A Walk in the Wood

The scene around is a wooded hillside, dappled in late sunshine, with tall and twisted trees, some with trunks L shaped along the ground and then towards the sky, their canopies sparse. Others rise upright to lofty heights. Their barks are gnarled and grey. As you walk on mould, among the lower bushes with their whip-like stems, pushing them out of the way, you see in patches the flowers of the forest, wood anemones here and celandine over there. Later the wood will burst with green in leaves and shoots, and the ethereal bluebells will shimmer in spreads, nodding at the last remaining daffodils.

There is a hush in the wood. It is the quiet of consciousness, waiting. Waiting for what? Perhaps for you to have passed by, or perhaps for your recognition.

There are many silent watchers. The wood, stationary, reaches out to you. A solitary bird sings high up, and in the clearing a rabbit hops to its burrow, out of your path. Water trickles through the ancient dead leaves, and you know the woodland night creatures will drink here later. Stop, listen, refresh yourself.

I am a semi-colon

More important than a coma

Less militant than a full stop.

I don’t butt my nose in everywhere,

Demanding a halt to the proceedings.

I don’t tell you whom something belongs to

Or when something’s missing.

I’m never surprised or shocked.

I don’t go around questioning everything.

I never speak to anybody or hear them think.

And I certainly never quote them.

I am a semi-colon

I don’t shilly-shally around

If I see two sentences that were made for each other

But they haven’t got a conjunction,

In I jump ‘ Ter-Ra’

And cement relations.

God who created me

God who created me

And breathed His life

So that I may do as I please

I chose, trouble and strife.

Better men than I have died before my age.

There is a purpose to my existence;

Slowly, I’m discovering the plan

For my being, my substance.

All the mental anguish, has now gone.

The pain and suffering, no more.

With my Creator, I am almost as one

I was led through the open door.

I hope that I have love for all;

I saw the light, though not quite like Saul.

Now at peace,

Rather than in pieces.

Thanks, God.

Robert Brandon

With acknowledgement to

Henry Charles Beeching (1859-1919)

For providing the first line

.

Raging sun

It is said that in the tropics

The hot perennial sun

Can create wild demons

In young boys

The causes could be

The shimmering heat

The pumping glands

Sweat cascading

The vision blurred

The drenching rain

The golden sunsets

The blistering rays

That turned to scarlet nights

Were enough diversions

To offset the mundane

Like climbing a breadfruit tree

To provide for supper

This was not my idea of fun

And I would always try

Not to be around when

The women were preparing

To cook the evening meal.

For every loitering

Good-for-nothing boy

Would be sent up a tree

To pick or kick something

Out of it, and climbing

A swaying undulating

Coconut tree in a high wind

Just seemed to add to

The women lust for high drama

Against this backdrop

Of tropical existence

The sweltering pace meandered

Gently, punctuated only by

The occasional visit

From some passing hurricane

As happened in the nineteen sixties When Hurricane Janet

Visited our Island

In those days they were

Only given women names

This I used to wonder about.

‘Lets go see the high tides’

Said my brother as Janet

Came roaring in

Fearlessly we edged closer

To the sixty-foot waves

As they came crashing to shore

We were soon up to our waist

In surging storm tide

As we tried to get a closer look

But soon strong hands

Were grabbing us and

Dragging us to safety

‘You two ignorant boys

Will be the death of me yet’

Said our father angrily

Shortly after this excitement

Life soon returned to normality

And the queen deign

To pay the Island a visit

A beach was named after

Her sister who didn’t

Even swim in it

The yearning to leave the Island Just grew stronger with every

Lash I received from my

Educationalists, who were

Priests and Nuns.

When word reached me

That the gleaming white

Italian Ocean Liner

Moored off-shore

Wanted a cabin boy

I did not hesitate to pack

My bags and head for the Harbour, but I passed

My brother on the way

And I told   him not to say

A word until I was safely

Away, alas his promises

Were false, for as I sat

On the jetty awaiting my lift

A pair of strong hands

Lifted me up and my father said

‘Going somewhere son?’   

