NINJ WRITES

poems, creative writing and diary entries

[ninjwrites]

72: a wreckage

I want to say I’m sorry, but apology falls flat, words crumble like dust in the thick rock face of history, the debris of a million blasts, of lives taken, hopes chipped away at – our bitter legacy, set in stone.

I know you can’t forgive the unforgivable, nor forget the unforgettable; I know there are questions whose answers will stay buried in deep rubble. We can only begin; brick by brick by brick, dismantling.

Not far off, a green shoot, full of peace and promise, is bursting through the wreckage.

[ninjwrites]

67: control

It is out of your hands. Despite the careful way you weave the plait of reason, fold the fabric over itself, pull the strings, tie the bow tidy.

Time unravels tight knots, strands pull away and sway to their own rhythm.

You grasp and grip at threads they slip like silk through your fingers by forces invisible, indifferent, like gravity. Down, distant, out of your hands.

[ninjwrites]

66: snow

When I hear someone say, “it used to snow here every winter, not anymore”, I feel uneasy. I freeze, like a seed in the snow waiting to burst open. Where will life burrow when the cold stops, when the seasons flatten out into endless summer? Is it this question that alarms me, or is it the casual way in which the words are spoken? It used to snow here every winter, not anymore.

[ninjwrites]

64: things learnt from a dog

Things I learnt from a dog: Don’t judge. Don’t think too much, jump in the water, love. Love: yes, unconditionally. Be curious, always, cautious, occasionally; follow your gut. Be brave, don’t worry about getting hurt, roll in the sweet dirt, play. Stay loyal, forever, forget being bitter, forgive. No time to dwell when there’s so much life to live. So much to see and smell. So, my friend, do it fervently, foolishly well.

[ninjwrites]

63: spring

When the spring sun comes, it’s subtle. Not like the loud summer, the spring spreads gently. Beckons behind doors like a secret, expectant. Each day a little longer, leaves still whispering winter, hinting, hinting at the sun’s subtle coming.

[ninjwrites]

62: here, now

So we’re all here, in the now. How we sprinted off our feet before, now we sit still, in waiting, unsure. Never before has this occurred, it’s not war but it feels like a wreckage an unravelling a shattering; not of glass but of the known, a collapse not of brick and mortar but of assumptions that have housed us all, on whose walls we’ve leaned and learned, put up adornments, the structure upon which we’ve hung meaning and memory forever, till here, till now, torn down.

[ninjwrites]

61: women’s day // the original woman

To the first woman, the mother of all mothers, she who carried us and all others in her earth-womb; her oceans our birthplace her soils our tomb. Our mother she fed us, gave shelter, hummed lullabies of deep roots and dark matter. Patient, patient but she had a temper, burning wind and angry fire. Always providing unconditionally, the first life bearer, woman-earth, mother she.

[ninjwrites]

60: the valley

It was that short time of morning just before daybreak, when in these remote parts far away from any big city, nature still had its majesty and its music could be heard above the hum of humans and their industry. Deep in the valley, the cold morning chill stiffened the tree branches, but life abounded. A chorus of birds took over: the wood pigeons and their hoo-hoos, the robins, the blackbirds and the redwings. Undisturbed, they saluted each other with morning chatter like a rousing school foyer. The sounds moved up and down the base of the valley which was set deeply into the hill, so that from a distance you’d never know it was there.

Trees framed the valley on either side as if caressing it, with a clearing of icy grass at its foot onto which a veil of light poured in triumphantly. The trees, which with time, had bent inwards like the slope, emitted a permanence; a sense that they had lived through many suns and moons but would rise to the occasion each morning, ready to participate once again; to give and receive life. These trees were the guardians of the valley, patiently providing a sanctuary for its inhabitants, which tried so desperately to be invisible to the human eye. The trees seemed to hold nature’s secrets and mysteries in their thicket like a mother cradling her child.

In its rawness and beauty, this valley humbled many humans who passed through, for whom it was rare to witness such unspoiled places. Anyone who stopped and listened, who even for a moment, cast aside their human tendency for superiority over nature, would hear the trees talking and their gentle invitations. They would see that there was much to learn here in the silence of the valley. Those who were prouder, so wrapped up in their egoism that they’d forgotten how to be quiet, perceived the silence as a threat, and regarded this valley as just another place to be commandeered, a place on which to impose human order and aesthetic. Such people, oblivious to nature’s wise ways and unwilling to learn, bemoaned any signs of wildness and the layer of rot on the ground.

The wiser, upon listening to the valley, would see that the rotting twigs, leaves and animals, perhaps unsightly to the human eye, were nature’s ultimate gift: wise old things laying down their legacy and allowing new life to spring up. The humans’ fear of death paled in comparison to its purpose, now revealed. In the middle of winter, many things were rotting in this valley, and where the fool described the scene as ‘dead’, it was so very much more alive than his manicured places. There in man’s pruned landscapes, rotting things were picked up and put away, denied their vital role like a last dying wish unfulfilled.

[ninjwrites]

59: the cabin

Inside, the clock ticked steadily. Outside, the birds chirped and the wind chimes swayed softly with the breeze. On windy nights, their song never ceased; now, it came in gentle ebbs and flows. As I sat at the dining room table, in the main room of the cabin, a musty, doggy aroma emanated from all the soft furnishings, and no doubt from the two cosy doggy-beds in the corner. I could hear Bruno snoring in the next room, while Trixy sat silently behind me. Even in stillness, I could feel her readiness to react: to follow me should I get up, to prick up her ears if I made a sound. I did neither as the taste of peppermint tea lingered on the roof of my mouth, customary for this time in the afternoon. The cabin was as still as me, but life ticked on, quietly and surely.

[ninjwrites]

58: progress

In the name of progress we destroy indigenous land and people, we chop down trees and dig up the earth and turn it into money; in the name of progress we bury history, reduce the mystery of life into numbers and profits; we bite the hand that feeds, we drive forward forgetting where we’ve come from, knowing only we’re progressing; in the name of progress we grow our army, gear ourselves up for war, to a great reckoning where the Greatest Nation shall prevail, we push on, we fight, we dig regardless of what we disturb in the process, we push on regardless, in the name of progress.

[ninjwrites]

57: the miracle

Is it not a miracle that

not only are there beings

in every corner and every crevice 

of the Earth’s surface;

beings that tread, crawl, slide and walk

on four limbs, two or none,

who make homes

both in the depths of the dark earth

and up high in the treetops

and on every level in between,

not only are there also

those that fill the skies,

that dance in flocks for fun,

that, like us, enjoy the fresh air

and the afternoon sun upon their faces;

not only, no;

there are also water-dwellers

in the ponds, pools, lakes,

rivers and oceans who, story has it,

were the first residents of this place,

whose liquid life extends into depths

beyond imagination.

Is it not a miracle

that there is life, now, everywhere?

Everywhere, seen and felt,

within and without,

visible and invisible, alive,

my heart beats, and with it go

the drums of the universe.

[ninjwrites]

56: I knew this was the place

I knew for certain this was the place I belonged. As I stood at the base of the valley, nestled in thick woodland, I remembered childhood, walks in nature, remembered my body becoming one with the earth as my mind drifted off to a world of imagination.

In this wild autumn garden of yellow, brown and deep green, wind chimes swayed softly from a distance, inviting me to tread deeper. The wind tickled everything with its light touch and made it come alive. The wild animals cowered away, despite the slow movements I made as if to say ‘I do no harm, I come in peace.’

I knew for certain that this, not the concrete palace of the city, was the place I belonged. The city had bent me into shape; it had enlisted me, held me captive like a singing bird in a cage. I signed the dotted line, gave up my energy to the powers that be, and where freedom and flight had lived, money stood in their place; a mind and a body occupied with leisure activities and things. These were temporary distractions, they served me in their time. Yet when I arrived here, I felt the illusion shatter. All this time, I’d forgotten real aliveness was happening outside my window.

The leaves glistened and opened themselves like palms, reaching out to me as if inviting me to join their deep and heavenly dance. The tangled web of shrubbery at my feet seemed to extend far beyond the naked eye, deep into the ground; infinite roots that led to the very core of this Earth and connected with all that lived. The borders between my skin and the air, and the soil and the tree bark, began to slip away as I blinked and whispered nature’s language under my breath.

