Would you believe it
One in the morning
Of a Sunday dawning
A couple of kids
Thought it might be good
To travel back along the tracks
(After all they had missed the last train)
"Scary ", I thought,
But at sixteen anythings fun
Even a death run.
In a Sunday dress and shoes
Meant for prancing not stony floors
With rats and that
Into the black
(And it was when the tunnels
Neatly bent)
Not a thread of light to be seen.
The lad in front
And I behind, trembling slightly,
But did not mind,
Watching for trains appearing blast,
Into the cut away hollows' cast
Many stations we did pass
Along the platforms quick and fast,
After about six miles
Just as the sun began to smile
We two, laughing, very tired
Saw the steps cut in the side
Up a steep and grassy *****
Through the churchyard
Like two ghosts,
Along the empty, silent streets
Hoping not to meet
A policeman on
His morning beat.
Home at last and into bed
Please don't do what I have said.

Love Mary

Thank you Roger for being such fun.Love Mary xxxxbig

Private people you know the best
They leave out what is unintended
The bits of lives you never ask for
So free is this space that friendship
Flourishes unhindered to imagine.

Love Mary xxxx

The hurt came
Unknown to me
But I felt it
You gave it to me.

Love Mary xxxx

Give back the tree that stood by the gate
Casting its shadow to the south
Cutting hedges in half
Protecting the smallest of animals
From the hottest sun.

You have been a horizon from a silled room
A fragrance guided by light
Tomorrow's promise of another
And the gap left is a silence
Remembered when I cry .

She never had big enough eyes,
That's what I thought looking in the mirror,
And they were blue, so in photos
Always looked faded.
They were taken from my father,
The colour of speedwell in the meadows,
My mother's were hazel ,nearly brown.
Like my brothers.
Eyes are the entry to the soul it is said.
Over the years I came to like them.
Quiet eyes that lay on the surface of a canvas,
A painting created by a friend,
Who saw the beauty in them.

Thank you Ian for my  painting .
Love Mary **

I remember you
Do you remember me
We were just together
But we shouldn't be
Then you sat me down
And you touched my hand
Then you sat me down
And I turned around
And my heart did leap
The words were shy
Then you sat me down
I began to cry
In a silent place
We then embraced
Then I turned around
And I found your knee
And what was forbidden
Had to be.
I remember you
Do you remember me.


Love Mary **

Changes the way I think of you;
It means you go beyond
To another plane
Where the heart of another resides
In its separateness
And enter.
Fearing not the disruption
Or consequence upon you;
Opening your fortifications
The historical bindings
To embrace a colour
Never mixed before
And spreading it
As a blanket on the ground
For us both to sit upon.

Love Mary **

I will not know you little child
Or see your shining eyes
Look up at me.
Never trace that tiny face
And hold you upon my knee.

It is a sadness I must bear
But bear it tenderly
With a love that knows
No infinity or finality.


To Victoria and Pieter for their baby
Love Mum ***

The sea a sheet of molten gold,
Shimmering under a fiery sky,
The beach was deserted,
Sailing craft secured against the night tide,
Carefully built sandcastles awaited their obliteration,
A few seagulls picked over picnic wrappings,
I stood, alone, as the the sun dropped below,
Allowing the darkness over the horizen,
It was the end of another wonderful day,
And I felt full of gratitude for the chance of being born.

Love Mary **

Sometimes out of the throbbing chaos
A voice speaks with compassion
And for a short while
One is lifted
Above the clouds
To where the blue
Is crystal clear
And the sun
A circle
Of returning
Appreciation.

Love Mary x

Standing on the bridge looking down stream
The sunlight a curtain through weeping leaf
Trailing their ends in the moving slowness
Of a shallow children filled patch of crystal.

Love Mary **

Running outstretched to meet the birds
As they took flight at the field’s edge
Faces brimmed over with bright light
Pink boots left the ground, jumping
And hearts filled with the watching.

