Category: Serious Poems

I do find serious poems in me occasionally, and I do try my very best not to make them too self-indulgent. Honest.

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Juggernaut Growl

This is, perhaps, a slightly unsettling one, but as it’s World Mental Health Day today, I wanted to post something a little more challenging.

Juggernaut Growl

Adrift on this rattling sucking-dry river
I’m twisting like flotsam, my energy peaking
and troughing, my will being tested
and tested…

I’m smashing
I’m shattering
Over and over.

The eddies are frenzied with power, the current
seems drunk on futility, stripping and tearing
And on rasps the river
so careless, so cold…
As my essence is shredded and fed
to its time-silted soul.

Yet somewhere beyond the great roar of this monstrous
onslaught, I know you are talking to me,
And your voice, that smooth sanctuary,
Beckons me home with a pillow-soft promise of healing.

But you are more alien now
than the juggernaut growl
of this river, for I am
the grist to the grind of its fury, its
face-slapping, limb-snapping, life-sapping
venom, its shores as beyond me as meaning
or reason or pleasure or feeling…

 

© Nina Parmenter 2018

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Photo by Ian Espinosa on Unsplash

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Mariner Girl

 

Mariner Girl

Take me away, said the mariner girl,
From the islands of ought-to which circle the sea,
Let me be lady and lord of my world,
And let all obligation sink gladly from me.

The valleys are flowing with nonsense and noise,
As the hills raise their heads to command and cajole,
The air is a millstone which crushes my joys,
I will sail from the land, or else forfeit my soul.

Send me a star, said the mariner girl,
To blaze through my darkness and show me a path
Through the waves, to a place where my mind can unfurl –
Just me, and the sea, and my brave little craft.

The currents are flowing with maybe and might,
And the swells are a surge of why-not and just-be,
The salty-skinned air gives a kiss of delight,
As I sail from the land and join hands with the sea.

Farewell to you, restless mariner girl,
For I’ve neither a boat, nor the courage to sail,
As the land keeps me bound, so the sea claims its pearl,
But your spirit shines on in this dream-spinner’s tale.

 

© Nina Parmenter 2018

Photo by Ahmed zayan on Unsplash

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There Are Days

There Are Days

There are days… when each moment crushes
While everything rushes
To some futile end

There are days… when every voice mocks me
My solitude shocks me
I’m blind to my friends

There are days… when I feel luck has played me
And choice has betrayed me
For giggles and thrills

There are days… when my ceaseless fixation
With self-reformation
Just worsens my ills

There are days… when fear shakes its rattle
Each step a tired battle
Of me versus me

There are days… when perhaps it’s all worth it
My mess is as perfect
As screwed up can be

 

© Nina Parmenter 2018

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Nevermore

I am blessed with two children, and that’s the family I always dreamed of. But  it does seem like only yesterday that starting a family, being pregnant, the whole baby thing – well, it was all an adventure that lay ahead of me. And now, it’s all behind me.

And I think it’s OK to ponder on that, without everyone hollering “Ooooh do you want another one then?” No, I don’t. But yes, just sometimes, I feel a little wistfully sad that that phase of my life has gone by.

Nevermore

Nevermore the swell beneath my fingers,
Nevermore the flutters in my core,
Nevermore the secret smile that lingers.
Once, my womb bore nothing but potential,
Now it’s finished, done, inconsequential,
Nevermore to matter, nevermore.

Nevermore the sleeplessness that floors me,
Nevermore the ligaments so sore,
Nevermore the nausea that gnaws me.
Once, the humdrum hit a strange hiatus,
Once I was cocooned by special status,
I’ll nevermore be special, nevermore.

 

©️ Nina Parmenter 2018

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Photo by freestocks.org on Unsplash

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Toddler Tantrum

Here’s the latest in a long line of “parenting stuff I worked out a bit too late”.

It has taken until my second child reaches three-and-a-half to work out that a child having a tantrum (a proper one, not a fake one) is NOT generally a child that can be reasoned with. No, a child having a tantrum is a bewildered trainee human, confused and overstimulated by a overloaded, malfunctioning lizard brain.

You wanna reason with that? You go ahead, supermum. For now, I’ll just stick to giving him space and cuddles.

Toddler Tantrum

Your brother pushed the button at the crossing,
The bowl you want is blue; you got the red,
The world dissolves. And suddenly you’re lost in
A cruel new place, uncharted in your head.

This world is wrong; it threatens your survival,
Raw panic meets bewilderment and rage,
These primal feelings brawl and churn and spiral –
It’s all too huge to process at your age.

Your skin turns red, you scream, emotions wheeling,
Your chubby hands curl tightly into claws,
You hit the ground, you pummel out those feelings,
That seem too big and scary to be yours.

I meet the stares from passers-by with shrugs.
I’ll give you space, brave boy, then give you hugs.

 

©️Nina Parmenter 2018

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Perplexing Child

We know that part of the reason for our success as a race is our diversity. And yet, we still sometimes don’t know how to cope with difference. Especially amongst our children.

Faced with sensitive children, artistic children, gifted children, ADHD children, autistic children – we’re tempted to try to homogenise them, make them conform, quash what makes them brilliant. Because, as much as we desperately love them, what makes them brilliant can also make them a huge, perplexing challenge.

Perplexing Child 

My brave, perplexing child – you are unique,
You do not touch the world like others do.
The words we say, our rules, the things we seek,

They’re all a strange cacophony to you.

What does life feel like, there behind your eyes,
Your mouth, your nose, your fingertips, your ears?
If I could breathe your breath, what fresh surprise

would hide within your thoughts, your dreams, your fears?

You challenge life. You rail against the norm,
Within this world that needs us all compliant,
You’ll blossom, though, while they rush to conform,

You’ll grow in your own skin, become a giant.

One day you’ll burn magnificently bright,Until then, there’s a world we have to fight.

 

©️ Nina Parmenter 2018

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