The Torrington Poetry Collection

To Be A Pilgrim

2006-04-17T11:50:00.000-07:00

To Be A Pilgrim

You need more than a badge or a staff
or a good stout pair of boots
or even the watery blessing
of Holy Mother Church.

You need the heart and lungs of a lion,
a couple of bracing thighs,
an ego the size of an armoured
train and a devil at your heels.

It takes more than prayer to follow
the Master on His way.
You’ll need quite as much iron in your
soul as devotion in your heart.

And a good dose of laughter will always
make the miles go whizzing
by. So, tell a few jokes and a tale or two
and keep your glasses full.

And when you get to the end of the march
and they stamp your passport up
don’t gawk like a bumpkin come to town
just rest; then get you Home

Characteristics of Pilgrims
Valiant – Constant – Funny – Hopeful

Umbra

2005-10-17T02:41:00.000-07:00

When the Sun went out, my heart
fell out of my chest into my boots,
"Gone," I thought, "for good."
But the darkness wasn’t so bad.
Actually, it made me feel
rested, renewed; is reborn
too fanciful?
No; it’s just right!
"When is the next eclipse?"

Cross Over Jordan

2005-10-09T02:28:00.000-07:00

Cross Over Jordan

Standing by a dark shore, a hot wind in my face
I asked, innocently enough, “What lights are those
Just there, right at the edge of this old sea?

“That’s Eden,” said my guide, “Remember Eden?”
And, while I gaped; added, “Where G-D walked”
“The Angel’s gone now, of course, and the Snake”

“And the Tree and the love, that’s altogether gone.”
“It’s all palms now and sand, of course, and soldiers
Who waste their lives waiting for Him or us or both

Magic and Music

2005-10-08T11:16:00.000-07:00

Magikos (Greek)
The pretended Art of influencing the course of events by occult means
Mousike tekne (Greek)
The Art of combining sounds to create beauty of form

Magic and Music

In the garden of the Almavivi
The Countess pretends
The Count pretends
And Figaro burns

In the garden of the Almavivi
The Countess hides
The Count rages
And Figaro laughs

In the garden of the Almavivi
The Countess forgives
The Count is humbled
And Figaro smiles

In the garden of the Almavivi
The good come to a
Good end, as do the bad
Comedy demands it

But

In the garden of the Almavivi
Hear the Countess sing:
“Piu docile io sono
E dico di si”*

And find

In the garden of the Almavivi
A subtle alchemy transforming
Through the power of love alone
Base nature into pure gold

A very unpretended magic

Inspired by Act 1V of Le Nozze di Figaro by the original WAM

* I am kinder
I will say, yes!

The Tuesday Angel

2005-06-22T11:57:00.000-07:00

On the day before the stroke struck her,
A Tuesday, as it happens,
Helga met an
Angel.

On the day on which the stroke struck her,
She remembered the Angel
when she was
Unconscious,

On the day after which the stroke struck her,
She told me about the Angel
just as she fell
Asleep.

Der Dienstag Engel, she muttered
As she drifted away, a child again
Whispering to her Mutti or
Someone.

On the day after the day
After the day of that stroke,
Helga’s Angel vanished
As her memory
drained away
Entirely

Now we bravely laugh about the
Tuesday Angel but
We’re whistling in the dark,
I think, hoping he’s really
Gone

And not waiting around the corner

Multi Purpose Compost

2005-06-04T02:16:00.000-07:00

Multus
Purposer
Compositum
Latin
Old French
Latin
Many
Intended
Mixing

Mixed Intentions
Unintended
Consequences

Multiple purposes
Mixed
Compositions

Intentional mixes
Purposed
Multiplicity

Inspired by

Thalia (Thaleia) the "Flourishing"
The muse of comedy and of playful and idyllic poetry
Often seen with a comic mask and a crown of ivy and a crook.
By Apollo,
Thalia had the Corybantes, priests who castrated themselves in identification with the goddess, Cybele

And a bag of Mole Valley garden compost

God

2005-06-03T12:00:00.000-07:00

Is Alone
In
Him there is nothing
Between Idea and Actuality
No gaps to cross
No Interpretations to make
Only a wholly indivisible
Formlessness

Knows
To
God, Creation is Fact not Act.
No waves to ride,
No curves to slide across,
No holes, worm or plain,
To pass through,
Just an Eternal Present

Splits
The
First split produced Me
My Other, He called me.
I found my voice, asked why?
You’ll see, He said.
Later, when the second split
Produced Cosmos, I did

Speaks
Now,
Stand aside Son, He said,
And let me Work.
This was to humour me
Really He had nothing to do
In time. But for my sake,
He fleshed it out

Makes Music
One
Perfect note sounded
Within at first so only I
Heard Him practicing
Then out it came, soaring
Into the void, projected
All the way to the edge

Lets Rip
Crying
At the beauty of it all, I nearly missed
Harmony splintering and Symmetry
Warping into ugliness and the
Sudden rush of strings that shocked
Every Element apart before
Clumping and kneading them into
Difference

Works
The
Work had been hard, there were
Casualties, Singularity, for one,
Disappeared in the quickening time.
Unbothered, God lolled until they
Started trying to make repairs
Restingl, he nevertheless kept an eye
On them

Stands Aloof
It
Became popular, searching
For eternal verities.
Some just thought, others opined
A few even asked Him for guidance
As though He would
Tell them anything!

Watches
So
I dropped few hints. Well, they were
Lovable and heroic, in their way.
Then, one more impatient wrote,
iγ.∂Ψ=mΨ. “Apprenticeship over,” I thought.
But of course, He didn’t lke it.
“Be storming Heaven next,”
He said.

Waits
Well
They Summed histories, cancelled out
What couldn’t be, discovered what Was,
Began to see symmetry and hear harmony,
To feel Love and to be Aware
In time they overcame their petty bounds
And one by one sublimed.

Respires
They
Crossed over Jordan, entered the whirlpool
Shuffled off, seeing, at last,
His Face reflected.
And in that moment of terrible quiet,
Before Being flushed away,
They recognised Him and
He sighed

Groundstate

2005-05-23T11:50:00.000-07:00

Just before He said, let there be anything,

I was sat in the box seats hoping that

it would be, well, you know, special.
I, we, we all, waited but He just

sat utterly still, for ages.

So, of course, we stayed still too but then

He uttered and the balloon went up!

Singular it was and so quick.

Birth to death and back again and again

in one mad rush. And the noise!

A poet, one of theirs, wrote of

‘creation’s fires’ and ‘eternity’
Waxed lyrical he did, but

missed the point, of course.

There, He’s energy, Here, He’s Soul;

that’s all there is you see