THE PALE ROAD

 I like to hear the sound of our clock in the night. It’s a great comfort when you can’t
sleep to hear the unconcerned ticking. There used to be a brilliant clock in Dundee
which had, I think, nursery rhyme characters that came out and performed on each
chime. We would go and watch it until the hours made us move on. I haven’t seen or
heard this particular clock in years but it was so colourful and friendly. We collected
clocks once and they still live all over the house, some still ticking, some chiming,
some cherished.

  THE PALE ROAD

The house is quiet, silent,
Except for the ticking of the big clock
At the bottom of the stairs,
Whose chimes keep company
With those who cannot sleep.

Just before dawn,
A thin moon slides in through the window
And in a moment those awake
Walk the pale road of remembrance,
Of longing, until the past
Becomes the pale road of prayer.

Let the clock chime again,
That the past may be left behind,
The moon soothe the restless heart,
The whispered words bring peace.

                      ©2021 Gwen Grant.  

Available on Amazon Kindle and Draft2Digital e-books.

ROAD WORKS


ROAD WORKS

They dug up the road yesterday~
And all night long
The traffic lights have gone
From red to green and back again
In orderly succession.

No-one got held up.
The fox went through on red,
A jogger on green,
The hedgehog from across the road scuttled by
And the cat who rules the night
Ignored them all.
Turning into a red, green and orange shadow
Curled up by the gate
Until it was sure what was going on.

Tomorrow it will all be taken away,
The magic lost
And the world will have to go back
To steady colour,

With a bit of black and white
As the night draws in.

©2026 GWEN GRANT

LULLABY

LULLABY

Lullabies are for little children
Promised lovely dreams
And gentle awakening.

We are not children,
Our dreams exhaust us
And we awaken tired and weary.

Our lullaby is of plain song,
Stern, elusive, promising nothing,
Yet still singing.

Reciting
The long authority of hope.

Reminding
Of Love forever holding
The promise of a new beginning.

So quietly lie and close your eyes,
Love itself will sing our lullaby.

©2021 Gwen Grant.

GOOD FRIDAY

This is a day that always has an echo in my heart. I’ve published
this poem often before but my memories of Good Friday are so
vivid and loved, the Chapels, the people, the singing, the glorious
words that relate its sombre story always there to hold me, seem
eternally new.

GOOD FRIDAY 

So now it begins with the sun striking through the tall windows,
Onto the old brown pews and onto the pulpit,
Onto the slender Cross where the weight of this weeping world
Is carried on helpless shoulders,
Onto the crown of thorns blazing in the shadows,
Burning the darkness with its crimson glory.

This is not a gentle day, yet gentleness persists in breaking through,
For the soaring arc of the wide blue banner
Painted on the far wall of the Chapel,
Painted high above the polished table where blue scented grasses
Quiver in a silver goblet, unquestioning and faithful,
Presents to us those golden words painted on that lovely blue arc,
Words that insist ‘GOD IS LOVE’
Which gently insist it is this we must always remember.

The singing is bright now, pausing, darkening, lifting, soaring,
Until a sudden startling descant adds its own touch of glory
To all tough and tender hearts caught in a flesh
Ever subject to death and to corruption, yet ever open to joy.
These singers of sacred songs seek the strength of God as they sing
And in those three plain words, GOD IS LOVE, find it.

Then the crisp cold air smelling faintly of lavender
Drifts like a prayer into the silence and the silence is profound
As silence always is when God is listening.
And God is always listening.
And love is always sending its quiet hope out into the world.

                                                                    © 2018 GWEN GRANT.

WALLFLOWERS IN NOVEMBER

We bought two bunches of wallflower plants from the market, not expecting to see any flowers until next Spring.  But they’re all blooming.  My Dad was a keen gardener and a good one and he would have been totally amazed by this.  But I remember the winters when I was a girl were bitterly cold and snowy so no flowers at all then.  Only ice flowers on the water in the old quarry. I’d forgotten those ice flowers which broke wide open when anyone fell into that desperately cold water and one of the older children had to be fetched to rescue them. One of the worst problems the rescuers faced was the ice, sending both rescuer and drowning child slithering and sliding out of reach so more and more dangerous attempts had to be made until the rescue was accomplished.

Today, in Spring, we are warned of bitterly cold weather on its way, snow on top of the hills and freezing cold winds but we hang on to the promise of summer.

     WALLFLOWERS IN NOVEMBER 

The old gardeners would never have
  believed it.
Not wallflowers in November.
Why, that would have been against all the
  laws of nature,
Unheard of.
Yet, here they are,
Smiling into the crisp November morning.
Their velvet yellow petals
Reminding the cold air of Spring,
Their dark reds almost bringing alive
The sultry sweetness of summer. 

One glance is enough to reveal
The energy of those glorious flowers,
Enough to set the world on fire,
More than enough to put bitter frost in
  its bitter place,
No killing will ever happen here. 

Wallflowers in November can do that.
Their petals scent the days
Even when the trees are dying,
Giving lie to all those stories
Of life and death endings.
Laying claim, once for all, to no endings here. 

Just wallflowers in November. 

                                   ©2019 Gwen Grant