Tag: river

Insect Waders on Water (haiku)


On smooth still water

along an ambling current

insect waders skim.

(Image by Artificial Intelligence – to prompt by Paul O’Mahony)

How does an Unbeliever pray?

Not on my knees with head all bound in thorns,
not in a pew prostrate before a god,
not stooped, nor bent, a sinner supplicant,
a poor unworthy man afraid to say:
Like as the eagle soars astride the wind,
like as the river flows from spring to sea,
like as erratic stands upright and firm,
a worthy creature proud to stride the land.

No more a child beset with guilt and shame,
but grown attentive to the joy of light,
humble as dust and underwhelmed by night,
a star that shines and whispers love to all.

We move in prayer, our talent in our verse,
we celebrate in time the universe.

Born in Aleppo



Born in Aleppo 

I come from a small place in between Paris, Nice, and the Hinterland.

I was born in Aleppo. 

I had friends there. 

Some had shoes, 

others rice. 

I don’t know what most survived on.

I was talking to Charlie Hebdo.

He said  ‘you’ll have to laugh your way through all the hail,

you’ll die many times before Aleppo.’

I believed that line. 

There was always a cat,

somewhere,

ready to pounce  

with a hungry mouth.

Cats are drones. 

One of the girls lost her mother to a cat. 

We were all born in Aleppo. 

It’s as if we came from Africa 

drawn to die 

on the bank of the River of Martyrs

before the smiles reached us.