Tread lightly

Hardly make a sound

Bow your heads

A gentle soul is leaving

No footsteps ring out

As he walks

He went as he lived

Without grand gesture

Or ringing bells

Just the whispered shadow

Of a good man passing

Faces are our covers
They show the world what we want it to see and to believe

A replacement cover can make a tired old book look new

But hands tell a different story

On the ends of your arms are two gossiping wagging tongues

They always tell the truth!

A favour granted

Is not willingly gifted

The clock is ticking

The grave
a quiet place of tumbled stone
which covers cold and ancient bone
which once was warm as you or I
and in our turn we too will die
fragile life to fragile dust
we live as every creature must
fixed in time of certain span
and then return whence we began

Time to turn the pages

Leave the book open

Scribble what you want to say

Then draw a line

Put down the Pencil

Make space for a new beginning

A fresh hand can start their story

You wrote a chapter or two

When someone moved over for you

Now do the same

Let the music fade

The lights go down

Time to leave the stage with grace

It is done

Goodbye

Lonely donkey
standing in a field
munching words
not quite fitting in with the herd
all the other beasts are brown
he is green, with stripes and one ear
braying out poems
that noone else can hear
he isn’t unhappy
as he chews in the sun
but it’s hard to be
the only one

Green figs in a bowl
and a chequered cloth,
I breakfast on birdsong

When the wind blows chill

Withering fruit on the vine

It takes the music

From a poets soul

Snuffs out the lighted candle

Silencing notes that only you can hear

Rhymes in your head dry and cracked like forgotten paint

In an alley leading nowhere

The skull beneath the skin

The emptiness within

The meaning

Is gone

But the frost lives on

Winters song

You hope will bring

New hope of spring

Green shoots that bind

And heal within your fragile poets mind

Early morning tea
Sleepy hands on a china bowl
Peace in the garden

Soft falls the morning,
landing safe, on cold and somewhat soggy ground,
drops the breeze,
stills the trees, kills the sound
spreads the light, dispels a fragile finished night,
brings forth a day, still grey, who lies,
and pays his way with promises of being bright

When you were bold Sir Lancelot
and I was a lady fair
we cast our fortune to the wind
and love was free as air

When you were old Sir Lancelot
and I was a lady fair
I never thought there would come a time
when you would not be there

When you were gone Sir Lancelot
I missed you being near
you left a sad and grieving maid
your lonely Guinevere

Spring you total ****
what goes with you
you promise much
teasing us with summer’s waiting arms
yet still you flirt with winter
and make us wait to sample all your green and airy charms
it just won’t wash, the rest of us have had about enough
I know you think it’s funny
now come on out and do your proper stuff

Deep and cool green pool
Edge of the board looking down
A flight without wings

Haiku butterfly
sips nectar from word flowers
makes a poem grow

Happy is a department store
something to look at on every floor
if we know what we are shopping for
but generally we don't, do we?

Sing like a bird in a tree
Without the rage
Of a bird in a cage

Autumn leaves blow random wild
a Harlequin in scarlet cloak
spring and summer's fated child
he dances freely with the breeze
and does not seem to know or care
that harsher colder winter winds
will one day strip him bare

bone dry air crackles
raising dust in midday heat
soon the rain will come

To live only in the present
means you battle the storms of today
without a coat or a hat
you cannot plan for future weather
without the rain of the past
experience is an umbrella

Spring is ready
underneath each piece of fertile land
the heist is being planned
a plot to steal old winter's icy crown
wrapping it in warmer days to melt it down

Hey gun lobbyists
Another load of children
Just surrendered

The tiny bit that you don't see

I only keep it around for me

The one that's there when I'm on my own

Who I am when left alone

I have others I don't hide

But that's my public facing side!

You strip me naked from the neck up

Run with my thoughts and bounce them

Take everything

Leave nothing but your opinion,

A termite

Eating at the hollowed log that once was me

Woodpulp on the forest floor

Far below where you cannot see

Infinite and beautiful

In variety and colour

Fungi flower in the light of your shadow

My hidden garden of words

Blackberry sweet
elderberry shine
we cannot ignore
the approaching signs
growing along the highway
to Autumn

The past is a ribbon

Threaded with shiny beads

A curled string of memories

That once belonged to someone else

Home for the holidays
smooth brown hills
set in a falling landscape
farms and fields of winter wheat
out west beyond the windmill
arms spread wide, dancing hands
that bow to grace a fertile gentle land
what new and subtle changes lie
beneath the wide wind blistered sky
that same familiar patchwork view
perhaps the change is me not you

Wages for the buzzing bee who works for hours and hours

among the drifting summer scent of honeysuckle flowers

A whisper in the dark
heard above the rain
when everything else is gone
hope will remain

In darkness
when fear of fear itself and the unknown
ensures that certainty and other showier birds have flown
an unremarkable bird of no particular renown
will sing to you, her feathers plain and brown
no matter how hard the road, or the steep the stair
nothing is ever hopeless as long as I am there

The winged things

Feathery worries

Ills of the world

Released furies

Moth like

Tearing holes in the future

To feed their ravening savage mouths and starving offspring

A plague of stinging hornets

Free to fly and drop their bombs of despair where they will

And yet beneath this hateful cloud

Lives hope

Crushed but never defeated while it lives

Yin to the vile Yang

Fluttering slowly behind

Always there until the very end

A tiny crumb of comfort

Oh Pandora

What did you do?

