BLACK (The curse cannot be ended)
Black below
Grey above
Like river’s flow
Devoid of love
Follow the line
Where it leads
To endless time
Where death feeds
No matter who tries
Black comes back
Hope never flies
The mirror cracks
The wounded soul
Cannot be healed
A bleeding hole
Love congealed
So stumble on
Through life’s rain
To a futile end
Of hurt and pain
© 2017 Chris Harris.
About this Poem
Life is full of ups and downs which we all experience. But for some life is a misery, a dominant feature of their life….and the black dog a dominant feature of that misery and something from which they never escape.
DREAM OBSESSION
A dream, two women, a blurred vision
My dream a moment of indecision
One woman, smaller, walks up the hill.
She turns, looks, her face and eyes still
That look, they say, that could kill
She appears to me as a faint image
A memory of some past damage
The second woman calls a name
Awakening past memories of pain
Hidden, deep, below some shame
Moments past and tears came
Emotions, feelings, suddenly aflame
In my mind forgotten images rise
Of hope crushed among the lies
I seem them still through the mist
I follow, then, I cannot resist
Like the first time we kissed
A primal force pulls me, insists
But they’re gone, nothing exists
© C. Harris 1985
About this Poem
This was a recollection of a recurrent dream. not always identical but always featuring these same two women (whom I never recognised) and always in an unknown beach location. It has no specific meaning or significance, so far as I can tell
THE GOLDEN YEARS
I see your golden hair fly
I hear your golden laugh
I touch your golden skin
You smile your golden smile
We walked the desert lands
We rode the canyons rivers
We paddled the icy seas
And strode the high plains
We laughed and fought together.
Loved and cried and danced
Shared the best, the worst of times
Watched the red and silver sunsets
Down the never ending miles
Sharing the endless road
I was careless of your love
I took your heart and emptied it
Until it was just an empty shell
Then filled it with bitter tears
And, when you were gone
I discovered what I had lost.
© 2020 C. Harris
About this Poem:
There are few people to whom I have talked about their past relationships for whom there are not aspects of some of those relationships that they regret. Something they have said or done that they regret. Unrequited love or desire. Affairs. This is about one of those possible regrets – which is that of not recognising what it was someone offered to you.
VENEER
I laugh and I smile
But my heart aches
My mouth forms a joke
But my heart breaks
I smile at the crowd
But feel only pain
Surrounded by friends
But absolutely alone
My successes are many
But I see only failure
With everything I want
I have nothing I need
My life is so totally full
But so completely empty
Life so very sweet
And oh so very bitter
© C. Harris 2021
About this Poem
This is about the masks we all wear. The appearances we put on even when we are feeling uncertain, depressed or lonely. How we seek to appear happy when we are not. The sense of being an imposter in a room full of people who appear more successful and who we believe can see right through our own veneer of success and confidence. This is the veneer all of us will wear or have worn at one time (and which, incidentally, is a big part of toxic masculinity).
SLIPPING AWAY (The final journey)
I see the sadness in your eyes
The final journey ahead of you lies
A final crossing of the bridge of cries
Your final days just the sound of sighs
Is it regret for a life not fulfilled?
Do you sigh for the love that was killed
For the career that marriage stilled
For all the tears that were spilled
Or perhaps you just cry for life’s joy
For the memory of holding your little boy
For the feel of your very first toy
The love that nothing could destroy
Your beloved sister now long gone
All that’s left is her plaque on the lawn
An empty space in your heart at dawn
A space that leaves you sad and forlorn
The passing of friends leave you alone
Everyone gone you’ve ever known
Your children have left now they’re grown
Every birthday an empty milestone
Of your generation now it’s only you
You wait now for the last rendezvous
Nothing more left in this life to do
Soon you will slip away in the night too
© C. Harris 2021
About this Poem
As I’ve observed my Mum, Aunt, Uncle and their friends and other relatives getting older, as I’ve observed some of them fade away and die, I have often wondered about the sadness this must create. The sadness of being the last or next to last of your generation of friends and family.
