Sandcastles

I watched them heap the peach coloured sand with care, with love. It was only a small mound. They patted it into shape with long, elegant, starved fingers, leaving ridges down its sides as if it had been turned out of a jelly mould.

He stood first, leaning with great weariness on his staff, the hot wind catching his torn robes. She remained crouched, keening, singing a lullaby, crying. Then, exhausted, she stood as well. Beneath the hot sun they said one last prayer over the grave of their baby and began the long walk back to the feeding station, picking their way with care between the myriad rows of tiny sandcastles.

The hot wind continued to blow, smoothing, wearing, grain by grain by grain…

Traveller

I discovered
a time machine
travelled back
and saw you sitting
beneath that tree
went searching for
my mum and dad
caught nothing more
than a fleeting glimpse of
their childhood

saw unicorn
and grace and belle
sunshine moments
framed forever
half forgotten

there are places
it will not take me
places where
I must use
my own resources

I stood a long while
upon the lake shore
by the house boat
saw distinctly the sapphire flash
was overwhelmed by the smell
of sandalwood and rose oil
overwhelmed by
tears

decades traversed
in a few twilight hours
the journey ended where it started
with a handful of photographs
in a box
my time machine

I have been

I have been in many shapes:
I have been a needle in the gun;
I have been a plane in the air;
I have been a shining brow;
I have been a book in a head;
I have been a victory in war;
I have been a flame in the darkness;
I have been a voice for the mute;
I have journeyed as a moonbeam;
I have been a queen of the lake;
I have been a feather in a merlin’s wing;
I have been a word in a spell;
I have been a tear in the eye;
I have been the string of a harp;
I have been enchanted for a year in the light of stars.
There is nothing in which I have not been.