Aftermath

How can it be that someone
I don't see,
only think
about sometimes,
but never contact,
or try to,
leaves such a gap,
in their final leaving.

My life has not been changed.
All is the same.
So why the difference now
that you're really in the past,
when you were already part of my past
and not of my future.

Nothing has changed for me,
not really,
not in reality.
So why do you occupy my thoughts
in a different way.
Why does my future feel different
now you cannot be part of it,
even though you never would be
and I knew it.

Perhaps because I can no longer
dream you there.
But why not
when you could never be there
and I knew it
the same then,
as I know now.
Why is it different,
now
even to dream?

https://godoggocafe.com/2019/09/21/aftermath-lynn-white-guest-barista/?fbclid=IwAR3aXe34rrv7JoEHviYqDN83JAYkb9dl3Ks1u_zmLoyHDCX1DEgTOAocLLw

Fox

It’s a rare thing to see,

a fox in a field of pink,

a fox in

a field 

of foxgloves.

He looks up and sniffs them.

He could put his nose right inside

if he chose.

But he doesn’t.

He could slip each paw

in turn

inside

the pink glove,

but he doesn’t

choose to.

Why would he,

unless he knew

the connection,

the link,

the identification.

But he doesn’t

know it.

So 

he just sniffs the air

and moves on.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1795856327/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_awdo_t1_0P-FDbP7XWCW7?fbclid=IwAR2mP1qYUzptYGLx8o_mWnSpVHBYIVcoZC_ye86VVS4CapweP5yOno_gOA8

Shall I Go Gently?

I’ve always been indecisive
and I’m still undecided
but soon
I will have to choose
whether to build my ship,
and furnish it
comfortably
and sail with you
gently
into the dark
into oblivion
gently
or to rage and fight
scratch and bite
kick and scream
so that you have to drag me
to where I will not follow
gently
into oblivion
into the darkness
the inevitability
of the end
whichever way I choose.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Y4MW43H…

The Future’s Past

I feel no nostalgia
no longing
to go back
to be part of my past
I don’t look behind me.
I feel no fear either
no concern
that one day
it will catch me up.
I know that it’s already here
part of my present
with me
waiting
for the future.

https://blognostics.net/…/20/the-futures-past-by-lynn-white/

Rejection

It’s not that I’m not tempted,
she said
and I don’t want to offend you.
She took my hand briefly,
to show no offence
was intended,
then let it go.

I held on to hers
as she explained.

Then we walked in silence
for quite a long way
enveloped in the dark night.
Hand in hand.
Quiet footsteps
that didn’t break the silence.

She looked up at me and smiled.
I smiled back.
Or was I the first to smile
and she smiled back?

I don’t remember.
It doesn’t matter,
but we still don’t remember.

https://godoggocafe.com/2019/09/21/rejection-lynn-white-guest-barista/

Reclusive

He was a hermit,
a recluse living in a cave with his cats.
He had a long strong thread
made of cat gut
and he sat all day
every day
playing cat’s cradle
and all that jazz
on his home made guitar.
And then one day
the cats decided
enough was enough
they were all jazzed out.
So they ate him up
and played rock ’n’ roll.

https://hereticsloversmadmen.com/…/09/18/reclusive-lynn-wh…/

How To Float

They told me a stone would never float.

I didn’t believe them

so I threw it carefully on to the water.

It stayed there

on the surface,

a miracle!

So I threw another carefully to land on top

and then another

and another.

Now a stack of stones was floating 

on the water.

They told me a stone would never hang in the air.

I didn’t believe them

so I threw it carefully upwards.

It stayed there

in the air,

a miracle! 

So I threw another to land underneath

and then another

and another.

Now a stack of stones was hanging

in the air

casting its shadow on the water.

Believe in the miracles you can make.

Don’t believe what they tell you.

Cast a long shadow.

https://issuu.com/…/do…/scrittura_magazine_issue_16_summer_…

A Blue Whale

Look at them all
swimming round me
taunting me
waving their legs at me
tickling me
pinching me
and swimming away
constantly taunting me.
No wonder I’m depressed.
What a wheeze to make me
the largest creature on the planet
need to eat one of the smallest.
Well Joker, I’m not laughing.
Forty million krill a day
I need to eat
according to Wiki.
Yes, I keep up.
I’m well informed
but it doesn’t help me
doesn’t make me feel better.
To add to the insult
I was given a tiny mouth,
too small for the job.
See, I’m hardly a basking shark
swimming round all day
with my mouth open
so they can swim straight in.
No, it’s open and close
open and close
till my jaw aches.
No wonder I’m blue.

https://blognostics.net/…/2019/09/13/a-blue-whale-by-lynn-…/

https://blognostics.net/blognostics-an-innovative-experience-in-literature-poetry-and-art/2019/09/13/a-blue-whale-by-lynn-white/

Never Never Land

My sister has gone to Never Never Land
It’s where all the lost children go,
those who don’t find their way home
and those who fade away and die
like the wild flowers I pick for the house.
My mother says
they stay children for ever
and can play all day long.
My sister was allowed to take her trike with her
even though it was all smashed up.
My mother says
the magic people there will fix it.
It sounds like fun there
but my mother says
she will never let me go,
not even if I find a magic carpet
to carry me up into the sky.
Perhaps she thinks I’m getting too old go there.
She says that the children there will grow wings
and become angels,
I think angels are a bit like fairies,
and when my sister gets her wings
she will fly back home
so we can be together again.
My mother says, no, never,
but I don’t know.

http://www.ekphrastic.net/…/ekphrastic-writing-responses-he…

A snippet from my poem "IT'S CLEAR" was used by Chris Jepperson a street photographer in in Columbia in this example of his work.

https://www.chrisjeppersonarts.com/my-photo-gallery

Better Together

We will always be together,
said my little brother
if he felt lonely
or if we were sad.
I would give him a hug
to comfort us both
we will, we will.
We will always have each other
always walk together
even if broken into little pieces
even if distorted by pain
we will pick up the pieces somehow
and put them back together
even if they’re re-arranged
even if not in the same places
we will still be us
together.
But later
we forgot
and walked away
from each other.

https://ninemusespoetry.com/…/…/12/one-poem-by-lynn-white-3/

Mermaid

It was the change in her hair she noticed first
growing now like harsh thin weed
but attached
firmly
attached
and inedible.
She tugged at it
but the pain was too great
to separate it from her head.
And then her scales
began to disappear
her beautiful shiny scales
washed away with her gills.
Her brothers and sisters
and the rest of the school
swam around her still
but she couldn’t hear them,
couldn’t understand
what they were saying.
The art of communication
had been lost
washed away
with her gills.
What was she now?
Neither fish nor fowl.
Fowl,
where did that come from?
She ran her fingers over her skin,
still smooth
unfeathered
up to now.
She waited
waited to see what would emerge.
Then the next wave came
and carried her
to the beach
so she crawled along
the sharp sand
uncomfortably
on her swollen belly
until she found a rock
and clambered up
then slithered down
algaed slime
into a recess
a safe cave
a haven
with a shallow pool
left by the tide,
a birthing pool
she thought
and she knew
that the next tide
would bring her sustenance
while she waited to see
what would emerge.

SPILLWORDS.COM

Mermaid, a poem written by Lynn White at Spillwords.com

Spillwords.com presents: Mermaid, a poem written by Lynn White, who lives in North Wales. Her writing is influenced by issues of social injustice ...

Secrets

Do you have a secret life,
with secret places explored
only by yourself?
Do you?
Tell me about it,
let me in.
No you can’t,
of course you can’t,
it’s a secret.
Only you can go there.

So I must imagine
your secret life for myself.
May I?
Perhaps a house
with another family in it.
Perhaps a box hidden
under the floor
containing
old love letters
or pornographic magazines

Am I getting warm?
Of course you won’t say.
Well, you can’t say.
For you are part of
my secret life.
My imaginings,
my dreams and fantasies.
And they are part of me.
As real to me as the life I expose.
but no one can go there.
They’re my secrets.
What about you?
Do you have a secret life?
Do you?

https://www.scarletleafreview.com/poems…/category/lynn-white

SCARLETLEAFREVIEW.COM

Category: LYNN WHITE

Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries...

Bits And Pieces

I loved Auntie Mary’s bits and pieces drawer.
Loved the metal box full of buttons
I laid out carefully
to admire the different colours,
the different shapes and sizes.
Some were very old
cut from outfits long gone.
I thought she should remember them
but she would never say,
only that she cut them from clothes discarded
in case she needed to replace those lost,
buttons were expensive back then.
I found a silvery chain
with a broken clasp
that glistened and gleamed
as I wrapped it round my fingers.
She said she couldn’t remember where she wore it.
I didn’t believe her, it was too beautiful to forget.
Then there were the discarded ornaments
that had once been on show,
presents from seaside places, so they said,
but it was the photographs I liked best.
Pictures of family I’d never met,
pictures of family I never would meet.
Now, I only remember the one of three young women,
my auntie and her sisters.
They were sitting on a wall with the sea behind them,
perhaps they had just bought one of the ornaments.
My auntie told me that people had said:
“just look at our Mary, showing her ankles!”
“I was very. daring”, she told me smiling.
I couldn’t that imagine the prim lady
in her always blue dresses
had ever been daring,
but she had hidden the picture away
because she thought it revealed too much.
On later visits I would always ask
to look in the ‘bits and pieces’ drawer
but it was never allowed again.
Perhaps it had already revealed too much.

https://blognostics.net/blognostics-an-innovative-experience-in-literature-poetry-and-art/2019/09/08/bits-and-pieces-by-lynn-white/

BLOGNOSTICS.NET

Bits And Pieces by Lynn White

Bits And Pieces by Lynn White I loved Auntie Mary’s bits and pieces drawer. Loved the metal box full of buttons I laid out carefully to admire the different colours....READ MORE

The Village of Twee

I am just arrived in the village of Twee
with its little front gardens carefully wild,
with its thatch nicely polished,
its flowers dust free.
I wonder who tends them
in the village of Twee.
Who shampoos the pinks
who waters the pots,
who sweeps up the leaves
and prunes all the phlox.
There’s no humans to see
in the village of Twee,
just cars with their robots,
red, white and pink.
They wave as they drive through
with shopping piled high
singing ‘tra lah lah, welcome and fiddle di di.
There’s a welcome for all in the village of Twee.’

They park right outside,
with the pavements long gone
to give wider roads for motoring robots.
So how did it happen, this robotic coup.
There must be a story or legend to tell
to explain the strange culture I came across there.
Well, pavements weren't needed
with no humans to walk
and that’s how it started
if truth it be told.
And it’s ‘tra lah lah, welcome and fiddle di di’
as the robots drive smiling through the village of Twee.

So are there still humans?
I've heard they're indoors
their legs long since wasted,
they're unable to walk.
So the robots took over
and they do what they can
to keep the thatch polished
and dig up the weeds,
to feed all that need it
and take out the waste.
And when work is finished their day will come,
when new robots grow older, they can move on.
Singing ‘tra lah lah, bye now and fiddle di di,
there’ll be no more humans in the village of Twee’

http://www.sirenscallpublications.com/…/SirensCallEZine_Aug…

SIRENSCALLPUBLICATIONS.COM

www.sirenscallpublications.com