May you walk into your future
with a flower by your side.
May you step on stones of life
with joy within your shoes.
As a heron stands in the rushing river
may you weave your web with care
Between branches of your tale,
there is mystery round your corner
in the maze that is to come.
As you taste fragrance from the breeze,
may the wisdom in your heart
breathe beyond your deep blue sky
an old branch fallen
submerged in river water
aging, gracefully
Rain falls – a stream born
Poetry flows past a rock
Fresh ink on a page
On smooth still water
along an ambling current
insect waders skim.
(Image by Artificial Intelligence – to prompt by Paul O’Mahony)
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
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.
From Bath to Cork with baby Grace 