Rose Colored Windows

by John-Philip Penny

  'Husha, husha,

  Whisper, whisper,

  We'll all soon fall down'

  Now play another tune

  And turn with me once, dear lady

  Upon the threshing floor

  Don't just stand there

  Waiting for the revelling to stop

  And for all things to draw to a close

  There is time enough

  For the hooded lime man

  With his rickety old cart

  We Will Always Need

  We will always need

  Something more than miracles

  And something less than proof

  My heart breaks

  With you near to me

  But I am like a backwards wave,

  Hesitant to arrive next to you

  These secrets will find their voices

  In the end, as all secrets do

  Things only seem to be infinite

  They're really just in a transition

  That lasts forever

  Prevail. Be this to me, for me

  Because even the sun

  Will only last as long

  As each flower

  Poetry

  Poetry's not an act of will

  Nor an act of love or hate

  It's not one's own biography

  Or the longing for a perfect state

  It's not an interrogation

  Or the bleeding in merciless fire

  It's not the fine tuned memory

  Plucking away at the wire

  It's not about obsession

  Or a prayer that sleeps on your tongue

  It's not a children substitute

  And it's not the iron lung

  It's not the waves on the water

  It's not the sand on the shore

  It will never make you rich

  And it will never make you poor

  It's all about the moment

  Of how you think and feel

  About this space and time

  And this wound you cannot heal

  It's all about the pen and paper

  And the hand that makes so bold

  And it's all about the dream of warmth

  On nights that get so cold

  The River Of Sound

  Beside the river of sound

  They brought her down

  They brought her down

  Beside the river of sound

  Without mercy or pity

  And with wrists wound round

  Without pity or mercy

  Pinned her to the ground

  By the river of sound

  Lonely, a buoy bell sounds

  Even lonelier, a tiny cry

  In the distance goes unheard

  On the river of sound

  A young girl was found

  Floating on the currents

  Where it was said she had drowned

  Now mist muffles the sound

  Of the wind on the waters

  As it makes its rounds

  Across the river of sound

  I Want To Take You There

  I want to take you there

  To my secret place

  We'll make a marriage

  Between what we know of ourselves

  Into what we know of each other

  We're just fragments in the end

  Of the same unnending dream

  We'll learn never to move

  From this place

  And yet only to move from it,

  Hands within hands

  Tell me what happens to trees

  When they no longer speak;

  Becoming mute Totem Poles

  Do they dance and fall like us,

  In a world between dark and light?

  There is nowhere deeper to fall

  Than into each other's arms

  As childhood loses its mornings

  And makes dreams in their place

  Slow as legs moving underwater

  If only we could exist like this

  All of the time

  As unselfconscious

  As naked children

  Wearing only sunlight

  I've waited so long

  For your beauty

  To be born into our beauty

  And for the world to stop

  Like a hobby horse

  Rocking in an attic

  Coming slowly to a stand

  Open your closed lids

  To see the darkness still

  Here inside this closet

  Where side by side

  I've written our names

  Twelve Horses

  Twelve horses

  Through the mist

  Bells tinkling

  Hooves kissing stones

  A dark carriage

  With pale girl inside

  Fevered children

  Dream strange scenes

  Nannies murmer

  Ghostly lullabies

  It Is In The Distance

  It is in the distance

  Between our hands

  The never-dream

  Between morning, noon and night

  There must be some fragment

  Of me in you

  Like the moon dragging the tide

  In its silver-light fishing nets

  Look for mirrors

  They're everywhere

  A world of reflection

  In every pebble, in water

  Still or moving

  How precious this will all seem

  When our dreams have been exposed

  And nothing manifests itself

  Even in darkness

  The Smallest Figure

  The smallest figure

  Of my religion

  You, as disiplined as a

  Water clock

  I recall

  Your delicate frame

  I've chased in the rain

  In my mind

  But don't hear me break

  Within myself

  Like the splintering of old ships

  As I take the cloud's instruction

  And don't trade in your shells

  Or give up the luxury

  Of dancing in the courtyards

  Of tilted shores

  For you are waiting delicately

  In the darkest reaches of my mind

  Like joy in death, or worship

  As I hide you from my wails

  Where Are You, Soft As Nails?

  Where are you, soft as nails?

  And where is your bed of thorns?

