I wish that I could see the dawn
That follows the one of my demise
For I could then tell all of you
If ‘there’ beyond is truth or lies.
And if I did see dawn it’s true
That to a better place we go
But if I don’t see that new dawn
Then I could never let you know.
And so your journey you will make
Some with husband, some with wife
And you will find out for yourself
If there exists that better life.
©Joe Wilson – By dawn’s early light…2015
Speeding along not a care in the world
the young man and his beautiful girl
driving in an open-topped E-type Jag
they were happy
………………………….and life was a whirl.
They were racing along the motorway
fast approaching Gravelly Hill
when a tanker jack-knifed in front of them
……….I can hear their screaming still.
They had nowhere to go but under
the trailer, however, was too low
and I, in a car a short distance back
saw both of their heads suddenly
…………………………………………………go.
One head rolled onto the hard shoulder
and sat there staring right back at me
while the other bounced over the railing
and fell into Witton
……………………………….for all there to see.
It put me off my lunch I can tell you
for that’s where I was going at the time
and if it wasn’t for the fact that it’s totally true
it would be a case of the ridiculous
……………………………….from the sublime.
©Joe Wilson – Heads, you lose…2015
A little dot of light in the distance
Signalled that they were on their way home
She was waiting at her own insistence
As the trawler drew closer through the foam.
Her man had taken another man’s place
And he sailed with yesterday’s tide
But their baby was due in only three days
She wanted him back on dry land by her side.
It caused her to reflect on her father
He’d been lost in the’53 spring tide
That had raced down the east coast of England
Brushing trawlers and ferries to one side.
They called it ‘The Big Flood’, it was really that bad
It happened unexpectedly
Two and a half thousand, including her dad
Were drowned and swallowed by the sea.
January thirty-first into February one
The storm raged like no other before
Then it turned out to sea and was suddenly gone
Leaving death and devastation in it’s maw.
The trawler was pulled into the harbour
And her husband jumped the jetty and ran
He took her into his arms and she worried no more
He was home, he was safe, and her man.
©Joe Wilson – The trawlerman’s wife & the 1953 spring-tide disaster…2015
I see the lights of distant towns
yet hear the noise of happy sounds
while sitting, seeing in my cave
in total silence
……….…..like the grave.
My cave’s a room
within a house
where I sit quietly
….………..as a mouse.
I cannot think
as thought is gone
from brain which stopped
……..…….it can’t go on.
And so to dust
my body goes
reduced by maggots
……………and fed to the crows.
©Joe Wilson – Desolation…2015
Winter creeps across the land
where mighty oaks and birch trees stand
and insects hid beneath the ground
face certain death if they are found
by mice or rats…and foxes too
nature’s food chain survival glue.
But up above the canopy
buzzards hunt by two or three
they square the ground on high patrol
in search of rabbit or tasty vole
life’s bitter struggle is borne this way
the same tomorrow as yesterday.
And as the winter creep moves on
the weakest creatures now all gone
rats and rabbits…mice and voles
bed down for winter in food-stocked holes
yet o’er the land where we draw breath
there’s barely sign of this fight with death.
©Joe Wilson – The winter struggle…2015
Within his head there are thoughts, so many
most are irrelevant and thus ten a penny
though rare amongst his brain’s detritus
a thought whirls round just like St. Vitus
yet as he struggles this thought’s recall
he knows not if it be grand, or small.
And then it’s gone and is no more
remembers not he, nor is he sure
thus he returns to comfort’s while
wanders round his country pile
his life of wealth is all for naught
soundness of mind cannot be bought.
©Joe Wilson – Some thing cannot be bought…2015
He opened the binding of The Weeping Book
curiousity piqued, he needed to look
but how he wished he had never seen
the horrors therein that were so obscene.
The guilt of man along the passage of time
senseless slaughter without reason or rhyme
each page he turned ill had been done
by book possessed he ventured on.
The rape and pillage of those years before
children the victims of violent war
races were mixed, the one good thing
vicious hecklers of bigotry sing.
On and on through the pages now
the hurt caused pain behind his brow
saints and sinners all listed here
their sins for all to see quite clear.
He saw the vilest sins of history’s pain
enslavement of those for other’s gain
let loose man’s done some terrible things
hope’s voice is quelled by vicious stings.
The Weeping Book so perfect in name
from front to end it’s full of shame
and he a priest of noble birth
would find before day’s end, his worth.
No water passed his lips, nor food
his mind so troubled by soured mood
and then the page on which he gazed
revealed the future of a man gone crazed.
No change could he make to the book
transfixed at his poor fate he’d look
and as he pushed the dagger deep
as fate revealed he went to sleep.
The Weeping Book then slammed tight shut
till guilty man next came and put
his hand upon the tome’s dark cover
then his sad fate he’d soon discover.
©Joe Wilson – The Weeping Book…2014
And the days were spent in wonder
at all the horrors He’d seen
He sent unholy flooding and chaos
To wash the planet clean.
To see if change was ever made
He waited then two thousand years
But horror still was all around
And what He saw proved all His fears.
Can man not recognise his fate
can he not see when he is wrong
can man not see of His design
that words like peace and love mean strong.
The fiery pits that destroy our Earth
aren’t in the depths of Hell
they’ll be the fire and cordite
of that last exploding shell!!
©Joe Wilson – Self-made Armageddon… 2014
For I would walk my love, with you
down lanes and through these pastures green
and we would talk as good friends do
of joy and life, in mood serene.
For man could find no better mate
than lifelong’s lover by his side
with things as these to cogitate
and stroll along in time’s great tide.
And as we glide along in peace
we talk and laugh enjoying life
my love continually doth increase
for you the one who is my wife.
To have found you so long ago
and loved you then as I do now
an angel surely let me know
the route to your heart, and the how.
If other men had love as mine
to grow and last a lifetime through
had lives all filled with hearts divine
and days of joy and romance new.
Such joy they too would countenance
and lives that feel so much more fine
as they cavort through merry dance
in life so wondrous such as mine.
©Joe Wilson – An angel surely let me know… 2014
It rains
All of my sins
Are washed
–away!
No one will come
There is no witness
This life will cease
The rain continues.
I’ve been so careful
I’ve been discreet
The rains now run red
Out into the street.
The blade in the gutter
The wrists opened wide
The red rains flow freely
I’m empty inside.
It is over now.
©Joe Wilson – The red rains…2014
Jovis on a Journey... 