Trevor Baylis

1937 - 2018

Colin and I stem from the same group of acrobatic enthusiasts back in the early sixties. Each weekend we would all descend on the local swimming baths with devastating effects.

Since those times Colin, like the rest of us, has gone his own separate way of inventiveness. It must have been something in the water!

The book is a compilation that works its way from an imaginative narrative into light-hearted anecdotes and poetry, before finishing on a more serious note with a dissertation and its associated poetry.

Trevor Baylis OBE CBE

 

Step into the Rainbow

by

Colin R. Brookfield

 

©1998 C R Brookfield (Publisher)

ISBN Softback: 978-0-9532635-0-9

ISBN Hardback: 978-1-9163819-0-2

 

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in the whole or in part of any form whatsoever.

This book is sold subject to the conditions that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published.

 

Drawings by Colin R. Brookfield

 

For her patience and tolerance,

my thanks go to my wife Anne

without whom I could never have

finished this book.

Contents

 

About the Author

 

Foreword

 

Grandfather’s Legacy

 

Anecdotes and Poetry

 

Step into the Rainbow (Dissertation and accompanying verse)

 

Index with Category

 

Further information

 

By the Same Author

 

About the Author

Colin Brookfield’s life has been a balancing act between many occupations. Born in 1932 he left school at fourteen. He was put to the building trade and in later life ran his own business for several decades.

He ran away to sea at sixteen and sailed around the world with the P&O ship SS Corfu until he was eighteen when he was called up to do his National Service in the army. He became a Physical Training Instructor (PTI) and whilst stationed in Germany, went on to become the individual fencing champion of BAOR (British Army of the Rhine) and nominated for the Royal Tournament.

After leaving the army he was eventually drawn into local functions with his acrobatic speciality act (Duo Collise), which in turn led to an agent and paid appearances.

Vocal training followed and for many years, he sang locally as a solo tenor, accompanied by his wife Anne on the piano and later in light entertainment with Anne.

In 1968, he and his wife Anne emigrated to Australia and travelled 28,000 miles around the continent before settling on the Gold Coast.

They returned to England after five years where Colin resumed business in London. Anne worked in the music industry of EMI Records and later with British Airways, until her retirement.

He has always been intensely interested in human nature and, his lifelong ambition has been to express his observations and solutions as to the anomalies of mankind and his books have now gone into the subject more fully.

Three of his books, (The Summerhouse Journals Trilogy) The Summerhouse, Summerhouse Timeshift and Summerhouse Stepping Stones, were a break from reality but still had aspects open to question.

He has acquired several patents (one presently being developed in China). His inventive interests and other hobbies included sub-aqua, water skiing, surfboard riding and hang gliding.

Anne was classically trained on the piano and, both she and Colin used to be members of oratorio choral and musical societies in Australia, London, Dorset and later, in Cyprus.

In 2007 they moved with their two Siamese cats, Sable, Sapphire and Amber, their black domestic, to Paphos in Cyprus. Sadly, all the cats passed on during their seven years on the island. They have since rescued four feral Cyprus cats, Millie, Dobby, Pippin and Bravie and in 2014, brought them all back to Somerset in England, where they are thriving and playing for the first time on green grass.

Foreword

My book is divided into three parts. The first, Grandfather’s Legacy is a short story for which I drew upon the fond memories of my early days. They hark back to the beautiful Midlands countryside in the 1930s where the memories still remind me of how difficult life was for those who served the land and who often lived in solitary places. These were people who drew upon the past in an ageless continuity, for they were locked into the fabric of a system over which they had little control. Changes, when they did come, were usually at a slow and barely perceptible rate, and in these places, last to arrive. Faster change did arrive of course, and in the process, old ways were disconnected forever.

Looking back, I sometimes wonder how modern people would survive that old, isolated way of life. To rise or fall according to ones own abilities and the vicissitudes of Nature. Could we envisage a life where income was so low that one grew most of what one wanted to eat or went hungry? For those people there were no refrigerators, washing machines, heating, electricity, gas or piped water. The disposal of all waste products was a personal responsibility. From our modern perspective, it sounds rather depressing, though in my brief sojourn within the old ways, the people that I knew seemed to exist in a more contented way than we do now.

The second part of my book, Anecdotes and Poetry is a mixture of poems and memories, some of which are humorous (I hope you find them so) and others convey some depth of human feeling. All the anecdotes that refer to the young boy are factual accounts.

The third and final part is a dissertation with accompanying verse upon which I have actually based my book, inviting you to Step into the Rainbow and to read it with a little more depth of feeling. It covers the more serious side of human nature and it is my hope that the thoughts that lie within it will pass something on.

Grandfather’s Legacy

 

Peter stared forlornly at the television and muttered to himself, “Damn garage, full of promises, what a joke. Here I am with no car, and no holiday either, if my promised lift to Shropshire in the morning turns out to be as reliable as the garage.”

“I hope you’re going to put the garage and work out of your mind for the next few weeks,” said his wife Jill as she bustled into the room, bearing a tray of coffee and biscuits. “Darling, I wish you wouldn’t wear that vulgar ring,” she added with a slight grimace.

“I really should wear it for a while Jill, after all, it’s scarcely a month since my grandfather passed away and it was a thoughtful present. Besides, there’s a real gold sovereign set within it.”

“I don’t care! You’re not a barrow boy. Now, perhaps it might be an idea if we check through the holiday itinerary,” she said while pressing the ‘off’ button on the television remote, and withdrawing a neatly folded sheet of paper from the further side of the coffee tray. “I had a word with George today about giving you a lift to Shropshire during his weekly business trip there, and I must say, he was rather envious of your week’s fishing trip. However, he sees no problem about tomorrow morning, even though it’s slightly off his usual course to your drop-off point. He’ll be here at seven-thirty and suggested you both have breakfast along the way.”

“It makes sense,” Peter replied, “anyway, it will give me an opportunity to fill your brother’s petrol tank; I already feel guilty about my heavy cases and fishing tackle cluttering up his car boot space.” He put his cup down. “To be on the safe side, I’d better jot down a few details in my notebook. Now, according to the country cottage brochure, Bramble Lane should be approximately seven miles past the village on the right-hand side, and the cottage is about one hundred yards along the lane. I understand it’s occupied by an elderly couple.”

Jill moved the tray to one side, making room for Peter’s small notebook. “By the way,” she said, “make a note of our holiday flight times. We have to meet no later than eight thirty in the morning at Terminal Four at Heathrow on Friday the 24th, which is only about three and a half hours after George has delivered you back home from your fishing trip, and you will be very tired.”

She was feeling rather cross that her six day symposium in Brussels had clashed with the first week of Peter’s three week holiday. “Quite honestly Peter, I would have felt better knowing you were resting at home with a good book. At least then, I would know you hadn’t fallen into a river with your silly old fishing rod, or that you weren’t rolling about in the hay with the farmer’s daughter,” she said with a smile. “Oh well, at least we’ll get away to the sun for a few weeks afterwards.”

The following morning, after a parting kiss and some good advice to her husband about not sitting about fishing in the rain, Jill drove off to the airport and Peter embarked on the first stage of his holiday, with his brother-in-law chauffeur.

“Thanks for this George, I’d have been in rather a mess without your help, the garage promised me faithfully that the car would be ready, and then to be told at the last minute that it wouldn’t, really got matters off to a bad start. Though in the light of how things have turned out, it’s probably for the best. I don’t really need a car when I’m at the cottage.”

“Sounds a bit static,” George replied, with the village pub and the local brew uppermost in his mind, “it wouldn’t suit me, being without wheels.”

“To tell you the truth, I would normally feel the same way, but not this time. It may sound rather strange, but as I sat here watching the countryside slip by, my thoughts were on the things that my grandfather mentioned when I last visited him. You see, his words hadn’t struck home in the way they normally would, due to my rather overworked state of mind.” He took a moment to contemplate. “Grandfather was born in the very same Bramble Lane that we are going to, and who knows, perhaps our family name will still be known by someone, or the cottage might still be there.”

“Steady on old chap,” said George, “you sound as if you might be building yourself up for a bit of a disappointment.”

“You’re probably right. Grandfather had such an extraordinarily engaging way of putting things, that he did rather affect one’s imagination. He gave me a few sketches of his old hideaway fishing places around the mere and rivers, close to Bramble Lane. I hope they’re still there. From all accounts it’s supposed to be an isolated, but very beautiful place.”

Peter sat for a while wondering whether it would look the same now, as he settled more comfortably in his seat.

“I must say though, he was rather strange about the ring he gave me,” holding it up for George to see. “There was also some old money in a tiny drawstring bag. He said they all belonged together and asked me if I would wear the ring. Sounds silly I know, but I’ve brought the whole lot with me. He was a hundred and four, and passed away only two days after I saw him, so this is really something of a ‘sentimental journey’, visiting secret places that only he knew. I’m really going to miss that old fellow.”

The car slowed down and drew into the car park of a Shrewsbury hotel.

“We should be at your place within an hour or so,” said George encouragingly. “Fancy a sandwich? Must be two hours since we had breakfast.”

“Don’t know where you put it all. Though, a cup of coffee wouldn’t go amiss.”

George proved quite accurate in his estimate. Within an hour of leaving the hotel, they finally stopped by the side of, what could only have been Bramble Lane, and it corresponded with the seven miles past the village as instructed.

“I can see something in the hedge,” observed Peter, as he made his way towards it.

“What is it?” shouted George.

“It’s an old signpost, but most of the paint has peeled off. The word ‘lane’ is still readable but the first two letters of ‘Bramble’ have disappeared. We have evidently arrived at the right spot though,” Peter yelled.

“Alright, get in, and I’ll drive you down.”

“Not a good idea, it looks like a walking job,” Peter replied as he moved back towards the car. “There’s no way a car could get down this deeply rutted lane without parting company with the exhaust pipe and engine sump. Anyway George, many thanks, you’ve been great company. I promise to catch you a few trout, and no doubt you will have a few exaggerated fishing tales to listen to. Anyway, I suppose it’s time I made a move, I was told it’s only a hundred yards or so up the lane to the cottage, so I’ll see you on the twenty-fourth at the arranged time.”

“OK, see you in a week; have a good time,” George shouted as he drove off.

Picking up his fishing rod, he attached it to one of the cases with two elastic straps, and set off along the dusty track. It soon became obvious that the only form of transport using the track must have been horse and cart; there were deep ruts either side of him, left by large iron-edged wooden wheels. There were also many indentations through the centre of the track, made by the hooves of a large draft horse.

After walking some half a mile with no sign of human habitation, Peter sat down for a rest on one of the cases. Close-by, he noticed a rusty, old cast iron water pump half covered with vegetation, protruding from the high hedgerow.

“The first sign of human existence!” he exclaimed out loudly, “Well passed existence.” He stood up and walked over to inspect it. Taking hold of the long, graceful cast iron handle, he eased it upward to see if the antique still worked. Its rusty parts let out a loud squeal of protest, and so did every bird within two hundred yards as they exploded from hedges and trees in alarm.

He let go, as though the handle had delivered an electric shock. “Hello countryside,” he said quietly, “the city has arrived.”

Then almost with a feeling of embarrassment, he lifted his belongings and removed himself from the scene of desecration.

Plodding on for another quarter of a mile did nothing for his rising feeling that something had gone badly wrong, and what was more, the feedback he was receiving from his shoulders and limbs, gave the clear message that they were not prepared to put up with much more of it. It was then that he saw something that raised his hopes.

The track had just made a sharp bend to the left and he was grateful to be confronted by a small, low cottage that looked as old and as natural in its surroundings, as did the two ancient oaks that stood to the left of it. The track itself ended at a five-bar farm gate at the other side of the cottage. It then led on further into some small outbuildings belonging to the tiny farm.

Peter spotted the name ‘Sanscroft’ above the cottage front entrance. “That’s something I wasn’t told,” he muttered to himself.

After lifting the iron door-knocker, it fell with an unexpectedly loud crash, that once again set the birds squawking – and Peter, cringing.

A few moments later, he heard approaching footsteps on a stone floor, and the door opened wide to reveal the cheerful, though slightly surprised figure, of a motherly, middle-aged woman wearing rather old-fashioned clothes.

“Yes sir?” she said, in a strong country accent. “What can I do for you?”

There was a clear feeling that he was unexpected.

“My name is Spencer,” he spluttered, “Peter Spencer. I was under the impression that arrangements had been made for me to stay with you for a week’s holiday.”

“Well, I’ve not ‘eard anything about that, I’m afraid you must ‘ave come to the wrong place,” she replied.

“Obviously, something has gone dreadfully wrong and it’s left me in rather a mess. I can’t face the walk back to the road with all my luggage, and even if I could, it’s a further seven miles to the village.”

“Pr’aps you ‘ad better come in,” she said, “and we can talk about it while the kettle is boiling. By the way sir, my name is Mrs Persill.”

“I’m from London,” he quickly added.

“I could tell that,” she replied, “city folk, they say, ‘ave some very rum ways of dressing, like we never see in these parts.”

They passed through a second doorway that led immediately into a cosy, low-ceilinged, apparently multipurpose room. It had a small window to the front and another that looked out on the back of the cottage. Under this window stood a large table covered with a heavy material. A handsome brass oil lamp, with amber coloured glassware stood in its centre. The room so fascinated Peter, that despite his obvious plight, he couldn’t help absorbing every little detail. There were four chairs placed around the table and like the hallway, the floor was flagged in stone.

On the wall to the left of the table, there was a wide chimney breast, and inset into it was a large black, iron cooking range with an open fire in its centre. The fire apparently heated the oven to the left of it, as well as the water on the right, as there was a large polished brass tap to the lower part of that section. On the hot plates over the oven and the water section, stood a large iron frying pan, several black cooking pots and a huge black kettle which Mrs. Persill was now filling with fresh water from a nearby jug. The kettle was then hoisted – with the skill of constant practice – onto a large hook which left it suspended at the optimum distance above the flames. There was a great deal of headroom above the range, almost five feet from floor level, before the heavy timber mantle shelf jutted out. On this, stood a collection of hand-carved wooden pipes and a few clay ones. Three well-used candle holders with their snuffs sat there as if in readiness for some emergency.

