The continuous dance..

Walking to work,
headphones on,
music fills my ears,
but a fluttering sound filters through.

I look around,
then up.
In the tree ahead; two pigeons
sharing the same branch.

Two pigeons side by side,
a small space between them.
One edges slowly towards the other,
taking small side-steps.

Each time he tries to move close,
he is met with her fluttering wings.
She, wanting her own space.
He side steps again,
She flaps her wings
warning him to keep his distance.

The dance continues...
small side steps,
flapping wings,
small jump back,
one beat of stillness,
and so it repeats...

The things the BBC are responsible for...

At the bus stop,
A very irate, old man opposite,
Sharing his opinion
While almost steaming with anger;
"How would you like it,
if I came into your living room and swore every night?!"
His much calmer friend;
"No, I wouldn't like it at all..."
The angry man now shaking his head vigorously;
"Well that is what the BBC do every night!
They don't have the right, the BBC!
I would cancel receiving the BBC if I could"

The old man continues along the same lines for a while.
In the gaps his friend mumbles sounds of agreement.
I drift off and stop listening.
Somewhere along the conversation creeps back into my consciousness.
The calm man seemingly moved onto a different topic;
"It's always busy"
Assuming he means the bus that has now arrived,
I look up to see it packed.
But the angry man declares,
"It's all the BBC's fault!"

Spirit of our time

I only post my own work on this blog.
Writings, photos, poems.
But today I want to link to a video, a track.
By Gravel and Partisan.
Sampling Leonard Cohan.
Words, Images, Music.
Strong, Hitting, Meaning,
and in someways breathtaking.

Experience for yourself:



Find out more at the Gravel Project: http://gavelproject.blogspot.com/2010/07/leonard-cohan-partisans-project.html

Getting used to changes

Too much white,
Clearer to read?
I hope,
but so much white space,
I want to fill it.

Have also added links to my Flickr and Twitter.

A Little Visitor

Dad calls,
I go to see him.
"Look, Look"
I look out of the window,
to the backgarden.
His fingers point to a little hedgehog.
I tiptoe out to see it,
It has seen me,
It stays very still behind a branch.
I leave it, and go back inside.

I tell my dad I have not seen a hedgehog in our garden since I was little,
When we used to leave out a dish of milk.
Dad tells me the hedgehog comes to visit every night.
He looks at his watch,
"He's a bit late tonight."

Mum's solution to the lack of daisies in our garden...

"we will fill our pockets full of daisies"


how i smiled :-)

Big Bets

The usual bus journey to work,
day of the Grand National.
A young, teenage lad,
gets out his phone to make a call.
His call is answered,
his voice loud and deep.
Shouting, "Hello, Hello?"
"Put us 50 on Snowy Morning..."
He repeats, still shouting,
"Put us 50 on Snowy Morning!"
Young lad, in his work uniform,
putting on the big bets.
The person on the other end asks a question,
this time he doesn't shout.
In a lowered voice he answers,
"Yeah, 50 pence".

A smile secretly creeps across my face.

Fragile Memories

So much has past
too many memories
scattered across the carpet of her mind

She has always been a hoarder
and now the memories she has collected
have become too much

She searches for her needles
carefully choosing a delicate pair...

...she now spends her days alone
knitting the fragile threads of her life away

Broken Pieces of Hope

Walking along the sand,
breathing in the fresh sea air.

A satisfying crunching sound
with each step I take.

I pause...
looking down at the shells under my feet.

Broken,
I have crushed hundreds of little pieces of hope and beauty...

Hidden words

She carefully carved the words,
immediately realising what she had done,
She tried to scrub them out.
But it was too late,
He had already seen it.

He started towards her,
She looked down to avoid his eye contact,
Desperately trying to cover it up
as he was to pass by.

...thinking how foolish she had been...
...trying to imagine what he could possibly think...

A tear fell,
and yet her eyes were dry.

