 | Hazel Saville is from Carmarthen, Wales, in the UK. She has been writing poetry since her early teens. She has worked as a social worker and since 2000 as a hypnotherapist/psychotherapist. Amongst other things, she is a visual artist, a songwriter and plays the Celtic harp. Hazel likes exploring ideas in her work. She particularly enjoys the musicality of poetry. Her poems have been published in a number of UK magazines and anthologies. |
-Call Everything into Harmony
Prompt – Compose a poem about your idea of patience and what your time frame means for moving through a day,
a week, a month, a year, a life…What is the core of waiting through each day?
I hurt my leg when I was thirteen
just at the start of school summer holidays.
It broke my heart being trapped indoors
unable to run and play. Six weeks in plaster
seemed like forever. I stamped and champed
at the endless stretch of day.
Now many possibilities bid to fill my time
and if it seems I am slower at what I do,
the day rushes past the faster.
Yet always the day works best for me
when there is a core of waiting,
a knowing that flows
from my deep innocence.
Then I say yes to my heart,
“Yes, this is the way
and I will walk in it.”
Call everything into harmony
and heaven is revealed.
—
Poem 29 – I Give You This Day
Poetry prompt-write a poem about heaven.
Heaven is fulfilled in your sweet body, my child, in your
palpitating heart…For heaven is born in you, in the arms of the mother-dust. Rabindranath Tagore
I give to you the Black Mountains of Dyfed,
the green wooded hills of Panteg
and the golden sands of the West.
I give to you the new-born lambs
leaping in innocent joy
in the pastures of the Mother.
I give to you the new-green leaves
dancing to the skip of Her song-
Yes, I give you this day,
I will not turn away from it
despite the chill cruelty
of man to man.
*
Now I am here
to open my heart to heaven,
the heaven that has been waiting
so long, so patiently,
for me to let
its perfection in.
And the seasons turn and turn,
and the worm eats at my shell
but still my heart swells
as the light of heaven
enters in and I join
my heart to the dance.
—
Poem 28
Prompt – Use the heroic quatrain – pick someone you truly admire; and in her or his voice have them invite a friend to your house for dinner. The fun here is in your imagining her or his voice speaking well of you, encouraging the friend to consider how pleasant an evening it would be at your home. (I’ve extended the word house to include a meadow by the river on our land-an outdoor event for the hoped-for good weather coming soon.
Soon is the merry month of May,
when harsh North winds at last relent.
I bid you come on this fair day
down by the river, beside our tent.
Our tables pile with food galore
with drinks, exotic, sweet and rich,
with fare you surely will adore,
come sit and taste-all will bewitch.
—
Poem 27 – The True Artist
The true artist: draws out all from his heart,
works with delight, makes things calm, with sagacity… ,
from “The Art of Recklessness: Poetry as Assertive Force and Contradiction” by Dean Young (English version by Denise Levertov)
How do you catch a wind and use it
to glide across the wide seas?
First you must learn the ways
of winds and tides,
you must know your craft:
the sails, the rigging
and how to set her fair into the wind;
you must know where you wish to go,
and how to chart deep waters.
So with art,
to flow with the wind of spirit
and bring your passion to it;
to catch its tides;
you will know your tools
and have them ready to hand.
For none of us knows precisely,
which way the wind will blow,
how the heart will move us,
to lay in a rich cloak of colour
and let it billow, belly up into the blow.
And you must know
how to press your advantage home,
and when all is done,
how to steer clear on the home run,
and come to harbour’s rest.
—
Poem 26 – The Lamb and the Lion
Poetry prompt-be funny
The lamb and the lion both went for a walk
over the moorland and to the far park.
They took some money to buy some honey
and a nice cream tea, as sweet as can be.
The lion leapt and pranced and gambled,
the lamb talked loud while on she rambled
until they came to the Bing Bong wood,
where the clashes and clangs that some find so good
made the woolly lamb quite lose her track.
She bleated, “dear lion, let us go back,
to my dam and my brother, my sister, your cub
to the flock and the herd, to our fine country club.”
Lion lifted his head and purred like a cat,
“dear lamb,” he demurred, “do not fear that,
for the Bing Bong wood, makes a sing song noise,
so don’t let that take you by surprise,
but let us continue to our sweet delight
and there we will feast through all the long night
on all the rich treats our money can buy,
pray do not turn back while the sun is still high. ”
He gave her his hand and continuing thus
they passed through the woods without further fuss,
they entered the park in the gathering dark
and there stood the warden, greeting them with a bark.
“Good sir,” the Lion spoke boldly out,
“point us please to the tea shop, for we without doubt,
must now sate our hunger on succulent sweets
our stomachs are calling to taste of its treats.”
