Shadows… #Poetry

Image by Luca Finardi from Pixabay 


Shadows slide across the land
No one will notice the unholy hand
Guiding, pushing forward
Searching for somewhere
To be more than just a ghost
Late at night, shadows 
may cross your sleeping form
Your life has changed
New colours, new ideas, strange thoughts
Knowledge you know 
you did not obtain from learning
You have become more than before
Shadows continue across the land
Looking for a home…


©AnitaDawes2023

Unknown Forces… #Poetry

Image by donterase from Pixabay 

Inside the mind, trouble swells
Next tick of the clock brings it nearer
to the people seated at the table
Eating food that has been prepared
Rushing the meal, chasing time
Cod on the menu, bone warning
Evening meal under moonlight
People take their chances
There is something bigger than time
       hidden between the fabric of space
Overshadowed by unknown forces
Rain, black as night covers the street
Souls ancient, dance between the shadows…

©AnitaDawes2022

Shadows…  (or a touch of backward thinking)

©JayeMarie2022

Some people live charmed lives, don’t they?

Everything good seems to drop in their laps. As I get closer to the end of my days, I have been unable to stop wondering why my life had to be the way it was. Back then, I always seemed to be at the end of the queue when dishing out happy days.

I would have settled for dull and boring days, anything but one more day of misery.

People who know me know I am a trier, and I sometimes wonder if that was half the trouble. Maybe if I wasn’t so willing to accept everything that fate threw at me, my life might have been easier to live. Not known for ducking and diving, you see. At the time, I thought all I had to do was wait until I was old enough to do my own thing.

I was determined to climb to the top of the dung heap, to breathe fresh, clean air, the air of success, of possibilities, and make something of my life. Unfortunately, no matter how hard I tried, this never really happened. I trudged through an endless succession of hopeless situations.

I hurtled from one mistake to another. They were never the same mistake, though, something I remember with a touch of pride, not that it helped much.

My life is full of shadows. Shadows that haunt me every day.

My heart is like a piece of Kintsugi, carefully repaired many times but hanging in there like a trooper.

Kintsugi fosters the idea that a broken object can be repaired and be made useful once again. It tells us we can always begin anew despite past failures. Accepting imperfections helps us to break free from the obsession with perfectionism which causes unnecessary stress and inhibits creativity and productivity.

Getting older has been a Godsend for me. I am more in control now, and many shadows have faded, no longer waiting in the corners to ruin my days. There are one or two things I would love to change, to put right what I did wrong all those years ago, but time sometimes makes this impossible.

As my life slows down and my memories lose clarity, I hope to enjoy the gathering peace for a while longer…

Are we Free? #Poetry

Shadows stretch across the floor
           Disappearing into darker corners
Hidden in mind’s eye, they linger, 
        like lost souls, looking for home
Any thoughts I had, were mixed, scrambled, questioning
Kites when they break free, that’s what shadows remind me of
               When they hide in a darker space, are they free?
Evening shadows, are they the same ones, out of hiding?
Silly thoughts that take hold of the mind
Peppering the space inside my head, 
        with strange things to ponder on
Evening starlight, are there shadows up there?
Away from our gaze, I wonder
Running after my own shadow for too long
Ending where I began…

©AnitaDawes2022

Long Grass… #Poetry

Image by Thomas Hoang from Pixabay

Playing inside the long grass
Happy, safe, childhood free of pain
In my family’s hands I grew
Leaving home, my first pain
Arrives, concealed in sweetness
Dad kissed my cheek, waved me on
Education, part of the plan
Later, life grew strange
Pushed by my peers
Hell was raised
In pain, loss of innocence
Away I staggered from college life
             to the safety of my home…

©AnitaDawes2022

ABOUT US: For those new to our website and blog, we would like to thank you for visiting. Between us, we write in several different genres, so there should be something for everyone to enjoy. Anita cannot abide computers, so I (Jaye) do all the technical (oily rag) stuff! Our books tend to be varied, from horror to supernatural romance and coming of age, and mystery thrillers.  We try to keep our website interesting with guest posts, bloggers, poetry, and reviews for all the books we read. Our books are shown in the right-hand sidebar and clicking on the images should take you straight to Amazon. If you enjoyed your visit, we would love you to leave a comment… Hoping to see you again!

