Buying, vying for space in the crush.
Queueing, rueing the race to spend.
Sighing, desiring a place to sit,
a vacant seat another target.
But this time shaded and discrete.
A place of grace to contemplate
what pleases and how it teases,
leaving the blight of appetite.

His wife and he, they tried to see
what differences they defended,
where calmness was the casualty
and tranquillity upended.

They struck them down, each in its turn
to please the other's whim,
until no fault was there to find,
and boredom settled in.

Some say you can't read someone's thoughts.
Some claim to read them like a book.
It's phantom pages may engage
but I move on from thought to thought.

Those readings choke like a bindweed cloak,
coiling, twining, transmuting brutes.
Stereotypes shape many folk,
stifling, stunting valuable fruit.

'You're frowning,' she said.
'It can't be that bad.'
He switched thoughts, creating
plausible lies, hiding,
protecting regrets.

Things done, never undone
left to sink in the silt
of the best forgotten
growing into islands of debt.

The number one of many mounds
in Suffolk's shrouded Sutton Hoo
is savage Raedwald's resting ground,
shipboard treasures the only crew.

His iron helmet and his sword,
his shield and spears and silver bowls,
rich remnants of his royal horde
declare dominion over souls.

Who would bury me with treasure?
No weapons, just my worldly goods,
my Sunday suit, not made to measure,
my poems, written just for pleasure.

I'll just read the birthdays now.
Good gracious! Is he still alive?
It's getting late for fifty-eight.
I thought he'd taken his last bow.
How much more can he survive?

I see he's still on fifty-eight,
while she's now owning to forty-five.
What will tomorrow's lot contrive?