Fallen angel
The door behind my mind
Opens and I find
Every day a new beginning
I rise at the crack of dawn
Feel the air against my skin
Walk with the aid of a stick
Listen to the dawn chorus.
Thrillingly it’s late March,
A year since the sepsis,
When madness danced with the spectre of death,
I emerged stronger, cherishing every breath.
As I walk, I hear a symphony of sound,
The dawn chorus, nature's melody profound.
I’m thinking that when I return
Home with Charlie I’ll read
Yeats' words, again, words that I’ll never forget:
“The world is full of magic things,
Patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”
Today my senses are sharp
It's late October dark
Like a razor I cut through the trash
Of man’s deceit — then breathe a sigh of pure relief –
The buds on the trees, this blossoming of the north
Swirling skies, as the autumn winds return,
Astound me: such wonder in the world.
My dog and I are old now but we rub along,
Learning from each other
How to hone our senses
To see into the life of things.
John Marks
Sun 5th Nov 2023 17:09
Thank you kindly Hélène. This is better:
Broken Dreams
There is grey in your hair.
Young men no longer suddenly catch their breath
When you are passing;
But maybe some old gaffer mutters a blessing
Because it was your prayer
Recovered him upon the bed of death.
For your sole sake—that all heart’s ache have known,
And given to others all heart’s ache,
From meagre girlhood’s putting on
Burdensome beauty—for your sole sake
Heaven has put away the stroke of her doom,
So great her portion in that peace you make
By merely walking in a room.
Your beauty can but leave among us
Vague memories, nothing but memories.
A young man when the old men are done talking
Will say to an old man, ‘Tell me of that lady
The poet stubborn with his passion sang us
When age might well have chilled his blood.’
Vague memories, nothing but memories,
But in the grave all, all, shall be renewed.
The certainty that I shall see that lady
Leaning or standing or walking
In the first loveliness of womanhood,
And with the fervour of my youthful eyes,
Has set me muttering like a fool.
You are more beautiful than any one,
And yet your body had a flaw:
Your small hands were not beautiful,
And I am afraid that you will run
And paddle to the wrist
In that mysterious, always brimming lake
Where those that have obeyed the holy law
Paddle and are perfect; leave unchanged
The hands that I have kissed
For old sake’s sake.
The last stroke of midnight dies.
All day in the one chair
From dream to dream and rhyme to rhyme I have ranged
In rambling talk with an image of air:
Vague memories, nothing but memories.
William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)