We said goodbye to my sister yesterday, a teacher for 34 years at St Paul's C of E Primary School in Manchester. She was a brilliant actor as well as being a great teacher, bringing every story to life. Her classroom, outside the main Victorian school building was simply known as "The Prefab". She also loved her garden and Spring was her favourite time of year. Writing this poem has helped bring s...

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25.03.20

A warm wired cage 
Flickering with heat 
And the promose of a future filled with family 

An empty room of an empty man waiting for life 
And a question from a little girl, 
"Where is all the furniture?" 

A backyard and a garden 
A family of merry
A birthday party torn asunder by a virus 
And a little girl crying in her bed alone 

A Christmas filled with trampolines
Box...

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Under the sun I was a good boy

I never did wrong.

The trees were very giving

As I climbed

The highest branch

Under the sun , I was a good boy

Who never did wrong

The light would stay

Till I was too tired

To kick a ball

But at home, I was bad  boy

Who always did wrong.

The dark spelt

Foreboding

Trembling

Till...

The light broke way 

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Tendrils of sight swim
memories from my child mind
vast Graveyards flash past
the coach windows
as I sat alone, 
my split-self bristling
against the fabric seats
My school friends chatter
then later they climb
into sleeping bags, safe
I brought my heart out
into the moonlight, breathless
learning how not to wake
others with my grief
whilst you took your half
of my heart
high up int...

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a wild little elf
with wide-eyed wonderment
I was magically alive and frolicked

owner of a child's idyllic home
named Cherrybrook

all by himself,
dad constructed a house
in the late 1950s
from a dilapidated 1800s barn
 
our spread was situated on
eight acres of untamed sugarbush forests
with old wagon trails crisscrossing the woods
hung with grapevines
 
dad also made a lake wit...

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At first, they did not ask,

Because they thought

I could not speak.

I had birthday parties

Just like you, but

Something was missing.

I continued to chant

That I was not an orphan,

But it was no use.

Again, they did not ask,

Because they felt guilty

And it was too late.

I kept switching trains.

I felt half-blind,

Sometimes half-deaf.

I learned to smile

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CONUNDRUM

As a twiggy little boy of 9,

I was so curious

About the bumblebees hovering

Over blood-red roses, flesh-pink roses,

Bushes filled with pale-yellow honeysuckles

That grew in my Grandmother's yard.

So curious, when I reached out to touch one,

That bumblebee stung me with its

Needlelike tail, leaving behind a mark,

Swollen red, painful,

On the caramel ...

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You Could Own An Upright Piano

You could own an upright piano

The newspaper advert said

And although I can’t play one

The words got messing with my head

We had one when I was a young boy

It stood in the front room, unused

Because no one in our house could play it

So it left all our visitors bemused

Well – actually – I could play ‘Chopsticks’

And my gran...

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Bluebell Woods

In the enchanted forest, far, far away

Rabbits dress in waistcoats and chat about their day

Fairies live in toadstools, deep in the wooded dell

They sing and dance to the chimes of the quivering bluebell

An Enid Blyton story, a fairy tale or dream

Or closer to the truth, than at first it would seem

Down in Bluebell Woods, which is not so far ...

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And all the doors looked all the same again

He stopped at number one to sneak a look

Here he heard the clearing of ash and soot

And all the doors looked all the same, again

He stopped, at number four he stood once more

To inhale the smell of Vim on tiled floor

And, all the doors looked all the same, again

He stopped at number nine, to check the time

The cuckoo clo...

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Grey bin days

Ash spilling

Sparking

From beneath

Buckled

Loose-fitting metal lids

Carried back- breakingly

To the monstrous wagon

Limping it’s way

Around the close

Like a club-footed relic
 

Behind the chipped

Leaded glass of number thirteen

A terrible gargoylian face

Pressed up close

Stares out

Mrs Ashall has seen a football fly over her neat ...

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From the front at least

A beautiful victorian dresser

From behind

The ugly truth

Assembled from wooden orange crates

The company name stamped

Telling of a former

More humble existence

Two little drawers

One at each side

Gunmetal latch handles

Age worn

From opening and closing

Hold family secrets

Make up

Lipstick stumps

Snaps from Blackpool ...

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The strands of us all

lived in a tassled green pouch,

bound by thread and bloodline.

The house that held it

still holds my softest days

in dream sequence;

of them all, slow Sunday afternoons

out back, in the care of hands

that performed miracles -

a table for my dolls to dine,

a wardrobe for their clothes,

a seesaw solid enough

for every one ...

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Hitting the Wrong Note

Rooted next to his upright piano,

close in the tiny room,

I couldn't breathe.

He held one hand

to the small of my back,

the other across my

taut diaphragm:

(I can believe he loved

the music, but he craved

only angels, expected them -

and, by God, he was

going to have them,

even if he clipped

their wings along the way).

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For the people of Aberfan, 50 years on.

October 21 1966. A day I will never forget.

MY NINTH BIRTHDAY

I’m sure it won’t surprise you to learn
I was a proper little show-off.
‘Too clever by half’
said my Victorian grandmother
who lived in the flat downstairs.
‘You spoil him, Muriel.
Children should be seen
and not heard.
Be quiet, John!
When you begin to PAY a littl...

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Sweaty Little Fingers

1, 2, 3, 4, 5 once I caught a fish alive. 

"That's not a fish! It's a tadpole!"

1,2,3,4,5 once I caught a tadpole alive

I loved the little fella and I wanted him to thrive 

but he was too small for me so I made him dive 

back into the water.

1 little frog hopping around. I bend and lift him from the ground. I wrap him up all safe and s...

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I no longer recall the time we spent together,
yet my heart pines for your presence,
I wish I told you how much I love you and miss you.

I no longer can feel the warmth of your hand ruffel my hair,
yet the flashes of our play still warm my heart,
I wish I told you how much I love you and miss you.

I no longer fear crosssing a road on my own,
yet insecurities of daily life trouble me wit...

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snotful, brimming with adventure

ragamuffin

got down in the ditch

burrowed, knees scratched

contemptible

ignoring social resonsibilities

      dining correctly

      shaking hands

      being precise

instead

grovelling under a footpath

where rain had been like a friend

real, natural

breath dank with small echoes.

Looked back i...

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When I was younger

Not so very long ago

The best thing I owned was a radio and

A pair of headphones

The ability to block out noise was crucial to my survival

I used to tune the station just out

So that there was always white noise

Static safety

Blocking out the screams

The smashing of plates

The threats

The actions

Classical music was my choice

As the songs w...

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In that place

The summers were always hot and the skies completely blue.

And in that place

Where nothing ever hurt me

A lie was never spoken; it was all completely true

In that place

When the morning sun spilled into my room and woke me

Then I’d be up and out and riding my bike

And in that place

The place where I’d be the fastest biker ever

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At night we sealed the light in, to be safe.

There was music, and the sewing machine whirred.

We played on the rug with a painted wooden car,

Like the one Daddy used to drive, when there was petrol.

Now every night the warden was on his bike,

In the pitch black streets, checking the dark houses

In case the careless light was spilling out;

The rain on his rubber...

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Dusk in Northumberland

I cannot throw away this faulty photograph

wonder if mother peeled off that oval sticker,

the one I remember:

Boots pronouncement of defects

on red eyes, on the ghosts of double exposures,

Now half forgotten

Framed by the stone walls scaling hills

I didn’t know that my great grandfather built or

the skill that made them stan...

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 Like the child I used to be

In a timeframe, that hadn’t altered.

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