We just keep going

On 7 Jun 2014 By jovisgoesIn Poetry, wisdom, WritingLeave a comment

Wasted moments ere we tarry
Time not always on our side
Making plans but not completing
They get swallowed in the tide.

Of life that seems to sweep before us
Courage fails to stir our soul
Ideas falling by the wayside
Stay the hand from touching goal.

And chance may come to make our mark
We reach to grasp the offered boon
By working hard for gifts so rare
Success may come, but not too soon.

And so we plough the furrow long
All working at our chosen craft
The joy of being published shines
Especially if you’ve next work’s draft.

©Joe Wilson – 2014

The Strive

On 7 Jun 20147 Jun 2014 By jovisgoesIn Poetry, wisdom, WritingLeave a comment

Weaving our way out of obscurity
side-stepping the positively bland
we seek to bypass mediocrity
and strive for supreme quality
in the hope of making our stand.

Sitting, quills, pens, or fingers poised
we wait, we wait, as thoughts emerge
then off we gallop, focussed, keen
often lost within our thoughts
patiently creative, the ideas converge.

Looking perhaps to distant past
chance could we upon a worded track
down which the writers have all moved forth
noting down with deft learnt skills
they raise their voice and don’t look back.

That we can match such contribution
the aim of all who follow along
the thoughts that all need writing down
ere minds play tricks and they get forgotten
Transcribed then and to us they belong.

©Joe Wilson – The strive 2014

Always thinking

On 4 Jun 2014 By jovisgoesIn Poetry, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Swirling visions of kaleidoscopic shapes
fill the head with conflicting thoughts
The mind in free-fall as it makes its way
Through the complex outing of a typical day.

Kandinsky perhaps summed the mind up the best
In the broadest proud shapes that show up the tell
Of the brains complexities in the thoughts they go through
As we all wend our way in the journeying we do.

It’s a hell of a ride so welcome aboard
The mind goes to places and takes us along
Our imagination rich with creativities mood
As it takes information and turns it to food.

©Joe Wilson – Always thinking 2014

A Whale shouldn’t die like that

On 1 Jun 20141 Jun 2014 By jovisgoesIn Anger, Poetry, Point of ViewLeave a comment

The giant fin whale swam along with the tide
A nineteen-foot calf was swimming by her side
They were swimming away from her mate’s now dead shell
Trapped in a lagoon and then all shot to hell.

She’ll raise her young calf on her own from now on
Not mating again as they only take one
Her mate had followed a herring shoal in with the tide
And for a short while there were those who had tried
To help him turn and head back to sea
But the cruelty of nature would not let it be
At eighty feet long and a shallow cliff lea
It could not turn around to escape and be free.

And then a vile streak in the locals took hold
A most wicked shooting match began to unfold
The most handsome of whales was trapped and revealed
As shooters took aim and young children squealed.

They fired and they fired and they fired and they fired
Stopping only to reload and then when they got tired
They even drove speedboats across his shot back
Leaving deep deep prop cuts as a further attack.

And when they were done and the whale was no more
His body burst open and in death he’d now score
For the stench of his now rancid corpse was so rotten
This beautiful creature wasn’t easily forgotten.

There was a man who tried hard to get him free
But one man alone is as a wood with one tree
And by the time he had got national press all aware
The whale was now dead, so bored, they’d not now care.

©Joe Wilson – A Whale shouldn’t die like that 2014

Many years ago I was enthralled by the work of Farley Mowat the renowned Canadian environmentalist who died last month. From reading his book, based on real events ‘A Whale for the Killing’ published in 1972, I took to studying whales as a hobby and I quickly realised just what a perfect creature the Fin Whale is. It is the only whale that is match coloured along both sides giving it the same symmetrical beauty as a dolphin and is the second largest creature to live, the Blue Whale being the only creature bigger. It is so amazing it can lift its entire body out of the water. Why on earth would you fire thousands of rounds of ammunition into a creature so beautiful? Why?

