{"id":74,"date":"2008-09-08T09:55:45","date_gmt":"2008-09-08T09:55:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/?page_id=74"},"modified":"2023-07-07T17:17:03","modified_gmt":"2023-07-07T17:17:03","slug":"poems","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/?page_id=74","title":{"rendered":"Poems"},"content":{"rendered":"

You can find some of my poems online by clicking on their titles:<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Escape”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Lockdown Release”<\/a><\/p>\n

“In a Strange Land”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Thera: Before the Eruption”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Moods of the Mother”<\/a><\/p>\n

“January”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Gethsemane”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Dante in the Garden”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Winter Weathers”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Roofers”, “Like Flowers”, “Dawn”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Rose Prestwich”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Luderitzbucht 1906”, “Dancing in the Namib”, “Kolmanskop: High Noon”, “Diamond Prospector”<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SEA HOLLY<\/strong><\/p>\n

Believing in nymphs I suspect in this pale
\nblue-grey spiky plant a passionate girl.
\nLoving sun on her skin, enraptured by rain,
\nthrilled by fingers of wind in her hair,
\nshe peeps through our window, laughing, not needing
\none thing we could give her as singing, rejoicing,
\nshe weaves from earth, air, water and light
\nthe colour we love, her unique,
\nindescribable luminous blue.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

——————–<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DOGE<\/strong><\/p>\n

A blaze of blue, that ultramarine,
\ncostlier than gold, carried as chunks of lapis
\ndown treacherous mountains in Afghanistan
\nthen rowed over violent seas to Venice.<\/p>\n

White Indian silk stitched with gold,
\nwith flowers and fruit and leaves of light,
\nlike sunset over snow, rich but cold.
\nHooded, piercing eyes of the head of state.<\/p>\n

Too old for the sword, but you see his active days
\nin the turn of his head, like a hawk. He saw
\ngalleys on fire, corpses bobbing in blue bays,
\nthen came to power through finance and the law.<\/p>\n

A thin smile, a sensitive, scholarly face,
\na raptor\u2019s beak. That calm, pitiless gaze.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

———————-<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

EGYPTIAN\u00a0 LABOURERS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Naked under the sun,
\npatient as earth itself, these men,
\ninheritors of nothing, worked
\nwith sickles of flint teeth
\nto cut their master\u2019s corn.<\/p>\n

Better the work of the fishponds, wading
\namong cool fish, though bitten by leeches,
\ntheir eyes hurt by splintering light;
\nworse the quarries, digging stone
\nwith hoes of wood or picks of bone,
\nbreaking up stone with stone.<\/p>\n

Humble, soon forgotten,
\nlike earthworms ploughing earth,
\nlike insects labouring,
\nthey lifted pyramids to the stars,
\nthen walked away and left them to dead kings.
\n—————–<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PROTEAS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Leaves like sculptures in dark bronze,
\nenormous drying blooms, each head
\na clutch of clubs furred like tarantulas legs:
\nmy sister sent them from South Africa.
\nMum loved them, messengers
\nof all she\u2019d left there \u2013 fever heat,
\ncicadas shrieking at Christmas, thunder, dust,
\nthe violence she hated,
\nbut also light, space,
\nred kaffirbooms and aloes, dusty grass of the veld,
\nlong-shadowed afternoons on trips to the Drakensberg Mountains,
\nand all the small-town, homely things;
\nclassrooms at GHS, girls in green,
\nGranny waving from her stoep, Granddad hoeing his mealies.<\/p>\n

Those are my images. I don\u2019t know what Mum saw,
\narranging proteas in bowls on the table.<\/p>\n

She lay on the couch in their shadow,
\nwincing with pain when she moved,
\ntalking about our children and our futures,
\ndelicate and dying, grey
\nface merging with grey hair,
\nlight as a wisp
\nof willow herb blowing away.<\/p>\n

———-<\/span><\/p>\n

—————–<\/p>\n

———-<\/span><\/p>\n

EGRETS<\/strong><\/p>\n

(South Africa, middle fifties)<\/em><\/p>\n

In the gentle light of evening,
\nflocks of snow-white egrets came.
\nEvery day it was the same:
\nas my dad and I were walking,<\/p>\n

thrilled with joy, we\u2019d watch them landing \u2013
\nbeauty, grace, and perfect aim.
\nIn the gentle light of evening,
\nflocks of snow-white egrets came.<\/p>\n