And so in delight they lounged on the grass
and eat honey and scones as they saw the sun pass.
Then they feasted on quince and cream and jam
and the lion consumed a large leg of lamb.
—
Poem 25 – The Mystery of Movement
Prompt- write of our involvement with movement and being that takes you to a place of Zen, and opens you to the Other.
Being of mystery
animated by breath of Love
moved by the tides of seasons,
by the flow of feelings,
by a force of will
that cannot still the mind.
Gift that shelters me
on my earth journey,
gift that so long has bid me
see and know it’s mystery,
while I have turned away
intent on other things.
Now my arms lift,
stretch to receive the love
that fills the inward breath,
the slow exhale back into earth,
both giving and receiving.
And the mind is entranced
by the body, by its twisting, turning,
spiraling, springing — each movement
controlled and folding into the next,
where dancing limbs float through willing air
and the mind must surrender care
and live here, in the mystery of movement.
—
Poem 24 – The Light That Gives Life Meaning
Prompt-Sitting in a poets wondering
Bright gold forsythia stands
despite cold north winds
that have laid me low.
I know,
although it’s petals will soon fall
it will come again next year–
I have seen that is so,
spring after spring
Yet what of us?
Our span is long
besides spring’s fleeting flowers.
As years spin by
we flower and fruit.
As fruit falls,
we bare the bones of life,
scraping in dark
for some bright metaphor.
Have you heard the song?
Have you seen the light
that gives life meaning?
I extend a hand
clutching at lucid moments
in which I know
my light will come again.
—
Poem 23 – Her Ceaseless Choreography
Prompt – a poem about the moon.
I, once a fool in love,
lingered so long in moonlight.
I had exchanged a kiss and felt
that magic held the reins of night.
And moon was swift to orchestrate
the symphony of romance-
that with the shadows of the night
I might boldly dance.
Was my embrace in silvery light,
my surge of passion and the beat
that drummed out from my heart,
moved by her mystic making?
Yet, when the moon waned into dark.
I saw stark choice foisted on me.
through what deceit was I enmeshed
in Her ceaseless choreography?
—
Poem 22 – Where the Heart Can Speak It Secrets
Prompt-A Poem About Stillness.
Do you know that the body
can just like that,
plunge you into stillness?
You may think you can
always race around-
but the body can take matters
into its own hands.
The body will accept
some virus or disease-
it can make your systems seize,
unilaterally –
it just shuts down
your whirl of activity.
How much better to weave stillness
into the movement of the day,
a stillness where the body tells its needs
and the heart —
the heart can speak it secrets.
—
Poem 21- The Strings That Wind Around the Fabric of My Life
Prompt-Write about an Object in Your Life
Harp – gifted to me on my twenty-first-
your strings wind around the fabric of my life.
For years I’d seen my father labour at your making,
often challenged, thwarted by deficient plans.
See the piece inset at the top of the neck,
close to the soundboard-that was needed,
for the half tone leavers to be realigned-
so much like me in my shaping!
The wood is mahogany, luscious honey colour,
yet the years have shown it could not endure,
the extreme of holding thirty-six strings in tension.
The mahogany neck cracked-much like I did,
breaking at life stresses-yet given time and love
the body repairs itself-and the harp was fitted
with a plate of brass, to enable it to bear
the pressure. Everything of worth
takes time. It took me years to learn
how to make music on these strings.
How quickly it slips out of tune with disuse
so that I pluck at dissonance.
What does it take to make time to play,
to move my soul into the wave and rhythm,
to flow with music, to let my body love
the strings that wind around the fabric of my life?
—
Poem 20 – Live Your Life in Sunlight’s Play – A Roundel
Spring winds have blown dark clouds away
and birds exult in cobalt sky,
they sing on trees new-blossomed by
bright golden heads, all lifted high.
Now ’fore the sun they bow and sway
and listen as the blossoms sigh,
Spring winds have blown dark clouds away
and birds exult in cobalt sky.
Magnolia stands in grand array,
it’s time to live, no more to die,
frolic and dance and be the why
and live your life in sunlight’s play,
Spring winds have blown dark clouds away.
—
Poem 18 – An Extraordinary Astounding Dragon Striking a Flamboyant Bizarre Hussar
Prompt- Find six or seven words you like and string them together for a title of a poem and see what you compose from this title.
See
a flamboyant bizarre hussar
carrying a long lance,
tall as a tree.
See
an amazing Dragon,
so out of the ordinary
it can hardly be
real!
Said Dragon so casually
extends a huge claw
and, no big deal,
Strikes
said lance from the hands
of the flamboyant
hussar. “Yikes”
Cries
the astounded hussar,
stricken in more ways
then one. “Lies!”
“Lies!
none of this is real!”
