A carrot in the toaster

Stay, stay the hand. The candle, let it burn,
the cradle of despair will grant no rest.
Don’t close the door against my sure return.

Curled deep within your misery, you yearn
to shift the load that’s put you to the test.
Stay, stay the hand, the candle, let it burn.

How slowly turns the mill, the ancient quern,
the product that results may be the best.
Don’t close the door against my sure return.

The greatest gift you have, you should not spurn,
enfolding bitter pith there is the zest.
Stay, stay the hand, the candle, let it burn.

I glimmer in the darkness, time to learn.
Wait patiently the advent of your guest.
Don’t close the door against my sure return.

Precision timing is the prime concern,
I spring eternal in the human breast.
Stay, stay the hand, the candle, let it burn.
Don’t close the door against ny sure return.

© Marion Sharville

Past eight o’clock and the sun still warm.
Dappled leaves rock gently, silvered in sunlight.
Fuchsias dance on spindly legs, a ‘pas de dozen,’
a free-for-all on the breeze.

Chalk-white against the trees
the painted dove-cote stretches tall.
New-mown grass awaits the shadowing of the young fox,
not yet brave enough to tackle next-door’s rooster.

Daisies nodding off; the neat and tidy
scratch and snap of shears;
tree-tops twittering with fledglings;
murmurs of a closing day.

Crashing through this lullaby,
joy-riders play their Russian Roulette;
two-wheel cornering and screech of tyres

and little Jimmy, down the road,
with his hammer bashes old cars
—can’t wait to be big enough.

© Marion Sharville

Nursemaid to Mother Nature, she coaxes the tender shoots
towards the light, releasing them from their clammy dungeons.
She caresses the leaves, unfurls the petals and paints the primroses.

Applauding the trumpeting of the daffodils,
she dances through the dappled woods, with the bluebells
and sprays a rainbow of colour on the dark brown of the earth,
showering all with gentle rain to release the perfume of life.
All is prepared for sister May to take over the next shift.

© Marion Sharville

The Easter Feast is a wondrous story
of Sacrifice, Hope and Love and Glory.
To children today; the things long ago,
may not seem true; not on facebook, you know.

Why choose a donkey, to ride into town?
Why not a carriage for a man of renown?
No red carpet for the path of a King,
Just Palm leaves strewn ‘neath the donkey and Him.

It’s hard to believe a man really would
suffer and die for other folk’s good.
Yet, Dad said, two fire-fighters recently died
saving some strangers, trapped there inside.

Excited children will hurry, when bidden,
to find chocolate eggs, playfully hidden.
Renewal of Life, these eggs represent
after carrying the cross through the six weeks of Lent.

He doesn’t mind the colour of our skin
or if one is fat or painfully thin,
ugly or beautiful, tiny or tall.
He gave us His Son to die for us all.

Then, three days later to rise and to live,
was not just for those who declare they believe
but to ‘not sure’ or ‘don’t know’; the world and his wife
and, on Easter Sunday, the true Gift of Life.

,© Marion Sharville

.
..ON THE NUMBERS ONE TO TEN.

ONE day, TO be sure,
the THREE of us
went FOR a stroll.
We met the girls
and climbed the FIVE-barred gate
into Ryan’s orchard

and there, the SIX of us
were in SEVENth heaven
as we romped in the long sweet grass
and ATE the forbidden fruit.

When the village clock struck NINE
we made our way to the pub
so as not to waste any more drinking time,
for TEN to ONE, TOmorrow
the THREE of us will go FOR a stroll
and meet some new girls…

It’s the beer that counts.

© Marion Sharville

The Parks and Gardens Committee
voted to scatter their dreams
along the grass verges of the A224.

No-one noticed the kick-start of life.

Cars swished through the dark tunnel
of winter, their drivers unaware of the gift.

Emerging, dormouse-eyed, they are
surprised by pools of daffodil gold;
a nodding acquaintance.

The Committee moves to another agenda.
The gift continues its sunburst fanfare
to Spring…
after Spring…
after Spring….…

© Marion Sharville

Young March steps from behind the long dark skirt of February, lightly toe-dipping into the fast-flowing year.
Cautiously, she caresses the trees, seeking sanctuary.

Emboldened by their welcome, she feels her feet, shakes off her fear, blows out her cheeks and starts to set her pulses wild,
a challenge, test of strength, a force within, a teen-age mutineer
having a fling; a skirt-lifting Whirling Dervish; a devil child.

Recklessly she shoots the rapids of the rooftops, searches every cranny for things to play with, until they’re spoiled.

A deceit of tempo lulls us, as she seems to slow and stop.
Her power drives her on though, without slackening, hurling dustbins, screaming like a banshee down chimneys, through locks.

The damage?…of no consequence. It’s beyond her reckoning.
Exhausted, spent, she succumbs to April’s gentle beckoning.

© Marion Sharville

I met him in the shoe shop,
he was trying on a shoe.
His socks were full of holes
but Oh!.. His eyes were blue.

Dad says he needs a haircut,
short back and sides would do.
I like his little pigtail
and Oh!.. His eyes are blue.

He wears Bob Dylan’s sweatshirt,
that was worn at every ‘Do’.
Mum says he should have washed it
but Oh!.. His eyes are blue.

I’m meeting him on Sunday,
what is a girl to do?
Mum says, to keep on walking
but Oh!.. His eyes are blue.

© Marion Sharville

Crisp January cleansed. The old year’s dead
and shriven as Spring lambs we can’t evade
the dreary days, the month that lies ahead.
Like purgatory, the crossing must be made.

Though leaden skies are clamped down and secure,
the sun may shine but doesn’t warm a thing.
The shortest month, yet longest to endure,
March bides her time to have her gusty fling.

Bleak February’s world is monochrome,
with all her colours drained and stored for Spring.
It seems this month has set her heart of stone
to sharpen up the rain for added sting.

A cruel time, when all is said and done
and yet…the snowdrops do not fear to come.

© Marion Sharville

You enter the windowless room.
Grief closes and bolts the door.
You are alone in utter darkness.
Others, outside, beat upon their wailing walls
but you do not hear.

Time has no meaning inside this room.
Minutes pass like years until, one day,
a chink of life sneaks in,
bringing a tentative touch of warmth.
Soft voices hammer against the silence,
calling to be let in.

Cautiously, you unfasten
the self-indulgent safety-chain
and peer out once more
into a world still ceaselessly
turning around you, where loved ones
have been patiently pacing the floor, ready
to offer you the kiss of life.

© Marion Sharville