December on my Japanese Calendar. (New final line and other changes).

The first tea plants grew from the eyelids of Bodhidharma
When he snipped them off to keep himself awake
During long days and weeks of meditation.

Old legends cannot always be believed in
Although they are attractive enough to be almost true,
And green tea has a taste as sharp as Zen.

But no meditating monk would need a bowl of tea
To keep awake in this fearsome winter weather,
The sky an ice sheet mirroring the snow.

Three men, almost invisible beneath broad cloaks
That hang like bell tents from their stooping shoulders,
Cross a long white bridge with cautious footsteps,

They are following old footprints into open country
With barely a tree or boulder to offer them cover
If the wind should turn around to whip their faces.

Balanced between the limits of life and eternity
These travellers follow the ghost of a narrow road.
Snow blind and frozen they stumble along the way,

And because I cannot know, or seek out their destinations,
They remain enigmas trapped inside a time frame,
I can only guess at who they really were:

Exhausted merchants trudging through the snowfields,
Stubbornly pushing against the weight of winter
To reach the end of just another journey;
Or local farmers
Searching for the first inklings of spring?

                            *

This print by Hokusai has no known title.
Perhaps it is a riddle without an answer.
Perhaps it is a gateway to Satori.

I must trust each line he cut into the woodblock,
His eyes were clear as the sleepless Bodhidharma`s,
And he carved with care the truth as he perceived it.

His eyes were as clear as the eyes of the old Zen Master.
His pictures are mirrors made without a flaw.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
October 4th. - 31st. - November 30th. - December 1st.- 3rd. 2019.

Trevor J Potter's Art: Old Style Letters - New Version. (Completed poem)....

Trevor J Potter's Art: Old Style Letters - New Version. (Completed poem)....: It is like the old times. I sit writing letters to you, Pen on paper. No hurried text messages in a private code. Texts that can be wip...

Old Style Letters - (A poem in two parts).

                 1

It is like the old times.
I sit writing letters to you,
Pen on paper.
No hurried text messages in a private code.
Texts that can be wiped out in a moment,
Never to be stored in a perfumed bundle
Tied with a silk ribbon.

It is like the old times.
We are both avowedly old fashioned,
Preferring hard backs to videos,
Oil paints to photos;
Crops we have grown to packaged vegetables
Picked off a shelf in a supermarket.
We would live in a Vardo if we could do so,
But camping by the roadside is no longer viable.

It is like the old times.
I scrawl long letters to you
Believing you will keep them
Underneath your pillow.
(I keep yours in a jewellery box by the bedroom window).
We have found an integrity in outmoded ways,
A no nonsense strength that binds us together.

It is like the old times.
We have thrown away the new tat
And made the past our future;
We should learn at once the art of calligraphy
So that even our household notes are beautiful.

                 2.

There is a homeliness in simple things,
(My pinewood desk - the ticking clock -
The flow of ink on paper).
Such simple things are made to last,
To be of use - and not to fail.               

Yet we all must fail, retreat and fall,
That is the shadow on human nature;
But when our ashes are crushed and mixed,
Then scattered on the quiet water,
With luck these letters will remain
To tell our little story.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
July 24th. - 25th. - November 14th. - 22nd. - 23rd. - 25th. - 28th. 2019.
Note. It has been very difficult to find the structure of this poem, but now that I have split the poem into two parts it has gained a strength that it had previously lacked.

Song of the Sixties.

Whatever happened to Anna Banana?
Whatever happened to Kevin the Witch?
Whatever happened to Raymond from Sligo?
Whatever happened to Rex of the Road?
We all got lost in a Broadway fantasy -
Don`t you know?

Whatever happened to Zoe and Jailer?
Whatever happened to Bungalow Bill?
Whatever happened to Bobby Driscoll?
Whatever happened to me?
We all got dumped on the ash tip of history -
Don`t you know?

Last night we were somewhere - today we are nowhere.
When the spotlights go out - we must make do - or rot.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter,
November 18th. - 19th. 2019.
Last night while walking to a rehearsal of the Friendly Choir at The Kiln Theatre, I suddenly started to list the nick names and real names of a few of my friends and acquaintances from my now long ago youth and wondered why it all went so badly wrong.

The Gift that is Forever. (New Version).

The night was very still.
The hum of distant cars was lost
Behind the shimmering wall
Of a hundred cherry trees,
And the pink snow of blossom drifted soft
Upon the sleeping houses
Stealthily.

You snuggled close and warm, just like a kitten
Seeking sleep and safety in my room
While urban foxes roamed from yard to yard
Scavenging for scraps.

This was the first night that I learned to trust you,
To accept the absolution of your love
Gifted freely without a single question.
Your quiet hope revoked my selfishness.

I thought I had grown too old, too cynical to love,
A divorced man who despised the Easter story,
Who mocked the ancient customs,
But when you arrived on my doorstep bearing lilies,
Cradled in your arms with such great care
That not a single leaf was torn or crushed,
My fiercest doubts melted like the frost.

You looked into my eyes and gently smiled,
Lost for words I leapt and laughed like a child.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
April 23rd. - 27th. - November 15th. 2019.

Venice.

All my life I have cried for Venice,
The city built for mermaids
And sailing boats.

The city where the descendants of Ancient Rome
Are born with webbed feet and fins
And can swim like fishes

Months before they ever learn to walk.

The city where I learned to dance on water,
Transported by the music of Vivaldi
High above translucent moss green waves.

But now the seas have turned as black as ink,
Darkened by the smoke from fossil fuels
That stoke the fires of a billion factories,

Factories as far away as Philadelphia.

The black ink pours across the floors of marble
(That glisten under moonlight in St. Marks)
And stains the gilded chapels and the altar

With a rime of filth that stinks of kerosene.
And the people cough and retch in putrid air
As they struggle knee deep through acidic slime,

Slime that suffocates mute swans and fishes.

Throughout my life I have cried for fragile Venice.
At first my tears were tears of love and exile,
But now my tears are tears of loss and rage.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
13th. November 2019.

Trevor J Potter's Art: Three short poems. (1) Wistfulness. (2) Sparrows i...

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