After Our Dusk Had Fallen

 After our dusk had fallen

There were no words to say

The right, the wrong, the never was

For space came cold between us

Unspoken

A breaking of the trust

No hope, no hope, no going back

But once, it had held us close

Yet how quickly spent

And we, with souless courage

And with silence

Amidst the empty spaces

All thoughts new emptied by your doubt

Hard admission made

Yet, when I  reflect 

And reach for happy memory 

The history of our time 

Shared as  it was

An audience of friends

That called themselves our own

But kept  their secrets to their souls

Will they remember

As I grow old 

Or forsake the good there was

Another human story left untold

Look at me, fix un-judging eyes and see 

How fallen is this silence

How far we’ve come to be 

Here, take my hand, if not for guidance

Then as gentle end to enmity

Don’t turn away, recall kind words sincere

Before this hush descended

Before the dawn foresaw our tears

Herald of a time just ended

Cloaking memory of so many stolen years

All trust suspended, all ceded to an instinct for contempt

Cruel questions un-mouthed and unprovoked

Cruel answers left unsaid to blame pre-empt

Living only in the mind as protest deep bitter choked

Mouldering the quiet, unguarded innocent

Insistent menace, sharp toned veneers

Tapping the shoulder of conscience and hearsay wisdom

Come, look at me and say what truth can stem such tears

That takes each man, each loving woman, in their kingdom

To be as they are and not subsumed by fears

 Summer is coming
Along far off beaches in the East
Where briney strands of seaweed
Lie lifeless in their nests
Spring has lost its place
To reddened seas and dunes of whitened gold
Where sighing breezes at last can breath
A brief impression of this passing time
With faint and crusty pattern without meaning
Lost on rising sands forgotten in the mist
Here seagulls hold their flight
Masters of this reworked air
Now filled with urgent callings of delight
Over it comes, breaking the far horizon,
Rushing to our place of memory and sentiment
The pools and rivers running out
Through rocks of slime and moss
To find their home amidst the foam and spume
A border of two contingent worlds
Where Man and Woman soon may walk
To seal their futures with a kiss
And turn once more to bravely face
The love they have and choose
Not coiled in fear but found in firm embrace

 

Come with me
Through streets of night and day
Where gold is made and quickly drains away
The meal of grand distinction
Is Rome Imperial installed among us
To serve, to shock, to mock
Our confident despair
It feeds such loveless lust
That peaks again
Despite deep wounds that tear
All that we hoped for
Lost to another dying year
Marked by rituals of old
New formed the same
But emptied of their meaning
A feeble spark for reveries of old
Burnt into memory
A blackened piece of history
That marks the journey of our time.

 

The house stands solitary

Sure refuge for an anxious and unsettled spirit

Where humanity tears its troubles out of sight

In search of peace and holy sanctity

An island on a Western shore

Edged and turned to catch the sun and more

Where dreams form gently in the air

And hope pervades each simple room

Bleached white, the sand all sifted soft

The seasoned boards long worn to creaks

That tell to those that listen

That all is empty now

Long hollowed and exhausted

Until another Summer spent

As brace against the breathing ocean

A silence for souls  new emptied of their life

Amidst a sea wind's siege

While wilful shutters clatter out abroad

A lost mariner's lament

The rising smoke a Pope's device, a certain portent

For a brace of entangled lovers

Locked in their own desperate embrace

Caught before the embers of a glowing hearth

Their hallowed refuge suffused with grace

To outlive their love and offer sanctuary

To another and another

For an eternity's disgrace.

You have come back to me
Hot breath and sighs
And scented skin
That oft remembered smile
All wash away the ills between us
Brush down the dust, revive the hope
No shadows here
For only the warmth of the open window
And the sound of the sea
Can rouse us now
 

Where did you run to?
No, I shall not ask
Nor feel the blame
I carried for so long
You are with me until the clocks return
That is enough
Or the telephone rings
Or you must go, again
Why is it so?
 

One more silence
And I am gone
No more to wait
Lest Love should mortify my soul
And turn to hate
If we be doomed then it must be so
No man can fight the dying tide of fate