He shrugs his shoulders,
hefts his truncated lance,
and tries
again to thrust it
at the extraordinary dragon.
One of them dies!
—
Poem 17 – I Am Dancing Till End of Night
Prompt – present the confessional “I” in a grander environment, in which we can be seen as connected as humans to nature, for example. Use the heroic couplet, rhyming over two lines.
There are angels dancing hand-in-hand
with my heart’s child, now left to stand
in her wise innocence, free to sing
her true song. She’s invited in
by the Divine. She, bursting with joy,
knows sorrow’s touch-that love’s no toy
to trifle with. Love is to bless
all life that lives, not less,
but more than words express,
a movement of the heart to stress
from the wide scape of possibility
that love can answer every need in me
and although I’d forgotten why, where and how
I can reach this place, I see right now
the changes that love have brought to me,
changes I cherish, yet long still to see.
My heart is renewed, transformed in light
and I am dancing till end of night.
—
Poem 16 -The Heart Shackles Are Not As You Think
Prompt – Go to your bookshelf, count to the 9th book, open it to page 9, find the 9th sentence & begin a poem with that sentence. Let your poem not exceed 9 lines. My book was Thirst by Mary Oliver
“The heart shackles are not as you think.”
Was it the mind that kept my body chained
away from the bright space where I could shine?
Or was it the heart that bound me
in the place where I would break?
None of this is as I’d thought–
on a scented summer evening, amidst the jasmine
and the stock, my heart whispers,
my heart knows– how to return again.
—
Poem 15 – The Stronger Pull of What You Really Love
Prompt – A poem that is a conversation between yourself and one of your favourite poets.
“Let yourself be silently drawn
by the stronger pull of what you really love.” Rumi
I love colour
skirting the shapes of form
in exquisite swirls-
a rainbow edged in gold.
“Observe the wonders
as they occur around you…
Feel the artistry moving
& be silent…”
I would pour myself
Into the breath of Beauty…
I want feel it coursing through
the corridors of my being.
“Breath touched my soul and I saw beyond all limits…
On this path let the heart be your guide
for your body is hesitant and full of fear.”
So I would see, and bring
that light into another form—
let it shape me into a lucent,
lambent new born,
creature of earth and air,
of all that I behold,
chastened through fire,
silvered in a shimmering sea.
“Although the road is never ending,
Take a step and keep walking ,
do not look fearfully into the distance.”
I will step into a new sunrise
as you advise:
“Love risks everything
and asks for nothing.”
—
Poem 14 – Striving To Sing Its Radiance
Prompt – Capturing an experience of God, nature, and of the longing of the heart.
“I am trying to read the form of longing
And see a wind with the sun inside it…” Tim Lilburn
I long to bring into being,
sun of the wide sky,
wind of starlit night,
and channel into form,
the luminous light of heaven.
My heart reaches
to touch the numinous,
striving to sing its radiance,
it’s shade and tone
into tumultuous being.
My canvas graciously receives
the press of colour,
stroke of brush,
the scrape of Knife,
the spread of paint
I seek to form and fashion-
’til
all I see
is lambent light
and I would shape it-
here—again–
again.
—
Poem 13 – A Worshiper of Bast
Prompt – write a poem about another faith of any kind, from a different perspective to your own, living it as though you were living in a dream.
I stroke her sleek fur
a worshipper of Bast.
I love her feline poise
her curled comfort.
She watches me through slits,
her slanting eyes
close to my caress,
open to a flap of wings.
She teaches me
to pounce into this moment,
how to relax
the tight tangles of my history,
to relax into Her grace,
Her being.
—
Poem 10 – Love takes its due
Write using these six words in the body of your poem: slant; pleasure; trembles; told; holy; rivulets.
My mother told me
so little
about pleasure of the body,
I had to search in books
of dubious literary value,
books that not even whispered
Of the holy ground
on which I dared
to tread.
As I read,
my young heart
trembled with desire.
How could I know
this slant on life
would hardly fit
me for my future?
How could I know
that rivulets of water
could not wash
that
stain from my soul?
Now, an old fool,
Love takes its due
and cleanses all.
—
Poem 9 – A Simple Minded Impression – A Glosa
Glosa: the form opens with a quatrain, borrowed from another poet that is then followed by four ten-line stanzas terminating with the lines of the initial passage in consecutive order. The sixth and ninth lines rhyme with the borrowed tenth.
tell the flowers
the sun loves them.
The grass is under the same
simple minded impression.
–Tony Hoagland – “Please Don’t”
The heart is quite
simple minded,
it simply says,
what it feels.
conveys impressions
that would take hours,
days, months and years,
for the mind in its ivory towers
simply to tell the flowers
they are so loved.
