Parfum

After Barbara’s funeral

you asked,

“If I died first

what would you keep of mine?”

I couldn't answer, apart from the quip

"ten bob it'll be me goes anyhow".

Afterwards though I did think

long and hard

and it would be your smell

I'd be lost without,

the trace of No 5

on your pillowcase.

Indelible as your fingerprint,

closer than your smile, yes

I'd need the smell of you.

© Graham Sherwood 04/2017

Wolverton

When asked to wait by someone
boredom very quickly agitates my eye
so everything must be assessed, like evidence
and where it fits within this scene.
A row of untidily parked cars
become uneven poorly manicured toes,
a line of chipped nail varnish reflectors.
Hastily planted whisper saplings
wave and jiggle like excited schoolgirls
awaiting a royal visit.
The clinical lines of a nearby modern building,
raise an acute angled razor blade
not yet bathed by the struggling sun.
Random people come and go
like film extras, aimlessly searching for their mark,
they really have nowhere definite
to strike out for.
Unseen, somewhere distant are children
no doubt a ball is present,
they call and squeal like hungry gulls
squabbling over scraps.
My someone arrives, so I snap
the notebook tight,
the scene, the sounds, the scents
the dramas tightly captured within.
Where to next?

© Graham Sherwood 04/2017

Hejira 1

We are all of the sea

there is salt in our blood,

the salinity of our beginnings

brought onto this land.

We stand to look at the waves

see the tides stroked by the moon

and feel that same motion

the roll, the rinse, the draw

perpetually repeated.

With eyes closed we list

involuntarily, primordially

toward the magnetism of the waves,

fearful that we can never return.

We, destined to scramble up the shore

two steps forward, one step back

must make this place our land

a new place.

© Graham Sherwood 04/2017

Gandini 4x4

(Please read the poem before watching the youtube clip)

silhouettes, smoke, suspense

slap-slap!

sigh

skittles soar skyward

split-second

stop!

standing shoulders squared

syncopated sequences

sssssshhhhhh!

sure-footed, soft-shoe

site-swapping, structures

smoooooth!

silence settles spatial spirits

somnolent symmetry

smile

https://youtu.be/5oU2Z-z2DK4

© Graham Sherwood 04/2017

March to May

(Observation on unseasonal weather).


This early spring

is yet to paint its colours fast,

a hazy bud break on folded limbs, blows

grey green smoke and swirls of lime and olive

the branches are quietly mesmerised.

Chaotic hedgerows bleed

and newly shorn

sport a watercolour swathe

of washed russets

more akin to autumn.

Competing blackbirds

urgently over sing the criticism

of fractious magpie banter,

the poetry and words of springtime

spills into our ears.

So hold back the spoiling summer

heat, where beauty blossoms

to swiftly fade, stolen innocence withers

and perfumed puberty dies

amongst the once fresh grasses.

© Graham Sherwood 04/2017