Sonnet

I have been shipwrecked.
And once adrift for a night and a day.
So often in our life we are checked.
We find ourselves at bay.

Best then when we boast.
To boast of our own weakness.
Often we will not reach a friendly coast.
Better to accept it with meekness not bleakness.

Today I looked into the clothes cupboard.
And a moth flew cheekily out.
Nothing here will beat Old Mother Hubbard.
But of this I have no doubt.

There is little point in storing up treasure here.
It will all of it join us on our bier.

Haiku

Store up treasure here
All of it will die in flames
But not in heaven

Sonnet

I only wish you were able to tolerate.
A little foolishness from me.
I hope any readers will not berate.
And be forgiving is my plea.

I know my verse is rotten.
But I do my best.
It’s soon to be forgotten.
And barely able to pass the test.

But a bit of creative writing is good.
Even if no one reads it.
It lightens the mood.
And you feel you’ve done your bit.

So I will keep sighing and trying.
And try not to be too trying.

Haiku

Just be tolerant
Of all of my poor efforts
I just do my best

Sonnet

God loves a cheerful giver.
And there is no limit to blessings.
In the dream my wife asked me to be a caregiver.
I hesitated and she cut off love’s strings.

I apologised, she smiled.
I loved her, then I was irritated by someone being different.
But I understood them as they smiled.
Why, we should rejoice in people being different.

And then we are told to pray in a private place.
And to do almsgiving in secret.
All this is very difficult to accept, to leave no trace.
How difficult to do something and not to keep it.

So I will carry on quietly boasting.
And in the end receive my due roasting.

Haiku

To give in secret
Is so difficult to do
But better to do

Sonnet

Their constant cheerfulness and their intense poverty.
Have, through great suffering, overflowed in a wealth of generosity.
It’s easy for us to be cheerful in our prosperity.
I wonder what we would be like in the midst of some atrocity.

It is so easy for us to love those who love us.
No hardship to greet friends cheerfully.
But what about the irritating mobile on the bus.
Or the man asking for your pass, grumpily.

They all live under the sun.
The good, the bad, and the different.
They all have bad times and a bit of fun.
And they probably find us indifferent.

I will try not to look morose.
And take humility’s bitter dose.

Haiku

Love those who love us
That’s all so easy to do
But all the others?

Sonnet

We prove we are God’s servants.
By great suffering in times of distress.
Deep down in our psyche is disturbance.
Wounds fester there, hidden, let’s confess.

A small event, inconsequential rips away the sticking plaster.
Feeling, resentment or worse boils over, all is bleak.
And then into our shell we retreat further and further.
We find it impossible to turn the other cheek.

Our resentment does not hurt the other or make him broke.
It wounds only ourselves, if only we knew.
If he takes our tunic we will not give our cloak.
If he orders us to go one mile we will not go two.

But that’s easy to say, and alright for the few.
So difficult for the many and me to do.

Haiku

Turn the other cheek
Yes but it’s so hard to do
So we carry on

Sonnet

Once it is sown it grows into the biggest shrub of all.
And puts out big branches so that birds can shelter in shade.
And we too from the tiniest most unlifelike seed can grow tall.
We do not come from nothing, we are made.

It was dusk here and I was listening to the birds.
The chaffinch and her descending flourish of a song.
The mellow slow clear warble song of the blackbirds.
And the tree sparrow in her hedgerow and her tonal song.

I can look here for ash and sycamore but no mustard tree.
But It is not just large, it is invasive and hard to root out.
Thus like faith despite every setback, it endures to our glee.
This is all so true if only we could figure it out.

My own faith is just a seed but last night I prayed to Mary, fraught.
And I was enveloped in calm sheet and received what I sought.

Haiku

The Mustard tree grows
From just the tiniest seed
Into a great tree

Sonnet

The old creation has gone.
And now the new one is here.
I was walking along the road quietly alone.
With only quiet bird song coming to the ear.

Below me was a Lincolnshire chalk stream.
Above me the towering summer laden beech trees.
The light flickering on the surface in transcendent gleam.
The new brightly green leaves barely rustling in the breeze.

The water so shallow it barely covers the ankles.
The differing shades of brown shining under the surface.
Small rapids quickening the water, here nothing rankles.
Small insects dance in the sun turning to me her bright face.

Here I stood awhile alive only to present sound and sight.
Enjoying for a while the soon to pass bright evening light.

Haiku

Stream flowing in light
Alive just to sight and sound
Only birds calling

Sonnet

Christ May live in your hearts through faith, then built on love.
You will have strength to grasp the breadth, height, and length.
I was thinking of all the long dreary e-mails from UK dot gov.
And then in the church another thought came like a breath.

