Ambition

 

Solid is the dream of a shadow

Sometimes we hunger for an unimportant word
Earth is the bottom rung of paradise
Hopes are as sermons never heard.
 
Life is a limbo where nothing is defined
Cuckoos and priests; free homes, no wives,
The simple deed of a simple man
Can cause convulsions in other lives.
 
In a race of lifelong borrowers
Jews are needed and know where to go,
Can you stop the hurl of an avalanche
By grabbing a handful of snow?
 
A vicious circle of unsatisfied longings
The lariat binding struggling desire,
Islands bound in oceans blanket,
A spark resentful of father fire.
 
Eternal life the always dream
Of those who never posted a will,
Hardy summed it up with his words,
‘That sportsman time but rears his brood to kill’.
 
All things seek what they can never have
Blood flows both ways, in and out of heart,
All striving is futile in ever shifting time,
Life and death; ever just one breath apart.

 

 

Dust to Dust

Into the arms of her neighbours

The great mother oak fell in Newcastle Wood,
Six weeks they waked the stricken one,
She clung to her roots as long as she could.
The red squirrel squinted and sipped from the brook,
Higher destinies; his to overlook.
 
Her red ripened body of fungus and sweat
Dismissed civilization not even skin deep,
Her dowry a mixture of hope and regret
Dark dirt and bark stile; only willows may weep,
The haggard bony bosom her stolid remains
Her cousins filling gaps in country lanes.
 
Circumstance took me aside to view the fatal fall
And marvel at the mystery of her revolving face,
The scent was as old turf across Roscommon wall,
Nature has no mercy; neither honour nor disgrace.
Surrounding sounds were curious, muted as the strain
Of a curates galloping whisper of his Office in the rain.
 
Her secrets are all vanished now, never to return,
The wills and wonts of what will be called by a dying moon
Never meant for sawmill but in suns bright grate to burn,
And become again that acorn, dancing to seasons’ tune.
Life often changes her dress but her body is still the same
Better to topple in splendour than shrivel up in shame.