What Takes You There Takes Me Too

I do slow down
I do take more time (mostly)
I do carry on leaving
But Lumb Bank is still within me

Stop, I say to myself
Have I said too much
Have I not said enough
Is all truly or otherwise revealed

I have bought
The collected works
Of the mountaineer poet
Also bought his book Found At Sea

Which is a mirror
Quotation
To one I saw many years ago
Which I photographed

Lost At Sea
Being apt I thought
For how my lover at that time
Appeared to be feeling

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon

Just One Man, With One Other

He had written the poem a long time ago
He was surprised
When I asked him to autograph
That particular page in the book

Surprised isn’t quite sufficient
He was visibly moved
Stopped in his tracks
Silent, for the first time that week

Eventually he gathered himself
Told me: that even though
It was a book of prize-winners
He himself did not win a prize

Something to do with the poem
Having already been published elsewhere
Which, at the time, made him disgruntled
Though he thanked me, he signed the work

Better still
On the Friday-night group readings
He asked to borrow the book
He read the poem out loud

With a bit of history for introduction
I like to think, that together
We both could wonder, just where
Those thirty odd years went to

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon

After Internment

Today I move on
Today I move away
Where to next
Where to now

Slow it down
Take a walk
Look at the sky
Breathe in the air

Yet still I stay
In my room
No firm handshakes
No warm goodbyes

The first day
Of the ninth month
Of the nineteenth year
Of this century

The sixty-seventh year
Of first days
Of next days
Of last days

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon

AWOL Until

Beneath my window there is laughter, joyous conversation, but I am not among it; of course I could, as if on an Easter morning, lift the sash, poke out my head; but I don’t.

There is a leftover glass of wine, in the room next to the breakfast table, most probably from an evening gathering; I did not attend, but stayed in my room, above the interaction.

There are books in which to write, also books for the reading of; I have partaken of both, tasted the elixir if you will, but I won’t remember, once I have returned home, unless…

Sunlight falls on the variegated leaves, as chocolate fills my imagination; tonight I will be here, probably speaking out loud; however, tomorrow I will be making fresh tracks.

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon

Towards Quietness

The perspiration sits with me
A short hike through the woods
A nature trail, beside the Colden Water
After walking along
An immense man-made path
Presumably for the workers
To make their way to the mills

What I hear now
From the peace of Lumb Bank
Is a scrambler bike, its rider
Possibly risking life and limb
Riding through the trees, over
The rocks, just as Arthur Lampkin
I never did take such a risk

Hornets in the sweet-williams
Mesh of fennel in sunlight
Butterfly inspects my wrist
Soon it will be mid-September
When we will be in Ibiza
Climbing the stone steps
Up to the castle and the cathedral

But before that I have to tell you
That I know so much more now
Yet I also know so much less
Take that mountaineer poet
Who goes to places where I never will
Or that quiet gentleman
Whose prayer poems I cannot equal

Happenstance in Heptonstall

Poems Started at Lumb Bank

Arvon 2018

Available from Amazon