loss

THE WEIGHT UPON THE WAVES

/ deuxiemepeau / 13 Comments

 

And in the tide
tight with time and its turning
they left their posts,
impaled upon the sand,
impressed upon the land.

And there they stood
ten in heart and ten in tide
for time to tend,
impaled upon mind,
impressed upon mankind.

And on they marched
up the land and on from shore
for evermore
impaled upon their wain,
impressed upon the flame.

And out with wave
woe on water and touch from time,
tormented years
impaled upon the crest,
impressed upon the chest.

And on they went
refugees in search of root
swept along the shore
impaled upon with tears,
impressed upon with fears.

And on it goes
those who run and those who can stay
and those who are lost,
impaled upon the wars,
impressed upon the waves.

All words by Damien B. Donnelly

This 2nd photograph is also of St Clair beach, Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand, taken by Nigel and used by Liz for her blog Exploring Colour.

The original link to Liz’s blog post is;

https://exploringcolour.wordpress.com/2019/02/06/drawn-to-the-light/

Liz has also penned a glorious poetic tribute to these long standing piles entitled Survivors and the link is

https://exploringcolour.wordpress.com/2019/02/12/survivors-poem/

Nigel’s Landscape Architecture blog is;

https://growplan.wordpress.com/

CALIFORNIAN SPARK

/ deuxiemepeau / 10 Comments

IMG_7140

Here in parks in Paris, France, I potter
through a past so old and cold
that it cannot be parted, we cannot
easily outrun our own ruins while Cali
beckons me with her rock and roll band;
those make-me-feel-good brothers
and sisters since seduced back
to their former States and somewhere,
in between, the loneliness lingers;
the hazy clouds of craziness I have crossed
and the curt corners I have yet to console
on this journey through time; today,
in the blinding light of a frozen park
in Paris, France and tomorrow beyond
the clouds where Cali is a calling.
In shades of blue, ice cold, I see the breath
collapsing into weighty snowflakes
that makes all movement morose
in this Sunday morning of sunshine
that somehow still shivers skin
on both sides of the ocean, on both sides
of these clouds where I’ve looked at love.

Today, I potter through parts of Paris,
France, that are pressuring, impenetrable
and oh, so pleasurable like cases
of bitter sweetness but tomorrow
I will come to court the hissing
of those Cali lawns that are calling
in a Spring called Palm, waiting
to ignite a spark from a snowflake.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

I am off to Palm Springs tomorrow so see you all in a week

BLUE MOON

/ deuxiemepeau / 7 Comments

The moon was a blue whisper
and beauty a delirious ache
even the breath could not crush,
a sorrow born in summer
under a sky of shadows.

I picture you;
petrified over a pool of pulsing pain.

I run,
often to leave
before being left.
Like once I was left?
And the moon was a whisper in blue.

I run,
to get away quicker
this time.
Than that time?
When beauty was a delirious ache.

I outrun
not this skin,
not this being I have become
of years and tears and tensions,
but a feeling
that has festered
since I was fostered.
And somewhere still is a sky of shadows.

I leave
through the open door,
somehow left ajar
as if someone
might one day
return through it.
To release the breath that was crushed.

As if someone
might one day remember
what they had left behind
when summer gave birth
to sorrow for a season,
for some still unknown reason.

But what if,
in all that time,
in all that motion,
I have run
too far to be found?
And you remain
in that pulsing pool of pain.

I run
with little thought
to where I am going
but with every effort
to hide what I am too frightened
to find.

The moon was a blue whisper
and beauty a delirious ache
even the breath could not crush.
A sorrow born in summer
under a sky of shadows.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

I WISH…

/ deuxiemepeau / 5 Comments

—

Our lives were lived in London then,

2 boys at play on shades

and stages,

in 4 bedrooms

that couldn’t bind us

forever.

In arms we sobbed

from 1 of our 2

3 seater sofas

in our 4 bedroomed house,

watching dreams disappearing

beneath the ashes of the Apple.

Eden had ended for the West.

No one knew who they were anymore,

the afternoon dawned into darkness,

arrogance had eaten the eagle’s feathers

and I only saw shadows in reflections

of myself in mirrors

that couldn’t capture the truth

of who I was or who

the 2 of us had become.

There was confusion, everywhere,

on all sides of the world, on all

the streets in shock, the television

a mirror to the madness

we couldn’t move from.

We were voyeurs to the violence

and already traumatized

by the thoughts of revenge

as Bush read books in the back row

of a preschool of potential

pacifiers or partisans.

And now, today…

—

We’d stood once, together,

years earlier, before the 2 sofas

and the 4 bedrooms

and the discontentment

and then this word called terror,

2 boys in awe

on the top of the world

with Broadway just a bellow below,

not realizing that life was but to Rent,

that No Day But Today meant this day,

not some day, somewhere.

