A Meditation on COVID-19

I took up meditation many years ago and have practiced it on and off since the early seventies.  In a deepened state of meditation one's hearing become more acute, picking up sounds that are normally muffled by the day-to-day humdrum of everyday life.

My country is in its second week of compulsory lock-down thanks to the ravages of COVID-19.  While this is an inconvenient measure, most agree that it is for the better in defeating the coronavirus. And I should add, most are abiding by the rules set down by the government.

A real plus of the lockdown is that  the sounds of nature are once again to the fore; the call of magpies in a far away tree, the rustle of autumn leaves as I talk my morning constitutional.

It is not until comparative silence reigns that one fully realises what has been lost.

If you had an opportunity as a child to spend time in the country with friends, you realise how lucky those on farms, who are communing with nature on a daily basis, really are. They do not face a daily barrage of city noise pollution.

So, while this virus might keep us pinned to our homes and immediate surrounds, lets make the most of the quiet while it lasts.

COVID Capers

The couple doing their stretches in a garage
converted to a make-shift gym
dog walkers on a leash smile and wave
at me, or was it him?

The great silence.

Can you hear it? 

Still

Falling leaves cushion the tread
of the morning walk
A pile of books long stored
and seldom read

Buckle in for the long term
the world as we knew it is no more
its nature's way of settling the score.

The Haze Poem

The Haze Poem

I amazed at the haze
and the ignorant bliss
of farmers who burn
as if nothings amiss

As I stand in the mall
looking out at the smog
there's just me and my mask
and a passing stray dog

Think I'll invent a huge solar powered fan
Sumatran focus in mind
Send it back if we can
Taste your own medicine
is my cunning plan

Roger Smith, 2013

• Hazed and confused

The Frog's Lament

The Frog's Lament

To be a frog in Singapore

is not for the faint hearted

Hashima is our common fate

from oviducts soon parted

and once they get a taste for it

...well the craze has only started.

Roger Smith, June 2013

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Today's Print - In The Deepest Pools

In The Deepest Pools
Roger Smith
Click on the image to see the larger version

I have started a series using one of my poems as a starting point and translating it into a visual 'abstraction' using a QR Code generator and Photoshop.

My Soul Is In Fort Canning

my soul is in Fort Canning
long before the march of progress
incendiary sounds and shouted orders

there are some places you never leave
still others where memories live
amongst the quiet and verdant green

you can feel me in the dank surrounds of battlements
the stillness before the tropical rains
a rhythm of droplets on spreading fronds

in truth I have never left you
the forbidden hill of legend
where empires lost were never reclaimed
and royalty wept at your feet

my soul is in Fort Canning
a quiet meditation still
of universal peace.


Roger Smith. 2011

At Dawn

Image via Wikipediathe ethereal wail of a ferry captures the dawn,
fog in the channel towards Rangitoto.

stirring the white throated tui,
who by ten will sweeten the neighbourhood
with tones sublime.

there is a subtle stirring
of a nor' easterly in the pohutukawa,
crimson crowned awaiting summer.

nothing stops the tide
before sunrise yachts made ready,
the race and day begun.

A Whale Of A Tale

It's strange but true
that whale poo
according to the pundits
can clear the world of CO2
so lets have it
in abundance

Roger Smith  June 2010

Source: Sperm whale faeces 'helps oceans absorb CO2'

Queenstown

In the boiled bone
miasma of the morning
the ochre brown of a cockroach
its dead legs spread towards the sky
and the soil
a root claw holding back results of rain

The two glazed elephants
are standing guard
next to the purple of a bougainvillea
while nearby a man with sinewed legs
searches for life
in the dry canal

Roger Smith.  May 27, 2010

The Haj Sheep's Lament

I will never return
to the pastures of Canterbury
fleeced and flocked
dipped and docked

Now interned in holding paddocks
with the Alps behind
the panicked prodding
from cattle truck to waiting ship

It's the dry dust of the desert that waits me
the ritual of the knife
a slash
a thousand blessings

My carcasse given to the poor
in a plastic bag
as an act of piety

So far removed
from the green of Canterbury

Roger Smith - November 2009

The White Bridge

We never crossed the white bridge in Taipei
your yin
my yang

we scurried past
as ships across a bay
of mild unease and discontent

a bridge too far perhaps?
every advance followed by a retreat
maintaining the balance

avoiding the meeting of love and laughter

Roger Smith September 2009

The Xmas Shell

Above the bureau radiant
your pink lips
opening to translucent orange
and tales of Kenyan times
when the rule of the Raj
a white flex to the motherland
destroyed your smooth corrugations

In Papua we buried the likes of you
letting the ants devour your innards
disinterring your carcass
to let it shine once more
varnished by the caress of the sea


Roger Smith 2009

Black Sands

And so he said
shall I
upon a summers night
in Waitara town
walk upon the black sands

cool to the toe
shuffling underneath to feel
the tuatua burrowing away
from the advancing tide

the bleached white ewe skulls
emerging above high water mark
brought down by rivers flow
scattered amongst driftwood
their upward arms towards a menacing sky

River Dancing

On a summer night you can hear the snap
of a jack
ripples in the silver twilight
pursed lips towards the moon of mayflies dawning

in the still heat of evening making love
on the fatal attraction of
discarded waders
in a life so short and a dusk so long

and as blackness envelops
the memories cling like arms
passion sated
the whip of line laid low on water

stalking, still
the stream of consciousness unabated

Sunday In The Pool

two falcons circling
on thermals high
high still higher
above the thirty eighth floor

lying on my back
in a languid blue pool
ripple light bursts tiled and fountains spouting
watching the opening in the heavens

a gentle wind rustles
in the bougainvillea
its spindly vines with colour splashes
climbing towards the sun

Singapore Poem

Eating Noodles

I walk Alone

I often walk alone

through the black sands of memory

fleet footed past twisted driftwood

of thoughts on a fast running tide

Jagging at the blood shoot

and the sound of steam whistles

mutton on the chain

and then again

silver finned catches chasing whitebait

over the painted pole

Faintly now

the sound of wild West Coat surf

receding with time

from place and time

Far away and further still

from Egmont's cone

cold winds upon the breath of Tasman storms

The Beast Of The Night

I am the beast of the night
my yellow eyed
steel jawed existence
at runway's end
Preying, preying

I am at at ease with the night
and a blood red Singapore moon
In the solitude of my thoughts
Praying, praying

You are asleep to my right
quiet 'neath air blanket blue
and a family below
Staying, staying

The 'Dry' Season

The air was still and steamy
and my clothes were damp and dank
not a breath of wind was stirring
while the drains beside me stank

Just a plaintive throaty warbling
ahigh the pong pong tree
the dry season's come a'calling
for the bird as much for me

The fumy buses passing
by the shelter where I stand
I wave in desperation
with make shift fan in hand

The dry seasons come a'calling
to the Queenstown MRT
I stand upon the platform
just my plastic card
and me

Moth Mortis

The moth that died in the library
withered and frail
from a life full of freedom and flight
beyond the pale
moon in the tropical night

Spread thin
on the carpet of hope
rough textured dreams towards the light