Some Even More Of Me Poetry
I am continuing this introduction to my poetry collection with two poems about romantic regret.
Some examples of my work, which I have chosen for these blogs, are favourites of our youngest writer, Simon Jay. An achievement to have your work admired by someone at a vastly different stage of life, and of the opposite sex? I am hoping this bodes well for my goal of attracting a wide audience.
Dead Daffodils was written nearly twenty years ago and was indeed inspired by such a moment as the poem describes. I got into my car after visiting someone in Ealing, and felt this rush of joy as I looked out at the daffodils on a patch of grass nearby. I could not rationalise the feeling. I was not at a very happy place in my life and I am not a great flower lover at the best of times. And then there was the small point of the daffodils being dead! But the joy was alive – and real. I immediately realised why and that here was an opportunity for a poem. So I went home and wrote it.
The photograph frame was not really inspired by so much heartbreak. I had been given a small heart shaped frame by one of my children. I have a lot of framed photographs and did, in those days, keep on the chest by my bed the collection of items as described. I put the empty frame there wistfully hopeful that somebody’s face would one day fill it. But the poem actually came not from romantic longing so much as a dispassionate interest in an empty photograph frame. A fertile theme for any writer.
Immediately as I write this my mind is a-jangle, thinking how many words, subjects or ideas could lend themselves to poetry, a short story, even a novel. As we think of photographs or their frames, what stories could they tell, or could we weave around them?
I have often thought, after writing a longer piece, that maybe it would have been better as a poem. And, very recently, it worked the other way round for me.
I am hoping that, now you have seen four of my poems, that you will be curious to read my whole collection, which began when I was a teenager.
Poetry in my books? Well, in Neverland, Brenda tries to write some verse. And in Reasons, there is a very long story – like a short novel – called Lips That Would Kiss. That title, in itself, a tribute to my favourite poet, T.S.Eliot. In there, the heroine, Maggie, has a love of poetry which is possibly her salvation.
DEAD DAFFODILS
Sudden rush of joy
At dead daffodils?
The daffodils are Ealing
Ealing is him
Where I last saw him
The feeling is him
Now
I must carry it back
Back from him
Back through the place
Back through the daffodils.
Back to pure joy
Without him
In me.
THE PHOTOGRAPH FRAME
Bed
Bedside table
Cards, photos
Photos propped up
Photos in frames
One frame golden
Heart shaped
Empty
No photo
No face
No lover
Empty frame
Empty heart
Empty bed
Pamela Pickton’s book Neverland is on sale on Amazon now, and on all good ebook websites, and you can also find more about Pamela Pickton’s travails and worldly challenges in her Zitebooks’ collection of short stories, Reasons, also ready to buy on Amazon.
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