Peter Lilly: Poems

I am thawing. I will soon be liquid. But, for now I crack with violent snaps, and in contrast I serenely drip, drip, ripples expanding into relaxation. I am thawing. I will soon be liquid. But for now I exist in two separate forms, one hard and unbending, cold and unfeeling. The other is calm, laughing in movement, penetrable in stillness and I am alive in both. I am thawing, and I'll soon be us eful agai n . . . . Having spent the last few years working with the homeless I have encountered all sorts of people who are running from, hiding from, trying to heal from, or fighting against all sorts of traumas. Because of this I have come to view trauma as something that freezes people: It can make people hard and unfeeling, can paralyse people's development so they cannot grow and it can chill people with sorrow that doesn't fade.  The process of recovery from a trauma is difficult because there are ups where progress and healin...

I have missed the sun: softening the pavements with blissful warmth; enticing petals to open and expose their reproduction in splayed peacock beauty; immediately splicing reels of nostalgic summers, ice cold beers and fascinating fires, projecting them red  through closed eyelids; pulsing a single tear, the best kind of tear, from the well of appreciation to tenderly evaporate from skin cheeks; Causing what was dull to glisten and deepening every colour with respiration and the smell of photosynthesis; re-igniting the love of water that shocks the throat with cold, suspending the need to breathe so one may fully appreciate all that is reflected and absorbed; somehow diminishing stresses and concerns in the truth of essential relaxation. Yes, I have missed the sun. (inspired by Vitamin D) Written on that first really sunny day in April 2011.