Everything is BIG here.

Meals are big, bums are big, cars are huge and the skies are a million miles wide.

Janet and I are travelling in the Northwest of the United States of America, spending time with Boaz and Lisa in Idaho, Steve Yocum in Oregon and Greg and Linda in Washington State.

The trip is a "quickie" in that we are fitting one helluva lot into just three weeks duration.
Never in all my days have I seen such huge quantities of food served up in restaurant meals, plastic bags discarded, American flags fluttering and all the young, blonde girls in tattered, impossibly short cut offs and sleeveless tops talking loudly, incomprehensibly at a million miles an hour ......Just blows you away!!
Monstrous pickup trucks, Rams, Broncos, big V8s travelling the freeways continuously. Sheriffs, troopers and Road cops all wearing firearms on the hip, in their souped up pursuit vehicles parked on the roadside shoulder, eyeballing everyone as they pass, with a mean, accusatory glare.
Out on the range there is a million square miles of nothing but sage brush and basalt rock....and searing, baking heat.
114 degrees in the painted desert of Moab. Beautiful though with vaulting red sandstone cliffs and rearing stone arches against the blue-est of blue skies.
Standing pillars of ancient sedimentary rock born in depositions laid down in vast oceans of bygone eras, millions of years ago.

History is painted vast in this immensity. The gigantic and abrupt catastrophic inundation of a vast and deep inland sea, swelled suddenly by floodwaters of rivers diverted by lava flows from subterranean fissures....Unimaginable torrents abruptly released, gouging out ancient lava beds to create gigantic waterfalls and deep, sheer sided chasms.

Cascades that constituted the biggest river flow ever known in the history of the planet, washing away everything from the epicentre of the continent in Utah through Idaho to the Pacific ocean in the rugged coast of Oregon. Such was the Bonneville flood of 12,000 years ago illustrated today by the gigantic chasms created in the beds of basalt and rhyolitic larva throughout Idaho and the fields of massive, round, house sized boulders strewn from the floods origin near what is now, Salt Lake City in Utah to the coast in Oregon, a thousand kilometers away.

The two weeks stay with Boaz and Lisa just disappeared in a flash. They took us down to Moab painted desert, Zion National park, the Craters of the Moon, Monument National Park and up to Stanley and the Sawtooth mountains by the mighty Salmon river. Janet and I took advantage of a couple of push bikes hanging in the garage and spent most days cycling the local trails and visiting Starbucks for a celebratory cappuccino or two....Those bikes saved our bacon, walking trails in that heat was ******. Great hospitality enjoyed here. watched reruns of Sopranos on Boaz's 70 " SmartScreen TV and enjoyed Arnie's escape from postwar Austria to Mr Universe and fame and fortune @ Hollywood with Boaz whilst enjoying chilled margaritas in the hot tub.

The camaraderie of meeting an old mate of 45 years past, Steve Yocum of Oregon  a fellow writer and author. Both of us intent on shooting the breeze, putting the world to right. In some ways a sad exercise in that no longer can either of us make things right for with age upon us, neither has influence. We can huff n puff n blow the house down....but it seems, nobody pays the slightest bit of attention. The penalty of age is invisibility. The relief in it all is that, really, nobody actually gives a hoot!

Just two Old Dogs letting off steam..... it's rather cathartic actually! Thanks to Stevo, Ian and lovely Heidi for the accommodation, great hospitality and warmth.

The cool atmospheric relief of the serene and calm, Puget Sound in Seattle, Washington state gave welcome respite from the intense heat of the interior and the serenity of our cottage accommodations and startlingly beautiful garden surrounds. A forest of conifers and deciduous trees harboured gardens of blooming roses, hollyhocks and multihued cone flowers, emerald lawns carve swarths of sunlight in avenues of deep, green shade....a delight for the sunburnt brows of yesterday's heat.
Woken by the bassoon blast of the passing early morning ferry out in the waterway, to stroll out to sit at the very edge of the sandy, pebble beach and gentle surge of the deep, clear saline waters of the magnificent Puget Sound.
The peace of early morning crisp cool air, a seascape of moored fishing boats on mirrored waters, the distant Olympic range rearing to its' full 7,000 ft against a powder blue sky left us quite breathless with the utter beauty of it all....add to that a lovely breakfast offering of fresh berries, kiwifruit slices and yogurt and a chilled glass of fresh squeezed orange juice...and we absolutely, couldn't want for anything more. To Greg and Linda our love and thanks for giving up your beautiful bed, travelling us around beautiful Seattle and being our airline coach to and from Portland. We shall return the warm hospitality next time you hit NZ and Taranaki.

Vulcanism has dominated the terrain in Idaho, Montana, and Utah. Continental drift westward of the land mass has brought about a steady transference eastward of the massive geothermal hot spot which currently lies in Yellowstone park and which is the source of all volcanic activity within the park..
Idaho, in ancient times, wore the volcanic mantle of the region in having truly gigantic rhyolitic ash and magmatic eruptions. These cataclysmic eruptions emptied deep cavernous, subterranean magma chambers which collapsed under their own weight leaving vast circular calderas in the landscape. Subsequent plate tectonic activity caused deep faulting allowing huge flows of sticky magma to surge to the surface like searing hot black toothpaste, spreading across the plains obliterating all evidence of the rhyolite caulderas, surfacing the state, to this day, with millions of acres of hard black basaltic rock.
Here and there, rhyolite has wormed its way to the surface building gigantic domes, over the centuries these have weathered leaving statuesque, dramatic flat-topped mesa scattered across the landscape.
Altogether a truly unique and enthralling terrain for visitors to behold and one which reveals a dramatic insight to the volcanic and tectonic violence of the recent past and gives a definite air of mystique to the beholder.

