Michael Shepherd Time Poems

Yesterday...
Valentine's, you missed it, too bad, he left no forwarding address-
I watched from the pub window
as a van from a high-class Consultant on
...

Why should I take your time
describing in loving detail
the day so many years ago
when I smelt the air on a cliff-top –
...

bind your books
in crocodile skin
...

what would earth be

without rain?
...

This is the story I was told – I’ve omitted
the details which might identify
and narrow down the nation,
the place, the family, the man…
...

Why waste time
on searching rhyme
unless the knowledge wants to sing?
...

Oui, c'est beaux, le jardin... at this time of year;
mais... for myself,
a little too overgrown – but Monsieur
prefers it that way… you see him down there
...

There's a first time
for everything
said God
giving the Word
...

it can happen any time
and there’s no place which is
too improbable for it or
cannot be contained in it
...

Time perhaps, for wonder –
to look around in awe
at how all that surrounds us
has somehow come about..
...

I said to the stone,
What time is it?
The stone was silent.
...

the sculptor,
called to the great task; through
the huge columns, ringing echoes even with a sandal’s tread,
the stone chamber,
...

and a poet I was reading yesterday
said, have you noticed
that portraits of people change
after they die?
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It’s part of the tourism thing –
you stick your nose, more in duty than in hope,
into the local church;
the flowers at least
...