Waiting Too Long For Jo. (Completed Poem).

Listening for you to ring the bell 

Puts my nerves on edge,

And I can never guess your mood 

From one hour to the next.

Waiting has always been - for me - 

A pointless occupation. - Perhaps you disagree.

Old trees in our garden do not count the days,

They are far too busy reaching for the sun.

The axe will not concern them until it splits the bark.

As always, waiting proves to be a pointless occupation. 

I am waiting for you to cease prevaricating.

Either move back here or stay put by the roadside

In that run down caravan with a smashed in window.

You rely too much on hauliers shifting fags and readies.

Sharing a meal with you is not a problem,

But under my roof please, not in a rural layby

Where lorries double park, their motors running.

Such deprivation rots the prize of freedom.

Waiting for you should not be be such a bind.

If we wait much longer I may prove to be unkind.

I love my freedom too, but in ways that enhance living,

Tending the shrubs and trees - watching the young fruit ripen,

Not cadging coke and pasties from unsuspecting strangers.

The cards are on the table Jo. -  Step up and show your hand.

It seems to me that waiting is an endgame occupation. 

I guess you disagree.

Trevor John Karsavin Potter.

21st.- 22nd. - 23rd. May - 26th. - 2022.

Getting the tone right was not easy writing this poem.

Sabatha of the Twenty Eight Stars, (2nd. Rewrite. New longer version Completed).

Dissolving blank masks in bitter tears

I meet your eyes, blue and piercing,

seeing me as I truly am.

Debussy on the radio

reminds me that your home in France

may soon become a distant memory.

And my favourite view of central Paris?

An umbered text book photograph

pressed between frayed, wine stained covers.

I have seen all things we both held dear

despoiled by pampered narcissists

disguised as caring politicians.

Religion can also seem divisive.

You meditate. I wear a cross.

Two customs often mocked - derided

by folk who only view our masks

and not the truths that live beneath them.

But hope burns deeper than politicking.

It seems hope is a child of love,

not of deceit and subterfuge.

Tyrants enforce passports and visas,

but cannot stop strangers becoming friends.

Thus it was for us when we first met

in a time of conflict and revolutions

when governments feared freedom of thought.

You smiled. I crossed the line to greet you.

Language is not a problem for us,

and customs are only shadow boxing,

so when I phoned you late last night,

your sad face flickering on the screen,

I knew that we are safe and well

and strongly bound together.

Love cannot be destroyed by loss,

or faith by separation.

Trevor John Karsavin Potter.

First Version: July 29th. 2016. - April 20th. 2020.

Ne Rewritten version: May 17th. - 18th. - 28th. 2022.

Umbered means seen through firelight in the context of this poem. The fires that ravaged Notre Dame de Paris; also the fires of Brexit and religious disharmony.

Trevor J Potter's Art: I live in Many Minds. (Newly Revised).

Trevor J Potter's Art: I live in Many Minds. (Newly Revised).: Late summer stillness. I drag a stick across the pond and watch the mud come to the surface.- At dawn moisture danced upon the cobwebs. ...

The Outcasts. (Revised).

I cannot tap out Morse Code messages,

or draw simple patterns in the air

with outstretched fingers.

My hands are now so wrecked

the keyboard is a minefield to my touch,

and pens often end up on the floor,

I don`t know why it hurts so much to grip them.

Am Dram is our natural way of being,

so if you wish to talk to me with signs,

please indicate your meaning with a glance,

or come out front and mime a scene or two.

Do this and I shall know just how to answer,

with a wink, a nod, a seraphic loving stare,

                             a quirky sideshow guffaw

as I nudge and elbow obstacles aside

to try and keep the sight lines unencumbered.

Truth is a shadow danced across your lips,

a sort of dumb show clear to us alone,

We can also speak through touch, with hugs and kisses;

our foreheads pressed together in the dark.

My hands are snarled in knots,

                          bashed up and nearly useless,

curled in upon themselves like mollusc shells,

the life and love lines tangled, cut to shreds,

                                 meshed and badly frayed.

I can no longer hold a book, a pen, a pencil,

throw a ball or wear a pair of gloves,

but these clumsy paws can still stretch wide and clap,

set free when you step up to take the stage.

Trevor John Karsavin Potter.

Poem first sketched, (as End Of Term Love), September 18th. - 19th. 2016.

Rewritten between November 18th. 2021. - May 12th. - July 31st. 2022.

Trevor J Potter's Art: Two Poems. (1) June 25th. 2016. From the Roof of T...

Trevor J Potter's Art: Two Poems. (1) June 25th. 2016. From the Roof of T...:                   1 . June 25th. 2016. From the Roof of Tate Modern. A black spot on a sheet of paper. An ink blot relentlessly spread...

First Love.

In the midst of the crowd

A wild girl smiling -

Hair fragrant as forests -

Eyes midsummer blue -

The long handled bag hung over her shoulder

Twisted and swung like a garden swing 

Attached to a swaying bough.

"I wish she would sit next to me" I murmured

Into the depths of my half filled glass.

"I would rather chat until the rafters rattled

Than sit by myself and quaff".

Outside in the night the church bells were ringing.

And lo and behold

Without asking,

Not knowing

How I would react to her forceful presence,

To the weft and the warp of her long winded stories,

& The nervousness

She had buried beneath them,

She sat down so close we were nearly touching

And straight away told me her name.

Dear reader, I did not marry her,

Our love was too strong to make that mistake.

We were not influenced by the church bells ringing.

But the conversation we started that evening

Has continued for half a century or more,

And the warmth of her arm at ease on my shoulder

Recalls that first night when we talked until dawn.

Outside in the darkness the church bells were ringing

To proclaim a miracle that was not ours to name.

Trevor John Karsavin Potter.

May 8th. 2022.

Trevor J Potter's Art: (1) Walking on Water. (2) After the Storm.

Trevor J Potter's Art: (1) Walking on Water. (2) After the Storm.:                  1.   Walking on Water. I stand in the shadow of the Cathedral.                                                        ...