Emergency Ward Wasp, an Urban Adventure.

...............enters the Study
Wasp 
Unzipping the quiet spaces
With a curt buzz,
A snide bell intermittently ringing.

I am stung into action,
The Skull and Cross Bones
Now come to mind;
The pirate loops the loop.

Iron invades my soul.
The cat looks on from a safe distance.

A brass weight snatched by sweaty fingers:
A square of wall crumbles to dust:
My shoes turn white.
I had imagined a sabre splitting hairs,
Not this plummeting rubble.

The cat spins like a broken Top
Flaying the carpet.

Electric wires fizzle and pop:
Smartly the safety catch is thrown
Instigating silence.

The thermometer has lost several degrees
In less than a minute.
I carefully put down the brass weight,
Then return to my book.

The cat stretches her paws and yawns.

A small wing flickers.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter

October 24th. 2012 - January 6th. 2013. (First sketched May 20th. 1973)


 

First Meeting.

Stunned by the sweetness of your smile
My so obsessive rushing to and fro
Has instantly become irrelevant.
We are standing still, apart, quite motionless,
Captivated by an awkward sense of wonder.

The stars this morning are (perhaps) auspicious;
Well, according to the astrologers I refer to,
Those with gaudy charts in Sunday Mags.
And being of a Quixotic disposition
I tend to by pass common sense reality.

You laugh at my inability to say a word.
The leaflets advertising life insurance
That I dropped the instant you swung wide the door
Are scattered at my feet. I shall not now retrieve them
But, in thrall to your quiet presence, I enter the well lit house.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter. 
 September 20th. 2013. 
Revised 3rd- 4th. February 2015.

Four Seasonal Poems.

               1
The Christmas Present. 

Your book of Japanese poetry
Lay open upon my table.

Winter clouds split by sunlight,
Ice melts from my window.

                             December 25th.-26th.2012.

                   *

                   2.
 Expected Reconciliation.

A face in the dusty mirror
Briefly glimpsed at sunset.

Your hand brushes my shoulder:
Jasmine blooms in the cold garden.

                               December 24th.-26th. 2012.  

                      *

                       3.
             Late Autumn.

    Under pale skies we walk
    Collecting crimson apples
    To taste the sun.

                               April 26th. 1969.-December 26th. 2012. 

                       *

                       4.
           New Year`s Eve.

        Being midnight
        The ants crept homeward
        Touched the grass
        With their little feet
        Leaving no prints.

                                July 1st. 1965. 

Trevor John Karsavin Potter. 
July 1965 - December 26th. 2012.   
A Happy Peaceful New Year, May all the kindest and best hopes and dreams come true.                

The Statuette of a Laughing Buddha.

I brought him home in a little blue box,
Mi - lo - fo, The Laughing Buddha,
Fat as Falstaff and twice as merry,
Hey merry down derry, hey merry down dee,
but
No fool he, Maitreya, Buddha yet to be,
Re-born to enlighten a future, a time of
                                                  beauty
That only the fortunate initiate shall see.

Laughter his wisdom, wisdom his joy,
Is it all so easy?
                         Can this possibly be? 
Should I really be sitting out in the snow 
   Under the shelter of the Bodhi Tree?

The twinkle that brightens the cup of his eye
Lightens my house, fills me with laughter
Rebellious and free,
                              ho derry down dee;
Like wine that is new his smile intoxicates me
                  Banishing my customary sobriety.

Now out of his box the whole house is his oyster
In which to meditate,        or maybe,     to roister,-

      Whilst lacking a single thought in my head,
                            I snore in bed.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter. 
19th. December 2012.

Black Madonna (Revised Version).

Black Madonna
Scarred hands and twisted arms
Carved in ebony

Boy child
Created with the same ferocity
That replicated her beauty

Strong arms
Lift him to the passing throng
In a gesture taut with longing

Strong hands
Gnarled but strangely delicate
Fingers cracked by hard work

Holy infant
Made from the same hard block
Cut to create his mother

His hands are different however
Soft - reflecting the light
From the ring of votive candles

They are carved in white wood
The grain is faulty
Knots on the polished surface
Contorted like old wounds

The frail Franciscan Friar
Leans forward to kiss the rough wood
His face a mask of sorrow

Almost indifferent
I pause to light a candle
And sip some holy water
Before resuming my journey


Trevor John Karsavin Potter 
15th. August 2012. - 12th. December 2012. 
19th. July 2013.

This poem is a response to visiting the ancient Christian shrine of the Black Madonna of Willesden, North West London. The visit, my second since the image was restored, took place in August 2012, but most of the poem was written the following December.

Love & Confusion.(Revised Version).

Tasting your wine

                 Inconsolable-stung by bitterness

The December shadows deepening

                 I think of you

Holding the child towards me



A delightful dark haired girl



I caressed her hand

                  The inconsiderate crowd

Self obsessed-thronged about us

Cold shadows

                     Dancing



Friends-in fact-are distant-strangers

 Stuck fast-in their private-thoughts

  Unaware of our selfless devotion

   They have never-really-seen us



(My thoughts are a vortex of images.
Am I here recalling a dream, 
Or reality refracted through time?)



My Love                          My Love

Your absence darkens my world view

              I miss the lilt of your laughter

The child in your arms



 It is too hard-too hard-to live-alone

Bearing the weight             of memory



Trevor John Karsavin Potter 
4th.-6th.-7th. December 2012. 

Californian Buddhist Wedding.

The cicadas in the distant gardens presaged heat.

In those moments the world seemed transfigured by hope
As we stood side by side on the tranquil beach
Hands barely touching;
The silent stars spun a glittering web beyond our niche in time.

Speaking few words
We watched the moonlight shimmering a fragile path
Upon the surface of the waters.
A magical path that few have dared to follow.

Like discarded fragments of our former lives
The stones that we collected on the shore
Were flicked across the tops of breaking waves.
Bad memories should not linger to deceive us.

Suddenly you kissed me.
A tentative kiss, like those that children give. -
Turning we climbed back up the concrete stairway
And entered the quiet house.

That morning when we whispered our solemn vows
In that Buddhist Temple high on the green hill
We had been changed forever by simple words.
No secular laws were needed then to bind us,
Only our fearless honesty.

But now grey walled Manhattan claims your time;
And here I sit and watch the London rain
Darkening the cold window.
December nights are long and strangely empty.
The distant moonlight seldom splits the clouds.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter. 

27th. - 30th. November 2012.
June 5th. 2014.