Aftermath

Written back in 1987 - are all years containing the number 7 doomed? To me they are!

We overplayed and underplayed our parts

And paid the price; we went our separate ways

For me to think of you, and you of me

Some part of all our long and restless days.

For what advantage? We may never know,

We cloud each other's vision at the hearth,

I loved you well, but love was not enough

We neither paused to give the other breath.

 

Like people trapped behind the moving screen

We both replay our scenes, we freeze each frame

Of shrugs, of nuance, words of lost intent

We blurted out in anger all the same.

But anger rests, and now there's only loss

As keen for me as you, I must confess

If I could still regain the way I came -

But mist and chill obscure our waywardness.

 

We charmed and chafed each other in our turn,

We stormed and raged, and whispered words of love,

And tried to use the magic we had known

To lighten hearts that long had ceased to move.

But at the end you left me in your pain

And I was too resigned to turn your head,

I'd fought and loved, and fought and loved in vain

'Til love was some black season I had bled.

 

What now for us, the doors are shut and barred,

The shutters strain at every passing gust,

And winter freezes over at the heart

To chill the brief young season of our lust.

We may yet meet at some pre-destined time

When life has buried both beneath its dross,

And I may look at you, and you at me

Without this deep and dreadful sense of loss!

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[Distant horizons]

I have the same problem with years ending in 1, they are not the best for me. This has a much more personal feel than any others i have read of yours. A different angle from your pen. Beautifully expressed without the rage most pens would find in a similar situation. Has a sad finality to it. Superbly done.

[Penlady]

I agree your writing is as a ballad. Such raging fire and rising heat must surely burn quickly and sometimes completely into the hearth ash. But time is the hope that may heal, but then again, maybe not.

[...]

I enjoy reading your work :)

[Marie]

I love the way your poems rhyme and read like a ballad. You have good things to say and say them very well.