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Limbo We are somewhere between the days before and the days to come. Waiting to see a deadpan face, giving away nothing of the long-term prognosis. We are somewhere between the fire and the rain waiting for sanity to arrive. Will the future be smoke […]
Past The past arrives, like four o’clock in the morning It presses you with insights, but on waking, in daylight there are only fuzzy dream-like edges It is a spiral all that is unresolved, returns to be dealt with once again faces change, faces forgotten […]
Present
There is only now
Now, the sun lands gently
on your shoulder,
and even if you try,
you cannot bring forth
the moonlight;
it will come
when the silver sliver
has her moment
Not before
There is only the now
Now, the time arrived,
your yesterday heart
securely in repose;
You cannot say
where it will beat tomorrow;
Even with the certainty
of plans etched into calendars,
all is tentative until the
allocated slot but
your heart beats despite
the gathering ambiguityThere is only now
And so, we rise
and breathe
and walk
uncertainCertain only
that there is now
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Time How did we get here? This clutter-filled space where connection has been replaced with tasks. You asked me how I was, and I said “busy” – it would take too long to tell you what is really going on And we would both have […]
Language Let me take words and paint you a picture; The topsoil of my faith is shallow and lacking in nutrients; The candles, the hope, the meaning I used to hang my heart on, eroded by the flood; The emotions that spilled from the peaks […]
Words
I remember the words,
the ones we sacrificed
on the altar of love;
the very ones we thought
would keep us alive
Intentions cast in stone,
words turned to rock;
pebbles now on the shrine
of regret, we pick them up
at four in the morning
to feel their weight
in our hands
while the world sleepsand the heaviest one
is ‘never’Voices stilled,
frozen beauty
echoing in space.
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Inspiration Sometimes inspiration comes in a bolt, a light that stirs internally, and shifts the mood from low and slow, to joy Something so powerful should be vast and magnificent, but in reality, it is normally small; The way the slipping sun falls through the […]
Meaning Every word has meaning, how do we all know, that this is a pot or this is a clock? From the sky, to the sea; the way I say you, the way you say me Every word holds something different for each; perhaps in […]
Autumn
Autumn came to whisper –
clinging on is futile,
all that is attached
will once again
fall upon the ground
Autumn came to tell me –
summer’s work was done
and the time was now,
to flow to fallow,
and rest before the reawakeningAutumn spread the rumours
in yellow, red and brown –
surrender to the cycle
of life, and time and love
for all that is and was
will begin again
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Winter In the winter of the frozen prayers, when the leaves of language had fallen to the ground and dissolved within the pond of life, you still remembered how to say “I love you” In the winter of the barbed-wired heart when feelings took flight […]
Summer All those summers, when innocence was bronzed, and love grew ripe on apple trees All those summers when laughter, dappled in the leaves and everyone you loved was whole and near and vital All those summers now in black and white and those remaining […]
Spring
Wistful wisteria
lays in wait,
watching,
not knowing
that it is the day
before the leaves
appearNaked branches
blanched in shyness,
scrape the ice
from the sky,
and know it is the day
before the leaves
appearFrozen heart,
locked in loneliness,
sees the other
in herself
and feels it is the day
before the leaves
appear
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Longings It arrives in sleep, this deepest longing, repressed, forgotten how much I used to love the simplicity of green and blue against the sun It arrives in sleep, this innate remembering, still alive within my core, and I am a smaller version of myself, […]
Illusions They say you are gone but I know you are only out in the garden, going for a walk, enjoying the sun They say you are gone but I know you are only just around the corner peering at the doves in the tall […]
Memories
In years to come
when my bones are brittle
but my memories clear,
I don’t want to be the last one
who remembers blue skiesIn years to come
when my heart beats slowly
but my memories are crisp,
I don’t want to be the last one
who witnessed the wild,
before we eliminated all
the animals and birdsThe majestic, myopic rhino;
the elephant, whose memory
will outlast mine;
the fat galah waddling pink
across my lawn, strutting
its own importance to
a watching cockatoo;
the bee now replaced
by a pollinating drone
because politicians
thought humans had
dominion over EarthIn years to come
when the ice has melted
from our consuming hearts,
I don’t want to be the one
who remembers
we did nothing.
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Dreams The night is made for dreaming; stars puncturing the sky, the gentle rocking of the oarless boat drifting to the place that knows no time I will meet you where the crickets dwell on a summer’s night, as they sing their song to the […]
Myriad There is something about travelling, your feet touching unknown ground and the music of that particular patch of land playing into your body There is something about awakening, when you see yourself In others, you in dark skin, you with brown eyes, a myriad […]
Strangers
In a strange land
the sky was not my own
I wandered
through the streets alone
and no one looked like meIn a strange land
the food was not
what I had grown;
table for one, I dined
a million miles from homeIn a strange land
the words did not roll
off my tongue,
child-like I pointed to
what I wanted
and smiled in thanks
that still my needs were metIn my homeland
I bumped into myself
and met a stranger;
it took a while
to see I was my friend.
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Meander Come take my hand, let’s meander with no particular destination on our compass; just endless possibilities of finding a hollow in the scrub of noise; a clearing in the trees Come take my hand, let me tell you of the hidden words that won’t […]
Destinations Someone assumed, given my youth when I emigrated that I was fearless They were not to know I spent years calling Australia home, before I had ever tasted the water or witnessed the red sand crashing like waves into the blue ocean Soothing my […]
Wanderlust
Sometimes the anticipation of travel
is more exciting than going;
the thought that the sky may be wider
than the pile of dishes blocking the horizon
connecting beyond the mundane
of “what should we have for dinner?”
to the joy of sitting with a menu
that needs translation, but not the food
which your body recognises as homeThe gentle boat of a new you
moored in a silent lake
the idea of a blankness,
a shriving, only enough baggage
to carry in one hand;
the essential you
leaving behind the burden of home
to say you come from
somewhere, far away;
locals shake their heads
at the distance you have come,
dreamily exotic,
you know the truth,
the spring cleaning you never get toBut for a moment you too believe in
your own uniquenessAnd towards the end of the trip
you hear the gentle calling
of your own pillow,
the one on which you process your own life
the one where you will dream again
of escaping the mundaneFinding yourself
Defining yourself
in relation to the world
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Creation Random notes joined together, you created, living art Different shades, matching colours, uniquely you sound of blue Helix strand, filled with love, embodied now but eternal you © Tanya Southey #52words52weeks #monthlymusing
Joy of Art Joy bubbles in tiny movements, holding a paintbrush at a delicate angle, the first gentle blue on a blank canvas Joy arrives through the eyes, glancing at the wall filled with art; drinking it in Joy bursts from the drum, in the […]
Music
I have a recurring dream,
a place I have never been,
achingly familiar,
I know the curves
of the hills;
the trees call my name;
the river has held the stars
and the music speaks
in a key that knows,
notes float
strung together in truth
I awake and wonder
which place is real?
The one I am in now
or the one I awoke from?
And then the music says
what my body feels
but my words cannot,
the drumroll,
that all exists
and nothing is real
Everything ends
just as it starts,
sound never dies
somewhere in the universe
these notes keep playing
© Tanya Southey
#52words52weeks
#monthlymusing
Symphony The squawking parrots open the first bars of morning, breaking the hush that held the night; the crows to my knowledge have never committed murder, except to screech intentions at an empty sky; the earliest dog walkers totter like treble clefs, led by their […]
Lovers You were my first love, you held me like no other, blanketed me with sky, soothed me to sleep in violet moonlight, and told me we were spinning through the stars You were my first love you kissed me with crystal water and whispered […]
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