Category Archives: Poetry & Short Stories

Every which way

Tempting Faith

Tempting Faith

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I traced the stained glass story of your deity.

Perched in a pew, any one will do

Therein lies the memories –

Of my youth.

No solace except in sentiment;

No solution, but I tried.

I mixed the colours, pastel, in my mind.

The angels promised heaven,

The “szents”, they sang a song

While Jesus, God, the Holy One,

Sent blessings from Anon.

I sat below, redundant,

Seeming new but still familiar

The light of day it shuffled in

And spoke in the vernacular.

“Like a Morgue” my cynic muttered

“To keep the soul preserved”

Still I’d rather the scent of churches

To any hospital ward.

I left my mind adrift

But nothing tangled,

Nothing bit –

The bait remained unused.

And so with geneflective ritual

I upped and crossed the threshold out…

Yet Solomon’s wife,

A seasoned statue –

Like this I turned that one last time.

The past in ruins, my faith collapsing,

I dared look back

There comes a time, not now.

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“The time for joviality –

 is lost,” he said with much hilarity

“I don’t believe a single word!

I’m much too used to your being absurd.”

He frowned and left me with a glance.

Such looks as born of bitter chance.

“I knew you couldn’t tolerate

The very things I had to say.”

But these last words they sadly fell

On his deaf ears – this I could tell;

Because he turned once more

And smiled

And left the distance separate –

The time

Leaving (not gladly)

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The relative stillness,

Almost deathly,

The waiting.

The big hand-

played  tricks

Gave more minutes;

Just a shadow

Or a battery low.

Yet time, itself,

Seemed weighted –

Even if it finally passed;

Those last few moments

Then seemed rushed,

As broken from the

Reverie.

Torn from the

Tender embrace.

Time and taxi whisked

Me away.

Tram Thoughts 2

Tram Thoughts 2

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Loosened by the draw of day
the sunlight passes,
dust paths flicker,
the hurdy-gurdy lumbering feels
of the rattle-worn-infested tram.
The noise of life enshrouds
the hiss, the fizz,
metallic rumbles:
the passing glory-questioning
and the silence of the cyclists.
The occasional move to rupture-
an all-intrusive noise surrenders,
for with the daily wear and tear
the idea lingers, the truth asunder.
Upon the steel; in driven poise
emerging, purging with each noise.
The pen clicks on,
the tram collides,
with the future as is present time.
The destination never reached
till when it is and darkness scours
the corners of the mortal weave
the soul is routed, then sent forth.
Aligned, laid flat, that final pose,
not matters then, the weed nor rose.
When stone shall mount and commemorate
and dirt and dust and weeds take flight.

Tram Thoughts

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As the tram light races along the track towards me,

The morning wraps its autumn chill around me:

I draw comfort from the little things –

My breath; a couple’s kiss;

A child’s questioning of a weary granddad,

enlivened, reawakened in his life by this, such youth.

As the tram passes on into the city,

Its bobbing on the tracks, my lullaby,

I feel the weighty eye-lids that I fight,

the chance to float away again consigned to night,

I persevere, with beauty all around…

Set In Stone

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csabautca

Off the street, out of the pubs –

I traced the stained glass story of your deity.

Perched in a pew, any one will do

Therein lie the memories –

Of my youth.

No solace except in sentiment;

No solution, but I tried.

I mixed the colours, pastel, in my mind.

 

The angels promised heaven,

The “szents”, they sang a song

While Jesus, God, the Holy One,

Sent blessings from Anon.

I sat below, redundant,

Seeming new but still familiar

The light of day it shuffled in

And spoke in the vernacular.

 

“Like a Morgue” my cynic muttered

“To keep the soul preserved”

Still I’d rather the scent of churches

To any hospital ward.

 

I left my mind adrift

But nothing tangled,

Nothing bit –

The bait remained unused.

And so with geneflective ritual

I upped and crossed the threshold out…

 

Yet Solomon’s wife,

A seasoned statue –

 

Like this I turned that one last time,

The past in ruins, my faith collapsing,

I dared look back

And so am doomed.

Commerate All

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twins
A beacon of …

 

I’d like to be remembered for my life, not my death.
Not just another victim that you will all soon forget.
Commerate me on a “Canal Bank Walk”,
Remember me by verse about which we can talk.
And let death in the shadow that lurks at Ground Zero
Create hope – and not just another tragic hero.

As darkness fell

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Residing beyond the realms that once bound me

I’ve come to relish in the realisation more clearly:

 

The twisted remains, a memory,

A vacant enterprise, just dust.

Neither glory nor romance to entail

From the remnants of all that is lost.

 

The hollow shell, the creeping unease;

With corners and the shadows yonder.

Beyond the senses as perceived –  They lie or –

There lies the spiralling notion – the wonder?

 

The crevice caused by day and night

In fading sense as brightness flickers.

Far away a burning line of earlier

Tends to flitter while the soundless beckons.

 

The vacuum, the sea sound echo,

In the emptiness a ringing enveloping.

Tightening jaw and loosening bowels compete.

Hair pricked, fear pecked, if this, the truth developing.

 

From an upstairs window, only desperation

A broken pane, cool air and promise –

The creak, the moan, the groan, the shuffle;

Downstairs and to escape but all this between us.

 

The final spurt, the tension, the ragged lurch.

The stumble; the bladder, unrelenting, pushes.

Into the yard – the broken bottles, bricks and mortar;

A mockery against the wall –  false bravado flushes!

 

Babbling esperanto

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I have a language I do not speak

And speak a tongue that’s bitter;

I try to learn another one

But it merely makes me fickle.

Spread thin I realise

That I am not an expert.

Loosely able to convert

The basest of ideas!

Thick or thin, black or white

it doesn’t really matter…

In the jumble of my thoughts

Je probalok arís kai otra vez!

 

Home-coming or –going

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mealtime
Who's missing?

 

In the taxi coming here

The mind allowed the traffic

And time

To inspire me.

I wallowed in the memory

As only those

Who’ve yet to feel emotion.

I held images,

Coined words,

Of which all this

Is a whimsical parody.

I left roads wash over me;

Some seemed familiar,

Some just wanted to be.

I’ve lived in the city,

You see,

For more time than

Every other, bar one:

And now I return to

That beginning.

A man, with a family,

But alone this time

On my travels.

I am a man who

Will soon become

A child, the youngest brother;

I am returning to

Start over…again.

Copyright © Martin O'Regan
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