Sea and Shore

‘Why do you tear at
My towers and my turrets,
My walls and my pillars
My barrs and my beach;
And mutter like musings
Of untoward poets,
And scatter your silences
Out of my reach? ’

‘Why do you surge and
Assault in your anger
The fortress I built for
My lady asleep,
And slowly dismiss each
Dispute you remember
By wearing each stone
From the base of the Keep? ’

‘What is the torment that
Claws at the crofters,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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Half-Remembered

We touch things we see not
And know things we know not
And dream of sweet things that
We’ve not set in store,
We say things we think not
And do things we do not
And wonder at wonders
We’ve wondered before.

I see you in shades of
Another life’s colours
Where sweetness and pleasance
And love was the play,
Where green was the colour
You wore to the wedding
That bound me to see where
Your loveliness lay.

And wild was the country
We took for our mansion,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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Aftermath

We overplayed and underplayed our parts
And paid the price; we went our separate ways
For me to think of you, and you of me
Some part of all our long and restless days.
For what advantage? We may never know,
We cloud each other's vision at the hearth,
I loved you well, but love was not enough
We neither paused to give the other breath.

Like people trapped behind the moving screen
We both replay our scenes, we freeze each frame
Of shrugs, of nuance, words of lost intent
We blurted out in anger all the same.
But anger rests, and now there's only loss
As keen for me as you, I must confess
If I could still regain the way I came -
But mist and chill obscure our waywardness.

We charmed and chafed each other in our turn,
We stormed and raged, and whispered words of love,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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The Eclipse

‘My thoughts are often consumed by death
And the dark side of the Moon, '
I said to Jane as she sensed my pain
On that Sunday afternoon,
We'd sat through the morning sermon
Of the Tempting on the Mount,
‘The Devil is often abroad, ' she said,
‘More times than we can count! '

‘Yet God is the infinite mystery,
He never has shown himself,
He doesn't swoop down to rescue us
Or curb the excess of wealth! '
I said there were so many questions
That had led me into doubt,
But Jane, the waif, had a simple faith
And she turned me inside out.

‘Look at the trees and bushes here
And the way they propagate,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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The Farmer's Wife

‘Why the commotion now, my love?
You cry at the breaking dawn,
The dog's asleep in his kennel still
Though the cock has crowed for the morn;
The birds have stirred in the branches there
Of the willow, out by the lake,
Why do you weep, and cry, and mourn
Before you're even awake? '

‘What became of the silence we
Enjoyed in the days gone by,
When a simple glance was enough romance
And we lay, looked up at the sky.
When a whispered word that I barely heard
Would sound from your own sweet lips,
As my hand reached out to relieve your doubt,
Caressing your fingertips? '

‘I must get out to the barley field,
The sheep are starting to lamb,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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What Happened to the Day?

'My child, what is that sound I hear
That rush of many feet,
I hear the people gathering
Tumultuous in the street,
I hear the people shouting
But I can't hear what they say,
The sun begins to set, my child,
What happened to the day? '

'I well remember waking, it
Was such a glorious dawn,
The clouds splashed red and tumbling
From Dante's palette born;
The clouds so red, it hurt my eyes
I had to look away,
Why look you so forlorn, my child,
What happened to the day? '

My memory has failed once more,
Again, it's taken wing,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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Dark Angels

Their shadows stir and mutter
But too low for you to hear,
They often lapse in silence, when
A group of you appear,
They hunch down in their hoodies
Or they mix with the elite,
It's hard to tell the goodies
From Dark Angels in the street!

They populate street corners
Sell their poisons down the line,
They wait for you in alleyways,
Give in, and you'll be fine,
Their friends are dressed in uniforms
With batons, on patrol,
But ready cash backhanders see them
Under their control!

They have no moral compass
And in that, they're not alone,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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A Lover's Verse

A sylph is passing my threshold stair,
Drifting her fragrance through the vine,
Promising dreams of a never-could-be
From the loss and the lapse of a former time.

She finds me adrift in a restless sleep
Alone at the reins of a phantom hearse,
She plants a kiss upon either cheek
'A gift, ' she says, 'from the universe.'

I try to wake, but she hushes me
And lays my hand on her silken thigh,
'Your words have won you a sweet respite
From the pains of the death in life, ' she sighs.

'I come to you from the Lords of Life
To offer you more than you thought enough.'
My lips are restless and seek her breasts
As she sips from my silver stirrup cup.

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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You Were Only Talking...

It's four o'clock in the morning,
No sleep for me this night,
I sit on the cold verandah,
And watch for a chink of light;
The wind howls round about me
The moon's not raised its head,
And you are out there walking,
Walking,
Walking,
And you are out there walking,
When you should have been in bed!

I'm shivering in the darkness,
It's colder than the crypt,
The rain that passed right over
Left puddles, where it dripped
My mind sets off to wonder
Why life should be so grim…
You said that you were talking,
Talking,

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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Sandcastles

While sifting through old photographs
Of childhood, black and white,
I came across a scene that stirred
My memory, overnight,
Three children by a sandcastle,
The finest ever made,
My sister, me and Hazel,
Made with bucket, and with spade,
With towers, crenellations
And surrounded by a moat,
The sand was dry, the tide was out
It stood there proud, remote.

Though sixty years have passed since then,
That camera shutter's sight
Caught just one random moment in
An afternoon's delight,
It froze that moment of our lives,
That castle on the sand,
And though the tide swept in that day

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poem by David Lewis Paget
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