Poem Of The Month: March 2011

For March's Poem of the Month I have chosen Eddie Wainwright's poem Lying in Wait. It is taken from his collection: "Love and Death."

I am very sad to report that Eddie Wainwright died on Monday 21st February 2011. Click Here.

LYING IN WAIT

Your eyes are dimmed, their pretty blue’s

clouded, pleading not to be hurt again.

I’m desperate to help, don’t know how, can’t find

the words, can’t hug you better, stroke you

as I could a cat. Not easy for me either, then.

Out there, the birds’ happy commotion

suggest spring’s stirring; too early yet, I tell them,

it’s only the false dawn of Valentine’s,

the one day when I may write sweet nothings

under the cloak of anonymity. Let this then be

my pretext, and I’ll pretend I never wrote them.

But as you read, please let your eyes smile just a little

Your sights are set elsewhere.

You smile on cue, assent,

as though you understood;

a sleepwalker on pilot.

You’re pretty good at this.

Can’t fool me, though,

with your glazed eyes and your fixed smile,

gazing elsewhere.

But if I gently stirred and whispered,

We ‘re here and now, not there

where you are, would you wake?

Tell you what: meet me

when the stars brim and the moon’s

a golden crescent on the hill’s

dusky shoulder. Tell you what: I’ll lie

in wait for you, dear distant dreamer;

and I’ll wait for you.

The author has asserted her/his right under Section 77

to be identified as the author of this work.

Light In The Window by Peter Griffin