A Poem a Day (597): Blue azure

 
Blue azure 

Blue azure cracks in saturation spent,
seeps out through the edges. Histories etched in
streaks of sea and sky explode in full colour,
welding canvas, seeping in, aquamarine tears.
 
Dusted rays glimmer with a distant light, bed
down in places we never knew were occupied,
the bent-over vessel empties, the tide turning out,
ashes slides, submerged, a portrait unpainted.
Here, wealth is water, a thing so pure and simple.
 
In these skinny mirrors the dark does not reflect,
but its character lingers, negativity in relapse.
We sense night where we least suspect it,
worn Venetian masks vanish in trim alleyways.
 
Skewed headlights slink fast, streak the rain, pools of
haze reflected, seep in, swirl out on a raft of knowing.
We turn a corner. Metal eyes. And another. Metal eyes.
Change our way, spot three more. Double-back to four.
A turn, & one perches, angled out, the uninvited guest.
We wait out this déjà vu. Three at once, near-collide.
July 11, 109 in 20 minutes in the quiet zone.

And still. Departed. There is space between 8 spindly trees,
bark arms wide. Tall. The rush, a yawn of air sings free,
this spacious sense of green trails through our fingers,
sensing. Blossom travels, pink petals warm our path,
scent the way. And we are outside it all, looking in.

Copyright, Vickie Johnstone, July 31, 2023

A Poem a Day (596): Rain after eight

 
Rain after eight
 
It follows.
The rain, shy of curve.
Man Ray, the practical dreamer.
 
It crosses continents at will,
speaks without a telephone. No ringtone.
One universal language.
 
A call to tranquil nature to awaken,
leaves to unfurl and draw it in,
while petals seek to shiver out.

The Hierophant blazes through
this bounteous blue with shield aflame,
opens doors. Like a phoenix, he rises.
 
Tears slide from the parting skies
without grief, solitudinal lightness,
rhythmic touches, even strokes.
Slips. Surfaces. Slides sublime.
 
Slithers down an open screen
to seep inside. Misted glass drips,
splattering ethereal words unsaid
in a watery hand.
 
It collides with the soft, circling air,
stills, creeps into the slightest crevice,
wakens whatever it finds inside.
Devours. Coolness driven whistles down
the windowpane.
 
Scattered chords, a light patter of paws
across a tiled, tilting roof.
 
Tyres sweep through the tuneful torrent,
splatter bald cobblestones, create islands
circled by swirling seas.
 
We step back, pausing to breathe in the evening.
The clarity, the sheer fall, the coveted.

Copyright Vickie Johnstone, July 26, 2023

A Poem a Day (595): Drift

 
It's almost too hot to write... 

Drift 

Pure energy drifts, blazes in colours hewn from glass,
reflections cut in fleeting, glints of sunblast strewn,
wild gold dust ever-a-move as if stillness were a curse.
 
There is rebirth in the flowing, overreaching, the arch,
the way you just won’t sit tight in your allocated box.
These sparks defy the lines and lines of etched steel.
 
You watch eyes blink out the bleak darkness of the earth,
this glint amid starbright, a crossing of the gods of old,
grey-bearded and worn. Their fables wander down the ages,
and ourselves are but light years scattered upon thinnest air,
set adrift among the distant echoes left by deft travelling stars.   

Copyright Vickie Johnstone, July 18, 2023

A Poem a Day (594): Psychopomp

Psychopomp
 
The Guide of Souls,
he will carry you to the end of days,
where the Earth tilts and the tide turns restless,
the deep ocean opening as a door without hinges,
a gateway through which you will glide,
seated in the arms of his narrowboat, listening
to the turn of the churn of the wide, open sea.
 
He hears the rhythmless still of your heartbeat
as the loudest strike below the cry of birds,
grey gulls a-gathering and a solitary albatross,
wings spread, a soaring cross in a sorrowful sky,
your loneliest wingman on the journey in.
 
The ferryman of Hades, son of Erebus and Nyx,
he leads you from the living to the tribe of the dead,
removes the coins from your eyes so you can see,
vanishing his fee in his skeletal hands.
 
Eyes blazing, they burn in his skull, like Dante said,
dark cloths draping him from head to toe.
You watch his bony hands work the ferryman’s pole,
hypnotic, endless strokes counting out the seconds.

