Seating Arrangements
They sit where they always sit.
Habit is all.
They have each their proper place,
The old ladies, ranged around the room
In a great circle, staring straight ahead.
Sunlight slides over them, time scours
Their faces into anonymity
Minutes and hours accumulate in drifts,
Condensing into weeks, months. Years.
While from the corner ever sounds
The television's inane yammering.
If even one could choose a different chair
Give the kaleidoscope a sudden shake
Might they then waken, look around,
Recognise each other and themselves,
Even start to squabble, to remember
That they were human once?
But no.
They sit where they always sit.
The Day they planted Di
The day of Princess Diana's funeral
In Swanage they were dancing in the streets.
We spent the morning in the campsite, where
The service was relayed into
The shower block. It felt strange, being
Prayed at in the bog.
That afternoon we went to Swanage,where
They'd decided not to cancel the Folk Festival
So all along the front accordions played
And weirdly costumed dancers merrily
Cavorted. It was fun. I bet
Someone complained about it afterwards.
Later, in the pub, the TV showed
Scenes from the funeral with the sound turned down
(But they turned it up for Elton John).
Miss Rainbow who is very good
Miss Rainbow, who is very good,
Shops for all her neighbours, brings
Prescriptions from the chemist, posts
Their letters, even though she's getting on
Herself, and none too well.
Miss Rainbow drops in often for a chat
Bearing scones and flowers from her garden
And knows what's going on, who's sick, who's dead.
She keeps an eye on things, she's very good.
Miss Rainbow went to college, she knows how
To deal with all the heavy scary forms
That thud upon the mat, to strike
Terror in the heart; she'll help
To fill them in. She's very good.
Miss Rainbow finds the going hard. As time
Goes by pain clouds obscure the sun.
Her vibrant colours fade, dissolve to grey
And empty skies. She will be missed,
For she was very good.
Mixed Infants
Back into school -
Playground shrieking
Died at whistle-blow.
Do they still form lines?
The quality of silence
Changes, out to in.
Light shafting through
Windows, high in walls
Tapestried with alphabets
Dust galaxies spinning
Neat rows of stars.
Here where we used to sit
Undersized tables, chairs
Snap at your shins
And the smells -
Polish, chalk, wellies, dinners
Sums and songs, shoebags
Intellectual property, lost beyond recall.
The ghosts of ancient children
Hang in the air, giggling.
Killing Time at the Zoo
They come here to kill time, the warthog said.
To seek some respite, for the world outside
Is harsh and full of pain. The bars you see
Are not to keep us in, but keep them out.
They mark our territory, our domain.
Here we are safe, the elephant agreed.
Our servants feed and water us, supply
Our every need; and all they ask of us
Is entertainment, that we be ourselves
And let them contemplate us, and admire.
Easily done. We of the monkey tribe
Know well enough how to amuse
Our earthbound relatives. The bars
Which formed our prison then became
The apparatus for our flying circus.
We showed them what they'd lost.
And if some of us hankered for wider spaces
Most knew better. We were content.
Though now and then we wondered:
If they came here to kill time, what
Would occur when time was dead?
This:
The iron beasts, smashing through our walls,
Spewing destruction. Our cages crushed
Under their tread. The ostrich and the shy gazelle
Had nowhere left to run. The elephant
Stood firm, but flesh and bone, no match
For steel and fire.
We, man's nimbler cousins, could escape
Into the wider zoo. Here all are caged,
And killing everywhere. We do not know
How we offended, what it was we did
To bring such retribution. Let us go
Back to our old life, in the zoo
Where only time is killed.
Love is ...
Love is …
The sweetest thing
Love is …
What makes the world go round
Love is …
Never having to say ‘sorry’.
What a load of bollocks.
Love is coloured pink and red
(An unpleasant combination)
On a million greetings cards
With themes from sentimental to obscene.
Love murders forests -
An environmental disaster.
A blood-red rose, price inflated
Is a bloody rip-off.
Love sells
And when sold
Is no longer love.
An End to Winter
The year is bedding down. The hedgerows flame
In gold and ruby, as a last salute
Before the long slide into darkness.
