Short Story

The pen and ink sketch was drawn on the day of Princess Diana's funeral. It is of a small jetty, or pier, set out towards a still, almost settled lake.

Stand, step, edge a little further

Step, stand, out into the mist

Stand, step, alone at last

Wait, sit, take out a canvas

Or a notepad, and a pencil

Sit and wait, wait for the moment

When the church bells chime

When heavens seventh wave

Splashes onto the buttress

Land, island, bordered by ocean

Island, land, your one country

Land, island, alive at the last

Kindle link here

A Gathered Ramble

Derbyshire dale
Dale, vale, tales
Of stone and ditch and vetch

As I approach the ledge
I know that vertigo
Will kick in

Kick in, kick on
See it for what it is
No more than
Sharp and glossy stubble

Fear of the day
Long cut field paths
Water falls
Water pools

Hockney it was, I think
Who talked of big skies
Outside the cities bounds

Good times, bad times
Aspire to treat them equal
Feel refreshed, be my friend

available for kindle here

Canvas

There is always noise
Even here, miles off the beaten track
I can hear the drone of the highway
Somewhere over the hill

The stubble is sharp, and glossy
Soil redder than brown
A five-bar gate, half off the hinge
Dykes dry, also somewhat overgrown

All this space
Not a single house
Or another person

I am warm
Sunlight allows me
To play with shadows

Other sounds are to be heard here
Once I let the road noise
Become no more than the back story

available for kindle here

Troop

The field looks tired
Crop all covered in dust
Four of five days of sunshine
A good while longer without rain

Trees all straggled and forlorn
The partridge hardly able to croak
First steps towards desperation
East of Eden where dust bowls await

To believe, in life's transformations
Put in the work, sit and watch
As all before is eaten, ravished
By the blight of restoration

available for kindle here

Dreaming Of Climbing Further - Part Two

The walls and the water fountains
They could have been anywhere
Yet away, at some distance from the metropolis
They gift both resplendence and comfort
To aid the habitual study and prayer

Fear is at one malignant
Fear is always close contingent
So trips my tempered thread
So skips my secret heart
Behind this omnipresent frown

One Hallelujah chorus
With monks in blossom streams
Witnessed, in contemplation
Chants of the silence strum

The twenty first century poets
There words too are gathered
As though they were a refrain
For Lucia di Lammermoor

available for kindle here