Pete's Poems

I have only started to write poems as a hobby in the last few years but find I get a lot of pleasure out of it and have made some valued friendships with other amateur poets on that marvellous and addictive website ‘Poemhunter.com’  A selection of my poems from late 2003 to early 2006 has been published as 'Calling the Moon' (2006) by Lulu.com. Below are some of my most recent poems:

Links to other poetry sites:

Sally Clarke's Poetry and Pictures Portal

As It Was in the Beginning ...

 That morning by the empty beach

Just you and me, the sea,

The sighing waves that break

Upon the sand, the sun, the sky,

White billowing clouds sailing by,

No living soul save you and I

To gaze upon the waters where

Ten thousand silver sequins

Glitter in the sunlight, dancing

On the surface of the sea.

Time has no meaning here:

This scene has been the same

Unchanged a million years, or more,

Long, long before man came.

True, too, you may be sure, it will remain

The same when we shall be no more —

The sea, the sand, the waves

That break upon the strand,

The sun the sky, the rolling clouds

And sunlight dancing on the water.

                        5/9/06

Heaven is Here and Now

 Heaven is here and now —

drowsing in the sun

on a Sunday afternoon

in early June, a distant hum

of some machinery, the murmur of

the sea, borne on a breeze

that cools, and rustles the leaves

of my apple trees near where I sit

in this comfy chair high up

on my garage roof where I overlook

green fields that stretch

for miles and miles to where

distinctions merge in the blue and

misty shadows of some other land

beyond the far horizon.

In the sun-warmed air sleek

swallows swoop and wheel

while other birds fly to and fro

so purposeful on errands that

no man may know. A falcon glides

above the trees, two butterflies

rise high in a spiral dance

and over there shining bright

black and white against the green,

heads down, a herd of Friesian cows

lazily graze the lush grass

that grows in a field by the sea..

All this we know will pass:

other days will bring grey skies,

cold winds that bite, pain, loss, disease,

and bitter sadness, perhaps, but yet

this summer day when the sun is high

in a clear blue sky,  we can truly say,

“Heaven is here and now”.

                        11/6/06

If I Were 21  Today 

If I were 21 today

I think I’d dance the night away.

I’d drink champagne and polish off

Half a bottle of the best Smirnoff.

I’d carry on till the night had flown

And trust my friends to carry me home.

My coming of age they’d never forget

Nor I remember, you can bet!

St. Abune Teklehaimanot A more surprising saint there’s not Than Abune Teklehaimanot, He is my all-time favourite saint; There is none other quite so quaint.    He spent his time converting kings And once he sprouted several wings. He was climbing down from Debre Damo When he fell off the cliff with a cry of woe.    His friends believed it was the end, But then he started to ascend. Six wings he’d grown, quick as a flash, To save himself from a nasty crash.   Three times round his home he flew So all could see what he could do. When he got old he lived in a cave, All part of a plan his soul to save.   In it he stood like a planted tree And neither the sun nor the moon did see. For years and years Abune stood there And never sat upon a chair   Until the day one leg fell off This very remarkable man of the cloth. Undaunted, Teklehaimanot Just stood upon the other foot.   He kept that up for seven years, Four of them waterless, it appears. So now you’ll see why he gets my vote, St. Abune Teklehaimanot!

A Question of Philosophy

 When evil strikes

In fire and flood

Or untimely death by dread disease

We sometimes wonder “What of God?”

The ancient Greeks

Long before us

On this very same question reflected.

Wise Epicurus put it thus:

“If God is willing but not able

Such evil to prevent,

Call Him ‘God’ still, if you will,

He cannot be omnipotent.”

“And if He’s able but not willing

Such evil to prevent,

God He may be, but I say

He is malevolent.”

“If God is able and willing, too,

All evil to prevent,

Why in the world should pain and death

Afflict the young and innocent?”

A Biker’s Funeral

In memory of Stephen (Reggie) Pearce

of Kilnsea, 1980–2005

The wind blows cold through the churchyard trees

and sadly tolls the passing bell

as mourners shuffle up the leaf-strewn

narrow path between the leaning stones.

He was just twenty-five, so young,

so full of life, and love of life

and laughter — killed outright one night

in a head-on crash on his motorbike.

From far and wide we’ve gathered here

to pay respect to our young friend.

I’ve never seen the church so full,

oh death, how can you be so cruel?

 Who will forget this funeral?

Four hundred strong in the nave we stood,

family and friends both young and old

and a phalanx of bikers in leathers and boots.

Between the holy platitudes

and hymns they played his favourite songs;

one had to smile to hear within

that ancient august church of stone

come belting out the vibrant tones

of modern rock and heavy metal.

Who can forget the coffin passing

in procession like a royal barque,

the biker’s helmet on its lid

resplendent in heraldic colours

— rich gules, azure, argent, or,

a shining light of knightly splendour?

Who will forget that send-off from

his fellow bikers when three score

or more bright gleaming motorcycles

with a thunderous roar led off the hearse?

