bear witness to the tail-end of the night
as dawn controls the dimmer switch;
such briefness of colour at this time,
where new light clashes with new light
in a forge of fading thought,
leaching the present,
leaving us hope,
the colour of the future,
it colours us all.
I'm talking to the tea leaves in my cup
Getting closer to my mouth each time I sup
"Why do you now float? What is the snag?"
"Well we're loose-leaf now, we're free, we've split the bag!"
Passing clouds, so light they barely have the breath to say hello. Uneven pavement dares me to not watch my step. Birdsong peppers the air. So much so I want to sneeze into song and dance in my street. I don't. Because I can't sing and this isn't Oliver!
But I do want some more.
Dark clouds tumble over themselves in a rolling sky. A cat is a horizontal Slinky tiptoeing along a brick wall. Next doors synchronised door-slamming could be in the Olympics. A man in a van honks his horn. Next door rushes out, slamming yet another door on a percussive morning.
Tints and hints and shades and hues of Sunday blue. Look to where the deepest blue touches the fringe of space. Black and blue. The Gossamer Gods have spun a delicate atmosphere around our silken sky. We hang in infinity, overseen by ancient threads. But are we spider or prey?
A house hides under a fresh coat of render. A new look to compete with our pebble-dashing, stone-cladding neighbours. But what lies beneath? Fake Mews? The memory haze of summer; remebrances recalled in pebble-dashed, stone-clad uncertainty, rendering us all unreliable narrators.
A dull, grey, Shoetown sky, the colour of cabbage water. The gazebo proudly waits for no one at the back of my garden, like a child whose parents have forgotten to attend their school play. I listen to a songthrush sing. The gazebo bristles and stiffens in the wind.
Nobody's sure why this one tree leans at such an awkward angle. Romantics say it's because generations of lovers have leant against this landmark while waiting for their dates.
Pragmatists say it's the only perpendicular object around and it's the world which is out of kilter.
Time is the second hand sweeping so fast
Time is the hour hand immovably cast
Time is our face on the clock we all see
Time is the acorn and time is the tree.
This is the same tree from different
Life is all about perspective. Make sure you see the big picture, but don't forget about the little things. They're all connected.
A bright start to a day where anything is possible. Clouds have vanished leaving nothing but hope. A man whistles a tune I once heard long ago. The name escapes me. I smile at the thought that this is how memory is made. It arrives flat-packed for self-assembly. No instructions.
The tick of the past
The tock yet to come
The Present falls hard
On Time's beating drum
On Time's beating rhythm
No time to succumb
To Time's algorithm
Mere parts of the sum.
I drift while I sip in this timeless, unpoppable bubble of the present; yet the pull from the tides of the past urge me back to the shores of an eternal summer.
A man out of season walks by in a heavy coat. A petrol can rests on an old car roof. It's probably worth more than the car. The other side of my street resides in early morning sun. For now I'm housed in shadow, waiting in turn for my season in the sun. I could do with that coat.
I'm getting rich slurps
with delicate tones of sips,
I'm getting the odd burp
with hints of smacking lips,
I'm getting floral bouquets
from every cup I pour,
but to make sure I am certain
I think I'll have one more.
Overnight, the rain was greeted like a returning hero to parched lands, to much thunderous applause. Now birdsong is the only sound left in the morning. As if nature Herself had sent tiny, winged fighters to chase away the noise. We are hearing their melodic songs of victory.
Dappled sunlight falls on shadow as tree canopies become parasols for hire. The cost? A mere walk in the park. The slick salesman of a summer scorcher will catch many out at noon, including mad dogs and Englishmen, who wear their bright red arms and faces as a warning to us all.
Thursday's overnight chill is replaced as the great sky furnace ignites. I'm hoping it stays below 25°C, today. Anything above and my proud, ancient, Celtic skin is in fear of turning shades only found in old Dulux colour charts.
'Scotsman Burnt' or 'Sunstroke Red' come to mind.
whether your tea is in bags or loose leaf
whether you sip or you slurp for relief
whether you drink from a mug or a cup
the very best brew is the one you last supped.
Tuesday lights its pilot light and the day whooshes into view. The ghost sign for Wedding Car Hire at the top of my street is now as faded as the photos of the brides and grooms it once served. A hint of the past. Cobblestones peeking from the edges of Memory's tarmacked road.
Monday. A baby-bull-in a-china-shop sort of day. Monday is led towards Tuesday, causing as little damage as possible. We're cowboys for the working week. Cattle herding for the weekend. We're all the man with no name. We work for a fistful of dollars, sipping from broken china.
Colourful weeds grow out from a thin gap where a garden wall meets a pavement. Are they wild, urban flowers? Parkour pansies? They grow incredibly quickly. They weren't here the last time I passed. They know their time is limited. Brief, misclassified beauty. Wallflowers no more.
The sky is such a deep blue this morning that I wouldn't be surprised if it's trapped people's gaze. Flecks of birds occasionally dot dot dash across the sky canvas in avian Morse Code. I cannot decipher what they say. I realise the beauty of this message is all in the pattern.
Bin day. Black bags litter my street on a hill with no sense of irony. One long, unbroken, saggy line arcs over the brow. What lies at the end of this rubbish rainbow? The sun glints off empty wine bottles in boxes, redefining righteousness, recycling fleeting crocks of gold.
A puppy pulls and strains from a brand new lead at a brand new world, trying to sniff everything, everywhere, all at once. A cracked speed bump suggests a sleeping policeman is waking up. A plane flies so high overhead that it may as well be an insect crawling along a blue leaf.
Dark clouds tumble over themselves in the morning sky, giving Monday the appearance of heavy bags under its eyes. Soggy bunting sags. Parties popped. The clink of glass bottles tumbling into recycling boxes signals the slow march into the week to the beat of the Jubilee Retreat.
As the last trestle table is folded back under the stairs, the last strains of God Save The Queen and Sweet Caroline fade from our ears. As the word Jubilee enjoys its long retirement. A country returns to normality. Work or school on Monday. Cold Coronation Chicken for all.
It's still Jubileeing outside, though it's forecast to clear by Monday. It's the heaviest downfall of Jubilee on record. Scattered outbreaks of trestle tables still likely. Cake in the North. Quiche in the south. Gale force bunting rising to hurricane strength in some newspapers.
A Union Jack and a Ukrainian flag hang from a bedroom window. Continuity and chaos. A pigeon flaps rubber wings and emerges from a tree of twigs. A milk float groans its white bones over a speed bump. The milk shakes. The milk shakes, shake. The clotted cream just wobbles a bit.
I'm so pleased that God has now saved The Queen
It means all our singing wasn't routine
If He has now stopped saving old monarchs
Could He please help the homeless and stop with this bollocks.
A fading 'ghost sign' up our street still touts for business. Like a weak, black and white TV signal lost in space, it hurtles through time with no final destination in mind. Only when the last brick fades will our transmission end, but it will live on in the memory of the stars.
Today's reminiscent of a colour convention where only grey has turned up. My weather app, ever apologetic, reads out that this is as bright as it's going to get. My gazebo flaps about in the corner of my garden like the uncoordinated wheezy kid who always,eventually, sat out PE.
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