Attitude

Age be damned
           this is no time
for complacencies
           life is something
to be cherished
           Whoever heard
of a churlish sparrow
           or a tiger that tired
of its stripes or a rose
           too shy to bloom ?

Today the sky is blue
           there’s love
in my heart
           and I have
my whole life
           ahead of me

John Lyons

That restless feeling

I could just sit back
           and admire the world
just as it is
           I could listen to the wind
as it races around the houses
           and ruffles the foliage
of the garden trees
           There’s a plastic bag
on the loose lifted
           at every gust and now
floating free through the air
           The cats I would normally see
have taken shelter
           and there’s no sign of foxes

I could just sit back
           and tell myself that today
there’s nothing to spark
           my imagination or to entice
my mind into expression :
           I could but I can’t

John Lyons

Sunday snow

Each of us has
           our own silence
our own voice
           our own view
of the world :
           art and poetry
are at the point
           of sharing
of mapping out
           the common ground

Today it’s snowing
           and as I watch
the falling flakes 
           I remember
all the years
           that it ever snowed
in my life
           so that the snow
is a revisitation
           bringing a tumult
of memories
           out of the sky

John Lyons

Small mercies

Heart
no tears
no excuses
no self-pity
this is life
your life
get on with it
be grateful
for all mercies
large
and small

John Lyons

The power of poetry

The energies of meaning
           that power the poetry
in which sounds and sense
           vie for our attention
in which nouns acquire
           the emphatic thrust
of verbs of action
           love and rose
and time and tide
           all tied to the kinetics
that accumulate past
           significances
and propel them
           into the future
a horse for a kingdom
           by any other name
and whether it is nobler
           that the rich should steal
relentlessly from the poor
           poetry that wades in
to lift the smokescreen
           to tell it as it is :
to announce and to denounce
           the felonies of greed and avarice
and the hard-heartedness that
           would demean our neighbours

What molecules of water
           perceived within
the heaving ocean !
           On a sunswept day
years ago I have seen
           trout leaping
in the crystal waters
           of an Irish river
affirming in so doing
           the endless bounty of life
and so of love and all the words
           that bind us

John Lyons

A reminder

All night the wind
           raging against
the constructs
           of man and nature
tiles lifted from roofs
           branches torn from trees
and then at dawn
           a sudden calm
hostilities at an end
           just a warning
now back to business
           as usual

John Lyons