To view additional poems, please click on the titles below:

A Camera Has the Trick of Freezing Time

Her First Tattoo

Just Felt a Slight Bump

Late Summer Migrants

Matins

Shangri La by Bangalore

Shut Your Eyes and Jump

Thoth

White China Tea

 A Yorkshire Ratcatcher

 Always puffing on a pipe

You'd see him pedal his old bike,

Tattered old jacket in faded tweed

Trouser bottoms tied with twine,

Arsoowal's trade was catching rats.

He must have had a proper name

When he was christened as a child

But if he had, we didn't know it.

His naming ceremony came

That day we saw him riding down

The village street, apparently alight.

Smoke billowed from his trousers where

He'd stuffed his lighted baccy pipe.

"Mister, mister!" we all called

"There's smoke coming out of your trousers!"

In scornful disbelief he turned

And mouthed at us one word—"Arsoowals!"

Blood on the Floor

 Where religious beliefs

Are strongly held

And faith is a rock

Of certainty,

There you will find

Rectitude,

Morality,

Righteousness,

And blood on the floor.

                        20/8/06

Sub specie aeternitatis

 This Sunday afternoon I meant

To write a poem but fell asleep.

I woke alone in the summer house

To hear the raindrops pattering

On the wooden roof. Outside the grass

Is lush and freshly green. Beyond

Upon the paving stones are scattered

Apple blossom petals. Already

They have begun to fall.

Seasons pass and spring follows

Spring. Each year it comes anew.

Branches sway in the wind, the leaves

Fluttering like shoals of fish.

Their scales glitter in the sunlight

Like a waterfall of time

Splashing into eternity.

            21/5/06

Gaping Ghyll

 Wet walls of rock enclose

a caverned space — earth’s womb

wherein we wander like

lost souls in exile

from our sunlit world above.

Here chthonic gods and goddesses

of darkness rule. There is no sky

but far away and high above,

faint daylight from the surface

filters through the cracks

and chimneys in the roof.

The only sound down here

is trickling water and the

crash and splash of three tall waterfalls

that fall so fast

through all the emptiness of this

great cavern underground. They say

it is so vast, a whole

cathedral could be lost

and swallowed up within its maw.

Before these towering walls

and buttresses of rock, as old

as time, I feel a need

to kneel, for never before,

in any cathedral made by man,

have I ever felt such a

terrible sense of religious awe.

                        3/6/6

Relax, Enjoy, Be Merry!

If I were given the choice, I would

get rid of ‘ought’ and ‘must’ and ‘should’.

Such words would go in the rubbish bin

along with ‘guilt’ and ‘blame’ and ‘sin’.

We only need to love each other

and treat our neighbour as our brother.

All other ‘do’s’ and ‘don’ts’ don’t matter;

they’re just a lot of idle chatter.

We’ve only one life as far as we know,

so let’s enjoy it before we go.

                                    4/6/6

Home-thoughts from a Broad

 (With apologies to Robert Browning)

 Oh not to be in England

Now that May is here.

The sky all day

Has been cold and grey,

And it has rained since Saturday.

The chaffinch sits hunched

On the orchard bough

Bedraggled and sodden and dumb

While the whitethroat like

The swallow wonders

What folly made it come.

As for the wise thrush ....

It doesn’t give a damn what you think;

Like me, it’s pissed off with this sodding weather.

                                    21/5/06

The Parasitology Exam

 (A found poem based on an account

by Rita El Khoury)

At 7.30, after morning breakfast

it was the parasitology exam ...

I had some 40 worms

to memorise —

Latin names, contamination, size,

colour, cycle, treatment, diagnosis,

signs clinical and otherwise,

as well as prophylaxy, reproduction,

not to mention all the different

types of eggs,

their shape and size.

These 40 worms I carried in my head,

a salad mix you might have said.

One question I found pretty hard

concerned a man with diarrhoea,

nausea and restless fever.

I knew 30 worms that could cause that

but this was special for the man

had hypereosinophilia

of five percent; percentages

are different for each worm.

I had a guess and chose

the species, saginata

of the genus, Teniae

And thanks to Lady Luck,

by all the gods, I got it right!

Tomorrow we’ll be tested in diseases.

                        9/11/07

The Songthrush

 Do you remember how the songthrush sang,

Those lovely liquid notes that spilled

Forth from his throat like a mountain stream

So fresh and clean and how they gushed

And filled the clear air of early spring?

Do you recall that speckled breast, the warm

Brown feathers, upright stance, the bird

Head cocked, alert, upon the lawn,

Say, early in the morning

Soon after dawn when yet the dew

Lay wet upon the grass? Now let me ask

When last you saw a songthrush on the lawn

Or heard one sing so that you knew

That spring had come? This bird, too,

Once commonplace, I fear has now become

Just like the shrike and corncrake that our fathers knew,

As rare a sight as some celestial comet

Or shooting star that lights the darkness of the night.

                                                25/3/06