Returning

First day --
subtle glances, eyes meet
as you move from my world to theirs again
and I trust you there
(for the most part).

Locker filled with all you prepared well,
mind open to new facts, figures, friendships.

I stand back and watch you go,
leaving me incrementally,
each year a little easier, for both of us.

The youngest one, the last
to need me in that physical way of
tuck-ins and bed time prayers, applied bandages, and
now it will be mine to tend to bruised feelings, and broken hearts.
Not long now, I fear.

For you are a beautiful one --
strong and athletic and
able to take on the world courageous,
for that I am thankful.

I remain here, peripheral --
daughter of my mother and mother to this daughter
waiting, praying,
cheering on the inside.

September 8, 2009

Dusk

photography by Bob Evans







There’s an expectation at the coming of night
that with the curtain of darkness drawn down tight
activity will cease with a deep sigh,
and peace will come.

Yet, all it really takes is a step onto my back porch --
to feel a playful breeze rise over my wakeful skin,
to smell lavender preparing to be ravished by tomorrow’s honey bees,
to hear the trill of tree frogs promising passion in the darkness,
to know that night is not a silent ending
rather a dark resurrection of life and love.

Lesley-Anne Evans
September 2009

Pink Warrior

Girl in the fuscia raincoat
twirling at the top of the playground hill…
Round and round, eyes closed

(fully in the moment), until
he advances up the slope
guns blazing.

Fists clenched, you
stand your ground and
force his retreat.

Warrior princess of the school yard
you spin around again,
a vision of victory

while your pastel clad playmates
run screaming
for a teacher.

Lesley-Anne Evans
Fall 2008

Love is stronger than death

photography by Lesley-Anne Evans








It wouldn’t take much, maybe
just belief in a love greater
than the separation of two lanes of worn asphalt,
to reach out your moss covered arms,
roots stretching triumphant down the embankment,
and take back the forest primeval.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Conflicted

'Glaring empty', by Lisa Mabey








I sit on the edge of your bed
and watch you leak
small drops
of life.

I anticipated doing things for you,
rather than this --
this waiting, hovering,
trying to interpret
what your heart mumbles
between slurred words.

Like a beachcomber, I search
for tiny wave tossed treasures,
then leave for home - empty handed -
and pray for the tide to turn.

Lesley-Anne Evans
03/02/09

Jazz singer

Five o’clock shadow on your eight o’clock face,
you hold the mic tenderly in your embrace.
Your baby face wet with traces of sweat, and
you sing to me, you sing to me.

Main stage lights glitter and black ebony glows,
brass band sparkle matches the shine on your shoes.
The boys play on as you croon your song, and
you sing for me, you sing for me.

Heat wave in the words that haunt your lips,
crowd of thousands wrapped ‘round your fingertips.
Platinum wives and young women breathlessly gaze, as
you toy with us, you toy with us.

Black patent shoes dance on the door to my heart,
your flirtatious promises are a well rehearsed art.
I’m mesmerized by your contrived gestures of hand, and
I swoon for you, I swoon for you.

Then it’s over, the starry night fantasy done.
You exit stage right, your encore is sung.
My heart quietens, then resumes a familiar dance
to my true love’s song, my true love’s song.






photography courtesy of our imac
photobooth application









Lesley-Anne Evans
2008

Returns

I want to draw your attention to this lovely photograph 'Backstage', by my friend Lisa Mabey. She's a very talented, beautiful and humble woman whom I had the delight to meet when our daughters played soccer together last year. It's my absolute honour to begin posting some of Lisa's photography in concert with my poems, and hope that you will visit her blog 'Breath' to view more of her glorious work.

Lesley-Anne







Returns

It could be pure coincidence
that on the afternoon you come back there is a storm brewing.
I feel the heat of August sun withdraw behind clouds
moving in fast from the west.
I see pampas grass bend low to accommodate the breeze.
I hear the porch chimes call out, "storm warning"
as my head unpacks memories.

You are unpacking cardboard boxes
and maybe expectations of a renewal, or at the very least,
a new start, just up the road.
So it could be an aligning of circumstances --
the weather, you, and my dramatic tendencies
to sense something more than a change in the wind.

Still, there’s something emerging within me --
resolve like an Oak tree, deep rooted, watered in,
able to withstand storms.

Lesley-Anne Evans
August 2009

Diversity

photography by Claire Evans







The same God; angry, jealous, holy
cracked open bedrock chasms to devour hard-hearted betrayers,
also holds my tears of grief and self-pity
in the palm of his open hand,
delights over me with singing.

The same God; creative genius, humorist
dreamed up aardvark and blue-bottomed baboon,
also considers my heart's response to quail babies
following their mother across my cul-de-sac
in a perfectly straight line.

