Wooden figure, Auxerre

In Auxerre, the older houses often have statues or wooden figures adorning them.

If Tears There Should Be: Poem

If Tears There Should Be

.

If tears there should,lying dormant in

This silent heart, let them flow, unchecked

Or let them go

.

If tears there be when I walk the streets

And my footsteps sound hollow

No time for sorrow

.

If tears should overwhelm me

By sheer torrential power

Over and over

.

Let the tears come on, slow.

The fountains flow.

Let this emotion show

.

Now, or just go.

.

Copyright: Rani Turton

Invalides, Paris

The golden dome of Invalides that contains both Napoleon's tomb and the Army Museum.

Deserts That Dance In My Mind: Poem

DESERTS THAT DANCE IN MY MIND

.

Endless walks, nothing at all in sight;

Nothing and nobody in sight.

My mind, still and

Oblivious to the external world, scorched and

Silent, walked , walked, walked on.

.

People with pasts have memories to keep them warm

And others, have nothing more to say.

The mind, like a furnace, clings to the air

To burn, to burn, to burn bright.

.

There are deserts that dance in my mind

Strange, irreal and almost divine.

They beckon, they chase me from reason

As I circle in the vast nowhere, somewhere, everywhere.

.

Copyright: Rani Turton

The Red Carpet, Cannes

The famous walk up the red carpet for the film festival at Cannes.

So Acute Was My Loneliness: Poem

So Acute Was My Loneliness

Cobbled stones, not dust.
So acute was my loneliness that dream I must.
Escapism was a flight from dreary realism.

If roam I must, if chains I must break
Alone, in this pebble-strewn destiny
My happiness I must fake.

So acute was my loneliness that home was far
Too far; too far and distant my loved ones and my thoughts
That in that black cosmic wilderness even the North Star
Seemed close enough to touch. That even my words
Seemed transparent and tinted with Orientalism

So distant and cold, so empty my worlds.
So acute was my loneliness even the poems would not come
The words fled, the streets wet, a spectre I had become
My memories tinged with the bitter things I had done

All alone. When dawns touched my lids after fitful sleep
I had resolved never, never to weep
However deep the pain. However acute the pain
The sun would shine tomorrow and I would become myself again.

Copyright: Rani Turton