Trees and The Taste of Shadow When a tree falls how can its shadow stand? And yet in the forest behind our eyes shadows stretch far into the future. Even when the tree has long since fallen and rotted and returned to the fecund, hungry soil of history; even when the sun, with its golden tongue, is licking the ridges of mountains memories are longer than shadows. And the taste of darkness is a sharp, metallic tang that can, with enough swings, cut right through the most deep-rooted loves and thick-trunked family. In shadow, bare dirt pushes back the greener grass. In shadow, consoling moss softens the edges. But what does this mean for the forest behind our eyes? You tell me for once! I’m sick of walking these paths, pulling answers from trees like cicada shells. Tell me – this shadow these trees what does it all mean?

Shards - The 1 Poem Podcast of Cameron Semmens

Shards - 16 - Trees And The Taste Of Shadow

Today I take my hunchbacked heart for a walk in cathedrals of trees. And each step off-road, off-grid, on dirt, returns me to an earlier me – to a memory of milk teeth smiles and always look up. And with each step, on this day (I wish it always felt like this), my thoughts become more like dragonflies; and my muscles more like winter bees; and slowly the skin of my civilised self hardens and sheds – a cicada shell; and suddenly, from the outside, I can see the useless husk it was – so fragile and constrictive. And as I keep walking further into the forest all my straight lines begin to warp and twist like wattle branches; and all my black-and-whites are softened into shades of green; and all my human grandness shrivels and cowers beneath a towering grove of mountain ashes. Fecund, meandering, I grow into my youth like a tree re-entering the seed. I am simpled; trimmed back to a beautiful potential. I know, in many ways, this cannot last; but I also know this moment is growing roots; this moment is digging in deep; this moment is going to sprout words and flower into poetry – I can see the lines, like leaves, already forming: Today I take my hunchbacked heart for a walk in cathedrals of trees...

Shards - 15 - The Fern Cycle

wait un-fisted with all your openness seeded with hope and joy will visit like a finch from the dark understory and joy will return with a sudden flit and flash of colour no matter what sadly you will be unhappy at times and all those around you and all those you love will be unhappy at times but equally no matter what joy will visit fleeting fine-feathered it will swoop in from the corner of your vision arrive when you least expect did you know the finch can only flourish with access to dense undergrowth? perhaps all the thorny tangled mess of unhappiness in this world is just a frame a shield a home for this flighty little bird no matter what joy will visit joy will return but it can’t stay it can’t stay if you grasp for it and try to hold onto it it’ll be gone even before your fingers unfurl so just be still and joy will at some point arrive at your side ‘til then wait un-fisted with all your openness seeded with hope

Shards - 13 - The Joy Finch

Suddenly it twigs! Fear is a stick insect hiding in the branches of my thinking; eating away at my budding dreams; nibbling out holes in the leaves of my beliefs. I see it now! I see it!

Shards - 12 - Fear Is A Stick Insect

Before we enter knowing we are always spinning there’s an astronomy in us all that speaks more of space than light and we are spun through in-betweens until caught in the gravity of that single question that black hole at galaxy’s centre that mystery so heavy and pivotal everything revolves around it – everything – and the closer we get to this ultimate horizon (this final event) the more we are bathed in answers illuminations that stretch us beyond our capacity to comprehend until finally we enter into the ultimate infinite intimate embrace

Shards - 11 - Singularity

Shards - 10 - Thankfullness Is A Team Of Huskies by Cameron Semmens

Shards - 10 - Thankfullness Is A Team Of Huskies

Give melodies to everything you say, new life must be sung into this world. Let your arms be a lush valley. With syrupy stares sway like a grove of maples in a gentle breeze. Watch their eyes. Whisper ‘open sesame’. Keep watching. Study the red river deltas on their eyelids; and in your mind, follow these tiny rivulets to their surging source. Keep watching. Blow gently on the bouquet of dandelions that is their face. Stoke their downy hair as if it were the ermine fringe of a sovereign’s crown. Smell them like you would a new-blooming rose, aware that thriving comes with fertilising – the scent of poo, itself a miracle. Be the librarian. This soft-covered story with blank-page eyes shelved on your forearms needs your shushing. Quick, sharp shushes for boisterous visitors. Soft, slow shushes for lulling and loving. Let your sighs be fairy floss; let your hums be jester plums. Surrender your vocab and fill your mouth with colourful marbles. This warm body in the corona of your love carries heat passed on through generations; it is the hot tip of an iceberg – the cold bodies of a myriad humans the submerged mass of traits and immunities and adaptations. Hold this vital, restless tip carefully, prayerfully, it can burn through flesh and future.

Shards - 14 - Upon Holding A Brand New Person

Shards - 04 - You Bring The Story I Bring The Coffee by Cameron Semmens

Shards - 04 - You Bring The Story I Bring The Coffee

Shards - 05 - Hold Hold The Sacred Breath by Cameron Semmens

Shards - 05 - Hold Hold The Sacred Breath

Shards - 06 - Age Is Not Wisdom But It Can Be by Cameron Semmens

Shards - 06 - Age Is Not Wisdom But It Can Be

Shards - 07 - Thylacine Silence by Cameron Semmens

Shards - 07 - Thylacine Silence

Hey... take it easy... or you might just burn yourself out.

Shards - 08 - Today I Turtle

Just went to the dentist today... thus... this freaky little poem.

Shards - 09 - The Hope In Mouth Ulcers

Shards - 03 - Bowerbird

Shards - 02 - The Rattling Of A Dumb Stumbler

Welcome to Shards – a glinting fragment of transparent truth to flash in your mind's eye or cut you open. Irregularly, a fresh poem – a poetic pause in your day to make you think or smile or be inspired or just to see the world a little differently.

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Shards - The 1 Poem Podcast of Cameron Semmens

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