In a land of 360 million people, supermarkets are downright huge...and they contain the spoils of the nation's plenty.
Acres of dazzling variety... and cheap by international standards. The very best of prime beefsteak, sides of pork, Alaskan cod freshly caught and displayed in rows of chilled enticing exhibit. Every possible vegetable and fresh picked fruit known to man in piled pyramids of brilliant, colourful display. Beautiful ornate furniture, beds, mattresses, tiers of car tyres of every conceivable brand and size, wheelbarrows, fertilizer, fresh flowers in mountainous display, ***** in barnlike chillers. Supermarket trolleys for giants..... and gird yourself for a marathon hike in collecting your basket of groceries...and give yourself half a day....you'll need it!

America has momentum, huge momentum. Across vast tracts of country lie networks of highway. Multilane concrete that tracks mile after mile carrying huge trucks with 40 tonne loads. Incessant trucks, one after another,  thundering along carrying the lifeblood of America, merchandise,  machinery, infrastructure, steel, timber and technology. Gigantic mobile freezers hauling food from the grower to the markets. Hauling excavators, harvesters,  bulldozers and giant Agricultural tractors. Night and day this massive source of production careers across the nation transporting the promise of America, the momentum which drives the Stars and Stripes onward, ever onward.

On the margins of the cities of Portland and Salem the unhoused gathered in squalid tent communities. In the beautiful city of Seattle I saw many down and out unshaven, untidy individuals with hopelessness in their eyes, pushing supermarket trolleys containing their sparse possessions. I drove through rural communities, some of which, reflected hardship and an air of despair. Run down dwellings in need of maintenance and repair, derelict rusty vehicles adorning the **** strewn frontages.
Not 20 kilometers away in Ketchum and Sun Valley Idaho the homes were palatial in grounds tended by gardeners and viticulturalists. Porsches and Range Rovers graced the ornate, rusticated porticoes. Wealth and privilege in evidence in every nuanced nook and cranny.
America is, indeed, a land of contrasts, a land of wealth, privilege, and plenty..... and yet a land that, somehow, tolerates and abides a fragile paucity which emblazons itself, embarrassingly, within the national profile.

On a hot day in Twin Falls, Idaho, I walked into a huge air-conditioned sporting goods store specifically to look at guns....and in the long glass cases there were hundreds of them. From snub nosed revolvers to Glocks, 38s, 45 caliber even western style Colt 45s and the ***** Harry Magnum with the long, blue gun barrel and classic, prominent foresight.
In the racks behind the counter are hung fully and semi-automatic rifles of myriad types...all available for sale providing the buyer has appropriate licensing.
In a land where mass shootings proliferate weekly, I ask myself....does this availability of lethal weaponry make sense?

The aching beauty of the mountain country in Northern Idaho, Oregon and Washington state cannot be overstated. The Sawtooth mountains, the Cascades, Mt Ranier, Mt Hood and the Olympic range. Ridgelines of towering conifers as far as the eye can see, waves of green deciduous running down to soft grassy clearings with boulder strewn, rushing streams and the cascade of plunging waterfalls. The magnificence of the natural beauty of this rugged, heavily timbered mountain country just defies description being far, far isolated from the attentions of man.

To happen upon this country from the far distant reaches of the South Pacific is a culture shock, to be suddenly exposed to the extreme largess. It is difficult to calibrate, hard to encompass, impossible to assimilate....but the people encountered warmed us with their generosity of spirit, their willingness to welcome travelling strangers into their homes....and, of course the invaluable time we spent with our family….and for these factors alone together with the huge magnificence that is this........
GRAND AMERICA.
We are truly, truly grateful.

Janet & Marshal
Foxglove@Taranaki.NZ

Insidiously creeping through man as mist
Infecting, with, occasional, mortality's twist,
Unceremoniously spread around the world
A dire inconvenience, so darkly unfurled.
Cost to production to Covid's disdain,
The cost to humanity cited in pain.

Tho hark deep in bowels of offal's speak
Malignants dwell, where few do seek,
Malignants which through eons past
Deigned not to regale man's repast.
Deigned not to seek to penetrate
Until this moment's hint of hate.

But reality strikes just round the bend
Lurks deadly that, which portends... end.
A virus unknown, so lethal to man,
That it's virulence cast will infect all it can.
Anticipate death on a planetary scale
Where half will fall to expire in it's flail.

50% a conservative guess
And rabidly spread in it's virulent quest...
And fast, from pole to pole in a week
Leaving ravaged remnants staring and weak.
Leaving whole populations reeling in shock
Now frantically bulldozing millions en block.

New, this world, with it's paucity's few
Where grief and ignorance combine to hew
A continuity, new to man,
Where expertise is a rarity planned,
Where humanity, left, strives to reheal it's goal
On a planet that, now, can support what they stole.

