Radiating twilight, and are the deer awake?
Grey and ghostly shadows come a-gliding through the break;
Wolf and fox and boar are here, glowing through the may,
So far away in Chernobyl about the break of day.

Evacuated city sleeps abandoned now and still,
Stunted trees and weeds grow rife, the air is dank and chill;
Contaminated apples wouldn’t tempt old Eve to play,
So far away in Chernobyl about the break of day.

Classrooms lie with open books, and shops with open doors,
The soccer stadium’s overgrown, the fairground Ferris snores;
Vines climb up apartment blocks, old washing hangs and sways,
So far away in Chernobyl about the break of day.

The monster that is always near lies mumbling in its sleep,
Cracking, shedding toxic dust as Geiger counters bleep;
Post-apocalyptic scene, atomic age Pompeii,
So far away in Chernobyl about the break of day.

My ragged wings are black as night, my eyes are cold as sin;

the crows and rooks and magpies, and the jays, my nearest kin.

I am a rogue and vagabond, I raid the nests of Man;

I’ll steal his golden trinkets and I’ll take whate’er I can.


Some fools have tried to trap me, and yet others have their guns,

but they who think me stupid little know what’s to be done.

Some others think to bribe me for to leave their crops alone;

I swoop in with my brothers and we take their kernels home.


To superstitious folks who see me perch upon their roof,

a new born babe will follow, for that is the Devil’s truth.

Yet down your chimney should I flit, beware the Reaper’s blade!

Within the year cold death shall come to master or to maid.


So look outside your window now and see what I may do,

If on the weather vane I sit, then rain shall come to you.

But if me and my brothers all do chatter, jack and caw,

then pray we are mistaken, for we tell of coming war.

Winter gives way to Spring,
life returns anew to the land,
and so the ages pass.

Deep within the Greenwood
a figure stirs beneath the mossy bole
of a venerable holly tree.

Melting ice falls glittering
from a fold of velvet.
A thin wind whispers in the whins.

Startled, a song-thrush flits wildly
over ragged brambles,
the dawn sun gleaming in his wide, black eyes.

It is time, once again,
for someone to re-awaken
the sleeping snowdrops.

Small hail rattles petulantly
against leaded attic windows.
Below, in untended gardens,
a child's broken swing creaks
where unkempt brambles
scratch at cold night winds.

In the abandoned nursery,
where faded draft-blown drapes
brush toy-strewn floorboards,
a dappled, paint-blistered rocking-horse
sways faintly on a fleeting, moonlit stage.

Where innocence long since died,
a legless bear leers at a blind rag doll.
A jammed spinning-top lies rusting
upon a hopelessly scattered jigsaw.
A ***** Harlequin slumps in depression,
his wanton Columbine gone forever.

From the torn, once gaudy, pages
of a faded, open book,
mocking rhymes echo
insanely down the years.

Crockery elopes with cutlery,
a suicidal mouse runs out of time,
Humpty mimics Lucifer . . .
and a little boy laughs to see such fun
as Old King Cole
steals your adult soul.

Shivering, she hurriedly draws
the bedroom curtains,
catches her nail in the fabric
and curses her dying candle.  

Sarcastic concern echoes from the bathroom:  
“Are you alright, dear?”

She raises the finger in his general direction:
“Oh sure, I just love November power-cuts, don’t you?
Some romantic weekend this turned out to be!”

But there is no disguising the smell of fear.

Out in the backwoods
a loping presence sniffs the air,
and crunches ever nearer
over drifts of frost-rimed
fallen leaves.

Hanging motionless
in warm, tropic seas,
sun glints on fin as
diamonds dance.

Ungainly giant,
head without body,
balancing existence,
suspending belief.

She walked through pastures green
beneath an oppressive sky,
warm July drizzle drifting down
over web-strewn hedgerows,
bejewelling her coat
and forming tiny pearls
on her long, black lashes.