Hanging on the wall to one side of the chimney breast was a highly-polished copper, bed-warming pan. On a shelf above it, casting a baleful eye in Peter’s direction, was a stuffed owl, covered for protection with an elongated glass dome. To the other side of the chimney breast hung a wall clock; its brass pendulum swinging hypnotically from side-to-side beneath its glass-windowed wooden case.

The only rug to be seen, lay in front of the cooking range, and nearby stood a comfortable chair.

The wall opposite the fire had a heavy curtain hanging in its centre, which he suspected covered an opening at the foot of some stairs. Several feet to the left of that, was a door which presumably led to another room.

Suddenly, a slight sound drew his attention to an armchair that had its back towards him. Moving forward a little, he spied a small boy curled up fast asleep within it.

Mrs. Persill noticed Peter’s sudden observation. “Unusual for our William to be asleep this time a day,” she said.

“He looks comfortable,” Peter indicated, as he lowered himself into a chair that was provided for him, and it wasn’t long before a hot drink and home-made bread and butter was placed in front of him.

“Now look,” she said as she sat down, “if you feel a need to get back to the village, I can get my ‘usband to ‘fix up the ‘orse and cart. It’s not very posh mind you. Then he could take you, once ‘e’s finished in the lower field. That’d be in about three hours or so. He couldn’t come right away as ‘e’s cutting the last of the corn while the weather is right. I would like to say though, we ‘ave ‘ad the odd guest stay ‘ere over the years, although not a posh London gent like yourself. But there you are, whatever way you want to do things, we would be obliging.”

“Thank you. You really are so kind. I’d love to stay for the week, that’s if your husband doesn’t mind. I think the people that were supposed to arrange all this, will have it sorted out by then. Incidentally, I’m hoping to be out fishing from dawn to dusk, so I wouldn’t be any trouble.”

“Oh, don’t worry yourself ‘bout that, we’ll manage. Now can I get some more for you to eat or drink?”

“No I’m quite full thank you.”

“Well then, if you’d just like to follow me sir, I’ll show you where things are, so as you’ll know your way around.”

“By the way,” he added, “people usually call me Peter.”

“Oh I couldn’t do that, it wouldn’t be proper, you being a city gentleman and all that,” she added.

Peter followed her, but said no more as she opened the door to the left of the curtained stair entrance. It led into a small utility room where food was presumably prepared prior to cooking. They then passed through another door and out into the open.

“We ‘ave another little room,” she said, “but we can only get to it through this other door on the outside. There you are; ‘ave a look inside. It’s the coldest place that we ‘ave, as the sun never reaches this wall of the cottage, so it’s where we keep our perishables, not that we keep too much in ‘ere in the warmer months.”

Hanging up inside were several joints of cooked meat, some rather high pheasants, and a side of bacon that was covered in a muslin-like material to protect it. Various covered dishes lay on the shelves.

“Well that’s our main food store; all the rest of our needs we grow in our vegetable garden. Now then, I don’t suppose that really interests you. What I really brung you out for, is to show you where the pump is, in case you be in need of water anytime, but when you want a wash in the morning, there’ll be a jug of water and a bowl on the wash-stand in your bedroom.”

Peter couldn’t help but remark on the water pump, because its extravagant design seemed so out of place.

“Oh, that was father’s work,” she replied, “he replaced the old one that used to be here with another that he found lying abandoned in a nearby field. It must ‘ave belonged to the great house that used to be somewhere ‘ere-abouts afore it were burnt down and then demolished.”

She led on further down the pathway until they came to a small building, which due to its isolation and particular size and shape, needed no explanation – even to a ‘city gent’.

“This be the small room,” she said, “in case you need it, if you know what I mean.”

He nodded his head enthusiastically, hoping that by doing so, they might move a little faster away from the cowshed midden that was steamily marinating close-by in the late afternoon sun.

‘Barney’ was the next port of call. “We be very proud of our Barney,” she said. Peter noticed the udders beneath Barney, but decided not to ask the obvious question. “She gives lovely creamy milk.” Barney swung her head around as if in appreciation, and her large brown eyes surveyed Peter for a second, before she turned her attention back to the large chunk of brown-coloured salt she had been licking.

Peter noted how clean Barney’s stall was. The floor was thickly covered with, what he took to be straw. Up in one corner, stood a small three leggèd stool and several spotless containers with handles. Milking equipment, how charming, he thought, but like Mrs. Persill and her house, they seem like relics from the past.

Sounds of activity from outside the cowshed, sent Mrs. Persill hurriedly away, having first excused herself. Peter followed at a much slower rate, examining each area before putting a foot down. He thought it best to be prudent when cows were around.

Outside, Mrs. Persill was standing there chattering away to a man, who Peter assumed was her husband. Surprisingly, he was dressed like a farmer who had just stepped out of a Dickens’ novel. They certainly go in for hand-me-down clothes in a serious way, thought Peter.

Unlike his wife, the man had a lean build. His face and hands were weathered to a deep brown. His moustache had points that projected out a couple of inches either side of his upper lip; they had been waxed and given a twist or two, to provide the sort of military appearance of a bygone age.

He was holding the bridle of a very large draft horse, which was scuffing impatiently at the ground with one of its gigantic hair-covered hooves. With a nod of the head in Peter’s direction and a touch of his hand to his forelock, the man and horse moved off, as if they had just bidden ‘Good Evening’ to the Squire.

That evening, they all sat down to a meal. It was one of the tastiest Peter had ever eaten, and the quietest. Apart from the occasional “Can I get you some more sir?” or “I’ve packed some lunch for your fishing trip in the morning,” that was about it.

Strangely enough, there was no sense of inhibition, just a comfortable feeling that idle chatter was surplus to their needs, or perhaps Peter thought, surplus to Mr. Persill’s, especially when he suddenly murmured, “Stop blathering at the table woman!” She smiled at Peter as if to say ‘It doesn’t mean anything.’

Her husband must have exhausted himself with that diatribe. It was the last word he mentioned that evening and very nearly for the rest of the week.

After dinner, the farmer settled down by the fire, having first brought down a gigantic pipe from the mantle shelf. Its bowl was about three inches in diameter and about four inches deep, with a stem some twelve inches long. It was curved at the end towards the smoker’s mouth. He deposited what seemed like an ounce of tobacco into its gaping maw, and applied a light to it. He sat there for half an hour or so, with both hands cupped in his lap supporting the bowl of the pipe, as it threw out great puffs of smoke like the chimney of a locomotive.

It wasn’t until the locomotive finally ran out of fuel that he decided there were other things to be done, and disappeared out of the door.

“I noticed that Mr. Persill is very quiet,” Peter observed, “I do hope my presence isn’t offending him.”

“Not at all,” she said, “father never could string more than three or four words together at one time. ‘Is father was just the same. Anyway, who is there to talk to out there in the fields all day ‘cept the ‘orse and, ‘ees got even less to say.”

He took the opportunity to change the subject. “What happened to William? Why didn’t he have dinner with us?”

“Oh, he wasn’t feeling too good, so I gave him a little to eat and put him to bed. ‘Ee’ll be right enough upon the morrow. Now, you’ll be feeling rather tired I expect. Perhaps I should show you to your room. I start cooking breakfast at six every morning, but you get up when it suits you. One little thing I should mention though, if you go out passed the cowshed in the morning, pr’aps you could make sure to close the wicket behind you or we might ‘ave the animals at the vegetables.”

“Certainly, and six in the morning will do me fine. I’m not sure whether I mentioned it before, but I expect to be back rather late each day, if that’s alright with you.”

Having nodded her approval, Mrs. Persill reached up to the mantle shelf to bring down a candle holder. “Follow me,” she said, “and I’ll show you to your room.” The candle wick was lit and she proceeded through the curtained opening and up the steep stairs. The stair handrail turned out to be rather a surprise; it was just a tree branch, about two inches in diameter, still with its original bark on it, which he found rather amusing. At the top of the stairs, they came to a small landing with three rooms leading off it.

“Ere we are,” she said opening the first door. The room was quite a good size, or it would have been had it not been for the large double-size iron-framed bedstead that in turn, was almost swamped by its high mattress and overlapping quilt.

Peter looked out of the window while she checked that all was well. In the dim light he could make out the form of Mr. Persill, digging a long trench across the vegetable garden.

“Doesn’t your husband ever stop work?” he asked.

“Ee ‘as to keep busy sir, we ‘ave to get all our vegetables in whilst the weather is suitable, because come winter, if we’ve not enough to get us through, then we go ‘ungry. You see we only rent this farm; what we grow in the lower field must pay the rent and feed the animals. Then there are things like oil for the lamps, candles and peat for the range. It don’t leave much to spare even in a good year.”

Next, Mrs. Persill pointed to where her husband was working.

“Now that long trench that father’s digging, is for next year’s prize carrots and parsnips. It’ll be almost as deep as I am by the time ‘ee ‘as finished. Then he fetches our ‘orse and cart to the spinney for leaf mould, and that’s laid through the bottom of the trench. Then father sieves all of the soil back in the trench. That way, his prize parsnips and carrots grow downwards nice and straight, ‘cos there’s no stones in their way.”

Peter was amused by her animations and chatter.

“Ee always gets first prize at shows. They call father ‘The Carrot and Parsnip King of Salop’. The worst part of the whole business for me, is when it’s time to dig ‘em up. You see it’s my job to sit on the ground and hang on to the vegetable, whilst father burrows down like a rabbit ‘till he comes to the very last whiskery point. It all counts when it’s measured by the judges, but believe me, father is very touchy at these times because, if I move one little bit, it might ruin the vegetable. But you want to see them when they’re all cleaned up! Most of them are taller than William when they’re stood on end.”

“It sounds very interesting,” Peter replied.

“Now, you see those tiny little hillock-like heaps in a row across the bottom end of the vegetable patch? Well, that’s what we call ‘clamps’. They’re full of potatoes that have been layered in, and covered with straw with a thick layer of earth over the top, so as the frost can’t get to ‘em in the winter. What I do, is open up the side of one of ‘em when I need potatoes, then I take what I want and block the hole up till the next time.”

“What a great idea,” he replied

“Rabbits are a problem, so we let our dog Gyp off the chain at night so as he can patrol the vegetables, otherwise the varmints gobble them up. Father is usually out at first light to get us a few rabbits, but ‘ee’s run clear out of black powder.”

“Black powder? What on earth is that?” Peter enquired.

“Well, I can see you don’t know much about guns in the city. Black powder is what you pour down the muzzle, then you put some wadding in, followed by the lead shot, then more wadding is pushed in to stop the lead pellets falling out of the end of the barrel while you’re hunting the rabbit. When the trigger is squeezed, the hammer hits a little thing that father calls a ‘percussion cap’, and this ignites the black powder. I know it’s a rather old sort of gun, but some of the farmers round ‘ere still ‘ave ‘em. They often borrow black powder off one another till they get more in from the village shop.”

“Do you know, I never realised what went on in the countryside, I’ve never thought about it before,” murmured Peter thoughtfully. He could see that Mrs. Persill was pleased with that remark.

“I’d better be getting on,” she said, “there’s lots to do before father and I retire. There’s a snuff on the side of the candle holder when you want to put the candle out and there’s a pot under the bed, just in case it’s needed,” she said, disappearing through the doorway. “I ‘ope’ you sleep well.”

He would have roared with laughter if it were not for the thought of being overheard. Nobody in their right mind would ever believe that such a left behind place could actually exist at the closing of the second millennium, but he didn’t care what others thought; he found it very special.

Looking under the bed, he discovered a round china object with a handle on one side staring back at him. “Thank you, but no thanks,” he said quietly to himself as he pocketed a small torch, and headed for the stairs.

Mrs. Persill was not to be seen in the main room, so he made his way towards the rear exit. As he passed through the little room where the food was prepared, he saw a large pie dish sitting there full of savoury cooked rabbit. In the centre of the dish, a small china object like an upturned egg cup stood high above the gravy level. Nearby, on a large wooden table, he saw the pastry which had been nicely rolled out ready to cover the pie and realised, that the thing in the pie dish must be to stop the pastry from sagging into the gravy.

Once out into the back yard, he made his way (not without some trepidation) towards that formidable little building at the end of the path. He didn’t get far before Gyp introduced himself with a curl of the upper lip, displaying a set of teeth which a sabre tooth tiger, would have been justly proud.

“Be’ave yourself you varmint,” came the gruff voice of Mr. Persill from somewhere in the bellows of the earth. “Don’t worry sir, ‘ee baint a vicious dog, ‘ee don’t bite strangers.” Peter had an unpleasant feeling that he was very likely to be the first stranger to test the theory.

He encountered Mrs. Persill next, as she made her way towards the house, taking very small steps to avoid disturbing the two pails of water that were hanging either side of her on short ropes from the hand-carved wooden yolk, that lay across her shoulders.

“I’m just getting the water in from the garden pump for the ‘ouse. The ‘orse and cow needs water next, but the pigs ‘ave ‘ad theirs. So I won’t be long now,” she said with a cheery smile.

Peter shone his torch into the little room; there was a shelf and a candle on it ready for lighting. The ‘seat’ was a plank of wood with a hole in it, and a bucket set beneath. On the wall close to hand, was a nail on which some squares of paper, had been unceremoniously spiked.

Getting into bed that evening was an experience like no other. Having first pulled back the heavy quilt, he found it necessary to launch himself upwards and over, so as to negotiate the extreme height of the bed, only to disappear into a crater, as the feather mattress enveloped him.

The next thing he heard was the farmyard alarm clock, telling the world it was time to rise and shine, or perhaps, it was just the cockerel’s way of telling everyone he wanted his breakfast.

