Prayer of Apology

Here again, Lord.
What can I say?
Your majesty,
Greater than all my mind could ever concieve.
Your love,
That moves from from emotion into pure existence.
Your peace,
An island in the storm.
But here I am again, Lord.
How dare I refute thee?
How can I feel this and wonder -
A blashpemy in itself -
if you are listening to every word I say,
Like a father, a shepherd, a mother, a God,
Like my greatest friend?
But here I am again, Lord.
Worship in my heart,
Love in my soul,
But doubt that strikes my head.

Exam

Friday afternoon on a
Warm summer’s day.
Shouts from the playground:
“Come out, come out,
Come out to play!”
We can’t, our
Hands cramped,
Heads aching,
Blessed repose and rest
Never came to the deservéd.
A hundred and twenty seconds to every minute.
A hundred and twenty minutes to every hour.
Time is as Time does,
And nothing slows time like
Endless low distant hum, or
Sigh, mutter of ourselves.
Exam time is here -
Forever.

Yes, its exam time in Birmingham. Fun fun fun… This was written during an exam (I finished slightly too early, I feel…) so it is, really, the genuine feelings of a real schoolchild. As if the rest of this blog isn’t…

Brand New Pen

Clean, black, flowing ink
Spills forth like:
A bubbling spring,
The fount of all knowledge,
Words from a child’s mouth.
My new pen flashes with
sparkly reflections of my thoughts.
Ideas fall onto the page,
With my brand new pen.

Yes! I’ve just got new pens, and they feel fantastic. Bring on the writing!

Goodbye

Goodbye.
I don’t know why we parted.
But we did.
Truthfully? I blame myself.
My cotton wool balls tenderly,
Their soft warmth spreading,
Stretch out towards you.
Would I have kept you?
Would I have saved a friend?
Or not?
Shadow upon shadow, a dim,
Greyer-than-black mist
- rain not falling -
Falls itself upon my outstretched life.
Midnight’s blackest hour was
never so dull as this company.
Yours is lost. I defer to this.
You can keep the teddy bear.

I suppose I ought to provide some explanation of the ‘teddy bear’ line. In drama at the moment, we are preparing a drama performance for our final exam. In it, one of the characters, after taking a teddy bear off his younger son, dies. One of the central parts of the piece is his funeral scene, where the child dramatically tells his father that he can keep the teddy bear. How cute.

God’s Science

Dear God,
Are you Science?
Monday morning, IAA.
Empirical. Valid and Reliable.
Quantifiable.
Where’s your test?
Your science practical,
Grey drizzle as
Students sit at benches, bunsens
Flaming hot – can we show you
Through formulas, triangles,
Times and divide.
When’s your test?
Many years – or less -
I sit, lie, stand, say my last,
To meet you, the
Last Science practical in my life.

The Passionless Lover

Really, I don’t agree, but
Try to take it away from
Me and watch as I become
Angrier and angrier and
Angrier and angrier until
You feel like you could
Steal an impassioned defence
Of it, except for the fact
That really, truly, honestly,
I don’t agree.

This is a short poem about those people who like to say things to impress and to shock. It is an all too common trait, and I suspect that I may have it to, but it is very irritating to listen to.

This Page is Left Intentionally Blank

This page is left intentionally blank.

Blank as when it was created,
Untouched by destructive pen.

Blank, uncluttered,
An empty space,
Ready to be filled with new ideas.

Blank as if it were a blackboard,
Freshly wiped,
In preparation for the lesson.

Blank, free,
Open for anything.
A celebration of beginnings.

This poem is what it says it is; a celebration of beginnings. I came up with the title while reading the GCSE 2009 exam poetry anthology. A poem had been removed from the anthology because it was about knives, and in its place was the peculiar heading: ‘This page is left deliberately blank’. And I thought ‘What a good poem that would make’, and this poem followed.

For more information about the anthology ban (which was nothing short of rediculous) try this.