You can check out a video of the author reading this poem over on the Unchained Media Scotland Facebook Page by clicking here.
On this, a very significant day
Allow your heart to be light
A force that has stopped the world in its tracks
Has taken your dreams out of sight
In sweeping the darkness across the globe
The virus has shattered your dreams
Keeping loved ones apart, taking life that we know
And ripping apart at the seams
Sometimes life changes the pathway we plan
And we cannot control everything
Beautiful plans for spectacular days
And fresh, wooded walks in the Spring
Take this day of postponement as nature’s gift
A chance to be thankful, and smile
Because all your planning, your effort and work
Will happen in just a short while
Your day to sparkle will come, I know
It was always there in the stars
When the time’s right, your dreams will come true
When the Earth has healed from its scars.
About the Author
I was born in Dundee but emigrated to South Africa in my childhood. I’d have to say my upbringing there had a lot of input into my views on how inequalities need to be set right now. I always had a passion for writing but never did anything about it until I did an Open University degree (while working and being a single parent). I wrote a lot of poetry at that time as well as some short stories and plays. A few poems were featured in anthologies and I had some success in a local competition with another. My poems were fuelled by sadness or hurt and when life got happier and I met someone and got married the need to write kind of hibernated. Until COVID came along. I work for the NHS, I am part of my health board’s headquarters in the Chief executive’s department and had the both frightening and fascinating privilege of being privy to all the decisions being made and ways the board was handling the insane situation we found ourselves in. So I wrote, and wrote and wrote. I’ve now written 7 lockdown poems (plus another one written tonight). These led to a few more commissioned poems for funerals, businesses and family. It’s been a tough time and I feel pretty emotional much of the time so it was a good way to vent that. I’m amazed with how well they’ve done and very pleased people find them as touching as I do when I write them.
Off the Record 