It needed the expertise of a seasoned speleologist to get out of the feather mattress; nevertheless, he was soon up and using his battery shaver. A stripped wash in cold water was a new experience, especially when he discovered there had been hot water waiting for him in a jug just outside the bedroom door when he finally opened it.

The mouth-watering smell of eggs and bacon greeted him as he entered the main room. ‘Good mornings’ were said all round, and little William immediately took sanctuary behind his mother’s skirt.

“Ee’s a rum lad is our William; ee’s not used to strangers,” she said, placing a large plate of bacon and eggs in front of Peter. “There’s plenty more bread and butter if you need it,” she said as she poured the tea.

Peter was most intrigued by the tea-pouring process and the unusual teapot; it was rather large by normal standards, made of some sort of pewter-like metal. To pour the tea, the cup and saucer were placed under the bent-over spout and then the teapot lid was lifted by a knob in its centre. But unlike most teapot lids, this one was like pulling the piston out of a car engine, but easier of course. Then the lid was pushed gently downwards whilst a finger sealed the vent hole. This put the contents of the pot under pressure, and lo and behold, out poured the tea from the spout without lifting the pot.

“I’ve put your lunch by the back door with your fishing tackle, and filled that jug-type thing (referring to the thermos flask) you left me, with hot tea. I’m sure it’ll get cold within the hour; I don’t ‘old with these new fangled ideas.

Would you like father to go along and show you some of the special fishing places that he takes William to?”

“No it’s alright,” Peter replied, “I’ve been given a map of places to fish. But thank you anyway.”

William was still well-concealed behind his mother’s skirt, but his eyes kept peeping out to take in every detail of the strange new addition to the family.

“By the way,” Peter enquired, “it has just crossed my mind. How did Barney get her name?”

“Well, our family has farmed ‘ere for about two hundred years or so, with quite a lot of cattle and there was always a ‘Barney’ in amongst the ‘erd, so it became a tradition you might say, and even though we could only afford one cow, I couldn’t bring myself to break the tradition.”

“Quite right too,” Peter said with conviction, “neither would I.”

It turned out to be the sort of day that dreams were made of; not so much because of catching the fish (that act weighed rather heavily on his conscience and accounted for most of his catch regaining their freedom) but, the pleasure of the day had more to do with the disappearance of those nagging problems that normally dogged his professional life. In this place, he just seemed to slip unconsciously into the natural rhythm of the surroundings until he felt part of everything.

During this time, his gaze had been moving lazily across the waters, until his attention was suddenly drawn to, what appeared to be a small island at its centre with some sort of structure within its foliage. It occurred to him, that if this turns out to be the case, then it must have been something to do with the ‘Great house’ estate that Mrs. Persill mentioned. Being out of reach, he soon put it out of his mind.

A Mallard duck broke the silence as it suddenly exploded from the reeds close-by.

“Good gracious!” he exclaimed looking at his watch in disbelief. “Where on earth did the day go?” He started packing his things together so that he could be in good time for the evening meal. It was whilst he was doing this, that he noticed something within the reeds, so he waded out to make an inspection. It was a small, and rather ancient boat half-submerged in the water. Without too much difficulty, he rotated it sideways until it was upside down. Once the weight of water in it had been removed, he was able to drag it to dry land. On first inspection it seemed rather rotten, but a few firm kicks proved it to be otherwise, so an idea began to form.

Time was now getting decidedly late, so he hastily lifted up his things – but in doing so – the fishing gaff caught on some rushes. Tugging rather too hard to free it, he landed flat on his back and the freed gaff flailed backwards, taking a small piece out of the tip of his left ear in the process.

“Damn!” he yelled, thinking the damage to be more serious and clamped a handkerchief to his ear. Back at the water pump, he gave himself a tidy up before walking back to the house, as he had no wish to alarm the household with his blood-smeared face.

“Good evening to you,” said a voice that came from within the part-open door that Peter was just passing. “‘ow was the fishing?”

Popping his head around the door of the meat store, he saw that Mrs. Persill was just pulling the muslin-type material over the side of bacon, having just cut off the rashers for the following morning.

“I had a lovely day; anything I can do to help?” he enquired.

“Well, if it’s not too much bother, perhaps you’d like to see if the ‘ens have laid any eggs under the ‘edge there. It’ll be dark before I get a chance and by then, a fox will ‘ave found them.”

Within fifteen minutes he was back in the house, proudly displaying eight lovely brown eggs nestling inside of his hat.

“Looks like one of the fish got the better of you,” said Mr. Persill, looking at Peter’s mutilated ear. William’s eyes opened wide at the imagined battle between this stranger and the denizen of the deep.

At that moment, Mrs. Persill returned from the meat store.

“I’ve cleaned your fish and laid them in salt. I’ll cook them in the morning and you can take some with you in your packed lunch.”

“I caught them for all of us,” he replied, “there will be plenty more if today was anything to go by, only next time, I won’t make the mistake of taking the gaff with me – I’ll get the fish out of the water with the net – it’s less dangerous!”

The following morning, everyone was surprised when Peter enquired about the old canoe paddle which lay amongst the bric-a-brac by the old cowshed, and had been there for as long as they could remember. They were even more mystified when he took it with him.

Sometime later, and looking worse than it did before, the little boat was once again afloat. Peter climbed in gingerly with his belongings, and sat there for a while to see if the lake was going to come in and join him. Ten minutes seemed long enough to convince him that it wasn’t going to, so fishing was done in all sorts of new and successful places for the rest of the day.

That evening, Mrs. Persill was quite amazed at what an old paddle could do to the fish catch; so many had arrived that it was going to be fish on the menu all round for several days. He felt a little guilty keeping quiet about the old boat and paddling around the mere all day, but he didn’t want them worried about him.

During the following day, he suddenly realised that there wasn’t a great deal of holiday left, as yet another fish went into the keep net. But his mind was on other things. Perhaps with lots of care, he thought, I might just make it to the island and back; it certainly invites investigation. Thirty minutes later, he stepped out of the boat and on to a small island that probably hadn’t been set foot upon since the ‘Great House’ existed. A few rotted posts marked the place where the old jetty had obviously once stood. An overgrown pathway led away from it and into the trees. It only took a few minutes to negotiate its length, despite the efforts of the rampant shrubbery to keep trespassers away.

The journey was more than worth all the effort, for standing there in all its dilapidated glory, was a beautiful old summerhouse. It was about twenty feet in diameter, covered by a green coppered roof that was supported by ornate iron pillars; its elevated hardwood floor was encircled by ornamental iron balustrading and reached by three iron steps from ground level. The structure had the appearance of a wonderful old bandstand; a few small remains of wooden latticework still adhered here and there, which had apparently enclosed its open spaces, perhaps for some densely growing perfumed roses to flourish on, the ancient remains of which, still littered the floor.

Further discovery revealed a small brick store nearby. Its perished wooden door hung drunkenly on one hinge, and then none, as it collapsed on touching it. The gloom soon revealed a most delicately designed lady’s chair, lightly constructed in metal. Two faded, but exquisite hand-embroidered cushions were fastened on the back and seat. It was a touching experience to look upon the elegance and beauty that would once have graced this place. He took the chair out and placed it on the summerhouse floor, as it must have been many times in the distant past.

He discovered a larger chair within the store, which he then placed some distance from the other one. Making himself comfortable on it he eased it a little to one side so that it was facing squarely towards the other. In his mind, he was trying to recapture some feeling of the place and those that would have used it all that time ago. He thought about the latticework and how it would have looked, filled with scented roses and the scatterings of sunlight through their leafage on to the floor. He tried to visualise the ornamental ironwork in complementary colours to its surroundings, and the pathway as it would have been, neatly bordered by the bright summer flowers as it meandered down towards the sturdy wooden jetty, that he imagined would once have been there. The more that he let go of the present, the less of a stranger he became amongst the images that he was making.

Just for a tiny moment there was a feeling that he might have dozed off.

“I have!” he exclaimed out loud, and was astonished when a voice answered him back.

“You obviously fell asleep,” said a quiet, well-educated voice. His startled eyes opened wide at the sight of a young lady who was now sitting in the chair opposite, which a second ago was completely empty. She was dressed as if ready to step into a Regency stage play.

“Ye-yes,” he fumbled, surprised that the lady seemed to know him. Then something else caught his eye. On his fingers, were several elaborate and expensive rings and fine, white lace cuffs protruding from the ends of his sleeves. All of these things were a mystery to him. He returned a smile to the woman in, as relaxed a manner as he could, given the peculiar circumstances and hoped it would not be the prelude to some expected dialogue, but instead, she merely sighed contentedly and picked up a small wooden frame from the side of her chair. The frame supported a tightly-stretched tapestry and as she swung it around onto her lap, he caught sight of a magnificent mansion within splendid gardens sewn upon it.

“I’ll just finish this Simon,” she said, selecting some coloured threads, (he almost said, ‘Who on earth is Simon?’ but thought better of it) “and I shall be ready to return to the house when you....”

Her voice was interrupted by a loud crash from somewhere behind Peter. He turned quickly to discover the cause and saw a large wood pigeon making a hasty departure, having been badly let down by the old tree branch that now lay dejectedly on the ground, but something was wrong. His view was no longer obstructed by the dense wall of roses that had been there a split second ago. With equal speed, he turned back towards the young woman, but his eyes were met by an empty chair.

He took a few moments to compose himself. “What an incredibly lucid dream,” he said aloud. “Imagination can play some very strange tricks in lonely places.”

Being a tidy person, Peter returned both chairs to the place where he first found them and was about to leave, when his eyes fell quite by accident on a little wooden frame. Some perished remains of tapestry, now denuded of imagery were hanging limply within it, except for one small faded segment, on which he could see part of a grand mansion and garden.

There was quite an extensive time lapse before he managed to get his mind back into the kind of order that he had once been familiar with. The word cryptomnesia had come to his salvation.

Of course, he thought, I must have unconsciously noticed the faded picture and frame when I first entered the store, which then set the scene for my dream. Peter contented himself with that rational explanation, until he noticed the handle of a lady’s decayed handbag lying just inside the brick store. As he bent down to investigate its contents, a beautiful silver-edged, glass covered miniature spilled out; it was the hand-painted picture of the young lady with whom he had just exchanged words.

After returning to the cottage, he made a vow never to divulge his secret to anybody.

“You’re very quiet,” said Mrs. Persill at dinner, “I think you’ve been wearing yourself out tramping around those fishing places all day and every day.”

“I’m sure you’re right, I think it will be an early night for me if that’s alright.”

The view from the bedroom window was the same as any other night, just Mr. Persill digging away. No wonder he has nothing to say; the poor man is always working, he thought. He lay awake for a long time. It was dark and the whole house was quiet and asleep when he reached for his lighter and applied it to the wick of the candle. The flame wavered for an instant and then steadied, bringing the room into view. It was the last evening of his holiday, and most of his things were already packed to save time for the following day. Moving his legs over the side of the bed he slid them to the floor.

Sitting for a while on the chair by the washstand, he took the sovereign ring off his finger and idly turned it over and over in his hands as he went through the week’s events. Then, something about the ring caught his eye. There was a pin-size hole just beneath its outer edge. His curiosity aroused, Peter reached for his tie pin from an open case and pressed it into the hole. There was a sharp click as the claws holding the coin flew open, sending the sovereign tumbling to the floor. Beneath the space where the coin had been, was a thin gold base inscribed with initials that made no sense to him. They were certainly not his grandfather’s.

He picked up the gold coin, replaced it and squeezed the ring claws between his fingers. There was another audible click as they sprang back into position, firmly grasping the coin.

“Well,” said Mrs. Persill the following day as she cleared away the last of the late lunch things, “it’s been a pleasure ‘aving you. Father is just fixing the ‘orse and cart so as to get you and your luggage to the road. I do ‘ope your friend don’t forget to meet you there.”

“I can’t thank you enough. It’s been a dream holiday and with such lovely people.” He put his hand inside his coat jacket to withdraw his wallet. “Now, how much do I owe you?”

She flushed a little. “I don’t rightly know what to say. What if we settle for seven shillings and sixpence?”

Peter was dumbstruck. “Seven and sixpence, my goodness, that’s not enough,” he said, producing three fifty pound notes.

“We don’t use that kind of London money round ‘ere, I’ve never seen the likes of that before,” she said.

Peter was mortally embarrassed as he tumbled all his worldly pocket goods onto the table in a vain hope, that by some miracle, Mrs. Persill’s eyes would suddenly alight upon a face-saving solution.

“There you are!” she suddenly exclaimed reaching unexpectedly, not for the nice newly-minted coinage of the day, but for the tarnished old coins that had spilt out of his grandfather’s string bag onto the table. In a state of thorough confusion, he watched as Mrs. Persill emptied the contents of the bag completely upon the table and proceeded to total them up. “Seven and fourpence, fivepence, sixpence. Exactly right,” she said, “not a penny more or less.”

How uncanny, he thought.

She beamed. “I’m sorry if I made you feel a bit awkward over that London money, it’s not reached our parts yet. Still, we’re always a bit behind the times.”

Peter pulled the ring from his finger. “Please let me at least add this to the payment. The gold coin comes out if you need to use it.”

Her face changed almost to panic. “That would be taking a grave advantage of you,” she said. “It’s far too much money for the little that we ‘ave done. In fact I’m feeling very guilty about the seven and six.”

“Very well then,” said Peter. An unlikely thought crossed his mind. Old money might have some high resale value in a neighbouring town’s antique shop which could account for her preference for it. It did sound a bit far-fetched though. Then his mind drifted back to the business of the holiday home agency. Perhaps there had been some sort of belated contact with Mrs. Persill with regards to settlement.

“Look, what about me making William a present of the ring. To tell you the truth, my wife dislikes it, so it won’t get worn. William can wear it when he becomes a big lad.” Mrs. Persill reluctantly nodded her head in assent.

