Of Gallipoli, and war's lament

Amidst that cataclysmic conflict

This was but an episode,

An ill-considered, desperate plan

That measured zero even in

The twisted scales of military logic.

And you were there, perchance,

As I am here, a child of others'

Histories and dreams.

You the unknown grandpa

Of that long unfocused silence

At the armistice day parade.

You, with countless others,

The parent of the children

Reading letters from Papa,

The husband of the lover left behind,

She for whom your body burned

Who shaped your future dreams 

And aspirations, now cut short.

Yours a world of duty, honour,

King and Empire sinking 

in a bog of foxhole, shell and 

Mortar-blasted trench.

And I look back though eyes and years

Not left to you, but mine

To thank you for, in some strange way,

And so, in reaching out across 

A century's tangled wire and loss

I crawl across a no-man's land

Of other, futile, battle grounds

To whisper you are loved,

And gently hold your shattered 

Blood-stained hand.

On the centenary of the death of

Capt. Edgar Ruddock,

At Gallipoli, June 18th 1915

TENTATIVE, IN ADVENT

Sitting in Departures, still,
Amidst the silent inevitability
Of pre-dawn preparations,
I watch, yawning in
Anticipation.

A plane waits,
Dis-eased upon the ground
And jessed to Gate 19.
Such waiting is the
Cockcrow of the day.

In the half-light, heavy-hearted,
A family waits around a bedside,
Stretching the long night-watch,
Attentive to the final
Stuttering of breath.

Elsewhere a mother waits,
- expectant blend of fear and hope -
Straining in anguished rhythm,
Reluctant yet,
Before the final push.

Memories there are, as well:
Centennial nightmares of
Another "final push"
As young men awaited
Death's whistling invitation.

And hidden deep beneath the sheets
A child waits,
with dread, amidst
The stifled screams and sobs
of raw domestic violence.

Even the sun, it seems,
In Advent doubt,
waits with tender longing,
uncertain if
to bless another day.



On flying back to London from the Indian Ocean
December 2014

ANOTHER DAY

It is a time of quieting.

Lazily a gull glides the shoreline;
Far off, the Bornholm ferry sinks
As does the sun to its horizon,
While blues turn opal green,
Then redden in the dying
Embers of a Swedish day.

The gentlest sounds of
Tired children, bidding goodnight
And sharing story times
Of trolls and monsters,
Echo the rhythmic falling
Of the waves across the bay.

The smell of sizzling meat
Mingles with the cool
Touch of lager spiced with
The scent of dune grass and
marinaded in the evening air.
With every sense, for sure,

It is a time of grateful quieting.



July 19th 2014

LOVED BEYOND LOVE

Yesterday we attended the wedding of two people who have found each other in what might loosely be called the second half of life.... and it evoked this prayer of blessing:



You have travelled
Your several ways
On distant roads,
Over many years.
You have crossed raging rivers,
Climbed peaks of exhilaration
And plumbed valleys of despair:

Now in His graciousness God
Has given you each other!

So may you today
Journey on together
Over many years more -
Each the other’s compass,
Pilgrims on the venture,
Companions on the way,

And may you find
And know
And celebrate
The One who walks
Behind, before,
And with you,

Holding you both
In everlasting love.


Edgar Ruddock
6th July 2014

EASTER VIGIL

What gathering mourners these
Who standing cold, bewildered and bemused
Against the fading darkness of the night
Regenerate their tears of bitter loss?

What fire is this, that kindled 'gainst
The chill of memories so close and raw
Bursts not in yellowed flame or radiant warmth
But rather flickers only in the dampened dawn?

What beacon lit that speaks of resurrection?
What candle this, that ritually borne aloft
Dares to proclaim new life, to penetrate
The darkest space, and claim it for its own?

What tales of a people's past, what myths
And explanations, what pain or loss
Or dreams of liberation these, so gently
Now unfolded in the brooding of the dawn?

And so we wait, and ponder 'midst
The singing of the birds in joyous expectation,
How love's defeat, how evil's jubilation
Is overturned: explosive resurrection!

Easter Day
April 2014

PETIT DEJEUNER

Yellow green and gold
Finches chatter the
Early morning news
Amidst the misted stillness
Of the dew-rich dawn.

Then comes a Bulbul
To the terrace; and with a flash
Fast capturing from the air
A passing moth, she then
Before my eyes, dissects it
Wing from wing, and deftly
Turns and eats it whole:
Such is the brutal truth
Of nature in which beauty
Claims its sacred space.

So I to my breakfast
Make my pondering way
Past scented frangipani,
While high above, a hawk hangs
Motionless upon the morning air.


St Julian's Retreat Centre,
Limuru, Kenya
April 2014

HAMBA KAHLE, TAT'MKHULU

Deep rumbling thunder echoes round

The southern Malagasi hills as ancient

And primordial earth calls back Madiba 

For its own. Rains of blessing tumble 

Down in thankfulness for such a life: 

What hammer on a broken rock or surging 

Wave upon a prison shore could break a spirit 

So imbued with human dignity and hope?

Then overwhelming storm erupts

And hurls to earth its terror-laden bolts

That split and crackle unpredictable

Against a blackened sky: as did

The racist terror of a state gone mad

In search of unattainable security.

So did a people rise in stark revolt

And rising, with Madiba, paid their price.

Now nature's synergy of opposites

Conspires to breathe a cataclysmic

Shuddered breath, to open

Cosmic gates of love, and welcome 

Home this champion of a better way,

A way that will not offer hate for hate,

But rather bears the pain, and through it

Finds humanity's redemption path.

On hearing the news of Mandela's death,

In Madagascar, December 2013