Not ten steps from here I might be dead and buried.
And tarry here a long while.
Suddenly I knew it was alright.
It was somewhere else that my true self would be carried.
I left that church with a smile.

These certainties only last for a moment.
But they are real and true for all that.
So it is through faith that we find atonement.
And then we set out again and all goes flat.

But then I looked at my wife as her emotion was held last night.
And knew that love grows and flies ever higher like a soaring kite.

Haiku

The moment was short
But yes in it I believed
Yes there was no doubt

Sonnet

O let the nations be glad and sing for joy.
For thou shalt judge the people righteously.
We need never about our faith be coy.
Nor we ever tried a path over piously.

Psalm 67 is the prayer that we say every day.
Beautiful in its soaring rhetoric.
It ushers in the new parliamentary day.
And is more inspiring than the usual rhetoric.

I opened it by chance today.
It brought back memories, sitting alone in our village church.
In this much quieter place our fears in its verse we can lay.
And help us in our life’s search.

As we say, God be merciful upon us and bless us.
And cause his face to shine upon us.

Haiku

God be merciful
And bless us and cause his face
To shine upon us

Not one dot will disappear from law.
Until it’s purpose is achieved.
I just wonder if this is my life’s core.
I have given less than I have received.

I have so often failed in the least.
Will then I be the least.
I forget so often the high priest.
Not to mention sometimes his feast.

So many commandments infringed.
So much wrong teaching.
My efforts at the edge, fringed.
Not to mention useless preaching.

Oh well let’s hope I be shown mercy.
Despite every controversy.

Haiku

The teaching is hard
But certainly it is right
How to follow it?

Sonnet

If salt becomes tasteless.
Who can make it salty again.
How long lasting is our faithfulness.
To live we must die like the grain.

We will never be saints, who can say.
Perhaps one small act of kindness.
Is all we can manage every day.
This is not a game of fitness.

Our light will not brightly shine.
It is well under the table, despite our talk.
We will not be first at the finishing line.
But we will have walked hesitantly the walk.

We come in with the seas restless tide.
And we leave without trace despite our pride.

Haiku

We come with the tide
Too soon we leave with the tide
And tides ignore us

Sonnet

Taste and see that the Lord is good.
The humble will hear and be glad.
My sight was covered as by a hood.
My time night thoughts were sad.

The doubts were drearily swirling.
How could a faith healer build stars.
But in my dream I saw this flowing.
Into a place as dead as Mars.

And belief was an ever wider stream.
Full of art and music and exploration.
This was now a joyful dream.
Of full bloodied happy sensation.

And so I greeted another day.
And thus I keep depression at bay.

Haiku

Can God create stars
Surely this isn’t possible
But alternative?

Sonnet

O God who in this Sacrament.
Has left a memorial of your passion.
Let us us now then never lament.
Because we are in His possession.

When the communion’s bell rolls.
We can believe it His Body and Blood.
But do not look into others’ souls.
It is for each to take it on the flood.

But what a wonderful moment.
To think He is actually here.
Truly nothing then to lament.
No need to ever shed a tear.

I wish I could absolutely believe this.
Or is there something that I miss.

Haiku

Is His Body here
It is for you to decide
And your conscience

Sonnet

They had put in the money left over.
But she put in all the money she had.
We don’t know if we are in clover.
We don’t know why we are sad.

Why is it we can’t be more generous.
Why don’t we give more to the poor.
Do we think it weak or dangerous.
Can we salute giving’s grandeur.

The world is rent with poor and rich.
We the rich will not give enough.
Between lies a vast ditch.
Half the world deprived of foodstuff.

I say this and do nothing.
I am worse than nothing.

Haiku

We give left overs
Others gave up all they have
Can we not do more

Sonnet

I can see my son.
The light of my eyes.
It does always sink, the sun.
Soon it will be dark, it sighs.

It is the depth of the night.
That comes the worst depression.
Nothing at all then is right.
Then everything is open to question.

But the sun will rise.
And morning will come.
Death will come and we will arise.
Speech will return to the dumb.

Love can be companionably silent.
All can be contained in the moment.

Haiku

Sight will still return
The blind will see again soon
But maybe not here

Sonnet

He drew up a marriage contract.
According to the law of Moses.
In marriage there is no certain fact.
Everything can get up our noses.

The only rule is compassion.
For those married and divorced.
All have a place in his mansion.
Nothing should be forced.

Communion should be for everyone.
Whatever their history or sexuality.
No one should have to be alone.
Love is the only reality.

Let us worry less about law.
And more about holding God in awe.

Haiku

Don’t worry with laws
Love everyone the same
Give the same to all

Sonnet

I desire to be delivered from earth.
And to become earth again.
Sometimes all is dearth.
All is marked with stain.