She later stood by the gate to wave goodbye to him as Mr. Persill arrived to help load his luggage.

The horse and cart finally clattered and jostled to a halt at the road end of the lane. Peter clambered to the ground and salvaged his cases; he then stood back, as horse and cart turned in a wide sweep across the road, ready for its return along the lane.

Peter smiled and nodded his goodbye to Mr. Persill, who did the same as he touched his forelock with his hand, in that amusing ‘Good afternoon Squire’ way of delivering it.

Soon he was alone and sitting quietly on one of his cases waiting for George’s arrival.

A car horn blared in the distance and minutes later, George’s car pulled up at his side. Then, with all the luggage loaded, they were soon on their way.

“What on earth do you get up to on these once-a-week quick turnaround trips of yours?” Peter enquired.

“Well,” he said, “as a matter of fact, I’ve got a small shop that someone looks after for me and I just pop down once a week to bank the declarables. I pocket the rest and toddle home.”

“I’m not listening,” remarked Peter.

“Well, what have YOU got to say,” George enquired as the miles rolled away beneath the wheels of the car, “tell me all about the holiday old boy.” Peter consented, but knowing what a sceptic dear old George could be, left out all the eyebrow-raising parts. George had however, remarked on the name of the cottage.

“Sans, that means without doesn’t it? Sanscroft. How strange!”

It was two weeks later when the plane touched down at Heathrow, and a healthily tanned Peter and Jill made their way back home after their holiday together in the sun.

There were only two letters on the doormat, which rather surprised Jill, given the amount of cards and letters that she had dispatched to friends and relations. It was with a feeling of confusion that she read the contents of the first letter. It was from the Country Cottages people.

Dear Mr. Spencer,

We were sorry to discover that you did not arrive as arranged at Bramble Lane. However, it is regretted that due to these circumstances, we are unable to refund your deposit.

Yours sincerely...........

 

All kinds of suspicions began crowding into Jill’s mind. No, he’s not that type of person. How many women have made that mistake? she thought, remembering how uncharacteristically quiet he had been on holiday – hardly mentioning his fishing.

“Peter, I need a word with you!”

“Don’t be silly Jill, there’s been a mix up. I’ll get a letter off to Mrs. Persill right away. No I won’t. George will confirm that he left me at Bramble Lane and just to further satisfy you, when he makes his usual trip tomorrow, I’m sure he won’t mind parking his car at the end of the lane and taking a walk up to the Persill’s cottage. We can give him a large bunch of flowers to deliver on my behalf, and he can sort out this payment business at the same time.”

“Do I hear this right?” spluttered Jill, “You stayed at a cottage for a whole week, seemingly unpaid for, with people who were not expecting you?”

“Please,” said Peter, “I’m as nonplussed as you are. Let’s drop the subject. George will get it sorted out for us.”

Knowing that bad news seldom comes alone, Peter opened the second letter. He hoped that by doing so, any more bad news might be presented in a more favourable light.

“It seems we have to see the solicitor at three-thirty this Saturday,” he said. “It’s about a parcel that was entrusted to them by grandfather, to be given to us after his death.”

The following Friday evening they were both waiting with some trepidation for George to knock on the door. They were having a cup of coffee in the kitchen when he arrived.

Jill opened the door. “At last!” she gasped, “I’ve been biting my finger nails over this. Come on in.” Jill took a surprisingly short time settling him down with a hot drink. “Now, what’s the Bramble Lane story?”

“Better sit down both of you,” he replied, “because you won’t get much satisfaction from the answer.”

Suddenly a cold chill went through Peter. “Before you say any more George, I want to tell you both the full story. I couldn’t bring myself to do so before, because I thought it was all too bizarre to be believed.”

After Peter had finished, they all went quiet. Then George broke the silence.

“It so happens,” he said, “that when Peter and I drove out of the village towards Bramble Lane, we were on what they called ‘the old road’. The new road that replaced it, branched off sharply to the left just outside the village and, typical of rural villages, nobody had bothered to signpost it. Anyway, the roads came together again fifteen miles further on. I checked this new road and guess what? I discovered Bramble Lane right where it was expected to be but, it was not our Bramble Lane; this one was much wider with a tarmac finish, so I turned the car around and took the old road. I checked it twice from one end to the other and there was no lane to be found anywhere. I then went to the village library and you’ll never guess! There used to be an AMBLE Lane on the old road and it led to a sort of cottage-cum-farm. The name of the people that lived there was ‘Persill’, but get this, the Persills died over NINETY years ago. The land owners demolished the empty buildings; the unwanted lane had its hedges uprooted and the plough took care of the rest.”

Jill and Peter looked at each other in total perplexity. The story was unbelievable.

“It’s almost as if the cottage fulfilled the destiny of its name, doesn’t it?” George said in wonderment.

The following Saturday, Peter presented himself at the solicitor’s office and collected the parcel.

“Well?” Jill intimated, nodding towards the package that sat on the end of the dining room table, “are we frightened to open it?”

“Not at all,” he replied, “I just thought you would like the privilege.”

Once inside the wrapping paper, they discovered a sealed letter and a bulging folder with his grandfather’s name on it.

“I didn’t know your grandfather whiled his time away with this sort of stuff,” said Jill as she opened up the folder and took out several pages. “Do you want to hear it?”

“Well, he wouldn’t have left it if he hadn’t wanted me to hear it, now would he?”

“Well I hope you like poetry,” she said, “because there seems to be a lot of it. I’ll just read you a couple of short ones. This one’s called ‘Brief Allotted Whiles’.

How many candles lit and guttered

that left their scent upon the air;

but that was in a bygone time

and not a trace is left to share.

 

So many feet have come and gone

that brought their sadness and their smiles

that left to each along the way

cherished thoughts, for brief allotted whiles.

 

The next one’s called ‘The Thrushes Song’

 

Lesser moments come and perish

and then a moment left to cherish,

a heart that’s touched by something gone

as flies away the Thrushes Song.”

 

“Goodness me Jill, even the poetry seems related to my experience. Don’t read any more.”

Peter picked up the sealed envelope and opened it. Then having read aloud the customary preamble, he moved on to the more relevant details. It was in his grandfather’s handwriting:

 

“And now Peter, there is something I wish to say that should have been said a long time ago.

Originally my name was William Persill and not William Spencer, as you have always known me.

I was born and raised by my parents to the age of twelve at ‘Sanscroft’, in Amble Lane. Sadly though, my father suddenly became very ill and eventually died. My mother struggled on for about another year against impossible odds through a very severe winter, then fell seriously ill herself.

I remember her saying to me during her last moments that I was to have the gold ring with the sovereign in it. She said, “You remember the city gentleman that stayed with us for the fishing, the one that caught a piece out of his left ear with his fishing gaff, and gave us the seven and sixpence when he left? Well, I put the seven and six aside for a rainy day, you’ll find it with the ring, in the drawer by my bed”.

Well, after my mother died, the land owner kindly found a family called Spencer to take me in, and eventually I was given their name.”

 

Their concentration was suddenly broken as something fell from the folder that Jill was holding. It rolled across the table and came to a halt in front of Peter. It was the ring.

“That’s impossible!” Peter exclaimed. “I gave it to that small boy last wee...” With his voice trailing off, he hurriedly fetched a small pin and pressed it into the aperture on the side of the ring. With a sharp click its claws sprung open and the sovereign fell to the table, the thin gold base upon which the coin had rested carried the initials W P.

Jill stared at the initials. “This is incredible! And yet, you gave this very ring to a young William Persill.” She stared at Peter’s damaged left ear. “The man that gave him that ring also damaged his left ear with a gaff, stayed for one week and paid seven and sixpence.”

In Peter’s clenched hand, there was a tiny silver framed picture of a pretty yesteryear young lady. He put it back in his pocket for good; perhaps too much had been said and shown already.

There was something else inside the folder, so Jill tipped it out. A small drawstring bag dropped heavily onto the table and jingled like old money.

Anecdotes and Poetry

Gentle Clouds and Other Things

Upon these high blue vaults,

a fitful artist’s hand at play

that in a trice dissolves, and then

refashions in another way.

 

Across those wind awakened skies

of shifting shapes that scurry,

that scarcely for a moment frame,

and thence to new life hurry.

 

Then earthward cast their mirrored forms

to dance the lands and sea

and hold the eye enchanted

at each fresh geometry.

 

And yet, this fugitive of form

bereft it seems of being,

belies a constancy of life

that is elusive to the seeing.

 

But little changed, the Phoebus eye

its battles for ascendancy,

and Selene still the parian form

playing interlunar truancy.

 

Though when the world slept silent

of all breathing animation,

those restless but attendant clouds

were playing mother to creation.

 

Yet, constant still upon the air

in freshly formed attire,

faithful to its melting moods

that gently downwards spire.

 

So weeps to earth their progeny

like tears of sparkling gems

in the magic of the alchemy

that from golden Phoebus stems.

 

Fond Memories

Fond memories haunt their favourite places

favourite things and favourite faces,

things of yore that gather lustre,

tucked away awaiting muster.

 

Either Way, a Price to Pay

Love unlooked for, never found,

by chains of fondness never bound,

nought to care for or be cared

of love’s felicities impaired.

 

Love like wine has tendencies,

its fondness forms dependencies,

but wine excluded from the list

is untasted and thus unmissed,

no intoxicants to make their call

through their symptoms of withdrawal.

 

But love that stayed and never flew

that grew into a part of you,

one day it must be torn away

and maimed, insipid life must stay.

 

Yesteryear’s Dreams

Small girl tucked up in her bed

the candle flared, the shadows fled,

thoughts and pictures filled her mind

shadows returned to chase and find.

 

Over toys and dolls they prance

that join in the lively dance,

the candle guttered, ceased to shine

a sleeping child, as clocks strike nine.

 

She Shames the Sun

Her radiance doth put the sun to shame

to cause it hide behind a cloud its flame.

 

When night in folly makes its presence found,

her luminescence casts its light around,

confounding night, dawn’s chorus thus misled,

causing creatures of the night seek early bed.

 

Primordial Mysterium

Flora’s colours scents, verdant hue,

Knew long the earth ere fauna grew,

‘tis bound to be this way around,

for fauna’s needs aren’t barren ground.

Things to taste, to smell, to see,

serving no receptive faculty,

No eye yet born to gaze the land,

Nor imprinted foot upon the sand.

Yet implicit there in flora’s form,

the opening of the eye would certain dawn.

 

Should I Trust These Eyes

Sat well that smile upon her face

untrespassed by a frown

evoking heady imagery

that none but she could crown.

 

Though should I trust these smitten eyes

that know of images and nothing more

that are times too eager pleasing

that have served me false before.

 

But my feelings tell me I succumb

to thoughts presaging shame

for not once did I consider

her fears could be the same.

 

Pussy’s Deliberations Upon Paws and Effect

Would I cringe in terror

in a haunted house?

No, I’d fall asleep with boredom

unless I’d found a mouse.

But you wouldn’t find a human

spend a night in there,

could this mean cats have problems

not seeing what’s not there,

or could the answer to this riddle be

that ghosts just play unfair?

 

Imagine us in uniform,

would we be officious,

would all unregulated things

seem to us suspicious?

 

Calvinistic reformations

and dubious moralities,

are we cats that paranoid

about our own mortalities?

 

Are all moggies superstitious?

Does a walk around a ladder

seem to them,

the more judicious?

 

Do we make voodoo dolls

and stick them full of pins

or mutter mumbo jumbo

to save us from our sins?

 

It’s strange that horse and dog

and the mice and rabbits

like us moggies, aren’t afflicted

with bizarish human habits.

 

It seems Nature’s whole menagerie

is not seeing what’s not there

except the human kind that is!

It’s quite a strange affair!

 

Callow Eyes

I stood returned upon a place

that never had its due

and stood, though this and I

were freshly made anew.

 

As though beneath a darkened sky

the rolling earth did eastwards wend

and did so with uncommon haste

to make of this my journey’s end,

and melt the dawns dissolving grey

and to its going say adieu.

 

Then I, in that awakened moment saw

how callow eyes did once construe.

 

Where Love Is

Where love is, winter dies

for only summer it espies,

devoted love is blind to all

and not at home to other’s call.

 

Simulacrum Diurnal Dream

A dream that thought it lived,

died at eighty-five,

discovered that its dream

had never been alive.

 

It dreamed and died again

like many times before,

a different stage and part

rewritten for each score.

 

Specious formulations,

the dreamer and the dream,

locked in the immutable

fabric of the theme.

 

A dreamer has some licence

extemporising on the theme,

latitude for sub-scripts

by which its traits are seen.

 

It also has nocturnal dreams,

secure from its scheming,

with symbols to decipher

that embody crucial meaning.

 

But many, many others,

share diurnal dreams,

interactive variations

upon the self same themes.

 

Diurnal dreams are programmes

and meant to run their courses,

whilst symbols of nocturnal dreams

point ways to drain their sources.

 

The Extraordinary Happenings at Tallabudgera Creek

At its journey’s end, yielding its identity,

this River, fresh and clear, merged within salinity.

Then menacing and dark, there entered from the ocean,

the portents of a predator with thrusting tail in motion.

The lifeguard gave the order to all of those that swam,

“Move out of the water as quickly as you can.”

Upstream, the river gouged through a basalt ridge

that straddled on its shoulders, the river’s final bridge.

 

Beneath this bridge, the denizen encountered interception,

for there, the lifeguard in his boat had mounted his reception.

Silently the creature swam beneath the boat,

downward went the lifeguard’s oar, the creature’s back it smote.

 

The watchers were astounded, it surely wasn’t true,

the creature just exploded into a thousand pieces flew.

Then the lifeguard rescued a tiny little bit,

but what he held within his hand just did not seem to fit.

 

It wriggled and it jumped about

and fell back in the creek,

returning with the other bits

to reform their monstrous clique.

 

Fair Dismissal

Dead, outside his front door, Rover was discovered,

but he hadn’t given up, for later he recovered.

