I have always dreamt and some of  my dreams strike 
into my heart with the very first pictures which show me
where I am because from here, I know exactly what is
going to happen.  Is that a bus stop with a bus rolling by,
ignoring the outstretched hand of a person wanting to get on? 
Why yes it is!  And that person is me.  This is the start of
 a dream that always frightens me because I have to walk
home in deep darkness and untold terrors fall upon me on
that journey.

SILENT MOVIES

Little children
Lying quietly in their beds,
Dreaming.
Flushed faces,
Closed eyes
Flickering like old silent movies,

Shadows
Of hidden worlds,
Of unknown people
Demanding attention.

All we can do, watching,
Is hope that all is well
In these places we cannot enter.
That each child will be safe
Until they awaken.

That every traveller
On the high plains
Of hesitant fear and aloneness
Will find the keys
Of this unknown kingdom
And retreating,
Lock the doors tight
Behind them.

Dropping the keys
Into deep water.

©2024 Gwen Grant

 I wrote this poem many years ago and sold it to a national magazine. However,
I didn’t know when it was being published but, one day, at a Railway station, at
the start of a long journey, I bought  a copy of this magazine, opened it, and there
was the poem! I spent the whole of that journey reading the print off the page.

      I KNOW YOUR FACE

I know your face as I know my own,
And yet, one odd glance
Surprised your outside face looking in
At me.
Odd.  I thought I knew you well,
Yet there you were.  A stranger.

So many years have gone by since we met
And loved by firelight.
I remember asking what you were thinking
about,
And listening.
Since then, it can’t be that I haven’t listened.
Just never asked again. 

                                              © 2018 Gwen Grant