That’s not say that there isn’t also joy and pleasure in the things they have always enjoyed; the family in the next generation, nature, food, film or many other things but it has always seemed to me that there must be some ineffable sadness in losing most of those one has loved.
It’s a generation of people that doesn’t talk much about their feelings whether they be joy, grief, sadness, loneliness, love or any other emotion. Do they regret missed opportunities? Lost loves? Abandoned or forgone careers? So much remains unspoken, unexplored.
THE PEDESTAL
The pedestal
Makes them tall
Before the fall
The pedestal
Takes the humble
And makes them vain
The pedestal
Takes the onlooker
And makes them a fool
The pedestal
Takes the writer
Makes them a flack
The pedestal
Takes the gentle soul
And makes them mean
The pedestal
Takes the mythical
Gives them feet of clay
The pedestal
Such a little step
Such a terrible thing
© 2017 Chris Harris
About this poem
Between 1982 and 1989 and again between 2010 and 2015 I worked, frequently, with politicians, those with ambition to be politicians and political staffers and party apparatchiks. One of the things I learned was that no matter the party, the people attracted to being candidates and politicians were narcissistic, egotistical and arrogant. There are exceptions, of course, but, in general, few of those people are really people we should be electing.
A part of the problem is that we frequently adulate these people, putting them on pedestals, hero worshipping some. We treat them with a respect that many have neither earned nor deserve. This tends to simply bring out more of the qualities, in those people, that are least desirable. Even in the best of them it can be their downfall. Power corrupts.
But it’s not just the people on the pedestals that behave badly. We all do. We ignore their worst qualities and accept behaviour that we wouldn’t normally accept. And those who should hold them to account, such as journalists, are blinded by becoming too close to them.
NARCISSISM – #40 – In the series, “Writing from the Road; poems, prose and images from 65 years on the Road”
This is my 2021 project to use all my finished writing and some of the 35,000 images in my Flickr archive: https://tinyurl.com/3j5utzm3
To see more visit my blog:
Home Page: https://www.idiottraveller.com/
Poetry: https://www.idiottraveller.com/travel-poetry/
NARCISSISM
Look at me
Looking at me
It’s a call for you
Quiet, I’m looking at me
Vote for you?
What’s in it for me?
Oh, Narcissism.
Take a picture
A picture of me
It’s your friend calling;
I’m taking my picture
Give you a hand?
What’s in it for me?
Oh, Narcissism
Look in my soul
Just a reflection of me
It’s your brother calling
Quiet I’m taking my picture
Give you a dollar?
What’s in it for me?
Oh, Narcissism
Look in your eyes?
No, I’m looking at me.
It’s your Father calling
Quiet I’m taking my picture
Do I Love you?
What’s in it for me?
Oh, Narcissism
I don’t see you
I just see me
It’s the hospital calling
Quiet, I’m taking my picture
Pay my taxes?
What’s in it for me?
Oh, Narcissism
It’s your Mother calling
Quiet I’m taking my picture
It was your Mother calling
What did she want?
She called to say goodbye
She died yesterday.
Oh, Narcissism
© C. Harris 2021
About this Poem
It’s interesting to look at the Instagram feeds of some people these days. The number that contain nothing other than endless selfies is extraordinary. Their vision is nothing other than themselves. They may be in the most extraordinarily beautiful places but they are completely focused inwardly.
Not only are they self-absorbed but that self-absorption is accentuated by the nature of the images. Some photograph themselves in few, if any, clothes. It’s a form of soft porn and, for young teens, a form, almost, of kiddy porn. Facial expressions reflect what people see in the beauty and fashion industry, posed and pouting.
All of that is a reflection of the superficiality of our society where looks are more important than substances and where celebrities and “influencers” have millions of followers but those who should be celebrated (nurses, teachers, ambos) work long hours, for little, in relative obscurity.
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