Eyes in the darkness...
do you not see them glowing
beyond your camp-fire?
Saturday, 19 November 2016
Wednesday, 9 November 2016
Saturday, 5 November 2016
Seventeen
First five syllables
then seven syllables more
then another five
And to my mind, each
line could stand alone, though these
obviously don't....
Thursday, 3 November 2016
Tuesday, 18 October 2016
Morning haiku for Ben
Southern Rail
Naming my blessings
i lie in the night awake
scrolling your options...
Thursday, 6 October 2016
Tuesday, 27 September 2016
Mount Brandon Haiku
(for Alistair, who is climbing today and sent a picture from the top)
Heart sings with the view
the paint-splashed frenchman's trouser
fills my day with blue
Thursday, 15 September 2016
Monday, 12 September 2016
Thursday, 11 August 2016
Sunday, 7 August 2016
'The Library Suicides'
The structure, and the cinematography and the beauty was like a kalaidoscope - image folded into dazzling image and then unfolded again into a darker and disturbing perspective...
Sunday, 31 July 2016
100 words July 1966
July afternoon 1966
I was at girl-guide camp
(believe it or not!) and,
saturday being parents' visit day,
mum drove over to take me out
(rescue me!)
We went to the nearby village
where the cobblestones on the edge
of the street were plastic -
they were filming Dr Doolittle -
yes, the original!
I think we saw Rex Harrison -
him they called Sexy-Rexy -
talking to the animals and
one or two other actors
dressed to kill
And some of the shops had a TV
lurking in the back room...
A draw! ...Score!... no, wait!
'They think it's all over...it is now!'
100 words
The bluest sea and sky today
first meet my eye
and the joy of the dogs released
to run free
through meadows of green -
fern-scented its childhood memories,
bright yellow Ragwort, covered in the ladybird red-black cinnabar moths,
earliest sharp-sweet blackberries...
Down through the still-wet woodland
paths, sharp left at the small-holding
with its smell of chickens
and its optimistic morning
washing-line;
on to the edge of the holiday village
and the first walkers,
everyone of whom is greeted
as a long-lost friend
by 'Kitty'
And home over the hazy cliff
to coffee...
Saturday, 16 July 2016
Saturday, 9 July 2016
'there must be those...' (adrienne rich)
it's the little things -
let's meet at the horizon
where the lines intersect -
greet each other's tears
with a dance of sorrowing
as our smiles reconnect..
Wednesday, 29 June 2016
Nailing my colours...
'Earthling.' I will not
stand beneath your flag. Only
this. Love, truth, beauty...
Sunday, 26 June 2016
Oh England
Channel-browsing last night, we came across Ralph McTell on a keyboard in that far-flung field at Glasto, where presenters hang out...as he began to sing I KNEW that the chorus would contain words which have haunted me all my adult life:
'and the echoes of the green hills run down the city streets' he sang, several times
So there we have it...that line must have come from the flip-side of Streets of London. I never owned anything else by McTell and my subconscious has retained the words all these years.
Now, what to do with them?
Tuesday, 21 June 2016
Thursday, 2 June 2016
Kitty's Field
Musing in the sunshine, while Kitty runs, jumps and rolls in her favourite field, I imagine in some distant future, a neo-stone-age campfire conversation near the beach:
'And then you skirt Kitty's Field, you know, at the top of that ruined cliff railway. It's called Kitty's Field on all the old maps, but no-one remembers why...maybe there was a railway cat?'
Saturday, 28 May 2016
That sort of morning
Refreshed by wood sorrel
and random conversations about dogs, the wonderment of small children
and turkish poetry in translation,
we take an even longer way home...
Friday, 6 May 2016
Wednesday, 20 April 2016
South Beach
Strung out along the beach
like beacons
of a 'don't give a shit'
generation
last night's abandoned barbecues
Saturday, 19 March 2016
You and me
Silence and breath
the spaces in between
say more -
don't say more
breath and silence
in between the spaces
Friday, 12 February 2016
Sunday, 24 January 2016
Feeling inspired
Wandering somewhat aimessly through dreamtime, I meet my long-dead maternal grandfather, looking spry and in his middle years.
We chat about my memory of him as a bowler-hatted city-gent when I was a child - 'ah, I was much older then' he explains.
We see, exhibited on the wall of a gallery, tiles (fridge-magnets?), inscribed with individual words. These few things are all that really matters we agree - truth, beauty, love...
I wake and spend a happy hour or two planning the artwork :-)
Wednesday, 13 January 2016
My Wednesday
We walked the rope-labyrinth today
in the yellow-sun
needle-sharp rain
I was listening to 'Beloved'
on the radio
and mindfully litter-picking
Her tender paws were glad
of the sweet soft grass
as she ran
to and fro
And the world turned...