See the bright faces.
turn to the sun
in adoration-
the love is mutual,
inclusive, me to them,
the mind notes it
while the heart delights,
tells green leaf and stem,
the sun loves them.
I love the flowers
seeing them grow,
each day regarding
buds that thrust
and burst to perfection.
Try as I may to tame
their beauty, they are
bespelled to fade,
to die without blame.
The grass is under the same
enchantment, greening now
after spring rain.
Ewes with small lambs beside
eat every growing blade,
yet here the grass
continues without question,
being cropped or chopped.
Does it know it will come again?
Does it taste the love of heaven?
Or is this a simple minded impression?
—
Poem 8 – I Love You
Look within the dim interior,
see such secrets, moving darkly,
shadows stark against a wall.
The heart had noticed long ago,
that play of unfulfilled desires,
but mind remains impervious,
to heart’s sweet subtle promptings.
Impenetrable mind, oblivious,
to the broken cries for love.
The cries become more desperate
with every passing hour and day,
’til the body must convulse itself,
destroy its own, frail fragile form,
before that mind becomes aware
of a child, moving in shadow, here,
without love, without care,
waiting, so alone there,
waiting to be taken into your arms,
to be stroked and gentled,
to be loved from the heart
with a tenderness that says “I love you”.
—
Poem 7 – Haiku on a Mandala
Bright breast of Gaia
all parts a complete whole
art in perfection.
—
Blackbird
I sing,
heart opening
in a flow of notes,
notes that fill the evening air
with a promise of life,
with life anew,
of bud and leaf,
of worms rising to meet me
in turned earth,
and my song, like no other,
brings all my desire
to this moment,
where I am whole,
my being one with bliss-
for this I was made.
—
Day 4 Prose Poem
Yesterday I met a dowser, a diviner of futures. I had to admit that I too, in the past, albeit the quite distant past, had used this art of dowsing. I employed a pendulum, a weight attached to a piece of string. Pendulums are commonly found in new-age shops — usually some sort of crystal attached to a small chain. I used whatever came to hand.
Dowsing with a pendulum is a simple procedure-you establish a no signal and a yes signal by asking the pendulum to provide one. Then the pendulum will move in a specific direction, for example, turn clockwise for yes, and anticlockwise for no. Once you are happy that it is signalling correctly, you ask it a question that has a yes or no answer.
This process works basically by connecting to the unconscious mind, therefore you cannot ask it, for example, who will win the presidential election, as your unconscious mind will not know that. You can ask it questions about yourself, and about what is good or bad for you, as your unconscious mind is intimately connected with your body and knows all about your life history.
My new acquaintance told me that nowadays, instead of using a pendulum, she would use her body to provide answers. She would go to the greengrocers and silently ask her body to show her what specific vegetables were best for her. The answer would come when her body swayed towards vegetables that were good and away from those that were not so good for her.
I stopped using dowsing years ago as it took so much time and made life complicated. Maybe, if I had continued the process, and acted on my answers, I would be living a different life, in a different place, surrounded by different people. But I chose not to do that and I live with my choices.
—
Blue Rock-Poem3
(Today’s prompt was: “What spiritual attribute marks where you live as an emblem?”)
She rises on Blue Rock
‘Crug Las’ was the old
name for my home
in the Welsh.
Some time before we came,
nearly 40 years ago,
Her name became
Bryneiddan.
And ‘Bryn’ means a hill,
but ‘eiddan’ (pronounced I-than)
is of no specific meaning
that translates.
She has stood firm
through rage of ages,
endured storms within and
storms without.
When I return She settles
me safe on Her firm
foundation, rock of my life
my heart’s home.
—
Mark Rothko’s Red 1968
Red is the flame of Earth–
red curves into Her sphere,
bright against dark,
light against solid,
a square compressed,
desire held back,
rectangle pressed, down
with weight of doom.
My heart is of the earth
joined to a heaven
that whispers hope.
Flickers of hope
ignite a passion to reclaim
the morning of our innocence.
I walk in a garden,
colours surfeiting sight,
there is nothing to know,
no sophistry connects
the swift response of love
awakening light
—
Blue Rock
She rises on Blue Rock
‘Crug Las’ was the old
name for my home
in the Welsh.
Some time before we came,
nearly 40 years ago,
Her name became
Bryneiddan.
And ‘Bryn’ means a hill,
but ‘eiddan’ (pronounced I-than)
is of no specific meaning
that translates.
She has stood firm
through rage of ages,
endured storms within and
storms without.
When I return She settles
me safe on Her firm
foundation, rock of my life
my heart’s home.
—
Poem 1 Home
Home
is where the heart
is carved,
where dust that settles
is disturbed by passing feet,
where feelings chafe
when passions meet.
Home
is where the heart
is carved
apart
we come together
to complete
ourselves.