poems and paints 2012
DESCRIPTION
Poetry and paintings chapbookTRANSCRIPT
Still Waters
2012 collection
Stephanie Spiers
Rising Brook Writers
e-PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR The right of S M SPIERS to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 & 78 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 I painted all the pictures, I wrote all the poems.
First Edition 2012
Cover picture:
Oil on cardboard
Still Waters
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Stephanie Spiers
2012 Collection
Rising Brook Writers
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4
oil on canvas **
Still Waters
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A Drum: A Big Drum!
When my time is come
I want . . .
no old frauds wailing in embroidered sashes,
no medieval mumbo-jumbo,
no part-time taxi drivers picking their noses,
no gritty-fingered sandboxes,
no trolling out of superstitious belief systems
which have been long superseded
as irrelevant.
No, I want a drum!
A big drum,
banging loud
to shout
this unbearable suffering is over.
Then leave me quiet
with the good earth above and below
and squirrels, field mice and rabbits for company.
Dec 2008 after a funeral service
Rising Brook Writers
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6
oil on canvas ***
Still Waters
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A Price Too High (Carers’ Rap)
When the price demanded by love is too high,
long days - short days - years passing by,
Carers holdfast: taking up the slack,
sleeves rolled up, they’re on their jack.
Unqualified nurses’ demanded sacrifice.
‘Try more tea dear, come on be nice!’
Teetering on the edge of personal abyss,
Wailing inside, keening for what they miss.
With no let up on the morrow,
just another day of toil and sorrow.
Slogging hard from early light,
at every frustration and another fight.
Carers always die first, statistics show
worn out, defeated, always on the go.
While unburdened, the ‘cared for one’
happily lives on and on and on and on.
Not ‘Voluntary’ work! Just unpaid.
Bowed and broken: nerves shot and frayed.
Shattered, living on a different planet,
Every sacrificial hour tested to the limit.
Caring isn’t a choice, it’s not a ‘vocation’.
There’s no chance of a fat promotion,
no direct lines of communication.
No-one sane signs up for tribulation.
Without respite, without let up,
day in, day out. Over-spilling cup,
losing their own life’s inner beauty,
caught on a spiral of love and duty.
Rising Brook Writers
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Ink and pencil sketch
Still Waters
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Heritage: Going . . . Going . . . GONE!
They’ve ceased discussing History,
in the red-brick university.
The Bard’s ‘To be or not to be?’
too non-PC, apparently.
If bearded undergraduate don’t hear of every past mistake,
and lessons learn, and errors make,
burning midnight oil when eyes do ache,
so canst appreciate verily true from tawdry fake.
The board of sage Dons from on high
determined in wisdom: ‘But Why Oh Why?’
Leaving dusty tomes sleeping long years to lie
unopened! Fragile heritage for sure will slowly die!
No more Henry! No more Bess!
Forgotten Cromwell, and all his mess.
Cousin Mary’s gone too, and all head-less,
but I never liked her anyway! Must confess!
2009
Rising Brook Writers
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10
oil on canvas ***
Still Waters
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Blue shirt with a white collar
The day we met you wore a midnight blue shirt
with a white collar and a striped silk tie.
I was captivated by your brown-velvet voice,
smooth as butter-cream, vowels melting,
baritone slow, oozing concern, sincere and caring.
I fell in to trouble deep within, in that moment
of clarity, acknowledging a need for solace.
But, looking back that was half-a-lifetime ago
when the blood stirred and blossom was on the tree.
Before the loss of an innocent.
Before rejection and declining second-best,
before weary years of non-commitment.
Before that absolute betrayal.
Before the shame of shared denial
as others intervened leaving their mark.
Without a battle, without a shout,
you and I slipped through each others‟ fingers
leaving behind only a catalogue of regret
and no hope for a happy ever after.
June 2009
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12
oil on canvas board
Still Waters
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Ariel Hierarchy
Rated „Poor man‟ of nobility,
on the cusp the Tercel stands,
while Sparrow Hawk is tranquillity,
tithed priest o‟er all their lands.
Servant of all and yet false knave,
overseer Kestrel on high flies,
sentinel messenger to the brave,
for those who‟ll listen to his lies.
Lanner sits beneath the salt,
„Bring succour Lanneret,‟ the lowly squire.
Aloof Gerfalcon stands beyond fault,
regale the monarch hailed by choir.
Proud Peregrine envies all,
Bastard Hawk shares in conspiracy.
Earls and their Barons watch the falls,
o‟ the hooded and belled aristocracy.
Rising Brook Writers
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Pencil sketch
Still Waters
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Jupiter Ascending
Winter comes:
thoughts turn evermore to death.
The good light is gone.
Depression hovers in the eaves,
fog lingers on the leaves.
Heavy dewfall on grass stays all day.
Leaves fade to gold and russet: a debt to pay.
Jupiter is leaving, ascending in the night sky
trailing its moons: visible to the naked eye.
October threatens, arriving with umbrellas.
Flooding and misery follow in its wake.
Cut back the brambles, grub up the marrows.
Candle the pumpkins, store the windfalls, make
haste. Chop logs. Light the fires.
