Stillness Perfected. (Four poems sketched in the British Museum).

    Jin Ding Ware.


Black dish with copper rim.
The beauty of darkness
set against the white
of the adjacent vase.
Simplicity more luminous
than porcelain dragons.

                *


              Stone Buddha.


          The Amitabha Buddha.
             At peace in Nirvana
          but forever earth bound,
       standing on the marble lotus.

  I wish I could find your stolen hands.
Then you could clap them hard and sing.

                *


        November Rose Buds.


The black bowl compliments the ewer.
The refinements of a perfect marriage
adding grace to the breakfast table.
Those rescued stems I placed in the vase.
I hope their buds will soon unfurl.

                *


Ming Dynasty Porcelain Bottle.


Two Blue Birds.
A pure white sky.
Summer and winter fused together.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
November 19th. 2016.

Written in the Chinese Ceramics Gallery of the British Museum.

The Miraculous Draft of Fishes.

The kettle had steamed up the kitchen windows
and I was reminded of the London Fogs
of long since departed damp Novembers
when the autumn reds and yellows softly faded
into greyness, just like my grandmother`s Victorian
prints of Raphael`s tapestries.

The whole of my childhood in one sepia moment
flickered deep in my mind, then retreated back
into the labyrinthine libraries
where chains attach my oldest memories in leather covers
to shelves of dusty books that are rarely touched
except, perhaps, when an unexpected event fidgets the keys.

Thus it was when the steam fogged up the kitchen windows
taking my thoughts back to those simpler days
when Raphael`s picture of The Miraculous Draft of Fishes
seemed to hint at an innocence that I cannot now retrieve.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
November 15th. - 16th. - 17th. 2016.

Trevor J Potter's Art: December Daffodils. (Revised).

Trevor J Potter's Art: December Daffodils. (Revised).: Daffodils in December? I wish they would fold back into sleep, we can wait a little longer for the spring. Your face on the pillow; th...

December Daffodils. (Newly Revised Version).

Daffodils in December?
I wish that they would fold back underground,
we can wait a little longer for the spring.

Your face on the pillow;
the pale features of a Tang princess
perceived beneath still waters.

Your features, awash with dreams
that cleanse the lines and blemishes
from beneath your long eyelashes.

The moonlight on your still face
turns your skin to silver,
silk soft when I touch you.

Solstice pale, I watch you
sift through your secret images
that are locked in coral palaces.

But wherever your dreams now take you
you remain as calm and quiet
as a Buddha on a lotus.

Yet for you sublime satori
is found when you kiss your lover,
not alone in caves of silence.

Winter is the shortest season,
we could just as well sleep through it,
fierce storms a distant murmur.

Daffodils in December?
I wish that they would fold back underground,
we can wait a little longer for the spring.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
December 23rd. 2015. - November 11th. - 12th. 2016.
December 18th. 2019.

Trevor J Potter's Art: Soulmates. (First Version.)

Trevor J Potter's Art: Soulmates. (Revised): By the lakes edge the flash of electricity in the air cracking the night sky apart, breaking my window. Your face, caught in the mirro...

Soulmates. (First Version)

By the lakes edge
the flash of electricity in the air
cracking the night sky apart,
breaking my window.

Your face, caught in the mirror
just before our first kiss
as we crashed out of our loneliness, landing softly together,
free falling through a hail storm of dazzling reflections
that perhaps, were our previous lives.
Your face, caught in the mirror;
pale moon between dark clouds.

I had known you for ten years before we first met,
of this I am almost certain.
Your voice a soft whisper on the edge of my dreams.
Your heartbeats
a distant thunder.

Now we curl close like children come in from the rain,
safe home at the end of a journey.


Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
November 4th. - 5th. - 7th. 2016.

Trevor J Potter's Art: Halloween London 1969 - 2016. (Revised)

Trevor J Potter's Art: Halloween London 1969 - 2016. (Revised): Sitting in the window seat Reading Anne Sexton London far below me Pre on line hegemony Frost bright and bustling Whole neighbourhood...