John Melhuish Strudwick

It was the time
of crocuses and primroses
when she laid her small white hand
lightly on his heart
her prayers for him were like
pale pink blossoms floating
on a river of light
to higher planes
she had found her voice to sing
and with her voice
she was calling his soul
imbuing strength
into his heart, hands, deeds

Around them in the twilight
a cool fragrant breeze arose
and a nightingale began to sing.

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale

My hand meets yours
gently in the dark
like a sigh of relief, as if
our secret sorrows didn't matter now
that you have my hand.

With my other hand I hold
onto the blood-red skirt
of Divine Mother
red like
the rose of her cheeks
at dawn on mountain tops
or the fiery golden purple
veil of dusk;
the blood-red of
her evil-destroying fire.

The night shimmers
with the invisible pearly light
of a hope not far away but
just out of reach,
casting a luminous glow
on the pure white spring blossoms
growing in the dark,
and in the moment where
the only truth seems to be
to succumb and to suffer,
that hope is like a dream vision
brightening the dense darkness,
a duty that is a friend.

Golden sunset.
Church bells ringing
in the valley.
The distant song
of the first spring bird.
A cold breeze rises up
from the lake.

My essence, like a piece of
expensive fabric,
billowing in just such a wind
- the inner tempest of thoughts
and emotions.

That fabric has gold
embroidered on the edges.

I stand still in the wind
and sing. 

How Did I Know?

A cold, dark night of January
I sit by your dreaming and
you awake, you sit up and you weep.
I hold you, stunned,
What has he seen?

"I'm not ready"
Your only words.
For what?
I knew it then, but
it couldn't be. It must be something else.

How did I know?

A dark night of August
you told me
the words so small,
narrow, inconspicuous
but within them a vast, destroying reality.
You held me
in your pain,

John Everett Millais

in my stunned speechlessness,
feeling its impact inside me
everything shattering,
imploding
silently,
desperately

How did I know?

Hand in hand we approach
the imposing building
to plead for mercy, for time.

Around us
the velvety spring green
gives the air a golden hue
a fresh healing love surround us
but do I dare allow its comfort
to reach the immovable winter within?

What was the verdict?
What was the answer?

It's the heaviest day
when even the most hidden veils
between us fall away.
I walk with you and you
take my hand and your
understanding touches the thoughts
and questions in my heart
there is no space between us
only an interpenetrating compassion

My heart so heavy
I'd rather not breathe or move
but do anyway
to honour your presence
that is like a field of spring flowers,
a golden healing light in my life.

I'd rather not move but do anyway
to let my strength, even if pretended,
be a gift to you,
like my believing and heeding your words,
to let it be an insufficient offering
for the divine hand that constantly
touches, moves our lives.

More Love Than You Could Imagine

There is a voice
crying on the mountaintop.
It is your voice
seeking for me,
calling my name,
traveling vast distances
hoping only to see me again.

Hearing it

Art by Frank Godwin

is when
I truly began
to believe
in your love for me

but that agonised, urgent voice
is like a primal force
unraveling the foundations of me,
like an unforgiving hand
shaking and destroying.

Death is not an unhoped for,
sad event
happening where you can always
turn your eyes away from;
it is an ever present force and truth
infusing our lives every second,
living in our every inhale and exhale.

Turn to face
mortality,
unflinching
and you will find more love
than you could imagine.

I felt I could not write, so I wrote this.

***

The words won't come,
they are not right
they hide and won't let their grip go
when I try to pull them out.
So the inner space seems empty
with flames burning at the edges
but when I look it's gone again,

Art by William Adolphe Bouguereau

in the time I pick up my pen
the glimpse is gone.

The pain, the sadness, the sacred
prayer and effort
the puffs of red flame and
waves of love
the crushing not knowing what to do
trembling, burning in the inner space
clamouring to be let out
threatening to destroy the whole heart
unless I find the right words.

The golden vapours, the indigo sky,
the stars and the snow
dyed with the blue of night.
The tears that won't come, the words
that won't come
the days that are altogether wrong...

The fir trees have stood in the forest
since the beginning of summer.
They look at me and they know
their silence is the same as this
only more peaceful, filled with grace,
patience, acceptance.