My Solitary Self: Poem

My Solitary Self

I asked my solitary self, shy, splendid and sad
What to do wth the rest of my life;
My solitary self, debating with being and existing
And unravelling sundry strife.

My solitary self, aloof at times
Decided to ask my soul when and where
My brain and body could join in
And finally all griefs to share.

Wisdom, wherever it lies,
Perplexed by this intellectual discussion
Asked my solitary self to flee
All complicated abnegation.

So, alone with my solitary self,
Again I let my mind wander winsome and wild;
Slowly walking on mile after mile:
And then I saw my solitary self smile.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Stone Face in Niche in a Wall, Nevers

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Interesting angle to this face, cunningly hidden in a niche in a wall.

Sacred Was This Longing: Poem

Sacred Was This Longing

Sacred was this longing; like a flame
Whitehot and purified: flaring towards freedom
Nebulous but euphoric in a mad quest for liberty;
To rebel, to fight and even maybe lose
With that sacred faultline of losers the world over:
Cracks in the surface, waiting, waiting for a kinder destiny.
Sacred was this desire: wrapped in life's energy.

It was what enabled the city lights and country earth
To course in my life's blood. When I raised my head
To look at the stars they were attainable;
When I looked at the horizon it seemed so near
I had touched rockbottom but now I could fly alone
Touched, brushed, cleansed by

This sacred longing

Copyright: Rani Turton

Doorhandle, Paris

Artists who imagine and create everyday objects like this one are geniuses indeed.

Strum, Strum Gently And My Heartstrings Sing: Poem

Strum, Strum Gently And My Heartstrings Sing

Strum, strum gently and my heartstrings sing
A song that comes from deep within
Words that coin their own phrases
And that is how I begin

A terrible ballad of love
I can speak of emotional hiatus
Begin at the beginning and then
Let this song sing about us

Strum gently and let the world fade away
The time I have with you will soon end;
There is a meaning to this interlude,
I have a liftime this heart to mend.

Strum, strum gently, do not pause when
The words do not come;
Thus my heart will continue to beat
And I to this love will succumb.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Father's Day Is Almost Done: Poem

Father's Day Is Almost Done

Father's day is almost done;
His hair shines silver in the light:
His hands, frail, hold a book,
His smiles to see a bird in flight.

He walks slowly as though
To still time in it's flight;
The sun will set, will set
And it will soon become night.

Father knows life is fragile.
With every passing season;
He unravels thread by thread
His life's passion and it's reason.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Seashell bat, Sables d'Olonne

Very fascinating art! A bat made entirely out of shells on the walls of a house.

Rose, Your Glory Turned To The Sky

Rose, Your Glory Turned To The Sky

Rose, your glory turned to the sky
The sun on your face; the wind's caress
As you whisper as only roses can
The rain, the rain falls softly on your skin.

Rose, your glory turned to the sky,
Perfection, almost pity as the tempest comes
And scatters your petals far and wide

Your perfume comes, goes,
Remains on my hand.
Rose, your beauty is known by
Poets, lovers, artists
From every land.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Mind, Losing Control: Poem

Mind, Losing Control

Mind, losing control, asking why.
Mind, wandering from hemisphere to hemisphere
And trying to find a place
A kind of santuary.

Disturbed and often weary.
Eroded by life's wear and worry.
Mind, losing control, fatigued
Strumming the strings and softly singing

Of life's lonesome starlit trek;
Of scorching sunlit trails:
Of eclipes on moonlit nights
Of bards, emperors, and knights

Of the toil and tears and all those years
Trying to be and become; of wanting,
Waiting,  and wishing when
The body was still young

Mind, losing control, asking
Why the fire dims and embers at times
Want to blaze bright and consume
The ideas, the desires and the poetic rhymes?

Copyright: Rani Turton

Painted Picture On A Truck, India

Indian lorries or trucks have lovely hand painted signs and pictures on them. A real feast for the eyes.

The Sometimes Song: Poem

The Sometimes Song

Wait a while. The mind's confusion and slow steps
May quicken: when the sun comes out from hiding
And weariness itself wearily walks itself away.

Then, sometimes, in the silence of the stars
I can hear your voice. I can hear and taste and see
The years that brought me to this misery.
Sometimes, when familiar streets come my way
Or I come to them, anyway
What I really am trying to say

Sometimes, the softness of those instants
Comes back to me: the intent, the ideas
The emotions and the inspiration
That still remain with me. If you had been,
Sometimes, near me

Things would have been different.
These unfamiliar conceptions of destiny
That life brought to my door would have dissolved
Like the morning mist: sunshine-kissed.

I, in this sometimes moody musing, ask you to listen to this

Solitary sometimes song.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Doorknocker, France

Splendid doorknocker in metal in France.

Cycles: Poem

Cycles

Cycles of life spin, in eternal rotation
Like the sun; words, wounds
And weary worlds speak in
Samsara rhyme;
Eternal reconversion. Thus it
Happens time after time.

Look into the sky, pierce the clouds
Look beyond and see
Is the mind a deity?
Who is it that sees?
Is it me? Or is it noone?
Do not dissect the mind: ah, it is
Already all done.

I can touch and feel
As long the blood courses in my veins;
As long as there is some life in me.
I can touch and feel and see:
Ah, in perfect synonimy.

Cycles of life spun, spin, sing.
Cycles  becomes cycles and then
The weaver loses his soul within
The poet finds the words
On the path to nowhere;
And cycles begin again, somewhere.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Mysteries: Poem

Mysteries

There is a mystery in living
When, how, for how long and why
No need to use complicated rhetorical arguments
The devil's advocate I can play indeed
But the end is always the same
Its almost as if our lifespans are a timed game.

We can hop from land to land
For reasons only we can understand
We can lament and weep
Until at the end we finally sleep

To sleep perchance to dream
As a great poet once wrote
In lifespans, life's cycles, in moments of oblivion
I even forgot all that I wrote
The great mystery was not action or living
The great question was extinction and annihilation.

To come back to the essential
I, Me and Myself
My small insignificant life
Could I even presume to be remembered
After the third generation, the fourth maybe?
And what was it's essentiality?
Wicks flame, flicker and glow
That is finally the way I will go.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Through Those Lanes, Lost, I Wander: Poem

Through Those Lanes, Lost,  I Wander

The night resembles the day: endless and refractive.
I wander, in dyslexic mode, unable to formulate
One thought into another. I have left
Analytic reasoning far, far behind. Emotions
That ebb and flow like the tide.

Through those lanes, lost, I wander.
Is it this land that is foreign or is it I?
Is it me the stranger, weary and shy?
I have tried to reason, but now there is no reason
Even to wonder why.

Through those lanes, lost, I wander.
Was I the substance or the shadow, or was it
Just reality that eluded clouded reason??
I wander, wander, and now as time
Walks by my side
Shadows lengthen; though those lanes
Life, love, pain and all that remains.

Copyright/ Rani Turton

The Eiffel Tower, Paris

Much has been written about the beauty of Paris. The Eiffel Tower's
illuminations are spell-binding in the darkness of the night.

In This Silent Hour: Poem

In This Silent Hour

Roofs, dreaming in the cityscape
In this silent hour when the soft grey sky speaks
When nobody calls me by my name;
The mind, soft in melancholy
Asks why, and then again why.

In this silent hour, moments pass.
There are footsteps behind me
Dreaming, I must be.
Or waking, walking within the dream
I may not be all that I seem.

Flights of imagination once again
The past and  present merge;
Blend into one pristine fancy:
Now, then, before, tenses blend
Is this how the silent hour will end.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Alexandre Dumas, Statue

Statue of French writer Alexandre Dumas at Villers-Cotterêts, his birthplace.

Life in Pastel: Poem

Life In Pastel

I think and often imagine
Even in scorched dreams
Myself and life as it seems;
As it seems, seems, seems.

I have a tenuous grip on reality
A self-made functional mode.
I think I have some aspects of alterity;
I can think in colours unrefined.

Pastel, refined, softspoken,
Colours that were not mine;
I can speak in languages
That are  often tough and fine.

I can think in pastel
Speak in pastel and subdued
My life, often in colours bright
To this  has now been reduced.

I have a life in pastel but inside
I have emotion bright and strong
I can think in pastel but emotion
Remains vivid and lifelong.

Life, filaments of life, in muted hues,
Is thus what it amounts to:
Live softly, there is yet a vivid dream
That I am driven to pursue.

Copyright: Rani Turton

A Thought, A Line, A Rhyme: Poem

A Thought, A Line, A Rhyme

If only, clothed in mystery and technical delight
Lines would write themselves down word perfect and bright
Instead of a kind of imperfect poetic sonism
Ah! writing a poem is more than hedonism

It started  with a thought, straying wildly and then
Inspired a line, and all the while; stay the thought even when
My fingers tried to write a single line
In silence, trying to still this heart of mine.

But even then, it wasn't each and every day;
Writing verse isn't as easy as they say.
Words followed neither rhythm nor time:
Slowly came a thought, a line, a rhyme.

Copyright: Rani Turton