As It Ever Was

Tags

age, As it ever was, creative, Depression, hope, loss, nostalgia, poems, poetry, time, verse, writing

And when at last the dust

That had crept into our eyes and

Scratched its frozen images

Deep within our hearts and minds

Began to fall

Did we find that we had found

All that we were looking for

The prizes and rewards that we

Had promised ourselves

So many lifetimes before?

Or did our vista still contain the

Dreams that we had always known

Were nothing more than that

No more than the pictures that we

Had painted with the hands

Of children fleeing from the night?

And all the promises that we had cast

Like yarrow stalks, now pebbles on the beach

Had given up their secrets to the sea

And washed themselves with the briny tears

That we had shed so freely

Thinking that they would be gone

Spent like the pennies we cherished in

The youth we dreamed away so soon

Before we learned to mourn its death

And let the black sank deep within

A storm that never passed

The ghost of all the days we thought

Would one day come to life

And take our hands

And lead us to all that grew on trees so near

So far from reach

But now through thinly veiled eyes

The scratches fall away

And through the sinking mists we see

All as it ever was.

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2000-2021

Set Free

Tags

Communication, creative, hope, Love, poems, poetry, Set Free, time, verse, writing

And one day all of this will end

And all the pain will go away

The days that in our hands we held

Will take their flight and set us free

And I will watch you rise once more

And hope that you will take my hand

These days we grew within our hearts

Will take us deep into our dreams

And one day all the clouds will clear

And all the things we ever saw

Will shower down before our eyes

These days we hold within our hands.

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2000-2020

Return to Dust

Tags

creative, lyrics, poems, poetry, Relationships, Return to Dust, time, verse, writing

It’s a slow parade

That passes through this town,

Faces hung so low

On every one a frown,

It’s a darker night

Than those we knew before

Still wind still so cold

No breath behind the door.

 

Can’t write the future

Won’t even try,

Can’t change the past

Was born to this,

Came here staring up

Towards the sky,

Soon found my feet

Forgot the kiss.

 

Learned how to wander

Far from the place,

It all began

And how I lost,

My sense of time

My sense of space,

And felt my fire

Turn to frost.

 

Grew so soft inside

A thicker skin,

My wisdom died

Upon the bough,

And those who came

Would not come in,

My amber heart

It kept them out.

 

It’s a slow parade

That passes through this town,

Faces hung so low

On every one a frown,

It’s a darker night

Than those we knew before

Still wind still so cold

No breath behind the door.

 

Can’t write the future

Won’t even try,

Can’t change the past

Was born to this,

Came here staring up

Towards the sky,

Soon found my feet

Forgot the kiss.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2000-2020

 

Shells

Tags

Change, creative, faith, history, Humanity, Life, poems, poetry, Revelation, Shells, thoughts, time, Truth, verse, World, writing

She sells shells from off the beach

Lifts the pennies from their eyes

And then fades away,

Slowly drifting through the crowd

Clothes that cannot mark her time

Whispers in their ears.

 

Hand scratch scars upon her face

Trace the days she never had

Curled upon the ground,

Rock-pool tears that kiss the shore

As the sea calls out her name

Disappears once more.

 

And for awhile we see

All as it’s meant to be

Until we turn away

Back to the world we made

And all the things we see

How we want it to be

A world we’d never change

Or seek to rearrange

 

Angry tides rise up again

Sweep away all that she knew

Kisses on the sand,

Faces lost amongst the clouds

Trapped forever in her box

Buried out at sea.

 

She sells shells from off the beach

Lifts the pennies from their eyes

And then fades away,

Slowly drifting through the crowd

Clothes that cannot mark her time

Whispers in their ears.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2000-2019

 

Alone

Tags

Alone, creative, Life, poems, poetry, time, verse, writing

And the pages turn

And the numbers fade

Like they always have

And they always will

Wiping clean the slates

And erasing words

Hiding the faces

And fading the names

And we all look back

As we always do

Try to see the things

That were never there

And when out of sight

Means we’re out of mind

Did they really mean

Anything at all

If for just one day

We could see it all

Touch the ones we know

See if something’s real

Or just shy away

Like we always do

Afraid to make the move

To hide and die alone.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2000-2019

 

Watching Suns

Tags

age, creative, faith, Life, loss, poems, poetry, Remembrance, Strangers, Sun, time, verse, writing

She sat and watched the suns

Come and go as if they were

Strangers passing on the bitter streets:

A nod, a glance, perhaps a smile.

