Pause

Pause

 

On a broken wing it flutters down
Cold, dismal, and pain-distraught
With wings of hope forever flown.
A quick look, a second thought-
That tiny pause.
Should kindness begin?
But Why?  I don’t even know him.

Leathered skin hangs loose on bone
From a hand stretched pleadingly
For a hand out, even acceptance alone.
A bother, I wave away impatiently.
Not a pause.
For another one can fill his tin
Cause, I don’t even know him.

Three times on that day was denied,
The one who healed and promised life.
His own belied, running away terrified.  
More than an ear lost at the end of a knife.
A little pause -
Before Peter cried over the din
“Why. I don’t even know him”.

Arms stretched out, opened with grace
Generous, comforting and warm
To the bird, beggar or thief an embrace
For the repentant, never a deal drawn.
That little pause,
Not once to any, however great their sin
Nor those misused words “I don’t know him.

The Fireman

He hears the house quietly plotting
Fire doused, fuming an acrid smell
The heat and smoke are choking
His job is to seek the living in hell

His breath labored, gets heavier
Clouds the glass on his face mask
Wet with sweat and dripping water
Fears the fires not had its last laugh

When flame to a fire gives breath
Vipered tongues lash out in disdain.
Like the eyes of man and death
Gomorrah’s fire ever more still claims

The quiet is what worries him in there
Alone among many, with madness itself
To save another is his duty, his care
But today, will he be able to save himself?

Every child he rescues is his daughter
Every house on fire is all his own
With the love to save another
The Fireman, his life disowns.

The graveyard climbers

There stands Mr Redy
At the edge of his boundary
Surveying further lands and trees
 He smiles, for in the distance he sees...

 More land covered with plants, trees and rock.
Why, that also can be mine, to himself, he thought
Bigger I’ll grow and more I can find,
 To the edge of the horizon all will be mine
               all will be mine, all will be mine.

 But to his little wish there was a problem little,
 For between that land and his; weed and periwinkle
Grew in that little plot -the village graveyard.
The silence of death lay just a few steps forward.

 But this would not deter his insistent dream.
Greed had stretched itself for more lands to glean.
Wealthier I’ll grow and more I‘ll be refined,
 Beyond that skyline all will be mine,
                           all will be mine, all will be mine. 


With his claim on paper he climbs that little wall
And strays through weed, through the living that fall.
Climbers that straddle dead stones pull him away
Caution, the future is bleak for those who stray.

There lies Mr Redy
Stretched out and still needy
For that land he wanted and so loved afore,
But unfortunately, the graveyard loved him more.