Month: Mar 2016

Who were your ancestors…

On By jovisgoesIn PoetryLeave a comment

burning

Hearken now and hearken well
A tale of witchcraft I shall tell
For from a past so riven in guilt
Where so much witch’s blood was spilt.
Who now reside in darker places
Or hide behind the cowan’s faces
For now they take the left-hand path
To serve eternity their wrath.
And scrying shows to them the foe
For them a death in pain they’ll know
They seek descendants of life’s bane
Who in the burning times caused pain
And dark black arts on them they’ll use
No widdershins can stop their ruse
The dead will fall and go to Hell
So heed my tale and heed it well.

©Joe Wilson – Who were your ancestors…2016

A lonely furrow to heartache…

On By jovisgoesIn PoetryLeave a comment

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It’s a dark and lonely road he walks
Full of silence and bitter regret
He knows he should have worked it out
But he wasn’t ready for solutions yet.
So in his dark and moody frame
You see a man of stubborn will
Who couldn’t admit that he was wrong
And one can see his dark mood still.

Some men will never say they’re wrong
They never bend or even bow
Perhaps they think they look less strong
Admitting that shows strength somehow.
So lonely furrowed path he ploughs
His pride won’t let him work things through
Yet all that lies ahead for him
Is sadness now he misses you.

And from the side-lines I must watch
He’d brook no fool advice from me
I see them both be-dogged by pain
Regretting all that there could be.
But wait – I see him turn and look
With love-filled eyes at she who wept
Maybe there’s hope of rescue yet
As he perhaps takes that first step.

©Joe Wilson – A lonely furrow to heartache…2016

The Devil gets his due…

On By jovisgoesIn PoetryLeave a comment

graveyard

Winds howling, darkening times threaten
Incessant racket from a clattering skylight
Hatches battened down, a storm on its way
Skies of foreboding as darkness brings night.

Dark forests filled with screaming ghosts
The foolish stranger now wanders therein
And thus In grasp of diabolic hosts
The scythe will rise, he’ll pay for sin.

For yet again the raven will call
And a scythe draws blood somewhere
The Devil’s abroad collecting his dues
If you’re a sinner, you’d best beware.

Amidst the branches shrouded in grey
The ghostly ensemble drifts away
In deathly silence through the night
Vanishing only at break of day.

And in that thick dark canopy waits
An evil so frightening to all
Except the Devil and his ghostly friends
Who wait and listen for the raven’s call.

©Joe Wilson – The Devil gets his due…2016

The Devil’s accomplice…

On By jovisgoesIn Poetry4 Comments

 

 

raven and scythe 2

I wrote this to accompany a previous piece
‘The raven’s awful call’.

The old bell tolled its mournful chord
A six-foot box slid under ground
And as they shovelled the cold earth back
The tired old bell was the only sound.
And the raven called as the scythe fell
Another would join him soon
When once again the bell would toll
Its sad and terrible tune.

Presently to the graveyard came
A fog so thick of damp grey mist
And one more of the throng fell dead
Another sinner on the Devil’s list.
High above in clouds so dark
The raven flies and flies alone
The Devil’s unwitting accomplice
Whose list is long and carved in stone.

So dark his wings and sure his flight
He joins with others to wait
And gathered in their unkindness
They sense the Devil won’t sate.
Long the years the two were met
The Devil’s disciple is he
He’s used as a terrible tool of death
He knows he too is not free.

For as the scythe cuts through the air
Once more a scream is heard
The raven calls his baleful cry
Another sinner is interred.
Now he sits on the scythe of death
No hint of life ‘cept blinking eyes
Until again the scythe is raised
When once again the raven flies.

©Joe Wilson – The Devil’s accomplice…2016

The raven’s awful call…

On By jovisgoesIn Poetry3 Comments

wallup.net

Still here I lie in Death’s dark shroud
Just more than dust beneath the ground
And even as they left this place
I heard the raven’s awful sound.
For those above had known me dead
And brought me here in six-foot box
Where even as I could not scream
I felt the dread from Death who mocks.

