Scattered

The easy words
arrive so easily
Measly
the tricky stuff, believe me

It’s the background see
council estates
cutting up rough
a wasteful education

Today the ploughman talks to me
a ring upon his finger
he talks of articulation
in the modern age of farming

He talks of the dust clouds
just before the tilling
He paints redness in the sky
and gladly fills the filling

We see no sardines of sadness
rake no artichokes of anguished memories
He says the easy words; he says them easily








a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Refuse

Dust
Corn stalks
frayed and broken

I am woken to be with you
hand into the breeze
shaded from the sunlight

Want no more
for fair or faint attention
Strengthened, poured out
as the tree, surely shed believes

Two turns in the worn and token tarmac
two lines away to the horizon
far into late summer’s sunlight

Want no more
for fair or faint attention
lengthened, laid out
as the casket surely grieves

Bushels of the futures
fine grained
Dusk


a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Recovery

I might have to write of nettles
of hedgerows swaying by the trees
The flight is almost over
from deep lows; weeping on my knees

Words have been read and written
the smitten vows
burnt in small degrees
burnt, without the smoke of leaves

Aiming for the settled
the settlement found me ready
Remember how my mother fettled
in posh houses, old grates to grieve

The weights of her love and affection
On her soft skin, in her soft voice

I have to write of those nettles
of being rubbed better
The stinging settled
by crumpled fresh dock leaves







a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Gateway

Round bales
in rolling up and down fields
That’s the deal; real ales
photographs at dusk, for cinema reels

Peeled potatoes, picnic in the stubble
calling out over the garble
That’s the seal, our unsung couple
trust red brick, more so than marble

a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here

Exit Strategy

The ploughed field will break into soft soil
The seeds will follow the hollow men
The wicker men will dance by the maypole

It’s a year before the harvest
It’s a year gone by
Over and over again

Stepping away from rooftops
The treasure of pleasure
Once more to climb



a poem from the collection Some Trickier Poems - Love with Conflicts - available as a kindle download or library item by clicking here