Under darkened skies
Hope is our new horizon
Always up ahead

Hospital coffee
hopeful light
mixed strong with wanting dark
a bitter longing blend
which burns the mind
but does not seek to fill an empty cup
stirred with memory
amid the bleeps and whines
of a machinery heart
truly a mocha morning

My heart is a singing stone

set by the stove to warm if cold winds blow

it hums a happy little tune

when love's kettle boils

and fills a mug for two!

Spring you called, how kind
I see you’ve settled your wandering mind
you brought a leaf for every tree
and flowers for every buzzing bee
sit a while we’ll have some tea
I made a cake so I hope you’ll stay
if not, can you visit another day

Butterscotch sunset
Fades our walls to caramel
Sweet hummingbird light

Follower

Leader

Sky dancer

Wind chaser

Shadow jumper

I am horse

From the beginning

Lets get things straight

I'm not your nation

Or your state

I'm not the moon

Or anyone's world

You cannot claim me

So leave your tiny flag unfurled

You didn't mark me

Like a dog on post

Leaving your scent

So you can boast

She's my *****

Because I'm not

Use the brain cell

That you got

Think real hard

And you might see

That I am laying claim

To me!

I want to burn the page

Use my pen to fuel the ash of memory

Let my words take flight and lift your weary heart

Set the world alight in syllables of flame

To bring you written beauty in my name

Feed the hunger raw within

Satisfy the ache inside the skin

But that is where my rhymes begin

I cannot give what I desire

And write to set your soul on fire

Something deep inside of me

Demands a certain symmetry!

Dare you follow the old road?

The one that leads to everywhere and nowhere

You with your masks and Jack ‘o’ lanterns

Will you take that path into the mountain?

Where midnight pixies dance to the sound of a flaming violin

And the night birds with their wicked lonely eyes hover, ceaseless in their search for prey

Keep your gaze on the way ahead

Never look around

You don’t want to see

The darkling things that are waiting

But they can see you!

Come with me to the broken table

Give up your Soul

Sit and dine with the dead and the ****** and those that aren’t too sure

Feast with us

And leave this tattered weary world behind

Halloween is play for children

Follow me to the old road

Real darkness lives there…

A fallen idol
is a wounded bird which sings
and tries to fly on paper wings

I don’t know what will heal the world
see the colours of hope unfurled
maybe we should ban all flags
the universal rags
of sovereignty
those emblems of pride
which divide
what part belongs to you or to me
where even the sea is chopped into bits
so it fits very neatly and oh so completely
into tiny bites
with regards to fishing rights
that say where we can sail
you can go to jail
or face a huge fine
for dangling your line
into someone elses pond
we are way too fond of the
walls that were provided
by any empire
who decided
it should all subdivided
so it could take the best
and fling out the rest
like meat to a dog
while they hogged the mineral wealth
that they took by stealth
how proudly they planted their pennant
became the sitting tenant and saw it wave
over the graves of the people they had enslaved
pretend separation of each earthly nation
what is it for?
to stop us going to war?
we can be entirely sure
that wouldn’t work
because it’s happened before
maybe we need a long cold drink
and a post-pandemic think
about what we could do
to improve our sprawling human zoo
and bridge a divide that has become way too wide
it won’t work, it’s political suicide
but consider the millions who have died
did the virus follow orders
or stop at any borders
no, it jumped all the silly dotted lines
that we use to define what is yours from what is mine
and after all if not under one God, we are under one sky
so we could at least give it a try!

It's a common wish

to swim with dolphins for a while

I don't trust that fish

What's going on behind the smile?

If I could

I would write you a poem that speaks of midnight

And fill my pen with inky darkness and the bright cold light of stars

If I could

I would sing of the rolling moving sea that is never stilled

Cool grey and aquamarine would fill my palette as I brush the words

If I could

I would bring you lush hills and deep shady valleys in between

Pine green and Ochre are the threads in my rhyming tapestry

If I could

I would speak of dawns and sunsets bathed in infinite beauty

Hot pink and vivid tangerine silks gathered into a cloth of sound

If I could

I would write you a living landscape of colour to keep you warm on winter days

If only I could...

Tofu tofu
it just won’t do
the box is pretty
with its dragon stencil
but it looks and it tastes
like it rubs out pencil