And as the bugs then through me roamed
As earthly bodies, mine did rot
My soul did not depart this husk
Such was the punishment I got.
And all the pain I still could feel
As rats gnawed at my hands and toes
There’s more to death than we may think
When blood through veins no longer flows.

Way up above the raven calls
The last call they will hear
He makes it as the scythe now falls
For soon they’ll come to join me here.

For if in life they’ve conscience clear
Their soul will soar on Heavenly peal
Though if like me a sinner they be
They’ll die in pain, a living meal.
They severed my head from my body
In years it’s never been found
I could never beg forgiveness
For who would have heard the sound.

Two hundred years in this dark Hell
The bugs and rats long gone
Just dried up skeletal bones remain
And the soul of a less than holy one.
Once, time stood still for just a while
For one short moment I waited
But then I saw the Devil’s smile
For in truth, he is never sated.

And yet once more the raven calls
As someone meets their doom
In six-foot holes beneath the earth
They’ll lie forever in this gloom.

©Joe Wilson – The raven’s awful call…2016

A comedy of sorts…

On By jovisgoesIn PoetryLeave a comment

For I am Dromio of Syracuse
To many I seem quite mad
But life within this be-twinned noddle
Is full of strangeness though not too bad.
I cannot tell though, my mind’s awash
I’ll speak to brother Dromio
For he is of Ephesus
Where madness reigns I do know.
Yet Antipholus and Antipholus
Such madness they posses
That I poor Dromio of here
May yet be Dromio of there.
O brain I feel I know not who
My Master bids me thus
Yet Dromio of where I fear
Perhaps the he of Ephesus.
And yet Antipholus is quite mad
For he would bid be me that
For I am Dromio not of there
Plain he would talk through his fine hat.
It’s true that being one of two
Does tax the noddle in many ways
For I am Dromio of Syracuse
Less and less it seems these days.
And yet, look there, I see my twin
I see my other self
Perhaps I’m really not so mad
But rich in kin and love in wealth.

©Joe Wilson – A comedy of sorts…2016

This of course is clearly based on the shortest of William Shakespeare’s farces,

The Comedy of Errors.

That Cheshire cat grin…

On By jovisgoesIn PoetryLeave a comment

Wandering in sweetest meander
Midst dreams of love-filled clouds
With only my love for company
No earthly, noisy crowds.

We travel to the greatest heights
Our passion reaching the peak
Collapsing into loving arms
Where neither needs to speak.

And yet, not really dreams at all
But reflections from a past
That is so full of nights as these
So filled with love designed to last.

And in the morning near the dawn
We lie in warm embrace
Again wrapped in each others arms
We’re soon transported to that place.

Till spent, grinning like Cheshire cats
As lovers with burning fires
A passion for a lifetime
In a love that never tires.

©Joe Wilson – That Cheshire cat grin…2016

Lord, why are we even here…

On By jovisgoesIn Poetry1 Comment

When I lay my head upon the pillow, Lord
And ponder this amazing world, I ask
What manner of creature did you think us
That You would set such an onerous task.
For surely we’re creative, Lord
We make such wonders grow
Advances in areas like science
There’s so much more we now know.
And yet, and yet, we kill ourselves
In wars and in the violent streets
There is no logic for these awful acts
So many dead bodies in blood-soaked sheets.
The wondrous planet on which life grows
We’ve blown up and torn it apart
We treat each other abysmally
You’d think we had no heart.
So why Lord, why entrust us
To care for our Earth this way
For we are turning what was green
Into infernal grey.

But I see you now Lord, I see you
You’ve acted with sleight of hand
You pray each day we’ll tire of this
For then we’ll understand.
But will it make us better, Lord
If Your faith in us is fulfilled
If at last our appetite is slaked
And no further blood is spilled.
It’s never easy to follow you, Lord
For You truly do move in mystery
But some of us work towards that peace
And to confine the horrors to history.
So I look more brightly to the future
In the hope that You’ll be our guide
In the constant search for calmer days
And Your companionship by our side.

©Lord, why are we even here…2016