Dream

Liminal

Audio dreams;

I am not blind but

There is something I cannot yet see

I hear you

The roar of the 

Is it water ?

Overwhelming us both.

I am

Drowning

With you

 

Guilt

The piano eyes me accusingly,

A blank page is spread invitingly,

Blue skies beckon longingly,

My radio sits silently,

And all the while the menacing clock's tick tocks.

Lost

 

Lost as the list that the wind 

Whipped from a hand

And dropped 

in a puddle.

That the author,

In a foreign land,

Holds in their mind,

Repeating and repeating,

Until it becomes a song. 

Home

My hat on the finial,

Shoes on the rack,

Coats on the hooks,

Your scarf on the chair.

A stray hair,

That mug you bought us for Christmas,

My father's pen,

A row of books all mixed up,

Chosen words,

The silence of your absence,

The sound of your key in the lock,

The one you love waiting,

Taking stock. 

Cinema 2

Blinking in the sunlight

The afternoon is blurred.

Behind us, lives another world,

Another story;

Magic lantern lit our faces,

Flicked us with its repetition,

Leaving us to wonder

As the lights come up. 

Home

 

House

Your black faced stone,

Roughly dressed and dusted

in coveted smoke.

makes me sad to see you. 

Taken from another place,

another not too distant time,

Heavy history transported,

Dismantled then rebuilt.

Dense with stories and breath, 

You weighed the trailer down. 

The builder took you away, 

Furtive like, contraband. 

                                                   -

 

Autumn's end - haiku series and poems

 From the balcony 

Burning brush paints Autumn’s hues

Church bell sounds the hour

Running out at night

Moon and Jupiter gleaming

The two old friends meet

Watching clouds go by Leaves fly high then softly fall Somewhere the geese call

Emptying my change Autumn leaves begin to curl A magpie’s harsh cry

It comes over me

Like dejas vu I feel sick

Hello Autumn

October lingers,

Shimmering in her red, gold and green, 

November waits 

on a cold grey stone, 

His blood stained poppies restless 

in their beds.

Learning to Speak.  First Words. 

Son

Your first word was  Ahhhh !  which you would say whilst pointing up to the centre of the ceiling of any room whenever we entered one together. Sometimes you were pointing to the light that was on, sometimes to one that was not, and sometimes because it was missing, you thought, in which case, you would search until it was found, your body swaying back in my arm, your arm stretched out, waiting to point at the right place. 

I can't remember how long it took me to tell you the common name for it.  My first child, I oscillated between teaching you what I thought I knew and what I imagined you should know, and letting you show me the nature of things, through your unencumbered eyes. 

So I think the big light, as your little sister decided to call it, was always   Ahhhhhhhh !!!!!!   between us and perhaps you've never named it anything else since inside your own mind because it's always there in the back of mine.  

Daughter

Your first word came long after your gestures and shouts. I worried it was because you were deaf but didn't want you tested properly because I wondered if the grommets so popular as a remedy for slow response to sound in small children those days might interfere with the natural development of your actual inherent capacity and potential, if that makes any sense to you at all.  Let it suffice to say that I was prepared to be patient and it paid off luckily - one day the blast of a plane overhead whilst we were at the top of the garden playing together startled you so severely I wondered if it had jogged your brain into paying attention to sound. You ran, terrified, inside and I had to coax you out over the next few days with games and lollies and lots of reassurance. Soon, you too would mooooo as well as point whenever a cow came down to the wall and moooooon also would escape your lips when we went in search of her appearance every early evening when Dada came home. 

                                                                            

Bottled

Fear and loneliness within a vessel,

Deep ruby red,

Paced upon the window ledge

Sun rays passing through dark green glass

Take the stopper out, 

A shout comes out. 

Sun's shine begins to gleam,

Out pours one long scream.

 

Addressing some thoughts upon dress.

I live in a Northern mill town. I've lived here forty years but I don't come from round here. I know and am surrounded by the history of the place but it's not my history. Generations of my family didn't build this place, nor are their bones resting in the local graveyards. The weather and the landscape has got into me over the years, I've planted trees and scattered seeds, my future might live on here, but the old history will never be mine.  

When my son was very small, I had to take him to the eye clinic regularly. The waiting room was mainly full of elderly people, alot of whom were brought in by the day ambulance and had to wait until everyone else on their route had been seen before they could go home. 

On one of these visits, I was sat next to an elderly lady who began chunnering about something or other rather grumpily. I couldn't hear her properly, she was obviously just talking to herself, but I got her gist when I caught the phrase ' she's probably ugly as sin ' and at the same time noticed a woman standing at the reception screen wearing a burka who seemed to be having some difficulty making herself understood.  

I was at once struck by the beauty of the highly embroidered garment but also the ominousness of the grille which provoked many connotations of combat and imprisonment within me. I began to feel both sorry and frustrated that the woman appeared to be having difficulty making herself understood.

I looked down at my son, sitting beside me and he too was transfixed by the lady waiting at reception.

I could tell that the receptionist was not making much effort to understand the lady in the burka and this was drawing the attention of everyone else in the waiting room. 

The old lady next to me continued to chunner and folded her hands I felt rather smugly over her ample stomach. I shot her a look I hoped might feel like daggers and stood up, taking my child over to the play area. He didn't usually like those areas because children often behaved in rough ways that disturbed and confused him, but I found a book and we sat for a while together trying to extract some respite and joy from its ragged, sticky pages until it was our turn to be seen.

I never asked my son about that incident, but years later we did have a rather heated discussion about my dislike of women covering their heads and faces. I confessed to him that I feared it exacerbated the already  existing and annoying perceived hierarchy among women determined by how we dress. Clearly upset and shocked by my opinion, no doubt taking it personally though I didn't mean it that way, he retorted that I should give men some credit for having brains of their own, which pleased and amused me. 

Yesterday, as I watched brave women in Iran burning their headdresses, I was put in mind of the bra burning symbolism which arose out of the civil rights movements in the sixties. Perhaps every town should have a regular trash can event when we can all stand and throw things away that we feel symbolise oppression in our troubled societies. 

                                                                          🍃🍃

 

Water comes and goes

Footsteps revealed then hidden

Along the sea's shore

Hopes written folded

Paper boat in a bottle 

Wishes hide at sea