Mis-timed Opening

Apple blossoms on saplings

are quick to open

this spring.

A sudden frost

shocks them.

(Like the heart opening

unexpectedly)

Confused

by changes

in the weather.

(Thought it was meant

to be a stable climate now

all blue skies & easy sunshine)

Mis-timed their moment.

A thousand tiny hearts

opening too easily at the

first hint of spring

Fragments

Walking down the Cally

I see Housmans Bookstore.

Still standing.

Not moved on

like the junkies and hookers

who used to hang round the Scala,

old Kings Cross wiped clean.

Capitalist exploitation replacing sexual exploitation.

I had forgotten till just now

how much I used to inhabit Housmans

browsing shelves with books on radical feminist theory

jostling with Queer Studies.

Anarchist books & leftist tomes

I step through the doorway and

sense a fragment of my younger self

here, drifting through the space.

[London's like that

Layers of memories,

Fragments of  our former selves

glimpsed in

unexpected corners

old haunts,

familiar streets]

Is that her, looking at the handmade zines

hoping to feel like she belongs here

when she didn’t before?

She loves it here

in this massive city

million times bigger than anywhere she lived before

the anonymity of it,

the crazy, chaotic nature

[but sometime she is scared too

of being cast adrift, alone, rootless,

of falling through the cracks.

But today,  I’m a tourist

on holiday from East Dulwich

a middle-aged mum,

School governor,

Fully paid up member of the mortgage paying class

a respectable sell out

Whose only act of radical protest is to

refuse the normalcy of  the marriage vow.

How did that happen?

How did I become so grown up?

Where did those 23 odd years between now & then go?

Two voices distract me, turning me.

I envy the freedom of the two young women on

the till, earnestly discussing oppression.

They are not snatching moments from

children

meetings

work

responsibilities.

I turn away, looking for her, my younger self

She is still drifting round the shop.

Funny thing is that now

I  can see her now looking forward

as I look back.

She is dreaming of a life like mine.

of fully knowing she belongs to somewhere.

I want to reach out through 23 years

hanging between us here

in this bookstore,

whisper in her ear

words of comfort.

 

This post is part of the WordPress Weekly Challenge.

Mess

piles of books occupy most spaces

and dust lies in undisturbed corners

in my messy home.

{sometimes I wish I was like the

women in the big houses round the corner

keeping bedrooms tidy, pristine

spotless windows

perfectly transparent

no  streaks.}

there are streaks

on all my windows

They do not shift

{Although, I’ll admit, I do not try to hard}

And in my bedroom – well,

my bed would make Tracey Emin proud

with the sheets and quilt askew

tea stains on quilt that I never managed to

shift.

This is the bed my boy was born in

the mess of giving birth spread over

plastic sheeting laid out by efficient midwives

catching blood, and wee and placenta

I never felt so primal

an animal,

groaning and growling;

at every contraction

my body was

taken over by a deep force

outside my control, outside logic

body split in two.

{I thought at one point I would die;

told the midwife that I didn’t want to have this baby.

She sharply spoke ‘Don’t be silly. Get on with it.’

And I didn’t have a choice so

yes, what else was there for her to say?}

Messy stuff, birthing.

I used to think that there would be a time

when I would be free of mess

that I could glide on ice skates

on the clarity of my mind,

the calmness of my heart

and the compass steadfastness of my will.

And my:

heart laughs

mind smiles

and my will roars with laughter.

Funny thing mess

It’s what we are born into,

it’s what we are made of.

inspired by a passage in Quaker Faith and Practice ‘We are all wounded; we all feel inadequate and ashamed; we all struggle.  But this is part of the human condition; it draw us together helps us to find our connectedness.’ ~ June Ellis, 1986

This post is part of the Word Press Daily Prompt – http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/04/29/daily-prompt-dickinson/

Sunday at the Skatepark

Sam poised on the top of the skate-ramp

balanced on his scooter

one foot in front of the other

ready to fly.

my throat catches as he pushes off

he & scooter soaring down the ramp.

and nonchalantly he rejoins the boys on

the other side, holding his own in the midst

of the rough & tumble group.

Glancing at me, he  wants to know I was watching

Still wanting my approval,

Still wanting to know I was impressed

Which I was.

(But  am I a bad mother

for not making him wear a helmet?

it is a long way to the

ground, a far old way to fall)

In another part of the park, young men -

louche & sexy with their shorts almost falling off their slim hips

confidently doing sophisticated tricks on skateboards

(not seeking approval from mothers I note)

the world is their’s, they own it.

I look away, searching for my boy.

Beside Sam now, a 10 year old girl with

long, long, long brown hair scoots.

They bond immediately amongst the rough boys on their

roller blades & exchange tips & their scooters.

