Minimum

Crimson sunrise
           a dusting of frost
soon will melt
           into the air

Sparrow-song heard
           and soon forgotten

John Lyons

Morning musing

If she were simply a dream
           I would not remember her
when I wake and she is gone
           I would not long for a kiss
that she could never give

The earth fired
           with a crimson sunrise
this cold morning
           a dusting of frost
on the trees and grass
           that will soon
melt into the air
           as all thing do
no moment
           no thing fixed for all time

Life is sparrow-song
           heard
and soon forgotten
           until it returns
a world of perhaps
           maybe / who knows ?

John Lyons

A piece of work

Sun that reaches
           down into the roots
light into flesh
           a girl’s arms
her hair her lips
           her body built
cell by cell
           from energies
accumulated
           in the leaves
of plants : from grains of life
           that feed this forest
of substantial souls
            Our honesty lies
in our adherence
           to the aboriginal scripts
that underpin the whole
           of our existence

that we should be conscious
           of our consciousness
knowingness of the self
           structures and codes
of language and behaviour
           the greatest discoveries
yet to come
           a poetry of time and place
of elegy and loss
           and memory
for we are who we remember
           ourselves to be
our inner beauty
           is of the moment
and love for one another
           our most precious movement

John Lyons

Dream

On the day that the rain stops
           the wind will cease to abrade
the river surface
           and the waters will run
smoothly down to the sea
           the sun will rise in the East
and the morning will be
           warm and blue and by noon
the roses will have spread
           their luscious petals
and the buzz of bees
           will confirm their status
as exemplary workers
           in the field

                                 By the time
the sun sets in the West
           not a shot will have been fired
nor a word spoken in anger
           swifts and swallows will feast
on the evening aphids
           and summer lovers will settle
snugly into their beds
           and dream of life everlasting

John Lyons

What words

What words will do service
to my thoughts and feelings

my life stripped to the bone
I carry with me what I need

dreams yes always even as
time slips away and fewer

stars illuminate my inner sky
I cling to love and hope

As I hover above the trough
of reality : all my days

I have sought to master the gentle
disciplines of tenderness

seen within her eyes an Eldorado
that I could grasp with both hands

Love is one step after another
and there is no turning back

it is a face soft against my face
it is a word shared time and again

it is the ultimate undying truth
fastidious in its warm fidelity

John Lyons

Now and then

Even now as the days grow longer
snow has fallen across the land

Yesterday I counted empty birds’ nests
in the trees high above the railway line

Today they are lined with pure white snow
no place in which to lay an egg or raise a family

But soon the icy beds will melt away
and spring will usher in the mating game

then crows and magpies and pigeons
and more will begin to strut their stuff

and the air will be alive with love : then
the whole of nature will change its tune

roses in their beds will bloom and in a frenzy
the humble bee will make all the honey it can

John Lyons

Creation

Without us
what significance
the world

the pebbles that sing
on the shore

the rise and fall
of the tides

what commerce
between the stars

what loves lost
or won

self-expression
of the universe

riddled with questions
we are the answer

to our own puzzles
our doubts and uncertainties

discourse of the heart
of creation

our egos bound for glory
in the humility of dust

John Lyons