Lost in reverie, she ambled
slowly down hill towards
a reed-edged stream
where, she recalled,
small birds chased midges
when the hot sun shone;
but not today, when humidity
stifled their flight,
keeping them close by men's houses
in search of scraps
and small, errant insects.

Absently, she noticed the long grasses
clinging wetly to her legs,
and as dim thoughts lumbered
through her bovine brain,
wondered if she and her sisters
would be taken away for milking
before the downpour broke.

She walked through pastures green
beneath a chill October sky.
Thin drizzle drifted
over web-strewn hedgerows,
bejewelling her coat
and forming tiny pearls
upon her long black lashes.

Lost in reverie she ambled
slowly downhill towards
a reed-edged stream
where, she recalled,
small birds chased midges
when the sun summer shone.
But not today.

She noticed long strands of grass
clinging wetly to her legs
and, as dim thoughts lumbered
through her bovine brain,
wondered if she and her sisters
would be taken away  for milking
before the downpour broke.

“They believe everything they read,
but they don’t understand a word of it”

Yeah, right . . .

“They say the world was created in six days,
but they never worked a day in their lives”

That’s so true . . .

“They say the world is the centre of everything,
but they’re at the centre of their personal universes”

So I’m told . . .

“They say a lot of things,
but they’re so busy talking that they don’t ever listen”

Guess so . . .

“I’m telling you, Lucifer,
we should’ve stuck with the giant lizards”

….. and with that God sadly
put down the phone.

Well I’ve lain in the dirt now for many’s the year,
and I’ve seen cowards fight and I’ve seen brave men’s fear.
I’ve witnessed their laughter, their songs and their tears;
I’m a spent cartridge case on the Somme.

My body is rusted and bent now with age,
ah, but once I was young, full of hatred and rage!
Back in 1916 history turned a dread page;
I’m a spent cartridge case on the Somme.

It was my destiny on the first of July,
as the larks sang above in a cloudless blue sky,
for to sentence a young soldier boy there to die;
I’m a spent cartridge case on the Somme.

Now the guns are long silent, the trenches are green,
and a peaceful sun shines on a poppy-strewn scene.
White headstones cast shadows where heroes have been;
I’m a spent cartridge case on the Somme.

This morning they found me, and out from the clay
I was pulled by a man in the harsh light of day,
just a small souvenir of a tourist’s brief stay;
I’m a spent cartridge case on the Somme.

One day, gasped the Dying Man,
your Empire will be nothing
but a tale in a history book.

Your great cities will lie in ruins,
and your very language
will be dead.

You lie, said the soldier
with the spear,
stabbing upwards.

A vagabond faints
in a wayside gutter,
a ring of scarlet patches
showing through unclean skin.

A great lord spews red froth
across a bed of linen,
as his lady watches helplessly
through a veil of tears.

A skylark sings high above
a half-ploughed field
where Piers lies choking
in the fresh cut furrows.

A harlequin sprawls
grotesquely swollen,
cap and bells twisted
in a masque of death.

Awkwardly leaning forward, sloping over damp, brown earth,
stands a young boy’s chiselled memory.
Above rooks caw incessantly in budding branches,
yet little ever grows beneath the great yew’s venerable shadow.

Here beside cold, forgotten, lichened stones,
thin pale weeds strain for scarce obtainable light.
Small insects forage through fallen leaf litter
whilst passing squirrels move swiftly on, sniffing decay.

Lettering barely legible, a long-dead stonemason’s art
serves only now as brief refuge for tiny red mites;
and yet for those with eyes to see a tragic tale is here,
a tale two hundred years in the telling.

“Hic Iacet Poor Benjamin,
who did Fall into some Awful Vat
within his Father’s Manufactory,
whereby he Perished,
Scalded like a Cat.
No more the Trees of Youth he’ll Climb,
for Ten Short Years was all his Time.”

Awkwardly leaning forward, sloping over damp, brown earth,
stands a young boy’s chiselled memory.
Above rooks caw incessantly in budding branches,
yet little ever grows beneath the great yew’s venerable shadow.

