The *>*>* is not a good look
Even for a stick insect
With magnificent eyes
The walnut cake
Is chock full of sugar
I didn’t expect that
The coffee though
Is spot on
Certainly a prime flavour
Unfortunately
The crystalline
Is already coursing through the veins
Along the line
Of the silent windmills
Twenty-four in all
North to south
Flight hill
Is this a portent
Can you still hear me
Do you still listen
Would you care
If you could
Should I worry
Either way
Well of course
It would be rude not to
Isn’t that the whole point
Of our being together
I ought to be more methodical
Draw up lists of pros and cons
Perhaps even create a ratings system
I’ve done that in the past
For now Green Lane ticks the boxes
Quiet, rural, good internet
A café (this one) round the corner
A bucketload of past connections
But is it a good thing
Or even sensible, to return
To a place of your crucial years
Where once you fell off Jack’s motorbike
That last bit is absolutely true
I just couldn’t get around the corners
During my try-out ride
On the Moto Guzzi, or was it the MZ contraption
I am in the Carding Shed Café
At Washpit Mills, Holmfirth
I have just viewed and made an offer
To rent a flat in the old yarn store
My mother worked on the looms
And I drove a fork truck full of bobbins
In my school holidays
Now it’s a vintage car museum, sort of
There is a sign in the corner
Which points to Cartworth Moor
Which is where in will go next
Also it is where, as a youth, I played cricket
Is it nostalgia that draws me
Am I just another old romantic
This might not be the end of my viewings
But at least I’ve made a start
He works on the Humber Bridge
In his bright orange, slightly scuffed
Tradesmen’s overhalls
But right now he hangs his head
Over the railings
Seemingly deep in contemplation
Above the silt scoured
Sand coloured waters
Of the tidal estuary
I too, more than once
Approached the precipice
To question what the future offered
