Poetry

All poems are published works under copright of the author. Please ask permission before sharing.

...

I Wish You...

I wish you an African morning,
I wish you an Eden land.
Ivory grasses spread at your feet,
thorn trees and copper sand.
Where the first cool moments of dawning
are scorched by the bright sun’s birth,
and molten horizons miraged by the heat
quiver above the earth.


I wish you an African sunset,
I wish you a sky on fire.
A thousand red blood-glow horizon
of the day’s passed funeral pyre.
Where the shredded clouds form a dark net
to catch the last bright blaze
of the mighty fleeing bronze-cast sun
As it sets in a scarlet haze.


I wish you an African midnight.
I wish you an heavenly sea.
To drown in a dark star ocean
And float on the tide back to me.
Where the foam of the waves is the starlight
that swirls through the endless skies.
To billow and crash without motion
And beach in a spray of fireflies.


Copyright Michelle Frost ~ December 2001

Homeland was first published online 2001. Since then it has been published in many places and travelled far further than I could have ever dreamed... or imagined! I wrote it to set free an old sorrow, never expecting it would echo in the hearts of so many others, from all over the world.

I actually wrote the last line of the last verse first - scribbled onto a scrap of paper in a doctor's waiting room. It would take me a full two months to work through the emotional journey of writing the rest.

HOMELAND



Within my soul, within my mind,
There lies a place I cannot find.
Home of my heart. Land of my birth.
Smoke-coloured stone and flame-coloured earth.
Electric skies. Shivering heat.
Blood-red clay beneath my feet.


At night when finally alone,
I close my eyes - and I am home.
I kneel and touch the blood-warm sand
And feel the pulse beneath my hand
Of an ancient life too old to name,
In an ancient land too wild to tame.


How can I show you what I feel?
How can I make this essence real?
I search for words in dumb frustration
To try and form some explanation,
But how can heart and soul be caught
In one-dimensional written thought?


If love and longing are a “fire”
And Man “consumed” by his desire,
Then this love is no simple flame
That mortal thought can hold or tame.
As deep within the earth’s own core
The love of home burns evermore.

But what is home? I hear them say,
This never was yours anyway.
You have no birthright to this place,
Descendant from another race.
An immigrant? A pioneer?
You are no longer welcome here.


Whoever said that love made sense?
“I love” is an “imperfect” tense.
To love in vain has been Man’s fate
From history to present date.
I have no grounds for dispensation,
I know I have no home or Nation.


For just one moment in the night
I am complete, my soul takes flight.
For just one moment… then it’s gone
And I am once again undone.
Never complete. Never whole.
White skin and an African soul.

...

Copyright Michelle Frost ~ 21 August, 2001

Earth Mother's Prayer

Mother
of
air and fire,

inspire us

to
weave desire

into
everything we do;

make
our hearts true.

be
our needle

Mother

of
stone and earth,

rebirth in us

a reconnection

to
the land beneath our feet;

 make
us complete.

be
our bridge

Mother

of
woods and watery

stillness

teach us

equality
through empathy

for
all living creatures grand or lowly;

all life is holy.

be
our balance

Copyright Michelle Frost ~ 21 August, 2001

The next poem was written on a grocery list notepad, as I was cooking dinner, one snowy December evening.

Saints and Martyrs

“Where were you, when the world ended,

and everything was suspended,

and the angels came?

Did they call your name?”

He held my hand and smiled,

like a child who has seen

the other side of magic.

Nothing tragic in this sharing;

his bearing was that of a man

transformed.

His grip was firm. An old man’s hand,

grained by life and turned on the wheel,

as we turned on the wheel

in spinning snow;

his eyes the axis and centre

to a world I could not enter. His eyes

surprised me into surrender and I stood

and looked beyond what was safe to see.

Him and me, spinning time

down.

Down

the softest feathers, the lightest snow.

Down

the spiral sane men fear and madmen know.

Snow, like angel wings, enfolded us

in silence. I held his hand; he held my gaze.

And I, amazed at my own composure,

unsure how to leave

yet knowing I could not stay;

Longing to stay... I walked away.

The sadness in my eyes, so close to tears,

were fears not for his sanity, but mine.

The likes of me, condemned

to be too grounded

in this well founded world to stay,

I walked away well floundered. I grieved

that meeting; that all too fleeting glimpse

of Paradise in his eyes.