Poetry

FOR MARIE AND EDDIE; LOVE CAN

/ deuxiemepeau / 27 Comments

A week ago, my sister Marie got married to her soulmate Eddie and I was so proud to see her wearing the wedding dress I had made for her. It’s strange to say my sister got married because I grew up as an only child, but there you go. Life delivers surprises everyday.

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Soulmates

I grew up knowing I was adopted, it was a bedtime story from when I was a little boy; I was told that while my friends all came from their mummy’s tummies, I was different and had been picked in a baby shop, my parents had looked around and chose me. Therefore I was special and grew up thinking adoption was pretty much the coolest thing in the world. And feeling extra special of course. When I was 18, I told my parents I was gay. Actually, I verbally vomited this information up on a Saturday morning, having grown tired of holding it inside for the previous 10 years. After the tears and the hugs and unquestionable family devotion, my mother decided that, as I had shared my secret, she would share her’s with me. I grew up thinking she had never had children but, on that Saturday, amid empty boxes of kleenex, she told me that she had had a baby girl before she was married, in rural Dublin in the 1960’s. More tears ensured, of course. The father didn’t want to stick around and Mum decided that the best gift she could give her baby daughter was to give her up for adoption in the hope that another family would give her the life that she could not provide at the time. That was my mum’s sacrifice and she carried it with her everyday. She still does. Years later, she met and married my father and they tried to have kids but, it turned out, my father wasn’t able to father children and so the circle turned and the beginning met the end and they adopted me.

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Mother and Son

Just over 10 years ago, my sister came looking for her natural mother and another circle completed its turn. Unfortunately Marie lost her own mother just months before finding Mum. Life takes away and gives back to those who are fortunate. Mum and Marie are peas in a pod. Their not only share blood, but mannerisms, laughter, the same sense of style, the same hand movements which you think are learned from your everyday environment but it turns out not to be the case. Mum also has two gorgeous Grandchildren so I’ve been let off the hook for not providing her with any and I got two nieces into the bargain.

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Marie’s daughters/bridesmaids, Mum’s grandchildren and my nieces 

This picture below is Mum and her daughter last Saturday in Dublin on the morning of the wedding in Marie’s bedroom.  Mother and daughter united again and my Mum got to walk down the aisle with her daughter on her wedding day with Marie’s adopted Dad on the other side.

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If you look out the window, the building opposite is a nuns convent, Temple Hill. That’s where I started my life. I told you, Life always delivers surprises.

My sister asked me to speak at the wedding ceremony. These are the words I wrote for my sister Marie and her new Husband Eddie, with love…

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He gives her his hand
not to take hers
but to place his heart in her hold

She gives him her heart
not because she doesn’t need it
but to let him know she needs him more

He stands beside her
not to sink in her shadow
but to rise higher together

She kisses his lips
not to take his breath
but to share his soul

He gives her his hand
she gives him her heart
they share their souls.
These are their best offerings
they are not money
they are not material

because material
can never hold your hand
and money
can never warm your heart

the way Love can…

This is how unions are made…
This is how families grow…

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All Words and Pictures by Damien B. Donnelly

 

METAMORPHOSES

/ deuxiemepeau / 3 Comments

 

Changing currents,
currently, body and soul
converging concurrently,
control lost to illusion;
divinity divining, dividing delusion
directing hands of fate
or falling me from faith,
body leaning in
bending to all beckoning.
Was it I who let go
of love’s hand or had fate decided so?

Was there a choice,
considered, consecrated, a confession
would I, could I be called up for blame?

In letting go,
I fell to freedom,
funny how freedom drops you,
seemingly untangled,
from the knot undone and I come undone,
at a loss, undefinable or redefined?

Partially salvageable, this time.
Selfishness slipping into single state
celibate, (sold a lot)
with no one to consider,
to hold, to cherish, to love.

What is love when you lay alone?
Where does love lay when you are alone?
Alone, love is where there are no more lies.

.

All Words and Photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

LITTLE BLACK DRESS

/ deuxiemepeau / 9 Comments

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And every day
that the sun still rose,
and some days
were unexpected,
she took the dress
and put it on
as if it pulled
back the years,
as if her skin again
was taunt,
as if her hair again
was blonde,
as if her friends again
were there.
And in the dress
she walked the streets,
in her simple little dress
with flowers in hand
she walked to him,
with lipstick
licking lips
no longer there,
and when she found him
she took a seat
by the earth
under which he lay
and knew he smiled
at her on high
still a beauty
in the dress,
in that little black dress
he had bought her
on one fine day.

