December

These are the long roads
The long roads
on the dirty days of winter
These are the slipways closed
on the dark and dirty days of winter

These are the silver skies
The silver skies
a soliloquy for the solstice
These are the winter cries
of the deeper sighs of the solstice

Down the long, long road
to where two rivers meet
Down through the day
to the blackest of nights

Over the hill
at the end of the world
These are the minute lies
that unpick our way home







a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Two voices, one being mine

You said
I need to test my fears
go into my uncomfortable space
You also said not to use brackets

Well I read your book of poems
yes you talk about deep meaning
family life, untouchable stuff
childhood death; you still longing

But there on the first page
indented and bolden
brackets around the word love
(Love)

You said brackets had no meaning
but now I think they were your jailer
that here you write of love from a safer
more comfortable distance

O Christopher
You can do better than this
You can be more than a one trick pony;
here read this book – I know you will

But will I Christopher
will I make a difference?
Did I, did I Mahendra Solanki
did I make a difference?

Next year is my sabbatical
where would you have me go?

No Mahendra that’s not for me to say
Your unsettled make up is of your own making
Your undoing should retrace those steps
follow along similar rites of passage








a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Senior Moment

In this quiet time
waiting for the cobwebs
listening to the inner ear
and all our sonic reflections

Watching the winter tree waft
around in the tip-toe breeze
all is grey, grey, or should I
lighten the mood and say
not grey, but silver

But still it is a quiet time
Is it quiet with you?
I imagine you in a cottage
with an open fire, or in
a maisonette with art deco
surroundings

Wherever you are
take from  this moment of peace,
settle with your own cobwebs
listen to your inner ear
let’s try one more time to balance









a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Rat

I have a snaking cough
that lies me low
But still you love me

I scive about
contributing nowt
But still you love me

I feel so sorry for myself
even ignore your sniffle
But still you love me

I take time off to stay in bed
sleeping in for king & country
But still you love me

I push out the boat of the self indulged
as sure as any shore bound sailor
But still you love me

I sit secure with sweets and figs
Let me though baby tell you
O yes I do, I do

I do still love you



a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Tom

The stamp is on the envelope
not square but secure
Her Majesty’s mail is charged
to deliver

Will you open the letter at
breakfast; over tea  and toast
or with your Scottish
porridge oats

I would have said more, though
I feel brevity to be your trademark:
Efficiency, without haste or waste
so to speak

The words, your words, I read them
again, in the bath with muscle soak
A balm for my aching
frozen shoulder

Your dedication was joyous
and that is why I write
That and to send you
payment for
Tormentil and Bleached Bones

Thanks

Christopher


a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Emerson at Eight

I wait for the sunset
take photographs of the fallen shadows
pick away at the frayed hems
of the poet’s daydream denim jeans

The evening primrose comes to collect me
her verse is voiceless as she opens
yet she breathes the air the concert gave us
She breathes the life we so shortly see

I wait for the sunset
on a patch of solitary ground
take stock of the distance to be found
in the poet’s hem picked denim jeans




a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Self

I am often of the opinion
that to read my own words
is the most appealing

The sound of my own
voice resonates with
the recurrence of infection

Try it if you will,
take a few moments,
write a few words,

Read them out loud,
praise yourself with a smile,
stood before a mirror

I am also of the opinion
that to read your chosen words
is to me often the most revealing









a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Footstep

Just to walk in steady air,
dawdle, leather scrawled into tarmac
Fingers curled,
seeds plucked from grassland fountains

Here and there a minor disturbance,
aeroplane or automobile
Or a thought, a flashback to a pain,
dull in its attempt at escapology

Just to walk, throw a stone upon the water
ponder, as though life itself is
in the preservation
as fingers brush the skin you breathe



a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Recurrence

Please do this one thing for me
thank you… could you do it again
could you do it again ad infinitum

