Poems of memories.

MEMORIES OF GEMS OF HA LONG BAY.

The soaring grey eagles fly,

A mirror in an endless sky

Of swimmers in the sea below,

Floating deeper than they know,

Perhaps a million miles high

Above earth or below sky,

The ship afloat upon the bay,

Close- yet drifting far away,

Those turquoise islands must fade

Against a vast sea of jade.

EXILE.

Exile is where you are not,

And where you cannot be,

It is what cannot be forgot,

Those you and I cannot see,

Still we share the same moon and sky,

Touch the same ocean flowing by.

SLAVES TO STARLIGHT

 “Please, then just kill me now, I cannot bear it any longer,” he asked, looking up from where he sat at her feet.

Earlier. It seems much earlier.

“How was the weather today?” the Lady asked him.

“Just normal, a bit cloudy.”

“Tell me, you know it is important to me to hear it.”

“Yes,” he obeyed. “In the morning the sunrise came late and there was fog on the mountains. The fog had lifted by midday and there was snow on the distant mountain peaks. The clouds parted for a minute in the afternoon and there were brief rays of sun. But then the clouds returned, darker than before, it looked like it would rain, but it did not. The sunset was nothing special.” 

‘Every sunset is special,” she corrected him harshly. “I miss those long autumn twilights, and the sun through the trees in the summer…”

“Forgive me, Lady. At least you still have the night, you still have the starlight.” 

“We have nothing but starlight… We are literally starlight, The atoms of your body were formed from ancient exploding stars, All the energy in the food which sustains you comes from the photosynthesis of plants- from the light of our star. All matter, all of you, is light moving very slowly, all mass is energy and all energy comes from the stars.”

He gazed up at her adoringly. To him, it was as though she spoke with the wisdom of ages. To be in her presence when she spoke that way made all the suffering and sacrifice worthwhile.

“When you gaze up at me, all you see is light reflected from energy… Starlight,” she continued.

She treated him to a smile, and feasted on the power she held over him, how he melted under her radiance.

“Give me your hand,” she commanded.

He reached up foppishly, presenting his hand like a Victorian gentleman asking for a dance. She grasped his hand in her left hand and with her right she took a knife from her garter. It was a tiny pen knife set in ivory and the blade shone like the stars. She cut his little finger and placed it between her lips. She drank like a thirsty kitten. 

To him, it felt exquisite. If it gave her much pleasure, she refused to show it.

The next day, he woke up exhausted. Partly because of loss of blood and partly because she had required him for half the night but he still had to wake at dawn to perform his duties on her estate.

He pulled on his clothes, washed his face with the cold water beside his bed, quickly brushed his hair and then left his cell for the kitchen. After a quick meal of black pudding, fried bread and ale, he got his tools and started work.

He worked until sunset. It rained all afternoon, so it was a long day. He returned, exhausted, to his cell, changed into dry clothes and waited to be summoned to the Lady.

He waited. He drank tea and ate a cold beef sandwich and waited. He tried to read a book, but his eyes hurt in the poor light of the cell. He waited, and the summons never came. Exhausted  and miserable, he fell to sleep soon after midnight.

He dreamt of riding a horse in a meadow, the sky was full of stars, but if it was dark he could still see clearly. He came to a river, and he knew, without touching it, that the water was colder than ice. He followed the river upstream. The river led to a pond. The Lady was bathing in the water. It delighted him to see her that way. The horse was gone, or maybe he was the horse.He walked towards the pool and the Lady… suddenly another man appeared, naked, beside her, then another man, then another…

He woke in his cell, very much aware of how alone he was.  

The next day was much the same, but he was less exhausted and it rained less. In the morning he trimmed the trees and rose bushes in her gardens. In the afternoon he did repairs on her stables, and the sight and smell of her horses made him uncomfortable but he could not quite remember why.

The evening was much the same as the last. Ceaseless, intolerable waiting. He tormented himself with questions. Why didn’t she summon him? Had he offended her? Was she angered by his dismissal of the sunset? He had been careful to watch the sunset carefully, to remember every shade of scarlet, the movement of every cloud. He had fantasized about composing a poem for her about the last twilight, but his education was minimal and he could not put the words together correctly. Had she forgotten him? There had been times when she had only summoned him to drink for a few minutes, and there had been one evening, months ago, when she had been too busy to summon him, but never two evenings in a row. Never. Maybe very late tonight… What could he do about it? Nothing.

He slept, and was constantly woken by nightmares, but he could not remember what they were about.

The following day he went through his day's work like a very old man. His body was weak and every joint ached. His head was clouded like a drunkard, he could not stop thinking about her, but at the same time he could not focus on anything. Pictures and  words and hazy feelings swept around his mind. What had he done wrong? What could he do to make it better? He replayed the last summons, every word they had spoken, again and again. Then he would remember his work, if he worked badly it might anger her, but he was too weak… He forced himself to work, although he knew the work was not good enough, he forced himself to eat and drink, but he tasted nothing.He avoided speech, even eye contact with other staff, that was easy enough, most of them avoided him. He felt like he had a terrible secret which he needed to hide from everyone, including himself. 

Eventually, darkness came.

(The sunset had been brief, but beautiful, it had been orange and rose gold, with purple tints on the clouds.)

He lay in his bed. He could not relax enough to get comfortable, and yet struggled to keep his eyes open. After an hour, which felt like days, he was summoned.

He strode towards her chamber, struggling to hide his fatigue. He entered, bowed and knelt at her feet.

“You look terrible,” she said.

He nodded, so very grateful that she had noticed. 

She looked down on him, searching for something that she could not find.

“Shall I tell you about the sunset?’ he asked.

“No, I know already. Give me your hand.” 

She took his hand and cut his wrist (very carefully so that it did no serious damage) with her beautiful knife. As she drank, she looked away from him, at the stars outside the window. After a minute she was no longer thirsty, she released his arm.

‘You may go,” she commanded.

He looked down at his bleeding wrist, then up at the indifferent expression on her exquisitely beautiful face. 

“Please no…I …” he began.

“Pardon?”

“Please…” he knew it was madness to speak, to think of disobeying, but he was too weak. He had waited for so long, to be dismissed so rapidly. What was wrong with him? He could not stop the flow of feeling, of emotion, of words -damn words- from his mouth. “Please let me stay a little longer, I have missed you… Please… I love you.”

Silence.. 

“You think that you are in love, that is pathetic, like a rabbit loving a wolf… “ said the Lady. “What do you even know of love? Nothing it seems... Love is essentially both worthless and priceless, It can be given, taken and gathered up for free. It is like air or rain water. It is only the concept of possession of it which makes it rare and have any value. The fantasy of ownership. That is what people fight or starve for. What you work and beg for- nothing but an illusion of possession. Love, or money,  can be given freely, but people are scared to. They hoard it, and that is why it is rare. That is why, for you, it is unobtainable.”

Silence.

“Please, then just kill me now, I cannot bear it any longer,” he asked

‘You have misunderstood. That is not how this arrangement functions,” she dismissed him.

Vampire poems recording.

See the link below for Youtube vampire poems.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gN2c4IMQGg4

TIME

 

He looked at his gold pocket watch. It, like every clock in his possession,  was set permanently at five minutes to midnight. Then he gazed at the setting sun in the misty sky. Finally,  he inspected the gaping wound across his guts.

"Damn you Time! " he exclaimed.  "YOU HAVE DEFEATED ME YET AGAIN! "

Much earlier. 

A gold pen scribbled across the paper. He loved gold most of all. It was the untarnishable substance, untouchable by Time.

See candle flames dance,

Like the flicker of angel's wings,

Remembering smoke spiraling and

So many long lost things,

As soldiers at the break of dawn,

Waiting for deep darkness to be torn,

And every soldier half in the past,

Half in a future which cannot last.

