#amwriting #poem #poetry Fen - 5

Fen - 5

Later we went back - dropping though the roof
tapped out by the sweet chestnut and time to rot -
into that kitchen of familiar ghosts.
In the grimy light, creeping through the crusted
single pane, that stared blank down the garden
to the playhouse next' the sump, we looked
to the shadows where once had been the cooker
and the fridge, and to the warping laminate surfaces
now thick with dirt and seeds, blown and dripped
but never quite of life.Yet still upon the wall
between black tracked damp, unturning
was the calendar stuck forever in July. We shared
a stolen No6, and let our memories run
to a fancied scene with party food,
and blue iced cake, and paper plates. and paper hats,
and a golden mat of sunlight, dabbled to the weight
of sandal'd feet. Until spooked into mockery.
We went into the living room peeled of all but
the leather settee, on which we stood to inspect
the bleached silhouette of the gun. So many summers
had it hung in the laze and stretch of afternoon
that the paper fossil trigger seemed in motion,
not as yet released. but taut against the cock.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook Fen - 5 notes

Later we went back - dropping through the roof
tapped out by the sweet chestnut and time to rot -
into that kitchen of familiar ghosts. Above
the shadow of the cooker unturning the calender
refused to move from June. Rooted in the grim light
our fancies ran to memories of party food
and blue iced cakes until in spooked mockery
we moved into the living room. The floral carpet
gone, the leather settee sat alone, we climbed upon
it to inspect the bleached silhouette of the gun.
So many summers it had hung in the laze
and stretch of an afternoon, that the trigger seemed
in motion, not released, but tight against the cock.

#amwriting #poem #poetry Fen - 4

Fen - 4

I would see her by the school gates of course.
But, who really pays attention to someone else's mother
when fighting for attention from your own. They said,
with her black eyes and hair, she could have been
a gypsy, or a Spaniard, but they said Italian, but no one
really was outside the television set. In the hip height
world of boys, and blood, she was just Luke's mum. Who held
the fasces rod, of nod or nay to pleading for an hours play
after school. When the sticky goose-grass darts
were sticking through the chain-link fence, Luke and I
became friends. Without strong feeling we declared
ourselves the best of pals, by the book-slat of paperbacks,
held in place by wire. And thus I was invited to the party.
To add to her foreign air, there were grapes in the jelly
and hard-candy cartoon characters wobbled on the top.
I killed one with a single bite, that split the head from body
and everybody laughed as we sat upon the rug, in that garden
fringed by willow, peppered out with meadow flowers.
And then came the holidays. Luke and I would meet
on the path, beyond the lane, to build dens from dead wood,
and whittle with penknives, or use them to play chicken
until a knife had cut our foot. Half way between our homes.
Just beyond the calling range. In the hollow tree we found
dead starling chicks, eaten by an owl Luke said, we each
took a skull and argued who should have the dripping eye
before we threw them in the running stream to see
which floated fastest. Then we sneaked across the horse field
to the stand of bamboo for spears, and back along the trench
of dike when Mrs Prior shouted, I didn't stop to look, just ran.
Only on days when it rained. Only on days when Luke went away.
Only after his father shot his mother, did I have to find new friends.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook fen notes 2

Mrs Prior, whose father bought the vicarage
during the reorganization of the sea
with the investmnts in Malaya, he managed to save
before the flag went down.

....

Mrs Prior, kept a shotgun by her bed
and mantaps amid the bamboo
where we went for spears. Her son
was similarly odd, wore check suits
of broadest cut, and drove a sports car
with the hood down, in all weathers.

....

I would see her by the schoolgates of course.
But who really pays attention to someone else's mother
when fighting for attention from our own.
With her black eyes and hair, she could have been
a gypsy, or Spaniard, but they said Italian -
but no one really is - beyond the television: of course.
In the hip height world of boys, she was just -
Luke's mum - who held in sway the nod or nay
to all pleading for an hour's play, after school.

....

Parties are measured in jelly and cake
and the number of sausage rolls required
to partake of the afters.

......

Each morning saw the village empty of men and cars
and enter a lull filed with birdsong. Until around ten,
Children were hustled from the settee, toast crumbs
swept from legs, and pushed out to play - and make friends.
It was all rather heraldic - the Raleigh rampant crossed
with conkers and acorns, and Clarke's shoes in clover.

.....

Without strong feeling we declared ourselves best friends
by the book-slat of paperbacks, held in place by wire -
which meant I got an invite to the party.

....

