If it’s quite alright, my darling
I’ll remember the time we met
A lakeside Autumn, so charming
If it’s quite alright, my darling
You offered your hand for dancing
Weaving in a timeless duet
If it’s quite alright, my darling
I’ll remember the time we met.
Places
Up in the hills of Merri Creek
Dancing around my red brick walls
I breathe in the eucalyptus
Listening to urban laughs and tram bells
Wrapped in blankets of holidays past
Dreaming of the day I can leave
Just so I can come home again.
There’s a teacup under my bed.
I bought it on a damp high street,
when the days smiled
and our light repelled
oncoming clouds.
You said I was weird.
So when summer ribbons
were moth-eaten
and flowers faded away,
that little teacup stayed.
It watched from the basket,
when lovely red sandles
were discarded,
onto your thick head.
And the purple pen you gave me,
the ink had run
dead.
I love that little teacup,
that sleeps under my bed.
Branded in my memory – those headlines.
“Everybody’s going to war”, she said
in big bold irrefutable lines
caterwauling across the world: “you’re dead”.
I remember summer, so exciting
hanging together in our township, there
used to be laughter at sudden lightening
we were innocence at the village faire.
But despite the darkness that lingers here
you’re flickering in the deepest shadow
and where there is light, there is hope my dear
inspiring a better tomorrow.
Here enters this world, a parable;
a soul whisked from Anglo and Asian
beaten to the creamiest caramel
cast into a classic Australian.
Creator mixed me with wit and wonder,
folded in compassion and empathy,
she filled my guts with bolts of thunder
and hammered in the nails of humanity.
She cooked me until I was honey golden
measuring each and every state of play.
She watched me carefully, my path chosen
She knew I would be delicious some day.
A little girl waits in an oak tree
like a pearl from the deepest sea.
She hears her call,
a bold buzzing,
drumming thoughts
a white noise humming.
The little deer through the years
riding through her fiery fears
she fought and sought
with all her might
dodging judgy worldly lights.
Battles won – she can count a few,
the mountain peak, it’s not far from view.
Yesterday’s fountain has run dry
the truth, bellows a Banshee cry
they cannot run. they cannot hide,
for all unjust will certainly die.
The little girl laughs from her tree,
the ones before whisper in the breeze.
Have you ever just stopped and noticed that buzzing,
the constant bzzzz and eternal humming?
A network of insomniacs, the lights are always on
from New York to London, and even Taiwan.
I dream of that moment, the holy grail of silence
in the deepest darkest spot of the worlds remotest island
a place where the trees won’t rustle and the winds won’t whistle
where there is absolutely nothing, not even a thistle.
But I know in my heart it will never come true
because no matter where I go, no matter what I do
I will never find a moment of complete and utter peace
when my heart beats so fast, I can hear myself breathe
Even my exhales are noisy, as they pass on out
and the voice in my head just wants to shout
I can feel the thump of my temples against my hand
and the thud of my head when it decides to land.
Have you ever just stopped and noticed that buzzing,
the constant bzzzz and eternal humming?
There is no such thing as silence, not even peace
Just me and you, and you and me.
The Huntsman’s name is Death,
his horses’ name is Time
they’re out to catch my breath
at the end of my line.
They wait in the shadows
they watch me at prayer
they blanket me in woe
they simply linger there.
Death and Time are good friends
they are the foes of man
every life they attend
every life they brand.
Inspired by Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘The Huntsman’
I wonder, how was this morning for you?
Can you remember the sights and the sounds?
It is in the moments we see the truth
a thought, while I stand upon frozen ground.
At 8, I watched the steam rise from my tea
At 9, I felt the breathe of Sunday morn
I walked, watching Winter begin its weave
the flowers stripped bare, revealing their thorns.
But, the flicker of hope remains in the sky
as the summer yellow turns to bright white
there is still beauty in things as they die
and nothing more beautiful then this sight.
So, the next time you step into Sunday
be grateful for the moment that makes May.
It’s 9am on a Saturday
fitbits and friends, lace up
there’s a purring koala next to me
and an adventurous little pup.
The tall eucalypts are singing us a song
as the birds harmonise
but this is our story
the tales of the creek
talking sunshine and flies.
Charlie Ann Alford 
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