If he turns, you might spy a vulture’s head, a raven or
an all-seeing owl, but you’ll never see the face within.
If you stare too long you might burn, so the albatross
calls you to lose yourself in the swirls of the Styx.
 
Birds in their masses waited outside your hearth,
heard the last exhalations of your Earth-bound breath,
before raising their wings to accompany with
across the outer realms; listen to their dulcet tones.
 
The mighty Styx towers each side as the water takes you,
a passage between the waves for one passenger.
Outside, the albatross will head back for another
while the ferryman guides you to the underworld,
where Hades waits with Cerberus, holding your shroud.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, June 24, 2023

 
A psychopomp (from a Greek word) means 'the guide of souls'.

A Poem a Day (593): Waterfall

Waterfall
 
Warm rain spills in a thunderous curve,
separates globules of glutinous paint scrawls
on cream paper, slides a rhythm over the top
to drip-drop down the edges in a waterfall,
a fine veil of your delicate lilac tears,
awakens the languid body when it feels lost,
embracing as an almost physical thing,
a shawl, an abstract hug in a bid to silence the world.
 
Hold the mystery in your skin cup, feel the rush,
the smell of nature watering your soul,
raise your fingertips to the sky in welcome,
feeling all that escapes yonder, big or small,
as life is here, in each molecule miniscule,
this breath of knowledge escaping your lips
as you summon the words to describe the rain.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, June 21, 2023

A Poem a Day (592): The drill

 
The drill
 
Morning-in-method wakes,
a celebratory feel. An upstage.
Darts in the 20 zone, flights up.
 
This is the slide into Easter’s tower,
padlocked doors and silenced rooms,
all eyes on a fabricated world
beyond the living and the doing.
 
The drill.
The orator reads from a list of
unspeakable words to an invisible audience.
 
Bathe with a missing curtain, your
privacy a luxury you can no longer have.
 
Underwater, limbs move slow,
one stroke forward, two pumps back,
circle inside the dead-pool current,
ebb and flow impossibly futile.
 
Pink conch curves. Empty shells.
This sea falls voiceless if you hold them
to your ear.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, June 9, 2023

A Poem a Day (591): FIRE&WATER

 
FIRE&WATER
 
Colours crisp, oceans of pure,
a coded dream of every element
wiped clean. A world without
a screen. No smoke, no to and fro,
negation of the ‘no go’ zone.
 
This ebb is where it all stops,
everyone folds. Bets are off.

The players have all played,
no one left to throw a die,
the final roll already known.
 
In water everything comes to be seen.

There is no fire without smoke,
but there is stoke, and the fire
has its starter, the fuse, the wood.
 
It was just a word played.

And in the candlelight no questions
were there to be asked.
 
El Nino keeps its promises,
pushing up the ante for 2024,
the 1.5C milestone.
 
Can you feel the heat,
drought, typhoon and monsoon
a-knocking at your door?

This fluctuation, oscillation,
subtle turnings of the tide.
 
To the decision-makers
seated round the highest table,
failing to gather all the data,
don’t shoot the messengers.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, June 8, 2023

A Poem a Day (590): Skinny dipping

 
I never had the guts to do that, but here you go…

 
Skinny-dipping
  
Blue-dip, skinny,
rival tans like skateboards
surfing cerulean stripes,
endless. Motor chasm.
Our lithe shadows carry out
on the rhythmic breath of waves,
exploring far-off realms.
We can’t hold them back.
 
Tread water. Boundless,
an energy field sublime.
We weave like fish.
Even the birds can’t hear us,
sunnying our skin like bees
a-buzz with summer’s tune.
Egos burn out. Skylight lifts us.
 
Clouds scoot, white-out
chameleons of twisted shapes.
Our feet kick out, bodies prone,
lifted in these cool maternal arms.
We are as the world is.
Light. Majestic. Ever-sleep.
 
Here, we’ll wait all the struck stars
a-shimmer, bridging the night
with lunar streams awaking light,
beside this most wondrous
naked moon.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, June 1, 2023

A Poem a Day (589): Catchment

 
Catchment

White feathers in the catchment
seek to reflect the faintest flicker of light,
dispatch a slick sensation of listening in
to flecked starlings take flight outside,
dampened by the first spit of rain.
 
Watch it all slide.
 
