Author: deuxiemepeau

HOOKED

/ deuxiemepeau / 3 Comments

 

Time washes onwards

but I recall each wave

I welcomed

over body

like a cover of comfort

like a blanket of trust,

a surrender to the water

warm, deep breath and dive

without drowning,

I recall each wave

but forget

how far it swept

from the shore,

 

how it left

each time

with a wanting

for more

as I drifted further

though I cannot swim

 

I am only fool

not fish

and how you fished…

 

how your hook cut

so deep.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Audio version available on SoundCloud…

GROWING GREY

/ deuxiemepeau / 15 Comments

 

Settled in,

window seat,

wet feet flooding past,

fleeting reflections

in the steaming glass,

looking for the light

in this city

now grown grey

like those hairs

to hard to hide

above those lines

the mirrors reveal

below the eyes

grown weary of watching,

how did the road

spread itself out so far,

behind is a distance

too complicated

to comprehend,

too muddled

to measure,

even the mirror,

this glass, this reflection

cannot hold

all that has been lost

from sight.

All has settled in

so deep

it is difficult to see

in the reflection

all we once were

as we make movements

meant to be meaningful,

amid all that has of late

grown grey. Grey is the new

black but we have no time

to mourn,

the track never stops for us,

the herd hobbles

forever onwards,

there is no going back,

no slowing down

regardless of the weight,

we moan like mooing cows

but follow like sleep

ignorant of the slaughterhouse

outside on those wet streets

with those feet flooding past

all those fleeting reflections

falling unnoticed

into this river

of graying blood.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Audio version available on SoundCloud…

TAKEN

/ deuxiemepeau / 3 Comments

 

What to report?

To what port must you swim,

in how little can one drown

(shallow is often

the sister to shady)

air is not anything

until it is nothing

 

and nowhere,

 

(sometimes existence

is only revealed

through disappearance)

–

are you someone

until you are seen

in the eyes of another?

 

What to report?

to which port do we reinvent,

circumvent,

is it possible for one to prevent,

(can prevention deter

a discernable direction)

fear is not anything

until it is everything

 

and everywhere,

 

(this skin does not tingle

until it’s been touched

or torn)

 

is there still a light

in the darkness

of the ransacked room

of this ravaged organ?

 

What to report?

How do you report

the trust that was taken (for granted)?

 

I tied to report it

but trust,

once taken,

cannot be listed

as things stolen

on a police report.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

FLUTTERING HOPE

/ deuxiemepeau / 6 Comments

 

Silence surrounds

this sweet stillness,

icicles are falling;

tears streaming

new paths

down old windows

once home

to fading reflections

and the robin

and his red chested breast;

forever stained, forever beating,

flaps through the open field

in search of a hushed hope

in buds that will soon bloom,

in life that will soon turn

below the hardened earth

and muddied soil.

 

We have spilt blood,

been drunk on its bitterness

and still we parch for more.

 

Sweet is this silence;

these mornings breaking,

crisp and cold,

cutting through the layers

we are desperate to shed,

we too are seasonal;

we rise with a spring

and tumble through each fall,

we are hot headed

and cold hearted

when comfort constricts,

melting pain down windows

too frosty to show any solutions

until we are emptied

and in the silence,

in that slowly

sweetening stillness

we are renewed;

ready to cut new reflections

into the smooth surface

of that shatterable glass,

our faith fluttering

on wings of hope.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Audio version available on Soundcloud

I DREAM

/ deuxiemepeau / 5 Comments

 

Dreaming,

 

seeing time

as something silky

you can slip though,

 

rearranging reality,

 

the hours revolving

around minutes

around molecules

neither past nor present;

 

the future still waiting

to be moulded,

 

dreaming

of tempering time;

 

of breaking it

 

of bending it;

 

redrawing curt corners

into kinder curves,

rerouting long roads

into achievable lengths.

 

I bend time

beyond this bed

of twisted sheets,

 

these withered webs,

 

tired and torn,

 

and mend

in my mind, slumbering,

that which was cracked

 

before the mirror

catches its reflection

of disruption,

of distraction,

of rejection.

 

And I wonder

in all this bending,

in all this mending,

 

how much the mind

will remember

 

and how capable am I,

in waking,

 

to let time forget?

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

CHRISTMAS COVER UP

/ deuxiemepeau / 9 Comments

 

In the shadow of all its history,

in the sorrow behind its sparkle,

I sprinkle fairy lights on the drying roots

of this dying tree.

 

At the summit of all its beauty,

from the forest freshy felled,

I place a blood red rose on this tree

cut down from hope.