Once we saw a chaingang marching:
\nZulu convicts, tired and lame.
\nI felt sick with fear and shame.
\nThey passed far off. One was shouting.<\/p>\n

In the gentle light of evening,
\nflocks of snow-white egrets came.
\n———-<\/span><\/p>\n

—————–<\/p>\n

———-<\/span>
\nCHIESA DI SANTA ANASTASIA, VERONA <\/strong><\/p>\n

In pink-suffused and blood-red stone
\nit glows with welcome. From the door,
\nadmire the high roof and the pillars\u2019 striding,
\nmeasured, confident, strong,
\nover the patterned floor.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a hunchback under the font. He crouches
\non a block of stone at the pillar\u2019s base.
\nFeel how the muscles bulging in
\nthose stubby arms achingly strain
\nagainst the skin tight coarse brown sleeves
\nof the marble suit he\u2019s wearing. Holes in its knees,
\npulled open like raw sores, expose
\nthe flesh, death white. As his twisted neck
\ncarries the font\u2019s unbearable weight,
\nhe barely breathes and his pupils, shrunk
\nto crazy pinpricks, stare at the floor
\nas if not seeing it, his brain
\nabsorbed in living through the pain
\none second more, one more. Whatever man
\ncould make stone live like that
\nhad God in him.<\/p>\n

———-<\/span><\/p>\n

—————–<\/p>\n

———-<\/span><\/p>\n

MOSHOESHOE AND THE CANNIBALS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Loathsome in skirts of human skin, they slunk self-consciously
\nthrough the hostile ranks of Mokoteli.
\nAs they knelt at Moshoeshoe\u2019s feet, under his mountain,
\ntheir breath still stank of the human flesh they\u2019d eaten.
\nReaching his hand to touch their fearful heads,
\nhe alone, in all that silent crowd,
\ncould feel how those creatures, demonised by hunger,
\nmight even now be human.<\/p>\n

[My long narrative poem about Moshoeshoe\u00a0appears in my booklet Their Mountain Mother<\/em>]<\/p>\n

—————<\/p>\n


\nHEAVENLY BODIES<\/strong><\/p>\n

As goddesses, cloud damsels, court ladies, demons, queens,
\nswarm in the nude on temple walls, their billowy breasts and thighs
\ninvolved in sacred mysteries
\nabove the heads of awestruck devotees,
\nI picture the maharajah\u2019s wives playing between beds of lilies.<\/p>\n

Naked in jewelled belts, warmed by the touch of his eyes
\nthat shine like hidden suns through private screens,
\nthey vie to display their pliant forms, the shapeliness and size
\nof breasts and quivering thighs, leaping as the flung ball flies,
\npursuing one another, fleeing with shrill cries.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s different in our gym.
\nWhen Miss Patel comes in,
\nstrips to her vest and stretches, ready
\n– among suddenly self-conscious men –
\nto hone her abs, her glutes, her thighs,<\/p>\n

though the mirror walls are alive with eyes,
\nher face is still as clear-cut stone; the lasers of her gaze
\nare locked on the figure straight ahead, the vision of herself,
\npounding the treadmill belt to do her k\u2019s.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Here are a few more you can find online:<\/p>\n

“The Trekwife”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Owl”<\/a><\/p>\n

“The Natal Museum”<\/a><\/p>\n

“Alexandra Park”<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You can find some of my poems online by clicking on their titles: “Escape” “Lockdown Release” “In a Strange Land” “Thera: Before the Eruption” “Moods of the Mother” “January” “Gethsemane” “Dante in the Garden” “Winter Weathers” “Roofers”, “Like Flowers”, “Dawn” “Rose Prestwich” “Luderitzbucht 1906”, “Dancing in the Namib”, “Kolmanskop: High Noon”, “Diamond Prospector”   SEA […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":2,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-74","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/74"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/74\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2583,"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/74\/revisions\/2583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/edmundprestwich.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}