Dreams recur in different ways.
The first hesitant holding of hands.  
The first tremulous brushing of lips.  
and when we try to recapture
that sleep-borne reminiscence
we are left with
the residue of sadness
or a residue of sourness.
We try to clutch at an ever diminishing
straw of recollection.
We almost have it.
Then it is lost.
Dreams die in strange ways.

He has gone.
A mere shadow of his former self.
But I still see him in the passing faces,
or queuing for the bus,
or shopping In the supermarket.

I see him
not as I saw him last
in his bed:
his penultimate resting place,
but as he was throughout those
years.

A child,
a playmate,
an adolescent evacuee,
a youthful, excited participant
in all those artistic delights.
The nudes, the landscapes,
the biblical, familial and  historical
inspirations.

And during those
Italian years.
Honing his artistic style.
Enjoying, and being enjoyed by,
that colourful scene
as eccentric as he himself
was destined to become.

And now he is no more.

And I am suddenly
and painfully
struck by this terrible thought:
he was the oldest surviving relative
of that generation,
the offspring of
a mother who was
the sister of my father.

It is a mantle I have had ****** on me.
I am the patriarch.

I look back to that period
of innocence
and deplore its brevity.

I recall when
we bathed ourselves
beneath the fountain of youth
and I believed
that our love would never die.

Was it a lie,
or just unspoken truth?

Every breath I took
brought me closer to you.
But it was not enough.
Why could I not understand
that all I lacked
was the recognition
that there was nothing
I needed
that I didn’t  already have?

It is a lifelong pattern.
A concern over what I might be missing
has always spoiled my
enjoyment
of what I already possess.

And while we continue
to blame others
for our own shortcomings,
we fail to recognise that
a voyage on
the vessel of forgiveness,
must begin with  forgiving oneself.

We have freedom of choice,
but apparently
we prefer to choose regret
rather than happiness.

All things are dust,
and to dust all things return
is a biblical pronouncement.
But while we may rail
against the losses and perils
of our existence
it is too easy to forget that
the bough may have broken,
but the tree still stands.

People died.
I’m alive.
Flowers may perish.
Weeds survive.
Good men vanish,
Tyrants thrive.

Moving in one’s lifetime tends to follow a distinctive pattern.
First we start accumulating: family, friends and treasured possessions,
and with that vast accumulation comes the need
for an expanded premises within which they be housed.

Finally with family gone and friends sorely decimated,
comes the time to massively downsize
and all that treasured furniture and bric-à-brac
needs to be discarded and persist only in memory.

I have to ask myself, when the time comes
for me to move to my last resting place,
who will then remain
to guard those precious memories?

And so I finally can say “goodbye”
to monstrously distressing twenty-sixteen
reflecting back with inward shrug and sigh
on happenings that never should have been.

But I have lived through all that could be thrown
by Nature with insouciant disdain.
retaining sensitivity alone
that I have sought to disregard in vain.

And now as these last few hours pass away
I sit with solitary glass of cheer,
ready to greet the dawn of a new day
that is the harbinger of a New Year.

And I reflect however bad may seem
the slings and arrows of life’s jesting style
it does no good to rant and rave and scream;
such immature response is juvenile.

Better by far embrace the positive
though hard to find in the twelve months now gone,
there’s always much denial to forgive,
and clemency comes easy when alone.

So let me cast aside self-pitying malaise
discarding too the self-indulgent sorrow,
and echoing the mundane Scarlett phrase,
I’ll put it from my mind until tomorrow

"[A season message to all readers]"

I do not celebrate this pagan feast,
But others do, I know,
And some may call it Chanukah,
Or worship Christmas snow.

But call it whatsoe’er you will;
Light candles, deck your tree,
Or merely give your heartfelt thanks,
Please read this homily.

You do not need a good excuse
To celebrate a feast
You only need to have your fun
Before you are deceased.

"[So, whatever is your preferred option at this time of year, please have a wonderful time and a very happy New Year to you all.]"