He put down his pen and drank more coffee. 

Light rain fell on the filthy ground as he finished addressing his men.

"... and remember, time is against us here, so finish your rum and get back to work. "

He was in a foul mood because he had dreamt of Her again. He had dreamt of running through the forest and Time was chasing him. It was sunset and it had always been sunset, and he ran and ran.

He drained his rum and started cleaning his pistol.

Damn you. Time, he thought, over and over again.

Some time later.

The enemy were out there, somewhere amongst the mist and charred stumps of trees. He led his men forward,  blindly, into the wasteland. 

Damn it. It's the wrong time. We are too late. Either the enemy has fled or they have had time to lay an ambush for us. 

We are out of time.

Always, always, out of Time.

They walked forward, silent footsteps muffled by the ash underfoot and the dense, damp air.

He heard the heavy panting of the man behind him. He could almost smell his men's fear. They were not true soldiers,  just men forced into the wrong time and place.

He walked on, trying to stand tall, trying to look confident,  to inspire his men, as though it was not already far too late for that.

A single shot ran out, echoing in the silent mist.

His men started firing aimlessly. They were panicking. 

Damn them. They were not ready for this. It was not their fault. There had not been enough time to train them.

Time had never been on their side.

A few shots turned into a hail of fire. It was a blizzard of bullets. A storm of burning hot lead.

His men were falling dead around him.

He raised his pistol,  tried to aim, but he could not see the enemy.

Nothing but smoke and mist and ash. It had always been this way… smoke and fire forever and ever more.

"Take cover men! Behind the stumps!" he shouted.

There was no time for that. It was too late. They were all gone.

Alone in the chaos he knelt behind what had once been the trunk of a tree. He fired a futile,  forlorn shot into the nightmare.

Then he felt it. A shot ripped through his guts. No pain, not yet. Just an irresistible force, the space where his entrails used to be, and the hot sticky blood everywhere. 

He looked at his gold pocket watch.

It was five minutes to midnight.

Toys Of The Grave.

    (Based on a true story.)

    These days there are many things which I fail to remember, but I shall never forget that little cemetery on Castle Street.

    I'm not sure how I first found it, it was an almost hidden sort of a place, almost invisible from the street. You passed through a tall iron gate with flaking black paint, then through an arch shaped gap in a poorly trimmed hedge, then there it was. A graveyard spread out before you in all its overgrown, crumbling magnificence. Most of the gravestones were over a hundred years old, and none of the stood up at the correct angle. Moss and ivy grew everywhere: nature retaking the dead. Behind an abandoned chapel stood an old Yew tree and beside the graves under that tree was the place where the broken toys were always found..

    The first one, if I recall, was a faded, headless doll. There was a rabbits skull and bits of fur near by.

    At first it was just another oddity in an odd place. like the circle of mushrooms with the egg shells inside, or the friendly, slender black cat, or the nameless graves beside the north wall.

    But the next time I went there, years later and with a lady, on the same grave, amongst the fallen pines and branches of the tree, I found a teddy bear which had been ripped in half. I tried, as you do, to rationalize it.. Perhaps the cat or some other animals had taken it there, but why to that exact place and surely an animal would bury it?

    The next month I returned with the same lady, she liked the cat. There we found a china doll, smashed into fragments.

    I was becoming curious. The next week I returned alone and found a rag doll. It was soaked with rain and its arms were missing. There were wings beside it too, the broken wings of some small bird, maybe a Robin. 

    That night I could not sleep. Curiosity tormented me. I had to know who or what was behind those broken toys. Just before dawn, I decided that I must spend a night in the graveyard to investigate. Only then was I able to get a few hours sleep.

    It was the beginning of winter and so sunset came early. At twilight, I passed though the arch in the hedge and walked through the long grass between the graves. Sat under the Yew, I opened the bag which I had prepared. I took out a glass lamp and lit the candle inside it, then drank from my flask of coffee. The rag doll was at my feet. One of the wings had disappeared.

