Wednesday, 20 May 2026

drained

drained


all my good points

leached by the acid rain of time 

leaving a grovel of gravel

plaster of paris they were

fairground kitsch 

i wonder how they lasted so long


tide’s out


the mud purrps and hisses

cracks

step not there my boy

step not


tide’s out


there are shards of glass 

under the mud

silt off the river of time

below the wooden quay

where the worms are fingered

for blood’s regret


tide’s out


hollowed out

down to your toes

all hollows

the cinders are cold

the bed warmer is cold

a story told of disbelief

has more false channels 

than the nile delta


tide’s turning


time’s been wasted

it’s too late

you are all you have left

of what you never were


stand 

let the tide take you

it is time

it is time

 

Saturday, 16 May 2026

a word if i may

 a word if i may


a vocabulary can capture the world

existence is one word

mathematics another

infinity is a tricky one

give me time to think

to thumb my thesaurus


while i’m thinking 

why don’t you give me a word

i love new words

they make such good friends

i love you

said vocabulary 

infinitely 

plus one 


i added


Friday, 15 May 2026

Caitlyn B Young

 This is the Spotlight profile page for my granddaughter Caitlyn B Young who is an actor:


https://app.spotlight.com/8135-0165-2361



Monday, 11 May 2026

politics

 politics


crunch moment

they clash!

vote called


the

          ‘oh for god’s sake’ 

ave it


and we’ve had it

a show of hands please

carried

that place that

 that place that

we bring questions 

seeking no answers

we refuse their answers

by our turning away

to return 

carrying more questions

to lay at the feet of

those places that keep

silence

our empty arms

carrying our inner eye

one day one day

but not soon

one day

Saturday, 9 May 2026

top and bottom

 top and bottom


Woolworths 

now there’s a counter to pick from

hesitation upon a wooden floor

around the oval counters

arriving back at one’s indecision


the serving girls floating

taking the proffered pennies

from sticky-handed pick-n-mix

kids with mothers in scarves

and gaping shopping bags


many doors pouring

in and out they came and went

how normal it all was

bottom Woolworth had a back door

steps arriving down town


Woolies

you’ll get it in Woolies

at the back on the counter

on the left 

of course

on the right 

were the records

for the likely girls


wooden 

it was all wooden

the scuffed floors

the shiny counters

where the tills rang time


and it was all over

the bag was broken

hundreds and thousands everywhere 

tears ran as snuffled fingers unstuck

those memories


sniff  sniff


too late now

the shop is closed

the girls are all old women

and i am just standing there

proffering my penny


Wednesday, 6 May 2026

Hatchery a pamphlet of poems by Elizabeth Osmond

Hatchery a pamphlet of poems by Elizabeth Osmond 


Elizabeth Osmond (a neonatologist) has a unique style that makes this the best poetry book I have read for a long long time.


The book is an an incubator of emotion where the child is superimposed upon the reflection of the clinician.


The poems are a series of petit mal that alternate between Elizabeth the person and Elizabeth the clinician. 


It is a rich vein of emotion derived from her care of her patients and almost seems to be a PPE against being infected with the vacancy of familiarity.


The language is as fractious as a crying baby until she picks up a pacifier and the reader is as satisfied as the writer is enthralled by it all.


I read her poems as a pastiche of recollections of her initial feelings when first walking a lace bridge over a chasm of her uncertainty that she has indeed arrived as a clinical practitioner. The caveats are well wrapped in the backward glances of her poems.  All through the threads from a clinical web of care glisten; her poetry highlights a pinnacle above the foothills of a doctor’s long journey.


She even describes dragging the minutiae of the clinic around the mundane day to day world outside of the hospital.  


Elizabeth has a feel for the history of her medical forebears and these are the grit in the oyster of many pearls of wisdom. 


Her book is available via the link below and I can thoroughly recommend it as a balm of understanding of the human side of stressful clinical experiences.


http://vpresspoetry.blogspot.com/p/hatchery.html