Push me a little closer to the edge
a little nearer to the rivers flow
It’s ok, I have my boat and paddle
I am used to working against the tide

Please do this one thing for me
it helps me greatly… together we may
do it again, do it again ad infinitum

Push me, I need gentle tough persuasion
to uncork the champagne, or race against time
It’s ok, I have my ways and customs
I am used to misunderstanding my dreams




a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Live with it

The modus operandi of affliction:

Settle for discomfort
Settle for pain
Proclaim always
that you are on the mend

Swear (loudly)
that you are road bound
for recovery








a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Wave or Hand Shake

In that instant of the laughter
that moment
when smiles broke out
and cordiality invaded the presence

We move on
join together our disagreements
build a case for a primary attack
to settle a score or
strike out for democracy

In that instant as the shutter closes
a world of turmoil surrounds
the picture framed, the hard life
only half way to a peace

We move on
past the beggar on the footpath
leave the downtrodden and the beaten
without a single word -
no room here for the laughter




a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Curtain

Was I ready for closure
was I ready for the snowfall
I had read about the science
but had I understood the gift

For only later did
I re-discover that we are born to play
Play it is our primary purpose
to skip & stroke kittens in the sunlight

Bake gingerbread men
on winter Sunday afternoons
Prepare ourselves for the snowfall
& be ready, lay in wait, for the closure





a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Cloth

I did not wake in your bed
but I was not uncomfortable
to be half naked in your house

Nor was I surprised
to see the newborn so sound asleep
laid gentle in the brightest white
simple, cottoned, quadratic frame



a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Silk Road

Nestled in the softened grass
off the pathway
warm in the afternoon sun

Do you go there
in your imagination
to meet again, ever impressed

In that stretch before the time to wake
before the time for sleep
before the time to make sense of it all

Two bodies nestled in the settled grass
off the coastal pathway
warm in the afternoon sun

If you go there
in your imagination
you would meet me there, I guess









a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Slip

The words walk behind
to half catch the contemplation
to make a sense of not a lot to do

All the while there are whispers
in the gantries of the molecular mind

Trickle, trick. trickle, trick, trickle

All these hours all the while
whispers behind the conversations

Did you think, trickle trick
that would be the thick of it
to make a sense of not half to do



a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Farmer’s boy

Easier
to drift off as the cowboy
Settle back
without a time to capture

Young boys, racing towards youth
Young men
blinded with lovelorn fractures

Easier
to drift off as the cowboy
Settle back
without a time to capture

Young blood, given for a truth
Teardrop floods
aching; set aside the tractors

Easier
to drift off as the cowboy
Settle back
without a time to capture







a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Build up

It is as it is
Or it is,
as we would want it to be

There is a washing line,
of football shirts in winter
of cricket flannels, in the height of summer

There is wanting
in the young girls eyes
but sadness lays deeper with the mothers

There is an ebbing tide
of bottle tops and dinghies
of champagne corks cheerful singing

It is as it is
Or it is
as we would want it to be

There is a smile today
A tear shared with a handshake
It is a sad foray
Pain bared for the mind sake

It is as it is
Or as it wants it to be

The cries of anguish
Set aside in quiet quarters
Cries of inescapability
building up defences

It is as it wants it to be
It is as it is

a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Virginia

Folded over, folded in on your self
You reach out, with curled up tips
your tributaries; branches & firm centre line
settled deep from tip to toe

You take me to the harbour rails
let me step upon the boardwalk
All my summer was in the waiting

Only when the seasons change
do you turn into your full colour
Only when the seasons change
are you undone by my wild winds

You are ripped from the red white stalks
torn, you let me pull you into the breeze
You float, without waiting, to my floor

Dry sun,  takes away our moisture
dry clear days take away our breath
until the day of gathering when we stroke
and caress; a private life in the public view






a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Handwriting

Notes I made
forbade the thoughts
of sloping margins

Suggestions, of my own
that I struggled to cope
without I barge in






a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here