The cordoned off cricket pitch,
behind orange tape long,
is waiting for the grass to grow
for when the summer comes along.

The leaves are shedding their autumn gown,
upon the grass it lays,
and in her winter-time-zipped-up coat
a small girl runs and plays.

The benches around the park border
sit solemn, scuffed and lonely,
if only someone would put them back together again
before they become broken debris

The sky lengthens overhead,
a puzzling sight to see,
it stretches forth over the horizon line
buckling past the old oak trees,

and the people walk in straight lines narrow,
concentrating on the ground,
if only they’d look up not  down,
they’d see the city’s teeth and not it’s frown

for Barry and Tina*

Life experience is something I haven’t witnessed,
the fitness of waking up and going back to bed
50 years on the trot.

But I look to my father’s hands and see
all twelve-thousand morning mists
he has seen.

A gristmill heart, grained hands
and workshop walking feet are
all hidden from view.

He writes in capitals, written
with precision, and crosses the T’s
as he goes along,

So not to prolong the sentence writing chore,
making more time, conjuring up the minutes
to potter around and mend unbroken objects.
-
Life experience is something I haven’t witnessed,
the fitness of waking up and going back to bed
50 years on the trot.

But I look at my mother’s hands
and see remedies read about in those magazines,
all to look younger in the staff canteen.

A watermill heart, smooth iron fingers
and contoured, sculpted chiselled
corridor feet are all hidden from view.

She scrawls her sentences; they become the tide
hiding letters and numbers in the swell
of punctuation and dotted I’s,

The T’s cross themselves and she moves on,
another phone call to attend too or
a new BBC this-time-more-accurate historical drama  to view.
-
Life experience is something I haven’t witnessed,
the fitness of waking up and going back to bed
50 years on the trot.

But if you keep on going, stay out of strong sunlight
so not to rot, those years will pass
as a striking blur leading to coastal Big Sur
roads, where the next 50 miles
bring just as many smiles as the last 50.

They lowered him on string,
his face unshaved and the coffin unhinged,
nothing broke his fall but a green cloth dressed in
storage-cupboard-fluff,
the first death of the second month.

Around him they said silent words, empty sentences
stretching the length of derelict paragraphs: morbid monologues
for the man who used words to **** up women
and tell them they were beautiful without them ever seeing it,
understanding it,
knowing if he was legit or not.