Occasional Impressions - music, prose, poetry and prayer on the web

9. Into the whirling whirlpool... Into the whirling whirlpool wordless You & I, my love Though we don’t will it, Will Other And Other will be time before mind, time after mind, time out of mind, we drift in the stream Of our life, & the life that is not ours. Never would I deny your love & your wife’s! all that love which is yours together, I glory & gleam in it. But I’m lost in the brown water now We are lost out of the present for the future once upon a time, time out of mind. Sluggish & sandy brown, lapping, gurgling, resounding waters Down in the shingle sound in my ears In the satisfaction inside me Written down, sealed down, then die down Dive down! acknowledge we travel some path together somewhere your hand holds mine. I may fear to lose you but there is no foothold for either to turn back. We meet in the future you and I We have met in each other A time out of mind. lkm 10. Sing me a song of the summer of our love... Sing me the song of the summer of our love Rhythm of hearts a-dance and minds in tune The joy so great it would not be contained, This lilting melody, this gay song’s boon. Through all hearts, on all sides, the blessing flowed; The scope of love surprises with its powers. Yet then I did not know, I could not tell The acrid rue of life, its leaden hours. Bitter the betrayal of me who gave so free Bitterer, the knowledge that I too had betrayed Bitterest of all the love that should be true and strong In ruins; leaves the wreck insidiously made. Was grace that I could know the Water’s surge, And check my heart's chaotic threnody; Then let return the theme of constant pain, The plaintive, broken song, the haunting melody. jeh 11. Praying (1) God Is the name The fingers of the drowning mind Reach at, cling to, and Burn themselves upon. Praying (2) I in moving darkness want To push hands through the black clay plastered on my eyes, And knead it to what can be seen or Understood. I Torture knowing into words Along the prism of my mind to shape The night I stand in. My words are nets Let down To catch The sea. Praying (3) I, on waste strange water’s shore In pale light wearying my eyes, My face in grass or sand, I Press my ear against the mind’s shell Lying near, straining to catch the strange Distant sea. Why Do not the falling waves on this frail shell Grind it to sand or water, crushing And breaking it to Itself? Oh God the waters are not strange. It is the shell I do not know. rdw - jan 1971 12. Found - in original MS form... [Found - in original MS form - inside B. Metzger’s The text of the NT when I had taken it ¾hr(BST) earlier to read. The copy had, however, been unopened.] The sea is falling down the sky to-day But nobody will know (who has not seen) Nor mind (who has) The sun last night spun drunkly on the moor And no-one cared at all (Who was (or was not) there) The moon was aching full with whitened mirth And did we laugh (who were within)? Yes, about something else and several sleepers - slightly - turned. emn 13. He loved her for her so sweet sympathy He loved her for her so sweet sympathy. She loved him? She’d heard tell he was clever. Both thought themselves safely sheltered and hid From the world and each other for ever. What happened when he found she never gave, She found him not that which she thought he’d prove? What else for them but recognise their fear And find them the way and meaning of love! jeh 14.She only loved him out of pity She only loved him out of pity For he was alone And she admired him For he was capable and talented Not over so - But promisingly And he was alone. Well, she was free to love him For she was alone And she could protect him Would always guard him And comfort him For she could always smile While she was alone. And he loved her out of gladness For they had been alone And he pitied her Could never leave her For she had given that life for him That nobody else would take While they were alone. jdy - march 1972

Occasional Impressions Poetry Collections - The Gemini Poets (1972)