poetry

Nature’s skin and bone

irlandesuk poetry

This season’s colours too
     will fade when our secret lives
emerge from the shadows
     and peacocks strut once more
and fan their feathers to admiring hens
     life leaf flower fruit life
this too
     is the way of the world

How my blood warms
     to love and the thought
of paradise – a smile
     the warm flesh pressed
to mine – a breath unearthed
     I turn around the light
in her eyes – streets strewn
     with cherry blossom
white chalk mineral words
     with which to sing
of such beauty shaped from clay
     of nature’s skin and bones

John Lyons

Fabulous artificer

irlandesuk art, poetry , ,

Flower_pot

                                  The gift, John Lyons (70 x 40 cm, oil on canvas)

Fabulous artificer
       artful dodger
visual charlatan
       allusive
illusion –
       shapes
out of all perspective
       a remembrance
of past things
       no rhyme or reason
school of primary colours
       what the mind sees
in the memory
       an image suffused
with chlorophyll
       the gravity of perception

How the light plays
       tricks of the trade
nothing new
       under the sun

So let it be
       a gesture of love
flowers bestowed
       an artless gift
to be hung in the heart
       of her home

John Lyons

Love in the air

irlandesuk poésie, poetry

A world tinged with gold
on this winter morning

two robins bounce
up and down

on the garden wall
I know what’s on their minds

Not a single fox about
not a magpie to be seen

just a gentle breeze
sifting through

the dry russet leaves
The worst is over

the best yet to come
—love in the air

John Lyons

Un monde teinté d’or
ce matin d’hiver

deux merles 
rebondissent

sur le mur du jardin
Je sais ce qu’ils pensent

Pas un seul renard
pas une pie à voir

juste une brise douce
qui remue

les feuilles rousses sèches
Le pire est passé

le meilleur encore à venir
—l’amour dans l’air

John Lyons

A word in your ear

irlandesuk art, poetry , ,

snail

What’s in
       a snail ?
a name
       a shape
a notion
       of speed
an inner
       ear

cochlea
       helix
such perfect
       geometry
a plump
       tasty pod
filled with
       damp desire

an aristocrat
       among others
in its blue robe
       its horned crown
sitting upon
       a bloody throne

John Lyons

Faded flowers

irlandesuk art, poetry ,

vannn

Faded flowers, John Lyons (25 x 30 cm, oil on canvas)

These are the raw months
       of north winds
of incessant rain and snow
       trees stripped to their bones
faded all but a few 
       of the flowers 
of friendship
       when skeins of ducks
fly west
       in tattered v-shapes
while other flocks
       simply flee the country

and in my heart stillness
       a longing for sunshine
to warm the cold stones
       to soften the edges
of the brutal horizon
       I watch foxes dance
within circles of magpies
       their days one long string
of unbridled entertainments
       : these are the raw months
a time to dig trenches and wait
       for these times to pass

John Lyons

Corrected text

The way of the world

irlandesuk art, poetry

image_647e1c31-d147-4fc3-aa05-64a8336fe017.img_0413

Doors are
at the heart
of the matter
art’s space
a condensation
of time
of coordinates
Doors of perception
art poetry
keys to known
and unknown
territories

Roads or paths
to or from
what lies beyond
what brought us
to this point
what expectations
are held

How many doors
in my life ?
When one closes
another opens
or so we hope

Love is a door
into another’s
heart and or
a door open
to another’s heart
: this is the way
of the world
not how it ends
but how it begins

John Lyons

Newly revised

Paul Éluard – Portable woman

irlandesuk poésie, poetry, translation ,

femme-portative
Of solemn effect in solitude

Earthly derision woman
When her heart’s elsewhere

If what I love’s granted to me
I’m saved

If what I love’s taken away
Annihilated
I’m lost

I dislike my dreams but I tell them
And like other people’s when they reveal them to me

Paul Éluard, Les mains libres (1937)

Drawing by Man Ray

FEMME PORTATIVE

D’un effet solennel dans la solitude

Terrestre dérision la femme
Quand son cœur est ailleurs

Si ce que j’aime m’est accordé
Je suis sauvé

Si ce que j’aime se retranche
S’anéantit
Je suis perdu

Je n’aime pas mes rêves mais je les raconte
Et j’aime ceux des autres quand on me les montre

Lips gorged on oxygen

irlandesuk poetry

Ink in print
       words draw
our attention to letters
       to lines
to shapes
       on the page

India ink
       on white vellum
the supple document
       of her skin
upon which
       I trace the syllables
love and now
       and forever

some inkling she has
       of the messages
my fingertips drum
       on her bones
signals that urgently
       alert her breath
as love pulses
       through her veins
and desire thrusts her
       into battle
and her pale lips
       gorge on oxygen

John Lyons

Riddles of energy

irlandesuk art, poetry
inferno
Cosmos, a detail, John Lyons (oil on canvas)

How did the light
       that you and I once were
at the origins
       of the universe
become the energies
       and the colours
of who we are
       today ?

Shapes and textures
       within a cosmos
yet to take shape
       the thermodynamics
of our love
       spelt out in equations
the riddles of energy
       and mass subsumed
in a kiss exchanged
       at the speed of light

John Lyons

On the night shift

irlandesuk art, poetry

shift
                                                   Universe, John Lyons (30 x 25 cm, oil on canvas)

On the night shift
       my mind is slower
more in tune
       with the stars

Look how long it took
       for the universe
to shape our world
       for the sea to separate
from the land
       for human life
to evolve
       for you and I to meet
to walk hand in hand
       across Tower Bridge

On the night shift
       my breathing is slower
I have been known
       to doze the hours away
to dream that you
       are still there
by my side and that
       time will in time
repair every injury
       to my soul

John Lyons