The Poetry of...
Steve Andrews
Poetry is very much like music, and in Steve we've found a man with abilities in both - and it shows. A successful musician - see www.peoplesound.com/artist/steveandrews or to hear his music at mp3.com, visit www.mp3.com/bardofely, Steve's poetry achieves a fusion of music from the heart and visions from the head. He tackles issues of the world with an intelligent, yet poetic soul, crafting some very readable, comprehendable and lyrical poetry.
No wonder they call him 'The Bard of Ely'...!
Morning Light
Morning light is fleeting,
Morning light is new,
Morning light's the distance between me and you,
Morning light is silver,
Morning light is green,
Morning light brings everything that I have ever seen.
Morning light is precious,
Morning light is gold,
Morning light's another dance
But same as in days of old,
Morning light is magick,
Morning lights your face,
Morning light shows fingerprints
All over the place.
Morning light is moving,
Morning light's the Sun,
Morning light's the next chapter
That we have just begun.
Soldiers with Wood and String
I was thinking about Kurt Cobain
And his chances were pretty slim,
And I was thinking of John Lennon
'Cos I owe a lot to him;
Just soldiers with guns of wood and string
Shot down with lack of understanding.
I was thinking of Jimi Hendrix
And other stars passed on,
Who gave their music
Immortalised in song.
I was wondering about our future
In a world turned upside down,
Where love's a word corrupted
To the sound of a weeping clown
And gunfire's from the soldiers
With guns of wood and string.
Song for Ayla
We met at the time of Imbolg,
You smiled at me and waved,
And you hugged me with affection,
Affection that I craved.
You have all the faces
Of the Goddess it is true;
I always think about you,
No matter what I do;
Ayla, Oh Ayla, I love you!
Sometimes you're like a little girl
With cuddly toys and jigsaw game
Yet you've the strength of the heroine
From the book where you got your name.
And you are skilled in magick art,
You cast an enchanting spell
With your love of Mother Nature's wealth
In all the tales you tell.
You have all the faces
Of the Goddess it is true,
I always think about you,
No matter what I do;
Ayla, Oh Ayla, I love you!
We met at the time of Imbolg,
You smiled at me and waved,
You hugged me with affection,
Affection that I craved.
Yearning
When calm settles over marsh and river-mouth
For fishermen, sandpipers and the lonely wader's cry
I yearn for you from the lowlands.
Oh, to hold you in the breeze, salt-tanged and wild,
Our warmth embracing amidst the reeds and grasses
I reach for you from majestic mountain peak,
Hunting you on Eagle's wing,
Desiring to share the moorlands paths,
Love growing amongst the heather.
The Hundredth Monkey versus the Beast
If you don't want to live in a sci-fi nightmare
With micro-chipped citizens, bar coded under the skin,
If you don't want to be a numbered slave to a computer
Then don't you let the Beast outside come in.
The work of ages has manipulated many
Political puppets lead the unwary with their lies,
Beaten down with fear and guilt and programming,
Watching out for retribution from the skies.
The churches have filled many minds with scary stories,
With all this violence you'll need Big Brother looking after you,
You know it's all being done with your interests in mind
And the spy in the sky watches everything you do.
So find comfort in your friend the friendly TV screen,
Get zombiefied with all the inmates of this zoo,
Beware of alien intervention in the real X-Files,
Dreams have a way of actually coming true.
Wake up, wake up, and find out what is happening,
Join the others who are making the turnabout,
There's always hope that we can change the future,
The Hundredth Monkey is discovering our way out.
Land Of Our Fathers
Hundreds of square miles of desolation are
Scarred by the bulldozer's claws,
Ripped by the roadways and pylons and
Levelled by Big Brother's laws
Hellish smoke-clouds obscure the horizon,
Poison and brimstone hang in the air,
Killing green trees with corrosion
Of acid that leaves our lakes bare,
Where is the land of our fathers
Now the green hills and valleys are gone,
Buried by industrial ogres,
Trashed and much trampled upon?
Where is the welcoming home ground
Now everything is boarded, closed down,
Where are our hopes for the future
When everyone's already left town?
I hear Arthur and his knights are awakening
To free this land in her hour of need,
To rescue us all from the slow death
Being brought by industrial greed.
Roll on that glad day of deliverance,
Freedom from the strangle-hold curse;
All power to the standing opposition,
To the enemies of our Mother Earth.
Road-rape
They have raped the fields
Of our countryside with roads.
They have covered up the land
With fields of rape.
The Search
In seeking to know myself
I found you
In seeking to know you
I found myself.
Opposites
We were going in opposite directions
When we met,
In opposite directions we were going
When we parted.
Optimism
I'm watching you playing patience,
Patiently waiting for me to say
I love you
I hope!
Beautiful Trees
Beautiful trees, ancient and wise
Are turned into trashy junk-mail
Increasing somebody's riches
Selling unnecessary clutter
And lies.
The Death of the Frog Buddhas
Fat frogs always remind me of Buddhas;
I watch them float and croak
Serenely under the moon and stars.
Little kids from this estate
Catch them, kill them,
Mutilate their bodies;
They cut out the eyes of these Holy Ones.
Fat frogs always remind me of Buddhas;
I watch them float and croak
Serenely under the moon and stars.
Educated and well-respected grown-ups
Catch them, kill them,
Cut them up in the name of science
In gruesome laboratories.
Fat frogs always remind me of Buddhas;
I watch them float and croak
Serenely under the moon and stars.
Greedy men and gourmets
Catch them, kill them,
Rip off their legs,
Devour them in culinary delights,
Sell them to the rich and pampered.
Fat frogs speak with primeval croak,
Timeless wisdom in their jewels;
The Bodhisattvas smile.
Helping the Goddess
On a fine sunny day
I gathered up seeds from my wild flower patch,
On a damp drizzly day
I took a small bagful
To some local waste-ground,
Freshly wounded by the bulldozer’s savagery
And I scattered nature’s dressing
At random in the wet winds of change,
Helping the Goddess bring life anew.
Beth *
Your delicate shining hands reach out
Clasping Heaven
And I stand in silent communion here
Marveling at the aesthetic stillness
Of your strength like steel, silk-smooth.
Your skin is as vellum to the gods,
Speak to me indwelling spirit;
What is your communication to those around you?
Let me in to the mystery of your slender strength.
Your graceful artistry defies the winds
As my love and admiration reach out to you
Across this void so shallow betwixt us.
I feel us touch as spirits
On this bleak moorland.
There is nothing between us
When you reach me in this ever moment.
* ‘Beth’ is the Gaelic for the Birch tree in the Pagan Seasonal Tree Calendar
Piece from a Park
I beheld all that I wished to give you
And all that I wished to shower
In a fleeting moment
Of blossom-pink
In the heart of a magnolia flower,
For golden is the moment
And perfumed is the haze
On a day like this,
As a heavenly kiss,
Where love is a word of power.
Then there, up there, in the blueness
Of an indescribable hue,
I fell in love with the whole world
Where you are me and I am you.
The peacock screamed his love-song
Like he knew that his heart would burst
And we lay on the grass
As these moments they pass,
Wondering if we are blessed or cursed.
The trees stood high so proudly,
Just trying to worship the Sun,
As I tried likewise the town clock
Struck loudly: six o’clock
But I think it meant one.
2 Prayers
I am looking at thee
Looking at me,
As my karma rebounds
I utter no sound but agree
That it’s the way
And I pray
For your looking at me
Looking at thee.
Give me a new skin
For dancing in,
May it not be taken, nor shaken,
Nor broken
And may I be awoken
In fair company.
Mystic One
Bedecked in rainbows, I saw you stand and shine
With a jewel on your brow
And you were higher than the clouds
When the Heavens danced to your tune.
O, Mystic One, where are you now
In this time-warp time?
When all the years fly backwards
You are there,
When the ground is quaking,
When the sky is shaking
And the violent seas are raging;
You are there in the calm of the storm,
You are there in the eye of the storm.
And you are like a peacock, like a warrior,
As you crusade in time and space,
Radiating resplendent beauty
With the mysteries of Egypt and Tibet
Harnessed in your cloak of Pagan freedom
From all the eons past.
O, Mystic One, where are you now?
When voices thunder in the gale
I see your face in green pastures
And in incandescent fires of future flame.
Solid is the Earth on which I stand,
Pulsing is the heart of light within;
O, Mystic One, you stand so firm
With your clock of clocks
To keep your total time
And your shield of nature and eagle’s eye.
Hymn
And in the morning and dead of night
When the wind blows softly
And the stars shine bright,
The diamonds of Heaven are for you,
The majesty of your moonlit crown.