Saturday evening, it's early, so early,
before all the bright young things come out to play;
5.30 down in the pub by the bus station,
paintwork is peeling, it's seen better days.

Up by the juke box a man in a faded
old jacket stands baffled, a coin in his hand.
Names flash before him in gaudy confusion,
he can't find The Searchers, his favourite band.

Three women gossip and shriek by the window
where pale light illuminates glasses of gin;
Elsie's a pensioner, Maureen's a widow,
and Dot buys a round from her last bandit win.

Up at the bar big fat Ronnie's demanding
they switch on the TV t o see if he's won;
Got a hot tip and he stuck on a tenner,
he'd better not tell her indoors what he's done!

Smell of stale ***** permeates from old Billy,
he's been drinking Guinness since quarter to three;
last night he was nicked by the cops on his way home
for taking a leak underneath a park tree.

All human life is arrayed in the bar room,
it's where people come when they've nowhere to go;
seeking companionship, happy the hour,
when somebody talks to them that they don't know.

Desolate rock-strewn mountains
lit by cold sunlight

Prayer flags flap in
ceaseless Himalayan winds

An armless, broken Buddha smiles
from a desecrated temple floor

Warm sun gives its blessing
to rolling blue-black cloud-band.
Sudden wind blows coldly
across the greening meadow.
Tall young grass bends helpless
before its unknown master.
White tailed rabbit runs now
for bramble-burrowed refuge.
Knowing magpie chatters
up high within tall oak tree.
Mare and foal seek shelter
beneath the may-thorn hedgerow.
Butterfly flits wildly
towards safe dry-stone walling.
Heavy now the teardrops
of saddened springtime weeping.
Rain pours like a torrent
down ancient foot-worn pathway.

Yet like a swallow flying,
so soon the squall it passes!

Sunlight glints like jewels
on dripping rain-bowed flowers.
Blackbird sings to blackbird
from branches decked with diamonds.
Steam arises gently.
from muddied flanks of cattle.
Furtive feet bestir now
to seek the heat of noontide.

Little Eliza she cries in her cradle,
Benjamin crawls on the rug by the hearth;
Hannah stirs soup with an old pewter ladle,
Jane’s picking blackberries down by the garth.

Mary and Lizzie attend to their baking,
Billy’s a carter out learning his trade;
wee Tommy follows - a man in the making -
gathering horse-dung with bucket and *****.

Widowed at forty with eight children living,
Mary, their mother, cleans houses by day;
money is short and the work unforgiving,
asking for strength, on a Sunday she’ll pray.

Thomas, her husband, was killed at the sawmill,
working long hours to put shoes on their feet;
times they were hard, nothing ever came easy,
but sweet was the love shared in old Sugar Street.

Elizabethan manor house
beneath a bleak October sky;
where black crows call from moss-stained trees
and hapless leaves hang where they died.

No breath, nor breeze, despoils the day
that fades now in its lowered gloom;
beset with clouds, a weakling sun
casts little light into the room.

Through mullion windows’ diamond panes
a manicured garden lays;
in muted fading colours now,
with mem'ries of hot summer days.

Electric candles flicker gold,
from panelled walls gaunt portraits stare;
old Lords and Ladies long since dead,
view everyone without a care.

And as the guide concludes his tour
and visitors head for their bus;
a small child glances back to where
he made an ice-cream-spilling fuss.

In black and satin stands a man,
his doublet slashed with crimson fine;
a drooling wolfhound at his side,
he bows in mockery, divine.

Started back last summer with
a piece of bad news.
Why us?  Why now? What have we done
to deserve this?  But no-one is to blame.
And  you try and make the best of things.
You say "Nah, that can't be right!
They must've got it wrong!"
But they haven't.  
They most certainly have not.
For these are the end days.