Parties are for dad's to shine.
With cricket bat in hand they defy diving boys
to get them out. Or lose in trees gliders
when demonstrating how to throw like a man.

#amwriting #poem #poetry Fen -3

Fen - 3

The harvest came in with the rattle of tinned peaches
and ham, soup, and baked beans snatched in haste, all
to the ruddy-faced cheer of the Reverand Ian. Who appeared
in his garb once a year, faintly smelling of myrrh, and
whispered Chanel, to give a speech, between hymns, of thanks.
And then we would all give our two shillings, now called
ten-penneth, into the box that hung on the wall, for Sabi,
the Indian boy we sponsored through school, who
would write a letter once a year to inform us he knew
how to spell orchestra. But for me the harvest brought
that delight of high windows, when the elm leaves redden
before turning to naught, And the shortened days
brought that light that forced the shine in paper
and a silver to the still wet ink as it dried between words.

#amwriting #poem #poetry Fen - 2

Fen - 2

There were always magpies on the tar-papered roof
of the crossing keepers lean-to. Watching the line.
Watching for the carrion swept aside by the London train.
The birds were fat, and fierce enough to fight the rats
that riddled the sandy bank, that ran into the flat
infinity of fields and sky, that almost made the track
into a ladder. They paced their perch like grenadiers,
shimmered blue in the half-hopped turn, then eel black
and milk, as they cocked their head to watch again.
On the table by the filigree gate, lay carrots bunched
by rubber bands, with silk haired roots like puppet strings
and round their crown a purple taint, potatoes bearing
soily eyes, cabbages still wet with dew, and parchment
skinned yellow onions hardened by the late spring frost.
I would wish the birds good morning, and count them
hoping for a boy, and eye the sweating gooseberries
veined within their poly-bags. Always on a Wednesday
we made this occasional trip, sometimes on bicycles
but mostly on foot, to this whitewashed house on the edge
of the world. So plain it was, four windows and a door,
with a rose bush by the lean-to, and lavender in the borders.
But what kept my fingers crossed, in the eye-spy of the walk,
was that the whiskery woman who tended to the gates,
for tractors and the doctors car, would come out
to take the money, and from her apron pockets feed me
liquorice. 

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook Fen - 2

At the keepers cottage where the whiskered wife doled out sweets
to us children, as our mother picked through vegetables.

....

In the gold light of late afternoon, the tar paper roof
of the keepers cottage lean-to shed gleam
eel dark, as it festered in its oily scent, hinting
of witches. Magpies ganged in three and fours...

....

In the golden late afternoon the tar-paper roof
gleamed dark as eels,
gleamed eel dark, festered in the oily scent
and hinted at witches.

....

In that gold of late afternoon, weary from tumble
we would weave away from the river bank
and the dens. Always without some article of play
that had been dropped, or lost, or tossed into the water
by sort excited type, unhappy at their status
within the clan.

....

There were always magpies on the tar-paper roof
of the keeper's cottage, where we went to buy
vegetables on Wednesday's. Fat from carrion
they picked from the line, and fierce enough to fight
the rats
On the outside table bunched and held by rubber bands were carrots
tinted native purple, cabbages still wet with dew,
and leathery white onions that creaked to the touch.

#amwriting #poem #poetry Fen

 Fen

Oh how I loved those Sunday walks
down lanes so lazy they made no bend,
when we would as a family talk
and say 'hello' to strangers and to friends.

At the level crossing gate when passing trains
made us wait, I reveled in the thunderous shake,
as I waved in the wake of skimming faces
and fought my sister to raise the latch.

There no feature was taller than me, but trees
and the distant bank of the hand dug cut,
and sometimes we turned in parallel
toward the cottage that sold raspberrys.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook knees

'Forgive me knees' I say, in a winded Macbeth moment
in the purgatory of the climb. The tricks of mind
see patterns now, see the rocks arranged, see more clearly
the celandine and forget-me-knots grown between
the scattered rocks one has willed into easing stair.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook christmas bikes

Behind the semi darkness of the velvet front-door curtain
we rode our Christmas bikes to the angle of the hall
and on toward the cheap grey sunshine of the kitchen,
and the catching smell of bacon crisping. Again
there was no snow. And, for all the greyness of the clouds,
no underlighting silver to hint at such today.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook day centre

We wither behind glass, outside the dampened world
of true colour, where every step and stair is marked
for caution. Wither to the clatter of the teacups washed
in the chatter of the kitchen. This place is clean, cleaned
as the fluttering knife buttering up buns and stottie cake.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook Day Centre

