Heavy Weather
I try really hard, really hard
Not to moralise weather.
It is what it is, what it was,
What it will be forever.
The sun isn’t good, isn’t bad,
It is nothing aware –
And the rain is the rain, just the rain,
And the rain doesn’t care.
The sun will soon shine soon enough,
To relieve soggy sorrow –
So don’t think me bad if I think that
It might rain tomorrow.
The Ant-Days of Summer
I think it must have been a day
When ants were flying
In July.
A long and hot and wingèd day
When ants were flying
By and by.
And that was when we chanced to meet,
With grounded ants about our feet.
Those virgin queens and horny males,
On scorching days
In late July.
The queens fly fast to test the males
On scorching days
When ants must fly.
The lads were swarming when we met –
But then, one shot is all they get.
The lucky males take turns to mate
With picky queens
In late July.
Upon the wing, the ants shall mate –
As jacks and queens
Shall fill the sky.
And I met you beneath their flights,
With royal weddings in our sights.
The girls bite off their wings to reign
As wingless queens
In late July
These girls will never fly again –
But hey, the queens
At least don’t die !
And you and I were changing lives,
As queens got down to digging hives.
Precipitation
The rain, it rains like rainy rain,
The time, it ticks so slow.
It soaks the garden, soaks the lane,
It soaks the overflow
Won’t it ever shine again ?
Won’t it ever go ?
We curse these clouds we undergo,
We curse this ever-rain –
But still the gullies rush and flow
And wash the boggy lane.
Oh, must the day creep by so slow,
And with so little gain ?
We check the window once again,
We watch the drops that flow.
Perhaps the clouds are bored of rain,
Have somewhere else to go ?
Check the garden, check the lane –
Not too quick. Be slow.
It hasn’t yet begun to slow,
It’s coming hard again.
It should’ve stopped an age ago,
Instead it has free rein.
So down to earth the clouds all flow
Upon the roof and lane.
We long to be upon the lane
Where blooms the indigo,
We long the garden to regain
Between the may and sloe.
Instead, the clouds forever reign,
Like icebergs in a floe.
So round and round our thought must flow –
The clouds. The time. The lane.
And like the day, they crawl so slow,
As round they crawl again.
They’re stuck with us, nowhere to go –
And still comes down the rain.
This is a sestina, whereby the six endwords are repeated each verse in a different order. Tradition also requires a seventh mini-verse, or envoy, to round things off, but I’ve never seen the point.
Summer Block
Ah, the lazy days of Summer:
Long and languid afternoons,
When cares are short and drinks are tall,
And lives are endless honeymoons.
So who would sweat on metric feet,
To try to pen a tricky rhyme ?
Just close the jotters, pencils down,
And let it go. It’s not the time.
On such a scorching hummer
When our cares are short and drinks are tall,
And lives are endless honeymoons,
Then no-one thirsts for verse at all.
So let it go, it’s not the time –
Just close the jotters, pencils down.
Our brains would only overheat
If assonance should raise a frown.
On long and languid afternoons,
Just who would sweat on metric feet
When no-one thirsts for verse at all ?
Our brains would only overheat.
Don’t try to pen a tricky rhyme
On such a scorching hummer.
No assonance should raise a frown
On the lazy days of Summer.
Charge
A lightning flash –
one-thousand-and-one
Its photons dash
one-thousand-and-two
Into my eyes
one-thousand-and-three
Through rain-soaked skies.
one-thousand-and-four
I wonder how far
one-thousand-and-five
Those flashes are ?
one-thousand-and-six
Been brewing all week,
one-thousand-and-seven
This cleansing streak.
one-thousand-and-eight
Hang on, have I missed it ?
one-thousand-and-nine
Or is it too distant ?
one-thousand-and-ten
I feel a bit cheated,
one-thousand-eleven
The clap uncompleted –
one-thousand-and-twelve
You can’t give us flashes
one-thousand-and-thirteen
Without giving crashes…
one-thousand-and-f……finally !
