Worthiness

But don’t think I’m not worthy
I’m worth any two of them soft lards
With my body I can carry an ox
I can pull a sheep
From off them bloody ledges
Up on the scar
Carry ‘em all the way home
If needs must
An that’s not through...

To read the rest of this page, or indeed the whole thing, you can go to Amazon by clicking here

Mothers

You turn away
Don’t you
Embarrassed
You don’t want
To be associated
With those harsh
And bigoted
Points of view...

To read the rest of this page, or indeed the whole thing, you can go to Amazon by clicking here

Sons

You can remember the past, perhaps not quite so clear, but you do remember, don’t you, you do remember overheard conversations:

They’ve no right being here
Bloody students
Who do they think they are
They’re not like me
Me
I’m an ordinary lad
But I’ve got a language of my own
I’ve got my own identity
For sure it’s true
Some of me mates have shaved their heads
A sort of socially implied tribal-bonding...


To read the rest of this page, or indeed the whole thing, you can go to Amazon by clicking here

W Spa

Gentle, peaceful
Warm summer
Except
Yes, except that I remember

That poem I wrote
About a striped wasp

And today
For this the last poem
I am surrounded again
By wasps

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Hairdo

I put one step
In front of the other

The morning sun
Warms me

The blue sky
Soothes me

Earlier I meditated
Listening to Quietude

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

English Summer

It is a few weeks later
The first two cricket test matches
Have been won

The football season
Has started
But not with quite such good results

The summer does continue
Butterflies
Meander through the garden

Autumn is a good way off
Yet we cannot stop ourselves
Preserving jams in preparation

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Am I Not

I struggle with Hegel
With his sense
With his sensibility

I thought I was ok
With the here
With the now

Here with the sight
Now with the sound
Here with the smell

Now with the taste
Here with the touch
Now with the feeling

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Vantage Point

That outlook
This outlook
Those outlooks
Over fields, and fields, of corn
To the blue, blue-sky horizon

That farmer
This farmer
Those farmers
Ploughing, with tractors
Harvesting, with combines

That summer
This summer
Those summers, never the same

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Woody’s Top

It is
Out in the country
It has
Five en-suite bedrooms
With a hot tub
Round the back

It was
A youth hostel back in the day
It is true, yes, we did once
Hire the place exclusively
For a bunch of poets
To disorientate themselves

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Big To V. Small

Perhaps Capability Brown
Or one of his contemporaries
Planted out
The widely dispersed trees

It is a style
Not yet adapted
To the window box
Or the small terrace garden

Though for sure
The rash of reality TV
Just needs a spark
For it to be off and planting

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Plant Out

There is a giant conker tree
There is an avenue of limes
There are places just to be
Church bells, with chimes

There are lavender plants
Fair awash with working bees
Of course there are sycophants
Desperate, almost on their knees

There are sets of onions
In a kitchen garden
Old ladies crush their bunions
Saying; sorry, I do beg your pardon

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Bake

All is blue sky
All is county wide charm
Victoria sponge, clotted cream
Pot of tea for two

Yet see how the breeze
Blows my fine, thinning, hair
Yes, you see how the shadows
Reflect overheard conversations

I have a photograph
Taken on a previous visit, it is of
The bell-tower, with weather vane
Butterfly wings, to fly us into the past

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Estates

In the gardens
Of the Massingberd lady
Who turned the pub
Into the non-alcoholic
Temperance Hotel
Which, within two years
Went bankrupt, was closed

I sit in the shadow
Of the tall yew hedge
Which had been discovered earlier
It is the only place of shade
On this sunshine August Sunday
Its mirror image, seat and yew
Are in full-on midday sun

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Guidance

It is your duty
To keep this life alive
So write to your little Ms cutie
With blue-brown eyes

Tell her you love her
And never a day goes by
Take care not to smother
Yet do not force her love to die

For in all of the time
That you sit with the words
You are always on that line
Of doubting the absurd

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Dress Sense

New truths
From dawn through
To December

Lent by a friend
Back then
Always to remember

Send her your love
You don’t know
If she still feels

Depend upon to see her
In those
Vainglorious heels

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Drought

There is a need
To water the roots
In these parched times
One needs cups of fresh water
Or jugfuls, imagined from the past

Ice cool, fascination

There was a need
To pluck the weeds
From those wasteful times
One needed cups of fresh water
To replenish, the spillage of the past

