The Idiot Savant [poem]
If you two were to ask me what I seek in life and love
(arriving at my place one day, with flushed young cheeks,
yourselves somehow in tasteful scattered disarray)
I would not hesitate to tell you there is nothing that I want:
I am replete in all my hermitry — the whole world at my feet
(the ultimate in idiot savant [and also self-deceit]).
Last Night
Last night I waited on my windowsill for the clouds to clear so I could photograph the Full Moon rising over the sea. The clouds didn’t clear for the moon but I got a ten-second unexpected treat when the setting sun was revealed and a rainbow too. (No filters or photoshopping). How I love the unexpected! It’s (almost) the only time life makes sense…
Jewel [poem]
She only shows her lithesome self at certain times of day
(just once, to be precise; although it feels like many more
to those incited to explore the literature on rocks and stones)
like sunlight glinting on the runelike facets of a jewel you may adore.
A myriad faerie glancings dancing spritely in a certain way;
I swear you would, like me, exalt her to your princely throne
of state and through her mysteries she would fascinate —
elusive as a fish deep in a stream or pheromonal fragrance
floating blithely on a breeze or wispy wyndly unremembered dream.
Doppelganger [poem]
I am a mirror
reflecting every
whisper which you’re most
afraid of in your self —
the feathered touch of
freedom’s fickle fibres
lusty
chime of bells.
I am a looking-glass
Contusion [sonnet]
At first only my footsteps could be heard
while walking in that forest on the hill.
But then a sound (was it a mockingbird?)
of grasping, struggling fingers; it was shrill.
Alongside all that shrillness came a voice
of endless rivered grief yet golden calm;
as lovely you made some pragmatic choice
which yielded an effective healing balm.
When all these puzzles hunkered into place
revealing their contused identity,
I wrote with blood my name in lowercase
and tiptoed round you gently — sacredly.
This bruise which lesions round your broken core
will surely fade with flowers at your door.
.
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© Alan Morrison, 2013
In Vain [poem]
[new poem for “Remembrance Day”, November 11th]
Face down in the mud (my newsome
view of world) brings wisdom’s harbour
neatly to my flapping open door. I spit
and loudly roar no more to stand again
This frailsome new fragility has warmed
the would-be wasted portions of my
priestly vision-vine which wistly grew
and grizzled largely unaligned and void
Unremarkable razor-marks adorn my
stifled throat like stuccoed roughcast
careless flungfast fungalled seizures
reasoning without success or even cry
Above my levelled head those bullets
zinging with a cold precision random
circus double-visioned conscienceful
velocity (to some: atrocity) of rhyme
Poppies like a carpet soon will cover all
the heinous futile excrement of war —
a sea of blood and opiates — while
skylarks inexplicably will singly soar
My fevered brain like blotting paper
soaks up unfertility from lifeless earth
What am I worth? sings every soldier
dying on a farmer’s former golden land
An oily cricket bat. A wicketkeeper’s pad.
The spireful village skyline pricks my
crude reality of clay and crashingness and
corkly balls as hard as bullets baffle me
Hallucination’s welcome information
numbs my broken body but it cannot
mend my seared and scarful soul.
A dozen holes. & war is birth control
What madness ever grazed this earth
with scars and bloody sackcloth ashen
screams and dreamless dreams of
something green and growthsome?
I lie here on the cheerful cusp of chaos
Mortar holes engore the ground around
me like a pusful acned pockmarked face
while generals sip sherry on the lawn
I am a pawn. They made my moves
(manoeuvres which they hid). A million
grieving parents inculcated to believe their
once were little sucklings did not die in vain
They did.
.
.
© Alan Morrison, 2013
I Can Make it on my Own [song lyrics]
Wind blows me
I don’t see
this debris
But I can make it on my own
Things fly past
this boat’s mast
unhand grasped
Think I can make it on my own
Refrain:
Rode full-speed ahead into the night
In everything there I will delight
Waves swirl round
I’m half-drowned
Not ice-bound
And I can make it on my own
Head held high
Smelled word why
Scored bull’s-eye
‘Cause I can make it on my own
Vocal bridge:
…..(Although I know that my arrow flies true
…..Doubt comes like haze in a dene
…..I’ll do much more than some smiles in my room
…..Won’t break me.
…..Can’t fake me.
…..It’s more than a dream…)
Not lonely
Just roamly
I bring me
Somewhere to make it on my own
Envision
Collision
Revision
Won’t have to make it on my own
Final refrain:
Rode hard on the wind into the light
With more wings than two (heightens the flight)
.
.
.
© Alan Morrison, 2013
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I can make it on my Own [song lyric]
Wind blows me
I don’t see
this debris
But I can make it on my own
Things fly past
this boat’s mast
unhand grasped
Think I can make it on my own
Refrain:
Rode full-speed ahead into the night
In everything there I will delight
Ode to Jack the Russell [prose poem]
In times of crisis someone always rises from the heap to lead the way.
In this case, Jack the Russell was the one to join the fray.
Often it’s the ones who look least likely to be heroes who defy all odds;
While those who brag beforehand fall to pieces when the action
on the ground or on the stage in life’s grand theatre gets too hot.
Somehow, the state of modesty bestows a later case of bravery
when even dogs can step up to the plate, regardless of their fate.
The Creative Process
What a fruitful mystery is the creative process! I cannot say that I write a poem or song but that it writes me. That’s the only way I can describe it. It’s not like automatic writing for I have to apply myself and instigate the momentum. But at the same time as I instigate, some other force then arrogates my mind; then words come like confetti on the wind from some uncharted place, often making me laugh with sheer joy at the flow! For this reason, no one can take the credit for anything. We are conduits, canals and watercourses, messengers and mediators from another universe. Saboteurs of mediocrity. Avatars of authenticity. Provocateurs for change.
The Naked Troubadour 