M@Foxglove.Taranaki.NZ
20 June 2023

Playing crowds
With  such contempt
Dismissive braying
Truth exempt,
Flamboyantly flouting
Grimaced maw
With acoustic blonding
Back swept, flawed,
Braying he will
When we  know he won't,
Taking handouts
Paying... he don't!
Dishonored hallmark
Whatever the plan
Quintessentially branding
The disgrace of the man.
Indictments fly
Like birds on wing
"Not Guilty" roared
In outraged sling.
Same performance
Same dead style,
Predictable
By a country mile.
    ........................
Trump to win in '24??
God in Heaven,
PLEASE, NO MORE!!!

M@Foxglove.Taranaki.NZ
20 June 2023

In religion proof of God is the adversary of faith.
The faithful claim that to seek proof of God proves only... "That ye are of little faith"!
Proof is, in fact, the enemy of faith....and to claim that you have found
absolute evidence of proof of the one God, sets you up as an implacable adversary to 99% of the world's established believers...for they believe only in THEIR God on THEIR terms.
Not YOUR God on YOUR terms.
Your claim would most certainly proceed to undermine and/or nullify their authority and diminish their influence and rank in the realm of their sphere of universal belief or agnosticism.

Imagine the reaction of the Roman Catholic Church, the turmoil caused in the scarlet clad robes of the Vatican?
The Freemasons would be compelled to rewrite their tomes.
Jews writhe, viscerally,  in their Synagogues.
The atheistic Communist Chinese may even release the assassins in order to ameliorate the claimed heresy from the very face of the earth.
Some followers of Allah would convulse in screaming outrage and, in cannoning their noisy AK47s into the void, would point the accusation of blame at the infidels of the world and seek immediate covernance of the fury of Islam through Jihad.
Putin would wear a thoughtful expression on his face, shake his head,  then assign the entire matter to the hands of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Maori elite would claim cultural reference to it all in the Treaty of Waitangi.

One thing is certain, should this revelation be put to humanity the universal reaction will be one of dubiety, doubt and skepticism.
Extraordinarily few will take the proof of God on face value.
For every single individual has his or her own barrow to push and it will take an extraordinarily spectacular global demonstration available, simultaneously, to all of mankind to even begin to achieve BELIEF.
For sane reason alone, shall not foot it....and you can't believe everything you read in the newspapers....can you?

M@Foxglove.Taranaki.NZ

Guardians of our sanctity, they who portray themselves, suitably qualified, to determine who in society, BELONGS!

Exclusive minions from cliques of poetry to the Roman Catholic church, Scions of editorial in mainstream media, Mandarins of golf club membership. Intellectual dominions within Universities, Educationists, minority ethnic groups, drug cartels, gangs, the rich and famous ….and the military, always the Military....and aspiring politicians of all caste and creed.

Society is put through the selection process every day in every way for essentially, there is no trust anymore throughout these realms of society and an aura of lofty heavy intolerance pervades, for there is nothing to gain by dilution of the criteria of selection and admission ….and a huge risk of excommunication should one be so foolish as to permit a paling of the standards and rules set, for acceptance.

And who, you ask, sets these exalted standards….Ah now that’s the moot point for each avenue of exclusivity has, in the wings, they who wield the power, they who jealously guard their domain and exclusivity with guile, authority and a large degree, of subtle, or perhaps not so subtle, threat. Islands of society, usually enthroned by individuals of accrued, clawed, seniority who are attuned to an environment of command and rule…..in select domains of, actual or imagined, privileged entitlement.

There is, of course, a cost to this. It results in a hugely stratified society. Those who are in and those who are out.
The “In Crowd” spend a fortune maintaining their status and spend much of their time enhancing their image and, what is seen as an expected, anticipated high standard of performance.
The “Out Crowd” are largely oblivious to their lowly status and are generally quite unconsciously happy with their lot, yet despite this, there are the frantic segment within, who are intent on trying to “Make It” by investing regularly in Lotto, Bitcoin  or the racetrack and/or pursuing a contrived elevation, levitation of status in the forever quest of attaining immediate notoriety, fame and beauty.

Said elevation, though, is subject to irresolute resistance imposed by a malignancy, unimaginable to most and bordering on visceral termination to interlopers or would be aspirants.

Thus it is, globally, within the kin of humankind….and if anything, the exclusivity is magnifying to an irreconcilable, irrevocable
….US & THEM!

M@Foxglove.Taranaki.NZ

Heavy is the load, this day,
Much, the penalties to pay,
Poignant is the lingered taste,
Fraudulently masked in waste,
Hands that ache but seek to feel
The softness in her glance, that’s real.
Seek to touch the gentle face
Of she, who would deport with grace….
Would that I, in what is left,
Trust in what remains, bereft?

Wandering in halls of stone
Starkly feeling, so alone,
Echoes in these failing years
Of ghosts lamenting falling tears
In laugher lost amid the shroud
Of sunlight filtering through cloud,
Seek to touch her wrinkled smile
Invoking shades of love…. awhile.
Would that we now, so bereft,
Trust that, what remains…is left?

M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ
May 28 2023

Janet and I went for a scoot around the Egmont volcano and, in one of our avenues of approach, climbed up through the winding green chloaca, (tunnel), of alpine forest to the 4000’ limits of the road, just below the snowline.

On this brilliant, blue sky day, with the afternoon rays illuminating all in relief, the vast bulk of the volcano loomed above us. Vertical hanging valleys with shiny black flanks of split ignimbrite and basalt glistening in the afternoon light.
The sheer immensity of the brooding giant before us, above us, now quiescent, but not so long ago the scene of gigantic unimaginable carnage where whole sections of the  mountain’s flank calved off and plummeted annihilating everything in it’s path. Vast lahars of debris, housing lava boulders the size of a bus, cascading down the mountainside at near terminal velocity travelling up to 30 kilometers, right to and beyond the surfline of the Tasman sea.

