Our Perigee

(The point when two objects orbiting each other appear closest).

There was always the feeling that something might happen
This last year, your movements have been gradual but consistent,
your moods like the weather, difficult, capricious and unpredictable.
But when you shine, oh! there is a radiance where clouds are banned
and stars become superfluous for clear sight.
I saw you dance on the solstice, a pagan, gypsy temptress swirl,
moving ever closer, exerting a barely hidden mesmeric draw,
your youth forever beautiful, pert and daring.
My old eyes widen at the possibilities as you settle into view.
So there you are, beguiling me, naked and ripe
a fleeting chance to feast upon your nubile form.
Tomorrow I’ll be older and you younger still.


© Graham Sherwood 6/2013

Southwold

(Very old pearl of the East Coast).

My mother would have liked Southwold.
Seaside how it used to be, gentile, old money,
apart from the Aston Martins and the Bentleys
squeezed cheek-by-jowl in the off-prom terraced streets.
On the bank holiday, sun cracking the flag
she is breathless, wheezing under the strain
of yummy mummies, energetic Rafas and Jocastas
who picnic on her greens.
Come Tuesday, she is alone again,
a widow, abandoned, bereft and peering from empty windows
until the next weekend visit, with tea on the pier
carefully ignoring the Sizewell glitter ball
that fades into the approaching fret.

© Graham Sherwood 6/2013

Buzz

(A study in listening)

A numbing, soft, uncomfortable crush,
the white noise of night’s silence
that the brain tricks into an urgent wind,
a balmy tinnitus, a mausoleum
from whence escape is futile,
other than to further hostile desolations.
Alone in my shrinking room,
where even the reassuring monotone tock
is lost amongst this velvet hiss,
or thrust in the heft of the commuting faceless,
still the lumbering drone of spectral noise.
There is no such state as solace, silence, sanctuary,
just the near imperceptible swish of consciousness
from which we writhe, but none can abscond.


© Graham Sherwood 6/2013