Love Maryxxx

I tried to give you my beauty
Learnt at my mother's knee
Of Wordsworth and the grasses
The hilltops and the trees
I had a little garden
And hours of golden fun
Hands brown with sunshine
Our laughter could be sung.
Underneath an open window
A little girl swings
Swaying her new dolly
While the blackbird sings.
Pictures of moments
Are all that I am
I give you my beauty
I lay it in your hand.
I know I am not you,
Wanderer of the stars
You beauty is of a different kind
But the choices we made are ours,
Underneath the heavens
Looking at the sky
We met in the middle
And beauty was not shy.


For my Loving Roger from Mary ***

Tiny, so small,
Not really there at all,
Arrived in the night,
To all our delight,
Came the morning light,
The sound of the birds,
The sun over the horizon,
Your first words;
And from your cradle,
I lifted you,
Only a handful,
My eyes full of dew,
That little cry,
Lifted my heart!
Us two together,
Never to be apart.

For my children, Katharine ,Alexander, Victoria and Elizabeth Kearns

A photograph captures  a heart ,
It is a sensation
A fixture in space
It tells a story but not of the sitter
Or scene that is taken
But imagination
The thrill of captivation
The concentration of inspiration,
So when you look at a photograph
It is the artist you see
Colliding with what could be.

Love Mary

When I draw you I create both of us anew,
Your form fills my eyes and I am moved,
I take from you myself, and all my idiosyncrasies.
You are my voice calling its name,
I try to find what is beauty,
Through line and mark and scale,
I give this back to you as Love,
A drawing on a page.

Love Mary

At some point
One realises
It has always been
About someone else.


Love Shakespeare

Here comes Margaret, it is nearly four
Takes her all day, to get out of doors
Makes it to the park
A few hundred yards
And back again, slowly, within the hour.

As she returns, Roger sets off
Carrying a note book
And wearing a cagoule mac
A five mile walk, twice a day
And factual writing recording his stay.

Wind direction, southerly, position of the sun
Underfoot weather conditions
A man on the run
Ducks on the pond, birds in the trees
How wonderful it is and all free.


Mary has a black car and rarely walks
Since losing her husband she rarely talks
The pavements are a sadness
Carrying memories of happy times
Walking together on Sunday afternoons.


Pat, goes gently, her knees are bad
Many operations has got her this far
Stoic disposition she loves the flowers
Looks at the gardens for many an hour.

Walkers of the roadway, kindly, unite
Giving to each other love and insight.


Love Mary x

A fairy in a dress of snow waves to the plastic butterfly,
A six pointed star watches as the painted bird sleeps
And ceramic leaves make circles in the wind.

Mr spaceman , all in red, nods to the dinosaur and says,
" If it weren't for you I'd never have seen the globe of blue",
The boy on the backyard fence cries,
And the Christmas doll lets down her hair
For the very first time.

Love Mary **

What does one forget with years
Is it the exactitude of ordered days?
The way slippers slowly wear out
And don’t get replaced until xmas.

I rarely comb my hair before midday
Or open the packages at the door box
The future goes under the bed to sleep
The past a comforting scarf red striped.

Love Mary ***

If I could leave behind Beauty
In whatever form that may be
The fall of light across a curtain
An apple on a pear tree
Putting together
Moments  of minute grace
Privileges unspoken
Things that only I can grasp
Then to this world I was not useless
But like a fallen Autumn leaf
Beauty in its structure
Though its life maybe but brief.

Love Mary ***







Love Mary

Sunflowers have no reason
To feel sad
Their petals fall off
Leaving seeds for next year.

For us it is different
Our endings filled with tears
Our hearts break the silence
Our love was it all.

I'd rather been a sunflower
Its seeds fed to the birds
Its flowers giving magnificence
To one and all.


Love Mary ***

Until March the Peacock stayed in
Keeping his eyes to himself.
Afraid of the rain and coldness of earth
The snowy harsh ice.

But Spring filled his garden with flowers
The trees fluttered with bees
And the sunshine on his feathers
Asked him to open his wings, please!

For a Peacock is a man of display
Loved the people as that passed
Stalked the grass of his grounds
And fanned us all at last.

