Thursday 21 October 2010

 

N.B. Teide: Volcano. Rhymes with lady.


TENERIFE

Two lovers by the ragged strand once trod
the sooty sand; slender maid with raven
hair, fisher boy of bronze; the dazzling sun
a gold doubloon, the moon a silver coin.
From rocks, ink-black as witches' cats, they saw
the teeming sea; for Paraiso Beach was
cast for them by Teide's fiery blast, 'neath
Milky Way in wind-blown spray where whale and
dolphin play. Feckless fools from far-off lands
soon found their paradise. "Commercialise
then urbanize, the mountains are for sale.
Bulldoze, landfill, then jerry-build; sewage
on the surf. Roll out roads for traffic roar;
monoxide in the breeze. Machinery tear
at prickly pear and green banana trees.
Throw up bars and apartment blocks; bedim
the stars with flashing lights; fill the nights with
keyboard beat and dancing feet to drown the
ocean's anguished cries ..." Her sculpture scorned, her
flanks defiled, the lady Teide broods. With
hissing sulphur in her breath, inferno
for a heart; such feelings pent, her rage must
vent to blast the curse and re-create a
silent land where lizards laze and prey birds
ride the balmy breeze, while a ghostly girl
and fisher lad go gathering wild herbs.

Charlie Gregory
Paraiso Beach

Sunday 17 October 2010

Just went away

You didn’t say, just went away
and killed the dream that filled my day.

I really thought I knew you well;
but, deep inside, you planned to flee
and didn’t tell. You gave no hint
about the end, like… ''I don’t need
you for a friend.'' Neither said we
didn’t care, but suddenly you
were not there.

                      I can’t dismiss you
with a sigh. It matters that you
say, ''goodbye .''

                        So smile, and blow a
kiss before you go. Never run
away and leave a friend to grieve.

 

Charlie Gregory
Cardiff

Friday 15 October 2010

Actual posting date 22-11-10 

Not for the genteel, this one.

                  Leap off a Day

Leap off a day full of struggle and toil;
pleasure-power fuels freedom's few precious
hours. Head for the cellar where solace is
found; shoulder a way through the jostling crowd.

The thicket is wild and dense at the bar,
winter-branch arms shedding autumn-leaf notes.
Barmaids flick taught aloof tails while they flit,
ripping off balls with their sharp little tits.

Machine gunning speakers spray punters with
rap. Call for ''strong ale!'' Leave the lager for
louts. Survey; edge away from the wankers
and drunks. He's got mad-eyes. She's pushing tabs.

Ocean of faces polluted by booze;
snatches of voices, wind-torn from the storm.
Crackhead is screaming about his bad trip,
rodents are filling his skull full of shit.

Rhythm-girls bob up and down to the beat.
Silky Desire still the queen of the dance,
Aldis-lamp pants flashing code through the gloom.
Refill my pot and slug whisky for luck.

Shouting and cursing and breaking of glass,
fun at the bar… stampeding; girls crying;
chairs swinging; fists flying; then Exocet-
bottles-and-boots in an all out attack.

Faces exploding in fountains of blood;
shatter-glass windows ice-blue-psychedel;
game-beating police rousing quarry to
flight; any brace cooks-the-books for the night.

Scatter and panic; a jam at the door
as we tear and then pull and then kick and
butt heads. Now dash for the street and the sweet
inky-black safety of swallowing night.

Find the fair-maid, Desire, cute little sprite
whose ignoble-knight offers vindaloo-
sauce, plan for scalding her arse and covert
ovens-of-love, as we leap off a day
.

Charlie Gregory
Cardiff

Thursday 14 October 2010

 

 

Actual posting date 16-11-10

image

 

The Mariner’s Mother

By a stone where seabirds shriek, a phantom
woman kneels to weep for loves she lost, and
one who shared her tortured grief. Weeps with the
voice of the wailing wind, for tousled-boy
and plait-haired girl; and one who held her tight.

Weeps for the dawn of a winter's morn, numb
world of lily-scent with ghostly shroud o'er
white faced girl. Weeps for the lad who fights for
fish in the fated trawler Laforey,
'til callous storm-gods dash his life away.

Weeps for George who whispers low as he pines
for children snatched-away. “Oh my sweet, this
pain must go. In the breeze our grief will blow...”
Three souls float on the fitful wind, George, lass,
tousled lad; where a woman weeps alone.


