covid or corbyn 

what will be top of the news

brexit stage left

 insomnia

climbing a tree

in the wind

 the comedian 

lying in the morgue 

takes my last laugh

 biography 

does the coat fit

this poet

 it draws breath

this storm high on oceans might

darkening eventide

 this wild sea

stumbling in a surge of flow

questioning my faith

 an understanding 

nothing and yet everything

the call of the sea

 then it clicked and

childhood was never no more

all the years ahead 

zither 

moaning of loons in the mist 

moon breath

 jenny wren

in the whiplash of a cobweb

gone

 autumn

each leaf the penultimate 

knock on winter’s door

 how much rain

can my hands hold aloft

until my eyes fill

 after grazing

the poets chew over the cud

then burp

 teen years

what is not important 

is it is

 autumn of my words

rattling like cornered leaves

but look there are buds

 one can but surmise

what light might have left the skies

long night of the soul

 the poet asks

will it be safe in there 

then loses the key

 wet leaves 

waiting their turn 

in yellow macs

 what once was so fresh

the end of a toothpaste tube

this love affair 

 mummy

don’t let go of my balloon 

eyes that frown

 lilies bobbing 

when magpies take the ducklings

the sky screams

 there was this view unchanging until you

eyes get closer 

until lips close their eyes

and time dies 

 how fast we speed to our own ends

 then there’s the sea

it’s about the sighs of it

i gasp for words

 woman

the repository of

everything 

 what was it

this sea rusted thing

set thinking

the hands that reach up

to all the hands that reach down

just one tear apart

all the while the violin

tears at the strings of my heart

take this out of me

for i gift it to thee now

wary various weighs

 a hen pheasant 

grasses into grasses

autumn colour

 the leaves cry kick me

and all the dust of summer

rises in a sunbeam

 he gave us the cane

across twitching fingers

this man all alone

 what is beneath

the leaf that you didn’t

turn over

 sand dunes

ripped from the sky 

by a blue wind

 mummy reads a book

the child examines his feet

the pages turn

 the rainbow’s escape

saw it yesterday briefly 

fitted description 

 tasting the tears 

of the chinese poets

long long ago

 the sounds 

between islands and islands 

telling tales

 fifty years ago

we swam around this rock

do you remember

 swimming a sunbeam

as sunset takes the day

we go

 near the door

a cat sitting

dawn

 leaves will always fall

when tarmac will pothole melt

it’s called nature

 dawn

the reflection fades 

the trees come in

 rocks and rocks 

and then there are the rock

you have to swim to

 falling into dusk

a scarf around the moon’s

beatitudes 

 the cat just pounced

on the deep bed in my head

but she is dead

 music and morning

the garden is listening

waiting with me

 the downside

of life’s bell curve 

ringing true

 in the dark of night

the telephone kiosk rings

for no one

 autumn twig

cleaning the mud off my shoes

i take one last look

 indigestion 

after eating my poem

i am still hungry

 autumn winds 

swinging in empty playgrounds 

the damp leaves linger

 losing their mouths

they cannot cry for help

the dark fishes

 built on alcohol

gyms casinos makeup

2020 falls 

 the last warm sunshine

falling through the last pale leaf

falling and falling

 the blinking lighthouse 

across many grains of sand

the night is falling 

 falling

each leaf tells of autumn

together

 goodbye fruit picker

for summer is in the jar

falling light

 the cold sea never

warms to to hesitation

it’s lovely in

 in this old book

a turned down page corner

sets me thinking

 blue river 

cold under the mountain 

moon drinking

 hill and river

following the moon down

town

 man

extra to the terrestrial 

covid culled 

 october flutters

in butterflying leaves

decaying

 rough sea

afloat in a coffin

grit in my eye

 Haydn 

the cat

and I 

 at last 

a real death poem

remains

 morning poems

battery at fifty percent

eventide

 gnats

are you flying or swimming

in the rain

 winter

seeing more in less

light is

 postman delivers

unbeknown the poems fall

through letterboxes 

normals change

it is quite normal to find

another normal

maybe it’s hard to accept

but that is also normal

 why don’t we laugh

when the pandemic calls

it will be too late

 conflagration 

the promises of summer

in falling leaves

 ambivalence

the caress of a storm

requited 

 all they see now

is mountains and cemeteries 

the old widow’s eyes

 the only way

to ‘know’ a storm

is to swim in it

 under the mask

there is another mask

and a gasp 

 big spider is dead

the cat has gone and killed it

oh my world wide web 

its babies are in the bath 

the cat is out hunting mice

 pavement crabapples

dancing the soles of my shoes

hopscotch in autumn 

 realisation

that the old ways have gone

pillar of salt

 what’s that strange noise 

playing with possibilities 

infant school