    That evening was uncomfortable. Clouds hid the moon and stars. The earth was cold and hard beneath me. I was exhausted from lack of sleep the previous night and at points my vision blurred. The headlights of passing cars over the hedge cast twisted shadows amongst the tomb stones and trees. Soon before midnight the cat came to keep me company for a few minutes. Minutes afterwards an owl flew down from the chapel roof and moments later I must have fallen to sleep.

    I tell myself that I must have slept and dreamt.

    I saw... I dreamt... a small figure. A boy, I guess. Short, slender, stooped over, with long, lank hair covering his face. In the candle lights his face was a a featureless blank, but I saw his shinning eyes and the horrid stains on his clothes. In one bony fist he held half of a torn teddy bear, the the other he grasped parts of a mouse.

    They were at my feet when the dawn light woke me.  

    It was then that I understood- he had to break the toys, to make them dead like himself, so they could be with him.

Moments

The world fades around them,
Like a rose without light,

Petals flutter gently down,

Unseen under midnight,

Where have the moments gone?

Will The Earth still recall?

Where did the dreams hide?

Did the stars ever see all?

Like iron in the ocean,

Or silver in the grave,

All shattered forever,

By time's infinite wave.

Certain Truths.

 I

"There are certain truths about the world which, after you experience and accept them, make it impossible to go back to the normal run of life. Those who understand these things are best suited to live nocturnally, or in some distant jungle,  or to go insane… Yet, it was an experience which we survived- which we won."

Those were the first words,  after exchanging greetings and pleasantries, which he said to me.

The tropical sun shone through the wooden, colonial style shutters,  casting warped shadows across the bar. The slight breeze from the antique ceiling fans did little to reduce the oppression of the stale, humid air. I recall there being peanut shells shattered over every surface,  and an ancient parrot caged in one corner.

I could see from the way he was slumped in his chair, and the gaunt look about his face, that he had been overdoing the narcotics recently. 

"Then there is still a bit of fight left in your?" I asked. 

"There is nothing but fight left in me."

I ordered a couple of pale beers and took a seat opposite him. It had been a long journey,  and I knew it was going to be a very long night.  He took a long swig from his beer, then lit his pipe. A sparkle kindled in his eyes, despite the dark bags under them.

"Tell me a story, " I said.

He smiled his lopsided,  broken teeth smile.

"I will tell you a fine story. From back in the day. We lived like kings back then. Barbarian kings! He hailed our pagan gods, we men arm wrestled in our drunkenness and roared our praises to the Gods…" he laughed until he coughed, then continued. "And always, around us, a darkness lurked. A threat which was our fate and our duty. It was a shock to us at first, monstrous, maybe I will tell you about that one day. But it became a habit,  we literally destroyed demons before breakfast,  because they often struck at dawn. You're a young lad, but not green, I see that. Do you know what I'm talking about? "

"Maybe, let's hear a story, "  I said, and I was curious. "Tell me about the first time."

He knocked the ash from his pipe and stared upwards at the last of the smoke spiraling in the air as it drifted out of the window. However, the expression on his face, his mouth narrow and straight like the cut of an axe, made it clear that he was seeing something else, something long ago and far away. 

"OK. .. "he was reluctant. "It was a bad time, my grandparents had passed over, I loved my grandfather more than any other living man. I mourned,  and in my mourning I was weak. In the darkness of night, and in my misery and my exhaustion it struck. I half woke from my bed to hear a terrible knocking on my bedroom door, opening it I saw the enemy.  It was seven feet tall, cloaked in black with hot coals for eyes. I retreated back to bed, hid beneath my blanket and damned it back to hell. I damned it and hated it and feared it with all of my soul. I did not wish to die, I did not wish to be lost. I damned it back to hell, and to hell it returned. Exhausted,  I slept, and when I woke again I knew my role, my fate."

"Is it that easy? To banish a demon?" I asked.

