by Joe Winter | Jun 1, 2020 | Song for Saraswati, Poems
At a University LectureBlack the air black black with chimney-insideand the inside of a hundred heaven-hungry heads of hair –the light is thin, attractive, but the mind is for the mind –health’s wholeness never is held by heart-speech here –suddenly aware of...
by Joe Winter | Jun 1, 2020 | Song for Saraswati, Poems
Pro-LifeAs God’s presence in the churchthe human in the womb.The tall arches, high windows, fine pillarsrebound with light.Is it inconvenient?Find the needle then,kill it offand crush its skullbefore it is let out into the...
by Joe Winter | Jun 1, 2020 | Song for Saraswati, Poems
At a School ServiceSomewhere outside the situation of a roomof chairs in rows and the figures of people elaborating a riteis somewhere where it all makes sense: the halting formulas,the rigid wooden lectern, the exact procession of steps and clothes,all that makes a...
by Joe Winter | Jun 1, 2020 | Song for Saraswati, Poems
A Note for Jenifer I met you some twelve years agoin Northwood; you were awkward, shyand cheerful. In mid-twenties I,befamilied round; you too were so.But you had not a soul in tow. Your father, mother, brother seemedupon a continent apart.My wife, child, I were off...
by Joe Winter | Jun 1, 2020 | Song for Saraswati, Poems
Fifth Birthdayfor D.From the black earth came tumbling daffodilsand apple-leaf came to deck the dark woodso did your birthday come today for mefrom the small questioning bird a jabbering songor a simple piano tune from a child’s small fingersso did your birthday...
by Joe Winter | Jun 1, 2020 | Song for Saraswati, Poems
In the Churchyard Last century and this, the grey chafed stone of people’s graves, the ribbons and the flowers on newer ones, the old left on their own, the thoughts they symbolise, the distant hours when many were as now, and many too have come to visit, see one laid...