2010
Rising Brook Writers
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16
Pencil and oil pastel sketch
Still Waters
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Blighted Blighty
Do dim green light bulbs really work
or are we all going blind in gloomy-murk?
Is veggie salad really ever a trend setter,
swapping cheesy burgers for rocket and feta?
When a wobbly size 22 is now the norm
and cross-your-heart bras are going down a storm.
Turn off standby: what a joke
whoever came up with that one was a bloke!
Spent chip fat running bespoke four-by-fours
how long before oil-conversion‟s on statute laws?
Melting arctic glaciers not much fun „tis true
nor congestion charges to clear air that‟s blue,
but, if solar panels would catch the sun,
why are they so pricy? Sort it out! Come on!
„n if rooftop copper heats up cold water
didn‟t we, shouldn‟t we, really aughta
have pipes slapped up on the roof of every home
as ubiquitous as a garden gnome?
Blue bins, green bins, purple bins and brown
mar street corners in every town.
Pavement junk-food debris rots amidst vomit stains
and removing chewing gum defies the best of brains.
Plastic boxes and cardboard cartons pile up high
a mountain of rubbish, rises, kissing the sky
as landfill sites finally give up the ghost
the stink of corruption drifts breezily off the coast.
Ahhh . . . to be leaving England‟s
green(ish) unpleasantly smelling land.
Eco-Warriors are right; bless their all-seeing eyes,
a kick in the pants would pull us down to size!
Stop griping and bitching and pulling faces,
get off lazy butts and stop scratching places
unseen by others
except by girlfriends, or our mothers,
for England Expects - so heed the call
and switch that light off in the hall . . . March 2009
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18
watercolour on canvas
Still Waters
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Control : Alt : Delete
The road to oblivion
is milestoned by selective memory.
The knack of targeting
negative recollection hard to acquire.
The gift of non-recall
a boon on the slide of decline.
If only transgression and trespass
could be wiped from conscious thought.
If only error and omission could
be erased from the personal data store
by control : alt : delete . . .
15 June 2009
Rising Brook Writers
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20
oil on board — work in progress**
Still Waters
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Billynomates
Scruffy and smelly
that‟s Billynomates
Red-rimmed eyes and hungry belly
that‟s Billynomates
Nits and an un-ironed shirt
that‟s Billynomates
Deep inside hold all the hurt
that‟s Billynomates
Black eye and runny nose
that‟s Billynomates
Arms on desk: a short doze
that‟s Billynomates
Dirty socks and no PE kit
that‟s Billynomates
Punching and scrapping: another hit
that‟s Billynomates
Scratching, scratching: ever thinner
that‟s Billynomates
No dinner money, no dinner
that‟s Billynomates
No school trip: no swimming fees
that‟s Billynomates
No shoelaces, dirty knees
that‟s Billynomates
No knickers nor vest
that‟s Billynomates
Missing the Sats tests
that‟s Billynomates
Mum‟s drunk, dad‟s gone
that‟s Billynomates
Childhood dragging on and on
that‟s Billynomates
April 2011
Rising Brook Writers
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22
Pencil and pastel sketch
Still Waters
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Web Eye
There‟re two WebCams broadcasting live from Market
Square,
voyeurs in Iceland and Japan can gaze at matchstick-men
who stand and stare.
on the web of waves. Who‟s watching these huddles of
faceless folks:
kissing in the rain; late and running; walking slow and
telling jokes?
Every twenty seconds. Flick, flick, and a hypnotic scene
change,
our life, yours and mine, ticking relentlessly by that all-
seeing static range:
looking south towards Eastgate Street and County Cham-
bers,
and then north west across the square – but who‟ll
remember?
Who will care?
It can‟t happen here
It can‟t happen here
2009
Rising Brook Writers
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24
oil on board ***
Still Waters
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Stafford Common - Sunday Morning Car Boot –
(Dedicated to the Sunday morning heroes out in all
weathers)
Littered with the detritus of other people‟s lives
each wonky table a kaleidoscope of memory:
toys a baby threw from its pram
being traded to buy baguettes of ham.
Schoolboys with a come-and-buy look in their eye,
desperate for old Ted to morph into a warrior guy
Polish, Urdu, French and Shelta voices mingle and fade
into the melting pot of common trade.
A bargain is struck over a handshake
by the proud new owner of a „vintage‟ rake
no doubt made in Taiwan last week
with knock-off DVDs: well worth a peek!
Roly-poly mothers haggle over second-hand shoes
crushing buniony toes into phony Jimmy Choos.
Sad stick-thin girls with pushchairs and straggly locks
counting the pennies for ice-creams and chocs.
Chipped and sorry, a flying Beswick duck all on its own,
and two rows further on another waits sadly alone,
and right at the end on row twenty three,
for just 50p,
the tiniest duck to reunite all the three.
July 2009
Rising Brook Writers
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26
oil on board
Still Waters
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Without Closure
Uncle George disappeared,
gone without a trace.
His mother fretted when Grandpa
died
and George didn‟t show his face
at the funeral.
Uncle George, mother‟s brother
always a bit of a lad.
