A WINTER’S TALE

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Will be reading tonight at Foxy’s Deli in Penarth at A WINTER’S TALE, organised by Artist Pauline Williams and Therapist/Poet Fran Smith, for more details CLICK HERE

Will be reading two pieces, see below, the Snowflakes In Your Eyes written some time ago, Snowflake Destiny written today…

Snowflakes From Your Eyes    by Will Ford

When the fingers of the winter chill that close around your bones

Are the only fingers that you feel, unless you count your own

Maybe there ’ s an empty space there in the life you live

That can ’ t be filled by good deeds or the charity you give

That can ’ t be filled by worthy thoughts of the woes of the poor

That can ’ t be filled by focusing on ideals anymore

That can ’ t filled by any God or other spirit guide

Nothing that you snort or smoke, and nothing you imbibe

Can fill the empty space once it gets around your bones

And chills you with the knowledge noone knows you feel alone

Because that ’ s meant to be something that only losers say

So you grin and bear the empty space and hope it goes away

When the world at large demands you wear a smile upon your face

No matter how you really feel, it feeds the empty space

It grows in size and appetite, if you dismiss your needs

As self-centred indulgences, empty space impedes

Your eyes from seeing clearly, your path to brighter days

And memories of sweeter times will start to be erased

Till there ’ s no way forward, no way back, nothing but shapeless void

And you feel like you ’ ve become a thing people wish to avoid

You become sometimes unable to look people in the face

In case they look into your eyes and see the empty space

But you wont be able to hide it, people soon get rather wise

To protestations of feeling fine that start to sound like lies

To everyone who hears them, then last of all to you

But you might find there ’ s noone left there to admit it to

When you recognise belatedly what others came to see

The shimmering outline, the empty space, where you used to be

When the fingers of the winter chill that close around your bones

Are the only fingers that you feel, unless you count your own

Beware the empty space that can leave you so cold inside

That when you weep no tears fall

Just snowflakes from your eyes.

SNOWFLAKE DESTINY     by Will Ford

Once upon time there was a snowflake on the breeze

Dancing on the air, and feeling very pleased

It suddenly found itself stuck upon a tree

And begged of passing brethren “what will become of me?”

No answers were forthcoming as it lingered on the bark

Watching other snowflakes dance and laugh and lark

Swirling windswept patterns all around the park

It’s over now, our snowflake thought, no chance to leave a mark

Then another snowflake joined it upon the tree

They didn’t like each other but agreed to disagree

Compromise is key and very necessary

When you can’t escape from somewhere you don’t really want to be

Frozen to the spot, forced to peer, ponder, stare

At other trees and other snowflakes becoming snared

On trunks, roots and branches, there and there and there

And there, and there and there and there and there and even there

Sharp silhouettes of leafless trees slowly turning white

Softening the atmosphere of evil in the night

That gets evoked in tender hearts by a wintry forest sight

As if the trees will grab them, well you never know, they might…

Our snowflake was one of millions whose appointed Winter task

Was to give the stark cold foresty wood a pretty Winter mask

While other snowflakes danced on past to become, um, well, let’s say…

Constituents of blizzard drifts, or Snowman DNA…

 

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