Remnants - Ed McGeough

Remnants

1.


What a powerful quiet it brings,
knowing
that it is worth the cost of all
to simply have you, close, warm,
here beside me
one moment
loving


'63
Farewell, Libby.

---

2.


she does not want me to speak of her
she can't stand too many words

she is a stranger
but I know her
I know her well

she will overthrow all that is settled and fast
by being herself
she will not change

by her alone I am justified
she is my reason, my chief awareness
she does not belong to me

she is strange and independent
I harbour, I hide her
like a pain

she is a fugitive
not to be shared with others
not to be kept for yourself

I keep nothing from her
I share with her all I have
she will leave me

she is a helpless child,
joy, full of herself
full of sorrow

she is a good woman
she radiates tender silences
loves quiet privacy and is passionate

she often curls into herself
in weeping or in laughing
she does not need me

she is filled with a young innocence
partakes of agelessness
she is light on her feet

she has given me much
never all
but she has taken all away

being all around me always herself
I do not love like dislike or hate her
since she only is

but she does not want me to speak of her
she can't stand too many words

others will harbour her
on her long flight to victory
and hide her by night


Summer '69
Farewell, Pat.

---

3.


To lie together
quietly
and feel the night
surround us

Remembering nothing
forgetting all
watching together
love's rise and fall ...


'92

---

4.


Hobo's Wish


Oh my clothes to be rougher

the road to be tougher

the wind to be rising

and the sky turning black -

straight ahead on the old road

the stories untold road

straight ahead to the brightness

and no turning back


'92
Farewell, Monty.

---

5.


Tumults too have an end -
the waterfall's torrential roar
sinks and is silent
in still pools -
Day descends into night,
all things fall back
into their being -
the road goes on


Nov '93
Farewell, OJ

---

6.


For 'a that 'n' 'a that - notes on the poetic impule -


Romantic, young, I walked alone
beneath these same bright stars
and tenderly touched a tree or stone
and contemplated bio/geo - logical scars

Age all about me in my youth
was my living history
in which I sought the truth
beyond any death or glory -
They all had their story
- two world wars gone by -
so bloody and gory -
and essays to do at school on the reason why
didn't really make sense
and sense - not wonder -
seemed the thing to make of it then -
So I was just another young 'un
puzzling my brain
about time and love and death and change
while thoughtless rhythms carried me along
from first love's tender kisses
to heartbreak's first sad song
'till time and death and love and change
were no longer things of thought
for my young fingers touching stone
became the ocean, the earth, the sun,
the air I moved in,
while my brain's drum repeated Alone, alone, alone;
as a man, not God but woman I found love in -

Still at night I walk alone sometimes
beneath these same bright stars,
and touch a tree or stone and contemplate
my own heart's scars,
and wonder about time and death and love and change -
and sometimes I still shiver
with the wonder of the strange


Ed McGeough - May '93