In A Few Words Read online

  IN A FEW WORDS

  A Collection of Poems

  By Jan Vivian

  Smashwords Edition

  Copyright 2009 - Jan Vivian©

  Contents

  THE WAIT

  UNE BELLE FILLE SANS MONEY

  FINAL WHISTLE

  STREET LIFE

  I’M A MISER

  Post Card to Yolanda

  THE WAIT

  A most unworthy

  But observant man

  Once said of her, that,

  “Girl, you are a special one,

  A sun rich bloom,

  A blaze of petal,

  And out there,

  Somewhere,

  There’s a better one,

  A man who,

  For you alone could settle,

  A man who’d love to meet

  A blondly tresse’d one,

  A man

  Who had the soul to greet

  A true word’s soft caress,

  Uttered by a winsome lass

  And who,

  For all he knew,

  Was loads of fun,

  He’d be a guy who loved

  A joyful freckled one,

  A lass

  Possessed of tender skin,

  And yes!

  A lass,

  Who’d make the best of him.”

  Oh God!

  Where is this wonderful creation?

  If only he would come her way!

  Not now,

  Or even unexpected soon,

  Unless,

  A happy and portentous day

  Had started with a mirrored face,

  That stared back brightly,

  And was heard to say,

  “Yesterday was emptiness,

  Today’s the end of loneliness,

  We each possess a loveliness

  From now, tomorrow and beyond

  I’ll find a man whose touch is fond

  The right man who to me is bound

  By love’s unseen but caring warps

  That brings to me alone, to us,

  Our loves’ all-healing happiness”.

  UNE BELLE FILLE SANS MONEY

  (With Apologies to John Keats)

  She was pretty,

  Yesirree!

  And thankfully,

  Not stick thin,

  So pleasingly,

  Tanned of skin.

  When tested conversationally,

  She said softly,

  I’m not brainy,

  I'm just homely.

  So, we gave it a try,

  Nothing frantic or intense,

  But from the first

  It made no sense.

  I’d lost it all,

  Or so it seemed,

  Cos

  To horse-play I was in thrall,

  To an octane high life,

  To thinking I have it all,

  Misplaced pride before the fall,

  From grace.

  I can get by,

  With the little I have,

  But marrying for money?

  Now that seemed the way to live.

  We got along,

  She said it was l’amour,

  But,

  No, just fleshy fervour,

  Entrapment by the silken skin,

  Enslaved to clammy warmth,

  Within her.

  But the girl, she had no dosh.

  Ah well!

  Now, where do I begin?

  FINAL WHISTLE

  The officer’s whistle went

  Over the top they’re sent

  To heaven or hell, they’re bent.

  A breach of the line?

  Scarcely a dent.

  Livid men, many lives

  Family and civilisation,

  Spent.

  Scenes so Infernal,

  Sacrifices bravely Carnal,

  Brigade’s men Fraternal

  Memories, all Eternal.

  Such glorious tales!

  The volumes are thick

  The walls covered, wide

  But nothing, no nothing

  Could stem the tide

  That ragingly engulfed

  Instantly, rudely snuffed

  Out the fledgling’s hopes

  Who, with boundless pomp

  Imbued

  Were, with anxious prayers

  Pursued

  In a cause thought just.

  Fight on! Fight On!

  To dust,

  We must!

  ‘Til the end,

  Bitter end.

  And so, after one last sally

  In a faceless, bloody tally

  The War Office

  Brown envelopes sent.

  Our hopes,

  On the door mat

  They end.

  “For Freedom and Honour”

  The medallions said.

  And our loved one?

  Oh! Our laughing one?

  He’s…Dead?…Dead!

  Jan Vivian©

  STREET LIFE

  (or, In Another World)

  In the grey dawn of everyday a singular man makes his way.

  Alley dogs bark.

  ‘Not again’, comfortably cocooned residents remark

  As the rubbish bins rattle, each day’s keep is a battle, of senses and quick wits,

  For to him the hostel’s beyond bounds for he and his hound like the sounds

  Of the street, where new companions they meet and gruff greetings they utter

  As each to their own, in bags, worthless clutter they carry, they seldom tarry,

  Too long, to consider their lives’ stock, even if many have been in the dock…

  And, for him, a reputation’s sunk low so another life is configured, somehow,

  On the street, where he may seem free as the air but he’s burdened by care

  For disparate loved ones, ambivalent have somes, purposefully unaware

  Of their man’s dishevelled habit, best suited to rural byways and ancient drove ways

  That, at other times he wondrously roams and under sylvan arches he makes up a home.

  But now, with many un-named others, a motley band of sisters and brothers,

  He gathers and he sleeps but they, unlike him, society don’t eschew and a wilder life pursue

  Even if graceless tabloids finally relented, false tales grudgingly recanted until finally,

  They even said ‘sorry’...

  But, Brian…the stories about you, they weren’t so easy to undo,

  And so, a great life was lost at great human cost, but did they care? No…

  A blip in circulation covered the waste of a hard-earned reputation. A normal life came to a stop

  Before, from your own hearth you were hounded by persistent tales, gossip, all of it unfounded

  As, behind hands, they still spoke of unseemly behaviour…not the wont of a respected teacher,

  The tone of the words reminded you of some braying errant preacher…

  Enough! Much has been written and said, a family’s gone; now a life is undone.

  Deep down, his spirit flares on; his mind lives and he strives to forgive

  Another’s unworthy slight, the blank indifference shown to his prevailing plight

  As, with his faithful bitch, Fleck, the city’s streets he now treks

  She’s companionable and dutiful, calmer now less emotional…

  She’s like him, cast off, by society pushed out and acceptance by peers still in doubt,

  But together, and for him Shakespeare’s book of plays, they fill many a wet lonely day as

  A street’s place they find, many greet and money's capped, not beggared for they still see the light

  Of each God given day and tenaciously cling to man a
nd beasts’ well-trodden ways

  Of love, mutual trust and forgiveness, to which their chosen God daily bears witness.

  Jan Vivian©

  I’M A MISER

  I’m a miser…

  I’ve turned off the radio,

  I no longer care what’s in print,

  They feed a mood of despondency,

  Should I live or simply exist?

  The sun still comes up

  And,

  I can still take a breath.

  At home,

  I care for those around me,

  While out there

  Politicians pledge all my money,

  Or,

  They devalue what I have left.

  And yet,

  Deep down inside me,

  I am not bereft.

  For, what you can’t see

  I count as my wealth.

  Jan Vivian©

  ‘Post Card to Yolanda’

  Angel

  Finally, I find myself in a place called Reconciled. Calm can be found here, usually, after a turbulent journey through Suddenly, Trauma, Disbelief and a wasteland known as Aftermath. On my travels I rested, in Family and a haven known as Deep Affection. It will be easier in time to revisit from afar Memory, and experience anew a comforting location that draws me back, compulsively. I can relive the past by simply looking at a picture - of us. A silver thread binds me to you waiting at a portal, until I reach Terminus – and Reunion.

  Your brother, Jan

  Jan Vivian©

 

 

  Jan Vivian, In A Few Words

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