He still looked rather groggy and the vet made his prediction,

the sandwiches were dodgy and required fast eviction.

 

“Meat sandwiches!” the lady cried, “my George had some for lunch,

Rover managed two or three and I had some for brunch.”

She quickly phoned the ambulance, it responded to her ‘mayday’,

whisking George away from work to save him from the pâté.

George staggered from the hospital, the enema was over,

his wife was tottering as well, and so was their dog Rover.

They got rid of their old milkman after hearing what he said

about the crate of bottled milk he’d dropped on Rover’s head.

 

A Fisherman’s Tale

Three fishermen were arguing whilst strolling through a field

towards a Shropshire mere, to see what it might yield.

The problem was the heavy waders, they only had one pair,

so two were left with soggy feet by one who did not care.

 

They were following a course through the pastures heart,

oblivious to the huddled cows that slowly moved apart.

Suddenly, their conversation jolted to a stop;

a giant beast had blocked their path; they were rooted to the spot.

 

The metal plate across its face, secured from working free

had forced the beast to raise its head so that it could see.

Just ten feet in between them put the men into a flurry

as they looked upon the angry eyes gazing at its quarry.

 

Suddenly, the deathly hush erupted into action,

when three men left at lightning speed as legs regained their traction.

The bull exploded like a bomb, it bellowed, shrieked and roared,

it leapt and pranced and circled; the ground was ripped and gored.

 

Then it stopped, raised its head and targeted a man,

then downed its horns and off it charged to execute its plan.

But its target heard it coming and quickly changed direction;

the bull continued straight in line, without a course correction.

 

The creature thundered onwards about a hundred feet,

then threw another tantrum, when horns and quarry did not meet.

It chose another victim, the outcome was the same,

it harried and it chased each man, like something quite insane.

But all the men were lucky, each one found his fence,

having learned a dangerous lesson at avoiding such events.

Though, one man learned a little more, his legs were slower than the rest,

when one is harassed by a bull, fleet and soggy feet are best.

 

The World is a Stage (Act One)

High above a mountain’s reach,

long before the dawn,

clouds were dark and ponderous

and battle lines were drawn.

 

Then upon the distant verge,

ascendancy was reached,

Æolus strove in winning mood,

the western clouds were breached.

 

And thus contaminating all,

like history’s doomed legions

where valour in its leaving haste

takes corporate cohesion.

 

How the scattered clouds then ran,

like wayside mongrels fleeing,

driven by the westerlies,

till none were left for seeing.

 

Then ebbed the night of velvet black

to finish its divesting

upon an air bestilled of breath,

till all the lands were resting.

 

And thus o’erhung no pressing shroud

but vast and vaulted sky,

a master-class in precious stones

against the moon to vie.

 

The World is a Stage (Act Two)

Second act, curtains drawn,

the stage all dressed anew,

clear as though ‘twere limelit,

the cast comes into view.

 

Echo takes a silent role,

catching every sound,

mute to fall on every ear,

captive noises don’t rebound.

Selene looks reflectively

‘pon images she makes,

and lays her elegance confessed

with vanity on mirrored lakes.

 

No light more delicately falls

through chinks into the void,

as veils of whitest finery

to dark made less employed.

 

Shadows, children of the light,

flee to leeward timidly,

leaning on the wall and post,

remaking trees in mimicry.

 

Shadows though, are like the sea,

all behested forms are fey,

thence morning’s prologue must attest

he westward crowed the night away.

Then Dawn from her awakened sleep

puts Selene again to flight,

to shed her luminescence then

upon some other distant night.

 

New for Old

Each moment by the wayside falls

a victim of relinquence,

as days must cede then be renewed

of fresh and fickle sequence.

 

This process touches everything

thus everything is changed,

henceforth with altered resonance,

this “new for old” finds nought estranged.

 

I Bring You One You May Not Know

Sometimes a rare and delicate thing

can reach for the stars and discover its twin,

it must reach, it must call, it can’t flower alone,

it must touch and be touched or why had it grown?

 

Though what cannot be, is out of consent,

unable to be what another one meant,

but leaving moments won’t be held,

nor waiting shadows whence to meld.

 

Innocence Lost

I went to the country when I was quite small,

to a house that was large, by a lane that was long,

with hedges so high and a brook wide and deep.

 

I went to the country when I was quite tall,

to a house that was small by a lane that was short,

with hedges so low and a ditch where water could barely creep.

 

The Old Painting

It must have stood three hundred years, forgotten and alone,

lost within a lonely place, decayed and overgrown.

Its openings were firmly shut, in time’s hermetic grasp

and ivy from its ceiling hung, that took its final gasp.

 

A little sunlight flickered through, like fretful candlelight,

their patterns danced the darkened room, thus more came into sight.

The sturdy walls were cracked and bowed with small unseeing windows,

old leaves lie as first they fell, untroubled where no wind blows.

Then I dreamed as I stood there, three hundred summers past,

into a bygone furnished room that was fated not to last.

This numinous presentiment made the senses reel,

as all that lay before me, was suddenly made real.

 

The sun now formed a panel of warmth across the floor,

where it crept in through the entrance of the open wooden door.

In awe I wandered here and there and touched the simple things,

and saw the glades beyond the door, a vision fit for kings.

 

There were violets growing at the door, sweetening the air,

so I knelt and plucked a single one and handled it with care.

But the scent of occupation lay plain upon the air

and I sensed of my intrusion, and of nerves in disrepair.

 

Then I sensed another feeling, I saw the room had changed,

there was darkness and decay again and I was left estranged.

My eyes remained for ages, glued upon the spot,

of this painting hanging on my wall, of a place that time forgot.

I settled for an aberration, it seemed the safest bet

until I noticed at my feet...........a fresh picked violet.

 

The Old Painting II

A very old painting hung new on my wall

with a rather strange background I seem to recall,

it was a view of the inside of a cabin or shack

that Nature’s entanglements had long taken back.

 

It came from a house, closed up so long,

that its absentee owner was thought dead and gone.

I sat deep in my chair and mused for a while

on this fanciful story; it brought me a smile.

 

Then a heavy log settled, disturbing the fire,

and the darkened room brightened as the flames rose up higher.

Then the strange shifting shapes from the flickering flame,

made the picture seem altered inside of its frame.

 

Then the door of the shack seemed to open up wide

and a sun unfamiliar, lit up the inside.

Then consciousness blurred for a second or two

but it didn’t return in the place that I knew.

 

I was gripped with alarm for I suddenly found

I was standing on strange unfamiliar ground.

I was inside the shack, now furnished and clean,

that stood in the frame, where my painting had been.

In dread, I turned round to escape from its stricture,

to be faced by a wall that was not in the picture.

A painting hung there, of the room I had left

with a fire and a chair of my presence bereft.

 

In a desperate bid I turned to the door,

though everything in me said to withdraw.

I took a step forwards into the light

and sweet smelling violets came into my sight.

 

I cast my eyes round a wondrous place

and felt its warm sun on my hands and my face.

Then I turned round to look at the old wooden shack,

but the tangle of Nature had reclaimed it back.

 

So I swung on my heel and into the trees,

with colour and verdure up to my knees.

It made things that I’d known seem duller and trite

and the Summers of Yore but a Wintry sight.

 

It confounded the mind, with no way to measure

its coming in fear and its staying in pleasure.

So I followed my feet by a musical stream,

through each vibrant and delicate unfolding scene.

 

Then a voice very close, with no form I could see,

jolted me out of my reverie.

Then a hand touched my shoulder and I turned with surprise,

transfixed to the spot by two heavenly eyes.

 

I stepped back, from a girl, some two or three paces,

and saw mirrored in her, three feminine graces.

She had elegant form, manner and face,

like the exquisite alchemy gilding this place.

I knew from that instant I would never think back

to a room with a painting, on its wall, of a shack.

 

The Old Painting III.

She stood in this strange and impossible place

and looked upon me with a smile on her face.

“I sent you the painting,” she said “of the shack,

it opened for you but not to go back.”

 

“Tell me your thoughts” said the girl’s gentle voice,

but the words of my world were too lame a choice.

Then her voice spoke again as she moved to my side

and she asked that I sit, there were things to confide.

 

“My tale,” she began “will be strange to your ears,

but is anything ever quite the way it appears.

You have trodden the difficult paths of your world

deciphering signs that few have unfurled.

 

They led your way here but I gave you the means,

for I painted those symbols you saw in your dreams.

I was also the briars that tangled your life

and I was the pain when it pierced like a knife.

 

But we are the opposites meant to unite

and I was your destiny into the light.

Remember the fable The Briary Rose

well I am that prize by the path that you chose.”

 

Then she smiled once again, but he suddenly frowned,

for the flowers and trees were dissolving all round.

Then the scene changed, but it was one he had seen

that had clearly appeared in a long ago dream.

 

Then she smiled once again and followed his eyes

to the fabulous setting now covering the skies.

For miles in the air and encircled around

were great ivory tusks reaching out of the ground.

 

And millions of glittering rainbows in space

were clasped within its tusked embrace,

and fair things flew in this heavenly high

that never could grace an indifferent sky.

 

But this wasn’t a dream it was perfectly real,

with much more of a vibrant and palpable feel.

Then a touch to his hand regained her attention,

attending his ears for the things she would mention.

 

“Perhaps I awakened a memory,” she said,

“for I spun this same vision long ago in your head,

but there were things to be read from those shapes in your dreams,

though left for your mind to discover the means.

So let me relate what your mind had been gleaning

and recapture that dream’s allegorical meaning.

Its image was besieged by an indifferent sky,

meaning indifferent thoughts where they tangle and vie.

 

Whilst the tusks were but symbols that offer the way

through which indifferent thoughts could lose their display,

and the rainbow’s inner and lighter formation

is the mind that has reached discrimination.

 

For the rainbow reflects what awareness imparts

when it looks upon things through their composite parts.

Thus a mind is unfettered with freedom to fly,

there is no other path to the heavenly sky.

 

But that was your dream and this the reality,

for you stand at the gates of your immortality.”

Then she moved very close from the place she was leaving

until only one person was standing there breathing.

Thus destiny merged the androgynous pair

and another fair form winged into the air.

 

The Giver Taketh

The sound was caught before it fell

and left no echo there to tell

and the word before it flew,

never reached where it was due,

and the breeze within the hand

trees were silent o’er the land,

and the eye that saw the world

darkness o’er the earth unfurled.

 

Nocturnal Spy

Helius master of the heavens,

Selene his reflective eye,

Helius watchful never sleeping,

Selene his nocturnal spy.

 

Nyx the bringer of the shadow,

Caster of the land in night,

Helius through his lunar mirror

doth the night by proxy light.

 

Nyx the bringer of the shadow,

silent o’er the land bedew,

secretive and skulking,

flees beneath a cloud from view.

 

Minds Abstract Processes

Means by which to understand

what can’t itself be touched or seen,

can be, but from its issue found.

Through time, by paths empirical emerge

nascent mappings of its margins,

thus objective man turns back upon himself

to place precarious and tentative, a foot,

within a daunting inner universe,

the abstract place from which he came

and origin of his every thought.

 

Felis Australis

All the experts tell you that

Australia has no native cat,

Ferals yes; they all agree,

roam in parts abundantly.

But I met one quite insistent,

its kind had always been existent.

 

In 1969, the month was June,

a night made day, ‘neath a desert moon,

upon a sandy track unfamiliar

between Carnarvan and Minilya.

Nothing moved with sound to scatter,

a stillness, even thought might shatter,

course red sand lay all around

for endless miles, without a bound.

 

A sudden movement at my side

revealed a feline, eyes open wide,

sitting over two feet high,

ten feet away, not seeming shy.

Long in leg and sleek in form,

tufted ears and coloured fawn.

Out of reach of any cover,

unsure, we looked upon each other.

Eventually its interest spent,

quick as it came, the creature went,

leaving me bemused to wonder,

“Had imagination made a blunder?”

Not so; I had a witness

for its testimental fitness.

 

The Evacuee

A man stepped from a small red car

at a lonely country spot,

from where, fifty years before

was a memory not forgot.

 

A chill ran through his soul

as he gazed around,

for all that lay before his eyes

was flat and well tilled ground.

 

The little brook still babbled

to clearly mark the place,

where once a little cottage stood

that now had left no trace.

 

His mind went drifting back in years

to a boy too young exploring,

whose feet were hot and tired

and rest they were imploring.

 

Doggedly he’d trudged

along a country lane,

the air was still of human sounds

in Nature’s own domain.

 

A rabbit here, and there a bird

from out the hedgerow peep,

the symphony of Nature’s sounds

all but lulled his mind to sleep.

 

But sounds of trickling water

came faintly to his ears,

and soon, an old stone bridge

with a brook beneath, appears.

 

Then a tiny wicket gate

within the hedge revealed

a cosy ancient cottage

in a grassed and hedged small field.

 

“Hello young man; please come in”

came a voice from know not where;

then, beckoning within a porch,

was a lady, with white hair.

 

Many visits to this cottage,

the boy made from thereon,

but his was but a brief sojourn,

one day, the boy was gone,

returned once more to London,

now that the blitz was done.

The years rolled by; the boy returned

a man, too late by far,

who had just become the owner,

of a brand new, small red car.

 

Except the Soul

Except the soul,

all is leased nought you own.

Earth’s treasures expire,

with flesh and bone.

All things are ephemeral made,

the soul the only precious jade,

that undefiled it will convey

its treasure to Elysium’s glade.

 

Unrequited Love

Head over heels at the very first sight

as I gazed and I longed till my senses took flight.

There were others that held a place in my heart,

though none held a candle to what you impart.

But how can I love what cannot requite,

by more than what’s given that comes into sight.

Whatever framed you, eclipsed the stars,

until sadly your petals fall into my vase.

 

We Will Wing on its Sighs

We are more than our footprints in last Winter’s snow,

that has melted away with nothing to show.

