The Way

 

Birth is the harbinger of death,

and light the mother of darkness.

Beauty is the child of ugliness,

and ecstacy the handmaid of misery. 

Partners in the dance.

Water hints at the mystery.

Humble and mighty in concert.

On the path to low places,

it becomes vast oceans.

Stones that block its flow 

are skirted.

In quietly yielding,

canyons are carved.

An unsung process

with no goal.

The Dao does not defy description,

yet is ineffable, making no effort.

In trying to understand it, 

do nothing.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

27 December 2025

going away

 

The ruined cottage

lingers in the field.

Its idle chimney 

mourns a turf-fed fire

that starved to death

when broken faces,

round the hearth,

laid down the sleán and left,

taking risks of promise

and the ache of going, 

leaving the gape of a doorway

to welcome wind 

and emerald moss.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

9 December 2025

virtual witness

My parents are standing

arm in arm.

Mum in reworked silk and sequined lace,

Dad in a Burton's double-breasted suit.

They smile before

an uncut wedding cake,

and a shared journey,

while I look on,

afterwards.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

7 December 2025

Reality Check

 I remember the future.

The one of youthful aspiration.

The one shelved along the way

as events fell short of expectation.

I recall the revisions,

ghost written by circumstance

in life’s scriptorium,

all prologue to a new edition,

drafted as the deadline looms.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

22 November 2025

The Cabin

There were warnings of a winter storm,

and now the evergreens

dissemble in their vestal white.

The snow is still falling, 

silently, unsullied by footsteps.

There is wood for the fire,

but no human warmth,

just the insulation of solitude,

with only questions for company.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

10 November 2025

24 August 79

Isn't it a marvellous view of the bay

from up here? And the golden flowers 

of the broom erupting on the slope!

Would you like some wine?

It's a fine Falernian.

Help yourself to the stuffed thrush.

What a heavenly spot, 

and not too hot.

Yes, a fine day for a picnic.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

6 November 2025

Il faut souffrir pour être belle

Drenched in salt-sea spray,

and cast into the role

of rootless drifter.

Branches broken,

flayed of bark,

and scarred by worm-inflicted wounds.

Then beached,

and bleached by searing sun.

Till eager hands reached out

to place me on display.

'Serendipitous', they say.

'A masterpiece'.

'Such subtle textures'.

'Sublime asymmetry!"

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

7 April 2025

Dissolution

 

Dissolution

A carrion crow 

surveys the roofless void,

and fixes on a pointless arch,

an unmeant folly.

The abbey is marked 'ruin' on the map,

not to suggest the picturesque,

but that disorder is ordained.

Listen carefully.

For among the shards of sun-fired scenes, 

unleaded lips remain

to sing a compline prayer,

and remind us of the coming night.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

20 April 2024, rev. Nov. 2025

 

Semiosis

 

One might suggest

your efforts were in vain

to drag ten tonnes of

sarsen stone across an open plain,

then raise it as a rough-hewn sign.

What was the point,

and was it worth the cost?

Perhaps we'll never know.

The cipher has been lost,

and few remain who care.

Or is your message

confident and clear?

Mere megalithic idiom

to say that you were here.

Once.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

12 April 2025

Samhain

 

A chiaroscuro 

of charcoal clouds

masses in the East

to mob the morning sun

and blunt its light.

Sensing that Persephone

has packed her bags,

senescent leaves

fall like ancient Rome,  

to reveal an empty nest.

Squirrels scurry 

along bare branches,

securing their cache

of burnished chestnuts 

against the coming dearth.

While Earth exhales,

and nights draw in,

mellow pumpkins grin.

Their fire-bright eyes 

watch as the world grows thin.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

27 March 2025

The Age of Enlightenment

 

On a quiet stroll

down a leaf-dark lane,

I met a young man,

from the past.

He had meandered 

through the weeks,

long before the shock 

of life’s alarm clock 

awakened him to face

the glare of awareness,

and the certainty

that his letters to the North Pole

would never be answered.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

18 March 2025

MALUM

 

Adam. 

Made in the image,

like the movie set of a Wild West town.

A cheap knock-off,

imported from the Middle East

without a warning label,

which proved to be the apple

that spoiled the barrel.

An expelled patient zero,

a walking Wuhan lab of viral sin,

waiting to blight all newborn.

Goddess of the Woods!

You, who never left the Garden,

protect us from his toxic strain,

whose arrogance gives licence

to the axemen

who fell your sacred groves,

and watch the hamadryads die.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

12 March 2025

THE PARABLE OF DECLINE

 

Tell us of the succulent grape,

left to languish on the ground,

that withered to a raisin,

and how we were seduced

by its sweet tastes

to feast upon an arid relic

of former fruitfulness.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

26 February 2025

The Clock

A ragged headstone

leans towards the West,

and on the grave

a dandelion grows.

 

Cursed as a weed,

this friendless flower

came as an airborne seed

to pledge a token of respect.

 

And so its golden florets bloom

in tribute to a nameless soul,

forgotten since the time

rushlights pierced the gloom.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

10 February 2025

Mnemosyne

 

Layers of life’s graffiti,

a palimpsest of simulations,

where memories are tagged

and stored on mental celluloid.

Like vintage film,

some frames become effaced 

while others dim to silhouette,

all detail lost,

and those that have been scarred 

by ancient wounds, 

endure and wait,

until a scent, a place, a mention

commands an encore,

and then the beast

that haunts the labyrinth

brings pain again.

John Walter Taylor

© All rights reserved

9 January 2025