Two Poems by Bernard Pearson

Serendipity

Like pressed  meadow flowers

Dry upon the foxed

Paper  in m’lady’s  book

Some lives will always be

Set by others for beauty

Of a kind.

But yours was storm

Water Careering

you towards

another ice cold

Sudden, descending

Cataract  ever carrying 

you along

In the old song of life

To which you  never

Quite learnt the words.

Bogart

Cigarette lolling

From pastrami coloured,

Whiskied, wafer thin 

Snarl frozen lips.

Your hard shoulder,

Made for girls

With other worlds

In their eyes to cry upon.

That thing you did

with your  hat,

As if it were trying you

on for size.

The twang of the hunted

In your voice left hanging

In the  haunted air

Silenced by the light of day

And the way you spat 

bad men casually,

from the sidecar

of your mouth and 

left them bullet rich,

to foul the sidewalk.

                                                                                   

___

Bernard Pearson's work has appeared in many publications, including: Aesthetica Magazine, The Edinburgh Review, Crossways, The Gentian, Nymphs The Poetry Village, Beneath The Fever, The Beach Hut The Littlestone Journal.  In 2017 a selection of his poetry ‘In Free Fall’ was published by Leaf Press. In 2019 he won second prize in The Aurora Prize for Writing for his poem Manor Farm. He is also a Biographer and Prize winning short story writer.