I see you when you are not there,
I call you from the place within;
Two alien hearts can beat in time,
Sharing the wisdom of a flower.
And when we touch too much is true,
The joining of such delicate skin,
The power of magic in your beauty,
The animal passion of our blood.
Monday Night
Monday night in the ghost-town capital,
A student and a lone-parent looking for the exotic,
It’s cold outside and empty inside
But plenty of lights show what’s on offer.
New club with futuristic name beckons, entices,
Sounds like something from a sci-fi film;
As number 7 comes up on a gaming machine
The screen offers a chance at luck.
And all the workers with their readies
Don’t go out until the weekend’s call
But it’s OK for all the others.
They have the freedom to go and catch the night.
Oasis predictably preaching, echoes of the Fab Four,
Taking over minds of the nation’s numb,
Heroes of the dispossessed blare in glare of barroom,
If you know what I mean?
House of Cards
This life you're living is a House of Cards;
First level of the game:
You're right on it, down to Earth.
Next step up is pure electric;
Energy warriors, spectres and ghosts.
Travel the domain of demons and wizards;
Find your way out through the middle door.
Go on higher, find the pure light
Or take a detour around some planet.
Angel wings can take you home
Or show you how to fly away.
The game you're playing is one of trickery,
It's all done by mirrors and wires,
Speed your footsteps through the maze of time;
Vanish in your own reflection.
Multiple lives in this House of Cards,
Many, many rounds and there are no rules.
Wheel of Fortune spins the Joker,
All alone in crowded rooms.
For Melanie
Saw you in the bar,
Selling flowers, bunches of roses;
I was caught up in some
Oh, so important conversation and
Trying to be cool, I kissed you briefly
And returned to my companions.
Then you stuck again in my mind:
After all this time
Still I want you, still you're gorgeous.
Flower Girl, Lady of the Roses,
I should have held on while I could but
Paths cross and uncross;
How long for ours to intertwine again?
You could sell me any bloom
With your smile and raven hair;
Even though you burned so much
Your hand is an angel's.
From A Newport Bar-room
Rain falls softly and grey in mists
As I gaze out through bar-room window
Into lights lighting for evening's life.
Traffic flows as river does likewise
Under ancient bridge,
Another bridge of time, spanning ages,
And I think of you again, wondering,
"Will you ever be mine?"
I ponder and consider
Divination by patterns in beer-froth.
"She loves me? She loves me not?"
I order another long drink.
I Love Lucy
From the first time I saw you on the TV screen
I was enchanted by your smile;
They say the eyes are windows of the soul
And yours did mine beguile.
Now I'd love to take you by the hand
And hold you in my arms,
Willingly I'd fall more enraptured
By all of your charms,
But I am only a dreamer,
I live in a fantasy
And I wonder if you could ever
Want to know a man like me.
I read in an interview somewhere
You'd duet with Jonathan Hill.
If you'd sing with me 'I Got You,Babe,'
It would be the ultimate thrill.
It could become a massive hit again,
We could be Sonny and Cher Mark II,
It's a song that's dear to both our hearts'
It's a song to say I love you.
I'll use the title of an old television series
For this verse of romantic rhyme.
Spelling out my message for the world to read
And for you at Valentine time.
The Same
At the bar they were selling the same range of drinks,
The beermats had the same information printed both sides,
My pint tasted the same as the last one,
The abandoned newspapers had the same headline stories,
The people in the bar all looked the same,
Their designer fashions were all the same,
The TV and video screen showed the same football match
At the same time,
In each team all the players wore the same colours,
All the people who were in town had come to attend the same event,
Some girls entered the bar sporting the same hair-dos
And even their make-up was the same.
I didn't feel the same.
I felt different,
So I wrote this and left.
TAPESTRY
Tapestry of the land from a train;
Green patchwork of the Goddess and again
I am reminded of the Otherworld that's here,
Of life force and living water that is clear,
Of the history lying buried in river sand,
Of magick mystery that lies within the land,
Of deeper mystery revealed within your hand.
Anon.
Copyright © 2001 Steven Andrews
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Like the Pagan touch? Find out more about the Bard of Ely by visiting Steve's websites - see www.peoplesound.com/artist/steveandrews or to hear his music at mp3.com, visit www.mp3.com/bardofely,
All work on this page is copyright © 2001 to Steven Andrews,
all rights reserved. It may not be copied or reproduced
without expressed permission from the author.
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Email: jonathan@poeticjustice.co.uk
