Hundreds of children in shiny, dark, wet coats
Lug learning in behemoth backpacks
Line after line trudge slowly with scholarly aim
Such tiny, hungry ants
Conformity;
Uniformity;
They swarm the sweet centre of school,
Ready, if not eager, to devour knowledge.
A timeless game of hide and seek is forever taking place. Day jumps out, revealing itself from behind the horizon. Night giggles with delight at such a good hiding place and determines to use it. Day then counts to a hundred. Night looks to the horizon.
Coming, ready or not!
A man walks down our hill so quickly, with such jerky, clockwork movements, that I look up the hill to see who's wound him up and sent him down. He appears late for something. How very British. Choosing not run but looking faintly silly. Maybe our tin man just needs oiling?
From worthy pip to golden core
There is one great expectation,
Gather up all the sunshine to store
Lead us not to temptation.
We could use the apples we steal
(We could make pure apple cider)
Scrumping for sunshine, there's the appeal,
Memory's friend & outrider.
An old lady is served in the corner shop. Counting out pennies she's 6p short for her paper. A man, a knight errant, steps forward and offers to pay on his debit card. Under £5, he's charged 50p. That must be the going rate for chivalry these days. I hold the door open for free.
The hinterlands of a new day;
The sun lies behind the houses,
Out beyond the trees.
My blue/green grass, faintly lit
By solar powered garden light,
A part of the sun to call upon
When the world is hidden.
It guides my way with its comforting, tiny beam of memory.
Night's stitching is slowly unpicked
Light's itching to seep from dawn's gauze
Balanced, they rest on infinite thought
Balanced, where all the crimes fade
Balanced, where all the new crimes will be made
We sit before both judge and jury
Amid verdicts of meaningless fury
The debit card machine is 'down' at the corner shop. So is the cash dispenser. "Broadband" mutters the owner. We mutter we understand. I don't. We agree it was a simpler time dealing in cash. I have no cash. We're at the whim of what we don't really understand. Aren't we always?
A lady wearing Winnie The Pooh pyjamas is in the corner shop. Maybe she's sleep-shopping. I wonder if it's for honey? A man flicks through a paper before placing it back. Maybe he's sleep-browsing. I leave the shop, wondering if I've had a walk-on part in other peoples dreams.
A limerick got lost in a joke
I once told to some random bloke
Walked in to a bar
Did a man from Forfar
Nicked the punchline just as I spoke.
A limerick isn't that long
It's five written lines that are strong
They rhyme at the start
And here in this part
And finish like this - I'm not wrong!
A child's sofa sits outside the corner shop. On it sprawl a doll and an empty beer bottle. Abandoned; they've outgrown their usefulness. I pick up the bottle to place in a bin as I adjust the dolls position. A man exits the shop, open-mouthed at my efforts to Keep Britain Tidy.
We study the hills, we're in awe of erosion
Mindful of space and our wilful implosions
We all shift the lands by the things that we do
For we're all plates colliding - just lost to Time's view.
The light from the stars takes a long time to reach us
We're made from that light and that dust
So the light from the stars is just trying to teach us
Slow down
We'll get there
There's no rush.
Morning develops in night's darkroom; as does the anticipation of precipitation, a rumour started by the clouds, who pass it on. A rising sun fails to mix its reds and yellows on this hidden blue canvas. Rumour has it that today's primary colours will fade to grey. Pass it on.
Shapes cast by light and thought,
Interpretations of a restless catch,
Wriggling off baited hooks of definition.
We may stand in fast-flowing waters,
Dreaming of the one that got away,
Yet we are oblivious to the river
As we fish for shadows and memories.
A man buys a scratcher at the corner shop. I buy a paper. He puts the scratcher in his pocket. I'll never know if he wins. He'll never know this tweet is about him. We briefly occupy the same space. I see him leave. He goes left. I go right. Life's silent lottery rolls over.
Transparent Tetris shapes fall into wings;
only the best purples of Scottish-heather
are allowed to radiate from its back,
it's grace and beauty bestowing it
60 days on Earth.
We can only imagine being
allowed such time to shine.
At the corner shop is a man in overalls and a man in pyjamas. They communicate through suspicious looks. Maybe they feel they deserve each others life. They buy their distractions for the day; Overall's takes a paper, Pyjama's some lager. There's a tiredness in both their eyes.
A large man struggles to walk a small puppy. The puppy pulls at its lead and veers right then left. One day they'll pass my house, side by side, in harmony. For now, the man stares blankly ahead, looking like he's flying a kite on the ground, as he's pulled along by a tiny dog.
I once knew a man on a trawler
Who'd fight for each fish, a real brawler
He fought and he fought
For every fish caught
He landed them battered, the mauler.
A key to a missing clock
A missing clock without a key
Working well together
But not
Separately.
Neighbours on their step. He can't find his cap. She doesn't know which one he means. The one he always wears. She's none the wiser. He thinks she washed it. She didn't. She thinks he left it on site. He didn't. They sigh. They kiss. He drives off.
It's red, if you see it.
It's the hottest ticket in town. Summer returns as a special guest star in today's production of autumn. The touring company of clouds have moved to another venue. The wind plays no role, merely an understudy. A word perfect performance, spoken in sunlight, illuminates the stage.
My grandmother once had a ship in a bottle
Until on a weekend I caused it to topple
The ship was in bits and I started to panic
Until I renamed all the pieces Titanic.
I try to speak as a rose smells in bloom
I try to speak as a laugh fills a room
I try to speak as a child's smile is cast
I try to speak as the wild seas are vast
Language, like nature, is ever evolving
Tongue-tied to tradition, yet nature's absolving.
Some leaves, they crash too early to the ground
And now, they're crumpled up and have turned brown
Some will hang on into deep mid winter
Fade upon the branch without a whimper
We do not get to choose the leaf we'll be
We find ouselves all fixed to the same tree.
The sky never got the pavement's memo. Both wear same colour grey. A man in headphones nods along to music, or is it a very lively Today programme? Light begins the morning puzzle by first doing the corners and edges. People are flat-packed shadow. Some light assembly required.
A man vapes in his car as he waits outside my neighbour's house. Faint light from a streetlamp is enough to turn the car into a giant snow-globe as the self-propelled mist makes futile efforts to escape. My neighbour exits, also vaping, and the two seem to float away on a cloud.
September creeps in under cover of darkness. The thief in the night becomes a squatter. The birds feel something's afoot, the trees have started to drop their guard. The lawn will soon stop growing, in realisation that change is underway. September. The rag n bone man of nature.
Posts
All Comments