Brief Encounter

Driving through life, many twist and turns,
lost, going round in circles, or so it seems.
Nobody else around, I've come across no other cars.
Lonely - country roads, hold no beautiful scenery-
or so it seems.
Suddenly, there you are! Perhaps you were always there,
yet I did not see you.
Driving through life - now your car is alongside mine.
Wind down the window. I'm talking, I'm beckoning you.
Now we're stationary, cars side by side, we've pulled into lay-by-
or so it seems.
Windows down, mouths open, now we talk.
I see you smile, notice you're beautiful.
Suddenly my loneliness has past, I reach out for you,
"Join me, join me in my car", I hear myself say,
perhaps together we will find the right way.
You just smile. Wait- now I see another passenger,
there's a man in your car.
I can't think why I didn't see him before.
He reaches for you, you reach for him,
now I can hear your engine start again,
or so it seems.
"No, wait, wait", I cry out.
I hear myself shout, "Please don't leave me,
which way, which way is the way out?"
Alas with one smile your car moves away,
the man's in the front seat driving now.
I think he knows the way,
or so it seems.

.

  The Fall

The leaf turned from green to brown and was discarded by The Tree.

“I thought I was special, I thought the Tree was going to keep me. It had already let all but a handful of us go, I thought I would be one of the lucky ones who stayed through the winter and got to feel the warm sun of the spring before they finally perished.

They are the blessed ones, given an extra three or four months of life, chosen by The Tree to keep it company through the lonely coldness of winter, whispering to it whenever the harsh wind blows.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have told it the story about the Lumberjack".

.

Desire in solitude

I keep my desire in solitude,

For he has no manners,

Always wanting, always demanding,

Never contented, never still.

Solitude is where I place my desire,

Incommunicado, from who? From me!

For his whispers are like shouts,

Always screaming, "let me out!"

I am the Solitude of my desire,

For I alone control his rage,

I alone feel his pulse,

And I alone bear the burden of his results.

I hide my desire in solitude,

For he has secrets,

Dreams beyond solitude,

Desires beyond dreams,

I keep my desire in solitude,

So I can live within my means.

© CHRONICLES OF AN ELECTRIC STORM PRODUCTION

MARCH 2004 by Femmi Etti

Gentle
               Kind
                            Hands

Gentle kind hands
Oh so sweet,
When I’m feeling hungry,
Give me food to eat,
But when I feel so happy,
Please share with me my joy.
For often I have joyful times,
Being a happy little boy
Although easily I get scared,
So please calm and sooth my fears
As I have been, so really uptight!
For very many years.
At night times, when I feel so tired,
Please just “LET ME SLEEP’
When the stars come out to peep,
Above the church spire, oh so steep.
At times, when I get so angry,
Please keep me so calm,
Just by making that “warm Embrace”
Within your loving tender arms,
When I thirst, give me drink to quench,
My body and my soul throughout
So I’ve no thirst to drench
At all without any doubt.

And last, but not least
Give me love within my heart
However distant we may be
Our love won’t drift apart!

Carousel

Around the Carousel they rumble
Cases all in different hues
Some that really look quite humble
Which no one ever wants to choose.

With labels truly mystifying
Thomas Cook, Mytravel too
On eagle eyes they are relying
That destination be always true.

Some have straps of different textures
To make them stand out in the queue
Others all have become fixtures
Their owners gone into the loo.

Where is mine, I stand there worried
I saw it loaded when I boarded
Ah, here it comes with others hurried
All my possessions safely hoarded.

It passes me, I grab it strongly
Me, standing just the handle holding,
The case moves off in direction wrongly
Through the black flaps now unfolding.

Again it passes , the strap I’ve found
I cling to it like person famished
Triumphantly I turn around
Botheration, the trolley’s vanished!

NO TIME

I knelt to pray, but not for long
I had too much to do
I had to hurry to get to work
For bills would soon be due

So I knelt and said a hurried prayer
And jumped up off my knees
My Muslim duty was now done
My soul could rest at ease

All day long I had no time
To spread a word of cheer
Nor speak of Allah to my friends
They’d laugh at me I fear

No time, no time, too much to do
That was my constant cry
No time to give to souls in need
Then came the time to die

I came and stood before The Lord
Bowed head and downcast eyes
For in his hands God held a book
It was the book of life

God looked into his book and said:
“Your name I cannot find
I was once going to write it down
But never had the time“.


This poem was written by my friend, Farrukh Saeed of Peshwar in Pakistan. I find it to be a moving piece, in the poem the word "Muslim" can be replaced by "Christian" and "Allah" by "Jesus". This makes one wonder what the fighting is all about, doesn't it?