Recycling

Sometimes
When I accidentally toss a can
Into the rubbish bin
Rather than the recycling bin
And I wrestle with the big question
Shall I retrieve it?
Or not bother?
I find myself pondering
The heat death of the solar system
When one day we and it
Will be vaporised and
Engulfed into an expanding sun
And if we’ve left the Earth by then
And are living elsewhere
I think about the stars
Moving away from one another
At breakneck speed
And the night sky empty, but for a tired moon
No stars
Just total loneliness
Though some say
The Universe will the breath in
And the stars will rush towards a common centre
And the universe will implode
Leaving nothing
Just a tiny dot
That is the weight of everything there has ever been


And I shrug
And leave the can in the wrong bin
Or sometimes I shrug
Retrieve the can
And throw it into the right bin
And sigh


I shrug and sigh
Like the two collared doves
Sitting on the telephone wires
In the lane

How Long Does It Take To Write a Poem?

I’m not yet sure
Let me check the time
Seven minutes to ten
The second hand passing the half-way mark
It’s Sunday morning
The sky’s a grey flannel
Cars rush along the Vauxhall Bridge Road
Heading for the plug hole
Two minutes thirty five seconds so far
Inevitably there will be a redrafting, maybe two
And there’s the possibility that this may never become a poem at all
Just a few scribbled lines in my notebook
And when the notebook is full
Be consigned to the old notebook shelf
Waiting for an epiphany
For the day that never comes
When Indiana Jones finds the room’s hidden entrance
In the rubble and the rocks
Lifts it carefully
Blows the dust from the book’s cover
Opens and begins to read
Eight minutes, twenty three seconds

First Light

It’s been going on all night
Make no mistake
Don’t be beguiled by the innocent look
Of those trees hanging about,
Hands in pockets, in the fields
Still pooled with darkness
Don’t be misled by the silver light,
The anarchic flight of sparrows
Or the crows practising tai chi

Don’t be fooled by the rising safety curtain
On the moon-clean stage
After the first act’s carnage has been cleared
Or the warming up of the orchestra
Now missing its woodwind section

This is not a fresh start
This is no new dawn

Drowned

Death on the level crossing
Not hit by a train
But crushed beneath the gate

Death by poisoning
Not rat killer or agent orange
Ate a lozenge past its sell-by date

Death by chocolate
Not the cocoa content or overeating
Slipped on a choc-ice at the match
And landed badly on some metal seating

Death by drowning
Not in the oceans mighty swell
But in the tears I wept
When you said farewell

Family

A roaring log fire
In the kitchen corner
A large old oak table
Where the family gather
Loud and hungry
For lusty sausages
And salted pork
Cooked on the embers
Home-made tagliatelle
Pasta cooked in cheese
Melted on the stove
Wild asparagus
Flavoured with truffle
Tobacco and woodsmoke
Hustle and bustle
A game show on TV
Leggy brunettes
Keep the men happy
Wine and Limoncello
Coffee as thick as a Sicilian hug

And we are turned out into the cool night
Above the villages of tiny lights
Where we wander amongst
The burning white stars

Loneliness

Loneliness
How physical is that?
It’s a flying paintbrush
Aimed at you
That paints a hole
In your head
That daubs a smiling face
That smears a purple sky
With grey

It’s an eraser
Found in an old address book
A magnet
And your favourite cassette
A pencil stub
Too short to use
A missing score
A landscape, wild and untamed
No frame will fit

And when you finally
Hang the portrait on the wall
No one comes to look
And who can blame them?
There’s another, and much better one,
At the exhibition next door

Newcastle Serenade

On the train to Newcastle
I can hear music
A five-piece band
Guitar, sax, bass, drums
And a silky female vocal

I look around
Ah! There –
In the luggage racks -
Musicians
Giving the train
A syncopated swing

The conductor
Sways down the aisle
With the microphone
She sings
Money makes the world go round…
I am tempted to join in
But instead
I point out to him
That we are in
A dedicated quiet carriage
And suggest that he takes his band
To the buffet car
Where customers might enjoy a little cabaret