The volcano has collapsed innumerable times in the last 2.5 million years only to build itself back to it’s 8000’ height with fresh magmatic and explosive eruptivity.

These andesite volcanos are quite unpredictable. Like now, at this moment standing in the magnificent grandeur of the looming massif, enjoying the vastness of it all, the freezing air and the alpine peacefullness….one never knows what the next moment will bring…..and when they do erupt the violence of these volcanos is beyond anything you can imagine.

But for this moment, there is a pristine peace in the massive larva flows capped with the soft greens of  alpine tundra and moss, the cascading, noisy waterfalls in every valley and crevasse. Freezing cold clear fresh water originating in the deep snow above and the dripping ice cornicles which adorn the top geometry of the summit.

There is magnificence here on the Egmont volcano….and we can feel it, deep in our bones.

M@Foxglove,Taranaki,NZ

Everyday in circles
Life goes round and round,
Concentric repetitiousness,
Unctuously profound.
Though the moment spat past,
Caught it on the hop,
Delayed it momentarily
Made the *******...stop!
Breathing hard with passion,
Eyeballs oscillate,
Frantic to resume the game
But left it far too late.
Can't locate momentum
Impossible to spin
Reversible prognosis now....
Out reverts to in.

M.

Ah! The fire burns, I see
Besotted, I would venture, free.
Though be it love or lust, would ask?
When read between the lines, to clasp
This passion to thy hairy breast
...Where voyeurism wriggles, best???
But good for thee, my brother man,
Tho God may frown, as often can?
Just meld thy forthright way, unclad,
....And laugh at they, who utter bad!

M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ

Aspirations earthly peak
Is sought by those who worldly speak.
Those who know the way of Gods,
Rig the system, flay the dogs.
Claim environmental gain
Circumventing critic’s pain,
And then there’s they who pulpit, thump,
To pocket cash and queue line, jump…
They who pound the breast with style
And prejudicial writs, beguile.

Quest the power glory trail
Grip the heights to far prevail.
Scorch the earth to **** to win
Sidestep justice, gorge in sin.
Shouldering all else aside
Clawing mantel's, ego stride
To climb atop the very peak
To be the King who shall, now, speak.

Clad in ermine, trimmed in gold
Falling shoulder length, enfold,
Fingered by bejeweled ring,
Exultant too, as choirs sing…
Leering high above the crowd
The Crown decrees…He Rules, Aloud.

Parliamentary upper crust
Dictatorial realm of dust,
Communistic fists of steel
Army juntas, just as real…
Across the world the powers feed
An iron fist to those who bleed.
The formula of global rule
That peasants cringe to power, cruel.

Democratic words so crass
Evaporate as vaporous, gas.
Mid promises of drifted mist
Conveyed in lies of brutish fist!
Israel, Africa and France,
Black and white in deathly dance,
Britain, Russia, USA
China charges into play…..
Nuclear weapons used as pawns
As God in Heaven sighs.... and yawns.

IS THIS IS HOW IT’S MEANT TO BE
FROM NOW UNTIL ETERNITY?

M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ
24 April 2023

Edging from the portal to the very plinth of sanity
Wending ways across the web amidst the spoken word,
Forging forth dexterity to clarity's dominion
In focusing the spotlight on all but the absurd.

To concentrate attention to a filigree of pigment
Is to re-collate the toning to an acceptable degree,
Avoiding condescension to the subject limitation
Allows the truth to permeate, surrendering to me.

Free now of the torment of a misconception's moment
Free now to attest to the pledge that makes it right,
Lost to all the lies and the desperate ambiguity
To soar in realization of this incandescent light.

M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ
21 April 2023

Questioning her leanings, friend
Will neither win desire, nor end....
Instead the fluid slips to point
Where passion slides to bridge the joint
To sup from that forbidden place
Electrifies with easy grace.

M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ
April 10 2023

Poignant
In the way chance falls,
Irresolute
And without recall.
Preposterously
In foolish play,
Galling,
In it's heartless way.
Laughable
When whimsy, seen
Embraceable
As so obscene....
To Whom now
Falls the questing quest?
Perhaps,
To he, who claims, knows best?
Enmeshed
Though, in his quagmire slog
Retreats
To distant treeline fog
Where there,
In crystal silence, long,
.....
DISCERNS NOW!
......
To a Blackbird's song





M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ
8 April 2023

Vermillion streaks in stratus, dark
Against the very heart of night,
Bands of deep red in the shroud
Portend approaching cyclone's might.
Morning shards of  fractured cloud
Stream across a shattered sky,
Smothered sun in shadowed orb
Against where apprehension's lie.

South East winds arising now
Tussock billowing in dale
Trees commence a windward thrash
In lieu of kiss of coming gale.
Greyness of a leaden sea
In the lee of storm's approach,
Beneath the streaming sand dunes
The seagulls shelter, in reproach.

Mounting gusts of boisterous wind
Cascade along the lamp lit way
Schoolgirls shriek as skirts fly high
And ominously, skies turn grey.
Supermarkets, in the city
Teem with queues in panic buy,
Grab bags now the urgent item
Just in case the flooding's high.