Back and forth, the glide and jump

sometimes side by side & sometimes a weaving dance.

The sun holding them in a soft, warm light.

My heart expands

and I feel my throat catch again.

Note: After a long afternoon at the Skatepark with my boy on Sunday,  I wrote this poem  in part as an (imperfect!) response to this weeks Weekly WordPress writing challenge 

Mind Moon

Entering the meeting room

my mind is clattering

like the teacups

I set out in the kitchen.

Be still and cool in thy own mind

Oh but George,  my brain is spinning

like a mind-moon orbiting erratically

round my body,

disembodied.

In expectant, waiting silence sit

others. I wonder ~ are their minds

cool & still? Or  racing?

In a bid to control the world,

my mind is

working overtime at:

planning

desiring

scheming

worrying

catastrophizing

fantasizing

But listen to the pulse underneath

whispers a voice

ancient wisdom echoing from the past

breathe down into the hara

and I do,

breath connects

head, heart and hara

Mind-moon slows, coming into

alignment, connecting again to the body.

Ask the silence,

the wisdom,

the divine,

A question you are longing

to be answered.

‘What shall I do now?’

wind blows trees waving leaves

outside the meeting-house windows

the answer comes

Just be

Be the white snow drops emerging shyly from frozen ground

Be yellow goldenrod plants seeking sun

Be the light that shines and dims with the clouds and seasons

Be tides that ebb and flow with ease and grace.

Never grasping

but like cycles of nature

ever open to change,

to surrender,

to the unknown

without fear,

without scheming.

Be still and cool in thy own mind

And I am – for this moment, I am.

‘Be still and cool in your own mind and spirit from your own thoughts’ – George Fox, Founder of the Society of Friends (Quakers), 1658.

This post is part of the Weekly WordPress Challenge – to take a photo of something iconic and write about it.  This photo is a photo of an iconic quote by George Fox, Founder of Quakers

.

Passing Through

I watch the airplanes fly into

weighted-down

black clouds above london

from my train that is just now

passing past industrial south of the river -

Battersea Power Station & lonely dogs

small and cold,

howling in concrete kennels

So many planes seem to be

crisscrossing the clouds today

I imagine the passengers above

nervous, looking down

as the  solid London skyline

disappears

their plane hurtling through

those dark clouds,

turbulence shakes and  rattles

like my train now rattles along

South London tracks.

Soon they will pass through

to blue clear sky and sunshine

en-route to adventures and countries new.

On journeys,

in transit,

transitioning.

Passing through, passing through, passing through.

Cake Karma

I wrote this poem in response to this weeks Daily Challenge to write on the theme ‘The Devil is in the Details’

Cake Karma

Auguszt Cukraszda could be in any European city.

Or could it?

The devil is in the details.

Crystal glass chandelier shines light high

above the customers retreating from the

grey cold wet day;

Outside the large glass windows at the front, yellow trams

cheerfully trundle through the slush.

Two grande dames enter and hang their

fur hats and coats carefully on the coat rack.

Soft, leather handbags, classy knee-length

leather boots, tastefully they move to their regular

table for strong coffee and good conversation amongst friends.

An  older man is talking with intensity, passion.

to a genial, paunchy slightly younger man nodding and smiling.

Three women in the corner beside them eating cakes,

laughing and talking ~ slightly too loudly for this city

(for the general level of conversation here, they have already noted,

is quiet & hushed unlike other cities they have known)

They are not natives of this city or country – that detail is clear.

The visitors are speaking English and only one a native speaker;

the others two speak with accents that are subtly different from each other

Other customers discreetly observe this (and other details) wondering how

this mismatched trio

came to be here, at this time, at this place

The trio fall into conversation with the intense older man.

‘What do you do?’ one asks curious

‘Are you a teacher?’ says another

‘I teach others the ancient Japanese art of the Sword – Iaido.’

‘Ah, a sensei.’ they say

The other man is his student – he suits his role of assistant to the master

Discourse flows on the merits of striving to draw the perfect circle

freehand & the sensei points out how we can never achieve perfection

yet in the trying we are bettered, we learn more, we are have more compassion.

‘That is the point of iaido’

With that he excuses himself, he needs to write now.

The assistant lingers  at this colourful table but the trio make plans to leave

and he reluctantly returns to his sensei

‘What synchronicity, what luck we had to fall into the perfect cafe’

They say, gathering their coats and scarves.

‘We must have very good cake Karma’ says one

laughing and laughing they fall out of the cafe.

Through the back of the cafe, the wise old cat inhabiting

the grand courtyard (it’s staircase of decayed grandeur

descending downwards gently) is roused briefly to stretch and sniff the air

as if to say

‘Cake Karma indeed’

before returning to curl up, to dream of days gone by.