The cold is biting, the darkness disorientating
in the hollow caves of loss, the waves
of anger, the shades of sadness, the madness
of life when it rips from the roots, when it
shoots poison arrows and leaves us bleeding
and battered, pleading and shattered, yet
alive, breathing and seething, while breath
was stolen from others, without warning,
without reason, they are dead.
The sun still rises, the earth turns, as if
nothing changed; it’s strange, as if
no one noticed the flames, the screaming,
the crashing down of a life, the smashing
to pieces of plans and dreams and what might
have been; the cold, grey ashes of a love
that burned bright and brief, too brief,
now grief is all that’s left, the theft is
complete, the mortal coil is shed.
The stones remain, memories from the burning
hearth, the bright blaze of living, the giving
of shape and form to who they were and what
they did, to what we did together, forever
cherished, pebbles in my mind, treasures
yet to find, a weight of shared times and
special places, remembered faces, traces of
adventures and folly, a patterned mosaic,
celebration of a life, enough said.
Wayne Visser © 2018
Book
Life in Transit: Favourite Travel & Tribute Poems
This creative collection, now in its 2nd edition, brings together travel and tribute poems by Wayne Visser. The anthology pays tribute to the likes of Nelson Mandela, Maya Angelou, Barack Obama, Antoni Gaudí & Leonardo da Vinci, and reflects on travels ranging from China and South Africa to Ecuador and Russia. Life is lived in the in-between / In transit / Between coming and going / Between staying and moving on / Between here and there / And what we call home / What we call settled or contented / Is merely a resting place / A station for refuelling / A nexus for reconnecting / A junction for changing direction. Buy the paper book / Buy the e-book.
