Memorial

Lines written in response to an incident observed on the North Circular Road, London. Kent coast, 29 June 2014.

You looked as if dumped

I had to stare

The cabbie seemed stumped

You fell from the air

Delicately, in respect for the dead

He drew your hoodie over your head.

Those arms outflung

So limp and so long

Might they once have held someone?

(You were so pretty, so young)

I get this, I do, you were depressed

I’m siding with you, the dispossessed.

Yet in my day we learned how to love

And not despise

Ourselves and each other

Our bodies, our lives

Everything, life, we didn’t hold back

Couldn’t you too do something like that?

The bundle of rags I mistook you for

Stretched out in the middle lane

Set such a challenge for each driver

Scuttling back home from work again

None can hurt you, brave avatar

Now that you in Paradise are.

Sweet girl, I will never know your name

Taped to the bridge on a pallid wreath

Yet still I feel some sting of shame

With the world you see beneath

These scraps of verse my scant testimonial

These few poor lines my heartfelt memorial.

How Pretty

Lines written on observing the attitude of purple and yellow pansies, craning at the setting sun. East Kent, 15 June 2014.

How pretty is the pansy flower in June

Distilled from air like a songbird’s tune

Conjured from nothing as if too soon

Our pinprick senses to importune.

Butterfly-petals alighting where they may

Turn triumphant, to scorn the dying day

The Sun that made them, each precious ray

I too face down, in my clumsy way.

Inkblot beauties, keep your anger at bay

God-favoured we revel in Nature’s array

Apollo commands, then must we obey?

Existence is ours, we defiant do say.

So hold, and hold, your perfect bloom

As earth is your bride, you are the groom

With leaping heart, all fears I entomb

A new day will come, we weave on its loom.