Bright side

Wide-open spaces
Rustle of a breeze
Through timeless grass
Birdsong
In flight
Above and out over
Downalong the meadow

Salt sands lay baking
Cracked earth
On barren beaches
Far reach
To past civilisations
Stationed
In retreat

Hillsides
Roll down
By wheat green grass
And corn

Not yet so high
O sigh for summer days
Summer days
Laid sideways such as these

Time
To reflect
To reconnect
With so many
Past
Beginnings
Forgiving
Living
Being alive

With skin
Our closest
Close
Companion
Here

Beside the
Whitest
Wild White Campion

Skin
Cradled around
Your finger
The ring of gold
Of
Past times
Last lines
Left to linger

Left
Bereft
Or bright side
Of many memories
Thoughts

Now to remember
On this quiet

There
Listen to the breeze
Listen
Through timeless grass



From the Collection I Suppose You could Call It Country, available on Kindle

He’s found you too (we all know a Buddhist)

You know a Buddhist
I know a Buddhist
Our friends know a Buddhist too

And then the meter reader called
The meter reader’s time unfolds

Your friend is going to retreat
My friend he retreated too
He took some time to find himself
And there he then he found you too
And there and then
He found you too

You know Buddhists
I know Buddhists
Our friends know Buddhists too

And then the text machine
Of mine I scrolled
The text machine
Of time unfolds

Your Buddhist friend is going to die
It’s all we ever know
He’s arranged the words
For you to say
Upon his dying day
The never-ending words
For you to say
Upon his dying day or two

You knew a Buddhist
I knew a Buddhist
We all knew Buddhists too

In time lifelong films
Rich picture rolled
Lifelong films
Of past times unfold

Your friend is coming by
That day
A slow opening cocoon

The butterfly
With dual wings
Emerged beneath
The blue sky
Amid the
Orchid meadow

Our lives of love
They never die
They never ever do

You know a Buddhist
I know a Buddhist
We all know Buddhists too

You know a Buddhist
I knew a Buddhist
We all know Buddhists do


From the Collection I Suppose You could Call It Country, available on Kindle

Donna Nook

If you still wonder why I
Say thank you
Then think on yesterday
Think on Donna Nook

The orchids
The meadows
The wobbly iron ladder
And the skeleton of a seal

Where otherwise
Would I have been
A computer screen
A television
A glass of lager
A cigarette
A sandwich
A stony single bed
And the no hope
Of another new deal


If then still you wonder
Think on nature’s riches
There instead
Two people holding hands and laughing
Three people
Each with a camera
With a photographic bent
And a moth
Straight out of its cocoon

Stories of
The beach edge watchtower
Cups of tea and scorecards
While practice bombs are dropped

From the Collection I Suppose You could Call It Country, available on Kindle

On the way of what to do

In these days of wondering
Days of wondering what to do
In these times of wondering
On the way to think of you
On the way to think
To think of what to do

So today the way
To blue skies and mountains
The way to spirits, souls
And stairways unleaden
Today the way to play
The way that children do
Without the wander
Or the wonder
Of the wandering wondering
Wandering & wondering
What to do

What to do
With the next few moments
The minutes and the hours
The days of country flowers
The seven steps to seek
That make up most my week

Seek out the moths
Sergei and stroganoff
The years of generations
Penetrations and separations
Of life lines into lifetimes

Take the pen
The paper and the pencil
Write down thoughts
Appropriate gestations
That may be met upon the spot
Past incarcerations
Or maybe not



From the Collection I Suppose You could Call It Country, available on Kindle

Paddle and Splash

I am in my brother’s garden
Alone
I am early
It is a mid June afternoon

My brother lives
I suppose you could call it country
But not an estate or a seat

Not in the grandest sense
Not a Chatsworth
Or a Balmoral
Or the old East Indies

Anyhow
Here I am
Here and waiting
And thinking

Could I ask you please?
Just for a moment
To choose
Your own favourite location

And
Then
For this moment
Listen to the wave’s splash

If your place is by the sea
Where you wander
Or paddle and splash

Back here
I sit on the wooden bench
A close fit two-seater
Listen - I can hear the birdsong

I can hear the flap of wing
Can you
I can hear the buzzing fly

This is a time
Unplanned
Here I am
Alone

With nothing needing to be done
Nothing at all
At this time of now
Is expected of me

Can you imagine such a time
When all that is to be done
Is that which comes
From within your own imagination

Imagine
Time for thoughtful recreation
Spontaneous blameless contemplation
Or action

I guess the grass was cut a few days ago
Anyway the shed is locked
No access to the mower

Unless of course I act against the law
Break
And enter

But why would I
When instead I can sit here
In the sun and the shadow

Sit here
And write for you
While I listen out
For my brother



From the Collection I Suppose You could Call It Country, available on Kindle