As the Winds of Time pass, they will carry us on,

we will wing on their sighs to the place we belong.

 

But we cannot leave what they would have stay,

it must join the leaves for the breezes to play.

We may linger in abstract in somebody’s mind,

though were we not that, ere life was consigned?

 

The Secret of the Special Tree

Sister staggered down the towpath

of a disused waterway,

struggling with a fishing rod

as her strength began to flay.

Defiantly her weighty catch

fought and gave no quarter

but she hadn’t caught a fish,

it was her brother in the water.

He was having swimming lessons,

they had worked on it for ages

and confidence was growing,

things had reached their final stages.

Then fishing rod and line

were discarded with disdain

as he slid into the water

with his confidence aflame.

 

The water foamed as skilful arms

performed their hopeful flaying,

but down he went like a piece of lead

until he hit the bottom, praying.

Luckily he held his breath

and could vaguely see the bottom,

there was rubbish everywhere,

discarded and forgotten.

 

Then off he went like a submarine,

towards the other bank,

past soggy shoes, old Wellingtons

and a rusty water tank.

Now he was slightly miffed,

for he wasn’t one to lose,

though he did feel rather special

with his underwater cruise.

 

Now all this secret training

was for a special reason,

to fit in with his larger plan

for later in the season.

Now all the local boys

swam in a nearby river,

but ego kept him from this place

till he’d learned to deliver.

 

At last the day arrived

at the nearby swimming place,

where swimmers cleaved the waters

with elegance and grace.

Now a learner at this place

would be sure to suffer jeering,

but now with independent style,

he didn’t mind appearing.

The river at this swimming place

undercut an old oak tree,

and trees were sometimes hollow,

so he thought he’d go and see.

So he sank into the river,

no-one noticed, luckily

as he explored the underwater

beneath the large old tree.

 

He discovered it was hollow

with an entrance underwater,

so a cunning plan began to form,

he would give those boys no quarter.

The scene was set, so in he jumped

and made a mighty splash,

having focused their attention,

he made his underwater dash.

 

His head came to the surface

inside the hollow part,

where he stayed for several minutes,

till he heard the shouting start.

Then down he went and swam

some thirty feet away,

so as not to cast suspicion

of where his hide-out lay.

 

He would disappear for minutes,

sometimes three or four,

judging time was easy,

he could hear them keeping score.

His fame spread far and wide

and people came to see,

but they never found the secret

about his special tree.

 

Transient Words

Some words remain, some lose their stay,

fleet in appearance, then conjured away,

elegant words losing their worth,

vernacular bringing them closer to earth.

Esoterica always claiming the day,

with words to which we are not au fait.

 

This Vision Hath my Constancy

That I might be her perfume

so closely to surround.

 

That I might be her shadow

and follow her around.

 

That I might be the echo

her feet upon the ground.

 

That I might be her sigh

my paradise is found.

 

Absence Makes......

Though eyes do rest ‘pon their desire

in time the capture slakes the fire,

for hunger only spurs the hunt

that appetite replete will blunt.

But what is nature, one must bear

yearning new and changing fare,

or what was had, no longer there.

 

Paw Old Me

Pussy isn’t silly, he knows what it’s all about;

he settles on my new laid clothes to stop me going out.

He’s not keen when my attention has wandered off elsewhere,

so he dumps upon the book I’m reading and doesn’t turn a hair.

 

He’s not fond of what I’m covered with, still, he gives a purr

then snags my clothes all over till it’s looking more like fur.

 

I place him on his nice new bed and stoke his little head,

then he waits until I’m fast asleep to sneak into my bed.

 

He’ll cause mayhem with the birds up our apple tree,

then calmly wander over to get a fuss from me.

 

Leave a kitchen cupboard open and he’s in there like a shot,

to finish in the cutlery drawer, stuck tight. What a clot!

 

I’m snoozing on the couch, so he lands like half a ton,

then takes off like a bullet from the muzzle of a gun.

The lovely rug that I’ve just bought, he doesn’t like one bit,

he pulls it all around the floor till I nearly have a fit.

 

He meows for dinner and for going out

then for coming in again, and more-oftenly – for nowt.

But at least I know I’m the boss round here – a fact that’s going to last.

I must go now, he’s calling me. He gets unhinged if I’m not fast.

 

Brief Allotted Whiles

How many candles lit and guttered

that left their scent upon the air,

but that was in a bygone time

and not a trace it left to share.

 

Many feet have come and gone,

brought their sadness and their smiles

and left to each along the way,

cherished thoughts, for brief allotted whiles.

 

Portents Lie in Imagery Bound

Music of the soul who writes the score,

whose fickle hand ‘pon manuscript doth draw,

of what seems right and what seems not

of equal right it doth allot.

It sees the gamut of emotion done

to strains that in fitful sequence run.

Does ambivalence veil an arcane masque

that intellect be challenged by a ciphered task?

Should dexter’s probity languish out of sight

that sinister be set an Icarus flight?

 

Thus portents lie, in imagery bound,

unsought by some, by others found.

Janus points the way he visioned all about,

knew what lay within, knew what lay without.

But caution to the eye, set amidst the blind,

prudence, is pretending it’s no seeing kind.

Feign of fallow mind deigning to agree

amongst those that thought they saw,

though in truth could never see.

 

Those of Grace

Those of grace are early called

to the incommunicable place,

though their memory like music stays,

when eyes and ears can find no trace.

 

Feelings warm and fondly treasured,

freely given and received,

though short the journey with you travelled,

‘twas not made that yours be grieved.

 

Love weaves a strong and subtle cord,

a bond through space and time

that it may hold together

all that is sublime.

 

Love provides a special place

to enter when we sleep,

though it can’t allow its secrets

into our waking moments creep.

 

So remember though you slumber,

there is a meeting place

between the here and after

where loved ones still embrace.

 

Feelings

A sound, a scent, a touch, a glimpse

to some with perfect warmth agrees,

whilst others feelings aren’t the same,

what’s warm to some, makes others freeze.

 

The Thrushes Song

Lesser moments come and perish

and then a moment left to cherish,

a heart that’s touched by something gone,

as flies away the thrushes song.

 

The Cat and the Wizard

The cat watched the wizard at Elysium’s door

as he welcomed the creatures from every known shore.

But cats soon get bored so it started to preen

and was struck by the thought that few humans were seen.

 

So the wizard was asked by the curious cat

could there be a reason accounting for that?

Humans are errant the wizard replied

They are deaf to the voice each one has inside.

But now I have started I’ll tell you the rest

and the parts you all play in fulfilling a quest,

for the Earth is the place of the predatory dream

The illusory world of every extreme.

 

Then the cat ‘shouldered arms’ and stared at its tail

and it thought about Earth and it started to wail.

Then it scratched at its head with a leg from the rear

whilst it poured out its woes for the wizard to hear.

 

Then it pointed its paw at the streaming menagerie

still armed with their tooth and claw weapons and gadgetry.

Said the Wizard “your memories of things that were fell,

they were not real it was part of my spell.

 

It was kinder to teach in a world of pretence,

so that all that come here won’t repeat those events”

Then the cat saw a mouse go scampering by

and it didn’t give chase and it didn’t know why.

 

The Wizard had noticed and said “look around

there’s no hunger no anger no fear to be found”

Then the cat had a stretch, after washing its face

and again asked why humans were in such disgrace.

 

He replied “they abuse their abstract ability

reducing all creatures to servile utility.

But my spell is eternal for those it entraps

with irrational thoughts and insensitive acts.

Then a solitary human stepped out of the crowd

and the cat gave a purr unbelievably loud

then it ran to the arms of someone it knew

and the Wizard looked on and enjoyed the view.

 

Cats are Stress Relieving

A lovely new carpet arrived at our door,

the second this year upon the same floor,

kitten came too and she sprinkled and splashed

till it smelt like the carpet last year that she trashed.

 

She’s consumed with affection and feminine charm

and a wire-brush tongue; we smell like a farm.

Faces suffer patiently, her sticky tongue and nose,

followed by the futile trips, where soap and towel repose.

 

Little nips are sent to please, nothing seems disdainful,

every thing is up for grabs but only where its painful.

Leaping blindly into baths was recently curtailed,

it wasn’t always empty, goodness how she wailed.

So it wasn’t herds of rhino playing hockey in our bath,

just moggy and her ping-pong ball; we’re too stressed out to laugh.

The date is set for neutering, two more weeks to go,

next door’s tom is amorous - we’re feeling very low.

 

Soggy Kids

The builders dug a giant hole,

enough to lose a bus in,

ready for a public house,

they should have filled the thing.

 

For now the war had started

and the pub a ‘non event’,

the rain came down in torrents

and in the hole it went.

 

The local boys were overjoyed

they brought along a raft,

so Jimmy and his sister came

to test their home-made craft.

 

Their boat was made of canvas

around a wooden frame,

but after dragging half a mile

it didn’t look the same.

 

Jimmy clambered in it

then his sister heaved,

but if she hadn’t grabbed his hair

she might have been bereaved.

 

Later, floating on a raft

that didn’t quite support her,

the wretched thing tipped sideways

dumping sister in the water.

Jimmy made a graceful dive

and cleaved his way across,

for brothers don’t like siblings

to become a total loss.

 

Having reached the other side,

his sister spluttered, “Jim,

that was rather clever

you’ve never learned to swim.”

 

Luckily the day was hot

to steam away the wet,

from a pair of unkempts

who may get a smacking yet.

 

Aeolus

Across the lands a drifting breeze,

to warm, to cool, to heat or freeze.

 

It carries scents to needful noses

that wild things know where food reposes.

 

Micro life to its breezes cling

and larger creatures on the wing.

 

Delivers water, dust and seeds

fresh air to fetid places feeds.

 

It harries and reshapes the land,

all things upon it feels its hand.

 

For Nature needs to rearrange

and with her breath deliver change.

 

Into every nook and cleft,

not a place is found bereft.

 

Then rests a while on mirrored seas.

and over land on silent trees.

 

Tomorrow though must wait and see,

for every mood’s a lottery.

 

Labyrinth

Theseus in the labyrinth

was a journey in his head,

his shadow was the Minator

until its blood was shed.

 

Ariadne was his anima,

his hopes lay in her care,

she knew how to find the door,

her golden thread led there.

 

All is Relative

If I were a Dragonfly,

quick to move and soon to die,

I’m certain I’d perceive my life

as long in span, not over spry.

 

I’d see the walking creatures

like zombies in slow motion,

a mockery of industry

with minds so slow of notion.

 

If I were a mighty tree,

three hundred years would fly,

I’m certain I’d perceive my life

an average span and rather spry.

 

Of course my hours would be seasons,

twenty-four would make my year,

walking creatures would be speeding blurs

with our timings out of gear.

 

If I were a continent,

upon the molten magma lie,

I’m certain I’d perceive my life

an average span and rather spry.

 

I’d count my year in millions

of orbits ‘round the sun,

if rumoured that I carry life,

I would not have noticed one.

 

Nature’s Golden Rule

Imperceptible to sight

is black on black, or white on white,

they have no independent meaning,

lest in contrast they are seen in.

All opposites and shades amidst

must interact or not exist,

’tis one of Nature’s golden rules,

all spheres of life it serves and fuels.

 

Our Time Will Come

Whilst sunshine fell upon her face,

I dreamed within another place.

 

Fly thought to her upon the breeze,

bring then her answer to me please.

 

Her vision formed and then receded,

for its return then my heart pleaded.

 

Then in my dream her soft voice spoke,

“Our time will come”, so I awoke.

 

Imaginations

Energy will ebb, energy will flow,

but imagination gives the orders

of which way it’s going to go.

 

Dids’t Grant Without Mine Asking

The unbidden came and said “Go free

from the cloying shadow; let they spirit flee.

Fly then so high the inward sky

that nothing can describe or even try.

 

So small it makes of all that’s left behind,

that words and breath withhold, as does the mind,

and fading pasts that echo on forever,

carries not a single trace that’s nether.

The ways are known as well as where,

so light as dreams upon the air,

at last, thy flighting feathers flair”.

 

The Black Shepherd Cat

The black shepherd cat flowed out of the dark,

quiet as a shadow, its paws left no mark.

Then it entered the room where somebody slept,

who was quite unaware just how close it had crept.

Then the black shepherd cat took over control

of the person that slept to awaken their soul.

The awakening one recoiled with surprise,

away from the black shepherd cat’s gleaming eyes.

 

But the black shepherd cat was there on a quest,

a mission of care at another’s behest.

Then a movement nearby brought its ward into sight,

so the black shepherd cat flowed back to the night,

for a sleek Siamese had appeared on the floor,

a friend who’d been lost from this world years before.

Then gathering all this was meant to impart,

the awakening one woke up with a start.

It was clear he was now in a parallel life,

for attempts were in vain to awaken his wife.

 

Had this been the lot of his Siamese friend,

an emotional trap awaiting life’s end,

alone in this house with no one to care,

nobody knowing that he was still there?

 

So this was the task in the ‘shepherd cat’s’ mind,

to gather lost souls for return to their kind.

But why was a human made privy to this,

a portent perhaps that one shouldn’t dismiss?

For a soul cannot fly at the end of the day

when emotional chains too heavily weigh.

But, to the black shepherd cat - I couldn’t owe more,

for I passed and returned through life’s final door.

 

One Extra for the Night

In alluding to our secrets

in metaphoric form,

popularity seems to favour

closet skeletons as its norm.

 

Though mine, I’m forced to say

has snout trotters and a sty

and won’t be left in allegory

like a “large white” lie.

 

It started on a lonely farm

in nineteen thirty seven

after city life, till the age of five,

it turned the thirties into heaven.

 

Though I had my suspicion

why my parents sent me there,

after five years of my mischief,

they’d lined up Grandma for a share.

 

It took, of course, a week or two

before I “found my feet”,

being several hundred miles away

from my London street.

