Through the eyes of the Ancients we see the way the future should be.
We live in a dark age, and yearn for the light.
The Memory of Wisdom
Category: Poetry and stories
Some of my artwork has accompanying stories and poetry. Here it is.
Juniper: the bastard killer
Juniper gathers up all that he finds,
Spirits away; out of sight, out of mind;
He’s never wasteful, never unkind,
And Juniper gathers up all that he finds.
Springheel Jack
At the frosted window and in the black heart of the whispering woods, with blue flame breath and tall as the trees, Springheel Jack treads a winding way between the darkest dreams and the dread unknown.
Double Happy
As a young girl, she’d dreamed of the dancing women, halfway across the world and half a lifetime into the future, who one day would make her smile. She’d stay in their land and become one of them, and dream of herself as a young girl, lost in the past.
The Three Graces
Three graces in the market stood
Clutching fabric hearts,
While passers-by did weave and sigh
Round donkeys and their carts.
The morning sun, the heat and sand,
The smell of herbs and fruit,
The slapping sandals, dusty hooves,
The stamp of foreign boots.
And in this noise and in this place
They stood with silent pride,
A fleeting glimpse of youth and love
With hearts held open wide.
We smiled when we saw them,
For it was strange to see –
And which three were the graces?
– It matters not to me…
The Age of Unbelief
High above the turning world
The glow of dreaming skies
Warms the lost and fragile heart
Reflected in your eyes
Hilm
I apply not my sword where my lash suffices, nor my lash where my tongue is enough. And even if there be one hair binding me to my fellow man, I do not let it break; when they pull, I loosen, and if they loosen, I pull.
– Mu’awiya, founder of Umayyad Dynasty in Amman 7th centur
Akhenaten
The heretic of ages past
Who watched a new sun rise
On sacred land, with stone and sand –
A god who never dies
With strange and graceful beauty
So long ago he fell –
His dignity, his failure
His name a broken spell
And to his spirit they are drawn
Unknowing and unsure;
The preacher, poet, mystic, slave;
The outcast and the pure
The Dark Age
When Viracocha came again
Into the coloured lands
We placed the golden future
Into his open hands
But with him darkness came –
So many bitter years –
The Sun God hid his face
And blessed our world with tears
The Urubamba Girl
Upon the ancient walls
Full of painted tiles
From across the oceans
The mountains and the miles
The little girl she saw
The sacred paths to glory
The thorns and the petals
The harsh or loving story
The blood and gold of centuries
The angels and the candles
She sighed and thought of home
And kicked her dusty sandals…