Objects And Places

The Gregory Poems 1985-1986 came out in 1987
Which could also have been the year
That I went to the University of Sussex
For an OU summer school in Cognitive Psychology

I was an engineer, my previous studies reflect that
Now I had chosen something altogether different
I took the book with me, as a defence mechanism
Along with my Peter Stuyvesant kingsize cigarettes

I remember the trip to Sark, also to York
But were they both in the same year
If so what year was that
How else to place a stake in the ground

There is a structure of sorts down in the woods
There was a structure of sorts up in the woods
Where children played, where children
With imaginary friends, lived their imaginary lives

There is a tree, and a field, at the top of this hill
There was a tree, and a field, at the top of that hill
A place to walk to, to take a breath
A place to smoke our Silk Cut filter tip cigarettes

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon

Times And Places

Feet flat, on the carpeted floor
Breathe in, breathe out
Headphones on, listening to Making Change Easy
Back straight, firm against the wooden chair

Across the valley, a rising bank of trees
Much the same view as from that basement room
In the Kenn (Exeter) Farmhouse B&B in 2010
Except today I am at a top floor window

Which does nothing for my fear of heights
In 2010 I wrote of 2004
Due  to my geographic proximities
Today I am here to refine a collection of 2004

Feet flat, on the carpeted floor
My book, Gregory Poems 1985-86 are beside me
Was that when my writing, or my poetry began
If so, then what made me turn to the verse

Yes, I had bought and read, John Lennon’s book
In His Own Write, which was a present
For my older brothers twenty-first birthday in 1964
When we lived in The Crown Inn, Birdsedge

I was still at school, though often playing truant
Especially from English, and French; but not
For too too much longer; I left to learn a trade
To become an Electrical Engineer, not a writer

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon

Eighty Nine

Body
Like a huge mountain

Mind
Like a vast blue sky

Breath
Like a non-disturbing wind

Available at Amazon

Eighty Eight

Body like mountain
Mind like sky
Breath like wind

Body like sky
Mind like wind
Breath like mountain

Body like wind
Mind like mountain
Breath like sky

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Eighty Seven

Tufts of grass
Morning dew
Time to leave
To find what’s due

Time to give
Time to find
A gentle view
A day that’s new

Available at Amazon