On Guard

The young
cannot believe that the old
were young
once.

The old
have quite forgotten
that the young
were once old.

Danger
comes from the worlds,
from the heavens,
from the hells.

Danger comes
through the sense doors.

Danger comes
to the body

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Great Men

But really you see there weren’t any great at all.
Those may not have stumbled,
heads high, walked tall,
filling the silence where others mumbled.
But words fail
skulls fall.

And before?
Before, they could taste, smell,
see, tell,
bore.
No different from you and me.
This is the way the world comes in
- unless you see the blood spilt
it’s only hearsay.

Greatness.
We have held a glass
over the antics
of a certain class

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Herakleitos I

Entendu! Understood!
One cannot step
into the same river twice.
Fresh waters
are eternally
rushing in.
Who passed this way?
And when?

Wait!
Pond river ocean
all are filled
with eternal waters.
In tasting these,
is Liberation not found?

And yet the ancient Dragon sits
in a dried out rock pool
singing for rain!
She has burned her lover's letters.

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Flowers Of The Human Spirit

A woman looks up
from her place among the dirt and pollution
of Silom Road and joins
her palms together in salutation.

Someone has put two one-baht coins
in her plastic cup
(without looking at her face) .

One hundred yards away,
The British Club is going to cool
their swimming pool
with ice for a Polar swim
at 11a.m. on New Year's Day.
'Free of charge. Free hot mulled wine.'
(There is a double crash barrier
with uniformed security guards
to protect would-be polar swimmers.)

At the Bangkok Motor Show,

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Kathleen

'Going out there is no other
coming back there is no trace'.
Love and care for one another,
Smooth the sadness from her face.

Like Orestes how she travels!
Light-foot ever, onward roams;
as the skein of life unravels,
everywhere she makes her homes.

Loves she keeps in golden cages,
(LOVE she smiles at from afar) ,
turns (with smiles) her golden pages
(climbs her grass blade to her star) .

Still the sadness does not leave her
though she smiles and smiles again
and her gladness like a fever
is shadowed round with wisps of pain.

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Upekkha

Looking with dispassion,
with equanimity,
doesn't it shine brighter than a thousand suns?
The broken wing,
the severed finger,
the uncompleted life
'the smyler with the knife'
the smell of fear
spirochaetes, viruses and germs
and the ever-chewing sepulchral worms?

And don't we see a thousand times and more
that what we build and try to hold in place
disintegrates, vanishes without trace?
And what we hoard up
and try to store
provides a breeding ground for rats?

And this which is the Past
is also Evermore?

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Sic Transeunt Tempora

Pushing up,
amongst rust-brown
and green furze,
glowing blue from within,
Michaelmas daisies
(who know nothing of Michael – nor his mass) .

But now, as the earth spins
in a darker, colder, windier orbit,
their leaves are brittle-green,
or hang like red spears
waiting to fall
and take their place
in next year’s compost.

Dry flower-heads
shrink in on themselves.
Like old men,
in extra large overcoats
tensing into scarves

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Raising The Dead

Because I cared,
I kept my friends alive
bathed in the light
of the good times we had shared.
But going back to compare
the in-between times too, I see
they have given up the fight
(together with the good times we had shared) .
Even the ones who still breathe!
(Especially the ones who still breathe) .

It wasn’t old Mortality
that carried them away.
They just seem to have slid into senility
and let their hearts decay.

They have accepted the walls
constructed for old age
with a semi-serious intention
for a senior citizen’s pension

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Unfinished

A face half in shadow
in the gallery;
sudden silence
among the guests,
candlelit at the long table below.

Girls
serving sherbet
in the caravanserai.
Before the whirlwind
in the sandstorm's eye
tears up the desert.

A severed head
and the black mask of the executioner
on Tower Hill.

Broken masts and torn sails
sliding
beneath the waves

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!

Calculations

Space you measure in feet and inches
and shoes by where your big toe pinches;
seasons by cherry, rose and snow,
when may comes and swallows go:
empires by rise and fall of kings;
weather by rain and drought and flood;
dead trees by whether the dragon sings
flowers by when they seed and bud.

But how do you measure silence?
Or the space between two thoughts?
Or the point where forces balance?
Or the product of two noughts?
Or where the shadows fade to
when the sun sinks in the west?
Or how your deeds are weighed you
as your life drifts into rest?

Houses go from stone to dust.
The builder is himself undone.

[...] Read more

poem by Brian Taylor
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!