Trickles like tears on the windowpane
create a view of misted morning,
unreliable mirrors recreating still life in paint,
skin canvases. Pictures of water rushing out
into ebb and flow and push and shove.
 
The light outside is caught by small hands,
tiniest palms, unable to stop this watery glide
seeping through stick-stubby fingers.
Fists pound a rhythm on tarpaulin roofs,
call out for some long-imagined sanctuary.
 
This wrapped blue circle catches dreams,
fails to open this turn-switch kaleidoscope,
yet cradles hope like a sleeping newborn babe,
draws it close against the seeping darkness,
all-encroaching, looking for a steal.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, May 23, 2023

New books

 

Hi, I’ve published some new ebooks. One is a fictional detective mystery with a supernatural edge, set in Victorian London, called Tirips Shade - Ghost Detective, and the other two are collections of poetry: Ink and Woman. 

You can find them in the usual places: http://linktr.ee/vickiejohnstone

Tirips Shade – Ghost Detective

Victorian London's finest detective, Tirips Shade, hunts a serial killer while investigating his own murder, assisted by his closest friend. A suffragette tries to get justice for women who have fallen on bad times.

Reviews:

reviewed by Keithtj on April 26, 2023 

I found Vickie Johnson through her previous book on zombies, I dream of zombies. I couldn't put it down, reading it on one sitting! This latest book is in the same vein. Ms Johnson has a wonderful way of describing situations and times, indeed she paints with words. Managing to evoke images and the atmosphere of the time. The characters are believable to the point you care what happens to them, and the story line is suitably gripping and nicely twisted, catching you out, just when you think you have worked it who the baddie is. A thoroughly wonderful and entertaining read more of Tirips and his world please!

reviewed by Ed Drury on April 8th, 2023 

I've followed Vickie Johnson's books since I stumbled on the Kiwi books. I've watched her effortlessly shift between genres and styles, but she's kept me a loyal reader the entire time, primarily because of her excellent storytelling and fascinating characters. This book reaffirmed my confidence in her to deliver a compelling story with beautiful characters. With this one, I think she has all the ingredients for another successful series of books, and I will undoubtedly read them all. I would recommend it to readers of young adults, paranormal, and cozy mysteries without reservation. It does have some edgy scenes, but it is, in my opinion, done within the context of the story and not the least bit gratuitous.

Ink

A collection of 74 poems, mainly written between April 2, 2022 and May 14, 2023.

Preview:

Ink

We are ink,

dotted on paper,

mute words waiting

for a voice to awaken them,

inquisitive hands to turn the pages,

open eyes to read the hidden,

empathy to wish to know,

pour out its warmth,

and be.

 

May 14, 2023

 

The surging sea

It’s something beyond words,

this speaking without saying anything at all,

none of the creations inside your head,

an outer world of living inner space,

this seeing without seeing,

a pull beyond the other world.

 

And here we pause before the rosebud sea,

this sheer wild energy, a surging out

of truth, ideas and pure patience.

Feel lost in the rush of it, the subtle shift,

the stifled air purified with salt,

the knowing without a reason to know.

 

It bends and rides and finds us here,

travels straight through us,

beyond the day and over the night,

and we can bear it, full-on, full force,

for we are with it, in it, of it,

and all the rest is white, white noise.

 

May 8-9, 2023

 

Woman

A collection of 55 poems on the theme of womanhood, mostly written between January 2021 and May 2023.

Preview: 

Floating

Sink or swim,

she moves in her true

direction, unwavering,

straight as a die.

 

In the water,

she’s an even arrow,

unyielding, her will

cannot bend.

 

Out of water,

she is limited by

the still numbness

in her limbs.

 

But here, floating,

she knows true grace,

and her body refuses to

let her down.

 

August 2, 2022

 

Rivulets

These pungent colours pack a punch,

run in single rivulets searching,

 

find solace in the in between,

the evidential stop and start.

 

It’s the flow until the end,

a delicate line drawn underneath

 

this elevation to ardour,

a pretence we no longer have.

 

Take watch of eagles in flight,

the soar and the silver arch,

 

the dip in a separated sky,

once launched, floating on high.

 

We draw our hands together,

turn our palms up to the sun

 

collecting its beaten yolk rays.

It seeps through our fingers.

 

September 11, 2021