WORDS FAIL - (A Fell Revisited)

                                                 

                                                                                        WORDS FAIL

These words do not ring true,

cannot contain the tread

of rubber sole upon the beaten track,

the slide of stone beneath the feet,

the rustling of leaves

among the tangled roots.

These words cannot ring true;

as roots erode the step

whose shelf they form –

my words fail to express

the stressful joy, fail to commune

with nature. These words

do not permit the real footfall.

The fell remains

Unconquered.

Malcolm Evison

09 January 2016

Revision of Apropos Kings How – May 1981

a flawed new poem

  a loss of kilter

sometimes it feels as if

the whole wide world

is out of sorts

at other times 

I know

that is the case

perfection

 was never the intent

quite simply

my faltering goal

malcolm evison

                  041215                                 

The Old Man

 

They hang; a heavy weightlessness,
like long forgotten memories
seeking renewal. The man sits,
beside the window, looking
at the clouds. Remembering.


But nothing quite fits. If only
he could pass, at will, into
insanity. That would remove
the purgatory – desiring flames
to quench the smouldering remnants


of a life. He sits, beside the window,
watching the clouds. And waiting;


waiting for night-fall. Remembering.

Malcolm Evison