, understand
Nature did not wave us through the door
At the edge of Europe are no hordes
Jesus is more small than any bud
The crackling canes stored laughter in their cores
The remnants of the foxgloves in the wood
Wave politely . even seem to nod
The raspberry canes, the honesty know more
Nature ,light and darkness, affect stored
S
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2022
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
The face imprinted on my heart is gone.
It faded slowly so I did not know
My heart is blank amd nothing lies thereon
The face imprinted on my Heart is gone
I do not feel the love of anyone.
This common loss affects us like a blow.
A metaphor,a simile,a pun.
My mind is blank its images have gone.
My heart is mine alone the love of none
Like a candle flame my love burnt low.
My mind is faded. Now I know no sun
Underneath the rivers silver
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2023
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Mary Braithwaite Poem
One day with my own self, such peaceful hours
The inner seas make music as they roll
And in the ground the worms air roots of flowers
The rain comes down in cold but gentle showers
Desiring to give moisture to all souls
A symbol of the value of quiet hours
In Northern hills we looked for Durham owls
They hunt by day to keep their bodies whole
While in the ground the worms air roots of flowers
My loved one was a native of those towers
Highcliff Nab and Hasty Bank called home
My days with him a-wandering there for hours
As he died , deep in my heart I howled
I held his hands, remembered , paid the toll
While in the ground the worms digest the sour
Lying in the heather we had roamed
May God have mercy on his homing soul
Now I enjoy in reverie our hours
Deep in the ground the worms drowse mixed with flowers
Copyright © Mary Braithwaite | Year Posted 2022
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