(See main page for bio)
Index of poems:
- Daddy
- Daddy (2)
- Eve
- I Love
- On walking out on a ledge high on the side of a mountain
- Pierrot
- Solstice
Sated at my mother’s breast I would dream through the milky afternoon But sharp at four thirty I would cry out piteously Knowing you would come And take me in your arms Soothe me at the time of my awakening. Bright light of my intellect Tugging at my heart strings Clever you … A twist of your finger Inside a doll’s armpit, A limb miraculously restored. You confused me With the flashing cacophony Of your brilliant chaos We collided, sparks, dark blue and silver. I remember The first time my embrace was resisted. We chapped each other Hurled abuse, dug up dirt Paralysed with pent-up emotion I shyed from your touch, But once You put your hand on my shoulder And the dam of love burst A wracking torment of tears. Remember when we shopped together? And stopped for a drink We talked and talked But always towards the end Your shutters snapped shut With sarcastic finality.
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My Daddy ran away A long time ago Tore past the loneliness tree Down the disappearing path Lost in a labyrinth of idiosyncrasy. Tucked up I wait for my bed-time story.Back to top
Eve soughed down on her haunches Her mouth stretched in a primeval grimace And breathed life into her sweet man. But wished she had sprung From the warm pulsing life Of his side Laughing uncomplicated man.Back to top
I Love
© Annette Armstrong, April 1990
The longing is on me Is love by me Oh God, the longing for you Is upon me Is love by me The longing, the ache For the touch, the feel of you on me Is love by me The gliding silk of your limbs Upon me and in me Is love by me, is love The man does be taking my love The longing for what is to come Is upon me And the ache for what is long gone Is love by me, is love by me Yes, the man does be taking my love.Back to top
On walking out on a ledge high on the side of a mountain *
© Annette Armstrong 4/6/05
* Featured again this month as we have
the video recital - see link under this poem
I am a bird, a falcon, winging in the currents of the air: as complex
As the streams and sub streams, the mapping of seas, and all known to me;
Feathers fluttering flat at my neck now, I see me, golden eyed, speckled,
Sharp: with mastery and gliding power in my wholly opened wingspan.
Over forests banked green on green, bright, and clearly delineated patches
Of dark, opening out on a snaking thread of silver,
Sister River runs with me
Taliesin says:
“I am a serpent in the river. I am love.”
Words swoop away from me in fluid light.
We speak differently from up here.
Click image for video...
just under 1MB, WMV file
Pierrot
© Annette Armstrong, May 1982
The first time we went to Richmond We sat in a pub And I said I would paint a picture in two frames: The first, pristine black and white Pierrot bending over a shiny black box With a golden key. The second Suffused with light Box open Yellow butterfly Set free And you knew. The second time You kissed me in the car And said the times you liked the best Were when you had me to yourself. Sitting on river steps We kissed and kissed We felt like one Now it has gone Imprints fade in the wet sand Of your memory I have lost my lover For ever. The lookalike I pass in the corridor Is a sham A changeling The faeries have snatched my man.
At the zero hour I am not. No thing I But - a softness in her eye As she falls to Rise again with His blinding joy streaming light inside her Midnight, and I am silent among shining stars Of infinite possibility. Dawn. Out there They wait White-robed in The cold grey light Swords in a Circle of stone In here I hold to the warm, Shivers waving over Membrane and bone, In vain I resist Life’s pull And uncurling From circle to straight line, I take aim and fire into the morn. Now, in the fullness of time At the height of the light I stand straight and strong And radiate In the noon-day sun No shadow at my heal No darkness in my soul I utter with tongue of fire And hear with ear of love. I am a soldier of light With torch raised brow high Ready in this moment To die into the sun. (Written for the Summer Solstice ceremonies, Stonehenge 1999. Of the three ceremonies, if midnight represents conception time; dawn is birth; and noon, true adulthood when we are revealed fully and cast no shadow.)
