Daniel Kemp

Words have no owners.

Silently they float disguised as thoughts waiting for a home, then if they find a receptive mind they grow, becoming a painting of so many colours that once put together correctly they become a masterpiece that brings joy to all.

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

There are ghosts fast come approaching
I saw them ducking through the dark.
Their eyes were hollow, still, and frightening.
The look on their face was grey and stark.

I heard a voice croaking and wheezing
As blood dripped from a severed head.
Whilst the body I saw kneeling,
But I wasn’t sure if it was dead!

The ghosts gathered by the bells that were ringing.
Curses were uttered to the cloud-covered sky.
A cauldron was lit and three ghosts started stirring,
But then the moon burst through and exposed the lie.

The milk was in the cupboard.
The toaster was in the hall.
The butter was in the garden shed
And as for the bread—I couldn’t recall.

I’d had an old person’s moment
When things go up the spout.
I think I should stay at home today
As I’ll get lost if I go out….. Boom, Boom

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

Long hues of shadows in areas that shade
Life comes from the darkness where anger is made
There’s a commitment to death as a way to end time
But then time is perpetual where love is no crime.

Don’t read the words as they first appear
Seldom in life are words honest and clear.
I could take you to where all words are true
But only if love has touched the heart in you.

Parables are stories with a story inside
Ingenuous exposition but are any lies?
The understanding of secrets is not what you need.
The declaration of innocence is how you’ll be freed.

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

From the earnest, solemn delivery of promises to come
To the whispering slap of the bullet not seen from the gun
There are records strewn everywhere of what could have been changed,
To prevent the easily persuaded from becoming madmen deranged.

If words could speak louder and reverse the shape
Of the acceptance of the inevitable without escape
From the decimating power that comes from a gun
Then promises could be kept in the time that’s to come.

But promises are not the power that some do seek
Pledges to the impoverished are considered too weak.
It’s the blood of the poor that bind the barriers that divide
The gun sellers from the dead and the screams that are cried.

© 2019, Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

When I was a young man the first thing on my mind was the opposite sex. Next came rugby in the winter and cricket in the summer. Academic studies were not high on my list of priorities. However, there was one poet who stuck in my mind and it wasn’t so much his work that I remember, it was the brevity he used to express emotions or paint an image. That man was Percy Bysshe Shelley and I can’t even remember how to pronounce his middle name.

Some of his poems were not brief they went on and on and on to the delight of poetry aficionados, but not me. The telling of a long-winded poem to a beautiful girl was not a priority. However, succinct poetry that drove a spear through all resistance was!

This old poem of mine is influenced by Shelley’s great command of the simplistic.

The Girl In The Heart

To rise from this barren earth
To soar above, to wing away
To escape from all that’s lacking
And live to love another day

© 2017 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

The sun bathes the garden, the colours it ignites.
The sky is the blue that promises Heavenly delights.
The still air is broken only by the slightest of breeze.
The only sound is from the birds in the surrounding trees.

A spectrum of colour in all of its shades
A walk in the shadows or through sun-speckled glades.
Either feel good if you’ve mind so to do,
The choices are there, they’re all up to you.

A Sunday breaking forth serene and relaxed.
Imagination is on hold, creativity untaxed.
My mind lays dormant as it’s a time to reflect,
On a life well lived but far from perfect.

What life is this if there’s no joy to behold?
What life can it be with no stories to be told?
Where would life be without the rain and the sun?
How would one feel if it’s all over before it’s all done?

But that is far off as you want on days such as this,
Watching the bees do their work as flowers they gently kiss.
Watch the sun as it changes the shadows to light.
Spend your days in your Heaven and rejoice in the sight!

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

When I’m bored as I am now, waiting for my latest novel to come back from its editing and proofreading, I try my hand at writing poetry and some Quotes. In a selfish thought, I hope one or two of them will survive my passing. I post the quotes to a site on Goodreads where I have just posted this one:

In order to criticise all one needs is a pen.
Fault can be found everywhere one looks if that is what one wants to find.
Beauty hides its face from criticism because it knows that those who seek to find fault will find it in her.
To withstand criticism and to write, needs a heart, not a pen.

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

This is the link to the Goodreads page if you would honour me and read some others.

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/list/72612151

Question

Where cast you love when love has died,
When the heart stops racing and there’s nothing inside?
Where goes passion, exciting and heaven-sent?
Where goes its taste, its fragrance, and its scent?

Can love once lived be lived once more?
Could absorbed by love be life’s cure?
If death be an end from which there’s no defence,
Was love created as death’s recompense?

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved