reading a poet

 reading a poet

i feel someone’s heart

stir within mine

the poem as a string

pulling on the marionette of me

at the edge of reason a poet

can posit something 

and i can feel it was me

that pulled the poet’s strings

to pull upon the heart of me

the post-war promenade

the post-war promenade

note them sleeping

discrete in their repose

on the promenade benches

in their very best clothes

their polished shoes

sun red faces

taking a snooze

in their belts and braces

under a summer sky blue

flowers in borders 

and grass cropped tight

how do you do

do you think it might rain tomorrow 

but today seems alright

turning the other cheek now

for the sun’s over the yardarm

and you know how 

a dream comes tasty

of high teas and pastries

and jam scones full of cream

but let’s not be too hasty

for soon …

ahh well   ahh well

i guess its time to go

as one by one 

they up and left 

the slow dusk to me

bereft by the sea 

swimming at langland

 swimming at langland 

tide’s below the donkey rock

surfers are riding off the crab

and the rollers are a rolling in and in

although the sky is awful drab

it soars as high as that hawk

hanging on the updraft

drawn in from the atlantic sea

who is spitting wilfully at me 

swimming in the sea

the rock of ages sunny jim 

the rocks of ages

that tree

 that tree

larger in a large emptiness 

spread above the snow of the wold

here 

it seems to say

i have seen this all before

and steady have i held the springtime 

asleep inside the deep of me

come my boy 

let me drop some upon you

for it is a cool laugh is it not

this stirring of a magic potion 

white soon

buds and leaves and flower’s berries

all within my open arms

oh sunny boy run

run to me my sunny boy 

tune in to the winter tree 

 the secret is

(looks both ways)

great gate eight 

shhhh 🤫

springtime

 springtime 

frogs squeezing their mates to death  (spawn shop)

frolicking lambs meeting their mint sauce  (bluebell cafe)

hosts of daffodils bunched in vases  (florists)

spring ~ in like a lion out like a lamb chop  (butchered aphorism)

winter or summer

 winter or summer

it’s just a matter of expectation 

born of the expression 

that has shaped our genes 

it’s a ferris wheel

the land is the same

just the view is different 

whatever your view 

others have held it before

and given that bequest 

it is a baton

in a relay race

seasoned by sweat

orbit

 orbit

the mothership is in orbit

around the heart of you 

the lunatic meanderer

has touched down in the 

sea of tranquility

the solar panels of my eyes

are drinking in the quanta of

your love

watching the lander blast off

holding hands and fate full

light years away

the problems of the world

 the problems of the world

perhaps they cannot be fixed

squeeze one & up pops another

when there are moles

leave the lawn 

become a mole

its nice in a hole

turn pessimism into an art form

smile at the smirking expletive

a poem for Jean

 a poem for Jean

my mother’s face

carried the woes of the whole world

and the world before that

and the world to come

there was a sadness that would not lift

‘laughing leads to crying’ she once said

in all earnestness she withdrew

not the remark 

but herself

she never knew which way to turn

under the spotlight of our love

she sang to the whole world

even when she ‘laid out’ the villagers

in their sadness they never recognised her sadness 

her knitted brow was her

our perception of her 

but not her burden

we saw what we were used to seeing

we sort of got used to it

the frowns seemed softer in the firelight

the cold draughts did not move her

but now and then that look came

taking her by the hand far away

took her from us into the valleys of her brow

the tributaries of the lake of tears

as if the hands of the lost were reaching for her

and she could not reach them in time

she seemed to be waiting in a silent wail

for the end of her time when perhaps 

she would be able to console them

and in the furrow of her worried brow 

recompense would flow

our flowers not welcome on the shroud of her

even if the flowers were her bequest to us

we find it all too slippery to hold

too cold to handle

too sharp to accept

too transparent to hang consolation

dear god 

look at me

frowning like she did

i like to think that might bring a smile to her face

eventually hangs there accusingly 

hi siri take a note

 hi siri take a note

walking about i keep meeting poems 

in the most unusual places 

in the most mundane places

here on the shelf in the store

two for the price of one

in the sea gasping at their bravado 

ten thousand neurones screaming 

write this one down!

write this one down!

hi siri take a note