Day Centre

She flicks through the paper, her pinching face
in defiance of the girl who would not wear
flat white shoes, nor cast a glancing smile
as he lays the tray aside. We wither behind glass
from the dampened world of true colour.
Wither with the clattering teacups washed
in the chatter of the kitchen. This place
is clean as the fluttering knife buttering
buns and stottie cakes. Drenched in signs
warning of steps and stairs.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook poems should be growled

Poems should be growled on the flexible
stone tongues of kings. Each voiced syllable
drenched in wine and heart stopped beer.
The coated soul, more brown
than fingers burned to the line's end
and the darted eye crusted in corners
picked clean by nails that pick the teeth.

Put on your dress.
Put on the jingled bangles, and dance.

And come, and come, to the water's edge
where the drum and the word hang like phlegm.
Come, sweet pretty things, come...

#amwriting #poem #poetry #PTSD Post Trauma

Post Trauma

The puffing, dusted, lane forgotten
we veer through the green barley:
knee high, trying to cut, parting
in rasping cough against our boots.
The map does not mark this place
as more than a battle-site, with context
in the contour lines, for those that wish
to see. You want a pommel or a bullet
to justify the weary drudge of the incline
towards the summit's stone barrow
of some dead king: long robbed of fear.

#amwriting #poem #poetry Homeless

Homeless

Returning from a short break, to the syrup in the vase
and the jaundiced wilted flowers that join the gathered must,
one remarks upon how little things are greatly missed.
For suddenly in comfort's reach are those items which
have laden pockets, been dug for in bags, rued and gnashed,
and replaced. A certain grace attends to unpacking.
Spilling and spreading back into that place called home.
And the first cup of tea - made with water familiar
to the toot of the kettle that through years of training
gets poured on the edge of the boil - is sipped
in promenade, to a checklist of framed pictures,
until colder than milk.

How quickly she transitioned, to clasp the buttons at her neck
and purse her lips, to pull her face to ward away
the sympathetic. She is dressed for all weathers - sensible
in May - when rain is just likely, as the sun to make the hay.
Quite by chance amid the tables outside the neat cafe
she meets the last to know, and their friend,
who knew him. Knew him when his eyelashes were the envy
of the girls, his soft hair they curled, they called him sissy,
fed him sweets and lemonade, and wheeled him in their prams.
That soft gentle man.

The suitcase on wheels, ringed and tagged, with dangling
dockets of aircraft holds, supports her now. When she looks down
she relates the detail, and when she looks up she sees
only the sky. "Do we want to buy her house?" she asks.

#amwriting #poem #poetry For Mighty Dread

For Mighty Dread

Sometimes - when the sharp focus of sensation
fails to ignite the brain to spout. I will
take myself off - into the quieting evening -
to the river, or the park, or just to traipse
the streets and gaze into the darkened windows
of places that are closed. If I'm lucky -
I will catch first sight of the bitten slice of moon
as it reappears. It lacks, somewhat, the grandeur
of catching your parents being human,
or the furtive agility of a boy, all eyes,
hopping over a ginnel-wall to retrieve a ball.
But there it sits, low upon the horizon
framed between the hulk of trees
and borne by the puffs of the last illumined cloud-banks. 

Once, at football, as a child tired from infants school -
I sat on the terrace step. Through the slatted fence,
as whisping mist rose from the mud-bound pitch
beneath spotlights, I followed the game with disinterest.
Until tapped with ash, and looking up,
I became scarred with the glory of a woman sliced,
front to back by the seam of her tights.
And I was sore afraid.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #sketchbook Iris

day's later, when all that remains
stinks of jaundice through cut glass,
in an effort at change, the irises are pulled
oozing on strings from the vase.
And you suggest dancing.
 

#amwriting #poem # poetry Sense of Sunlight

Sense of Sunlight

Clearly delineated, the ridge in water
moving at will between shadow and air.
Narcissus exhale upon the zest of spring -
pale yolk, unbleached, brassy stout, and slut -
in the verge of wheeling pollen. Chill light
reflects in echo of the time cutting brook.
Here the tongue knows only patterns sweet,
that in lost moments, name all things.

#amwriting #poem #poetry Black Sheep

Black Sheep

I hadn't been here - since in that hot summer
when mother cut fish-paste into sandwiches
and bundled us into the car. And forgetting
how annoyed you were with me, or me with you,
we plucked ourselves in the cold waves
that sent us dancing to the sand. No scowls there.
Just tales of lost sailors. And feet running
barefoot around discarded cans, and serviettes
of ice creams, still pink and brown and yellowed,
and a single white paper bag, that once held sherbet,
spinning, and flipping on the ridges of the tide.