Had a family bust up in ‟53,
in hindsight Ma thought it sad,
with him vanishing.
Leaving all his friends behind,
abandoning his mom and dad.
Broken hearted Gran went next,
all her hopes and dreams went
bad:
no consolation.
Even his sister felt the loss
despite a lifetime of sibling nag.
Georgy porgy; short trousers
grazed knees playing on the slag
heap from the pot bank.
„Whose moon is it?‟
He‟d ask from the coal shed roof.
„Full of draft questions,‟
said our Peachy, her voice aloof
but tears threatening.
Peachy never gave up hope
one day he‟d get in touch.
Always jumped at every knock,
anxiety blighted her life so much:
was he murdered?
What fate had befallen George?
Bonny black-eyed Irish youth
full of trouble and wild schemes,
a ronk „un and that‟s the truth,
but so missed.
2010
Rising Brook Writers
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28
oil on canvas board ***
Still Waters
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December Drowning
Through life now she wanders lonely:
trudges, brought low, along streets and
passing bright houses,
where never once a friendly face peers out.
No kindly host, no golden saviour.
Under leaden skies, beneath bus shelters,
she cowers shivering. Dithers in the rain.
Continuous bombardment by cares that hammer
and beat with every blow.
Worries stretched in never-ending thud
along the margins of every hour of every day.
Ten thousand queuing in a dance,
tossing inside her every dreamscape.
Shopping trolley, abandoned by taxi rank,
too cold to wait longer. Wanders away. Unloved.
Shouting voices inside her leer.
Inadequate. Inadequate. Inadequate.
Oh, for the quiet bliss of solitude:
tempting, dark glass-still waters beckon.
2010
Rising Brook Writers
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30
oil on canvas
Still Waters
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Latch Key Kids
Latch key kids against the wall,
blow on their hands, watch snow fall.
Rough bricks rub against their backs
cold, wet flakes soak their packs.
Red raw faces, remote and steadfast,
sodden salt crisps their only breakfast.
Lads with trousers holed at the knee,
loud girls huddle, two and three.
Legs so thin, knees so huge,
matted hair washed by the deluge.
Drops blinked by a deep, sad eye,
with grief remembered, youth gone by.
1996
oil on canvas
Rising Brook Writers
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32
oil on board
Still Waters
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Arreverderci Sorrento 1980
Lacrima Christi! The Tears of Christ.
A full bodied red; ripened and matured in oak
with an age of its keeping.
Red, red wine.
Deep as the reflections on a glass smooth lake,
as the setting sun turns the world to gold
before it says good-night.
Born on the slopes of Vesuvius, its latent fire
explodes on the tongue in a quick violence of sensation,
only to as quickly die exhausted and spent,
given over to weeping.
A pure expression of emotion, pulled from lava-blackened
soil,
dragged through sun-burnt vines to the swelled and
bursting grape.
Lacrima Christi doesn‟t travel well outside The Bay
of Napoli
without a spilling of its tears.
2006
Rising Brook Writers
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34
oil on canvas board — work in progress**
Still Waters
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Freecycle: The Old Gates
Scrap metal. Lying in the hedge. Skeletal.
Wrought iron. Wider than a man‟s height.
A resource for canine confinement:
our dog laughed and jumped over
from a sit. Long gone now.
Hard to paint. Too many curls and curlicues.
Airforce blue. Sprayed. Made such a mess.
more on the concrete and the broad
leaves than on the uprights.
Sad reminders of happier times.
Given away: saved from landfill
to start a new life with a young family
to keep their dog in, apparently ...
2010
Rising Brook Writers
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36
oil on canvas ***
Still Waters
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Veteran: Homeless
Forgive his trespasses,
dwell not on fault and lapses:
enduring in an oblivion of silence,
soaked in sin, a tired broken hero.
Bottle‟s constant friend: scarred warrior,
battered against life‟s shore.
Caring of his dispersed brood.
Weeping much, giving of his best.
Penniless and giving of his all.
Deprived and asking nothing in return:
held in low regard:
loving, giving, caring, kind.
Let of this be our memory.
2010
Rising Brook Writers
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38
oil on canvas board
Still Waters
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oil on canvas board
Of Daughters: Past, Present & Future Perfect
She, the only one true, who is lost:
deserted by and gone
beyond, to a place unknown.
She, one step away, who avoids:
distressed and damaged
beyond redemption, stays away.
She, in-law, who is still to come:
wary and afraid,
uncertain and jealous without reason.
She, blood of blood, long awaited:
renewed and perfect,
lineage continued. The wheel turns.
November 2008
Rising Brook Writers
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40
oil on canvas board
Still Waters
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I hope you have enjoyed this wander
through some of
my poems and paintings.
If you have ever fancied picking up a brush,
or writing a poem,
it is never too late to start.
There is everything to gain
and nothing to lose.
Some of these pictures have been
commissioned**, some
have been on show via
Stafford Art Group Exhibitions***
or at various local outlets
including the County Show Ground.
I also have a blog and a poetry column
“Got the T-shirt”
at www.openwriting.com
All the poems included here have been
published previously elsewhere.
Thank you for taking an interest.
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oil on canvas board