Sky-Watching: Seven Sonnets & One Poem by Gary Bills
A CHOIR ABOVE THE DESERT
The bushmen paused and listened to their star,
a gift to them – “just listen well”, they said,
“it sings above us now - of who we are…”
But van der Post just shook his crowded head;
perhaps he knew that men once heard a bell
and in those chimes were ships and moons and coasts,
and dreams, for some, of what no tongue could tell
when language was a gabble filled with ghosts -
too haunted for an outline in the sand.
The Fire said, “wait” – the domed Night roofed the plain,
“I’m wide enough,” said Night, “for any land;
remain beside the Fire and praise my name..."
Most did - but restless souls refused to hear,
although the stars were singing, bright and near.
YOUNG KING HENRY'S PILGRIMAGE
Winter, 1511
Every King is crowned in Mary's realm
for England is her dower - the priests all say
that angels built her house with beams of elm,
with roof of thatch, and there, I'll kneel and pray.
But first, my feet must bleed along the lane
that leads to Holy Walsingham, our goal;
when Nazareth comes to England, what is pain? -
since every drop I bleed shall make me whole,
as true as Jesus Christ who, on the Rood
bled wounded for our sins, while Mary cried -
I seek her image, though it’s roughly-hewed.
Her Child endures. It was Man's sin that died;
and so, along this pilgrims' way I'll go
barefooted - humble, through the biting snow.
A GOD IS IN THE BRAIN
Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law…
Ye are gods?
When I pray, I pray as every star,
whole galaxies are turning in my head:
those clustered lights for worlds that were and are,
they balance on my tongue, alive and dead
and coloured by my spirit while I speak.
If this seems vain - it is a gift we share;
the utterance of making settles deep -
Creation through the Word, for as we stare
the Universe is curious through our eyes:
we're each a point of reference for its form,
and no-one's born and no-one ever dies,
in this, a masque where changing masks are worn,
where names might change, but selfhood will remain;
from dance to dance, a god is in the brain.
EQUALITY
circa 1500...
So many shrines, with State and God aligned,
the wayside benedictions graced with flowers.
Two jostling faiths? - the blooms from hands refined
and fortunate, and those of rustic hours:
from country verges - offerings from the meek
ones and the ragged ones – Oh see, they kneel!
Their prayers are plucked in season, week by week -
poor people praying hard for every meal
or whining how their prayers of need are true…
But Stinking Willie stings the parson's nose,
with aconites and ramsons - bluebells too
all rotting near the lily and the rose,
as pilgrims think on Christ's redeeming palm
and statues bless them all, or do no harm.
SKY BURIAL
From this Tower of Silence let me rise
and leave those tacky fragments picked by crows,
all scrips and scraps devoured - my staring eyes
removed at last. I'll have no need of those
once I am winged with light to seek the light -
regaining sight I had before my birth
when all was glimpsed, or known - as was my right,
before the blurred confusions of this earth
perplexed me so - as one who half recalled
the sheer descent from brightness. To what end?
I was the stranger here; the days appalled
a soul for different bells. Let me ascend
O Universal Mind - let me soar free
beyond the hills, to where I'll truly see.
LOVES BEYOND THE SKY
True love - rare love connects the neurones so,
it even grants infinity a face,
and those who follow – loves that come and go
are each the dearest All, but leave no trace
for each succeeding eye; yet in one's mind,
the spinning macrocosms find their space:
eternal - unsuspected by the blind,
and this is for the best – let darkness hide
the bubbles filled with sparks which you might find,
which no one else can see. Observe with grace
what love has made, once made – for time must bind
the heart - to every point where love and place
made time anew; these loves beyond the sky
turn slowly through my thoughts and never die.
NOTHING ‘GHOST’ IS TRUE…
Miracles of Science - this and that
excluding piebald unicorns with wings
as nothing flies from physics - fact by fact,
we grow to doubt that any angel sings;
the gathered angel choirs dissolve in cloud.
Belief is much reduced, and wonder too,
and everywhere, the world is brash and loud,
assured in this that nothing 'ghost' is true.
But if the quantum froth has ghostly ears,
then eldritch realms can listen for a thought
and shapes for dreams and nightmares may appear,
to teach the hidden truth that's seldom taught -
the monk who kneels in prayer, and you and I,
are brief vibrations puzzled by the sky.
THE TIMBREL HEART RESOUNDS
Thank you, for this planet by the sea,
The full moon dwarfed - the near conjunction rare -
Seen only by the drunkard and the bee,
A mirage of New Earth in rippling air.
Our woods are green, but none so green as those,
Our oceans surge, but none so vast and blue –
Her islands half-concealed by clouds of rose,
Her continents slow-turning out of view,
And always, from the canopies at dawn,
Exotic birds give praise as they are born.
The morning of the world is always near,
Let flautists or the lutanists decide
How best to bring their dances to the year,
Mere romps and stomps, where lust and youth collide;
But see how dancers break yet whirl with joy
Because the orbits whirl them each to each -
The timbrel heart resounds for girl and boy;
The first wolf howls, one crab invades the beach,
One dolphin clears the surf - the gods grow mute
To see creation born from pipe and lute.
Gary Bills was born at Wordsley, near Stourbridge. He took his first degree at Durham University, where he studied English, and he has subsequently worked as a journalist. He is fiction editor for Poetry on the Lake.
Gary gained his MA in Creative Writing at BCU, with a distinction.
He was nominated for a Pushcart Prize for his post-modernist epic poem, “Bredbeddle's Well”, which was published in Lothlorien in 2022, and he has been nominated for the Best of the Net awards, for his short story, “Country Burr”.
Gary's poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including The Guardian, Magma, HQ and Acumen, and he has had three full collections published, – “The Echo and the Breath” (Peterloo Poets, 2001); “The Ridiculous Nests of the Heart” (bluechrome, 2003); and “Laws for Honey” (erbacce 2020). In 2005, he edited “The Review of Contemporary Poetry”, for bluechrome.
His work has been translated in to German, Romanian and Italian. A US-based indie publisher, The Little French, published his first novel, “A Letter for Alice” in 2019, and a collection of stories, “Bizarre Fables”, in 2021. His second novel, "Sleep not my Wanton", came out in January 2022, and it is due out shortly as a Spanish language version.
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