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To avoid being an old geezer
Frowning at the world
Glaring at “the youths”
For laughing, having fun
I realised I don’t need
sex, drugs and rock and roll
(ok, maybe just drugs)
(the others don’t sound too bad)
But I need to make space
For some joy in my life
In between all the spreadsheets
So I wrote this poem.
It’s easy for me to say, I’ve got work to do
and do it
It’s harder for me to say, I’ll go and enjoy myself
and do it
(so I wrote this poem)
If I make space for it
I’ll find my own path
Through the fallen leaves
And rushing rivers
So I spare you the experience
A few years down the line
Of meeting me
As an old grumpy geezer.
I often feel like three parallel lives
Is what my heart desires
They would bring an end to relentless sighs
And my present quagmires!
I could be an astronaut, politician and beekeeper
Have ten children, have none,
Have three wives, have none,
It’s not a bug, I promise, it’s a feature!
But since my physical limitations don’t allow me
To lead three parallel lives
(I would need at least six arms to drink tea!)
And imagine how many fingers I’d need in so many pies!
So, all in all, my conclusion is thus:
Leading three lives is tricky
But why all the worry, all the fuss?
I need ten lives, now that’s less picky!
A question I must figure out
Or else judgement comes swiftly
By the means of the axe
Inside my mind
A kind of relentless pressure
to keep moving, to keep understanding
Until a deadline: settling down: scary!!
I have to know it all before then
Have all the answers
Have all the questions
Have all the questions to the answers to the questions
Must not waste my time
Must not burn out!
But why? What’s the rush? Why all this life? Why not future lives? I can’t do it all.
But I can try 😎
How can people sit here
twiddling their thumbs
twiddling their life away
waiting for the next coffee break, the next lunch, the next weekend
are they being held here by the want of stability, money, fame, power?
(Maybe not fame and power,
working at a company selling nuts and bolts)
Maybe it’s a vision of themselves, a vision of comfort,
of seeming liberty—but a reality of thinly-veiled dependence
on package holidays and shiny new bells and whistles
waiting for life’s clock to tick silently by?
My heart is in a thousand pieces
Scattered around the globe
It aches as I reminisce
Of all the places called home
Day in and day out, the pain drips like blood
Small daggers of longing, homesickness and want
Stab relentlessly, morning by morning, day by day
As they make my heart wail and daunt
Living deep inside, like a burning poison
For which there is no hope of cure
All to do is try and craft a living
The result: only doubts are sure
Craft a living and a meaning
In all the foreign lands
Since all places are full of strangers
Where will you be in safe hands?
Try, try as you might
This seems like a lifetime’s Cross
Lean against it, if you can
Else all will feel like a loss.
Some things in life are hard to chart
As much as economics would like to disagree
My head was pierced by a dart
Filling it with anxiety
This went on and on until I was wholly lost
In constant distress and pain
My life was shell-shocked, all was paused
Would it ever be the same?
Now, years on
My heart is healing
My head was wrong:
It was scared of feeling.
Let winter be one of joy
And the rain bring you a smile
Fear not being coy
You have walked many a mile.
Walking along the wheat-lined path
The future smiles in the wind
The past orchestrates and plays its wrath
As the singing breeze begins to din
Question-marks sprout like giant beanstalks
Impaling the clouds, making them bleed
Tears of pasts and presents walk
Hand-in-hand in this great deed
Sunshine on the trees creaks to a standing halt
As all the paths in front of me split and veer
The fields open up an infinite vault
They have my horse backing up to the rear
Perhaps they mean no ill deed
Perhaps they just line the road
Perhaps my heart will be joyful
Accepting the way without greed.
Picking up the seeds I sowed
And the leave questions unanswered
As they waft away in the summer wind.
Wisps of cloud
like tongues of fire
rushing silently overhead
O the beauty
of the world outside
our own heads
Seeds of grass
like grains of sand
grow silently under our feet
O the beauty
of the world
when we care to look down
Treebuds
like wrapped bubbles
waiting to burst
O the magic
of spring
when we open our eyes.
Rip your hair out;
punch the wall
bang your head
till your ears fall
You’re writing an essay
it’s sunny outside
your teacher gave you a weekend deadline
it’s time you cried.
Being in love
Loving someone
Feeling the tug of your heartstrings
Is beautiful:
Your heart is out there, embracing the world
And somebody is out there, embracing back
that is an incomparable feeling
You are worthy, they say
You are deserving,
You are beautiful: you are too.