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Best Poems Written by Thomas Harrison

Below are the all-time best Thomas Harrison poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Herstory, Not History

(for Virginia Woolf)

She wanted to buy some flowers but drowned Herself instead,
drifting along the ebbing flow of time, with warm
water cracking Her slim figure and airless lungs.

‘will I freeze the river?’ She thought, wondering if the trees
would still rustle in the wind if She wasn’t alive to notice it,
thinking if Her man’s heart would still beat if She could
no longer shock its rhythmical thump-thud-stop with kisses.

the wood was chopped down around Her home. The
veranda from which She surveyed the world was but
deafened by cruel hacking chopping and sawing at the 
hands of men whom took Her feminine beauty away.

She became the water as She died, became the weeds,
became the bark that broke her own back, the pen and the phallus.
‘this isn’t purgatory’ She realised, ‘this is revenge and reward’.
‘I am a sacrifice to literature. I am a sacrifice for the word’.

from writer to death to glory to ink
to the lies under rocks uncovered, 
to god to me to the taking of Her own life,
She is the paper in our very hands.

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Where Loneliness Lives

In shoes with their laces untied, a picture frame with image faded,
in a hotel room whose guest is dust, a drawer, empty, but for rusted pins.
In the letter that you never reply to, the bin not emptied,
in a phoneline disconnected, a priest flockless - no sermon to utter.

You got up from the dinner table and told me to wash the dishes.
I put them in the sink but left them, neglected, and the memory
of you hardened, crusted. I told myself I’d scrub them when you

came back. Flakes float in greasy water like leaves aimless 
in a puddle, the suds lamely lapping at burnt leftovers - a 
tired ocean current feigning interest in destroying castles.

In a kettle without water boiled, a car seat with no belt,
an artist’s palette blank, a notebook with no impressions of thought.
The deaf person’s signing without hands, in the umbrella without ribs,
in calendars void of days, a clock with hands counting backwards, 

trapped in the amber of time. A mosquito caught in a tree’s sap.

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

The Power of Water

“Don’t turn your back on the water...” my grandmother told me as I
skimmed stones across the tiny ripples of rock pools. 
Small scaly creatures and stones sliced toes like knives but
we were full of excitement then,
craning necks and nets at the alien life under water that 
swilled any blood away in a salty sting. 

Until that day.

My rock pool filled with tears/spit/teeth from savaged parents
covered and muddied by seaweed from miles out - dragged against
flotsam and jetsam from the seabed. It all tipped endlessly into my rock
pool in a careless hurry/rush/smash like workmen at skips. 

I went back to those pools and streams, like tears, crawling from the lake. 
Found it was lost and
drowning within its own water:
a roof slate, a car, a swing from along the coast. A doll’s
head that just bobbed and plopped. 
It would have been sucked and spat 
upward, surging towards the sky with plastic arms praying, 
in the deluge just moments (days?) before.

It’s not my rock pool anymore. It’s not our town. 

People killed by geography:
Subduction – Subtraction of me from my family.
Subsidence - Insidious silence that lulled people to exposed sand with palm trees over heads like question marks… before the wave even Noah would struggle to sail.
Tsunami… you and me. 

“Don’t turn your back on the water...” my grandmother told me

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

If We

If we were a beach
then you would be the sand, diamond warmth,
and I the shingle underfoot.

If we were a pen
then I would be invisible ink,
and you a permanent marker, fluorescent.

If we were wine
you would be the vineyard, the grape, the wine list itself;
I a bottle unopened, left corked.

If we were a theatre
I am the playbill of a show cancelled and unseen;
you, the stage in spotlight: golden, applauded.

I the tile and you the whole mosaic
for us as a Roman floor;
I a shattered pane and you the handle
with us in the shape of a door.

As clothing – you a shiny button, me a thread to be snipped.
As hair – you a photographed trend, I a ponytail clipped.

If we were a couple,
Then you would be blind.
If our love was a tape,
I’d forever record, pause and rewind.