Traffic blocks the bridge and byways
Wan in headlights falling rain,
Anxiously, the need to be home
Frought anticipation's pain.
All the birds have disappeared
Vanished, in the sudden still,
Eery in the misting rainfall
Frightening, in a mystic chill.

Havoc as she sets upon us
Howling wind and teeming rain,
Horizontal onslaught blasting
Gabriella's Song by name!
Bridges under siege with flooding
Trees down over roads,
Monstrous waves in tidal surging
Causing coastal overloads.

Imprisonment by sandbags
As flooded rivers overflow
In blinding rain of maelstrom teeming
Anywhere and everywhere you go.
Inundated cars on freeway
Flashing hazards submerged deep,
Rescued souls lost, bewildered
In sudden-ness disaster reaps.

Massive trees are torn asunder
Blasted foliage thrashing wild
Torrents rage through streambed gullies
Gabrielle, destruction's child!
..............
Aftermath of horror's silence
Hollow eyed and gaping jaw
A nightmare for your sanity?
Nay,  Gabriella's Song.... is flawed.

M@Foxglove,Taranaki NZ

Apprehension made you pause
To study the attrition clause,
Ascertain the forward path,
Condescend to actually ask....
Condescend to feel the heat
Of the artwork at your feet.

M@Foxglove,Taranaki NZ

Bright, they shone in morning sun
Eccentrically, they glowed as one,
Briefly in the morning light
Extinguishing their flame, by night.
Softly then, in morning mist,
To vanish in fame's tragic twist.

M@Foxglove,TaranakiNZ

Virtue lies in simple lines
Unencumbered by the times,
Same old song's familiar tune
Breeds contentiousness's classic rune....

"That worrisome and trouble lurks
So deep in thoughts, where trouble works."

Shed ye the dark within, old friend,
Then whisper, soft, thy song again.

M@Foxglove,Taranaki NZ
5th February 2023

Object or subject, a misogynistic twin
Sewing paradigm shift’s generational whim.
From exceptional woman to pedestrian man
Flows abuse from birth to beyond the pram….
A seismic shift in entitlements class
Paints a Promethean twist to a white camels ****.

Martyrdom’s surrogate threat is at rest
When ubiquitous *** is put to the test,
Where ardent desire is balanced by blame
With the hint of precociousness tinged, with shame.
Gentility sacrificed, shabby at best,
As virility's vanity fails the test.

Slumming in alcohol, hookers and drugs
Worming it all with the snails and the slugs
Tasting a virginal, transcendent plan,
Proffering opportunities chance in a man
Offering she, now…. to give it a whirl……
Magnanimously, Babe, in his ****, fool world.

M.
A surreptitious observation of “they” at play.
29 January 2023

It was with considerable sadness to learn of the recent passing of Bass local, Wally Marks.

For many years Wally operated plant-stalls at South Gippsland markets...including Wonthaggi and Grantville. He specialised in the bargain-basement bush business.

He was pushing 90, near deaf, failing eyesight, and could barely stay upright in a stiff breeze. In his lifetime he had the smarts and energy to make a bob or two. So, grafting-away at his advanced age was purely optional. It obviously gave his life real meaning. He enjoyed meeting people, having a chat, dispensing advice, and transacting. It was his opportunity to socially-connect on his terms. Moreover, he was very driven in his endeavours  – perhaps the legacy of a pretty tough childhood back in England.

Inside his living room there was a dust-laden photo of a remarkably handsome pair on their wedding day. His better-half had died long before. Muttering under his breath he once declared this had coincided with the time ‘everything started to go wrong’. However, he was the most stoic of individuals, and not prone to self-pity. His therapy was to busy himself out of his often self-induced loneliness. This was all the more remarkable given significant physical disabilities.

Outdoors, he staggered around like a cat on hot coals. When the weather improved he went native, un-self-consciously sporting nothing more than an unflattering, oversized pair of underpants. Sometimes even less. This gave the rather surreal impression of being in the presence of a venerable Indian mystic. Hobbling along, he would grasp at every approaching physical support within arms length. He would seed, plant and propagate, by which time there was no remaining energy or inclination for the more mundane task of tidying up the accumulating crap. Or perhaps he simply confined it to his peripheral vision.

Consistent with his exceptional stubbornness and independence, any attempt to assist him clear the mounting backlog was met with the most emphatic refusal. He liked it just the way it was, and didn't give a hoot what others thought.

He did not ask for any favours, nor shy away from speaking his mind. Ordinarily, compromise was not the subject of negotiation. Conversely, he was very forthcoming and helpful with advice to his customers. There was a soft side to him, but it could be eclipsed by his exceptional mental toughness, independence and defiance.

Somehow, he would load up his van every weekend and drive to the market de-jour. One expects he was sweating on the advent of driverless vehicles to enable him to continue for all eternity.

Wally had no compelling need to endure all this, and in reality no longer had the physical capacity to do so. However, he purposefully and courageously willed his way through the process until the day his spirit was snatched away. Snatched, but by no means meekly surrendered. His life therefore was one of purposeful struggle. Which made it full of meaning, or conversely as meaningless as those drawn to the fervent building of elaborate sand castles at low tide. Take your pick.

It may be argued his life could have been more comfortably spent. But comfort was not in his lexicon. He was not your born-again Ikea man, and clearly did not treat his home as a pristine retreat from the minor calamity outdoors. Indeed, his inside and outside worlds were indistinguishable, even for his beloved four-legged friends Curly and cat. Socially, this was obviously problematic, but it did not seem to bother him in the least.