 

The local postman had a cycle

with a spare seat at the rear,

he took letters off to London

and delivered theirs back here.

 

This method of delivery

was all I ever saw,

so I concluded that his cycle

made the journey door to door.

 

How I pestered that poor postman

for a ride upon the seat,

each time he rode to London,

taking letters to our street.

 

To save the postman’s sanity

I was found employment,

piglets and a sow to feed,

‘Twas not to my enjoyment.

 

Every time the sty was cleaned,

‘I ran the gauntlet’ of her teeth,

she seemed to have a mission,

to make my presence brief.

Though it could have been revenge,

for the times that she was fed,

when her nose went in the trough too quick

and breakfast finished on her head.

 

But soon I got the knack

of dishing out her food

and she replaced the biting

with a better mood.

 

Her den was just a tiny room,

the walls were made of brick

with an entrance like an igloo,

inside, the straw was clean and thick.

 

One day I overheard the news,

my parents were arriving

and I would have to pack my case,

then back to London we’d be driving.

 

The afternoon was drawing in,

sow and young were fast asleep

as I crept in beside them,

adding to the sleepy heap.

What a shock Grandmother had

as she filled the trough next morning,

when out I staggered with the pigs,

still half asleep and yawning.

 

Off to Foreign Climes

The mighty river lapped and swirled

somewhere far below,

awaiting two adventurers

who had nowhere else to go.

 

This place had been selected

by Jimmy and his friend,

from a daylight visit

to this quayside at Gravesend.

The Tilbury lights were twinkling

far across the river,

a cold dank mist lay everywhere,

the two began to shiver.

 

Then they fixed attention

upon a bollard’s rope

that had upon its lower end,

all their invested hope.

 

Then one by one descending,

they slithered far below,

into the inky blackness,

swinging to and fro.

 

Finally a searching foot

found the little boat,

but with water past their ankles,

they wondered ‘would it float’.

 

A baling can lay underfoot,

so this dispelled all mystery,

this dinghy yearned the riverbed

to disappear from history.

 

Fifteen minutes later,

the oars were in their place,

the Tilbury lights were targeted

and hearts began to race.

 

The plan they had concocted

for that seawards moving flow,

was row towards its centre

and they knew how far to go.

 

An hour passed and then they turned,

the plan had worked out right,

heading down the river

with their purpose now in sight.

 

A mighty vessel lay ahead

still anchored in its place,

three hundred yards between them

as the current gathered pace.

 

Jimmy turned their boat about

to make their progress slower,

but now the ebbing tide controlled

the dinghy and the rower.

 

Jimmy’s friend was first to see

the white froth dead ahead,

propeller-blades were churning

and filled them both with dread.

This vessel sat much higher

than a loaded vessel should,

so propellers out of water

was more easily understood.

 

Jimmy’s oars moved frantically

to save them from the maw

of the mighty ships ‘egg-beater’,

bent on closing their life’s door.

 

Then having done his utmost,

the ship and dinghy clashed,

slipping past the ghastly blades,

the dinghy’s oar was smashed.

 

They impacted and rebounded

from off the vessel’s rear,

into the bottom of their boat

with one oar left to steer.

 

Then the current dragged them

past the wall of steel

that towered high above them,

how small it made them feel!

 

This wasn’t like their comics,

where were the nets and ropes,

there were no means of climbing

on which they’d placed their hopes.

 

The dinghy speeded past the ship,

though minutes seemed like days,

carrying its cargo

of rebuffed stowaways.

 

Then they travelled seawards,

the ship now out of sight,

and gradually ‘pon every shore

so was every light.

 

Clouds were low and heavy,

blackening the smog,

the world seemed gone forever

from their dinghy in the fog.

 

But Jimmy kept on paddling

with the single oar,

relying on his instinct

to find a friendly shore.

 

Then the past intruded

that brought him to this place,

he was beaten with a stairrod,

and could see his father’s face.

 

Escape came from a window,

he jumped the thirteen feet

and scarcely seconds later

he was nowhere in the street.

 

Late September in the woods

made a chilly night,

until he found a haystack

and that improved his plight.

 

Sister brought the bread and jam

but only when she could,

until the days turned into weeks,

he’d be there ‘till adulthood.

 

Then sister brought his friend along

and that was where it started,

both of them were in a ‘rut’,

so adventure’s course was charted.

 

A distant foghorn brought him back

to focus on survival,

and wonder if a friendly shore

might welcome their arrival.

 

Jimmy’s friend kept baling,

his mind had not forgotten

the dinghy with its yearning,

to rest the river bottom.

 

Then heavy skies looked lighter,

the mist began to clear,

then a distant shoreline,

so they both began to cheer.

 

But mud lay thick and treacherous

between the boat and shore,

so he paddled onwards,

it seemed like evermore.

 

At last luck interceded,

a dredger lay ahead

and from it lay a walkway

across the muddy bed.

 

Then closing on the dredger,

a porthole came in sight,

a man was sleeping in a chair

beneath a swinging light.

 

The little boat collided

with a mighty crash,

the man leapt up in panic,

the two boys made their dash.

 

Four happy feet were grateful

to be on something firm,

though once you get your ‘sea-legs’

it’s not easy to unlearn.

 

Luck had made their ‘land-fall’

upon the Isle of Grain,

for open seas were waiting

beyond this last terrain.

 

Jimmy took a gamble,

returning to his place

though he didn’t get a hiding,

they kept him in disgrace.

 

Strange, they never asked him

how he’d spent his time,

so it stayed a lifetime secret

‘till it came out in this rhyme.

 

Polar Seasons

Autumns, Winters, Springs and Summers,

capricious seasons of the mind,

would that one could banish

Polar seasons of this kind.

 

Arcane Vibes

The wind plays its strains

in the trees and the reeds

and its pulse ripples down

for unknowable needs.

 

But are we not reeds

though not to the breezes,

do we dance to a tune

and not know who it pleases?

 

Are there arcane vibes

that are all played together

and the reeds that we are,

need but one that will tether?

 

Does it play you a mood

and a wish to be freed

that perhaps is a spur

for retuning the reed?

 

And thus to be touched

by a sound that had winged

from the chord a celestial

harpist had stringed.

 

An ‘Other Worldly’ Encounter

A voice was on the night air rung

and spoken in the Siamese tongue,

Its sound upon the quietness broke

upon my mind thus I awoke.

 

This urgent tone quickly worsening

called to mind my Siamese nurseling,

so curious what my kitten faced

I stumbled from my sleep in haste.

 

Soon the door was opened wide

to find me in the night outside

and there beneath a streetlight sat

my kitten and a large black cat.

 

But something else moved in the night

with soundless feet towards the light,

It was a lady of some substance,

I stayed no less, though with reluctance.

 

For what was elegance and grace

doing where it had no place,

with clothes a hundred years outdated,

we were sharing times unrelated.

Her arms reached out unnaturally

towards the silent cats and me,

I saw the large black cat respond

as though the two of them belonged.

 

Then she turned with arms outstretched,

her cat went too, though it were fetched,

they wandered outward from the light

and then away towards the night.

 

She came it seems, to guide its paws

back through time’s re-opening doors.

 

The Party and Other Things

Little Jimmy was a rebel,

he preferred to be estranged,

having noticed that the adults

were only surface rearranged.

Pretending to be one thing

and in fact, to be another,

he wasn’t going down that road

for others to uncover.

 

Socks were made for pulling up,

so he pulled his socks down,

covered legs went nasty white

and he preferred his brown.

Jackets must be worn at school

but it never suited him,

so he left it at a friend’s house;

teacher’s face was always grim.

 

Even hair was under orders,

every head was cloned

but Jimmy liked it natural,

so everybody groaned.

Whacking came on thick and fast,

both at home and school

and fighting in between with boys,

broke another rule.

 

Like water off a duck’s back,

were attempts at his correction,

he wasn’t going to finish up

an orthodox projection.

Although a stickler for his values,

he also had his price,

trifles, cakes and chocolates

were his corrupting vice.

 

Finally the day arrived

when he fell from grace

he was invited to a party

round at his friend’s place.

Now he knew children’s parties

meant lots of cakes and stuff

he also knew about the catch;

no-one turned up like a scruff.

 

So he stood before the mirror,

having climbed out of the bath,

the socks were up, the jacket on,

he hoped they wouldn’t laugh.

He discovered that his shirt

could fasten to the top,

but he wasn’t going to wear a tie

and turn up like a fop.

 

The hair would not pass muster,

it should not have had a wash,

it stuck out like a porcupine,

without grease, it wasn’t posh.

He rummaged through the cupboard,

there was not a thing in sight,

so he settled for the camphorated,

though it didn’t smell quite right.

 

He gazed into the mirror,

a vision of resplendence

and wondered was the cost too high

compromising independence,

but he was getting hungry

and time that he was going.

He knew the smell would soon be gone

for a boisterous wind was blowing.

 

Some half an hour later

he knocked the party door,

his friend was pleased to see him

and he was introduced to more.

The table groaned beneath the food,

twenty mouths began to eat,

then a little girl let out a scream

and vanished from her seat.

 

Camphorated was the reason

the table quickly cleared,

big sister from another room

very soon appeared.

Thirty seconds later

his head was in the sink,

shampooed half a dozen times

to modify the stink.

 

The sister started combing,

trying not to smile,

his mind was on the table

and its disappearing pile.

But time had done its damage

he was taken quite aback,

the table was a semblance

of a nuclear attack.

The gateaux plate was empty,

the trifle basin too,

and as other plates proved empty,

his disaster grew and grew.

But then a loaded tray appeared,

carried by his friend

and changed a near disaster

into a fat and happy end.

 

Nothing is Infallible

Nothing is so clever

that its never wrong,

nothing lasts forever

nothing lasts that long.

 

The Construction Business

There is no single item

that mankind has created,

whose pre-objective origins

were not fantasy related.

 

But fantasies come thick and fast

to every single mind,

judicious and improvident,

there is every kind.

 

Though seemingly capricious

from a narrow view,

in truth they are a reservoir,

an abstract elemental brew.

 

Fantasies are building blocks,

each mind makes its construction,

judicious ones will stand secure,

the others wreak destruction.

 

Judicious ones underscore

the process of their being,

their architect is intellect,

hope and sequel thus agreeing.

 

In establishing her principle,

Nature makes it clear,

that intellect alone creates,

then........what made us appear?

 

Happy School Days

Jimmy came back from the country

with a heavy dialect

and started at a new school,

but wasn’t treated with respect.

They said he sounded funny

so he told them ‘what to do’.

They called him a country yokel

and so the tension grew.

 

They had a champion fighter,

a giant of a girl

that Jimmy kept away from

lest her venom should unfurl.

But she liked an easy target

and soon she sealed his fate,

instructing him to meet her

that night outside the gate.

 

Now Jimmy didn’t mind a fight

but never with a giant,

so he quickly made a plan

so as not to be compliant.

At last the classrooms emptied

at the finish of the day,

they all gathered at the exit;

they had a game to play.

 

But it soon became apparent

they were missing their main player,

and so the hunt began

for their victim for the slayer.

 

In the meantime, Jimmy,

in an effort to escape,

tried squeezing through a window

that was too small for his shape.

His head soon found its freedom,

quickly followed by his chest

but his trousers got entangled

so he couldn’t bring the rest.

 

At last the baying pack arrived

and soon his legs were captured,

followed by the rest of him,

he wasn’t feeling too enraptured.

They swarmed out of the building

carrying their quarry

towards a quiet secluded place

where they wouldn’t have to worry.

 

They quickly formed a circle,

silence fell upon the crowd,

with Jimmy in the centre,

his escape was not allowed.

Their champion stepped forwards,

her talons raked the air,

Jimmy looked upon the scene,

it filled him with despair.

 

But she was over confident

and didn’t watch her guard,

she didn’t see the lightening blow

that struck her nose so hard.

The girl let out an awful squeal

and landed on her back,

tearfully complaining

of Jimmy’s fell attack.

But her complaints were smothered

as the mob began to stir

and the next thing seemed to Jimmy

was a lynching would occur.

 

Eager hands fell on him

and raised him up on high,

then he heard them cheering,

it seemed a funny way to die.

But at last he got the message

they were glad she was defeated,

her bullying was over with

and justice had been meted.

 

Ticking Clocks

By ticking clocks within the head,

the pace is set and we are led.

The silent ticking clock awaits,

all things devolve to former states.

 

Voices of the Heart

Anima to ego, must we stay apart,

you’ve built a wall between us,

a foolish course you chart.

Your future’s bleak without me,

together we are strong,

break down the wall between us,

apart we don’t belong.

 

You rule in things objective,

I’m power behind your throne,

you’re grasping at illusions

when I’m cast out out alone.

 

My name can be destruction,

my name can be amour,

my name is many shades between,

I’m the keeper of the door.

 

I speak in ways symbolic,

unravel them you must

to seek from them the only path

to which a spirit may entrust.

 

The Jimmy Riddle

The school bus pulled up near some old Cornish mines

and the children poured out and formed into lines.

Orders were given “We must stay all together”,

it was a desperate hope and a wasted endeavour.

 

For they spread out like ants around the ruins and holes

and disappeared into tunnels, like rabbits and moles.

Teacher was dumbstruck, she ran here and there,

collecting the miscreants under her care.

 

It took all of an hour collecting them all,

though one was still missing at the final roll call.

“It’s Jimmy that’s missing” said a voice from the ranks,

“He’s been up to one of his usual pranks.”

 

“He went down a hole with a torch in his hand,

mumbling something I could not understand,

there were ladders and platforms right to the bottom,

according to Jimmy they were sound, and not rotten.”

Jim in the meantime, was two hundred feet lower,

three hundred more followed at a speed rather slower,

for the steep sloping shaft that he followed this time

had rotting supports that were covered with slime.

 

Then he saw some old writing just overhead

from the smoke of a candle, had been written “Jed”.

He stepped into a tunnel and walked for a while,

though a few yards with Jed seemed more like a mile.

