By The Brook Poem by Barbara Nixon

On a dew kissed rock a man sat and listened
to the rhythmic murmur of the brook
its smooth meandering pathway
hypnotic caw of nesting rook
unbinding wearied spirit
Nature's hymn to breaking day.

A kaleidoscope of colours, a captured rainbow
in his palms, as the Sun reflected ephemerally;
a sentinel from the heavens, a catalytic seed to sow,
on an empty joyless bottle grasped so desperately.
A vessel of unfulfilled dreams, shipwrecked, marooned
forever to remain undiscovered, captive in a lost lagoon.

His life replayed in spiralling colours, vibrant reds, blues, and pinks
clutching his brow in anger,
from the past he could not shrink
lost days, lost friends, sacrificed for liquid vice
'Oh how did I fall so low', he cried,
'why did I not think twice'!

From the bank he raised his weary limbs
glimpsed his reflection in the silver sheened water
made a pact with God and man his life would drastically alter.
He raised the bottle overhead, smashed it violently on mossy stone
past fragmented into smithereens, in liberation he did scream
a demon had been banished, a life given second birth
slave to a liquid god no more, but master of his reclaimed dreams.



by Barb