If cleanliness is next to Godliness, Wally was certainly not currying favour with Him upstairs for more advantageous treatment in the next life. He could have received any amount of more earthly assistance, but he steadfastly refused. Indoors, he gave the rather melancholy impression of a man defiantly protecting the spirit of his dearly-departed from the unwanted incursions of latter-day intruders. If she was not there to manage it, then  no-one would, not even Wally himself. In so doing, he forged an eerie symmetry between the slow decline in his physical state and his chosen surroundings.

Wally was a man who ran his own race. Unlike most, he was not in the least shaped by the whims and expectations of others. If the measure of a man were the lasting impressions left in the memories of his contemporaries, whether favourable or otherwise, then Wally’s life was a significant triumph.

RIP Walter.  

Pete Granger DDA, Tenby Point, Victoria, Australia

There's a mist in the air in this beautiful place
And the cows in the meadow are grazing, apace,
The light hangs thinly on threadlets, serene,
In curtains of diamonds' oblique blue screen.
The frost clings white to shards of grass
Sculpting rolling hills a-gleam like glass.
For wherever I travel, wherever I roam,
There's nowhere on earth like the Hills of Home.

Yonder the green-ness rolling in hills,
The beauty of which, immensely fills,
My heart with a gladness, my soul with joy
A replete-ness my spiraling mindset employs.
For whether in Spain or the peaks of the alps
Or delving in tussock or diving through kelps,
Wherever the wondrous, whatever the thrills....
Nothing approaches.... my Homeland Hills.

A tingle abuzz, All my senses a-flair
Anticipation's delight is filling the air
A feeling pervades as I gaze out the door
Seeing mountains and blue skies, majestically, soar.
Watching rolling white clouds and the green hills, perform
And the pounding pulse in my chest, is the norm....
And the brilliant smile which beams from my face
Makes these Hills of Home.... My Most Wonderful Place!

M.
Foxglove@Taranaki,NZ
28th December 2022

There but, for the grace of God, go I…..
That wizened one on corner bench
Balding with a wrinkled eye,
Challenged by his verbal clench.

He holds forth with a knowing tongue,
In cadence, difficult for me,
Phrases from a wheezing lung
In yesterday’s lost repartee.

Pedantic, in occasional  way,
Quite racist in the words that flow,
Combative to retorts, I say….
Breed angrily, response….. I know.

Wishing to avoid offense,
Impatient, in my need to go,
I interrupt, to make amends
And flee with fleeting smile to show.

Thus the way of late, it seems,
Curtailed in his ancient eye,
Impatience with the aged dreams,
Communication cauterized.

Hurt,  I see the face withdraw
Bite the sentence from the tongue,
Quiet….but  the look implores
Condescension has begun.

Agh, these days go thinly by
The telephone now rarely rings,
Words are short twixt he and I
A hollowness this silence brings.

M
11th December 2022
Foxglove@Taranaki,NZ

Read the words upon the page
Depicting how was such an age
That, then, ensconced in everyday
In truth, permitted Hell to play.

Where age with all it's wisdom gleaned
Should logically be rightly seen
As guidance for emerging youth
Where past mistakes impart as truth.

Though tragically, bereft as seen,
The actuality now doth scream
For youth doth relegate to grass
Aged wisdom's pearls.... as shattered glass.

Dispersed amid the flotsam tide
Lies that which salves salvation's hide,
Lies that which wreaks of God's works, twist,
Dispersed through cold, Alzheimer mist.

The waste of ancient eyes at rest
Expelled, devoid of life, at best
But should a crisis start to burn
Old minds may co-opt young to learn?

History makes the paradigm
That thumps the lesson home, with time,
In squandering the wealth of age
We burn the story, tear the page.

Now delegated to the shelf
Immersed in indignation's self
Old wallow in blue pity's taint
Inhibited by self restraint.

But then the moment comes around
When happenstance, by chance compound,
When youth, of clear complexioned face,
May stumble into mute disgrace....

Thence whilst the Angel trumpets grace
Whence in that vacant, silenced space,
Then flows of wisdom tumble thine
From lips that spake in ancient time.

Knowledge held in Holy Grail
Empirically forth then, when regaled,
As pomp and circumstance decreed
Should all, combined then, .... be agreed?

M.
9th December 2022
Foxglove@Taranaki,NZ.

Conspicuously stupid with smart undertone
Is the trait of dystopian mankind, alone.
Behaviorally infectious, totally unsound,
Sociologically rooted and collectively bound
Where the best and the worst all globally group
Midst that loud  Machiavellian Boy Scout Troup
All ideologically reckoned as the worst of their kin
Being Trump, Bolsanaro, Kim Jong Il and Putin…..
Racing back to the Stone Age to critical mass
Calling “freedom” and “human rights”, an ***…..
All cultures and creeds reach low tipping point
Where delusional madness inherits the joint,
Where they all buy bitcoin to shoot for the stars
And end up debunked on real estate… MARS?
Ha!
M.
Midst the clamor and cacophony of my fellow man!
September 18 2022
Planet Earth

Abruptly rearing up a thousand feet out of a thousand miles of flat South Australian desert, a massive plateau with near vertical flanks. Rich red coloration of the abrupt cliffs which separate it as a different world from the surrounding terrain and topped with a mantle of dense, pale green eucalyptus gumtrees.

Unbelievable to approach, seemingly impossible to perceive, like a rearing giant brontosaurus amid the sands of a vast hot flat swamp.