Sanity Reclaimed… #Poetry

Image by Luca Finardi from Pixabay
I used to think 
living on my own was fine
then the shadows moved in
followed by voices, 
they want me out
they say the house is theirs
time to turn the tables
I threw flour in the air
The shadows vanished
The voices remained
They whisper 
in the peeling wallpaper
Through the cracks in the floorboards
I strip the wallpaper, 
filled the cracks
The house is quiet
I reclaim my sanity.

©AnitaDawes2022

Shadows… #Poetry

Dark half entities
Day or night, reach across the land.
Breaking away from their hosts
Elongated, misshapen forms
Forests, great monuments.
We too have our own half-life
Following where we go
Bending its shape to the landscape
Stretching along walls, leading the way
Searching along the River Thames
Playing with the water
Dancing with the light
Teasing, find me, touch me.
I have watched the shadows 
Shrink back into themselves
As if frightened by a stranger form
They return to their host.
The land around is bright again
Lit by the sun.
When the time is right
Our own earth reaches into space
Like a dark searchlight.
I wait, hold my breath
watch Pac-man eat the moon
Until the dark shadow is complete...

©AnitaDawes2019

Eugi’s Causerie ~ Challenge ~ Shadows ~#Poetry

Eugi’s Weekly Prompt – Shadows – Nov. 18, 2021

Morning shadows dance across the fields
Like children playing
Evening shadows lengthen
Giants disturbing time
Trying to make space to linger
Some, wishing they were nothing
Not dust to blow away with the wind
No light can cast them out
They search for a place to rest, to be unseen
Sounds of the river call for drowning
Washing away of sad thoughts
Shadows pass over shadows
Entanglement ensues
Shadows continue to move
Within the many shades of darkness…

© AnitaDawes2021

Worry is a terrible thing, it steals the quality of life from right under your nose, reducing your world into a place of doom and gloom. We have been sitting on a massive worry these past six months and have refused to start the new year until we had good news.

I have desperately tried to keep everything normal, finish my WIP and keep the website going, but have to admit it was a poor imitation of the real thing, and I apologise for that.

I have not been sharing much of this with our friends and followers and this may seem strange after all your incredible support when Anita had that massive heart attack in 2020. Your love and good wishes pulled us through that terrible time, but when disaster struck again last year, it seemed far more serious, and we really felt that talking about it might make it worse.

Anita’s heart is still severely damaged, and despite having two stents and a pacemaker fitted, it only barely functions. When a series of lumps started to appear around her neck last year, the alarm bells started ringing again.

Because of the raging virus and all the hospital delays, it took months to have the lumps investigated. The consultant mentioned cancer and after deliberation, they finally decided to remove part of her thyroid. Surgery was a problem as they didn’t think her heart was strong enough, but they said that delaying it was not an option.

A nightmare time for all the family, especially Anita for she can’t abide hospitals at the best of times. My sister has never been ill and to be struck down by two life threatening illnesses almost at the same time seems very unfair. She made it through the surgery without incident, but we had to wait two agonising weeks to get the results of the tests.

By this time, we were all terrified and sick with worry, dreading the news.

The day of the appointment, I felt sick to my stomach but somehow kept a smile on my face. I think I held my breath when she was called into the consultants office, but five minutes later the door opened and she rushed out of the room, a massive smile on her face. We watched in amazement as she ran out of the ENT department to a standing ovation from the nurses.

By this time, we knew the news must be good, but I wanted to know how good. Just before we all reached the lifts, I caught her arm and made her stop walking. ‘Well,’, I said and waited.

She stood there and laughed at me, and I didn’t think she was going to say anything.

‘THERE IS NO CANCER,’ she shouted.

All the way home in the car, she kept saying those words, and her relief was wonderful to see. Despite the odds, her poor old ticker had survived the surgery and she was cancer free.

But four days later, we had to rush back to the hospital, as Anita was having trouble breathing. She is now back home, but it seems that worrying isn’t going anywhere after all.

She is looking better, although still very weak and breathless much of the time. The list of her medications grows ever longer, but … and you may have noticed this, none of what happened has stopped her writing her poetry.

Now all I have to do, is get my own head back together!

I love the way Anita has woven the shadows throughout this poem…