Ros Ayres | Poetry @rosayres - Tumblr Blog

The placing of stones

Inspired by Castlerigg stone circle

This is the spot you say as clouds gather over the Thirlmere valley. You crouch on the ground and touch the grass with your hand to be sure.

We hold our breath and wait, my heartbeat vibrates against my chest. You nod and gesture for the work to begin.

Then comes the sound of rock banging and rattling against wood. The men’s backs are bent double under the weight, brows are sweat stained and hands burn on groaning ropes straining against pulleys.

We watch as every stone is slowly dragged and levered upright. Birds are startled from the trees and autumn leaves scatter in the breeze.

Finally the circle is completed, we bow our heads in silence, holding this place in our joined hands.

The light of day is receding and the amber fells disappear in the mist.

The Tree

Connected, we were both born to this earth, grown from a seed. I hold my hand out and reach for you, your solidity grounds me, finger-thick grooves, uneven and worn, feel like home. I lose myself, leaning into your rough bark, closing my eyes, I let go. Your scarred spine maps to my palm, I sense your weight, leaves murmur, your body creaks. I think of the others, who have sought solace by your side, sharing wishes, whispering fears and fleeting promises. I listen, my ear pressed against your trunk, I hear my heartbeat vibrate, together we exist.

Poems for autumn

The wonderful Mary Oliver wrote this and I heard it twice recently. In a yoga class and shared by someone special. There are things to enjoy as the seasons shift.

Song for Autumn

In the deep fall don’t you imagine the leaves think how comfortable it will be to touch the earth instead of the nothingness of air and the endless freshets of wind? And don’t you think the trees themselves, especially those with mossy, warm caves, begin to think of the birds that will come – six, a dozen – to sleep inside their bodies? And don’t you hear the goldenrod whispering goodbye, the everlasting being crowned with the first tuffets of snow? The pond vanishes, and the white field over which the fox runs so quickly brings out its blue shadows. And the wind pumps its bellows. And at evening especially, the piled firewood shifts a little, longing to be on its way.

Wavelength

A prism breaks around the trees, a heart light fractures, low and fragile. That shade between green and orange, the space between apart and together.

Rain pours through the cracks, brambles shake and leaves fall into the mist. Everything is useful in some way.

This house is full of weather, rising water cuts through the empty rooms and the compass needle clicks, then wavers.

Listening to the fade, you press your heels into the dirt with a hand instinctively reaching for the ground as it drops.

Stanage in August

The heather returns in swathes, moorland contours are illuminated in glorious violet. Bracken crackles underfoot, knee-high ferns rub against our bare legs.

Finding rhythm in movement, we take on the steep ascent following undulating paths mapped in tangles of roots and rock. Trying to capture the expansive views with measured breaths.

Dramatic walls of gritstone meet the sky, light breaks between clouds. A pheasant bursts out of the undergrowth, a flash of green and gold.

Climbers move like ants along jagged edges, ropes swaying in the breeze, hands seeking cracks in stone.

First line and last line of ‘I capture the castle’ by Dodie Smith

I write this sitting in the kitchen sink, the cold ceramic helps me to think. Being elevated somehow makes a difference, I feel more decisive and brave.

If I could see your face, I’d be stumbling over my words, telling myself to keep within the lines, to be predictable.

I’d be looking at the ground and telling you, how it’s so much cooler today than yesterday. These conversations keep everything contained and safe, Maybe that’s why I am sitting in the sink.

My pen anchors me, I feel it’s weight between my finger and thumb and it gives me confidence. On the page, every sentence matters, there’s power in this paper. I watch the streaks of rain on the window pane,

I imagine they are magical threads connecting me to a higher place beyond this kitchen.

A space which can transform me, if I concentrate hard enough. What would that look like?

If you want to know the truth, this version of me would get to the point without this preamble. They’d not stutter and distract you with tales of the expected. They’d be dynamic in revealing the colours of their full heart. There’s only the margin left to write in.

I love you, I love you, I love you.

A sense of place

Squinting upwards, staring at the ascent of the crag, following our shadows, a dancing network of stretching and loosening limbs, mapping sequences in features and bright lines.

You feel things when on rock, seething doubts persist, breathing hard, swelling winds crash at our backs, the light splinters at the horizon. Fingertips strain to grip, hope and fear is held in every hold, surfaces glisten with uncertainty.

Carabiners clink against the weathered edges, our knuckles grazed in grit dust, movement is steady, ropes sway at our feet, muscles tense in anticipation, our heartbeats hammering stone.

Departed too soon - in response to the Sheffield floods

“I wasn’t ready,” your eyes are glassy, filled with tears.”I’d lived here, in this city all of my life, I was born on that street.” You turn and point behind you towards Kelham Island, your sodden sleeve is dripping on the pavement.

“I grafted hard to put a roof over our heads, but I wasn't strong enough to save them.” Your coat drags in puddles and the silence weighs heavy like rain clouds. Our hands are only a finger span apart, yet I cannot hold your sorrow.

“There was nothing to be done, it was so quick, too fast, the sound was deafening, the levels were rising and rising. Torrents hit us sideways, there was nothing to hold onto, I couldn’t find them. We were blinded by the river, pummeled and battered, it knocked the breath out of me.”

This is not just a rock

Up close in the sunlight, the rock sparkles,a precious beauty. This is not just a rock.

I feel the paper-thin ravines under my fingertips.

