This wonderful piece reminded me of so many people who have made a positive difference to the world and have now left it behind on their soul journey.. It makes us know that we need to invest time in leaving behind some healthy legacy of comfort, knowledge, wisdom, healing, healthy relationships and unconditional love. We can all make our mark....make that difference.
There are so many phrases here which are also redolent of Anglesey/Ynys Mon.
Do seek out the Facebook 'Images of Anglesey' page and 'Like' it to get stunning photography.
You will find 'immemorial waters', a 'vast audience of stars in a bullfight arena', 'flaming mountains', 'caves of your gut' etc. Welsh Romantics aren't we all?
I feel I could use this beautiful poem in our meditation group ...the visualisation....is ....so peaceful.
We had great carrots, beetroot, butternut squash,courgettes, and sweetcorn this year. The peas and beans were chomped to Kingdom come and the early Charlotte potatoes got the dreaded blight. However, we burned the blighted leaves and the potatoes have made a fine crop despite their early sickness. I planted lots of cut and come again lettuce and caterpillars got the lot. I now have them surrounded by gravel and tubs of Skol lager against the slugs and snails... a lovely second crop, despite the evil presence.
PETIE
Finger-marked the grubby door folds,
Sleepily revealing this moment-wakened child,
Sweetly smelling flannelette and Ladybird blue.
He hugs the handle’s security and blinks towards the crude bulb,
The Dark - a hall behind him.
His feet pat the boards in their warmth and bareness.
His nose runs, a trickle reaching his lip -
So he sniffs with almost a sob.
“Mummy!” his voice rises on the brink of anguish.
But, he remembers I’m there and his face swaps expressions,
Ringing in a pool of smiles.
I open my arms, bending to his lovely level.
He charges - a battering ram,
His love knocking against my knees.
I swing him up.
“Hello little soldier. Hush now. We mustn’t wake Imogen.”
“IMMY!”
“Sh!....” I whisper with my finger to my face.
“SH!” he shouts, revelling in the gushiness he makes.
Happy to be a substitute mum
I thrive on his nearness and needing.
I caress and scold.
I yearn.
I mould and learn
A myriad untold feelings yet to come.
Finger-marked the grubby door folds,
Sleepily revealing this moment-wakened child,
Sweetly smelling fleeciness and Mothercare yellow.
Guiltily he sidles along the wall,
Beginning his disarming act with a coy grin.
His cheeks are flushed.
His eyes dance -
His smile exposing proudly two,new teeth.
“Dink!”
“It’s time you were asleep young man!”
My tongue relents its sharpness as the charm begins to work.
I open my arms, bending to his lovely level.
He charges - a battering ram,
With his arms clinging and winding,
Snuggling and hugging close.
I treasure the instant and file it carefully away
In memory store marked, “For use in old age.”
The resemblance seems more than coincidental.
Andrew - You were not conceived in my womb,
But one Petie baby-sitting night,
Twelve years gone by
In my heart!
Author’s note:
As a child I was an incorrigible tom-boy and even as a teenager would not have been seen dead pushing out a neighbour’s baby in a pram. So it came as something of surprise, in my early twenties, when a friend twisted my arm to do a spot of baby sitting, to discover that I actually had a mothering instinct.
The moment was so moving to me that it remained etched upon my mind and gave rise to this poem, written several years later shortly after my son’s first birthday.
