Five Wonderful Poems by John Drudge

 

Another Night

 

Inspiration

From the dark side

Of living

Explosive reactivity

In the underbrush

Of passion

Settling in

To tomorrow’s promise

Of sunny days

And redemption

From memory’s mistakes

And dreaming’s demise

Tagged and tied tight

By stilted effort

Slipping insight

And another lonely night

Of strident prayers

For relief

Homeward

 

Running

Between raindrops

And stepping over

Sidewalk cracks

Through shards of reality

Into the fog

Of failing moments

With no footing

In slickened time

Slip-sliding into misery

Stretched and simmered

And scratching

At the barking moon

Bereft and bereaved

On the long walk

Home

Fading

 

Softly

The twilight cries

As I sit and watch

The rain

Dance like pockets

On the pond

From under the cover

Of the tall pine

On the ridge

As tired light fades

Into the blackness

Of the waiting

Night sky

Through the Valley

 

Through an eternity

Of tears falling

And slivers of light

Through cracks

In caves

The death of flames

In the morning dew

And the embers

Of smouldering truth

Beneath skin

Thinning

Bringing me to the edge

Of my awakening

Where the sun

Walks softly through

The valley

Of fearless dying

Turn of Winter

 

The cold days

Of November came

Like something inevitable

In the shortened slant

Of darkened days

Some sort of knowing

Deep in the center

Of us

The winding down

Of us

Through too many

Terse springs

And summers

Of brief awakenings

Too many turns

Toward nowhere

Waiting in disbelief

In the ice cold grip

Of winter looming

John Drudge is a social worker working in the field of disability management and holds degrees in social work, rehabilitation services, and psychology.  He is the author of four books of poetry: “March” (2019), “The Seasons of Us” (2019), New Days (2020), and Fragments (2021). His work has appeared widely in numerous literary journals, magazines, and anthologies internationally. John is also a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee and lives in Caledon Ontario, Canada with his wife and two children.