METAMORPHINE AND OTHER POEMS
Adrian Sturgess
Copyright Adrian Sturgess 2012
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Cover Art: Beti Bup
Brief Technical Note
May I suggest that, should your eyesight allow it, you select an e-reader font size that is small enough to allow lines of poetry to sit properly on the page. If the font size is too large then verse lines will double up and become messy.
The Dove
A white carpet lay across my land
And silence reigned.
A white dove flew straight past and
Its dark eyes looked peacefully
Into mine.
I heard the hateful sound of a gun.
It blasted without pity,
And the white dove lay quite still in the snow,
A small pocket of warmth in the winter coldness.
Dark red blood seeped from its breast
And shone like a beacon in the snow.
The dove looked beautiful in death,
And the man with the gun wept
Like a child at what he had done.
(C. 1993)
The Tree
I stood at the chasms edge
And looked across at the tree whose fruits were moons.
From the highest branch, there hung a fruit of special splendour
And as I gazed, it slowly filled my view.
It pulled me to itself with gentle force,
Until I lay and watched the stalk from which it hung
Divide the sky,
A dark umbilical cord.
Far beyond, hung other shining globes
And far below, lay the chasm, as dark as Satan’s heart.
My tranquil thoughts were pushed aside,
By a howling wind, that sent great shudders through the tree
And I sensed despair.
Not yet; not yet. Too soon; too soon.
The thoughts of the tree echoed through my skull
And I sensed malevolent greed,
Floating up from the chasm’s depths.
It’s fruits, nurtured since the dawn of time,
Could not yet match that which lay at the chasm’s heart.
They would perish,
And time itself may not allow
Of another crop.
The growing force of the gale
Sent me spinning from the tree
And blew me far away, like a seed,
To another land,
From where I have no wish to return.
I hope that the tree still holds it’s fruit,
Until the day when it feels the time is ripe
To let them go.
But the despair of the tree always fills my dreams
and darkens my days.
(C. 1997)
Metamorphine
Torn canvas, head bowed low,
Tell of aspirations out of reach.
A cry of anguish in the night,
Such beauty in an aged face,
Gently bathed in pale moonlight.
A soothing cloak of darkness falls,
And I’m safely wrapped in my cocoon.
Somewhere outside a lone wolf calls.
A chiming clock stands in a room,
A shaft of sunlight strikes the face.
No movement in the room disturbs the timeless timepiece.
Though time stands still, still, there’s time,
To set the clock in motion.
A sigh unheard drifts into space,
The secrets of mortality to embrace.
A small child dies,
An old man cries.
A lonely lover sits and weeps,
An orphan hugs her doll, beneath the sheets.
Drifting clouds on a summers day,
Casting shadows of fortune.
Footsteps sound in the next room,
A door blows open, my candle dies.
The card house walls start falling in,
A clammy hand is groping for me,
The fear of darkness is from within.
A picture hanging on a wall,
Ripples slightly, starts to move.
The scenery becomes a mirror,
Acting out life’s charade.
The picture-mirror sucks me towards it,
I struggle briefly then succumb.
The room around turns outside in
And I’m safely wrapped in my cocoon.
(C. 1976)
This poem warns of the fight we must all make against complacency.
If we have a dream then we must find the courage and ambition to step up and try to achieve it, no matter how unrealistic that may appear to be at the time.
Kitty
Kitty sits quite still,
A study in concentration.
Her eyes are fixed
And deep.
Bottomless pits,
That drag you down
To depths, where,
Fearing you will drown,
You back away
And go find easier prey.
Her hair is the gold
Of the setting sun,
On leaves,
In autumn.
Her features are forged
Of the timeless rock
That saw planet birth.
Her Gods were cruel,
Inhuman beauty her lot.
But, beneath it all,
Her mind is poised
And waiting.
A young boy lies in fevered sleep.
His life-force is
The pallid hue
Of the waning moon.
Young,
He has no one.
Frightened,
He reaches out
And the sun dawns on his twilight world.
He is calmed
And kissed with a silken breath
And given the life
He will never have.
Then, flown,
To his own dream world,
Where, knowing that he was truly loved,
Peace will reign,
Eternal.
(C 1983)
Kitty is a young girl of extraordinary beauty and with an extraordinary gift.
She is telepathic and empathic to an unimaginable degree.
She selflessly chooses to expend her entire life-force helping a young boy who is hovering on the brink of death.
Jonathon’s Room
As you walk into his room,
You enter the womb
Of Jonathan’s mind.
There is no ceiling, just open sky,
Where aircraft fight and dragons fly.
To the north a fortress with an impregnable keep,
Where a princess lies in eternal sleep.
To the east, a plateau where starships land.
Yet, the seeming disorder is carefully planned.
A balance of power strictly maintained,
Past and future counter-strained.
A star-warrior, with more brain than will to fight,
Is lanced through the chest by an armoured knight.
An alien attack from the depths of space,
Is dispelled by the hand of the lady-in-white-lace.
The ultimate sentinel, queen of queens,
She is the final guardian of Jonathan’s dreams.
Jonathan’s room; the abode of Peter Pan.
The reality of the boy,
The fantasy of t
he man.
(C.1981)
Focus
Focus,
Momentarily,
On a single
Blood-red bloom.
Let not the pre-dawn chill,
Nor the breathless beauty
Of the fading night
Distract,
But wait…
The frame is set,
The picture slowly shifts,
Until blue and red
Just contrast,
And then,
The warming,
Searching
Tendrils of the day
EXPLODE
And the flower turns to
A silhouette.
A change of scene,
A darkened room.
Time has passed
And near the tunnel’s end,
A softly spoken word
Enters through a portal,
Echoes softly around the walls,
Gains momentum,
Endlessly circling,
Shrill pitched,
Deafening,
Ever louder,
All devouring,
Beyond reason,
A raging vortex,
Mirror to all hell’s fury,
Illuminating the darkest depths
Of your soul.
And, as your scream of hatred,
Joins the beast in splendid duet,
The unreasoned din is answered
By a subterranean beat
And the demon thing is gone.
An insect whine lingers on
Then fades
And the door is open.
Stale air exchanged
For burning, blinding,
Probing light.
Beyond the door,
A meadow.
Summer laden,
Fragrant,
Long forgotten,
Long missed and gently kissed
By the morning dew.
All this,
A backdrop to,
The stumbling plight of
An agéd man.
Hesitantly,
He picks his way
Through the pastures of life’s reward,
To the edge.
Where,
With aching heart
And trembling hand,
He stoops
And plucks
A blood-red flower
And is gone.
(C.1981)
This poem, right from conception, was intended to be displayed on the printed page in the form of an ‘X’ with the first half of the poem forming one leg and second half forming the other leg. The legs were discontinuous at the centre, so there was no overlap and enough blank space to place the title ‘Focus’ right at the centre of the poem. Alas, I cannot achieve this here and so it appears in the conventional format.