Longing to go away and hating to walk past the
railway station instead of going in and booking a seat
on a train – any train to almost anywhere – I thought of
the time I was on the train in this poem. It was a sunny morning and
great fingers of sunshine swept the old dark shadows of
the station away. Stations and trains and total devotion.

THE OLD STATION WALL

That great black wall
Towering over the train
Standing at the station,

Grows little green ferns
In the cracks between bricks,

Sends tiny yellow flowers
Bursting out of the old tar and dust,
So full of life and hope,

Their tiny petals tickle
The darkness with sunshine.

©2021 Gwen Grant

We go to the north of Scotland for our holidays and particularly do we like the
sea coast .  On one visit, we were lucky enough to be there when a storm blew up.
It was  so awe inspiring, the power of the sea and the elements.  I didn’t feel quite so
lucky when we came out of shelter and made a run for it to quieter places.  You think
of the same power pushing a flower through rock hard earth but we can’t see that.
As I’m writing this, the moon is shining from a dark blue sky lighting up the world.

  DANGEROUS HARBOUR

As we stand here,
On the edge of the world,
The wet streets peeling away
From the tiny harbour,
The sea, in a fit of spite,
Swirls and tumbles
Onto the stony shingle,
Rattling the shells
From one bony ridge to another,
Hissing its peevish laughter
At the moonbeams dancing uneasily
Down this stretch of wild water.

Until, in a fury of authority,
The moon calls all to order.
Combing the white frilled water
Into its thin silver fingers,
Braiding light into the aching darkness,
Its own face darkening as it considers
The water’s bold and fierce behaviour.

Now look what’s happened!
The moon has turned her back
On the tiny, frozen harbour,
Battered by the shell hung water,
Smashing foam flowers
Onto the old stone causeway,
Onto our icy, hasty shoulders,
As we run helter-skelter for safety
To a deep and far away doorway.

Now the sly and sliding waters
Try to tumble us off our frozen feet,
Try and pull us into the rolling sea
To be another bony shell in the making.

                                   © 2018 Gwen Grant

Needless to say, this poem is based entirely on personal experience!  

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

 

   

We all need a light in the darkness and, sometimes,
it seems to me that one of the most humane inventions
we have  is the lighthouse.

   NIGHT LIGHT

The night was so dark,
So dense,
It could be cut into slices,
Served up
As a taste of what was to come.

Until a small light,
Flickering a thin whiteness
Shone through.
Almost too thin,
Too slight,|
To give hope that its strength
Could count against that terrible
Unknown country in hiding.

Refusing to be extinguished
It shone on and kept shining,
Its thin steadiness
Keeping the lost moving
Until they could see a way forward.

The smallest light
Defeats the vast darkness.

                        ©2024 Gwen Grant