Latest Poetry

Flanagan phoned – left a message

Flanagan phoned – left a message

Flanagan phoned – left a message   ‘hope you’re well I’m down your way be nice to catch up - I’ll bring some photos’   Flanagan had a forename she doesn’t use it - I never heard it   she lives alone in a pink-washed cottage on the white horse coast of Mayo painting wistful landscapes - gentle reminders of buried days - despite her arthritis   since her transplant she’s been teetotal she claims ...
AUTUMN

AUTUMN

One from many years back but seems apropriate now. AUTUMN 1969 Elms are flared with yellow; Oaks turn bronze; Mist swirls along the furrow; The year grows old. And the beech trees stand Root-deep in discarded gold. I, squirrel-like secrete About the hollows of my mind Jewels To hang upon the world At other times When all within Is uniformly grey, When poetry fades And reason Faces the light of day. But words cannot retain ...
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Thanks Santa

Thanks Santa

Happy Christmas ...
Mumbai

Mumbai

A truth I will never forget ...
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Retro

Retro

Carnaby Street ...
(ask not) for whom this bell tolls

(ask not) for whom this bell tolls

(ask not) for whom this bell tolls   I only popped to the pub for last orders, and to nip to the loo for toilet paper (the pub had plenty to spare)     but at the door   an old bloke sifting ashtrays, like chocolate boxes, looked in need of cheering up - I stopped to pass the time,   ‘looking for dog ends?’ ‘bugger off - mind your own’ ‘s’alright, mate, I don’t smoke’ ‘why you looking for dog ends ...
Dualism (Edited)

Dualism (Edited)

The view that the world consists of two fundamental entities, such as mind and matter ...
COVENTRY CATHEDRAL

COVENTRY CATHEDRAL

COVENTRY CATHEDRAL A torn cross of crucified metal like the twisted girders of a city seared by war stands in silent serenity. There is no figure on it; the pain is not individual nor is it long ago. Outside, with a trust that is undeserved, the ruins of the old reach out to touch the new; Forgiveness in stone, raised by the hands of men perhaps in the half knowledge that no longer can we ...
COME UNTO ME

COME UNTO ME

COME UNTO ME There is an old woman who lives in a shoe, well, not really old and nor really a shoe, but a very small cottage in Wales. She collects lost causes, human or beast, anything suffering, lost or almost deceased. She welcomes stray kittens, ponies, pheasants or quails, rescues rabbits from cats and pensions them off, with carrots and comfort for those who’re not fit, and others she doses, binds up paws or ...
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wallflowers

wallflowers

wallflowers   fifty pairs of peacock eyes watched Brenda in a fire-red and antique-gold taffeta skirt break cover from the wallflower ranks, skipping from the girls’ side of the Palais to the boys’   dappled by the dance hall glitter-ball, Brenda became the object of desire of a hundred obscure gazing eyes   the lads stood in a cloud of testosterone, Old Spice, Brylcreem and Mum Roll-On a straggle of Burton’s dummies swaying like washing ...
The purest lent

The purest lent
Picked

When you give up your favourite things for lent, try and sacrifice your words during  the period, apart from chanting prayers, be silent.  ...
Tenebris Interlucentem (into the darkness… light)

Tenebris Interlucentem (into the darkness… light)

Tenebris Interlucentem (into the darkness… light)   a winter Wednesday open-mic   in a dingy pub in Pontefract or was it Halifax?   I don’t rate poetry highly but if the beer’s good and admission’s free…   first up a hipster a ‘bad day Bukowski’ bragging a whore he claimed he laid all night in down-town Saginaw   an old bald guy up next in shades and a floral shirt, 6XL, read five straight doggerels all about ...
when Carrie met Harry

when Carrie met Harry

when Carrie met Harry   Renoir touched up a drab spot in his painting, Au Moulin de la Galette, with a twirling couple - a man in striped trousers and a woman in pink   the man, was an artist, Solares to his friends the woman, a ‘model’, was everyone’s friend   a hundred years later, reborn as Carrie and Harry, they had no memory of wild polka Sundays yet their eyes linked a little too long whenever they ...