Days with little favour

Days with little favour

(when lives shut down)

The thin warmless dome that hovers

like a spider, perfectly still,

above my head – is the world,

the cold-blooded world of lost passengers

and dreamers never able to fulfill that dream,

is the silent spinning fragile frame

of sensibility and propriety

that waxes the soul like sap spilled on a leaf,

is the astonishing disconnection of all things

so ‘together’ and workable on this platform,

is the inefficiency of a loose morality,

of a self-focused morality.

Numbness – a mouse too near the cat,

a split in jelly, never seen,

but there – a hut of chaos, a school

of dull teachers and the rat digging out

of an ordinary tunnel

or a tiger’s tongue lacerating the skin of a shoulder

just to be there

in the world, amidst all this dawdling pain,

perpetual pain, reluctant to embrace God,

and sometimes, even

the possibility of there being God,

reluctant because faith has been foiled

by abuse and hardness, forsaken

as unnecessary, left out with the trash.

amazon.com/author/allisongrayhurst

First published in “Section 8 Magazine”, January 2017

https://www.section8magazine.com/the-last-layer/

You can listen to the poem by clicking below:

“Allison Grayhurst intertwines a potent spirituality throughout her work so that each poem is not simply a statement or observation, but a revelation that demands the reader’s personal involvement. Grayhurst’s poetic genius is profound and evident. Her voice is uniquely authentic, undeniable in its dignified vulnerability as it is in its significance,” Kyp Harness, singer/songwriter, author.

“Allison Grayhurst’s poems are like cathedrals witnessing and articulating in unflinching graphic detail the gritty angst and grief of life, while taking it to rare clarity, calm and comfort. Grayhurst’s work is haunting, majestic and cleansing, often leaving one breathless in the wake of its intelligence, hope, faith and love amidst the muck of life. Many of Allison Grayhurst’s poems are simply masterpieces. Grayhurst’s poetry is a lighthouse of intelligent honour… indeed, intelligence rips through her work like white water,” Taylor Jane Green, Registered Spiritual Psychotherapist and author.

Reviews of ‘The Many Lights of Eden’:

“’The Many Lights of Eden’ is a journey: a journey of the heart through youth, anguish, struggle, spiritual awakening, grief, death, love, loss, guilt, struggle, despair, hope, surrender, God, sensuality, imperfection, motherhood, aging, the vanquishing of the devil, indeed, many devils, the inevitable fall from perfection and the casting off of old wineskins for a new one. Perhaps speaking of this book as a chronicle of spiritual maturing would be more accurate, the realization that there is spirituality within imperfection and that handmade temples cannot hope to compete with the spiritual temples within each of us. ‘The Many Lights of Eden’ is a diamond. It is a beautiful collection of insights. Allison Grayhurst’s thoughts and writings are a deep well. Drink from it, for the water is clear and crisp. This collection is a MUST-READ,” Eric M. Vogt, author of Letters to Lara and Paths and Pools to Ponder.

“I have been slow at responding to reviews for Allison Grayhurst due to summer’s busy days, however she brings life to each poem, heart to the images and everyone should have a collection of Grayhurst Poetry,” Ann Johnson-Murphree, poet.