A part of the Flinders ranges in South Australia, it is populated by huge, solitary grey kangaroos, screaming flocks of pink breasted galah's and a *** pouri of rapacious and venomous snakes and spiders plus clouds of ******* blowflies the like of which you would never wish to encounter again.

Hike on the narrow switchback trails and you will sweat a river of perspiration, the incessant heat of a burning overhead sun will have you running from sparse shade to shade. Precious little cover afforded by the spindly gum trees, the ascent is steep and the reflected glare and heat off the burning red earth will have you visualizing the instantaneous relief of a tankard of chilled frothy ale in no time flat!

The Wilpena Pound is a genuine wonder to behold. In a country of scores of vast geographical and geological wonders, Wilpena is unique in that it is a complete surprise to come upon and spectacular, beyond words. Not to be approached lightly or ill equipped it is reminiscent of Arthur Conan Doyle's fabulous  "Lost World". This giant uplifted plateau is uncomprehendingly isolated, challenging and massive.
A truely incredibly monolith, this vast structure is indeed unique and brutally rewarding to those few who venture forth seeking adventure in the challenge that is WILPENA.
One of a multitude of wild wonders of inland Australia.

M.
December 1998

I met her there last week, swathed in her earthy robe.
She spoke of incidentals, her aches and pains, the need to continuously gather firewood, the pro's and cons of forest life...the loneliness.
When prompted, with a gift of good tobacco, she told me of her best love. A youth of such tender beauty, of such delicate expression...and exquisite passion....and so brief an encounter, just four lost days of the most intense sensation.

The realization of love.

With the rising morning mist the curling elevation of senses spiraling within, beyond the sen-sate, beyond the purr of ecstasy,
beyond the mortal, mind numbing bounds of ordinary expectation...

And then he was gone.

"Leaving me as you find me now", she said, "old bent and depleted....but unsuspectingly, I find myself replete... for I have touched the very face of God and kissed the Devils hand".

She smoked her pipe, sitting quietly with me by the fire, she gently thanked me for the tobacco and the companionship and bade me, farewell with crinkled old eyes of good humour ....
and with that, and the knowledge that I had met someone of consequence, I took my leave.

M.
For Patty

As the rain teems outside the bathroom window, pelting like bullets against the double glaze,
I look into the mirror and see that huge scar extending around my right side, pink and shiny. It moves independently top to bottom, once cut never to be the same again.
Bulging unnaturally, there is a cannon ball within. Somewhere twixt the decapitated kidney and the sliced pericardium there lies a presence which I can never ignore. Solid and intrusive it inhibits movement and gives perpetual discomfort. It was never there before the operation, it has always been there since.

Gazing up into the 77 year old eyes I hate what I see, where there should be the  gleam of victory having vanquished the foe, instead I see the beggarly hallmarks of a victim.
The pallor, the network of suffer lines around the eyes. The lifelessness and ague of expression, the absence of vigour and the lack of will, of endeavor.

Not always is this so.
On good days I spring out of bed with the early light of dawn, smother the awareness of the cannon ball with two Panadol, swallowed with rainwater from the tap, prior to cleaning my teeth.
Striding down the hallway accompanied by the scampering cat, (leading me indelibly toward her bowl for food).
Cracking open the tin box and performing the ritual of the morning pill take… (6 with milk)
A cup of scalding hot tea, strong, sugared, with a touch of milk.
Then off to work with purpose, anesthetized against the ****** thing. Anesthetized against the negativity.

All my life I’ve been physical, proud of my muscular ability to achieve anything I set out to do.
My wife once said to me, “Marshal you never ask yourself whether you can actually do anything… you just do it!”
Those were the days!
Now I attack jobs, on the good days, and convince myself that something of the old spirit remains …and it does, the thighs pump, the hands, dexterously create…. The project grows and the spirit within soars….
Alas, two hours down the track with the cannon ball weighing like a tonne of lead in my gut and the wondrous physicality expired, I haul my weary self up the hill with the sure knowledge that I can no longer hack it.

Somewhere, in the twilight of my days, I have to come to terms with the limitations.
Celebrate the good and accommodate the other.
For I have faced the ****** foe and survived…and for this I must elevate myself....and be supremely and positively, grateful.
For I live and love...For what more can a man ask?

M.
Foxglove@Taranaki, NZ
25 August 2022

People come, people go they waft their way through life
Some have stern direction, others wield the knife.
Most leave little impact, a superficial touch
A special few impart much more, some give far too much.

A filigree of lace around a latticework of charm
Entices one to seek to know just why your words disarm.
For there, beneath the superficial self, behind your smile,
Lies a raw depth of talent which quite dazzles for a while,
Leads me to seek the secret story, hiding in your eyes
Confirming your creations….Which come as a surprise.

Once touched and found familiar, warm associations grow
Leading to expectations shared as friendships know
That these will stand the test of time enshrouding mutual trust
So when abruptly terminated…. Our feelings turn to dust.

Such is so with poetry, associations grow
Expectations generate anticipated flow,
One awaits with pleasure, new creations to the fore,
Awaits the stimulation proffered, offered, at the door.
There’s a well of warm familiar, a sisterhoods decree,
That isn’t quite but could be said to be, dependency?
So when abruptly terminated, feelings turn to dust
Like a death in the family….What must be, as it must.

