Category: creativity

 BITTER FROST TO SUNSHINE

 BITTER FROST TO SUNSHINE

All these years, we have lived
With lies as light as thistledown
In our minds.
Memories of those times
We broke with love
Bringing a sad remembrance.
Turning sunshine to frost
In an instant.

These are the memories
We want to polish up.
The ones that make us sad,
Uncomfortable, uneasy.
Make them more forgiving,
Sweeter, perhaps,
As if they had never happened
In the way we remember.

But we know enough to understand
No good ever came
Of turning memories into lies,
No matter how much
We may want to lie or be lied to.

In that dark time, then,
When we can no longer find
Forgiveness in ourselves,
When thistledown lies
Weigh heavy upon us,
Offer them up.

Offer up those memories,
Just as they are.
Offer up those times
We have not loved.
Offer them all up,
Trusting and safe in our trust
That Love itself
Will take each sorry heart,
Turn bitter frost to sunshine.

                                   © 2016 Gwen Grant

All material on this blog is copyright but if anyone wants to use part of it,
then please get in touch.   http://www.gwengrant.co.uk

CHANGING PLACES 

    CHANGING PLACES

The wise woman rises early,
Stepping into clean, fresh clothes,
Pulling on her lovely crease-free trousers,
Her unwrinkled Tee clinging neatly to her shoulders,
Her shoes so sparkling clean and pretty,
Even the flowers admire them. 

‘Bye!’ calls the wise woman,
As she goes singing on her way,
Everyone making room for her.

The tired woman rises far too late,
That extra five minutes somehow getting away from her.
And look! The clothes fairy hasn’t been!
So she wears crumpled Tee and wrinkled trousers.
Her shoes so dusty and dull
Even the flowers try to hide them. 

No ‘Bye!’ from this tired woman,
As she goes yawning on her way. 

But the wise woman makes room for her,
For tired tomorrow, wise today.  

                                                    © 2018 Gwen Grant

 

RAINY DAYS

 

       RAINY DAYS 

Rain Birds
Balancing on the washing line,
Until the wind
Blows them off. 

Rain witches
Swooping down in showers
Of grey drops
And dying leaves. 

Rain ghosts
Tapping on the window,
Not stopping
Until someone lets them in. 

Rainbows
Bringing old memories made new.
Your hair beaded
With raindrops,
Your smile
Putting the grey day
To shame. 

Open the window,
Now. 

                 © 2020 Gwen Grant

WAITING FOR SUNRISE 

        WAITING FOR SUNRISE 

There they are,
Sheaves of hay lying in the fields
Like golden Lovers,
Waiting for sunrise,
Waiting for the sun’s warmth
To cradle their tired heads.
Make soft shadows of eyelashes
Lying quiet against their faces. 

Don’t wake them,
Let them rest.
For over the thorn hedge
In the next field waiting,
Winter rests on its elbow,
Frosty fingers all set
To kill summer stone dead. 

Here comes the sun.
Time enough now to shake their shoulders
Before the frost gets close enough to touch them.  

Hold hands, Lovers. 
Hold hands and run.
                                                    © 2019 Gwen Grant

MAGNOLIA TREE

  MAGNOLIA TREE

The magnolia next door
Has been chopped down.
Never again will it scatter
Its blossom over the grass.

Nor will any wind
Bent on mischief,
Blow its silky petals
Into the water.

Letting the flowers
Dance on the glittering surface
Until they fragment
In the sun.

All that has gone now.
Caught for ever
In the sad and watchful eye.

                           ©2020 Gwen Grant