It was now, here.

Jonathan never got to see his story,

hear his one song, his glory,

rising like Mimi from death.

A musical is but a muse on life,

plots are not planned in the spotlight.

A house is not always a home.

Towers cannot always support

the grayness that chokes between

dream and destiny.

We all have our stories,

our songs and our sorrows.

Love is love is love.

Love is…

I dream I see the planes

fly over and not into,

I dream…

we are there in London, still laughing,

still in the bedroom, still loving,

still on that rooftop, still standing

and all is still possible.

—

I dream

the towers in every territory

are rising from the ashes.

—

But we are no longer 2 boys

playing home in 4 bedrooms

in SE26, on September 11, 2001.

We have stopped counting

what we’ve lost, we have run out

of numbers and can never

go back to before.

—

But still,

I wish…

—

All words by Damien B. Donnelly

We saw the musical Rent on Broadway, New York, at the Nederlander Theatre on June 24th 1999, Jonathan Larson, its writer and composer, died the morning his show opened for off-broadway previews. He received a posthumous Pulitzer prize for Drama and Tony awards for best musical, best book of a musical and best score. It is still running in cities all over the world today. We stood on top of the World Trade Center on the 23rd of June, at 2.20 in the afternoon. But we can never go back.

JOURNEYS, PART 17, THE BRIGHT RED ROSE

/ deuxiemepeau / 1 Comment

Rough round that rose bordered hem we ran,
regardless of where her skirts did scurry,
no fretting to the fraying of her fringes,
never noticing how nimble had turned to not-so nifty
above that border of red roses, oh so pretty…

We carried you, like a child, that day,
winter now withered as the bark
made a place for the bloom and I wondered
if April had ever held so soft a day?

Rough round that rose bordered hem
we ran, regardless…

We carried you, like a child, that day,
the old village hushed as if all had now
been said, as if all had since been seen
and I wondered if that stillness amid all
the emotion was your soul on the breeze.

Rough round that rose bordered hem
we ran, remembering…

We carried you, like a child, that day,
our toes retracing your well worn
steps, our memory meandering
through the journeys you found for us
on busses and trains on lanes
to foreign towns and holy lands.

Rough round that rose bordered hem
we ran, reverberating…

We carried you, like a child, that day
and remembered every knee you bandaged,
every tear you had dried and every belly
you filled with your apple pies and custard bakes
those fresh brown breads and coffee cakes.

Rough round that rose bordered hem
we ran, repeating…

We carried you, like a child, that day
as red roses fell from our hearts like tears
as that breeze brushed our cheeks like a kiss.

Rough round that rose bordered hem
we ran, in reverence…

We carried you, like a child, that day,
your body as weightless as it was lifeless
as we covered you in the red petaled ground.

You carried us all, in your arms,
and now we carry you in our hearts
along our journeys forever more.

By that bed, in the village
that housed you and still holds you,
hemmed in forever by a border
of bright red roses, we sighed
by those borders now broken
by all we took for granted,

and felt the touch of the torn
comes at the fall of that one bright rose.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

TEDDIES AND TIDES

/ deuxiemepeau / 7 Comments

–

I held on so long to a comfort

stuffed into the curve of my arm,

on nights when no one noticed

the child behind this mask of man.

I held on to a space outdated,

to a void I thought I’d vacated,

crouching into a cramped corner

of considered claustrophobia,

convinced I was more the victor

than the victim

–

(at times we can be both).

–

I held on so long to a tear

I thought time had torn but tides

are temperamental, unlike teddies,

they fold back on themselves

and we are swept again under, later,

long after, as if they had waited

to defy expectation

–

(we are experts at expecting to be the exception).

–

No one and nothing drowns

in the first wave. All and everything

is a cycle, tides come and go

and then return to take some more.

We are children and then adults

until adults lost in longing,

longing to understand the hold

of the child behind this mask of man.

–

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

A WHITE WING RISING, day 25 of A Month with Yeats

/ deuxiemepeau / 9 Comments

 

Day 25 of Jane Dougherty’s A Month with Yeats and the quote is: ‘And when white moths were on the wing, and moth-like stars were flickering out, I dropped the berry in a stream and caught a little silver trout.’—W.B. Yeats

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

My poem today is called A WHITE WING RISING

 

A starlit day,

on a distant shore,

as if summer had sent it

swarming like a snowflake;

silken wings to summon the sunset,

a white moth to raise a sweet soul

departing.

And there,

as a star was added,

the bright moon was kissed

in berry blush as the sun settled

beneath the lake where the lost trout

turned through tresses of silver dancing

and he smiled at his love, since lost,

now glimmering

in eternity.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly