(for Robin V. Robinson, photographer)

Water can be so tender,

As calm as a curious child

Looking in a mirror,

Or an old woman

Pondering the story of her life 

As she looks through a window.

It can sprawl out as quiet

As a crocodile in the sun,

Be as still as a small pool

Immobilised by ice.

It can sleep in the dream

Of its transparent self.

Water can shiver along

In the shape of a snaking stream,

With its memories

Of losing itself in a river

That will lose itself 

In the slow gulp of the ocean.

Water can be so powerful,

Thrashing the night body

Of a coastal landscape,

Crashing the genesis of its weight

On the black spine of a mountain,

Avalanching its anger

To the shaking corners of its night.

Water can be so weak, half hearted

In its being, and yet so strong

When it stirs the heavy terror

Of its flood-hauling fury.

Water can be so tender,

Like a raindrop clinging

To the clear face of glass,

Or a tear trembling

For a moment in an eye,

A full stop of grief,

A tiny globe containing

The ‘eternal note of sadness’.


Note: 'eternal note of sadness' is a phrase from Matthew Arnold's poem Dover Beach.

 
Peter Thabit Jones © 2022

Published in GARDEN OF CLOUDS/NEW AND SELECTED POEMS by Peter Thabit Jones, 2020