Onward I went into the thicket, until belonging became dissolving; I dissolved into this place, into its autumnal air, I became both the breeze and the matter it brushed past, movement and memory, of everything that had passed and everything that would come to be; eternity.

[ninjwrites]

55: Gozo

The wind howls, the hills respond

with solemn steadiness,

standing tall and proud, marked by the history

of this island, a small expanse.

Gozo, humble and beautiful, a treasure,

time moves her slowly forward yet her feet

stay grounded in times of old,

forever set back a little in time.

Church bells ring out across her valleys and bays

while villages hum with neighbourly whispers.

Beauty and harmony,

slow and steady, slumbering.

Cherished, beheld in her beauty by many,

a sanctuary, she offers open arms,

comfort and care.

[ninjwrites]

54: what do you tell yourself in private?

When you’re in public you’re well adorned

in an armor of words and parades,

a front of the strongest steel, shielding you from jabs, strikes,

harming when false and stinging when they ring true,

the truth hurts. It scalds as it tumbles out now,

but your armor is strong and you wield it well.

But when you go home and your guard comes down

and you look in the mirror, naked and alone,

tell me, man, what do you see?

Does the barrage of words that protect you outside

come up again now, privately?

Do you reach for cover, unable to face yourself truly?

Or do you bow your head like a child, and whisper and wonder,

ponder the wrongs and regret them, finally?

[ninjwrites]

53: Timekeeping

Everywhere we go, we keep time.

Once it was grandfather clocks ticking loudly in the hallway.

Then it was wristwatches with their faces meeting ours every hour.

Now it’s screens and devices; all shapes and sizes but it’s always the time you see first when they wake.

It’s interesting, our time keeping.

I s’pose long before the grandfather clock it was the sun,

not quite as precise but still a reminder of where we were,

anchoring us to something. Giving our day meaning.

It’s so necessary to us human folk, time, and time-keeping.

We can’t stand the not knowing. The just-feeling.

[ninjwrites]

52: Samhain

End of the harvest, light to darkness,

night beckons us with its crisp coldness, wisps of flame crack and burn in the bonfire saluting the last of the summer light, guiding sun across sky in flight. In this place where spirits and fairies delight we offer dreams, fears and all things hidden from everyday sight.

Come down with me to the edge of this world and look upon your ancestors; ask them if we’re doing things right. We listen for wisdom as the winter bows heads, droops flowers, sets the sun, curls inward and closes all that’s been undone. Histories mingle as the ancient stories of before fade to the foreground, weave themselves into the tapestry of sound that surrounds the night. This night we remember our roots; the fruits of summer finished as we look down and deep, in the dusk somewhere between wake and sleep.

Come closer, stoke the slow fire as we witness this collision of two worlds. A beginning and an end, befriending the night as its stars burn bright. We dance with the dead, rest our head upon their laps and they stroke our hair; telling us tales and whispering their wisdom in the midnight air.

[ninjwrites]

Day 51: migrant

I saw a young man staring out to sea, his skin as dark and silky as the deep water; me, I wondered where his thoughts took him as he sat unmoving on the outward-looking rock. The horizon stretched as wide as his heart’s longing; his lips tasting sea salt but yearning for flavours of home, thick spice and tang of fiery tongue; he was young, and he’d left because he had to.

Now, around him, people flirted with the sea; toes dipped and bodies jumped in whole, rippling and relishing the same wide water which, as this man made his crossing in the night, had painted death’s image on its great waves to and fro, while in boats people advanced, scared and sick and slow. Remembering this, a wave of relief washed over him; he was safe. Safe and despairing, he took some comfort in knowing the sun that now squinted his eyes, also shone on the faces of friends in streets he’d left behind.

As he sat looking out at this impossible length of blue, facing home he knew; this was as close as he’d get at least for now; but it would be enough, at least for now. Gazing out over the water he imagined the flowers at home bending in his direction, saluting him like the sun

and reaching out for his roots. Heavy in his homesickness, parted with his homeland, maybe forever, Aching, heart breaking, he got up, he turned and carried on.