Archive for the ‘Adrian Mitchell’ category

In My Two Small Fists

Posted December 26th, 2011

In My Two Small Fists

in that bright blue summer
I used to gather
daisies for my father
speedwell for my mother

with buttercups
and prickly heather
cowrie shells
and a seagull’s feather

treasures in each fist
all squashed together
daisies for my father
speedwell for my mother

(that’s how I see it
but I don’t know
if it really happened
[...]

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Playground

Posted August 22nd, 2011

This poem was written durting the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Playground

dark brown eyes
scanning dusty tarmac
a boy on a swing

head down
mouth humming
a boy swinging intensely

before dusk he must go
to his grandmother’s house
on the edge of the city

alone on [...]

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A Flying Song

Posted December 2nd, 2010

A Flying Song

Last night I saw the sword Excalibur
It flew above the cloudy palaces
And as it passed I clearly read the words
Which were engraven on its blade
And one side of the sword said Take Me
The other side said Cast Me Away

I met my lover in a field of thorns
We walked together in the April air
And [...]

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In My Two Small Fists

Posted March 30th, 2010

In My Two Small Fists

in that bright blue summer
I used to gather
daisies for my father
speedwell for my mother

with buttercups
and prickly heather
cowrie shells
and a seagull’s feather

treasures in each fist
all squashed together
daisies for my father
speedwell for my mother

(that’s how I see it
but I don’t know
if it really happened
[...]

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Elephant Eternity

Posted August 26th, 2009

Elephant Eternity

Elephants walking under juicy-leaf trees
Walking with their children under juicy-leaf trees
Elephants elephants walking like time

Elephants bathing in the foam-floody river
Fountaining their children in the mothery river
Elephants elephants bathing like happiness

Strong and gentle elephants
Standing on the earth
Strong and gentle elephants
Like peace

Time is walking under elephant trees
Happiness is bathing in the elephant river
Strong gentle peace is [...]

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Playground

Posted August 7th, 2009

This poem was written durting the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Playground

dark brown eyes
scanning dusty tarmac
a boy on a swing

head down
mouth humming
a boy swinging intensely

before dusk he must go
to his grandmother’s house
on the edge of the city

alone on [...]

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Life Is a Walk Across a Field

Posted July 8th, 2009

Life is a Walk Across a Field

This is the opposite of the Russian proverb, Life is not a walk across a field, which is the last line of Boris Pasternak’s poem Hamlet.

Life is a walk across a field
sometimes a golden dreamdrift of polished petals
and daisies bouncing among the hummocks of moss
which guide an infant river [...]

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William Blake says: Everything that Lives is Holy

Long live the Child
Long live the Mother and Father
Long live the People

Long live this wounded Planet
Long live the good milk of the Air
Long live the spawning Rivers and the
mothering Oceans
Long live the juice of the Grass
and all the determined greenery of the Globe

Long live [...]

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