Such is so with poetry, they come, they go
Little warning given, little passion shown.
Some simply turn the page, seek new pastures, green
Others wrinkle mouths and vent, viciously, their spleen.
The quiet ones just fade away, fade into the mist
Emphatic types, excuses, they so rightfully insist.

The Blush, my friends, Hath Left the Rose, the wilted petals fall
To now, the Great Departed souls, We wish… God speed you all.

M.
HP in August 2022
For my old mate, Wint.

In the quandary the future holds for us now, that climatic extremes become exponentially more extreme, that deterioration of the natural order of things accelerates to the point where mankind can no longer comfortably exist, where rising coastlines inundate dramatically and inexorably, where food can no longer be grown on the Eastern side of the nation, where the western side of the nation is inundated with continuous rainfall, where land values plummet on one side of the nation and soar on the other, where the population is forced to flee unwillingly, screaming outrage, from one area to saturate another. That social disorder breeds the seeds of revolution in the face of the chaotic inequities being suffered at the hands of governments no longer capable of coping with it all.

The sage words of Sir David Attenborough echo down the corridor of sudden shuddering inevitability in that the scenario described above pertains to NOW not further down the track, not to some distant future….it pertains to our brittle, susceptible world of NOW!

Environmental analysts are screaming the message that deep ice sheet temperatures are rising dramatically, glacial thicknesses reducing forcing mass calving into warming oceans. Oceanic salinity is reducing and oceanic current velocities and directions of mass flow are radically changing with catastrophic effect on weather patterns globally.
Ionosphere particulates and mass atmospheric pollution is changing the nature of our skies, increasingly they metastasize to phenomenon’s of extreme which flail oceans and land mass with violence and unprecedented wrath.

In 1997 the Kyoto Conference conferred, (with a sense of great nobility), in that 90% of the nations of the world were represented and agreed, after exhaustive debate, on a programme of emission control and environmental conservation….they all congratulated themselves and each other on the intention of the monumental climatic task ahead…..and went back to their home shores and did precisely NOTHING!
After paying lip service to the great speeches made, after preening themselves with the glowing mantle of adopted environmental responsibility, they went back to their respective governments and conceded to immense political pressures and kick backs of Big Oil, Big Money and the Banks.
Political concessions had to be made for GROWTH, ideology was cast aside for the immediacy of Nationally urgent issues…. MONEY….the economic necessities of the moment…(In time we will get around to the Kyoto crap and that irritating child, Greta Thunberg)!
In Truth…..
The responsibility lies with the main polluters, China, India, USA, Russia, Europe, Japan and Brazil. All unwilling to acknowledge, all unwilling to submit to the pain of real emission control. All unwilling to realistically unite to combat the environmental Armageddon, now, at their doorstep.
Russia, for example, is more willing to start a war with neighboring Ukraine, killing thousands of fellow Slavs, brutally destroying infrastructure and priceless artifacts, sending millions to flee in terror to the West……instead of dealing with the monster in the room of thawing permafrost over the vast steppes of Siberia or combating the enormous sinkholes that are occurring with profusion in the East of that land. China will not communicate productively on environmental matters with the West despite rampant, continuous air pollution in Beijing and the problematic encroachment of desertification from the West. Brazil allows the systematic felling and burning of vast areas of its rain forest annually for the development of commercial palm oil plantations… thus destroying forever a significant amount of what represents the lungs of the planet, the Amazon rain forest.

The planet will force the issue, it is applying an in-ignorable  force now….EVERYWHERE…..ISN’T IT?

The two primary polluters must come together to show the way, The USA and China have to get into lockstep, forget their combative ideology’s, forget their nuclear standoff, Come together as survivalists…for that is what they are. Formulate an immediate plan to combat the atmospheric pollution, the runaway acidification of the expanding oceans, the steady implacable rise of the temperature of the air we breathe. Combine their technological and monetary wealth to develop new research into the immediate replacement of fossil fuels………If they achieve this, the rest of the planet must fall into place behind them, they have no choice. But the Big Guns must first, SHOW THE WAY!
TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!
If this does not happen, the words of the wise, Sir David Attenborough will apply……THEN, WE, HUMANITY AS A CIVILIZATION, SHALL END!

M.
Foxglove@Taranaki, NZ

This crystal Autumn morn, where the dew sparkles on the fresh cut lawn, where the stillness of the cold air lends an absolute clarity to the
alpine vista before me.

The old Kaitake volcano with its vaulting flanks of Kamihe forest with outcrops of massive Rimu and Miro, Tawa and giant, towering Mamaku tree fern. Deep dark ravines tumbling down to fast flowing, clear water streams and moss covered, black boulder waterfalls.

Everywhere the sound of the Dawn Chorus, birds of every description voicing their celebration at the start of the new day.
The honk of the Paradise duck marking his turf in the cattle paddock, Two magpies perched on the very top fronds of a giant tree fern, warbling their unique song to be answered by another pair off in the undulation of the crisp green hills in the middle distance.
Tiny wrens and fantails flit amid the branches uttering their contribution to the swelling music of the morning.

The rapture of the song in the crystal silence and the golden light of the dawning sun throwing the  profile of the mountain ridges and the forest into a glory of deep dark shade and glowing gold contrast.

This moment, this magic moment swells my heart with joy.
The wondrous beauty before me holds the innocence of the key to my utter happiness.....I throw back my balding old head and roar with laughter with the complete  joy of it all.

M.
Foxglove@Taranaki, NZ
8th April 2022