Why do I always see the negative.
My first thought on awakening.
Why cannot I be happy that I live.
Need I concern myself with the reckoning.

Let me see beauty in everything.
The day is cloudy, the sea green.
The shadows lengthen, old age‘s bell does ring.
I cannot grasp what it does mean.

But light shines through.
And calls to me too, all is true.

Haiku

The day does shorten
And mine too will come to end
But that is just fate

Sonnet

What about your own alms.
What about your good works.
We dwell on our own qualms.
But we should not worry about setting off fireworks.

We obsess about daily problems, mere passing breath.
But what of real end of life struggles and the last descent.
We will all confront pain, frailty and death.
Can we not enjoy the inadequate present.

Tobit was blinded.
By mere inadvertence.
But he doesn’t seem to have minded.
He knew what was of true importance.

May I be like the calm sea.
And learn just to be.

Haiku

Learn to be as the
Calm and blue sea far below
Still always moving

Sonnet

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
And my spirit exults in God my saviour.
Love is never lost only stored.
It is encompassed all about with grandeur.

I gazed upon the sea today.
It visits but never stays.
Ever changing blue, green, and grey.
Hiding its heart in distant gaze.

I feel it’s movement within me.
The moment it visits my heart.
It is the remorseless sea.
Engraved and remembered on the mind’s chart.

Even away I feel it’s presence.
Invading, soothing every sense.

Haiku

In every visit
A memory is yet stored
Like the sea it stays

Sonnet

Was there ever a word so majestic.
From one end of heaven to the other.
The Cathedral organ rang out in sounds mystic.
Looking at the great cross here was my brother.

I was dreaming I was involved in some spat.
I looked at the postcard picked up from the floor.
It was St Joseph looking at a cat.
His gentle gaze struck me to the core.

I am in my small London back yard.
A robin is going cheerfully about her business.
Endlessly moving, always on guard.
Yet at peace despite her fussy ness.

Three separate occasions.
Yet one message of hope filled lessons.

Haiku

Three occasions
Can still contain one message
Three then works in one

Sonnet

From her blossoming to the ripening of her grape.
My heart has taken delight in her.
Wisdom and nature shelter us under her cape.
The everlasting search is the spur.

At midnight in the garden all was still.
There was not a breath of wind.
There was not an ounce of chill.
With nature I was gently twinned.

So motionless I could be framed.
In some picture of the countryside.
All desires to free this moment tamed.
Gone all regret and pride.

But why do I need nature to stir me.
Can I not use my mind alone to keep me free.

Haiku

Does nature stir us
Can we not use just our mind
It does not matter

Sonnet

Some have left no memory.
And disappeared as though they had not existed.
Hamilton Hill is a place to tarry.
In memory men of faith executed.

I fear the grim reaper’s might.
But death is merely a dark tunnel.
You come into it from hazy light.
You emerge from it into eternity’s bright channel.

At the entrance is pain and fear.
In the middle it is utterly dark.
Then you see a speck of light as you shed a last tear.
You emerge where no one cares if you have left a mark.

So I promise I will not fear my passing.
Then I forget and again start worrying.

Haiku

Death is a tunnel
Light at the start and at end
Black in the middle

Sonnet

Deep within them.
I will plant my law.
Way within the deep we find a gem.
In the darkness deep I saw.

Watch the film My Octopus Teacher.
Here is a new light on this creature.
They can be our preacher.
And point to a sympathetic future.

More intelligent than we knew.
Even capable of physical contact.
In strangeness find something new.
Wisdom can come from a new fact.

I swim deep into the dark lake.
Protect the wild for pity’s sake.

Haiku

Swim in the deep lake
Protect wild all around us
It can teach us too

Sonnet

They were in a daze.
And those that followed were apprehensive.
We will all find our way through life’s maze.
As St Philip says, try being prayerfully festive.

I had had a difficult talk about relationships.
Then I swam pass the coot making her nest of wood.
Her mate was calmly helping with sticks, mud and snips.
Both were doing all they could.

Here was no argument.
No dispute about what needs to be done.
Just get on with the job, don’t resent.
The birds seemed to have lots of fun.

There is no need for sadness.
Only joy and hopefulness.

Haiku

The bird makes her nest
Helped by her mate in all things
No resentment here

Sonnet

O God who bring light
To your church.
Help us to see what is right.
Aid us in our never ending search.

I was dreaming about St Joseph in my prayer
And in my dream I saw a golden light.
He seemed to envelop me in care.
Telling me all was held in his sight.

Will we approach our end.
As serenely as the Bede.
Our few possessions happy to lend.
Our life’s work our seed.

I pray for his equanimity.
Knowing it will not outlive all extremity.

Haiku

I saw in prayer
A white and golden lightness
Enveloping me