WOW, isn't that lovely?
Would you call your child that? Would you leave them there,    
   hanging without a piece of    
   identity to clarify just what  
   *they are?
Would you leave them there
   without a beautiful name that
   suits them dearly like: Grace,
   Hope, Joy or Micah, Joe,
   Ben?
Would you call your child Untitled?
No?
Then why would you call the
   poetry that you've raise from
   an idea and helped it to
   develop Untitled?
Be careful, poems have
   feelings too!

Lights flicker
      Blood drips
Brilliant mind
      At my finger tips
Don't look now
      Gotta think quick
What have I done?
      Oh! I know a trick
Slice it up thin
      Tiny little bits
So much mess
      Hmm, maybe a mince
Red and juicy
      Smells so devine
Mouth watering
      Just like last time
So heavenly
      It should be a crime
Down to the bone
      I carve a rhyme
My name etched like stone
      A deadly shrine
No where left to go
      But back into my mind
.
   .
      .
         .
            .
               .
                  .
                     .
                        .
                           Until next time....

From quiet homes and first beginning, Out to the undiscovered ends, There's nothing worth the wear of winning, But laughter and the love of friends.
Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953), British author. "Dedicatory Ode," Verses (1910).

Dear Parents

Thank you for deciding after two years of marriage to have a child, me.
Sorry I wasn't the boy that so many of my family desired, sorry I was late, sorry that you missed the "Rumble in the Jungle", if it's any consolation I know who won.
How I came to be is quite beyond me. Father's family disliked mothers and vice versa. Dad a steelworker, Mam a trainee chef, dad flipped a coin with a mate, my mother was the stake.
Four years later sister came along, then another four years the son, that so many yearned for made an appearance.
I saved my sister's life from my grandparent's dog, lost an ear in that battle, a bit like Van Gogh. Plastic surgery at seven, still hate Cocker Spaniels to this day. I tell everyone I saved her from a rabid Doberman (I know parents, there's no Rabies in Great Britain) what did I get for my trouble? A stuffed white cat and a sister that I made sit in a cow pat.
Thank you parents for sending me to a school that made other kids suspicious of me. A welsh medium school, might as well have been Hogwarts, but they taught me well, (I can swear in five languages) and read and spell.
Dad taught me how to head ****, mam you taught me how to make cake.
My sister taught me how to share, my brother taught me how really not to care. Live each day as if it may be your last, I told my brother that often.
Dad, one of 13 kids, mam one of 3, like me. Dad, I hate your sisters that are alive they remind me of the Moirai, or the three witches from Macbeth, I've tried to like them but I'm terrible at lying, and to be honest they are in their late 70's so they must be close to dying.
Mam, your sister is a lesbian, I think her army days gave that away. Your brother like mine a source of consternation a Navy man that never went to sea????
Now, my grandparents are all dead. Apparently, I have inherited my father's mother's temper. She disappeared for 3 days when she thought she'd killed my grandad!
I'm married now, no rug rats thank God, I'm aunty material, selfish and wicked.
Now, this sounds I know a little quaint and odd, but I know we've had our share of bad luck, but, 42 years wed, still in the family home, surrounded by trees, neighbours we've known for years and people we'd like to poison. But,we've laughed so hard mam you have a hernia, dad you are the male equivalent of a ****, you'll be flirting in the OAP home **** yes, sorry parents as one of your three I get to pick the residential home! And, as they say,that is a good life.
Jo **
P.s I didn't mention our family mental illnesses, early 20th century communism, possible adultery, coveting the neighbours Ford Capri, or pet cemetery in the garden. I'll wait til all are dead then spill about the good secrets.

I see you in the Fall
The red leaves whipping in the wind like your hair flowing behind you.
The chaotic movement connect to something
strong
sturdy
safe.
I see you in the fall.
The wind screaming in my ear
like you when the schizophrenia kicked in
terrifying
but beautiful
in a broken sort of way.
I see you in the fall.
Like the flowers that bend towards the slightest glimmer of sunlight
just as you would hold onto any ray of hope that came your way
like it was the last time you'd see it
I see you in the fall
as the trees show their branches
it leaves falling like your hair did
Beautiful
despite it's baldness
I saw you in the fall.
But now it's winter and like the leaves on the trees
You are gone.

Take my hand, as we walk this terrain.
To the place where upon a branch a woman was hanged.
For stealing grain to make bread, ensuring that her children fed.
Look upwards, crane your head, a woman killed for baking bread.
Now, take my hand and look overland, where grains of sand make up this barren land. From barren life hanging in a tree, to barren sand eroded by sea, come to me. Come away child.
Let's build a sand castle and forget the fear in grains and sand.

The next time you hold in your hands,
The tiniest little grains of sand
Think of how precious the smallest things can be
Like diamonds, or newborn babies feet.
Then think of the world as a grain of sand
Tiny, precious, and in someone else's hands
If we're lucky, they'll lay us gently back on the beach.
If not, by tomorrow we'll be within the tides reach.

Rita heard the doorbell go
A-DANG-A-****-A-DING!
She put aside her favorite book
And ran outside to take a look,
But at the door, well wouldn't you know
She didn't find a thing!

She went inside and sat down
And then it went again,
A-DING-A-****-A-****-A-DANG!
The doorbell chimed, the door bell rang,
She ran outside and looked around
But once again in vain!

Rita felt so very cross,
"I've had enough!" she said!
Instead of rushing back inside
She looked for somewhere she could hide
And found a patch of comfy moss
And made herself a bed!

It wasn't long when Rita heard
A-DING-A-DANG-A-****!
And there upon a fluttered wing,
A hummingbird began to sing,
Such beauty in his trilling words
That Rita joined the song!

When the chimes came to an end,
The hummingbird looked glum;
He gave the bell a mighty clang,
The door bell rang, and then he sang!
And Rita laughed at her new friend,
She'd never had such fun!

Smiling still, she went indoors
To read the next few lines;
Short-lived was her tranquility,
And solitude was not to be!
She giggled as he played once more
Those humming door bell chimes!

Rita bustled busily,
To decorate each room
With jack-o'-lanterns, giggling ghouls,
And grinning ghosts with dribbled drools,
And moonlight glimmered spookily
On ghastly painted tombs;

She went to fetch her costume
And hoped it wouldn't itch;
She grabbed a strange and pointed hat,
An odd shaped broom, a stuffed black cat,
And in the mirror of her room
She turned into a witch!

A sudden tap-tap-tapping
Came from her green front door;
She opened it excitedly,
A-wondering who it might be
And then she started clapping
And dancing on the floor!

Her good friend Fox was outside,
He wore a long black cape;
With plastic fangs, he danced about,
But when he sang his fangs fell out!
They laughed so hard, then went inside
And had a slice of cake!

Rita was a battery hen
And every day was bleak;
For her, life's stage was just a cage,
And meagre corn her only wage,
But things all changed for Rita when
She learned that she could speak.

She overheard the farmer say
"That cage is getting weak,
That's not just dust, but flakes of rust
And if the hens gave one quick ******
They'd all be free to run away
And we'd be up the creek!"

She waited till the dark of night,
Then pushed into the gaps;
The bars were old, the bars were cold,
It seemed as though the bars would hold,
But Rita shoved with all her might
And felt the cage collapse!

She ran right out the farmyard
In the moonlight, dim and pale;
No more is known of where she's flown,
I hope she found a lovely home,
Perhaps she'll send a greeting card
To tell of her next tale!