Tag: fear

On reflection…

On By jovisgoesIn Anger, Fate, Fear, guilt, Life, Poetry, political, Poverty, Regret, The World, Time, War, Women's RightsLeave a comment

I rise from my nice warm bed
and having made a morning drink
for my beloved wife, and one for me,
I run a bath.
As I luxuriate
in that warm bubbled water
I reflect on how lucky I am.

Later, washed and dressed for the day
I sit at the table and enjoy
a fine meal from God’s harvest
and again I reflect, and I feel…
guilt!

Guilt for the small children
who have no homes in which to feel safe
guilt that so many of them
will not eat again today.

I feel guilt
for all of the poor women around the globe
who will this very day give birth
to babies who they will surely love
but in whose having they had no choice…
no one ever hears their terrified voice.
Poor women beaten by poverty
who still struggle to feed those children
and yet too those who violate them so.

I feel guilt for all the men who cannot be made
to realise that the world is not theirs to design,
and at the way that some men feel
their own importance trumps all other considerations,
and guilt at all of the war ravaged lands.

And when I look down at the bounteous fare before me
I feel only one thing – shame.

 

©Joe Wilson – On reflection… 2014

Trick…definitely not a treat…

On By jovisgoesIn Fear, Halloween, Poetry, TerrorLeave a comment

devilish

 

It was just a shadow

but the way it moved

scared the bejeebers out of me.

 

I was just about to put the key in the door

when the big black shadow

passed  through me and cast itself

right down the hallway

 

…and then it was gone.

 

It was raining and very windy

and after a short sharp shake of the head

I dismissed it and entered

and switched on the lights

– all of the lights.

 

Hang on…

How had a shadow been cast in the pitch black darkness!!

 

I was already miserable enough

I’d had a really difficult day at work

Dealing politely with someone you’d call a jerk!

 

 

Suddenly – there was a sharp rap at the door

which upon opening revealed

children, one, two, three, four

“Trick or treat, Mister”, the young leader said

at which I grinned heartily

and recalling the juvenescence of earlier days

I was rushed back to reality and to him I said

“Trick”

fully expecting and prepared for a hideous mask or something.

 

In less time than it takes to say ‘Abracadabra’

the whole scene before me

turned red

I couldn’t make out at first what I was seeing

but then I realised that everything, everything was red.

Houses, trees, cars, even all the people

were all red.

Fiery red!!

 

I was in Hell – and I was terrified.

There was a long deep laugh

coming from – I didn’t know where.

it just surrounded everything

including me – what was going on?

 

And then I remembered.

“No!! Treat!!,

I shouted at the top of my voice

and just as suddenly as it had all appeared

it vanished.

“That’ll be a dollar Mister.” the youngest lad said.

 

I gave him five dollars

and closed the door

and locked the door

and very firmly slid the bolts home

and put the chain into its slot too.

I went into the study and poured myself

a very large whiskey,

and sat down, still shaking,

in front of the fire.

 

I had never been so scared in my life.

 

 

©Joe Wilson – Trick…definitely not a treat…2014

 

I remember…

On By jovisgoesIn Family, Fear, Illness, Life, Love, Personal, Poetry, Point of View2 Comments

I remember
back to a time
when the black dog
hung around my neck
like a heavy yoke, I
could never be rid of
the terror that it
would not someday return
to seek me out and strike
me down again, and the knowing
how close I had come to succumbing.

I remember edging closer to the crowded
platform’s edge, too filled with fear to realise
the probable selfishness of what I was about to
do, only vaguely aware of where I actually was, but
just able to register that touch on my right arm
and the voice that quietly whispered, “I don’t really think
you want to do that.” I remember turning to see who’d said it
and seeing that there was just a crowd of people. Of the owner
of the voice there was no sign, but it had been enough.
It had been enough to make me realise where I was,
for the moment passed and I made my way back.

