New Book - Kissing Frogs

Once upon a time there was a princess.  She did all the things princesses do, went to school, made friends, fell in love with unobtainable pop stars and dreamt of expensive weddings.  Then one day while walking by a pond a frog hopped out and pestered her to kiss it.  This she did and it turned into a prince.  Marriage followed but she didn't live happily ever after for the prince was cruel and cold-hearted.  She lost everything dear to her - friends, money, possessions and freedom.  Punished both physically and mentally for daring to try and interact with the outside world she gave up. Then one day,  her fairy godmother appeared and brought her back from the edge.  She taught her that her experiences were valuable and could be used to teach others.....
Kissing Frogs is a fairytale about domestic abuse, and not for the faint hearted ....

Available now on Amazon or as a download to Kindle.  Also free on Kindle Unlimited.

Arms of Orion - a poem

In winter skies Orion smiled
Down on me as a child.
He beckoned us to look beyond
The boundaries of this world.
To solar systems far away
Where heroes fought and dragons lay.
With possibilities they might just
Look to Earth and discover us.
With our heroes from above
We fell into an innocent love.
Happiness filled those magical days
Until we reached a certain age.

Come down out of the stars they said
The world's down here not in your head.
Put those childish dreams away
In the adult world you must stay.
Work and marriage that's for you
A house and a child or two.
But we were young, we didn't know
Sometimes love brings broken bones
We were smashed beyond repair
What we married didn't care.
Life shattered, dreams all gone
From universe to isolation.

In winter skies Orion cried
The day dreams and magic died.
He could only watch from space
Until the time we escaped.
Now I sleep peacefully in my bed
Orion slumbers overhead
And in dreams I'm free to wander far
To a universe full of battlestars.

Mametz Wood - a poem

The Welsh at Mametz Wood by Christopher Williams 1918

A couple of weeks ago I watched a programme about  Welsh soldiers who fought at Mametz Wood in July 1916.  It was really engrossing and unbelievable to think that many of them had never fired a gun and had  been training with broomsticks before being thrown in to face professional German soldiers.  Anyway, I started researching more and wrote this.

Mametz

She greets me by a shell ridden tree

On a carpet of splinters where flowers should be

By a blood filled pond where the dead blindly stare

And the pain of my forefathers hangs in the air.

Queen of the woods she takes my hand

Walks me round this haunted land

Points at barbed wire where bodies are hung

And bullets are flying to slaughter the young.

A steel grey landscape cradles streams of blood

The hands of corpses reach out from the mud

"What is this?" I hear a voice say

I have no answer, I'm generations away.

Branches crash, a million splinters sting

the children forced to fight the lightening.

With faces grimaced they fall to their knees

While she crowns them with a wreath of weeds.

For here they lie, she tells me now

Til the ground is churned by the blade of a plough.

And guardians of history dig where they stood

To reveal the truth of Mametz Wood.

So take this vision to your waking world

Let them feel our pain in your every word

Our spirits may sleep but restless we lie

Til our questions answered.  Why? Why? Why?

copyright 2016 carol ann lewis

Poet of Pontypool entry 2016

My entry for the Poet of Pontypool 2016.  It was awarded a Highly Commended certificate :)

Streets of Pontypool

Tell me your stories, spirit of old

From your sepia photo that my hands hold.

Give me a glimpse of times that have been

A history I seek that your eyes have seen.

How I would love to wander where

Gas lights flicker in the dull evening air.

Every brick and stone with a tale to tell

Of triumph, achievement or personal hell.

What kind of people would I come to know?

If I walked along Pontypool's ancient roads.

Boys in flat caps lurking in doorways.

Ladies in bonnets riding in carriages.

Horses trotting on the dust filled streets

In the market the smells of hanging raw meat.

Traders bartering while wives buy supplies

For men returning from work in the mines.

Shops, pubs and houses, I'd visit them all

Then watch local singers at the Town Hall

Park House and gardens, I'd love to see

How it looked when inhabited by the Hanbury Leighs.

Busy salesmen who stop for a spell

Of hospitality at the Crown Hotel.

Then a few steps from there, just because I can

I'd visit the home of my great great gran.

Spirit of old, I stand in the spot

Where you were captured forever in this sepia shot.

Time divides us but I see all around

Through my eyes and yours our lovely old town.

Porthcawl Nights - a poem

Here's a poem I wrote in 2002 that came third in the Pontypool Poet of the Year competition.

Porthcawl Nights

The summer air, cold and damp

Porthcawl nights in a caravan camp

As we walked together on the sand

We chased the sunset hand in hand.

On rocks watching passing ships

You talked of poverty and politics

You had to wake me from my snoring

Because I found you so dead boring.

Trips to gardens of rainbow flowers

Your poetry rambling on for hours

I was so glad when Saturday came

When you waved goodbye from your valley train.

You were my friend but I found you a bore

I went back to my home and saw you no more

To your letters I sent back no replies

Always out when you phoned - or so somebody lied.

Now you're a singer with a famous band

You left our valley for a faraway land

I can only imagine how dull I must seem

Now you're the hero of a million dreams.

copyright 2002, 2016

The End of Love - a poem

I used to write a lot of poems but lately I cant seem to get my poetry head back on.  Anyway, here is a poem from 2003. It was the first one I had published and it was in an anthology called The Language of Love published by Anchor Books.

The End of Love

She watched the end of love

Abrupt as a storm in summer

Loneliness of silence poisoned the air

Like fog in the chill of winter

Memory taunted her tormented heart

Waiting words he'd never known

Kept concealed like snow in clouds

Now she pined with her thoughts alone

Allowing shadows to creep

Where once was colour and light

Leaving herself the wishful green

Of a cold and envious sight

Truth entered and built itself

A self-piteous altar of pain

Where dreams as wishes that will not be

Paint his face in her life once again

Lives entwining suffocating themselves

Fading with every heartbeat

Burning inside like molten rivers

Freezing in the ice of grief

copyright 2003, 2016 carol ann lewis

New Book - Land of my Mothers

This is my latest book, out now on Kindle or in paperback from Amazon.  It takes a look at women's lives in Victorian Wales.  There are chapters on childhood, work, crime, home life, social life and death.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Land-My-Mothers-Carol-Ann-Lewis/dp/1518695396/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1459516673&sr=8-1&keywords=land+of+my+mothers