Noticing the lines, how the tones of grey merge, bands of icy white, like lifelines scarring the surface.

This is not just a rock. It’s part of something bigger. I hold it in my hand, sensing the weight of history.

Where has this come from? What weather shaped the rough to the smooth? Endings are hard.

This is not just a rock. It’s a memory, a story of transition, part of a shifting landscape.A small part of nature, which you gave me.This is not just a rock.

Heart space

Feel the ground beneath your feet, find balance, that line between earth and sky. Follow your breath, with one hand on your heart, sense the wind cooling your skin, release any gripping. Allow minutes to pass without measure, let your thoughts float like birdsong, move to your rhythm. Lift your gaze with the morning light, notice the trees reaching skyward, their buds braced for spring, like lungs deeply inhaling air.

The heart is a spiral

Spiralling layering spinning spiralling winding returning continuous curves

spiralling receiving contracting contacting maintaining pressure valves inhaling

spiralling vena cava inhaling moments maintaining exchanging gases pumping

atrium ventricle propelling blood

opening closing rhythmic spiralling balancing systolic diastolic beating spiralling. heart centre releasing revealing returning

Submerged

They say that the levels kept rising, grief was off the scale, the tipping point broke records and the world was left devastated.

In the darkness lights flicker, the building shudders as if it’s breathing, these walls are built for harsh conditions. We watch our mirrored reflection through toughened glass, grounded in our protective bubble, the surface is left untouched.

Life appears to flourish, tree roots trail like jellyfish tentacles, this woodland is symmetrical and never windswept. Crabs scuttle between rocks and we remain hidden beneath the waves.

Shoals of fish swirl overhead and the bell tower rings out dull echoes.

We are told the targets are no longer being reported despite the numbers on the brink. Earth has been removed from the dictionary, this is a life-sustaining programme and the odds are unknown.

The gap between here and there is immeasurable, pipes clunk and rattle and time seems to free fall. Searchlights skim the ground at speed, glowing halos that are soon lost in space. The floor judders under pressure, my heart is in my mouth, then the sirens begin.

Salt on your tongue

The pull of the sea, a yearning that never stops. It holds weight, like sand in my chest, an anchor, a search for home.

I taste it before I see it, salty and fresh. The ground is trails of seaweed and blue crescents of mussel shells.

These wide skies take my breath away and I watch the waves roll in, breaking on land, bright and dazzling.

The language of trees - a golden shovel based on a line from Emily Berry’s ‘Canopy’

My eyelids flutter awake morning shadows skitter in the breeze wide-eyed I looked

Quiet echoes in the clearing the sun is low branches appear to blaze this is light you can lean into

Ripples shimmer cascading downstream rolling on rhythmically like a breathe alive and vital you were my

The words scatter to the sky I feel the rough furrows of the bark I can still see your eyes

Time shifts memories in and out of focus features soften and sharpen the distance of grief cannot be measured

it’s unholdable like g-as

You get one chance only

Leaves rustle overhead a deep-rooted ritual a wave of calm I hold a prayer to the trees

Any person would choose this love accept it simply I repeat in my head you did you can

This place leads to nowhere nature is about instinct and survival I lay in the grass and look

Take care of me with your delicate fingers hold my heart take me into

I would tell you everything from the beginning to the

It gets me every time the fallen branches that wild look in your eyes

The unfinished map unique contours mark every trunk there’s such beauty in the roots of

I’m frequently lost in the gaps inside the absences I must start with a

I hold you close determined to save this person.

Out of balance

How does it feel? Like oil on water, viscous and hard to hold, difficult to measure, a creeping pressure, a crack on a window pane. Like the edge of a migraine, a harsh light, a raw scar that’s tender to touch. I sense that drop in my gut, am I even still upright? The last mug floats in space, clinking to nestle with the other crockery on the ceiling. I took balance for granted, I believed the laws of gravity would always be consistent. These days the world feels flat and uncertainty clouds every thought. I am talking to myself more to hear conversation, every movement takes conscious thought, some days I’m freewheeling and on others my body feels like it’s full of lead. I hold my hands to my heart, attempting to anchor myself to the earth, my focus drifts like clouds across a windswept sky. I breathe in the daylight, seeking to find my place, my chest rises and falls, and my feet can’t touch the ground, yet.

Edale

The gradient pulls at our calves as we take the rocky ascent, our jackets vibratIng in the wind, as we stop to get our breath.

With hearts racing, we reach the top, our words are whipped away by weather and the panorama reveals itself. Ablaze in earthy tones, fragile light catches shadows, shards of sun refract, illuminating contours and scattered silhouettes of trees.

Scarred ridges and edges map the horizon, solid compass points defining the skyline. We watch birds wheeling and arcing with grace, a quiet drama, grounding us to this place.

Inspired by the theme of space

A martian sends a postcard home

I must tell you about a visit to what seemed to be a place of worship, crowds gathered in a procession, making a pilgrimage in their metal boxes on wheels.

I felt the tension as slowly each group waited to get their moment with some higher power. I could not see who or what the special was, they were hidden from view.

The anchor point was marked out by flaming golden arches, here each party slowed to a stop, bowed and whispered into a silver ear.

You could cut the atmosphere. Then there was a movement, anonymous hands leaned out and did an exchange.

On receiving the gift of some magnitude, each person repeated the ritual of opening it, bowing again and breathing out some kind of prayer.

Before moving on and disappearing. I am still so mystified by this planet.

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Ros Ayres | Poetry