David Lewis Paget Poems

There’s not much of anything I can recall
From the time that we lived in the lane,
Only the puddles of rainwater eddying
With the wind’s gusting refrain.
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‘I’d swear that the sun is hotter, ’ she said,
‘It’s hotter than I can recall,
The garden’s turned into a desert, is dead
My plants are fried up to the wall.’
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He spoke of the stream that flowed uphill
In a grotto, long forgot,
Then said the stream would be flowing still,
And I could believe, or not.
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They bet me I couldn’t spend the night
Locked up in the Abbot’s loft,
Up where recusants once, in fright
Would wait for the stake at Pentecost.
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The Poetry Barn wasn’t really a barn
It was merely an old farm house,
It sat on the acres of Eddington’s Farm,
Surrounded by sheep and by cows.
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When I was a great deal younger than today, and first embarked on a life devoted to poetry, I made a decision to write a one verse poem every ten years, starting at the age of 21. This was to reflect the way I felt at the time, in relation to my life, and to my writing. The following is the verse written for the age of seventy-one, and below that the complete verses that built up to this point. The collection is called…

Into the Light
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I was out when the heavens opened up,
I was only but halfway there,
I hadn’t a coat or umbrella then
On my way to my darling dear,
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We moved on into this neighborhood,
When we couldn't afford the rent,
So my pessimistic Uncle Jim said,
‘Next step down's a tent! '
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Some say that life is a mystery
That we have to pay our dues,
It's written in every history
Marked out by a series of clues.
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Bring all the kids on home from school
And gather the pets in tight,
Send out and warn the village fool
For it's Crow Fly-Over Night.
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