The same God; mighty, just, compassionate
inspired men and women to leave complacent lives
take up causes of world proportion, like aids, orphans, slavery,
also removes my insecurity, my near-sighted view of life,
anoints my pen.

To God be the glory, forever and ever.

Lesley-Anne Evans
August 2009

Transcendent

photography by Joel Clements






Toubadours --
lyrical lines of airborne comrads
inhabiting space between sea and sky.
Harmony in form and function

yet, mammoth and undeniable,
like heat-seeking missiles --
transcending watery depths
and drawing up fish.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Old growth

Driving through I couldn't help but notice
how the forest flourished,
to the very edge of the asphalt.

As if, at any moment
the deer ferns might grow legs,
tumble down the loamy banks
and run, unhindered, with long lost cousins

on the other side.

As if the Sitkas waited, breath held,
for our transient passing
only to close in upon themselves
in an ancient prayer circle, and

again offer up forgiveness for our misguided intrusions.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Visit

photography by Claire Evans







You waited, didn't you…
until the last evening
as the sun was kissing clouds
like pink candy floss at the horizon.

I wasn't expecting you
and so, all the more sweet.
Your breath erupted and hung above the deep
and my heart sang out … whale…

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Cut

photography by Robert Evans









In the distance striped fields of ochre and green show how
one day, soft topped grasses moved like waves in the wind
and how a passing Massey Ferguson laid them down, unresisting
into rows like palomino manes, subdued and willing to embrace
the sun, heat up, dry out, offer up body and blood
as fodder for ruminations of cattle and poets and
farmers at the Feed and Tack.

Lesley-Anne Evans
August 2009

Away

Some days
if the truth were told
that is, if I were speaking it aloud
I’d say I want to run away
opposite direction to anywhere you or they are.
To a pine box even, or to float, lifeless,
in cold silent fathoms.

My mind screams
shut up shut up shut up
to incessant words, arguments, bickering.

I settle for an angry walk, wet faced in
pissing down rain.
Until mercy comes with full mouth kisses,
turns my heart home.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Forgiveness

I looked down only for a minute
to scribble something
(meaningful)
in my journal,
lifted up my eyes and it was gone.

All of it --
foreshore,
headland,
horizon.

Suddenly shrouded in a veil of soft grey mist,
making mystery of what was,

like a covering over all of my sins.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Crescendo

There’s music in the vineyard --
a rising tympani of leaves
exposing their soft bellies to
the western wind.

Harmonies of vine and wire
vine and wire, vine and wire
and the rhythm of staccato posts
support the melody.

Bees buzz, tasting floral hints
of autumn’s fruit
while heavy hot summer sun
pulls the song from root to blossom tip.

There’s music in the vineyard --
a complex composition carries on.
And, the cry of red-tailed hawk -
a grace note.


Lesley-Anne Evans
01/07/2009

Crow Babies

photography by Claire Evans


The whole, wide, white-crested ocean
and within clear view of your
wind beaten pine
was not enough
to draw your
bright, black, beady-eyed attention.

Instead, you flew
with your fuzzy-headed sibling
from pine branch to cedar-shake roof
of the cottage next door,
chortling softly to each other
and attempted to take a bath
in the rain water trapped in the gutter.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Walk a mile

photography by Claire Evans



Say nothing.

First, slip your foot into
my travel-worn shoes.

Can you see
scenic bi-ways, foot paths
and well intentioned plans
realized but for weather and love?

If so,
come share
the warmth of my hobo fire
and billy can coffee.

If not,
wipe the dust from your feet
and walk on down the road

in silence.

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Seabird

Photography by Robert Evans

How does it feel to leave land behind take to the sea live on silver offerings and faith in your ability to stay afloat regardless of weather? Such humble beginnings you wake alone to dirt walls and just a glimmer of light. Hunkered down in your snug burrow fed by swift and sleek parents, then pushed from your nest you fledge quickly to cries of their approval Now it’s time… No backward glances or salt pillars You fix your eye on the watery horizon and fly seaward. Lesley-Anne Evans July 2009

Husband, hunter-gatherer

Husband, hunter-gatherer

I’m looking for bits of rope
tossed up by the sea
Anything, really…
with knots tied in them,
some remnant of a sailor or fisherman’s craft.

Ok, you said.

Relieved to find some tangible purpose
for our walk to the tidal pools,
you searched a short time
and pulled a long, knotted, shell-encrusted, perfectly weathered rope
from between the rocks.

Holding it up to me
with a smile
you asked…
Like this?

Lesley-Anne Evans
July 2009

Words 2

When I plumb the depths
and draw up fresh
wet and glistening considerations,
presenting them on
heirloom plates -
an offering

Do you quicken, hunger
for the taste of complex spice,
pour Shiraz and savour
... slowly...
or do you crave
simpler
sweeter
things?


Lesley-Anne Evans
28/07/2008