Midwinter

The crackling fire, logs groaning into embers in the Venetian fireplace, lit the eyes haphazardly of the man and woman seated by the oval mahogany long table. The heat emanated throughout the room, the cold shivers both had come in with dissipated with welcome laughs and intense gazes at each other. In came an entire boar on a steel platter, roasted, steaming apples, potatoes and a multitude of green, purple and orange vegetables surrounding it. The boar was set down on the near end of the table in front of them. Emblazoned plates with royal seals lined in gold, and the finest silver cutlery were laid down carefully, by hands well accustomed to gentle motions resulting in not a resonance of china or metal connecting with another surface. An emerald chandelier above them with ebony white candles in its center was lit by a fire rod. Soft white reflections from the candles sprang onto the tables as the guests were served their dinners by the mansion staff. The dining room gradually growing lighter from the fire stretched far away into shadows bordering up to an oak roof, massive beams arching over and across. Around them blank walls, single stone blocks cut out from black granite, their edging creases tenderly smoothed down, forming total uniformity. Outside the winter raged, snow whirling, hazing the scene. The mansion, a grand and old domain, peaking to the sky, slowly being turned into a mound of snow, further and further away the snow majestically laying its cloak on the earth.

Perfect Christmas

It’s raining cats and dogs!
- can I have one for Christmas, ooh, look, there’s a dalmation and a collie, ooh, a tabby, oh mum, can’t I have them all, pleease?
Settled, down, a convoy of trotting paws, cats and dogs alike,
now going home.
It’s Christmas

Poetry and love

don’t you see it?
- well, yes I see veins, arteries and blood.
- the heart, you do not see it?
- yes I do see it, I just described it to you
- no, where’s the metaphysical, the abstract, the romantic beauty of it? Love.
- Poets, always complicating stuff
- the soul, do you see it? the beauty, the depth, the colour, the miracle
- I’m staring down at my sole if that’s what you mean, but it ain’t no beauty, just a sole
- People, always complicating poetry. Well..then, mind! do you see that?
- see what?
- heart, soul and mind, you honestly don’t see it?
- if only I knew what you were talking about?
- Poetry and love

Angel of Belsebub

And thus it were, I saw you, standing over me, a bright white light
emanating from your eyes, angelic wings unfurling behind you
dark as night, cool shadows shrieking from their movement
Around me, Death pursues, I look up and to the left, there I am
mirror imaged – dead, lying prone, staring blankly at myself
shadows hissing frenetically at me
your presence hindering them from their coveted spoils of war
I look right, and into your eyes, they beckon me
it’s time to leave this existence and step into the next
I shut my eyes, bright white light erupting from within – and a gasp
of freedom, from earthly shackles undone, to eternal peace
I rest

I wake up and feel bored

I feel like a bleak existence, hollowed out by the world
I struggle to be heard, to be noticed – here am I, I can work
I can produce – echoing back.
I wake up and stare into the monotonous hamster wheel called unemployment
I excel at some things, not at others, but why am I not seen?
I follow the trail of fellow non plussed’s
sending CV’s fruitlessly and desperately
at most, receiving an impersonal ‘thank you for applying, but..’
Sighs of weathered frustration whimper around the globe
When shall it end, this search for belonging, purpose, happiness
and become the three?

Salad roll

The crunch, the sweet blissful crunch
the cold water drops cascading from the bite
salt and heaven, all mixed together
another crunch, a sweet sensation lining the crust
sparkling, dazzling, the joy of bread, butter and salad

Words in shadow

Slipstreams of words
spiralling down on paper
like whirlwinds free, trapped in ink
they crash, they flow
they lift, they dive
slipstreams of meaning
shadow havoc on white