Today it felt as if we were being given one more summer’s day before the onset of autumn for real and with it the slow and inevitable slide into winter. It was the first day of John’s football season. A good morning to be out in shorts and tee shirt followed by a really fruitful afternoon of ticking things off the jobslist. Apple picking, and a goodly crop it was too, contributed to a sense of well being. Getting the crops in for storage to help us survive the long dark winter.

As I was picking apples I saw Adrian over the back fence, looking through a pair of binoculars. He had spotted a hawk eating a pigeon it had caught. Feathers all over the place and very impressive. It was a fine bird and perhaps explains the occasional pile of feathers in the allotment. I had previously assumed it was the work of a fox.

I’ve lit the fire tonight. I didn’t really need to but it felt right. The best of the day has gone and the wind has picked up outside. It is very cosy sitting in our front room in front of the fire.

With the fire lit and the darkness outside I can imagine being holed up for a long artic winter. not venturing out much, perhaps only to get some more fuel or food from the store. At night I can hear wolves howling in the distance and the wind howling around the eaves directly outside.

The gun is prominent in its place above the fireplace. We are not afraid to use it and it certainly helps us to supplement the fairly boring diet we have all winter when some hapless animal strays in the direction of the cabin. The cabin itself smells permanently of woodsmoke, as do we all but we don’t notice it. It is part of our life.

In the kitchen I hear the dishwasher being emptied and refilled by Anne as she gets ready to go to bed. Outside the occasional Sunday night car drives by and I even hear an aircraft coming in to land, presumably, at nearby RAF Waddington.

Yellow street light reflects off the Jeep in the drive outside. The fire has died down now, its purpose well served and I sit cross legged on the sofa, writing.

The wind beats my cheeks and blows back my hair as I stand on the breakwater gazing out to sea.

sentry I

wind: pummels cheeks
blows hair, unkempt, across face
catching eye, distracting not

as I search the scudding clouds
and foaming waves,
a swirl of whiteness, green and grey,
the cormorant and black guillemot
patrol their beat, cry for my attention,
ignore me and plunge
for their cold fish supper.

after five hundred years of watching
a lone sail sets its course

and now the fishing boats return
men in industrial overalls
Foillan Beg, Lenague, Coral Strand 2^nd
Genesis of Peel, Aleena,
stocky, thick set queenie-catching bottom-dredgers,
The Manx Cat, a “Sutton work boat out of Peel”
with two deck hands and a cargo of crabs
bright red buoys contrast with navy blue,
a swath of rust pours down the side,
dirty green nylon nets hang down.

oily sheen on the water.

Meg’s a swimmer
she swims lengths while she plays on her cello
and while she’s pulling on that bow
I hear from someone in the know
Meg lives in Wiltshire

Holt it right there. What’s going on here? How is Megan supposed to know what that first verse is all about? I mean to say that even her mum and dad might struggle.

[Read more →]

They looked at each other, with a certain degree of suspicion at first. Neither had expected the other to be there. You know how it goes. One minute you’re walking along minding your own business when bang, it happens.

Sometimes it literally does happen with a bang and you bump into each other. In Stella’s case it was metaphoric bang. She had just been ambling along with her mind somewhere else and had stopped by the river bank. There might have been something that had caught her eye but then again there might not.

[Read more →]

The boredom of the long ferry journey
hearkens back to another age.
No internet connectivity,
the flicker of the TV glimmers hope
but it is Sky News -
repetition accentuates tedium.

I imagine we are on a spaceflight to Mars but I already only have one hour of laptop battery left. With two years to get there and two years to come back (you would hope we would be spending some time looking round when we arrive) the question of the moment is what to write in my remaining laptop hour?

the condemned man drug free
draws in deeply the sea air,
wonders at wind-born birdsong
and absorbs the sun’s facial caress.
instant relief,
a care free moment that will end;
the lure of the laptop-reconnected.

Today
Weather:
Early rain / drizzle then dry for a time but further rain / showers later. Hill fog, especially early & again later
Wind:
SW veering W or NW, 10 to 18
Visibility:
Good, occasionally moderate. Very poor in hill fog.
Comments:
Slight risk of higher rainfall totals tonight.

Wednesday 4th August
Weather:
Scattered showers. Hill fog patches.
[Read more →]

2010 Royal Air Force Waddington International Air Show

Commercial Participant – Conditions of Entry
The Ministry of Defence cannot accept any responsibility in respect of personal injury, loss or damage to vehicles of property including motor vehicles in the car parks except to the extent that such injury, loss or damage is proved to be caused by M.O.D. negligence.

RAF Waddington reserves the right to carry out such vehicle and personal security checks as it deems necessary, and [Read more →]

Geoff Smith has by now been forgotten
Not remembered by his peers
- they’re all dead
He was a single, simple man,
A gardener who liked his life
Although he died never really
Knowing what it was all about
But there again
Neither did Copernicus!

Yellow, smoke stained walls alive,
Breathless, coughing back an
Evening’s abuse of much abused bodies
Shoulders hunch over enlargened stomachs
And half filled glasses; half empty
Promises of better times, unkept, uncaring

Sallow, time engraved carvings on
Faceless faces, well known but anonymous,
A collection of portraits
Hung for a lifetime then
Stored in dark boxes, out of
Sight and soon not even memory.

This is a duet with both parts to be read simultaneously.

The soul destroying factory – buzzum click
Eats away at the brain – buzzum buzz
Like a maggot let loose – buzzum click
Driving me wild – buzz buzz buzz

Day after day – buzzum click
The same monotony – buzzum buzz
The same pain – buzzum click
The same dullness of mind – buzz buzz buzz

The routine – buzzum click
Even the tea breaks – buzzum buzz
Are boring – buzzum click
How do they break free? – buzz buzz buzz

At night the pub – glug glug
The freedom, drink – glug glug
The same every night – glug glug
- gets boring.

The moderns factory
No whirling cogs
Or cranking shafts
Clanking through steam
And greasy bearings.

I look around
Even the bins
Are clean but I
Can hide behind
The noise that shrouds
This place in silence.

I scream a silent scream
Desperate amid the
Degeneracy of progress
Impersonal,
Practical,
I scream.

Under clear blue cloudless bowl of sky
Lay I, with sweet smelling grasses and
Wing-fluttered butterfly, accompanying crickets
Chorus in the meadow hedge
And small boys search and stoop to
Scoop them into jam jar summer cells.

Into the cooler trees I wander, though not a murmur
Of breeze to mop the August brow
And how at height of silver sun
I fall inert into the arms of one
Who cares as much as I and worries not
Of things to come, and time goes by

click here for part 4

I wonder what the birds think at dawn when no man is around. Contempt I would imagine for why would anyone want to miss the best part of the day? The early worm will have gone!

I look out of the window and see the slightest of movement of leaves in the small plant pots on the doorstep. The air in the conservatory is still. The remains of yesterday lie scattered on the lawn. A table tennis bat, dismantled hammock frame, a blue plastic hoop and toys spilling out of a shed door that these days never closes. Can’t close.

That shed’s days are numbered. It is going to be a barbecue area with a grapevine growing round the side. I don’t do many diy jobs these days but [Read more →]