Nearly (a ‘Big Triku’ poem)

A singular roar;

the horizon bends as stars

decorate the void.

~

Deep in the back of my seat,

I force my bellows open slowly,

and hold back as I breathe out.

~

Drawn back, I follow

a sickening ellipse – thrust

gone, new orbit lost.

Just Outside

Far from the fumes, our

polluted illusion in

clear resolution.

~

A distant hum outlines the

silence. The falling sea settles in

oily currents by the rocks.

~

A large gull slowly flaps above the

channel, pitches, meets its reflection, splashing

sofly, drifting backward on the tide.

~

A caterpillar crawls in

the hot white sand. A magical bird

flutters in shimmering light.

~

Black smoke joins a brown

band staining the horizon,

car engines straining.

Nicholas Rowe Poetry: – Selected Poems

Dear readers,

I have added a new ‘Selected Poems’ area to the site menu.

While the main menus (under 2018 and 2019) continue to contain all poems and are chronological, the idea of this new menu is to provide a curated selection in a customised order.

If I one day publish a book, I imagine it would include a similar exercise of selecting and ordering those to include, and I might be tempted to end with an ‘off-cuts’ section, including many of the rest.

I might (probably quite fairly) be accused of not being sufficiently selective in the ‘Selected Poems’ menu area, or missing out ones you think I should have included. Do let me know in comments if you have any thoughts on whether this new menu works for you, or on what you would leave out or add in.

Thank you,

Nick 😊

Spring Promise (a ‘Big Triku’ poem)

Sparkling white sunlight

on wavelets in the cove, cooled

by early spring sea.

~

Air warms in sunlit patches

sheltered from the salty breeze, coloured

by the first flowers of spring.

~

The colourful warm,

intoxicating flood of

summer on the way.

The Soul of the Sea

I remember, at the age of four,

a violent storm that blew outside

like nothing else upon this earth –

when I was taken near high tide

to feel that force of Nature’s birth.

Within the shelter of the land

the trees would sway and whip and sigh,

below the dark and dreary sky.

Before the beach a bank stood high,

with us behind, within its lee;

we climbed to face the deafening roar

and fought to stand upon the shore,

and saw the savage sea.

~

Far offshore great mountains boomed,

crashing in heaping boiling whites,

spray streaks pulling through the air –

bright in the green and purple light.

The salty blast blew through my hair,

blew through my clothes like paper, soaking

my face, my eyes, and stinging my nose.

I shuddered, cold from scalp to toes,

in awe as Nature’s violence rose.

~

And here I am in silent air,

nothing moving in this room,

trapped in a timeless, heavy gloom.

~

But I remember being there,

and once again I long to be

a shaking figure fixed before

a mighty storm upon the sea

with huge waves crashing on the shore.

~

And I will see that storm arrive,

my feelings swelling with its rise,

a fire burning in my eyes,

insignificant beneath tremendous skies,

the Atlantic blast beating through me,

a smile behind my wild eyed stare,

knowing that I should be there –

a part of Nature, with Nature in me,

alive in that moment, with the soul of the sea.