Charlie Gregory
Cardiff

To view this poem in its proper context visit
the Sailing with Hunters link
on this page

Wednesday 13 October 2010

Actual Posting Date 09-11-10

Thoughts in the Middle Watch

The devil's in the wind tonight;
hell is in my mind;
demons of the grief I gave
the girl I left behind.

For once;
just once;
in the grinding port of aching toil and din,
I paid to weep my pain in a woman's
gentle arms, and didn't think it sin.

But God ... !
Dear God ... !
Why did you hide your virus
in those mother-loving charms?

Now the girl who once adored me
lies gaunt upon the sheet,
stricken by my loving,
with lips that once were sweet
drawn back upon her teeth.

A thousand miles away,
my lovely waits for death,
and a bitter prayer she murmurs
with every ebbing breath;
and the bitter prayer she murmurs,
soulful eyes repeat;
‘I'll curse you out of heaven
if our paths should ever meet.’

Charlie Gregory
At Sea

Tuesday 12 October 2010

 

                 WPL

It’s my wife’s birthday on the 1st November.
She’s not materialistic in any way.
Still, I’ve looked around and found
a few bits and bobs she might like.

                  WPL

           Gifts for Elizabeth
Look into the sky tonight and travel
back in time, where diamonds light forever-
up beyond the Milky Way; and if you
know the stars by name you'll never be alone.

See Lunar, queen of all the nights, a-glide
with silver smiles; lingers while the morning
mist shimmers-all with dew, then hides among
the vapour-screens to watch her lover rise.

How mighty rides the Sun King, Midas of
the dawn, transforming leaden sea and sky
to sheets of dazzling gold; red carpets lie
on cloudscapes of plains and mountain passes.

Purple anvils, forging hailstorms; thunder
clapping; lightning flashing; Buddhas billow
then dissolve in peaceful islands floating
high ... Now yellow skies of driven rain-squalls.

Flooding fields send swollen rivers rushing
to the sea, where they boil and steam in the
tropic-tides, then leap on the wind and flee –
to return in tears to their native hills.

Such glory is the earthly engine, where
sylph-rainbows float on fields-of-flowers that
mirror back their subtle hues; while starry
fish flash in inky seas of ever-night.

Deep forests whisper secrets to the fields
and jungle-hedgerows where busy insects
drone. Fisher-folk of spiders spin beauty
into webs that find jewels in the frost.

Savours of the planet are bound into
a whole by the pulsing of the hours in
the rhythm of the days, that circle in
the seasons of the spiral of the years.

There's a presence and a theme in the beat
of the never-ending dancing of the
ocean on the shore, where a gypsy wind
croons love songs to the birds that pipe and soar.

To melt into this music is to blend
into the motion, and form again the
beauty of our truth; where minds are laughing
ripples on a stream that runs forever.

Find succour in the knowledge that all of
us are one, and the substance of all things
is the universal essence of the
stars ... and see strife as but a passing phase.

           With love from Charlie

                                    WPL

 

Monday 11 October 2010

Actual posting date
06-11-2010

Sonnet
in memory of X
who escaped from Idi Amin
then had to be chemically castrated

                                               Cleft sticks
                              She-devil magic wiggles wobble-orb
                              of siren-cleft, thus shaping heady dream.
                              This dimple-flesh all reasoning absorbs,
                              then finding bristle-mound hear loathing scream.
                              Around I pray for counsel and advice
                              on staying wayward thought or wilful hand,
                              but only rate some pill and jab device.
                              Flaunt-maids entice then quacks don't understand.

                              Do women dress to promise or deny?
                              Are medics meant to gag us or to cure?
                              Our purdah-girls go by with downcast eye,
                              dull robes bedim the glare of their allure;
                              but bimboes bray-out, "See – forbidden thrill,"
                              and they, or drugs, control my very will.

Charlie Gregory
Samaritan Days

                           Wpl

Unknown Girl
Busy office mid the traffic roar. My
phone has shrilled a dozen times before. Now
a girl is crying down the line; keeps crying,
crying all the time. ‘Don't speak, just hear. I've
taken pills but feel no fear. I random-
dialled; need someone there; unseen confessor
for my prayer, a ghost to know the reason
why, at seventeen, I chose to die. When
mother went I was alone – though he was
there; so life and body not my own. I've
run away but no escape. He traces
me, and then the rape. He gets a key and
wakes me in the dead of night. He beats me
when I say, “I'll tell,” or makes to mark me
with a knife. It's living hell; devalued
life. His friends, he says, fill every place – from
law to health and Women's Aid. I see a
spy in every face. I can't seek help; I'm
too afraid. My very soul must bear the
brand of his misuse, and yet I feel I've
no excuse. If God absolves me from all
blame – why do I feel this dreadful shame? It's
so unjust! My life's debased by this man's
lust. He won't have me anymore; just find
me lying on the floor ...’ Leaves me with an
empty line; crying, crying all the time

