Inside the Chapel of Kebble College, Oxford

Awed by the sky-rising towers of grace

With silence in steps I trickle my way

And stand in the half-light of altars and pews,

Puzzled in the majesty of panels and vaults.

Stirred to my veins, I gaze on those walls

And struggle to now gauge with unblinking eyes

The palette of faith that coloured those lines

And dazzle our empirical eyes.

I tremble and fold my unbelieving knees

And leave with whispers of prayers in the air

To fields of unclouded sunshine and green. 

The Tower and The Lark

Shores I had strolled with comrades-in-arms

Are gathered in the silence of night.

Cradled in hollows of chambers of waves

Our laughter and song now fade beyond sense

And paper my feet with sand.

Dolphins with mates have heard other calls

And vault and leap in harmony of flight

To waters that glisten elsewhere.

Here yet I stand, with memories entombed

And muse in th’shadows of moonlighted coves

That warble with stars in concert of heart

Libretto of lone-ranging lark.

And even as banners of dawn unfurl

I gaze at his flight, into clouds of light

And bend my ways with cotton-blossom hearts

To quarters up top in lighthouse on rocks.

Battered with waves and scraped by winds

It stands still strong among nettles and weeds

And scorns our whining with shelters in storm.


Spanned along spaces of shores and of stars
I reach for th'music that's rooted yet soars.  

Songs that’ll blow into a Sun

Signs we had taken for hope

Are tattered and mired in streets.

And vultures now hover

Over corpses of claims –

Claims that are rotting in drains.

How does one strive,

And sustain one’s faith

In times, as hooded as these?

Leaves that’ll wither

On branches in chill

Have siblings in spheres elsewhere.

There they must bloom,

In Amazonian gloom

While ours may loosen and fall

And send us their scents

In darkest of nights

For breaths that’ll blow into a song.

So, shackled in nights of fear and pain

We count our losses and hum

Songs that’ll blow into a Sun..