Poems by Nick Maley

NICK MALEY'S WORDS & PICTURES ANTIGUA W.I..

Although I've been writing them since 1967, my poems were first made public for a solo exhibition that I had at the Devonish Gallery in Anguilla in 1995 and were then shown at an exhibition at Aiton Place called Words & Pictures in 1997. If you wish you can use them in conjunction with our Caribbean virtual greetings cards (You can use part of a poem is you like but be sure to include the copyright credit (email address) at you will find at the end of each poem). THEY MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED OR REPRODUCED IN ANY OTHER FORM WITHOUT MY PRIOR CONCENT.

Not all my poems are here. More will be added as I have enough time. Some are about love (usually lost love), some are serious, some are whimsicle, some are funny.

WHIMSICLE:

MUSE ON A MERMAID'S KISS

How lonely is the mermaid?
that.... beauty of the sea,
who rests upon the ocean bed for all eternity.

What happens to the kisses that she saves for her companions?
Do they..... surge between the breakers?
Do they..... drift through coral canyons?
Do they..... touch the spiny lobster and caress the cuttlefish?
Are they ... cast upon the waters?
Could I .......... get one if I wish?

And I wonder.... would I drown within those ever moistened lips?
Would they.... drift across my torso?
Would they....... touch my fingertips?
'Cos I know they're out there somewhere just as constant as the sea,
and I want to test the waters of that sweet tranquility.

If I could find that secret place, I know she's waiting there,
with the flash of dappled dolphins in the current of her hair.
And I'd swim within her tenderness
with passion, wild and free.

I hope she has the patience
to save a kiss

for me.

DAY'S END

Tell me where the sun goes
when it gets so dark.
Does it crash into the fields?
or drain into the park?
Splash into the ocean?
Get blown off by the breeze?
Or does it simply vanish in a puff behind the trees?

BEAUTY

Black, red, yellow or white,
glamour is glamour.
Delight is delight.
And if I should choose,
(as choose I might),
the best of the best.

I couldn't.

Al right ?

FATE

Life can pivot on the simplest things.
Like
whether you're home when the telephone rings.

Whether,
amid fate's fickle dance,
you grab that fleeting, fragile, chance.
Some opportunity,
easily lost,
that should be grabbed at any cost.
Your life might change in a single blow
from a destiny
you'll never know.

My life was touched in such a way.
It made me what I am today,
and I have to wonder where I'd be
if I'd just
stepped out
for a cup of tea.

TOMORROWS QUEEN (Carnival)

Jump up.
Jump down.
Jumpin' all around.

Jump up in the country.
Jump up in the town.

Jump up where she's goin'.
Jump up where she's been.
Watch out where she's a jumpin'.

Here comes tomorrows Queen.

SERIOUS:

TROPICAL DEPRESSION

There's a hurricane a comin'.
Hear it knocking at the door.
There's a hurricane a comin'
and it ain't no fun no more.
There's a hurricane a blowin'.
Hear it pounding on my home
as the rain flies by my window
and the sea is filled with foam.

There's a hurricane a crashin' and a smashin' all around,
and the leaves are like confetti that it scatters on the ground.
And it groans amid my galvanized
and shakes my window pane.

How I wish that it would go away
And not come back again.

The awsome power of Nature is too vast to comprehend,
as sea
and wind
and earth combine
and giant palm trees bend,
as rain becomes a torrent
that hacks into the land,
as power fails
and moments merge
this isn't what I planned.

The raging of the hurricane appears to never end,
I know that once it passes
we'll soon be on the mend,
a week
a month
of debris
the sun will shine again.
But somehow in the midst of all
I just can't wait till then.

I really love this island where I settled with my wife.
I really love this island with it's casual way of life.
The beauty of the sunset
the sea upon the beach
the lapping of the ocean
my toes within it's reach.

I really love this island
and sailing on a breeze,
the glamour of the tropics
the drama of the seas.
But Nature can be sneaky.
We never know for sure when her mood will alter
or what she has in store.

There's a hurricane a comin'.
(Water seeps across the floor).
There's a hurricane a comin'
Watch the bending of the door.
My banana trees are breaking
and my pool is filled with mud
and the house is slowly filling
with some soggy
leafy
crud.

There's a hurricane a comin'.
Hear it make that eerie sound.
See the hedge a leaning sideways
and the fence upon the ground.
It's the seventh in a decade
and its now an awful chore.

How I wish that it would go away.
This ain't no fun
no more.

INSPIRATION

To meet the fiery challenge of inspiration
is to transcend imagination
with bravado
and ingenuity
that the progeny of our labors might emerge
like flowers
upon the sidewalk of humanity.

Born of darkness
into light,
empowered by truth
and passion,
they are drawn from the shadows of mediocrity
to ascend the brightest heaven of creation."

BELOW THE WASTE

The third world man
stands looking to the west.

He's emulating lifestyles he's been told to be the best.
A promise of such luxury.
A promise of such health.

Lets hope he sees the decadence that undermines such wealth.

Lets hope he sees the misery inherent in the system.
The fundamental value of this economic "wisdom".
Lets hope he sees the impact of excessive expectation,
the crime and the injustice that may infiltrate his nation.

Why copy their bureaucracy,
embrace their every vice,
until you've made a wasteland of your own sweet paradise?
They sacrifice their principles
like a men upon a mission
and only worship money
through their alter......

television !

They're swapping air for freon
and exchanging sand for gold.
Want....... to see their names in neon.
Want....... to buy what can't be sold.
They will tell you power is wisdom
and wealth is peace of mind
'till the jewels of your environment are things you've left behind,
and that highway for your Cadillac will drive away your bison
as they put the strength of Gandhi in the shadow of Mike Tyson.

You don't want to lust for glamour
and those glitzy shopping malls.
You can clearly see the homeless just beyond the palace walls.
You don't want to trash the treasures that your fathers came to trust
or to undermine their value 'till they're trampled in the dust.
But those airwaves whisper to you
and you have no way to stop it
and they say you have no value if you can not turn
a profit.

Well.......

There's no profit in a sunset.
There's no profit in clean air.
There's no profit in a palm tree
so who cares if it's not there?
There's no profit in tradition
so why teach it to your youths?

This philosophy of profit
undermines life's basic truths!

There's a name for this new order,
this new universe of need,
that inspires in us such wanting
and the name of course is greed.
It invades our sensibilities
and undermines our taste.
Then it steals our independence.

It's a blow below the waste

LOVE:

PARADISE LOST

As the thought of her breast
caressed my mind,
veiled memories of chilled passion
lingered.

(A shiver flutters through this recollection.
My emotions
enmeshed
are ever constant in confusion.)

The welcome moistness of her lips,
the smooth swell of her silken buttock,
drift
midst cold stares from fiery eyes
doused in a sea of helpless hopelessness.

Must pain and passion always intertwine as living collides with loving?

Must Paradise found
be trapped and barred
and dashed upon the rocks of reality?

I told her I would always love her.

I will

LIKE CLOCKWORK

My love is like a clock that runs on time.
The small hand's yours.
The big hand's mine.

Hand in hand we'll face the day and tic and toc our lives away.

LOVE

It's precious like a diamond.
It's powerful like the sea.
My love for you consumes me.......... through all eternity.
hot like fire and brimstone.
It's endless like a ring.
As long as I am filled with love I'll need no other thing.

"LOVE" is such a little word yet signifies so much.
A voice within that must be heard.
A momentary touch.
An old man with a photograph........ his lover and her child
who's life became an epitaph to passions
sweet
and wild.

If "love is strictly for the birds" that's why they fly so high.
It fires our expectations.
Brings soul mates eye to eye.
Eternal as the moon and stars
and pure
like virgin snow.
My love for you consumes me no matter where I go.

Its passionate like Romeo.
It's noble like a king.
As long as I am filled with love I'll need for not a thing.

Let my love protect you
as the woes of life attack.
It's the greatest gift I have to give.

I hope you'll give yours back.

WHEN I AM GONE

Oh dearest love,
don't mope when I am gone.
The passion that is shared by you and I
(though we may wish it on and on and on)
may shrivel,
like summer's sweetest bloom and die.

So even if you read
(as read you might)
these words,
think not of me who wrote them so,
if thinking on't might make you sad some night
remembering our love
so long ago.

The ocean of humanity is vast,
and we expire within a single tide.
So think of me as just a wave that passed,
and did, like all those other waves,
subside.

Instead, think of another, happy, time
that came before
or that came after...
...mine.

HUMOROUS:

THE FROG - (Antigua)

I'm just a little froggy so please.......
don't tread on me !
really not a cockroach
or those spidery things you see.
I don't have no hairy legs nor flapping pairs of wings.
I'm really cute and cuddly,
unlike those other things.

I live here in Antigua,
beneath a leafy tree,
And pop down to the beach at night
and paddle in the sea.
With sand castle competitions by the light of the firefly,
we drink rum punch 'till midnight
'neath a star encrusted sky.
(And although we have a great time,
things can begin to slide if the crabs come out to join us
'cos they samba side to side).

Sometimes,
(in the daytime),
'neath leafy parasols,
we sit and watch a concert by
the Froggy Folderols.
Other times,
like carnival,
we dress in fine brocade,
and hop off down a burrow for a mongoose masquerade.

But without doubt we like it best as sun begins to fall.
We have our choir practice,
(We're tenors one and all).
We sing until we're fit to burst,
As happy as you please,
and hop out from our hideaways in the coconutty trees.

We hop along the pathways.
We hop right up the stairs.
(Sometimes we do it singly.
Sometimes we hop in pairs).

So if you see me moving as you're going out to eat,
be very, very, careful I don't get beneath your feet.

Cos,

I'm just a little froggy who decided to drop by,
and sit beside your wall lamp,
and catch myself a fly.

FIAT & NOBBY

There is a purring pestilence that lives around our home,
that terrifies all earthly things no matter where they roam.
A little cat named Fiat,
a match for any leaf,
who treats the dog with pure contempt and goats with disbelief.

I heard a crash in the garden one hot and humid day
and found her by the compost
where the crickets often play.
Her head was all a quiver,
with disbelieving eyes,
for there before her sat a frog
with slippery, slimy, thighs.

Well Fiat's mouth fell open.
Her heart was all a flutter.
She did a backward somersault and landed in the gutter.
The frog stayed quite collected,
his skin all wet and flobby.
He smiled a little froggy smile and said his name was Nobby.

Well,
they sat with one another
discussing next week's weather,
examined all our potted plants and wandered off together.
They whiled away the afternoon,
these two unlikely chums,
crushing plants and dragonflies,
terrifying plums.
and as the sun was setting upon their leafy glen,
played hide and seek with a cassie bush.
Then hobbled home again.

The light was quickly fading
when much to our surprise
they gave each other a woeful glance
and said their last goodbyes.
Their mutual admiration
overflowed like a loving cup.
Then Fiat,
looking sheepish,
ate little Nobby up!

What did you think this was..... A fairy story?

THE MOUSE IN MY HOUSE

There's a little pile of sawdust in the kitchen of my house.
I wonder what has caused it?
Perhaps it was a mouse.
I'd really like to meet him with his cute and squeaky snout.
I'd grab him by the whiskers
and throw the sucker out!

ANTS</