But oh how we catch ourselves. A black tooth here
and there something which cannot be forgiven,
until, waking one morning you guess - for who is really sure -
that it is ten years since we spoke last. Of course
we mean to, but forgetting birthdays becomes a habit,
like hypochondria, or finding pine cones in a coat pocket.

And it all becomes smoothed out, when queuing
for some wine and biscuit, on the ringed rubber matting,
while the game retired music mistress from the prep school
paddles away at Bach. So many dinners dodged and missed.

#amwriting #poetry #poem Soon, The Wild Cotton Grows

 Soon, The Wild Cotton Grows

Swatting at a dull yellow dragonfly -
that has for reasons of wind and season
hoovered too closely into view - I fall 
into that tedious joy when you catch sight of your children.
They have broken from their clambering across the rocks,
and while one dances a hornpipe,
the other stands, eyes cupped,
looking out across the valley, to the butter-pats of farms,
or the various nick-nacks of copses and culverts that blur
into the kind of pastoral that draws the eye.
Or perhaps enlivens the female passenger of a passing car,
to observe that from the hilltop you can see seven counties.
Of course you can't. If you squint, and let your eye settle,
through the heat haze you can see perhaps Lancashire: at best
But the day is too hot, and pleasant, to quibble.
A single cuckoo soldiers on, hiccuping it's half song
over the whirling of the drying brook.
And now my children are stretched out and bathing.
So out of habit, I swat the air again.

#amwriting #poetry #sketchbook dragonfly

flicking at flies, that unwelcome come
in the languid sun by the brook.
On such an a afternoon with the hill half climbed
I wonder if it is proper to unbutton.
Will I seem one of the shaven crowd?
Who plug their offspring with sausage rolls.
This cumulative preponderance disturbed
by cloud shading out the sunlight.

Dragon flies and a single cuckoo
keep me compan, as chiclren clamber
to the challenge of boulders.
The rocks ellow with age, scarred
b ardent lovers and the cutting marks
of masons. This place more manmade
seems natural now, somehow.
Like wished for immortality in which
is always young, always finding
the path that leads home.

The cuckoo pauses, it's drone empty,
in contrast to the waterfall over which it watches.
And in that unfilled void, a dragonfly
arrows across my eyeline
to fill the world. Yellow the stones, yellow
as the rocks on which the children bathe, before
moving on to dance, or find new position
to stretch out and gaze at clouds.

First budding the leaves part like swallows
caught in less performance than the outstrectched children
bathing on the rocks. Even the dragonfly
holds more patience than they. Forever
changing with the wind.

#amwriting #poem #poetry #anorexia Anorexic on a Swing

Anorexic on a Swing

At the height, her feet breaking clouds,
she counts - banana - counts to be higher
in the giddy emptiness that comes with falling
uncaught and broken. Counts - Fruit Pastilles -
to go higher than the laughter of her secret
laughing self. Counts - roast chicken -
screwed her eyes to remain hanging
without back-swing - without counting -
without her father and his worried smile
encouraging her to pull once more on the chains -
to deepen the well of her collar bones
in which the salted beads of counting dwell.

#amwriting #poetry #poem 3am

3am

It is always the heat and the grind and the salted smoke
of cockles on the mesh, raked in parody of the crashing waves.
Their tongues hang, circumcised, like tired dogs, as they roll drop-ward
to the waiting drum. Pumped arms delighting at the back and forth,
a sweat dripped cigarette hanging, half smoked, tasting
of tar, and the darkness beyond the open shed lifting like sand in a glass.

Outside the ring of heat, cold wet morning
clutches it's arms to it's chest, breathing in the canker of the river.
A stiff knee'd old man is how that day comes. Stiff knee'd
and rising from his hard backed chair. It hobbles in
on clubbed feet, toes gripping at the new-lay
as old blood finally flows across the slashed sky of day.

First the green light and then the red, bobbing then chugging,
then throbbing a timbrel beat, and with a clanging bell
in comes the catch. Around the boat's wake swoop gulls
darting to take the spoils, that spill from the laden nets on deck.

Leaning on the rake, I pat at my pockets for matches.
And in that luminescence of phosphor
I notice the spire of St Margaret's outlined at last.
Two more tons to go, I think,
as I set myself once more to work,
with a satisfied pinging crunch of shells.