 

All words and photographs by damien B. Donnelly

THE STORY

/ deuxiemepeau / 7 Comments

 

How does

the heart

still pump,

how does

the blood

still run

when these

feet won’t move?

 

How do

the bones

not break,

how does

this skin

not shed

when these

hands cannot hold?

 

We dress

ourselves in

solid shields

of security

(see this shining steel)

that cannot sooth

the single soul

still shivering

in a body

still pumping,

still running,

still searching

for the answer…

 

are we

a whole story

here alone

and naked

and beating

and pumping

and bleeding

and crying

and crawling

through the hope

 

or just a half truth,

never truly told,

never really held,

never fully realized?

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

WHEN WHITE FALLS BLUE

/ deuxiemepeau / 10 Comments

Snow falls and the darkness drowns in silence, a hush
from heaven, falling, so slowly, even crystals cry.
Are these the tears of angels weeping who’ve watched us
falling, like this slow snow, like tears, trembling?

Snow falls and there’s a stillness and still this silence
between us. Bruises covered in a cold candid coating
of fragility, every day more freezing, more frozen,
just not enough to numb. Snow falls and paths disappear.

I thought our tracks ran deeper, like this winter, this weight,
like this waiting, behind the window, behind this glass
I can’t see through, beyond the storm falling, Slow falls
the snow and sorrow slips, cold where once there was comfort.

What happens to my tears, who’ll watch them with wonder
as I look out at the snow, slowly falling, and think of angles?
Wasn’t I once your angel? Are you watching, now, at some
slow distance while these snowflakes concrete all confusion?

In time, this too shall melt and be no more than memory,
even snowflakes fall for but a season. Snow, falling, slow.
Wishing it were spring. Even white is blue in the falling light.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Audio version available on Soundcloud

SLOW FALLING, day 30 of A Month with Yeats

/ deuxiemepeau / 6 Comments

 

I can’t believe this is it! 30 poems in 30 days inspired by Ireland’s greatest poet W.B Yeats. A poetry challenge created by the brilliant Jane Dougherty. Today is day 30 of this wonderful, inspiring, breathtaking adventure created by Jane Dougherty entitled A Month with Yeats. The final quote comes from the poem ‘The Lake Isle of Innisfree’.

“And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,” —W.B. Yeats

Jane’s blog which no one should miss out on is: https://janedougherty.wordpress.com

My final poem is called SLOW FALLING

 

Snow falls

behind the glass,

beyond the reflections

this window cannot see.

Snow, soft as the soul;

a canvas of white

fleeting purity,

as pure as that first kiss;

always caught, never captured.

Slow falls the first snow

as fine as feathered fragility

like that first time,

as tender as it was terrifying;

the feeling of discovery,

the fear of being discovered.

Slow comes the season,

and we are seasonal,

and we too are seized;

were we not yesterday

daisies dancing on hilltops,

a spring in our step

and blind to the slope,

were we not once sensory

below the sun, bonds burning

along bodies bare, but now,

beneath the snow,

red reigns regal,

enfants eyeing the skies;

hushed and hopeful

before the innocence

falls from their belief,

falls like this snow,

this frozen miracle

already melting

hearts we’ve had to hide

from the cold

and we can be cold,

like the morning’s first breath

beneath the crippling

clutch of winter

when his touch

is too far to find.

 

Slow falls the snow

beyond the glass, beyond the

shattered reflections of a world

of riots and reactions,

slow falls the snow

and I think of peace

and of people parading

under its hush of hope.

 

Snow falls and I wonder

how it would feel

to have a season

of slow falling peace?

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

UNDER PARIS, day 29 of A Month with Yeats

/ deuxiemepeau / 17 Comments

 

Day 29 of Jane Dougherty’s A Month with Yeats and today’s quote is from ‘No Second Troy’

‘Why, what could she have done, being what she is? Was there another Troy for her to burn?’—W.B. Yeats

Jane’s blog is: https://janedougherty.wordpress.com

My poem is called: UNDER PARIS

 

Caught

is the consciousness

in this constant climb

in this city of constrictions

and its current that constricts

and I can’t catch a breath.

 

And the barricades have broken.

 

Baffled

by the beat

my feet can’t follow

and so I am swallowed

sinking in this city of stone swamps

and its concrete that compresses

and I can’t get a grip.

 

And the barricades have fallen.

 

Stoned

is the spirit

of a soul now struggling

through these streets of revolutions

and its suburbs of no solutions

and not a single resolution.

 

And the barricades are weighing.

 

Turmoil

was her Troy

as this place is my poison

burning through this body of burdens

wondering if it was seduction or abduction

that imprisoned us both under Paris.

 

Are we to be buried

beneath this barricade?

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly