Magnetic, electric, eclectic eyes,
That shine like frozen diamonds raised by sunlight,
Decorated by free-falling hair that parades and cascades
With the freedom of flight, that will best strike
Those able to see the beauty within,
that goes beyond mere skin
I’ve quoted countless of my favourite poems, but I do like to share my own work too. The last one, She Loved Me Once, was in June, so I was certainly due.
She loved me once and I threw it away
A love so pure there was plenty to spare
And yet not enough for me to keep
And not enough for me to share
Her and I loved in different ways, speeds and styles
At contrasting times and in different places
Her love for me now sat with old newspapers
Faded clothes, expired milk and long-forgotten faces
But my love for her caught in a sandtimer
With my heart waiting for the last grain to fall
Memories varying from light to dark and dark to light
And questions and questions challenging it all
Whether better to have loved and lost I’m not certain
I wanted to love you the way you did me
My love took too long to catch up with yours
And you never slowed down, more’s the pity
I will let go, I hold on with fewer fingers now
The future is coming into view more than the past
But while we’ll never be that us again
Your role in my life will last
After finding an old poem Some Things, I decided to fine tune another poem I wrote while back.
Some things aren’t meant to be forgotten.
The first memory we hold
The poignant story we were always told
The first kiss we received
The lovely fantasies we once believed
The fantastic gifts we got
The ice creams we had when hot
The first person we had a crush on
Those neighbours with whom we always got along
The first difficult obstacle we got through
The wise words we’ve always listened to.
I wrote this poem a while ago and came across it when tidying my room and looking through some old papers. Hope you like it.
Not knowing when the dawn will come
I open every door
The wonderfully talented, and incredibly unique, American poet Emily Dickinson (1830 –1886). The reclusive Dickinson wrote over 1,800 poems, though only a few were published in her lifetime.
Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
The opening lines of the poem ‘Remember’ by Christina Rosetti (1830 – 1894)
He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.
Taken from the incredibly moving poem ‘Funeral Blues’ (1938) by gifted poet WH Auden.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heav’n of hell, a hell of heav’n
Taken from the poetic masterpiece ‘Paradise Lost’, by English poet and politician John Milton (1608 – 1674).
Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.
Taken from the poem ‘The More Loving One’ in 1957 by W.H. Auden
Alex Raphael 