Starlight Sonnetina

Wise Man, Magi, Philosopher - King;
Though each one was humbled, when heeding The Call.
So they hastened abroad, their oblations to bring
To that faraway town, with its unlikely stall.

Near the town, yet another king (killer ; distracted)
Demanded their presence (he'd heard of the Child),
Yet knew nothing of stars, or of starlight refracted,
Or the love that drew kings through the dark and the wild.

An invasion of sorts, when the border was crossed,
But their mission meant more than the laws guarding lands.
And without giving praise, saving hope might be lost,
So their caravan inched over Judean sands.

Later on, mothers cried in the streets where blood spattered,
While the three brought home news of the one king who mattered.

Redeemed

It's You when I wake
And it's You when I sleep.
It's You when I'm shallow
And You when I'm deep.

From the essence of image
In the furnace of soul,
You arrive without intro
To arrange me as whole.

Incandescent emotion
Fills the void in my spheres;
Just a glance or some laughter
And the fog in me clears.

Archangel, beloved,
You've embraced human form;
And throughout bleak midwinter,
In your space I feel warm.

'Everything but...' (Monday, December, Bletchley JobCentre Plus)

Lost his job -
Made a Claim.
Lost his wife -
Met a Flame.
Lost his kids -
Christmas dull.
Lost his house -
Moved to Hull.
Lost his way -
Took to Drink.
What loss next ?
Kitchen sink ?

The Valley of Death and the Home of Hunger

Roll out of Dar on
A claptrap bush bus
And you're there... or
Better, passing through.

Scraps of life dent
The roadside: Maasai beggar and
Brown scrub, but mostly
The dearth of breath.

Burton and Speke pushed
Through here; undeterred at
The name bestowed by Arab slavers.
Hellbound westward, or

Coastbound east. Two Victorian
Obsessives; slaves, too, in their
Quest for
The Source.

Pleuristic Speke, slung
Between porters, on his hammock.
Race-hate Burton, carried by
His bile, slinging

Cloth and beads at the
Feet of reluctant chiefs. We're
Always in motion, carried forward by
Truth, or a lie.

Why am I on this
Bus? Aimless Mzungu, safe
In passage, while death slings its
Bile across the road, wheel-bound.

Familiar hell-on-earth, like
Dachau, or Dealey Plaza; each a
Passing-through place or a terminus. Entirely
Random - as decreed by killers.

We're off to the Mountains of the Moon, over
The Pass Terrible, so clear the road before
This jerry-can juggernaut does to
Life what drought couldn't.