A sudden wind change
throws rain against my window
and the room shivers.
——-
It has been a stormy few days here. Posted on Poets United.
Sun-skated frost lines,
softened by ice blue skies
(echoing your bright eyes)
withdraw into shade.
Later, the Japanese prints
of fallen leaves on paving
(we both saw together)
recall gentler times.
Wet shoes, and mud underfoot;
smoke failing to rise
(the damp is too much)
smoulders, with my mood, like the day.
——–
I’ve been back in the UK a week or two, and we had a beautiful start to today – but it was still a struggle to motivate myself. This poem was inspired by walking into town with my son, for a coffee.
Posted on dVerse and Poets United.
Against the hostile sun, a man
came here once to shape this place,
while above the hawks circled slowly
and the sun burned.
With mud alone, and thought, sharp cries,
the fort rose, in the half-light,
while above the hawks circled slowly
and the sun burned.
Like a sandcastle, for sand men,
but standing, disturbing dust;
above the hawks circled slowly,
and the sun burned.
Under the hostile sun, strangers
sometimes came, even with guns,
and above the hawks circled slowly
and the sun burned.
After a while, they understood;
the walls were not to keep them out,
and above the hawks circled slowly
and the sun burned.
The fort still stands today, with men
on the ramparts, looking in.
Above the hawks circle slowly
and the sun burns.
—————
Al Fahidi Fort is now a museum in the centre of old Dubai.
Posted on dVerse and Poets United.
Seductive sunlight,
warming turquoise seas,
recalls my first kiss.
I feel the waters’ pull, floating,
and fishes glinting eyes, wary,
watching; from corals bubbles rise,
growing, as I breathe, and roll.
I feel the waters’ pull, drifting;
wet sunbeams crossing sands, diamonds
shifting, warming, waltzing, lazy;
woven with the flow, and ebb.
I feel the waters’ pull, deepening;
a darker shade of blue, misting –
imagined bigger fish, watching,
rising. Hastened by fear, I turn.
————-
I have always loved swimming, and rarely get the chance to swim in such clear and warm waters (and full of life) as the Gulf of Oman. It’s beautiful, although there is still that nagging fear when it gets too deep to see the bottom that there might be something big and hungry down there!
I have tried to capture something of the rhythm and feeling of the waves in this poem.
Posted at Poets United and dVerse.
Around glass towers,
sand floats as mist, settling
if movement stops.
————-
I have been to visit my brother in Dubai.
poetry diary 