Back to the arms of the woman who had always loved me,
and who had carefully, lovingly, nursed me back to health
over such a long time. I wept. I put my head on her gentle
shoulder and I wept as I had never wept before. I wept for all
I still felt, and I wept for all the selfish anguish I would have
caused this woman had I let myself fall,

for that surely had been my intention.

©Joe Wilson – I remember…2014

This experience is my own. It followed a period of severe depression after a
subarachnoid haemorrhage in 1986. Thankfully the depression eventually lifted and
has long gone.

The sirens call…

On By jovisgoesIn Dreams, Ethereal, Poetry, Story BookLeave a comment
The siren beckons...
The siren beckons…

 

I hear the wailing cries that call
They’re calling out to me
They call to draw the sailors down
To the shore at the bottom of the sea.

No one can ever resist their call
And so I fear I must go
If ever I find my way back home
Would I even really know.

The wailing calls grow louder
My captain lashed me to the mast
But the calls are strong and they took him
And I don’t know if I can last.

It matters not if you stop listening
For they find their way into your head
You just have to get away and onto dry land
Or they’ll pull you down to the sea bed.

At last I see dry land is yonder
It is almost within my reach
but the ropes that tie have undone now
And my feet can’t quite touch the beach.

I hear the wailing cries that call
They have now come to get only me
My mind is so full of their wailing
That I’m lost and can never be free.

©Joe Wilson – The sirens call…2014

Life, or is it…updated

On By jovisgoesIn Poetry, Poverty1 Comment

Did you call last night, I never heard a sound
just the distant hum of a soul nearby
another lonely person passing by.

Life on the street as a lonely old tramp
under the bridge and out of sight
I live in a loneliness of my own plight

Things you left, things I saw
bits of messages left for me
why won’t you go and let me be.

Is it the booze or is it the drugs
why can’t I make out the words
it makes no sense, it’s completely absurd.

Did you leave anything when you called last night
I’ve thought once or twice about ending my life
But I’d get more drugs if I sold the knife.

How the hell did it get to this point
I’m always too far gone to care
not even sure sometimes that I’m even there.

©Joe Wilson – Life, or is it…2014

 

She waits in hope…

On By jovisgoesIn Belief, Faith, Life, old age, Poetry, RegretLeave a comment

Though willing hands are always there
To feed her, dress her, and brush her hair
Disease has crept through her with stealth
Some things just can’t be stopped with wealth.

The frailty was quite slow at first
She couldn’t fasten her shoes at worst
But then it weakened her gentle heart
And eventually it tore her life apart.

And though she prayed with all her might
She started soon to lose her sight
She fell down often and broke her hip
And life began to fade and slip.

In time she couldn’t leave her bed
And dreamed her dreams of Christ instead
For she well knew he’d suffered worse
Than her small Earthly painful curse.

Now in her mind in fear she weeps
Her life but spent in fitful sleeps
She waits in hope for His Holy hand
To lead her to the Promised Land.

©Joe Wilson – She waits in hope…2014

His regret

On By jovisgoesIn Belief, Betrayal, Loss, Poetry, Regret, Terror, Time, WarLeave a comment

And so it was his past caught up
a dread for many years
it was time to face reality
and belay his darkest fears.

A time to face a painful truth
he’d never known this child
he’d left when he was just hours old
and the loss had made him wild.

A soldier he’d been sent abroad
to fight for others’ errors
and in the deepness of his mind
he remembered years of terrors.

They’d captured him and half his men
his captain they had killed
and made the rest including him
dig the grave and get it filled.

When he came home he was a wreck
who drank himself to sleep
and though he had had several jobs
they were impossible to keep.

He later found his faith again
and now he has a certain peace
but the fear of meeting his son at last
was filling him with unease.

He wonders if he’ll understand
and how it will work out
but the boy had come and sought him
now he waited full of doubt……..