"Sometimes,  but not often. We need purity of purpose,  sometimes only the Gods can give that. I'm embarrassed now, let's have another drink, the night is young."

As is the way in the tropics, the sun had set without a moment's notice and the pub became dim. It was quiet, I recall the sound of the barman walking on peanut shells, and the parrot squawking before he slept.

"You said that it attacked you in your sleep, how can you be sure that you were not dreaming? "I asked.

"How can you be sure that you are not dreaming right now?" He replied. 

I had nothing to say.

"Why did you really come here? You didn't come half way round the world to hear a drunken old man telling stories," he said..

"Perhaps,  perhaps not," I replied. "I need advice,  from  someone with experience."

"I'm in no position to give anyone advice, but I have plenty of experience," he took a long drink from his beer, gazed once more across expanses of space and time, then continued. "There was a girl, let's call her Morgana,  it was not her real name, but it's as real as any other name that she was given.

"Morgana had a friend,  and her friend complained of terrifying and unnatural visions in the night, of sleep paralysis, of waking up exhausted. You know the symptoms. After a few weeks,  his housemates took him seriously. Morgana  (being something of a witch, and something far more) tried to assist him. She cleansed his room with sage, and other blessings. It helped for a few days, but it did not hold back the demon for long. It was then that I offered to help her."

"What did you do?" I asked.

“The usual… A blessed hammer and a runic staff, splashes of holy water, prayers and curses. I called on the Gods- Odin and Thor, I believe. I heard, then felt, the presence of the demon. It was right there on the poor fellow’s bed. Smote it with staff and hammer, and sent it back to Hell. ”

“Did it work?”

“It would not be worth talking about otherwise, would it?”

II

They were sat by a fire in the ruins of the castle. Her castle.

He lay down on the grass and allowed the fumes of the potent herb they smoked to flood his mind. The starry sky melted away to reveal the rafters of the hall of her grandfathers. The bonfire smoke mingled with the tunes of minstrels and the clash of horn cups.

“Fey…” a distant voice spoke in welcome or acknowledgement.

The stout wooden rafters shifted and the summer sky returned. He looked across at her, lying next to him on the grass and smiled.

It had only lasted a moment, but it had been real once.  

I I I

"What do men love most in the world?" He once asked me.

"Beer ? Football ? To ride on the open steep, slaughter enemies and  hear the lamentation of their women, or whatever Conan said," I was not in the mood for games.

"No, it is to make love to beautiful women… because men love beauty and they love to make things. The enemy is the opposite,  they love to destroy and they hate beauty," he corrected me.

I thought about this for a while.

"And a wise man once said,  that we cannot save them all, but we can save the pretty ones," he continued. "It is not true, but it's a nice idea."

I thought about that too. I was becoming a bit critical. 

"Have you ever seen the Icelandic fjords in the twilight? " He asked, oblivious to my impatience. 

"No."

"Nor have I,  but I have seen them reflected in a girl's eyes."

"Why don't you tell me something useful? "I snapped. 

"I have been telling you useful things all night. Try to listen."

I think that the heat and dust was bothering me, because I was very intolerant . 

"You are full of shit," I told him.

He looked at me, and seemed much older, more tired.

"I did not invite you here," he reminded me. "You sought me out.  Take what you will or leave."

It was dark outside. From the windows, I heard voices speaking, whispering and shouting in a dozen foreign languages. I suddenly felt very alone.

I apologised and ordered more gin and tonics. 

"What do men hate most of all?"

"Tell me," I was exhausted,  but needed to see the thing through. 

"Weakness.  The enemy is the opposite,  they love weakness and despise  strength. Thus, we use strength against them."

"Tell me about these girls, you talk plenty  about girls but I see a lonely old man, " I wanted to change the subject and to challenge him.

"There were so many, and all so beautiful and wonderful in their own ways, but…" he stopped.

He looked across the room and I followed his eyes to the terrible shadow that creeped in the corner of the room.

"Why don't you deal with that?" He asked me.

Not a question,  or a challenge,  but a test.