TIDEWRACK

TIDEWRACK

All cast away into the sea

Come back tenfold upon our shores

Tangled mangled and enmeshed

On tides that have no course nor sense

But charged with dread to wrack our hearts.

S. Evans, Boscastle, 2016

LOVELY LYRICS AND SONG -'TWILIGHT'

Reminds me so much of 'Somebody that I used to Know' another wonderful song by this artists.

TWILIGHT SONGTEXT

I haven't laughed this hard in a long time
I better stop now before I start crying
Go off to sleep in the sunshine
I don't wanna see the day when it's dying
She's a sight to see
She's good to me
But I'm already somebody's baby
She's a pretty thing
She loves everything
But I'm already somebody's baby

You don't deserve to be lonely
But those drugs you got won't make you feel better
Pretty soon you'll find it's the only
Little part of you life you're keeping together
I'm nice to you
I can make it through

But you're already somebody's baby
I can make you smile
If you stay a while
But how long will you stay with me baby?

Because your candle burns too bright
Well I almost forgot it was twilight
Even if I think that you are mine
Well I'm tired of being down, I got no fight
You're wonderful
And it's beautiful
But I'm already somebody's baby
And if I went with you
I'd dissapoint you too
I'm already somebody's baby
Already somebody's baby

YESTERDAY WITH THE LOVELY JULIE HESMONDHALGH

Supporting a community charity event in preparation for Comic Relief.  Yes, it's that time of the year already!

Migration

Migration

My arms outstretched, as 
Barren as the branches
You listened in silence
Until I'd had my say then
Turned your head so slightly
Said you, "Had to go away"
And the park gates to be locked 
And the lamps teary in the dusk
Once more I begged you stay, but
My words bore the breath of winter and    
You'd already flown away.

S. Evans, Exmouth, 2016

WHY SHOULD I THINK OF YOU?

Why Should I Think of You?

Why should I  think of you?
As if I need a reason to
Thinking of you and me
And our sharing once
Of a drop from this  boundless sea
Only one drop I confess but
Our drop nonetheless
And all the more precious for that.

© Stephen Evans 2015

Evocation

It isn't your body that still beckons me
From the eyelid of the doorway
Or the mischief and promise
In your sigh and in  your smile
It isn't your  warmth in the private of  places
Or your eyes' dilation at various stages
Not the coupling of our heart-beats
Nor the whisper of your skin

It is none of these.

What most  visits my memory and recalls you again
Is the scent of your hair when we kissed in the rain.


(c)  S.  Evans

Songbird

Why cage this songbird in my chest 
If it's only going to choke?
Why weld this strong bird to my arm
If its wings are bald and broke?

That songbird will die

That strong bird won't fly   

That nest you built lies silent
Beneath a barren sky

(c) Stephen Evans 2016

ROAD SIGN

Spurning car I walk home
Amid the evening's drab recessional
Procession of hopes that fade like fumes
Before the opening of front doors
A rusting road sign signals me
"How often do they notice?" I ask
"Dented and weather-faded as you are?"
And rudely answer on its behalf
"Only when they need me."


School run and hearse I would suppose
Make daily use of you
Pointing as you do 
That right turn
Takes you to the school while 
Left to the crematorium leads
No more than simple stated facts
Amid the stream of passing lights
People always hurrying past, heads closed,  
Preoccupied in present
Dogs defecate where you stand 
And yet you don't complain.

You don't complain because you know 
That satellites will free-fall from sky
And batteries are apt to die 
And the blessed GPS 
Will drive us all in circles
Then park us neatly in a mess.

You know that when our toys break down
And once again we seek direction
You'll still be here for all of us
Season-wrought and resolute
Dependable, unchanging 
Mapping out our destinations
Turn left or right or straight ahead
Your simple trusted navigation.

(c) S Evans 2014

OLD COATS

Old Coats

Old coats I used to wear,

Of different climes,

Of different times,

Some hardly used and

Some threadbare,

They hang around and stare at me,

From the wardrobe's Narnian door.

