JG's Pages for Poets/Page No 24

Poem No 146

F = Gm₁m₂

d²

GRAVITY

by NICK HANCOCK

Among the big things of life are tree-ripened fruits-

not too high up, mind, requiring a ladder or a pole,

but within tiptoe reach,

sagging silently from a nest of leaves

as if to prove the product of G, their mass and the earth’s

should be divided by the square of the distance between them:

the stalk’s snap will prove the formula,

so let’s snap it, snap it, snap it off.

But, before raping the fruit of its sweetness,

hold it in your hand,

fix its colour-

the yellow of apricot,

the purple of damson,

the red of plum

and the soft blush of the peach;

fix it in your now and in your then

because both will soon be erased

like prints in the sand when the tide rolls in.

Above all, feel the weight,

the very gravity of life,

its heavy promise in your palm.

Your teeth meet in lukewarm succulence

and you know there’s nothing

more beautiful than this in life-

not the ignis fatuus of dreams,

not adventures, foreign or personal,

not the ringing of the eucharist bell

or the dominoes-bridges of intellectual argument,

not even the caustic command of hatred and war

(thou shalt hate thy neighbour as thyself),

nor the Croesus lament as gold turns into excrement.

Fruits are among the big things of life.

Poem No 147

from CATHIE BUTLER

SMILER

You have a lovely smile.

You're beautiful, with an innocence so rare

And a total acceptance of all things.

Never complaining, always ready to please.

While I grunt and groan and rant and rave

You sit and wait

And seem to understand why I do these things.

Your patience knows no bounds

And your forgiveness is total.

The love you have touches everyone

And never fails to melt the coldest heart.

You're one in a million.

You're my lucky charm.

You have a lovely smile

Poem No 148

Another poem from ROS BURTON

BLOCKED

Yesterday

is blurred

with the obstruction of others.

Their aggression

blotted my fear.

Transfixed it in

a moment of time.

Today

the words aren't here.

The forms unclear.

The smog

chokes my thoughts.,

leaves them struggling

in my throat.

Maybe in the morning

I'll gargle clear

the airways.

Let the mirror

reflect my mood.

Turn my emotions inside out,

so my life becomes right.

Poem No 149

from Louise Cary

'Yesterday'

Well I tried and failed
The hurt and loss detailed
Etched into my bleeding heart
Smothering me in clouds of dark.

Every second is a feeling of loss
The wonderful memories that time has forgot
By myself, alone I'm standing
In this world that is so demanding.

Tossing and turning awake in my bed
With these feelings that I dread
For I know that I am losing my love
My angel will fly just like a dove.

Unable to carry the pain in my soul
The love I once had has taken its toil
So I'll give up and run away
For what I once had has gone today.

Poem No 150

is from VINCENT McTIGUE

(France/Germany star, Burma Star

Second World War)

LITTLE PEOPLE

We are the little people

We are the ones who get told what to do

We are the little people

We are the ones who come last in the queue

We are the little people

We are the ones politicians ignore

We are the little people

We are the ones who get killed in a war

Let little people speak as one

Let's raise our voices high

And vow no other mother's son

Should serve the few...and die

Have they heard the 'crump' of shell

Or endured that living hell

Smelt the rotting corpses smell...

As I did