  My clothes are torn, and I cry out

  For all this radiance dimmed

  This is what you wanted

  To lose me in your fields of pain

  I have nothing

  Only a strange honor

  I cling to it, like a coward

  Behind a victorious weapon

  I have nothing

  While lovers meet

  I lose the child within

  I learned to draw from darkened rooms

  While you slept

  I built my flesh strong as lead

  And drove away all the strangers

  Who kept me from my work

  You have closed every door of revelation

  That you opened for me

  It wasn't even for the vision of your beauty

  That I stood next to you

  It's just that I had nowhere else to go

  And no one else to leave

  With Endless And Unknown Purpose

  With endless and unknown purpose

  With a gesture like a finger on a piano key

  Or a single raindrop on a branch

  I held you in the palm of my hand

  Like a stone until you were smooth

  And I looked underneath everything

  Every rock, every leaf

  Lifting them to reveal

  That everything is seperate

  And everything is one

  But now you are gone

  And
still I wait for your voice

  In the whispering of trees

  The wind through strangely shaped stones

  And in the glistening darting scales of fish

  For everything within still compels me

  Towards your distance

  And all that you have tossed from your deeps

  And I cannot move forward

  And cannot move away

  Now I can only offer words

  Tiny and muffled like rain

  That I may draw you out of myself

  Like a sword from a wound

  Into which even needles are lost

  St. Catharines, 2001-12

  When The Rains Come Down

  When the rains come down

  They came in a flood

  When the rains come down

  They came with blood

  I know my name

  I know my way

  The way I had come

  Where the beast had lain

  I wait here on the shore

  By the signal fire's glow

  And when the ships draw near

  I'll know which way to go

  When the rains come down

  They came in a flood

  When the rains come down

  They came with blood

  There never was a home

  Or a place for one like me

  And I never was much good

  In civilized company

  But when the battle's finally over

  Beneath this setting sun

  I'll turn away once more

  And holster this smoking gun

  When the rains come down

  They came in a flood

  When the rains come down

  They came with blood

  I Am Lost

  I am lost

  Lost like fabled cities

  In the wilderness

  Lost in the garden, the orchard

  Lost as a shell

  Is lost in the deeps

  And in the burning mountains

  The spices brought forth

  Lost in beauty

  And in love

  With the woman

  And without her

  Lost as buried relics

  Are lost to the ages

  And as tears

  Washed away in rain

  Lost within prayer

  The words of the Lost

  And in the caves

  Where holy doves are born

  Lost in the blood

  Spilled on the alter

  And as the flower

  In the rages of fragrance

  Lost within, lost without

  Lost like the lamb

  That bleats out

  Into the inky darkness

  Night Sonata

  She stands on the threshold of the door

  As the music plays itself

  Through veils of beauty

  Autumn touches everything this way

  Like ghostly fingers that hesitate

  Over the keys of a piano

  The night and the season unify

  Giving birth to new monsters

  That peer out like pale children

  Whatever Was, Was

  Whatever was, was

  Whatever is, is

  Whatever shall be, shall be

  Whatever shall not be, shall not be

  Whatever rises, rises

  Whatever falls, falls

  Whatever breaks, breaks

  Whatever holds, holds

  Rains fall

  And tears will come

  Let them fall

  Let them come

  Beginnings begin

  Endings end

  Let them begin

  Let them end

  Whatever was, is

  Whatever shall not be, shall be

  Whatever falls, rises

  Whatever breaks, holds

  Shake The Trees Of Their Lemons

  Shake the trees of their lemons

  Shake the trees of their fruit

  Down come the lemons!

  Down come the fruit!

  Three armfuls at once

  Gather them up

  Tricky, tricky

  Just before the dawn

  But mind the crows that wait

  Mind their harsh cries

  For they find easy prey here too

  Where the orchards are rattled

  Down to their bones

  Now mindlessly shake down the lemons

  And shake down the light

  Where yesterday's sun still lingers

  And where the smell of rotting fruit

  Sweetens all the air

  Death Awaits Everyone

  Death awaits everyone

  My moment too will come

  As I wait here in this trench

  In the place they call the Somme

  I too will meet my death

  Out in No-Man's-Land

  It waits amidst the cutting wires

  It wants to take my hand

  So let me rest a moment here

  While the clock slowly unwinds

  And let me listen a minute more

  To the squeezebox, as it grinds

  Was I still young when this hell began

  I feel I've aged a thousand years

  Here among the mud and the bones

  And the constant nagging fears

  But when the shells begin to fall

  And we run toward some battered hill

  I'll be thinking of the spring

  And the singing whippoorwill

  So let me rest a moment here

  While the clock slowly unwinds

  And let me listen a minute more

  To the squeezebox, as it grinds

  Yes, I will steel my courage up

  When the whistle it does blow

  And our Captain raises his pistol

  And shouts out 'All lads go!'

  But whin I die upon this field

  Either tomorrow or today

  I pray that my blood will nourish the soil

  And that flowers will bloom where I lay

  So let me rest a moment here

  While the clock slowly unwinds

  And let me listen a minute more

  To the squeezebox, as it grinds

  Flowers To Earth

  Flowers to earth

  Earth to flowers

  Clouds to rain

  Rain to clouds

  Fire to ashes

  Ashes to fire

  Stones to dust

  Dust to stones

  Words to silence

  Silence to words

  Light to darkness

  Darkness to light

  Flowers to flowers

  Rain to rain

  Clouds to clouds

  Fire to fire

  Ashes to ashes

  Stones to stones

  Dust to dust

  Words to words

  Silence to silence

  Darkness to darkness

  Light to light

  Like An Open Flower Gives Away The Sun

  Like an open flower gives away the sun

  So my openess gives away my heart

  And I am drawn to you within and without

  Like the ear singing in a shell when pressed close

  Songs like these flicker on my tongue

  And make me into a poet, and a singer

  For love covers everything with its gleam

  And reflects itself back onto everyone

  I once tried to empty myself to be filled by you

  And to give away all, in order to have everything

  I wanted to dance in and out of that flame

  As dweller in the darkness, or as seeker of the light

  But now I am totally enraptured!

  And need not give up one joy for the other;

  As both the joy of being empty, and of being filled

  Spring one another from the same fountain
/>   For we will learn, that happiness and sorrow

  Are both contained deep within oneself

  And love is the bursting nectar of both

  That sweetens this endless spin about the sun

  So put these naked words like seeds into your breast

  Where they will blossom and bear fruit

  And like children will dance out the heart's shape

  That guides its sorrow along the weaving path

  Oh, what a gift you have bestowed upon me

  To let me give myself in your own scattered fashion

  That drafts in dark winter the poems of summer

  And that kisses stones and flowers alike

  I Watched You In The Sun

  I watched you in the sun

  A blossom bloomed above

  As light poured down like honey

  On the woman that I love

  And I saw you in the rain

  It touched you everywhere

  Pressed close to every part

  Of your body and your hair

  And I want to be that sun

  And I want to be that rain

  But how to get that close

  To your beauty, and your pain?