If we were a cake
you would be the fingertip licked icing
and I a batter filled lump.
If we were a body
then you would be the heart
and I the blood you pump.

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Seasons Change

Imperceptible
as snow melting to spring sun
time and weather shift

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Bike Ride

Bike ride,
air through my hair,
sunshine dousing my skin.
Dirt and splashed mud cover wheels.
Sweat drips
heat rises, thigh to palm to cheek.
Music comes from nature,
leaf and rock crunch
below tire.

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Earth Is Sleeping

Earth is sleeping. It is dreaming in silent 
technicolour peaceful and alone, calm and
gentle without the tragic crush of mankind

and its usual stampede. Nature noticed it
slowly - having time to stretch, to breathe,
to open its eyes wide and bright and luscious

away from smoke steam and smog. The sky is blue, clear.
Rivers are lapping, gently. Birds fly above in chorus. 
The moon can be seen waving twinkling and white.

Earth is resting its patchwork body, its tissue of 
grass and pores made from the exhales of trees.
Its legs are growing hairy, left wild and unshaven.

This time of solitude and watery reflection 
is repairing habitats and watering oceans - 
replenishing nature, whilst strengthening us.

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Visiting My Adult Life

I heard a knock-knocking on the door.
It was my childhood self, visiting my adult life.

What had I achieved? it asked,
and where had I been?
Was pay equal yet? it wanted to know,
is heaven still a dream?

Heaven, it pondered, is it here on earth
in butterfly wings and melting snow?
It is spiralling in Dante’s nine circles, loved by Venus,
or simply in the cry of a new-born?

Heaven, it mused, is it above us in the air,
exploding in stardust, travelling like light to an eye?
Is it cradled between fingertips in a Vatican chapel,
or is it felt in pats on the back, any small success?

I looked at my childhood self,
unsure of this placed called Heaven.

Was it aflame inside a Jewish Menorah, 
or walking in Jannah, a Muslim-named paradise?
Was it in beads of blood upon a crown of thorns,
or swaddled with first born sons chosen as a sacrifice?

So, with forefingers and thumbs I 
made a rectangle with both hands.
“It’s in here”, I told my childhood self, “whatever 
you see in this space from where you stand.”

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Dinosaur Limericks

Miss Velociraptor knew she was scary,
she’d be rich if for each scream she had a penny.
She tried her best not to growl,
not to chase, beat or foul,
but not for long could she stick with any.

Mr T-Rex wanted a mate,
old now, he worried it was too late.
But his hands were so small,
he could never pick up the phone to call,
the dino he fancied to ask for a date.

Mrs Pterodactyl loved soaring in the sky,
knowing the dinosaurs below wished they too could fly.
Getting close to the sun,
sizzling like a hot cross bun,
merrily flapping her wings as she swooshed by.

Master Diplodocus disliked his enormous feet,
no animal with paws larger he ever did meet.
He even tried nail polish
to make his toes look less trollish,
whilst still crushing tiny creatures in the street.

Mummy and Daddy Iguanodon tried to evade,
whilst placing their youngest in some cooling shade,
that summer’s terrible heat,
which was rotting all their hunted meat,
their patience in the warmth just starting to fade.

Baby Allosaurus would not go to sleep,
all night long he continued to roar, dig and leap.
But when babysitter Plesiosaur
told him she was a very hungry carnivore,
no sound was then heard, not one peep.

Details | Thomas Harrison Poem

Tess of the D Urbervilles - a Series of Cinquains

I
Roles
beyond her age:
worker, carer, teacher,
parent, sister, lover, cleaner.
Alone.

II
A girl
made a woman
by a lover thought true,
a passion she believed worthy
of her.

III
Scarred
by cruel men
beyond her own control.
Emotional wounds left open,
heart wide.

IV
Mother,
black in mourning,
sought a burial, small,
in desperation. Cold, bleak, stone.
Grieving.

V
Stoic.
Astute. Selfless.
Forgiving. Gentle. Bold.
Important. Remembered. Loved -
she, Tess.