Artist

Alexander Averin

Friday 12 April 2013

Fragile Days



 
 
 
Fragile Days
 
The thick coat I wear is  Irish tweed and
bears a poet’s pocket, a deep vessel
for the rescue of snippets: phrases, dreams,
memories,  ideas and inspirations,
The coat is soft charcoal grey and crossed with
blackened herring bones, quite long and belted,
woollen, warm and wide but no-one can tell
how very safe and snug I am inside
its tailored sanctuary or understand
my need for its constancy as I go
on my daily round.
 
Today, another swiftly passing day
of no merit,  I had eavesdropped; something 
overheard stilled me into silence. I
disliked its nuance, I  saved its essence, 
wrapped most of it up in sorrow and threw
the rest away.
 
I may seem calm but only I can feel,
as I walk, that my tread upon the stair
is aggressive, frustrated by cause of
my fear for the fragility of a
world which has lost all of its subtlety.
 
Beseiged now by its trappings I find myself
miscast till I am dizzy with fear that
I may topple.  But my poet’s  pocket
of words are close, they guide me away from
the edge of the abyss to a place of
recluse where I can write, safe once more in
my withdrawing room.
 
Cait O’Connor
 

Thursday 11 April 2013

Tuesday 9 April 2013

All in this together?

Should we give a state funeral to someone who sought to dismantle it?