This is a small tribute to the memory of Farley Mowat (May 12, 1921 – May 6, 2014) and to people like him who try so hard, such as the Sea Shepherds who try to stop the massacre of bottle-nose dolphins each year in Taiji, Japan ostensibly for food, even though most Japanese people shun the whale-meat.

Locked-in here

On 30 May 201430 May 2014 By jovisgoesIn Illness, PoetryLeave a comment

he could see the nurses moving round
as they fussed about his bed
he could hear each word they spoke of him
as if he was already dead
and yet they knew he was alive
or why would he still be there
he’d already be burnt to ash and dust
and been stuck on a mantle somewhere.

it was odd the way that it started
he was walking home from work one day
his legs just started to feel very strange
then he collapsed as they both fell away.

he was rushed to the emergency hospital
where his condition had got better each day
but suddenly he went into a spasm
that ended with him lying here today.

locked-in syndrome he heard one doctor
say to a colleague talking over his bed
and while they were wondering about him
he silently screamed in his head.

all the things they were saying were scaring
and he couldn’t tell them what he knew
he felt lost and alone and so frightened
but about it there was nothing he could do.

he’s been lying like that for six months now
they’ve assisted his breathing as well
but they don’t chat as if he’s not there though
and to him that now feels worse than hell.

he stopped breathing

CRASH

they started his breathing this morning
but they’re worried that he’s getting frail
and inside his head he’s still screaming
and weeping though no-one can tell.

©Joe Wilson – Locked-in here 2014

A love of Beethoven (a sonnet)

On 30 May 2014 By jovisgoesIn Music, PoetryLeave a comment

I’m resting and listening to Beethoven
His Eighth Symphony to be precise
He called it his ‘Little Symphony’
But that doesn’t do it justice to me
It soars in such magical splendour
T’would be an insult to call it nice.
The majesty of the individual notes
Joined from such exactness of intent
Each note climbs up to heaven
Exactly as it was meant
I cannot match such beauty
And neither will I try
For when I listen to Beethoven
My eyes are rarely dry.

©Joe Wilson – A love of Beethoven (a sonnet)2014

Drunk in beauty

On 29 May 2014 By jovisgoesIn Poetry, Point of View, wisdomLeave a comment

I‘m drunk
I’m drunk
I’m drunk on the possibilities of life and those that choose to live it
I’m drunk with the goodness of some and how they shine out like a beacon
I’m drunk on the wonders of good books and the pleasures they bring to the reader
I’m drunk with the beauty of music and the excitement and peace it can evoke
I’m drunk by the way a thought can just pop into my head and allow me expression
I’m drunk by the beauty of nature and how it can beguile me in its diversity
But I’m captivated by the person who would take the trouble
To see another struggle and ask if they might help in some way.
That is far more honest than any of our politicians or most celebrities
It is one person at the basic unspoilt level of humanity
that we sadly rarely encounter, and much less embrace in our busy lives.

Consequences

On 27 May 2014 By jovisgoesIn Anger, Betrayal, PoetryLeave a comment

As he staggered through the door drunk
so his wife knew she was in for a beating
she could forgive him the anger he felt
she was the one who had betrayed him
she was the one who had been unfaithful
what she could not forgive were the beatings
he had no right to do that to her, he had no right
she had never imagined him to be a violent man
but since he felt the betrayal he had drunk
he had drunk so much he could often barely stand
but still he had no right to beat her, he had no right.

One night he went completely crazy and broke both of her legs
he broke one of her arms too but with the other one
she stabbed him to death with his favourite knife
she stabbed him so hard they couldn’t get the knife
out of his stomach till they did the autopsy
now everyone’s life is ruined, his, hers
the children’s, and his parents
and her parents, and their friends
and their neighbours, their work colleagues
and everybody they knew in some small way
has been affected and altered in some way.

She was wrong, he was wrong, everyone suffers
none of us are perfect and there are always

consequences!

My wife and I have had a lovely marriage that is still beautiful after forty-two years.
I just wish, rather naïvely perhaps, that others could be as fortunate.
Violence is no answer. ❤