She felt his damp cheek press against hers
as he took her in his arms
and held her so tightly,
showing the love he never before knew how to express.

Catch her specks of dust...

She sits with a pen,
With some paper.
Her mind filled with ideas, thoughts.
So inspired,
So full of potential.

Fantastic words start to formulate,
Miraculous images...

And yet as soon as her pen touches the paper,
Her imagination shatters,
It turns to dust
and blows away in the wind...

African Treasure

A beautiful little girl,
She and her friends full of wonder.
They follow us through the streets,
they follow the muzugos (white people),
that they so rarely see.

We go to visit a school of older children,
we take the young girls with us.
The four of them play amongst themselves,
as we talk to the older children.

Sometimes they are distracted by our play,
by our words,
but mostly they are content,
playing in the grass and dust around them.

We finish, and leave the school,
The four children come with us.
Outside the gates we are ready to head back.
Before we go I give each child a crayon.

The beautiful little girl takes it from me.
She opens her hand
and starts to draw on the treasure she holds.
I look closer.

Her treasure is a razor blade.
Her treasure is a danger,
Her treasure could infect her,
Her treasure could be a killer.

A girl of no more then four years,
Her toy of choice?
A tool that spreads a deadly virus,
In a country where AIDS is a reality.

Magic Spells

Only in films, and then, computer generated,
to set the eerie graveyard scene.
But this, tonight, is real.
Dirty fluff sweeping past the moon at such speed.
Some so murky it briefly blocks the light of the moon,
Some so thin the moon illuminates a magically, misty, glowing grey

-The sort you would see seeping from a witches cauldron.

Blossom

One little cherry blossom,

all alone,

...shivering...

petals shaking in the breeze

The first sign that spring is coming...

The sun shines a little brighter...

...but my heart sinks a little deeper

Oh, to be noticed...

The quiet girl,
barely utters a word.
Always armed with a book,
lost in her own world.
So thin,
So frail.

She thinks the world doesn't see her,
so she is fading away.
She no longer looks at the world,
eyes down to the words on the page.

She doesn't see the boy who watches her.
Waiting for one look,
one glance,
from his only love...

...his heart is breaking.

The beautiful music in his mind

There is an old man sitting on the opposite side.
The whole journey he has been scribbling away frantically,
Through pages,
Turning pages,
Flipping back.

I finally look over to see.
He has a mixture of manuscript and lined paper,
Words and music.
Swapping between pieces of paper
as he has new ideas for music,
then lyrics,
then back to music.
Tapping his foot
- hearing his creation form inside his head
nodding,
tapping along,
stopping.
- that's wrong
then a scribble
followed by more frantic writing.

Trying to capture all of these ideas before they fade away.
I wish I could have heard the beauty of his creation.

These evenings are almost perfect,
Cold and crisp, yet no bitterness is the air,
Just cold enough to wake the senses,
And bring your skin to life.

The air holds a smell,
A smell which always returns at this time of year.
The street is awash with beautiful golden colours.
Autumn trees so rich.

Within the darkening sky,
Lamplights producing wonderful yellow glows.

A tree stretches its branches out,
Towards the streetlight,
Surrounding it.
The lamp highlighting the brilliance in colour of the leaves
Creating natures beautiful lampshade.

In a cold damp station,
People standing around.
Canceled train.

I see four of them, watching,
With their big beady eyes,
Waiting...
Quick glances between them,
Challenging each other.

Another person comes around the corner.
Walking closer.
Off goes
.one.
..two..
...three...
But the fourth does not fly away.
He wins his game of chicken.

The three other crows fly back,
Ready to play again.

Dark Forces

Today is the first day this year that I woke up to darkness.
The darkness that fools your brain into thinking it is still night.
That darkness that acts as a weight on your eyelids,

-pushing them down.

A dark blanket has swept across the room,
Tricking my senses to fall back to sleep.

I think the blanket stayed with me all day.