PUDDLE

Only a memory of rain remains. Limpet slugs stick to my garden wall. Starlings dance at the hop to such à la carte delights. Clumps of weeds tease the grass, clenching drenched fists in mock triumph. I make tea. My dog drinks from a puddle. We're both very happy with our choices.

FATE AND A MISSED BUS

The sky hangs ripe with cloud, stories yet to be told. A woman returns for her brolly, missing the bus. A man sits on the bus,  dreaming of a life he and the woman should have - if only she could read his mind. Such dreams and clouds float by as fate clings to a different day.

SENSELESS

First mug of tea since Covid robbed me of my taste and smell: we seem separated, as if the glass window of the care home keeps us apart, our hands pressed against either side, desperate to feel something, but we only recall a memory of comfort in a senseless time.

WALLFLOWERS

A gentle, almost apologetic, tap-tap-tap of light rainfall, containing all the colours for a thirsty garden in each clear drop. An abandoned watering can, hoping for the next dance, then the next dance, sits brooding with the rest of the wallflowers. A very British shower.

THE FAILURE OF VINEGAR

Early morning mist is slowly absorbed by blotting paper sky. Light winds rehearse dances for the thunderstorms to come. Garden path weeds pop their heads up between cracks to see if it's safe to emerge. Spraying them with vinegar has failed. I crave chips. I settle for tea.

BOILING POINT

At the corner shop. A discarded Wet Paint sign. Morning must have finished its colouring in. A man in a boiler suit frantically scratches at a scratch card. He looks at boiling point. He sighs and buys another. I buy tea and leave, scratching my head. I'm off to boil my kettle.

PARCHED

Heat waits in a clear sky, above a parched land. I embrace cool air as a long-lost friend. I water my colourful plants with a hose. It works better under pressure than me. The plants and I know we'd both wilt without one other. We take only what we need and not a drop more.

MAD DOGS AND ENGLISHMEN

The overnight heat was just the warm-up act for today's sun. Everyone's in shorts, like primary school, albeit with questionable tattoos, cleaner faces and hairier legs. The corner shop's out of ice and ice-cream. Not cool. This Englishman walks his mad dog before the midday sun.

HOURGLASS

A sense of a promise of impending, arid heat. Birds hop and flit in an effort to finish early. The cool grass accepts it'll soon be straw. A tiny water feature will be an oasis for the tiny traveller. The mirage of time is broken as the desert sand in the hourglass returns home.

SILENT NIGHTCLUB

My heavy bedroom curtains resemble a pair of thick-set bouncers in my own silent nightclub. The edge of youthful light fails to sneak past unnoticed and is stopped at the entrance. Mingling birdsong thirsts for the day. 

Light and sound convince me to put on my dancing shoes.

THURSDAY

Thursday is a day alone. Friday associates with Saturday and Sunday. Monday revels in its infamy. Tuesday is popular because it's not Monday. Wednesday knows it's halfway to greatness. Thursday just gets on with itself. I like Thursday. Unprepossessing, but happy in its own skin.

REFLECTIONS OF A FALLEN LEAF

This leaf, like art, is most subjective

This one makes me feel reflective

It grew green once upon the tree

It now lays in this gallery.

REFLECTIONS

My dog gives his singular I NEED A WEE bark. I open the back door. He sits and stares. I encourage him to go out. He refuses. Perhaps I'm not Dr Doolittle. He listens. He stares. I do the same. We both silently reflect upon the outside world. A brief moment. No need for language.

RECYCLING

Flags still flutter in my street but move with all the grace and energy of a lunchtime stripper. The rain makes grass blush bright green. Sunday makes Monday tidy up. A beer bottle is definitely half empty. A garden chair stays upended. A pizza box waits proudly for recycling.

DÉJÀ VU

Overnight rain mingles with a sense of déjà vu

Hope is stuffed into a

hopelessly small and tattered suitcase

Until the next time

A ticket for its destination

Homeward bound 

Lost luggage on a carousel of dreams

Lost property

Unclaimed baggage

Properly lost

Again.

ACROSTIC (IT IN THE BACK OF THE NET)

F inally

O ur

O ne

T ime

B eckons.

A rtists

L ove

L arge

S tages.

C an

O ne

M atch

I lluminate 

N ational

G lory?

H ope

O vertakes

M anic

E xcitement.

SUNDAY SERMON

The motorbike from up the road kickstarts Sunday's sermon to life. It coughs its way down our hill as my street of terraced houses congregate in two aisles of narrowing perspective. Open bedroom windows are giant church organ stops. No one sings. Morning's broken. Blame the bike.

ANTI-AGING

Remnants of rain hang from my washing line in neat little drips. The slate on my roof, buffed by overnight showers, looks new, despite being 400 million years old. I stand in the garden waiting for the restorative rain to return. How long need it rain to rid me of my wrinkles?

THE LONG-STANDING SHORT-SIGHTEDNESS OF THE POET

I'm standing so far from my mirror these days

I really think there must be much clearer ways

Of seeing who lives behind that piece of glass

It once looked like me, on reflection, that's passed.

DAILY BREAD

 Fresh baked bread reminds me smell is the strongest of senses linked to memory. Dettol or sawdust transports me to primary school's queasy, tiny, tummies. Cut grass is Sports Day. Fresh plaster is my grandfather returning home white as a ghost, covered in the dust of his labour.

XXL

For a few years, now

In time's fitting room

I seem to be trying on

Larger and larger shirts.

VICTORY PEAL

A nation sobers up, coddled in grateful silence. A robin flits, hops and flaps on my fence, as if its tiny wings were new. A gang of starlings are losing at chess to a pigeon who won't move. Glass bottles clink delicately into recycling bins, but their victory peal prevails.

RELATIVE

No rain. Yet. We wait in trepidation and expectation, as if an overbearing great-aunt has promised to visit. It will lick our faces with its hankie. It will demand attention but ask for no fuss. It will judge us and leave. We can't choose family or the weather. It's all relative.

THE LONELINESS OF THE LONG-DISTANCE WALKER

A young man runs to meet a bus. He decelerates as it passes, like a sprinter on his first false start. He walks in the direction of town. Another bus proves the maxim and arrives almost at once from around the corner. He turns but doesn't run. He's now a long-distance walker.

CONTRITION

A contrite pigeon reproaches itself, repeatedly cooing "I know, I know". Our skeletal, half-finished gazebo shows its insides, outside. A neighbour's curtain twitches. It may be dreaming. Next doors cat snuggles smugly under a half-finished gazebo. The pigeon knows. It knows.