Charlie Gregory
Samaritan Days

                           Wpl

Friday 1 January 2010

 

Wpl

Mirror-world
A life ago, my father said, ‘I saw
your plane pass overhead; stood alone in
wind and rain and watched you go.’ I shrugged and
went upon my way; ‘choose the way you waste
your day. I've hay to make and seed to sow.’

Then, amid the hours of feeding pets and
tending flowers, I saw the vapour-trail
bisect the sky; a tear spilt by the bluest
eye, as you went out to set-about a
world I'd left undone – to sing the songs I
couldn't hum; and all my love was on the
wing, in tender, wistful thoughts of you that
day. My father must have felt this too, but
couldn't say; and I, the one with life to
find, wouldn't pause to read his mind. I know
it's much the same for you, just doing what
you have to do; but if we never say
or show, how can the other ever know?

The one is always unaware, as at
the other's heart they tear. My sorrow as
you speed away, is full of what we did-
not say. Maybe, one-day you'll feel this yearning
too – in the mirror-world of me and you.

Charlie Gregory
Prifddinas
Cymru

Wpl

Announcement
"State the fact," he tells the board, "announce mid-
morning without warning, too late then to
retaliate; say, 'Times change, so on-your-
way. Redundancy accompanies age.'"

Walks easy through his fortress-grounds of trip-
alarms and snarling hounds. Youthful bride is
safely sealed from vengeful pawn and bitter
foe, and waits, consoled by views of vale and
river's flow, gleaned through rail and safety-gates.

Mower idle on the lawn; barrow still
beside a wall; jobbing-boy holds toil in
scorn. ''We'll propel the youth to manhood with
a jolt; he'll learn the bitter-truth of how
to cope without a job, or hope; collect
his due, then face his fate as men must do.''

Holding high the diamond-ring, gift for the
girl with everything – to rent her love and
smile awhile; into the room where hi-fi
croons her favourite tunes then … "Christ!" Mind won't
focus with the eyes; wife on table, lips
apart, hair a-splay, radiant as her
wedding day; boy, a man between her thighs.

Charlie Gregory
Prifddinas
Cymru

Wpl

Natasha
She descends from en-suite and the balcony-shops;
sways down the stairway, leather-mini concealing,
sometimes revealing, lace stocking-tops;
carries her bruises where nobody sees.

In the hub of the foyer the faces are probing,
sharp as the glare of the night-patrol's lamps,
as she sprinkles a vapour of perfume around them.
Where has she been? what has she seen?
edge ever nearer; want her but fear her.

From the shelters and hides of their devalued lives
the other girls know what she carries inside;
science-degree; career that tumbled
when the foundations supporting the Motherland crumbled.

The Westerner sits and weighs up the scene,
wealthy vibrations of pleasure and ease.
''Are you looking for fun?'' almost a prayer,
crouching before him, hands on his knees;
smouldering eyes hide the pleading inside;
bleak deserts of poverty stretching before her,
murk of the tenement, queuing and crying,
pauper-line selling, pauper-line buying.

''How much?'' he demands. Heart skips a beat;
will he be the one to be swept off his feet?
Will he whisk her away?
New York maybe? Somewhere … D.C …?

''Two-hundred,'' she blurts, ''American-bills ...''
She suddenly chills. Pitiless tips of cruel icebergs
drift-in from the Muscovite mist
to rip-off the fees she must squeeze
from the floating unfaithful who crawl through her knees.

''Too dear,'' he waves her away.
It's me! She's crying inside.
It's me; every-man's bride.
"What am I worth?" she wonders aloud.
"Seventy-five," he replies, "one of the crowd."

She rises before him, standing head bowed,
defeated, not cowed.
The girls turn away, back to their chat.
At the bar, double Scotch-on-the-rocks
is served to a rat.

Charlie Gregory
Moscow
At the collapse of the Communist Empire

Wpl

Sonnet – with my compliments to the ladies

She said ...
“I dance to the beat of the pulse of life.
An urge, I leap and romp and jump and climb.
Not pretty and coy, an embryo wife,
I'm a child that's wild and craving playtime.
I'll skip along as free as my brother;
no fettered, skivvy-the-maid, who will toy
with your boring chores – some trainee mother.
That woman-role is to let man stay boy.

