Child,
Don't worry if the shoe fits
**You can always walk barefoot.

They preach
Don't be a sheep,
But ******* it
This wool is warm.

On Sunday’s Canvas
our footprints sketch a path
across the sand.
Out of focus, others dot the beach.
Hands drawn tightly together,
our talk ebbs and flows.

This is Sunday’s Cove,
the rim where rivers end and tell their stories.
Afternoon sea and sky run together until
we are surrounded by what we feel.
Sand shines in a festive way.

Here at the edge of the world,
night is celebrated with wine in a water glass.
Beyond the surf, we do not hear the silence.
We wake every morning to brush new paths.

It's a picture from better times
Long gone by
Cousins sitting in the doorway
Full of smiles
Still too young to dream
Just happy to be alive
But there is hope and happiness in all of their eyes
And enough life
To last forever
Enough dreams vested in them to fill the world
And I look at that picture
From so long ago
And I notice that the paint
Is scarred and worn
That dirt mars the door frame
But you know
Their smiles are so bright
That it doesn't really matter

They’re really rockin’ in Bradford,
Off the Pennine Way.
Deep in the heart of Yorkshire
And round the Robin Hood’s Bay.
All over South Ossett
And down to New Farnley.
Roast beef and Yorkie Puddings,
God’s Own County, Yay!

Yull see ‘em rambling at Ilkley,
Right to the county line,
Sheffield steel and Wednesday –
A football team so fine.
Better still, Leeds United,
Greatest club of all time.

Yorkshire, Kings of Cricket,
Oh what a boon!
Get down that wicket,
We’ll be champs by June.
Down a ginnel or snicket,
See our Olympic Champs.
Coal Miner Picket,
Relight those lamps.

Racing pigeons and ferrets,
Stereotypes tha knows.
Over t’top in Lancashire,
Them there’s our foes.
We’re the greatest county,
Our pride really glows.
We know you all hate us,
It keeps us on our toes.

So we’ll be rockin’ in Yorkshire,
What more can I say?
Us Tykes 're as barmy as Barnsley,
So I’ll be on my way.

Paul Butters

(With due thanks to Chuck Berry and also The Beach Boys)

my hands are stitched in love, i'm an ever-growing garden of laugh lines, my eyes are swirling galaxies of patience, my thoughts are made with care & carried out with passion, when the walls move closer to me & my heart starts beating too fast, there's a voice in the back of my skull that whispers "slow down. this too shall pass."

& you are that voice in the back of my skull,
the passion in my actions,
the care in my thoughts,
the patience in my eyes,
the reason for the laugh lines,
the seamstress who laced my loving hands

even on my weakest days when i swear i can drown in my own tears, you can bet your life that i will swim every time because you are my guide and you'd kick with tired legs across an ocean before you'd let something as weak as pain drag you underwater

i have no capacity for apathy,
no fear of what's in front of me
cause i was born from
a gentle warrior
who never let me wonder
how i'd make it through.
she always knew
exactly what to do