Wednesday 12 August 2015

POETS UNITED - BEAUTY

“Were it not for music, we might in these days say, the Beautiful is dead.” - Benjamin Disraeli

Poets United this week has as its theme “Beauty”. Contributors are asked to share a poem where beauty speaks to the readers…

Sometimes a few notes of a song half heard while one is rushing past another car on the road, or when one changes radio station, a few fleeting notes, can bring back with great strength memories of the past. Vivid images that one thought were forgotten are quickly resurrected. A snatch of melody, that someone hums in the street, a few mumbled words of lyric are enough to rekindle flames amongst the cold ashes. Music speaks to our soul and the only way for us to answer is with our heart. When our heart sings, the melody will cause our brain to raise a white flag, defeated.

The Child in the Truck

The streets, empty and cold.
The morning, grey and cloudy.
The leaves of yesterday’s paper
Waltzing with the wind on wet asphalt,
While bleary-eyed the newspaper boy
Sourly announces a newer version of the news.

And I, serene, relentlessly introverted,
Listen to your rhythms
Leaving your melodies to wander aimlessly
In the deserted alleyways of my mind.
Your verses loiter, lingering
In room after room of grey matter
Proselytising from my memory
Images - pale, faded, ideal…

“Oh, my precious urban loneliness,
Grey-dressed, frigid sister,
How slowly you unravel round me!
You unsex yourself,
And in your newly muscular grip
You tighten your wily snares
To entrap me with no hope of escape.”

Bathed in the wan, grey morning light
That tiny child looks feebly, wide-eyed
Through the dirty window of the truck.
And in the stark beauty of waiting
Sits silent and alone, abiding
The inexorable loss of innocence.

12 comments:

  1. There is a rhythm and melody to life. I like the image of that piece of discarded paper dancing in the wind because things like that def fascinate me and catch my eye. The quote lines in the middle are particularly intriguing. Were they from something else or more your own dialogue?

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  2. What a gripping poem - the purity and innocence of the child......we who know all that lies ahead that will impact her life.........a wonderful and thought-provoking post, Nicholas.

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  3. I like the play of the word 'grey' in the poem lending it a unique character and also the contrasts in the eyes...the weariness of the newspaper boy and the wonderment of the boy in the truck....

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  4. Oh the world through a child's eyes. There is a lovely loneliness wrapped in this verse.
    Cheers

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  5. The undoubted beauty of innocence.. and the pure hearts of children. Such a thought provoking piece.
    Beautifully executed!

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  6. You have left us with quite an image here -- in both the photo and your words. I feel for that child sitting alone in that truck! I have seen scenes like that. And they're heart-breaking.

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  7. The innocence of a child view contrasts greatly with that of the persona. Interesting

    Much love...


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  8. Oh this sent shivers down my spine. A chilling read with so much implicit in that "loss of innocence" you mention in your last verse. A riveting read, Nicholas.

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  9. That first stanza is wonderful... it sets up a mysterious, almost forbidding aura.

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  10. What a view on beauty and the way the world is.

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  11. How beautiful! I like the dreamy effect of this and the last stanza is stunning.

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