I let the sun pour into my eyes and finally after years I let go. Why?

Because I was growing. I was growing wings all the time. And I can fly.

From Listener (2008)

LISTENER

Let There Be Peace

Let There Be Peace

Let there be peace,

So frowns fly away like albatross

And skeletons foxtrot from cupboards;

So war correspondents become travel show presenters

And magpies bring back lost property,

Children, engagement rings, broken things.

Let there be peace,

So storms can go out to sea to be

Angry and return to me calm;

So the broken can rise and dance in the hospitals.

Let the aged Ethiopian man in the grey block of flats

Peer through his window and see Addis before him,

So his thrilled outstretched arms become frames

For his dreams.

Let there be peace.

Let tears evaporate to form clouds, cleanse themselves,

And fall into reservoirs of drinking water.

Let harsh memories burst into fireworks that melt

In the dark pupils of a child’s eyes

And disappear like shoals of darting silver fish.

And let the waves reach the shore with a

Shhhhhhhhhh shhhhhhhhhh shhhhhhhhhh.

Rain

Rain

The Actor’s Voice

The Actor’s Voice

This is a celebration of sound,

Of words said after the phone’s put down,

After the door’s shut at the editor’s cut –

Of thoughts held after the word ‘but . . . ’

This is the sound. The actor’s sound.

Of inflections after the flick of ash,

Before the crash, before the whiplash;

Of thoughts collecting before they arrive,

Of the deep breath before the dive.

This is the sound,

Of tender fingers in a clenched fist,

Of the wind carrying an invisible kiss,

Of a secret unfolding wish,

Before the candle blows like a lisp.

This is a celebration of sound,

Of words said after the phone’s put down,

After the door’s shut at the editor’s cut –

Of thoughts said after the word ‘but . . . ’

Thoughts caught between the lines –

The reading sounds of needing minds.

This is the sound of beneath the laugh,

Beneath the draft, beneath the craft –

The space between the paragraphs.

The pause between the polygraph,

The actor acting out of her skin,

The sound of shedding sins.

The sound of spirit, the sound of soul,

The sound of heat, the sound of old

Dreams fading, reawakening time;

Of hope breaking the mould of mind,

Of the beat before the hands clap,

The click, the clack, the trip, the trap;

The sound before a dropping latch,

The sound of looking back – the 22nd catch.

This is a celebration of sound,

Words said after the phone’s put down,

After the door’s shut at the editor’s cut –

Thoughts held after the word ‘but . . .’;

This is the sound before death;

In the beginning it wasn’t the word,

It was breath.

Patterns

Patterns

Laying the Table

Laying the Table