- Matthew Wilson
Selected Poetry by Matthew Wilson

Photo Source: PxHere
Former Friends of Royalty
Dance with me
For I do not wish to sleep
For she only dances there
In memories I wish to keep.
I had no time for royalty
Until she stared with lovely eyes
And I helped her from the wizard
Whose hatred burned the skies.
My anger got the best of me
When he turned the girl to stone
This princess who won my heart
And in doing so lost my throne.
But I have killed the evil wizard
And I cannot undo his spell
That made her flesh like concrete
And I curse the wizard’s soul in hell.
Hermes of the Mountain
Hermes is a fellow fast of foot
Who by now is halfway to the mountain
Holding a letter detailing my crime
Of how I poisoned the holy fountain.
Even Gods can be such petty things
And I did not receive my invitation
To the wedding of the happy couple
Although I had dutifully manned my station.
Now I sit in a grand hall of the dead
Surrounded by fallen
friends of the groom
But Hermes runs to spoil my fun
And the great Zeus would bring about my doom.
But my ship is the bringer of dead men
And I set my sail toward the sky
Thinking of murder when I meet him
How the poor winged messenger might die.
A Crown of Gold Leaves
I was a boy when the woods had life
Birds of paradise singing in the trees
Before the bulldozers ripped their roots
Like a doctor extinguishing some disease.
Those branches were
my escape from home
Feeling the setting sun warm my face
Safe from unloving and angry parents
Who wished for me to know my place.
A stick in my hand
would make me a pirate
A crown of gold leaves upon my head
Battling imaginary monsters in the trees
Returning reluctantly to my home and bed.
Now machines have
done away with the woods
Where I’d dip my toes
in the freezing streams
But still I play pirate in my memories
And birds of paradise sing in my dreams.
Seasons Lost in the Stream
The sound of running waters
takes me back
To those lazy summer
days that never last
When my daughter chased
tadpoles in the shallows
And scattered multi colored
pebbles with her toes.
No good season seems
to last an evening
And now I’ve lost the ebon of my hair
My daughter does not
reach out to call me
And I have forgotten
her children’s names.
But still I recall the
quickness of the stream
The flick of a trout’s tail
chasing dragonflies
Besides weirs that swallow
lost wedding rings
And reeds that grow
over scattered pebbles.
Now the water is cold
in my awful winter
And there are no fish
to distract my miseries
But still the sun gleams off the surface
Coursing quickly into a spring I will never see.
Matthew Wilson has been published repeatedly in Star*Line, Night to Dawn magazine, Zimbell House Publishing and many more. He is currently editing his first novel and can be found on twitter @matthew94544267