Love filling a blank page
What it says at the end of its days
Is what two people made of it.

Love Mary x

I wonder if we were together long enough for the weeds
To grow along the fences and in the ditch by the wall
If we would become cement.

Love Mary x

Between my heart and the page
There isn't any gap
The page needs no looking
My heart does that
It flies there inside me
Strokes across an age
Gives the world a truthfulness
That is handmade.

Love from Mary x

Evelyn
For you are beautiful
Unknown mystery
Washed in the waters
Blown by a breeze.

Waking each day
To the sound of cat's purring
The temperature of sunlight
Through curtained leaves.

Can you hear our loving
Feel together our song
We ride on your heartbeat
Shape ourselves around your body.

This is now
Between today and soon after
We wait in the doorway
Of futures unlaced.

Love Grandma

Without tenderness the world dies
For it is the only emotion
That prevents evil
It is the most powerful
Incorporating compassion
But not intellectually based
Coming from a deep sense
Of the fragility of things.
Unfortunately it may be selective
In fact usually is
And as such weakened
By virtues of taste.


Love Mary ***

Speech came easily that day
The day before it happened
Gaiety lay on his shoulder
Shimmering September sun
They had hoped she would
But neither mentioned
So he never definitely knew
And never would
For he drowned
****** under by
Dangerous currents
Just off coast
After attending
A friend’s funeral.
Beatrice is now
Twenty or more
She can but dream
Of the father
She never met.

Love Mary

INSIDE THE OLD GREY SHED.

Inside the old grey shed
A path leading from the house
Flower beds and
Grassy turf
Guided each
Advancing step
In children's eyes
This was a den
A place far away from men
Dusted by the wind and rain
A window with a broken pane.

And on this day,
It was particular
A female cat had
Birthed her kittens
In the old discarded tent
Blood stained with
The afterbirth.
It was the children
Who on their visit
Found something moving
In a corner
Afraid to touch
Called their father
This day remembered ever after.

A hand open to reveal
A bundle of softest fur
Curled together in a ball
Like an angora whirl
Three kittens there within
Newness in their pinkish skin
The children held them
Side by side
Watched as their feet did dry
Opened up their floppy ears
Spoke gently so they could hear.

Of the three they kept but one
Called her Lucky just for fun.
Next door took number two
The other one went quickly too.
Mother cat was rather wild
Fought her sadness
Took a while
Never settled sad to say
Had to be put away.
Lucky our special cat
Lived 18 years on our doormat .

Love Mary **
Thank you , Lucky our black and white cat.

A bird, not heard, flying high, some sky
Over meadow, above sea, see snow, landfill
So flap the palest of wing up lifted it sings
His secret only known is carried into flow.

Love Mary ***

Looking down from such rare and breaking site
To watch transparent wings flap the velvet sea
Ounces of oceans drained from chalky white cliffs
Where grasses took root and flowers windy peep
Peering  between yellow gorse on Tennison's Downs
We children, ran parted the *****, daring the edge
To be found, and there stood toes rolled gripping
Where grass meets air, the sparkling waters
And sailing ships, tugged the sea in mystery.

Love Mary **

There is a place I'd rather be
Where the world is clear to see
No direction, cannot breathe
Only saints are trouble free
How to wait, patiently,
For the time set down for me
Travelled all familiar roads
Came to a halt, no longer bold
All that is and all that was
Is what I gave and what I lost
For my life I say but little
I loved it so and want to get better.

Love Mary **

Oh to trudge up the lane
In the heat of the sun
Keeping to the near side edge
To face on coming cars
I would the wildest flowers, pick,
Hold them in my hand
Wrap around a handkerchief
With an embroidered band.

As the upward ***** straightened
A bungalow came into view
With my mother's gardening shoes
And a flower *** or two
How I loved this moment
My heart turned to glee
All my inside whispered
Soon be here with thee.

Love Mary your daughter **

The little girl who opened
The world of clinking shells.

Love Grandma ***

By the wall sat I
Dressed spread out
Tear in eye
On my knee a baby boy
Borrowed bundle
Of treasured joy.

