Illustrated with photos by Josephine Sacabo

There was something in him unfulfilled,
Something bigger than the shadow that he cast, 
Like a photo of something not quite in the frame,
A language that you've heard but never learned, 
Understood the music without knowing what it means.

All through his childhood there was a picture
His mother called the Ever-Open Door.
It was small - a faded watercolour of
A timber porch with a big stone arch,
Opening onto a path that curved away
Round rockery, shrubs, dry stone wall
Into an unseen landscape where
The distant sea was somehow near
And someone was always waiting.

Peter Jukes 2000

I often have this strange and haunting dream

Of an unknown woman I love, who loves me back
And who is, at any moment, not quite the same
Nor entirely other, who loves and understands.

For only she can understand my heart,
Only she alone - oh my troubles disappear,
And the beads of sweat on my pale forehead
Only she alone replenishes with her tears.

Is she brunette, blonde or redhead? I don't know.
Her name? All I know is that it's soft and clear
Like those of loved ones who have long since gone.

Her gaze is like the gaze of a statue's head.
And in her tone - distant, calm, and sad - you can hear
The sound of beloved voices that are dead.

Translated by Peter Jukes from Paul Verlaine's Mon Reve Familier