Cool blue, interpretation

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Pause

Don’t turn on the radio
Don’t watch the television
Listen to your own thoughts
Follow your inner vision

Tune into the silence
Meditate with calm
Contemplate your own thoughts
Stretch your unsteady arm

Be thankful for the moment
Take in a deeper breath
Silence is your answer
A welcome of such light caress

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

One Time Moreover

All of those early mornings
Sunlight through open-windows
Warm rays against the shutters
Fresh breeze, golden thoughts

To stand, to be
To stand, to be

All of those early mornings
Frost for the taming thrush
Mist on the distant bush
Cold warmth, golden thoughts

To stand, to be
To stand, to be

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Repetitive

I have given up
Times many before
I have shaved to the core
Only to find me wanting

I have left the cup
Once again too often
I have tried to cut loose, to soften
Only to find me wanting

I have edged the stirrup
From the breached harness
I have thus blunted the sharpness
Only to find me wanting

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Diktat Definition

In that empty place
Of built up frustration
In that barren space
Outwith of knowing how

On that rock face
Almost of desperation
On that crippling chase
Outwith of knowing how

With that last race
Caught up in complication
Returning then to base
Outwith of knowing how

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Prep

No reason to undo the buttons
No cause to unzip the flies
Except the change of weather
Leads to bodies laid
Expectantly, close there besides

No need to kiss the nubile lips
Don’t close the servile eyes
Except that this balmy weather
Carries summer’s sexy surprise

No desire to read your mind
No denials to deny your cries
Exploit the fair fair weather
With the sexuality
Of those heavily loaded sighs

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Manhood

I let the sultry, muggy day
Play all over my body, and mind
Such kindness roaming within
I ask her to fondle my skin

Yes, you, my humid weather
All sweating on our skin together
Wearing such sexuality forever
I ask you to be, my firmer tether

Wherever you lead I will follow
Hopes and dreams ready to lose
Serendipity of luscious thought
Made ready in my time to prove

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Close

The wind rises
As thoughts of thighs settle
The wonder of the prizes
With luck I’ll be on my mettle

The wind rises
Storms return to the east
The hangover of lust despises
Torments of the panting beast

The wind rises
As also does the sap
The mid-life crisis curiously assizes
That now we are on the final lap

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Crass

You are as I always am
You are as I always will be
I cannot say those long lost words
I am not here to simplify the mystery

I am as you always saw me
As you always thought me to be
I cannot fend off the new sadness
Unable to forget past games you see

You, and I, and we, together
We together, you, and I, to be
I cannot fall any farther, or further
Unable to gather-in a false sincerity

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Wedding Day

Slot machines keep on slotting
Kiss me quick hats
Pray kiss me on the lips
Life could go on forever

The Chic Baby from LA
Or maybe Market Harborough
Turns, and turns again
Outside the Imperial Ballroom

Later
In the half-light of the darkness
A life is taken
Somewhere up by the caravan park

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

On The Pier

Sisters, in sari’s
Hippies, with long grey beards
Deckchairs for people watchers

Soft white sands
With talk of past generations
Returning back to town

A polish narrative on the mobile
Continentals to continents abound
Ice creams, big as children’s faces

Candy floss, even bigger still
Who would, who wouldn’t
Who didn’t, who did; did you

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Only For Pier Customers

Grandmother, mother
Daughters, dogs
Laughter

Boyfriend, girlfriend
Ice-smoothie, expectations
Laughter

Dreadlocks, odd socks
Plimsolls, denim jeans
Laughter

Parents, children
Ride-on-bikes, payments
Laughter

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Two Sides - Same Coin

In Forest Row
I write of meditations
Of walks, of flowers

In Cleethorpes
I do not know where the sea is
Or the waves, or the windmill towers

I was, I will
I am, to be
I was, I will, I am, to be

I watch, I cringe
I detect, I am not me
I watch, I cringe; I am, but it’s not me

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

Affects The Poor

There is a level of obesity
Which would be difficult
To appreciate, back
In our low-calorie kitchen

Young men, old men
Young women, old women
Even middle age strollers
Are similarly afflicted

The invalid scooters
Cannot entirely be blamed
Yet they do play a part
In moving about those who are

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image

By The Tower

Families stroll by
Wearing caps and cardigans
Young men strut about
In tee-shirts, with towels

Summer sun
And roller coasters
Take me back to Blackpool prom
From Pleasure Beach to Talbot Road

Some things
You can only do alone
Some things
You have to do together

Available in Print or Kindle
Click here or on Image