And so from then on you try to
carry on as normal, whatever 'normal' is,
praying for some kind of miracle,
hoping against hope that one will be granted.
You smile like an idiot at strangers,
trying to be friendly, looking for support,
but looking plain weird,
your emotions in a whirl
and your feelings jumbled.
For these are the end days.

You go down the pub, have a beer,
play cards, laugh if you can,
but it's always there,
a shadow hanging over you
like the ace of spades,
poised to slice you in two.
You try and joke on social media,
post a little music, just to keep sane,
but your heart's not really in it.
For these are the end days.

How long do we have?  No-one knows.
And if they do, they don't answer directly.
You make your own daily forecast
in this new and strangely sad world.
Sunny skies one day, cloudy the next.
You have to stay strong whatever happens,
yet you fear the inevitable worst.
We are grateful we have good friends
to help us through.
For these are the end days.

Life is a gift.
Gratitude for what remains
is more helpful than resentment
for what’s been lost.

Our days are wicked short
and terribly beautiful.

All we’ve got is this one breath,
And, if we’re lucky,
we get another.

Upon the headland is my place
where seabirds wheel and turn apace,
a-screeching windblown tales to me
of distant lands and distant seas,
of sparkling beaches, gleaming quartz,
of strangers and of foreign ports,
of shark and serpent, kraken, whale,
of ships that foundered in the gale,
of sunken vessels, bones picked clean,
of hagfish writhing and obscene,
of ocean currents, plankton’s bloom,
of those that spawn beneath the moon,
of coral reef and rainbow hue,
of lava and volcanic flue,
of devastating waves and tides,
of those who lived and those who died,
Yet little does this mean to me
as I stare silent out to sea,
where seabirds wheel and turn apace,
upon the headland is my place.

Unnoticed, beside the hedge,
I watched them embrace.

She, body arching, silk snapping,
oblivious in her white-hot passion.
He, all the while,
behaving as if drunk;
snared by her feminine wiles,
paralysed by her clinging grasp,
shocked by her sudden forwardness.

I passed that way again today,
but they were gone, those lovers.

All that marked their passing
was his drained husk,
spinning madly
upon a broken,
abandoned web.

So long ago in King Hal’s time, our nets we cast upon the wave;
and drawing in did stand a-feared at what we’d caught in Orford Bay.

Entangled ‘midst our dripping catch, with eyes that stared all hellish green,
enscaléd like some creature deep, a Merman writhed as one obscene.

All webbéd were his hands and feet, his body dripped with ocean bile;
upon his head the ****-wrack grew, green-bearded was this demon vile.

Fast to the shore with awful haste we sped before the wind and tide;
Lord Glanville for to summon forth, the Merman’s fate all to decide.

Upon the quay his Lordship stood with men at arms and shriven priest,
and all did cross themselves in fear before this strange unholy beast.

“Enchain it,” cried Lord Glanville loud, “then to God’s Kirk with all good speed!”
The shriven priest prayed long and hard as to the church we did proceed.

With Holy Water, cross of gold, with candle and with testament,
the priest then exorcised the beast, who knew not what was done nor meant.

To all’s dismay he would not bow before the Host on bended knee;
and so to dungeon was he dragged to dwell upon his blasphemy!

The silent Merman beaten was, and hung in chains in for seven weeks,
and fed was he on fish and shells, yet never did he sleep nor speak.

And so at length his Lordship said, “Across the harbour tie a net,
and we shall see how he shall swim, but by his ankles chainéd, yet!”

The net a-fixed, the village folk came down to see the Merman’s plight;
into the sea they threw him then, with foam and wavelet flashing white.

He vanished ‘neath the waters like some seabird in pursuit of prey,
then surfaced laughing, chain in hand, and to his Lordship he did say;

“You thought to make me such as you, who walk in blindness o’er the land!
You’d punish me for difference!  You thought to treat me like a Man!”

So long ago in King Hal’s time our nets we cast upon the wave;
and drawing in did stand a-feared at what we’d caught in Orford Bay.