…and longing, yes, this most of all;

Sitting on my desk and due to be returned to the library is Franny Choi’s book of poems The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On . I posted that poem a few weeks ago and today I will post a second choice.The poem Things That Already Go Past Borders, is really a seriesContinue reading “…and longing, yes, this most of all;”

Dance, that ye need no other day!

After a severe storm last night I am hoping summer is not too far away. I think of fireflies and butterflies. In summer days I marvel as the sun sets and the darkening night is lit up with fireflies! Appearing and disappearing, shifting places with one another! A timely reminder of the beauty all aroundContinue reading “Dance, that ye need no other day!”

“Like thread through a needle”

Separation Your absence has gone through meLike thread through a needle.Everything I do is stitched with its color. W.S. Merwin 1927-2019 From a giant of a poet spanning nine decades I delight in one of his shortest poems. We are not told much in the poem but we feel the sorrow and the joy inContinue reading ““Like thread through a needle””

The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On!

THe World Keeps Ending and the World Goes OnBefore the apocalypse, there was the apocalypse of boats:boats of prisoners, boats cracking under sky-iron, boats making corpsesbloom like algae on the shore. Before the apocalypse, there was the apocalypseof the bombed mosque. There was the apocalypse of the taxi driver warpedby flame. There was the apocalypseContinue reading “The World Keeps Ending, and the World Goes On!”

“…seagulls are grounded”

“How To Speak Love In A Storm?” How to speak love in a storm?depends on the substance of the voice,as the trees rageand roof tiles smash,where seagulls are groundedand there is only chaos. How to speak love in a storm?is to put up a signpost for the lost,as on the bitter hillsideyou lie murmuring,‘Why isContinue reading ““…seagulls are grounded””

“Death has come here on holiday…”

From Minneapolis in Januaryby Michael Bazzett We live in the numbnessof an occupied citywhere every story has anotherstory curled inside its labyrinth— and when Sleep readsto you at bedtime, it isthe nested one that comesslinking out to sew you, with tiny stitches andscarlet thread, to the mattress.It is a story that believes itselfto be permanentContinue reading ““Death has come here on holiday…””

To see oursels as ithers see us!

In my old school book The Albatross Book of Verse, from which I have used many of the peoms found there, I marvel that Robert Burns sits between William Blake and William Wordsworth – poets of the early nineteenth century! The three of them would make interesting dinner guests. Scotland’s National Bard, Robert Burns, wasContinue reading “To see oursels as ithers see us!”

The Flow Country

In the far north of Scotland, in the two most northernmost counties, Sutherland and Caithness, there is an abundance of natural beauty. When I lived there close to 40 years ago I took it all for granted and as a barrenness that I had to drive through. Oh silly me! Recently a friend from thoseContinue reading “The Flow Country”