They rose in the levelled east,

Fought their way to the highs of their days,

Then struggled to climb each obstacle,

The mountains of the west.

She watched from the window

The porch and the gate

As the clock stole the hours,

Spirited them away,

And filed them under ‘lost’.

Emerald vines grew like memories

Creeping slowly over the garden fence,

Tendril-fingers seeping into the grain

Tenderly choking the life unlived.

She watched the marks of the years

Engrave themselves into her hands,

Pathways followed and gone,

And so many dreamed,

Her face the scorched and dried

Map of ages,

Marked, but abandoned before the mark of treasure

Had burned itself into her.

And the suns still came

And the suns still died,

And someone else took her chair.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018

Wooden Pieces

Tags

Communication, conflict, Creative writing, faith, history, Humanity, Life, poems, poetry, politics, Principles, religion, time, verse, writing

Above the birds circled

Silhouette patterns in the sky,

Monochromatic mosaics which shuffled like aging hands

Moving wooden pieces across a board

In some endless game,

Watching, always watching

Waiting for that killer move

That only Time knew

Would never come,

As far below, talking monkeys

Hurled sticks and stones across the fields,

Reached over the seas to tear the rage on others such as them

Moving invisible pieces across a board

As if they had a goal,

Forgetting that they had the gift

Of sound and word and voice,

Turning time upside down

As if it bore the blame,

And still above their sightless heads

The shadows wove designs,

Building plans like those before who came and failed and fell

Moving broken pieces across a board

As if there were a point,

Waiting, always waiting

Til aching wings gave way

Above the spinning rock

As silent Time fell still.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018

 

Waste the Time

Tags

creative, dreams, Life, nostalgia, poems, poetry, time, verse, Waste, writing

What did we do before we had

The time to waste the time,

When every moment seemed so full

Of obligation’s ties,

And commitment pulled us closer

Then swallowed up our days,

When hands were full and red and raw

From dawn to dusk to dawn,

Of all the things we ever made

For lives we never knew,

From pit to fire they came and went

To lay the tracks from now,

And love was just a distant dream

In books and silver screens,

We washed away the dirt of day

And with it all our hope,

So tell me now with hindsight’s eye

When dear time’s time we kill,

What did we do before we had

The time to waste the time?

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018

Kitchen Window

Tags

creative, Life, loss, poems, poetry, time, verse, writing

She stood at the kitchen window

Still her eyes looking out

Over the fields of wheat

Now clothed in concrete and stone

Salt-moist with the days

She had given away

And moments she had sunk

Her tired hands into

Too deep to ever catch the dreams

Which swam in the shallows

Transients in the currents

Which left their lip-stain

On shores she felt that she

Could never reach

Not seeing that they

Like the hours lost

Were nothing more than shark-bait

Driven onto rock-scarred shores

Wishing that the story book tales

Had not been quite so tall

And that true love’s lips had kissed

A promise of truth

That the dragons had left some bridges

For her alone to burn

And that the rainbow had borne

Her happy ending

Still, her eyes looking out

She stood at the kitchen window.

 

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018

Stations

Tags

age, Change, creative, Life, poems, poetry, Stations, time, Transience, verse, writing

Young man stands

Shoulder propped against the pillar

Its concrete cold, harsh, pock-marked

Echoes his mood

Like the burned tar smoke

That spirals like a dragon

From a hand which hangs,

A pendulum weight within the sleeve,

Detached at his side.

The girl waits

Hair scented with expectation

The flower-musk brushed skin

Alight and aglow –

She knows that he will come

And lay his cloak across her fears –

Painted hues of love

Which grow like the wisteria

Around her heart.

A man forgotten by time

The pages of his days

Scattered on the dust

Like flakes of decaying skin

No testament to the things that passed his eyes

And cut their mark into his flesh

Knows that days are numbered

But he no longer counts

As he waits for welcomed arms.

A restaurant doorway

Arms flung wide like a distant aunt

Two lovers embrace

Clinging to the space that grew between them

Remembering it like childhood

Before they squeeze its life away

A moment that they trust

Will hold them in the perfection that they feel

Their private slice of heaven.

And the trains they come

And the trains still leave.

 

© All original writing copyright Chris Nelson 2018