The Personification of Love

Love is strange, isn’t she?

People spend their whole life looking for her

But mostly they walk right past her

They don’t believe Love can exist beside them

Or realise Love is already inside them 

So, they search for her in higher places –

On mountain peaks and in the tallest skyscrapers

They even imagine her with wings.

But Love has a fear of heights, she hates pedestals

She is not in the air, she is the air 

She is not above, she is beside

And always – 

She must exist first in the one seeking

Love together requires love alone 

Love is awkward, isn’t he?

His socks don’t always match 

And he’s not always on time,

But he gets there when he needs to be –

Sometimes when you least expect him.

People imagine Love is some sort of hero

Carrying a sword to save their world from itself

But Love is terrified of war

And Love never carries weapons

The only pain love causes is when he is not there

And your lungs collapse for a little while 

Before you remember how to breathe again

From the place where

Love lived before

At her worst, love hurts like hell

– A sword between the wings that hold us close

But at her best love is your best friend and your teacher.

Teaching you things you never knew

About the world and about yourself

He makes you inquisitive and considerate

She makes you vulnerable and passionate

You’ll never forget his eyes or her soul

Even when there is a world between you 

Even if there is heaven between you

Love – awkward strange and beautiful Love,

Remains

Artwork by a talented Zimbabwean friend, Tara Wallace https://tarawallacestudio.com/

African Bones

On an African morning,

Where the half circle becomes whole

Where sun lifts from the source, a rising flame from a bowl

Where yellow grass shimmers beneath bending blue folds

Red soil licks bare feet –

And it sticks to the soul

On an African day,

Where the river rolls like a hymn

Where colours are rich and where wanting wears thin

Where peace lives beneath branches

And branches arch in green praise

Towards the face of the sun

In sepia rays

On an African evening,

Where the African roof is a bougevvilla coloured sky

Where the laughter is deeper and smiles are bright

The voices, that are heavier,

Sing the anthems of light

Where the red dusk of the day gives birth to new night

On an African night,

Where dappled dusk falls and dappled clouds rise

Where Kudus move sleepily and the nightjar cries

Where elephants make thunder and dry sands call rain

Lightening makes art

And the whole sky is its frame

In an African soul,

Wherever a travelling soul goes,

Strength, like a mountain, still carries the bones

Deep in that place, with new seasons and old

African laughter from ribs like a river still flows

And African love runs rich and fast in the veins

Carrying the soul

That red soil has stained

Images by my dear friend, Alexandrina Fleming https://www.anamcarafilmstudios.com/alexandrina

Intuition

Everything is exaggerated for Intuition. 

She feels everything –

in every membrane of her skin 

Even when her eyes are shut

She knows the face within

Intuition knows the sea from many miles away

Bundled in its changing tide

Breathing in with every sway 

When the sun is low, she’s low, 

When it’s up, she’s high

And in speaking she separates every truth

From every godforsaken lie 

She knows many souls, Intuition

Not by status or by name

She knows them by their colour 

And by the shadows of their shame 

The disturbed ones have dark marker 

Drawn round their face and arms

Seeping from the skin

Like black ink from fallen jars

Many walk upright in shades of grey,

In confines of pencil brush

With the world expecting greatness of them

And Intuition not expecting much. 

The red figures, they move awfully fast –

A future summons anxious feet  

And they forget to feel the world go past

Blinded by the world they want to meet

There are some; those who have hurt and healed,

And loved – and loved again

These are the bravest of all:

Healed women with their open hearts...

And open hearts of healed men

Like sunshine in technicolour hue

Sequins flapping at the seams 

They glow with hopes of turquoise dreams

Holding in their bosoms hugs of indigo moons...

Quiet, powerful, Intuition

With a knowing of all the unseen spaces

Thank you. You taught me all there is to know 

About warm people and warm places

Poem from, "From Dust" (book launching soon) Artwork by the talented Maggie Stephenson https://www.maggiestephenson.com/