“Seahorses and other miracles…” (From “Depths and Heights”)

Gerrard Chaiken

 

So often , you felt

As if there were a stone around your neck,

A stone in your heart,

As if your heart itself were stone,

And your broken-limbed body

A stone upon stony ground.

So often, you felt

Wracked with pain,

Hopes wrecked

Upon a heartless uncaring

World, whirling carelessly,

Indifferently, remorselessly;

And that you could not, in any way,

Stumble on, crawl on- let alone walk

Upon the unyielding ground.

 

But now: you wear

A tiny silver sea-horse

Crafted by some other hands

Of one, who, too, had suffered

The pain of re-birth,

The pain of feeling

Too much -or too little,

The day-to day doubts,

Unseen by an unseeing

And seemingly

Heartless world;

 

And once again, you wear a smile,

Tentative as a newborn infant hope,

Brazen as an all-knowing

And victorious goddess;

And fingering your filigree

Dancing sea-horse, you say:

“This is a miracle!”

And, beloved, there are so many more!

 

“Courting the Muse, 1.” from “BeMuSingings”

Gerrard Chaiken

 

The Muse of Inspiration

Is close at hand, ready to visit,

Ready to energise us;

But she wants to be welcomed:

Her infinite energy wants

Our definite intention:

Her seeming flightiness

And teasing flirtation

Demands deliberation,

Her artistry our articulation!

Intent upon our intention,

The Muse awaits faithful

Promises, not promiscuous 

Or prodigal words, but

A vow of Purpose…

 

Sonnet of singing striving and strife…(From “BeMuSinging…”)

Gerrard Chaiken

 

There is a war of worlds within the worlds within,

Whilst the sun shepherds the clouds to their fold of infinite space;

The Muses clamour for my will to show its retiring face

And behold dimensions I have not yet begun to imagine.

Here, down below, sloth in subtle fugue finds subterfuge in ‘ sin’;

As in overbearing battles each distraction desires to win-

Then in furtive but furious frenzied fight

The warring factions put my fictions to frantic flight-

But in the brazen silence, words spill and surge

And whirl pooling re awaken that ancient urge

And ditties dervish-dance from dead dirge

Then do faculties’ facilities in fantasia merge-

Now, in fecund fountain flow of forms unfrozen-

Reminding me of inspiration’s freedom chosen….

 

Holy face” (From “Depths and Heights”)

Gerrard Chaiken

 

There be no scars nor flaws upon the Holy Face;

For subtle ironies, and paradoxes, no place-

For inconsistencies, no room in Infinite Space;

And yet, as my relative life does crawl and race

At its intemperate, and erratic pace,

 

As after dreams and schemes I blindly chase,

Stumbling and lurching, clumsy, and grace-

Less, striving towards a hidden apex, from a base

Perilously unsteady, frantically trying to brace

Myself against the storms of suchness that interlace

Reason’s resolutions; yet, then, as I track and trace

Truth, and see how before despairing doubt I debase

Self, the greatest irony of all, raises its teasing face:

Tis that so heedlessly I struggle, against Love’s embrace.

 

Gerrard Chaiken was born in 1946 in Zimbabwe, from where he moved to Cape Town, the Mother city of South Africa. He studied languages art and philosophy at the University of Cape Town. Did Honours in English Literature, began a Masters on Virginia Woolf and abandoned it for personal reasons. Worked as a lecturer and teacher of English Literature, English as the second language, qualified as a professional librarian, and spent the bulk of his professional life as a Librarian, fulfilling his idea and ideal that libraries are, in a phrase used by the Ancient Egyptians, “the healing place of the soul”.  Poetry for him, is a realm of the True, Good, and beautiful, and is a reflection of these, as well as aspirational and inspirational, and is a force of great potency for aspects of our education and evolution.