Love Mum

Thank you to Pam for sharing her first baby
With a young girl.

Bronze through Autumn
Light strings across path
Leaf as nugget on branch
And me running to meet
The boy of my dreams
Through shadowed steps.

Love Mary **

Sorry for the inconvenience
Forgive the trouble
Tried all sorts
To do my best
Watch me flickering
As I say goodbye
You were the best lights
I could ever buy.

Love Mum ***

It was not to be Hoppedy!

I never made it past the shed ends,
Back to back at sixty five,
The gates for the everlasting
Had been closed down early,
When it came, to my days ride.

Shame as I turned that corner
Making  a maturing point,
Realising what life wasn't
Opening the seeds of delight.
But it was not to be Hoppedy!

Love Mary ***

Rain, midnight rain, nothing but the wild rain
On this bleak hut, and solitude, and me
Remembering again that I shall die
And neither hear the rain nor give it thanks
For washing me cleaner than I have been
Since I was born into this solitude.
Blessed are the dead that the rain rains upon:
But here I pray that none whom once I loved
Is dying to-night or lying still awake
Solitary, listening to the rain,
Either in pain or thus in sympathy
Helpless among the living and the dead,
Like a cold water among broken reeds,
Myriads of broken reeds all still and stiff,
Like me who have no love which this wild rain
Has not dissolved except the love of death,
If love it be towards what is perfect and
Cannot, the tempest tells me, disappoint.

When the truth is withheld
The world feels cold
Frostbite in the soul
Tiredness old.


Love Mary

There is love
Then there is great love
One may only every know
That there is one kind.



Love Mary **

On the longest road was our home
At the top where the road flops
Bending slightly to the east
From pebbledash to brick clad
This bend left our sight undone
Could not see when Mum did come
Round the corner in her coat
Carrying all the food she'd bought
Gentle corner I loved your curve
Gave us time to put away
Prepare ourselves for all to come
Especially the comfort of our Mum.

Love Mary **

Summer meadow you are calling me
The red poppies standing as swaying trees
Heads of corn tall in the light
My dress shimmering white
I have the picture in my head
Also in my album bed
For this day of moment's power
Etched upon a life-time's file
In the shade you came to me
Held me up so I could see
The love you had and let it be
In the meadow wild and free.



For my Roger and a wonderful day we spent in Essex.in 1968/9

I hope you understand
I know that not be easy
Short we are on intuition
As canker binds the vein.

Withered soul outpouring
The tempest grass flowing
I hope you understand me
Sad it be if not.

Love Mary ***

I feel your pain trickling down my neck
Catching the crevices in my neck folds
Placing a hand where it hurts the most
I know you did, you tried and you cried.

Love Mary xxxxx

Maybe in the fields where the mice run free
And the flower stems reach two feet high
Where the air circulates in the sky
And the soil is devoid of pollution
Only here is there a chance
Of  miracles.


Love Mary **

How to get there, that place of pity
Where others really mean theirs
Instead of fumbling like a demon
On stain glass and missing the boat.

Hope fell out the window of waste
Those who are fortunate can scream
But the rest stripped naked near die
Empathy is an old fashioned word.

Love Mary **

Daisy Mau is up and down
In and out and round and round
Beautiful as a red- lipped child
Brown eyes under a feathered brow.

A humour that is humankind
A heart of passion and fur- lined
Wanders through a poppy field
Crimson sadness at her heels.

Sensitive to all her days
Cradles honour on the way
Daisy May your sun shines bright
Treasure it and hold on tight.

Love will find you,  no need to seek
The world will open, and not be bleak
Hand in hand the years that pass
Will lead you on to touch the stars.

Stay awhile and sit by me
My darling Daisy you'll always be.

Love Grandma x

When the hour is darkest,
And not a wind comes near,
Know that you are complete,
And who gives a care.

Because, by truth, few are stirred,
Most, complacently out of ear,
Only those, who hear the drums,
Say this life can't always be sung.

Love Mary ***