©Joe Wilson – His regret 2014

Thoughts of Old Age

On By jovisgoesIn Loss, Love, old age, Poetry, Point of View, PovertyLeave a comment

800px-Flickr_-_HuTect_ShOts_-_Old_Age_Steps_-_Masjid-_Madrassa_of_Sultan_Hassan_-_Cairo_-_Egypt_-_16_04_2010
Photo by: Ahmed Al.Badawy, Cairo, Egypt

He was a very poor and sad old man whose pride belied his fear
That one day he’d be a burden to his folks who held dear.
He’d worked hard every single day, now he didn’t cope so well
He knew that his ears were a problem too, he was going deaf he could tell.

He guessed it was just a sign of his age, he’d soon be eighty-one
He’d been fitted with a hearing-aid, but he forgot to switch it on.
And though he had his radio on to listen to all the news
He struggled to tell what was being said, he rarely heard their views.

And so from time to time he sat and enjoyed his garden flowers
He didn’t need to hear them grow, he’d watch them sway for hours.
He’d take his paper and his specs and go down to his shed
And often not read anything as he’d fall asleep instead.

There are times when he forgets though and he sleeps in there all day
When his son or daughter find him, it’s getting more that way.
And he sometimes can’t remember what he’s supposed to do
It’s when his mind goes like this that his thoughts feel stuck in glue.

His son told him the other day he was looking for a place
Where others could look after him, but he’d still have his own space.
He’ll never want to leave this house, his memories are all here
His dear wife still lives in its heart, he won’t go, is that clear!!

But now the odds are against him as he struggles every day
He sometimes doesn’t dress quite right and he cannot properly shave.
And he’ll sometimes sit and weep the tears of a man who feels marooned
He’ll sit and wonder when he’ll die for it cannot come too soon.

©Joe Wilson – Thoughts of Old Age 2014

That Nagging Fear

On By jovisgoesIn Family, Love, old age, Poetry, RegretLeave a comment

Dead

When I was a boy I really feared nothing
As a teenager I couldn’t have feared less
But as a man when I became a loving father
My life took on all kinds of fearful stress.

You think but worry where your little kids are
You know that they’re at school, at least they were
The horrid thoughts that things might happen to them
Causes panic of the sort we all incur.

But they grow up and they manage to stay in one piece
Then they move away and make lives of their own
Then you get a call to say that one is injured
To the other side of the world you then have flown.

Later still you find your other child is ailing
And you do your best to stay so very calm
While your heart is breaking as you reassure them
This brave person that you once held in your palm.

So yes I fear so many things I never used to
Plus concerns about my body as it grows old
And of course they say we might now live to eighty
But I never did believe all I was told.

But these fears are just the things that keep us careful
It wouldn’t do to let them get to rule our lives
For it’s fear of fear that takes you to the limit
It’s the very thing on which the panic thrives.

©Joe Wilson – That Nagging Fear 2014

Sixes and Sevens

On By jovisgoesIn Family, Illness, old age, Poetry, Point of ViewLeave a comment

He dribbles a little now, he knows, but neither can he help it
Since the stroke that little bit of control is no more
It is the source of so much embarrassment to him
That he has barely set foot outside his front door.

It can’t go on though, it’s come to a head now
His nephew’s getting married and he’s been invited
He doesn’t know what to do, he’s at sixes and sevens
He knows he has to be there, he should be delighted.

The therapist had told him to exercise, “it’ll help a lot”, she said
“Also, you should look in the mirror”, a thing he cannot do
He couldn’t feel half of his face, the stroke had left him that way
“The exercises are there to help, they’ll help to get you through.”

He’d been lucky he knew, he had got his voice back, even though
He now sounded so different, he hardly recognised himself when he spoke
And he also walked unevenly as the stroke affected his hips
So much so that he thought he probably looked like a joke.

But there was one thing that made him feel really better
Two years earlier he couldn’t have even stood
So dribble as he did, embarrassed as he got when he was out
He knew he was making progress and that was all to the good.

And then he felt selfish for feeling sorry for himself
His nephew would want happiness, he deserved it as well
So he’d put on his best smile, he’d do what he could
He’d hide all his fears and hope no one could tell.

©JRW2014