J. S. WATTS

The Spirit of The Bed

The deep polished beauty of mahogany, iron and brass

stands proudly in my bedroom.

A present of the past, gifted to the future

as they parted company.

Memories of grandmother and grandfather;

the love with which he carved this colossus,

the love for which it was built.

Love is the integral part,

permeating each measured inch of rosy grain,

flowing through the dark wood he adored

like the sap which gave it life.

It caresses each sanded curve, each mitred corner

as he once did.

as she once did.

The craftsman remaking himself within his work.

With each chiselled effort less was left to give:

just enough for wife and daughter,

but what for a late arrival?

Had you stayed, granddad,

would you have crafted for me?

The spirit of the bed said, "But I did.”

Roaming Backwards Round the Circulade of Nezignan L’Eveque

Come stroll with me around the village. It is late afternoon,

the sun soaking the stones yellow with heat. In my memories

it is always afternoon, the bones of our feet flexing as

we step on, worn sandals slapping slowly across the cobbles.

Stories walk with us, echoing our footsteps now and sixteen

centuries past. Roman feet marching up the slope of the hill

to build the first fortress. Feudal workers, bishops, acolytes

naming this place their own, up, down, around concentric circles

through pestilence, persecution and health, healing, blood and war,

shadows and sunlight, the village stones soaking up light and time.

Cats flow down alleys and along time itself. Fountains spout years,

the church bells sound centuries: the twenty-first cohabiting

with the nineteenth, eighteenth, seventeenth. Passages cross and cut.

More years than bones in tired feet walk these streets. We stroll down days,

learn the bones of the village through our own, become its echoes.

J.S. Watts is a UK poet and novelist. She has had nine books published: five of poetry, Cats and Other Myths, Songs of Steelyard Sue, Years Ago You Coloured Me, The Submerged Sea, and Underword and four novels, A Darker Moon, Witchlight, Old Light, and Elderlight. See www.jswatts.co.uk and http://www.facebook.com/J.S.Watts.page

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