1003
A time of change? A time to reassess?
Though ever shifting clouds allow a glimpse
Of Truth, the fractured shards are marred by darkness
A time of change?
We know we need to, but the idea trips
Up against the problems and the mess
Of any unknown futures which eclipse
Brief benefits - let alone the stress
Of action - when we could just purse our lips,
Sit silent and do nothing in excess.
A time of change?
Brian Hick September 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 29.9.23
1002
Like the world itself it seems
That lack of form ar stark
Obscurity must fill the waking dreams
Of those who seek the poet's art,
Or else they will be ostracised
For purile hack regurgitations
Short of thought behind the eyes -
Just vapid limp-wristed emanations -
But we who know the ordinary
Trying to capture what we see
In words that readers, dim or merry,
Will understand, sans degree
From Oxbridge - let alone a guide
Sent from above or Brian Sewell -
Plod on, though we know we must hide
Our genius from those who chide.
Brian Hick September 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 27.9.23
1000
Elegy - Isle of Oxney
Where are the songs the reapers sang
Arcing their scythes across the field
To bring home the summer yield
The earth returned to labouring man?
Where are the bailers and the poor
Who glean the edges for the ears
Left for them to ease their fears
When winter famine knocks the door?
Where are the ricks and ancient hedges
Filled with the call of fledging birds
The nests of dormice and soft words
Of lovers tumbling in the sedges?
Oh, I know that life was hard
And there's no reason we should yearn
For sweated labour to return
With broken backs and prospects marred;
But here, up on Cliff Edge, I sense,
As wheat engulfs the valley floor,
That we have lost something more
Than simple toil amidst the tense
But futile race for more progress
And more cost-effective ways
To pile up wealth and fill our days
With entertainmnet, while they mess
With the months as they go by,
The seasons and the yearly round
The feast days that are more profound
Than advertising stunts imply.
The solstice and the equinox
The quarter days and harvest homes
Are wilier than the sterile gnomes
Who'd have us pinned down to the Box,
Ignoring how the world each day
Is different and calling me
To work with them to set us free
From sterile uniformity.
So if I cannot hear the song
Of reapers, or see the sunlight glint
On scythes returning home, or hint
At silent gleaners here among
The missing hedgerows, pardon me
For wishing that those things at least
Which sanctified a rural peace
Might find once more a way to be
A blessing, even to those who stand
As I, in silent hope, and long
For fields alive once more with song
To resurrect this silent land.
Brian Hick September 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 25.9.23
997
Roundel for our youth
Hastings is safe - we heard it on TV.
While Birmingham and London are ablaze
We are all snug in Sussex, by the sea.
Hastings is safe.
Where feral youth in cities smash and rage
Ours slope along the front hoping to be
Ignored by tourists, or they stand and gaze
At apps and extras - which it seems are free
With Blackberries - 'til the electronic haze
Contents, and they can wander home for tea.
Hastings is safe.
Brian Hick August 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 20.9.23
996
All I wanted was a little time;
A break, to sit on the beach,
To think, perhaps to write
And certainly not to talk;
Definately not to talk.
But we were not alone
And so we talked
Endlessly
Pointlessly
And I could not think
Could not write
Until I got home
And spat this out.
What a waste.
Brian Hick August 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 19.9.23
994
Heretic
Pelagius once wrestled with the text
And had to be expunged for what he taught.
How different things might have been had he not vexed
Augustine and the cardinals by his thought;
Then all the cloying weight of guilt and sin
Might gently fade away and our Free Will
Would stand alongside Grace to let us in
To all the gifts the Saviour meant to fill
Our lives, but which the ancient Pope
Realised would undermine his grip;
Where there's no sin to pardon and the hope
Of heaven can't be lost by this one slip.
But Augustine got his way and endless sin
Eats at each troubled mind from deep within.
Brian Hick August 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 16.9.23
992
St Catherine's Oratory survived
The reformation's crushing blows
Because its high position shows
The way to ships up from St Ives,
And through the years the spinster band
Has wheezed its way there in the hope
Of matrimony - while the Pope
Was happy for the cash in hand.
But cynicism can't explain
The answered prayers, the renewed hope
Which many found within the scope
Of simple faith's eternal gain
And even if St Catherine's story
Cannot stand the test of time
She waits, a martyr in the line
Of meditation's mystery.
From the Abbey Church below
The walk's enough to clear the mind
Towards - well, if not god-inclined -
At least to thought that starts to show
Awareness, sensitivity
To more than money, sex or food
And all that is grotesque and lewd
In daily life's insanity.
The oratory's stone edifice
Stands empty, yet, restored for use
And worship, freed from the abuse
Of doctrine or the casual tourist,
Shines a light for those who come
In search of meaning for today
Letting silence show the way
To truth, as it has ever done.
Brian Hick August 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 15.9.23
991
Twilight - Chesil Beach
You sneaked up on me, in the evening light
After a day spent trudging Chesil Beach
For unfound fossils and renewed insight.
You sneaked up on me.
Just as I thought that I'd begun to reach
That point where nothing ever would be right
You transformed the darkening bay to teach
Me, through every nuance of twilight,
That anything from indigo to peach
Is mine, if only I'll accept the sight.
You sneaked up on me.
Brian Hick August 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 13.9.23
990
Fossiling
On Chesil Beach the turning tide is clear,
Even the thrash and push cannot conceal
The rolling pebbles underneath the waves
Which churn like jewels in the midsummer sun.
Yet picking up each perfect form they dry
And dull as if removal from that nether world
Of sea and shore, halfway between each,
Yet home to neither - like Schrodinger's cat -
Forces choice and so kills off the life
Which only blossoms when in constant flux
Between the two uncompromising worlds
Gringing against each other to produce
The perfect smoothness which each pebble knows
Ensures survival and a beach which grows.
Brian Hick August 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 12.9.23
989
Jurasic Haikus
The Spinnaker Tower,
An engineering miracle-
For retail therapy.
At Pizza Express
No poems, just a menue
For the holiday.
On European alcohol limits
Italy allows
An extra bottle each week;
Viva Italia!
The bed is lumpy,
The coat hangers are missing
But we both slept well.
Pip, pip, pip, pip, pip
Off goes next door's smoke alarm;
Good job it's not ours.
It rained this morning
So I took my mac, but now
Swelter in the sun.
Junior disco
I cannot see to
Read or write, and the noise
Blots out all thought.
The beach, sans fossils,
Is silent, but the swallows
Swarm in happy clouds.
3.15 am
A young sea-gull calls
Like a squeaking gate up on
The caravan roof.
Austen & Palgrave,
Tennyson & John Fowles
All lived in Lyme Regis.
If I canot see
The Long Man for the darkness,
Maybe he's not there?
Brian Hick August 2011 on holiday with our granddaughter
©copyright Sally Hick 11.9.23
983
Mid July and of course it rains.
The Kentish coast has all but been erased
Beneath the sea mist which rolls in again
Despite the days of heat which sought to raise
Our hopes, only to sluice them all away
In squalls and chilly drizzle from the west.
If there are tourists, or the occasional day
Tripper, they're hiding or doing their best
To amuse the children who have had enough
Of slot machines and pleasure parks which fill
The gaps but can't make up for the real stuff
Of holidays - sun and warmth to instil
A feeling that we have enjoyed the hours
We spent in Southend, in spite of all the showers.
Brian Hick July 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 8.9.23
981
I see you in the darkness of the night
I hear you in the silence of the seas
I touch you in the breeze upon the hills
I sense you in the garden, on my knees
While weeding out the plants which you have watered,
While warming chilly hands beside the fire,
While meditating on the evening sunlight
While singing cheek-by-jowl in the choir
For you have never left me when I doubted
Nor given up the fight I might have lost
When, ignorant, I thought that you had vanished,
Insisting I alone must count the cost
For all the stupid things, the selfish actions,
Which blight my memory and seek to crush
All hope of any single act of kindness
Which could alleviate the futile rush
To justify myself, when all I needed
Was simply to accept, not question why,
Your selfless love that's always here beside me
And always will be, till the day I die.
I see you in the darkness of the night
I hear you in the silence of the seas
I touch you in the breeze upon the hills
I sense you in the garden, on my knees.
Brian Hick summer 2011
©copyright Sally Hick 4.9.23