Don't make us demure before we mature.
Don't shackle your daughter if not your son.
Rules that enchain us will never endure.
It's soul, not body, that makes the person.
Not shape, but humanity makes us tick.
Spirit's a flame in the mind – not the dick.”

Charlie Gregory
Prifddinas
Cymru

Wpl

Orang Ulu ( pron. Uloo) = collective name for the up-river tribes of Sarawak.

         Orang Ulu,
loping through mottle-green light of the jungle-track,
lighter than dawn-mist and nimble as wild-cat.
Hunt-hounds around-him are bounding and
wailing a death-hymn, or baying for
deer-spoor or fat-ox or wild-boar.

Ulu-agape at the edge of a clearing,
proud ebony, ironwood crashing before him;
din of tree-felling and sawing and logging,
plundering into the land-of-the-lair,
filling the air-of-the-woods with despair.

Animals fleeing; no way of escape.
Earth-mother, naked and bruised by the rape,
bleeds yellow-puss in the pure-running-river
where bones of the forest now rattle down rapids ...

Change; flooding the valley;
drowning the nestling, the gibbon and python;
feeding their life-force into the pylon ...

Rain; kissing the forest her final goodbyes.
Lonely in grief, tears in his eyes,
Ulu burying dogs in the shade of bamboo.
"Sleeping in nature," the sandalwood sighs,
"dreaming forever of hunting with you."

Charlie Gregory
Sarawak

Wpl

Reception
We’ll settle by the bar and watch
the women dance, then split a likely
pair, when we think we stand a chance.
I’ve one eye on the bridesmaid, with
the skirt that’s riding high – showing
off the daisies, tattooed upon
her thigh.

             The groom is still hung-over;
can’t find the pregnant bride. She dodged
into the box-room, best-man by
her side.  

              Mothers-in-law are screaming,
‘war,’ handbags all-aflail. Uncle
Jack is on his back. George is green
and frail.

             So we’ll linger here and
guzzle beer, till the barman calls
the time. Then make a play for a
pair who sway, join the pantomime ...

Hope you like the big one, with the
bird’s nest in her hair. Because I’m
heading for the bridesmaid, with the
skirt that’s riding high, showing off
the daisies, tattooed on her thigh.

Charlie Gregory
Prifddinas
Cymru

Wpl

Puck Fair
Killorglin, Co Kerry, Ireland

Where in August, on The Gathering day, the 12-year-old Puck Queen crowns a wild mountain goat, ‘King Puck.’ Then, as the Gaelic-tongued travelling people move into town with a thousand horses for the sales, the king is hauled to his pedestal above the town-square.

For three days now the streets are filled with music and dancers, entertainers and tumblers; bars open till three in the morning; air full of the wistfully beguiling lilt of the fiddle and
pit-of-the-tummy-pulping beating of the bodhran.

Through it all, King Puck reigns over his subjects from a luxurious cage at the top of the 30-foot tower as, on day two, the horse sales give way to the cattle sales – and day three, The Scattering day, he is dethroned and the people depart. And this is:

                 The Goat's Tale

‘There's magic in the Coolroe-stream, or pucks
weave herb into the browse to make me dream ...
In Killorglin-town I bowed before a
virgin-queen, who gave a crown to make me
king with vision over everything. Our
match remained unconsummate, for I was
hailed on-high, engaged, though caged, in things of
state. There, phantoms clad in cap and boot, waved
crooked-sticks and mumbled-strange in ancient-
tongue – then bought and sold the living-soul of
sullen-ox and horse and colt. While, at my
feet, the men danced women down the street, like
spectres borne on haunting-notes of lonely
songs that sang of sorrows in the years – how
wanton-maids, with torment-eyes, as wild and
green as Lough Lean's isles, and ringlets wrought in
purest gold, like wavelets caught in sunset's
mould, were, by their beauty, thus condemned to
birthing-pain and living-drudge. While boys, like
bumble-bees, beguiled by nectar spilled by
girls, were led along a lane of toil and
grudge ...

              Now I wake-up in the glen, running
free of 'Orglin-men, to gambol up the
giddy-scree into the cloud where Mother
Earth becomes the sky; and sense a life set
out for me, of butting he and tupping
she. Then see the visions of my dream; hear
the laughing of the stream; and wonder – why?’

Charlie Gregory
Puck Fair
Killorglin
County Kerry

Wpl