Each one a pocket memory,

Of a time and a person I used to be,

A musty moth-ball guards this place,

A sedentary sentry of a score of years,

Eyes me fearfully with mistrust and tears,

As I tell him how,

His war was over long ago,

His vanquished foe,

Now a fluttering of nothing.

Old tissues that fought the sniffles,

Through winter's monochrome months,

Hibernate in the deep -woollen dotage of,

A duffle coat duvet,

Spent ink cartridges,

Straddle cheap playing-away day,

Train tickets, while

Loyalty-cards scream of infidelity.

An orphaned button dreams one day of,

Returning to her family,

A compass awaiting re-discovery,

Points to where in a crumpled layer,

Twisted toffee wrappers, crinkled and crushed,

Their contents long discandied.

Choke upon layers of tweed and dust.

Summer stubs from seasons in the sun,

Of Pimms in the pavilion and Panama hats,

Who lost or won and innings scores,

And many other Wisden  facts,

Recede into the recess of a blazer,

And League match ticket books,

Tick off the score-card  of my life,
Triumph, failure, 

And mosaic faces in the crowd,

I never met yet shared such times.

Fragile cotton fibres,

Frame a faded picture of,

Two lovers in a photo booth,

Thrown together in a fumble of youth,

Forever in an amber-warm embrace,

His face could almost pass for me,

At twenty three,

Beneath,  

A lower tier of

Cinema receipts,

One unspliced spool of long  forgotten films retreats,

Across the inner eye,

A flicker of silver memory,

Surfaces for one moment to stare,

Then nosedives like some Titanic on her maiden thought,

Under a sea of the mind's  debris.

Lipstick painted phone numbers,

Index cigarette packet lives,

The spoils of victories of the night,

On first name only terms,

And calls that never were returned,

A sliver of some cardboard hope,

That never saw the sight of day,

Interred within a  side pocket,

Where they forever firmly stay,

Rest in pieces till the judgement day.

Post it notes in an interview jacket,

Preen with pride beside my first wage packet,

Past-it paper-clips  a half-pence piece,

An Ever Ready battery that one day

ceased.

Chewing gum wrappers ,

A winder for a watch,

A melted rubber band,

An empty roll of Scotch

Tape me to a past life,

 I thought I'd left for good,

Of doors that should stay firmly closed ,

Supposed they'd stay that way and would,

Now creak stiffly on their hinges,

Open wide to let me pass

Down corridors like warrens to

The wastelands of the past.

A single stamp for a letter never sent,

Scraps of throwaway thoughts ,

Some of them well meant,

Pleas to reconsider on

Crushed blue lines .

The jangle of a mystery key,

Unlocks another memory,

Of a life once shared  with a  secret she,

Of whom my parents would never approve,

Their attitude still painful to me now as then,

Invoked like a shaman's curse,

Still rattles my mind.

When fishing in the pockets of old coats,

Be careful of what you may find,

Be heedful of their hidden depths,

And the sharks-teeth thoughts you may provoke,

Be mindful of that old mistake,

That feelings mend and heal with time,

The languid lake can often be,

A drowning tempest,

Out at sea.

© Stephen Evans

ONE NIGHT STAND - REVISED

This is a revised version of my poem 'One Night Stand'.  I used this along with the poem 'Scan' for a course ran by CalArts.

One Night Stand

I won't bring you flowers
I won't share the hours
Or shelter you from showers
I'm just a one night stand.

Others will always hold your hand
Others will try to understand
Others will be the better brand
I'm just your one night stand.

Others will want to console you
Others will want to share the view
Others will go where you go too
But not this one night stand.

I'll be a point in history
Long forgotten as I should be
Too plain to be a mystery
Just the one night stand.

I won't cry and make a fuss
I won't lie or break your trust
Or phone you up because I must
I'll be your one night stand.

But if you’re liking what you see
Forever till you tire of me
I'll stick around and always be

Your only one night stand.

(c) Stephen Evans