All Words and Drawings by Damien B. Donnelly

Audio version available on Soundcloud;

https://soundcloud.com/damien-donnelly-2/little-black-dress

CURIOUS CORNERS

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Curiosity curated
around corners,
in passageways
of potted plants
and lingering light,
corners created
for the curious,
for passersby
to peep into privacy
in search of secrets
neath shadows and dust,
piggy banks with golden coins
and cans worthy of Warhol.

Dreams are dreamt
in little lanes
where light lingers
on broken benches
baring burdens of old,
curated into wood
and seeped into stone steps.

A passageway to
the past in Paris…

All Words and Photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Photographs taken in the Passage de l’Ancre, Paris 2eme.

 

DAWN II

/ deuxiemepeau / 22 Comments

Another dawn… They keep coming!

This is my second attempt at a ghazal for Jane Dougherty’s challenge:

https://janedougherty.wordpress.com/2016/08/17/poetry-challenge-44-ghazal/

 My first attempt fell toward folly rather than regarding the principles of form so I’m back again, same picture, same theme, leaning more on the rules this time- I think.

So a Ghazal is a love poem, made up of a collection of uneven couplets with a refrain at the end of each couplet, although the first and second lines rhyme too! The refrain should be no more than 1 to 3 words- I accept that I have a refrain of 4! I am a deviant! What can I say!  

Along with this, which I completely missed on my first attempt, there is another rhyme which immediately proceeds each refrain making an internal rhyme! Good lord!

Now, come on everyone, give it a try and, if you fall like me, keep trying like me too! Remember it’s all about the journey, not the destination.
My first attempt was penned in a Paris airport, this second attempt at home in Dublin, maybe my Irish ancestors will accelerate success…


       

Dawn. A Ghazal

I saw her lean into the light
saw Ushas try to still the night,

though she art Dawn, for two she slew,
a sorrowed sigh to still the night,

for fell thee fair, thou rarest gift
a kiss come by to still the night,

yet we no more than passing ships
must beg or buy to still the night,

but Time, born but to bitter brood,
would not comply to still the night,

so, rise dear Dawn, adieu sweet Love,
I make to die, too still the night.

      

All words by Damien B. Donnelly

DAWN ARRIVED

/ deuxiemepeau / 6 Comments

 

And so light leaned in as we had done
though not for fever, though not for fun,

although we had found and we had felt
that rarest gift which cannot be shun;

on one fair night a love alighted
when two from far took their breath as one,

yet Time, being so when love slips in,
seeks all connections to come undone,

when the dawn arrived, shrouded in shame,
born to tear apart what had begun,

she pleaded with the light unfolding
but hearts lost hold for the day had won.

All words by Damien B. Donnelly

WHITE STARLIGHT

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White starlight
light and lucent
springs from
ailing earth
in quite corners
of tended borders
so fine and fair,
fragility unfolding
precious petals
perhaps to soften
the edges
of darker days
that have set
shadows upon
so many sunsets

White starlight
cradles beauty,
a bold beacon
blooming amid
these burdens
that bind us
To broken branches,
she’s taking chances
ripe and rare
like subtle silk,
like flowing milk,
so bright and brave
to dare to bloom
amidst these months
of doom and gloom

White starlight
in broad daylight,
a wonder witnessed
among this world
of weeds
and tangled vines
that strangle
the timid
and the truth.

White starlight.
fear not fragility
for she is
born to fight.

All Words and Photographs by Damien B. Donnelly.

 

SOOTHING SOULS

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Mass has passed

and dolled up dames
roam the rues

with coiffed up curls
and cardi’s over shoulders
in summer
as Scholl’s sooth souls soles,

widows
window shopping
for treats to tickle time

that has left them behind.

All Words and Photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

CAPTURED

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Light
catches glass,
catches colour,
creates contrast
on walls
and water.
Light
leans in
and leaves
illusions on lines
where once there was
but shadow.
Buildings
become boats
baring sails
to beckon
the breeze
which billows
at its ease
through colour
caught on glass
with is captured
in the light.

All Words and Photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Photographs taken today at the Foundation Louis Vuitton in Bois de Boulogne, Paris.