Arrowheads of geese traverse the sky,
Chasing the swallows south, and in his nest
Of leaves the hedgehog snuggles. All the earth
Prepares to sleep.
And closer comes
The harsh breath from the north, the delicate flowers
Of frost, the ground like diamond sparkling. Yet
A comfort blanket mist encloses still
Melting to noonday sun. The cold retreats.
The roses linger till the year turns round
To overlap the blossoming almond’s snow
And winter is no more. Let summer hold
The world in warm embrace. Should we not bless
The kinder season?
No. The world must have
It’s fallow time, to rest, recuperate
Gather its forces for the next assault.
If autumn elides into spring, from whence
Will come renewal? One day we may regret
The end of winter.
A Boy Child
You didn’t stay for long
Nine months I’d waited for you.
I made a teddy bear from yellow felt
Stuffed it with cotton wool. I have it still,
Hidden in some drawer or other.
It was at this time of the year.
We’d thought you might arrive on Christmas Day
But no, you were late.
You waited till the last night of the year
To come; and left
Just four days later.
Four days I had a brother, I wouldn’t say
I mourned your loss, because I never knew you.
I only saw you once, in the hospital
Bundled in a crib, only the top of your head,
The curve of the cheek, showing.
You had a big nose, I remember that.
It was the possibilities. They never told me why,
He wasn’t right, they said, it’s maybe just well.
I wonder now and then
What you would have been if things had gone
As they ought. You’d be forty-five by now, married,
Children growing up.
I could have been an aunt.
There were other losses. My mother.
For the one who returned was not the one
Who went away. My trust in God.
Pray, they told me, and be good, you will receive.
I’d prayed for years, but what loving father
Gives, and then almost at once
Asks for it back?
And Christmases were never quite the same.
We waited and waited for summer to come, but then when it came it rained
The windows teem with water, while outside
wind lashes the forsythia. All the flowers
are flattened, and a deep
depression from the Atlantic squats
toadlike on the weather charts.
Armies of slugs
advance upon the strawberry patch.
Where are the summers we remember?
When we lay
bludgeoned by heat and barbecued
in endless sunlight.
What has become
of drought and hosepipe bans?
Nothing is as it should be, as it was
when we were young.
Really?
I remember
peering through the window, watching
the rain pour down,
while bucket and spade
stood mournful in the corner.
Well mac'd and wellied, I have splashed
through puddles on the prom, mocked
by racks of postcards showing turquoise seas
and golden sands.
I have cried before -
We waited and waited
and waited
for summer to come
but when it came
it rained.
My Father's Hands
I remember they were large,
his hands, enveloping mine,
rough to the touch, but never
when they touched me.
Clumsy, gentle, he was not
a handy man. Things fell apart,
it was not his fault.
I remember times
coming home, his hands
back as midnight.
Been dyeing, he'd say.
I would shiver
thinking he meant
dying.
but that came later.
Even now
I can see his hands,
stained red
with ink, not blood.
Dragonfly
Yes, I remember her
Her dress was peacock blue, and all the light
In the room seemed focussed
On her. She made all around
Look heavy, lumpen, drained
Of colour - while she glowed
Sparkled, always moving,
In a dance to unseen music.
So alive.
Electric blue, on irridescent wings
Darting above the stream
Of mundane life
And unresponsive minds.
It could not last
Time steals all, eventually
The lustre dims, the music strays off key.
Yet I can see her still, not as she became
But caught in that moment, locked
In amber, shining down the years
A dragonfly
In a cloud of moths.
The last safe place
They will not come here.
We have built walls, defences
Of steel and concrete, strong enough.
Our resolution's firm, our weapons
Ready to hand. Though they strive
Ceaselessly for our ruin, we stand
Forewarned. They will not come here.
They shall not come here. They are not
People like us. In these dangerous
Times, we must keep
To our own, trust only
What we know.
Hold firm.
Lock all the gates.
They shall not come here.
They must not come here. We know
Their lies, how they would subvert
Our judgement. We are right,
They are wrong, is all we need
To know. Their words
Are alien, dangerous. Close
Our eyes, stop up our ears, retreat
Into the void within, the last
Inviolate fortress of the mind.
They cannot touch us here.
