We are all dust.

Mere chaff blown on the hot winds of an African summer long ago,
when the world was fresh and humanity still sailed on clouds of air we soared above the baking earth and knew the freedom of the stars, not tethered to the ground in bonds of flesh and bone.

Dust we were and dust we will become again, in the end it's all the same.

Just dust!

We sit together at separate tables,
two bitter old nags who share the same stable,
once we shared every beat of the heart
but somehow we ended up miles apart

Walk then,
touch the silent acres,
dew pond wet
with shining grass unbroken,
a day still new,
wrapped in promise newly woken,
bare feet make the morning

No love
No hope
No freedom
No voice
No future
nothing is the absence of something
and that can mean everything!

Butting heads, locking horns
the difficult child of three
if any one was causing grief
It was always going to be me,
a stubborn chip
from a stubborn old block
never at ease we two
so I left and made a life for myself
far from the one you knew,
you pushed too hard
to tie me down
I went and you felt betrayed
you never saw my need to go
I could never see why you stayed

How many dreams,
how many wild and uncompleted schemes,
how many words
and the infant ghosts of poems I will never write
do I leave on my pillow at the end of every night

Wool gathering

Not writing

Fear has taken my words

A lone and hungry wolf

Hiding in the fold of my mind

I cannot think

My thoughts drift

Like smoke through a window

Out into the air and the light

Where I dare not follow

We were given a lovely world
but we trampled it and mashed it
beat it up and trashed it,
nobody else to blame
we did it to ourselves
and it's such a ****** shame,
we can't walk away,
we can't say I quit
we made this awful mess
now we have to live in it

She was always there
Britain's loyal royal friend
Working to the end

Leaden angry sky, why wear a sombre suit
dyed lantern grey to match the ocean’s roar
a shredded howling wind completes the set
it stings and sings a siren song outside my door,
be off, be off with you I say
go find a better attitude and temper
I do not like the mood you bring today

A favour granted

Is not willingly gifted

The clock is ticking

Postcard memories,
a sky too blue
and a sea too green,
shown in brighter colours
than they ever could have been

My heart is my gift

burn it on the fire

fuel of my desire

to keep you warm

through any storm.

When the wolves of life

are prowling

outside the cottage door

breathe in a little smoke

and know I love you evermore

Life, that divine eternal spark
did it really start
as a shot in the endless dark
or were we fated
to be created
neatly planned
by a pencil
in some vast immortal hand!

Four hundred years I stood  
a mighty oak of vast and stretching limbs  
until I fell, and then I lay,  
the home of scurrying beetles that you see today,
an old maid with a cap of spider lace
quite peaceful and content within my resting place

The shapes of sleep

Day smoke that flows throughout our waking hours
released to tease and twist our darkling thoughts to landscapes, cities of the quiet mind

Shadow towers defined by nothing more than fancy and a little fact
the unassuming act of pressing day on night

Unconscious distant learning stoked by fear to feed and keep its belly still, and a little yearning when we need it

Our treasures taken from that mental box we keep

unlocked, explored and plundered deep

The grey and somewhat shop - worn curtains, covering the shapes of sleep

Burn me
Bring down the heavens
Bathe me in milky light
Crushed pearls under our feet
Love me like the hurricane
you were
Our youth has flown
The tide has turned
Passion speaks eternal
A sounding voice to call all souls
Clarion song and tocsin bell
ring out for lovers

The sands of time
crunchy little bits of eternity
will one day grind to dust and scatter in the wind
everything ends, and begins and ends again
a sense of everlasting instability
is the only stable thing we have

A bond of light

Finger strong

Yet soft as the touch of skin

A silken thread forged in the heat of breath

Milk fire

Burning souls

White Hot

Cool as midnight

Blue Calm

Smoky and intense

Joining hearts and minds

Passion-Bird

Flying free at last

Liquid Sunrise

A burning arrow

Of dragon flame

Between us

We hunger when the grey doubt wolves are prowling around our doors, sniffing at the latches as we crouch inside

Our ears are stuffed with hopeful thoughts because their song is one of want and we cannot ignore their dreadful music

The newly  ******, searching for a light that won't be found

Chasing every spark, in search of faint salvation for our fragile shrunken world but mostly for ourselves

Stitched with good time memories and thoughts of better days to come

Thrown shadows, lit large on walls that once we thought were strong have lost their charm and turned from fortress into prison where we hold the keys to melted locks

Ravening, for days not so long passed when we were free to live in this tattered world of haves and have nots, when all are hungry the howling begins

Let green grass cover you

A daisy covered cape of spring

One last growing living thing

A counterpane of flowers

To mark away the hours, months and  years

Until the tears run dry

On the earth in which you lie

Advice not taken, words not heeded

The sharing of wisdom

Not wanted or needed

Now I am older and I know

Seeds on poor ground

Take some time to grow

Under darkened skies
Hope is our new horizon
Always up ahead

There must have been a time
When the world was quiet
just the moving trees and the breeze
and the waving meadow grass
When did that moment pass?
Now and again away from the din
a little stillness creeps back in
Maybe it’s been there all along
With its peaceful non-existent song
Perhaps we just forgot how to listen
to the silence!

Walk then,
touch the silent acres
dew pond wet
and shining grass unbroken,
a day still new
wrapped in promise newly woken

Some people like introspection

And quiet reflection

They don't need connection

To give them direction

A soft warm wall

Keeps reality at bay

When cold winds blow

Wrap yourself away

Stop the breeze on your thoughts

Bringing new ideas

To much comfort contorts

We all need a little pain

A shower of rain

It makes  us reflective

Sweeps out dead leaves

And gives true perspective

Winter's cotton collar is white
spring wears muslin sprigged in green
summer is floral poplin
and autumn cinnamon bombazine

I hear his footsteps on the floor

Waiting just outside the door

On carpet like they had before

We don't have it any more

I wonder who he's waiting for!

Life is a bathtub
stay too long
and you get wrinkles!

To read a book,
is a sharp descent,
and a swim in the author's vanity,
to write one,
takes a different skill,
I think it's called insanity

Not quite strong enough to pass,
although I try,
and beat with painted wings upon the glass,
the world beyond the window is where I want to be,
success is the garden, the butterfly is me

Depression,
a dark and empty place to fall
a tube of silent closing walls
which sneak on in and wrap you tight
they **** the air and drink the light
to leave you crushed in body and soul
a resident of the rabbit-hole

December night
plays at sip my shadows through the door,
drunk on light
it drains the glass of this short day
and dims the sight
like many winter days before

Three kids in a car

Two fast asleep

One awake

It was always me

Too much to see

Sipping on the mystery

The drama of silent midnight

Abandoned buildings wet with early rain

Still broken and brown from a war I had only heard about

Moonlight on shattered windows

Papers fluttered

A pub sign blew in the wind and squeaked as we stopped at the lights

And a painted peeling 'Jack the Ripper' moved in the fog

I closed my eyes and only looked a little bit

Enjoying the thrill

Safe in our solid old car with the radio playing softly

A pea green family tank to protect me from the darkness

The sleepy watcher at the window

Who had no idea she was a writer in training!

The Ice dogs are howling

Hear them roar

Loose on the wastelands

They mean war

Patrolling at the margins

Looking for an ‘in’

Listen to them calling

Let fighting begin

Scarred of greying muzzle

Torn and rent of ear

They sing throughout the ages

A song of blood and fear

The world will always listen

To their glory tales of  war

We invite them to come calling

As they raise an armoured paw

Then we watch our soldiers falling

As we always have before!