 

His wobbling torch threw weird shapes on the wall

and his feet echoed back like a distant foot fall,

he was now in a panic but he couldn’t go back,

where he knew “Jed” was waiting to mount his attack.

 

Then a steep sloping shaft came into his view

like the one he’d come down, so his hopefulness grew.

He ascended its ladders at a dizzying speed,

faster he hoped than “Jed” could exceed.

 

In no time at all he was out above ground

through a vertical shaft like the one he’d first found.

There were bushes about, so he stayed out of view

whilst he did some quick thinking, for he knew what was due.

 

Then he took a quick peek at the distant furore

where the shaft was surrounded by some thirty or more,

then a quick as a whip, he slipped back to the bus

for he had a good plan for reducing the fuss.

 

Jimmy pressed on the hooter for ever so long,

until the driver came back to see what was wrong.

“I’ve been asleep here for hours,” Jimmy then said,

until that awful commotion made me wake up instead.

 

When they got back to school, there were rumours about,

‘Jimmy entered a mine and didn’t come out’.

Several pairs of young eyes could vouch for this fact,

it left no doubt in their minds, it was a magical act.

 

A Dogalogue of Misfortune

We had a dog in our street

that kept a cat in constant flight

until that poor tormented creature

was a gaunt and haunted sight.

 

But the day of retribution

was soon to be at hand

when dog and cat with kittens met,

for then she made her stand.

The peaceful day erupted

to the sounds of doggy terror

with a cat clamped firmly on his back,

he knew he’d made an error.

 

Then off he flew at lightning speed

as she began to claw,

and disappeared around a bend

leaving fur upon the floor.

 

His ears were never quite the same

with edges all serrated

and he never chased that cat again

with his courage zero rated.

But he had a back-up hobby,

he really hated cars,

causing anger to the owners

whose paintwork bore his scars.

 

His modus operandi

was to sit outside his house,

then as the worried drivers passed,

he played a game of cat and mouse.

 

Then every so often

and no-one knew quite when,

he’d launch upon a passing car,

it never looked the same again.

 

He settled in one morning

to dispense the daily trauma,

when come-uppance in another form

came driving ‘round the corner.

 

This driver had a plan in hand

in case it should be needed,

then sure enough in passing,

the dog’s attack proceeded.

 

The driver got his timing right

then opened up his door,

and the poor old dog was batted

fifteen feet or more.

 

Now everything that purrs

and anything with wheels,

he has banished from his hobbies

for giving him bad deals.

 

With such a battered ego,

will he find a new endeavour,

perhaps with such a murky past

it’s better never to say never.

 

Purchasing Power

Jimmy was sent to the shops

for the Dandy and five cigarettes,

Woodbines came in packets of five,

without them father frets.

 

All the shops were nice and new

where Jimmy did the buying,

one of them stood open wide,

where puddles deep were lying.

 

Jimmy had new ‘wellies’ on

and ‘wellies’ needed testing,

so in he went and jumped about,

his legs weren’t meant for resting.

 

The water splashed upon the walls,

then on the armoured cable

and then upon the iron box

that soon became unstable.

 

Jimmy hit the pavement,

he was blown, or did he jump,

but thick black smoke was billowing

so he clambered off his rump.

Escape was now important

so he quickly left the scene,

the mark of Cain was on him,

the fates were being mean.

 

His naked parts were scarlet,

the hair was singed and hard,

the clothes had suffered quite a bit,

the Dandy badly scarred.

 

Weeks went by, the ‘scarlet’ went

the stutter took its time,

the cigarettes survived the test

and Jim outlived his crime.

 

Step into the Rainbow

Dissertation and accompanying verse

In 1997, I stood for a while amongst the ‘Great War’ craters and trenches of the Somme, beneath which many still lie unfound, those that were, are now but acres of sad little white crosses. Had it not been for that quiet interlude I may not have had the resolve to publish some of my more meaningful material, although by not doing so I feel that I would have been lending tacit support to the next generation of ‘sad little white crosses’.

We write poetry to express our feelings, observations and abstruse explorations. In many instances my poetical attention is directed towards those aspects of human nature that persistently undermine its higher qualities and are therefore socially pathogenic. I am of course referring to those anomalies that litter our daily acceptances, those incongruous abstracts that bring some of our perceived rationales into question and taint many others.

Amongst these anomalies are some that I feel require special attention. They do so for reasons of their collective effects. For the evidence of history informs us quite clearly that there is little general understanding of these negatives or their deeper workings. It is for this reason we are fated to be history’s repeaters, the latter-day ‘bit players’ in that eternal tragedy so frequently referred to as the unlearned lessons of history.

There is no doubt that much of mankind carries erroneous beliefs, and, of course, false beliefs generate distortions. In particular, these distortions affect the perceptions and expectations of our own kind and in consequence our dealings with them. It is due to these attitudes that so many people will inevitably make a personal input into history’s unwanted cycles of events and in many cases not even be aware they are doing it.

It is our evolutionary bind, that the ‘feel good’ factor attached to any fictions that we carry will always rebound unpleasantly upon us and others when we treat them as realities, and of course fictions are most assuredly the fodder of manipulators.

One of the constant surprises in modern and supposedly enlightened times, is that much of mankind is still quite unfamiliar with some of the most transparent causal influences behind the installation of tyrannical regimes, of which Hitler, Stalin and Mao Zedong quickly spring to mind. These regimes, like many others, secured their positions through a combination of convenient events. But these happenings seldom, if ever, take place in isolation, because the events will have received contributions from those (for reasons of personal gain) whose place of origin was firmly rooted within other national boundaries. However, if we really want to confront the unacceptable, then we must look closer to home, for there is not the slightest doubt that it is the rhetorical play upon the ingenuousness within each respective populace that really lays the groundwork by which these despotic regimes install themselves (commonly referred to as ‘the back door’ method).

The classic style by which the positions of such regimes are then consolidated is by the door of opportunity that is opened for all that is perfidious from within their populations. It is from these elements that bad history’s latter-day foot-soldiery emerge. They will swarm as they always have, to the advantages of one occasion and dissipate to the disadvantages of another, sinking back to the anonymity that more settled times bring along.

Each time we hear of another dangerous, yet far away regime upon our world, it becomes so easy from our seemingly safer place, to feel ‘Holier than thou’.

My reason for raising these matters is that these incessant eruptions of human negativity are, in truth, the mirror image of the negative potentials that exist within each and every one of us. It is simply the arrival of opportunistic conditions that determines when or where these human negatives will next express any one of their varied forms. There is no place upon this Earth where the door is fully closed to these unwelcome guests and open doors are open invitations.

If we harbour any ambition to become wiser about ourselves and about others, then there is but one possible route through which it can be done. It is accomplished by means of that essential journey into reality. The one that takes us into those dark places within the abyssal depths of the human psyche, its understanding provides us with our navigational skills without which we will be like so many of our forebears and become history’s ‘flotsam’ upon the human tide of events.

Reality keeps reminding us that we are not all ‘wonderful people’, some are and some will never be. To become even better people than we might already be, will inevitably require that our focus of attention should be upon those that are less than wonderful, otherwise we will have little hope of drawing more qualities of human understanding into our lives (the Dante journey).

In saying this, I should emphasise that my main focus is not so much upon the typical villainous activity that fills our daily newspapers (that speaks for itself) but more upon the subtle, understated and therefore unaddressed historical delinquencies. For this, we need a much greater netherworld understanding of the designing, the strange and the potentially dangerous human beings that exist within all walks of life and in all societies, otherwise in time honoured fashion, we will just stand tacitly or perplexed as to their social interactions, whose powerful social undercurrents are the very storm centres from which so much of our interpersonal and collective aberrations emerge, to close our eyes is complicity.

So hopefully, these explanations will begin to lead us towards some meaning of ‘Step into the Rainbow’.

In terms of archetypal symbolism, the rainbow stands boldly to the forefront, it has found its way into our songs. Mythically it has pointed the way to that elusive pot of gold and perhaps the difficulty in finding that pot of gold was that firstly, it needed to be recognised for what it was.

For that recognition, perhaps we could start by casting our minds back to that ‘young time’ prior to our informed rainbow awareness. Back to that moment when the true significance of the rainbow’s colourful composite parts first dawned upon us. How woefully inadequate had been our former perceptions of that commonplace acceptance that we had referred to as the light of day. Who would have thought it had concealed such an intricate and colourful composition? More to the point, how few would have awakened eventually to the possibilities of that paradigm in its wider sense. By this I mean that in the same way every one of us once belonged outside of that rainbow light of understanding (though in a harmless fashion), far too many of our kind grew older undifferentiatingly thus harmfully outside of that rainbow light of understanding their own species. In consequence of this, they became promotive to the more abstruse machinations of mankind. These are the plain facts reflected by the empirical evidence of historical events. Therein lies the root cause of bad history.

I feel it would further clarify some of these issues of differentiated thought, if we were to use an analogy and consider the workings of our mind in terms of that susceptible wide-screened object that sits upon our desk.

How easily the integrity of its contents can become corrupted. Our installed virus check is ever ready for the slightest sign of a troublesome bug that may have slipped into the system. But consider how aghast we would be at the thought of other people accessing our computer and writing their own dedicated self-serving programmes into it. Yet we so readily or unguardedly do so when it comes to that infinitely more powerful and personal instrument that sits between our own ears. That personnel human computer of ours has the most devastating history of being open house to the installation of other people’s self-serving programmes and distortions of the facts. They represent some of the most corrupting variety of abstract viruses within our mental systems. The strange fact is, that there is little reason why this should be so, considering that all we have to do is press the key and our own built-in virus check gets to work. Our virus check is called differentiated thought, it is our critical factor. By its very nature it is individuating. It is the guardian that stands between us and the corruption of our higher selves. It is whether we see fit to observe or to ignore this function, that will determine what will eventually filter down upon all that we make of life.

By using a rule of thumb generalization, we can put history’s collective transgressions into perspective. For instance we can identify most prominently, two social elements that are fundamental to the reasonable social order being pushed off course. These are elements which are representative of certain human characteristics that are drawn from all points right across social spectra. The first element is coloured by a self-servingness to its psychological distorts. The second social element by way of its unawareness is supportive by default to the first social category.

We have of course previously categorised a third generalisation, one whose influence acts as a bulwark against the first two and the reason that it does so is that its attitudes had been conditioned by its differentiating thought processes. These are the very characteristics to which I refer; as belonging to those that are standing within the ‘rainbow’ of awareness, because it is within this condition that the interacting composite colours and shades of human nature stand revealed for the benefit of their better understanding and better judgements. That indeed is the treasure awaiting those that ‘Step into the Rainbow’.

 

 

Same Story

Same Story told in varied ways,

the clearer picture better stays.

 

Faustian Bargain

History frowns on psychological hegemony,

the compact majority’s cerebral endogamy.

For latter-day composite kind

is thence to surrogated mind,

into the labyrinth beguiled

orchestrated like a child,

a tangled web of tainted choice

to emasculate the inner voice.

 

A corporate dependant way,

a caricatured overlay,

and its higher politics when properly read

must bring to mind what ‘Hegel’ * said.

“ For that which seeks a third reaction

must induce a first and second faction.”

 

It is the mutual friction formula

that politics may profit from the interplay.

For every herd goes where it’s sent

and thinks it knows the real intent.

Thus Bovines in the ‘milking shed’

are those that follow where they’re led.

 

*Hegel = Thesis versus antithesis = synthesis

 

What Hides from Light

Stones are better turned

to exposures we won’t like,

wishing facts not to exist

will but sustain this blight.

What hides from light unrevealed

must visit us at night.

 

Ned and Ben and the Great War

The stable door closed upon Ned ‘till the morning,

this was a new home, not the one he was born in.

There seemed plenty of room, the bedding was fine

and sweet smelling hay on which he could dine.

 

Ned was quite startled by movements close by,

as another horse rose from the stall where it lie.

“Goodness” said Ned “You gave me a fright,

I’m new here you know, my very first night.”

 

“Ben is my name” the other horse said,

“I’m very old, and have to be led,

It’s not pleasant alone I think you’ll agree

but now it is fine, with your company.”

 

“Did you say Ben?” Ned almost gasped,

“Ben from the Great War?” his startled voice rasped,

“Your exploits are legion and whispered with awe,

you’re the last to survive, the last one that saw.”

 

“Now listen,” said Ben, “there’s things I must tell,

I must pass on my stories of actions, so fell.

My working life started in coal yards and dirt,

pulling great heavy carts, I had whippings that hurt.

 

But just like so many, the bedlam dragged on,

until sold at auction, then the bad years seemed gone.

My new master said, “You’re not fit for the plough,”

though in scarcely a year, “you’re a lovely horse now.”

 

Those times were so dear, with my master, a friend,

as I worked in the fields, my well being he’d tend.

But rumours were flying there soon would be war,

then the army procurers knocked on my master’s door.

 

I was sent with the others, and moved place to place,

our numbers kept growing, concern marked each face.

They put army marks on us, instead of our name,

it made us feel lost and filled us with shame.

 

Another thing wrong, that made noses sore,

was that everything smelt like an old army store.

The army liked shouting and made lots of noise,

our peace was the victim this bedlam destroys.

 

But things got no better, we were packed aboard ships,

then sent off to France, fear venting from lips.

I was given a job at a horse transit sector,

the far away guns raised a frightening spectre.

 

The horses in multitudes poured in and out,

there were awful things waiting we had little doubt.

Now horses all know, at the end of their day,

they return to their stables, their oats and their hay.

 

But when these horses left, they didn’t return,

and this wasn’t right, it made our stomachs churn.

One day with the rest, I was sent to the front,

a war, not of our making, where we bore the brunt.

 

Now terror stalked us, with survival in doubt,

for the earlier horses lay dead all about.

With exhaustion we slithered through great seas of mud

and saw our friends dying in pools of their blood.

 

Then luck paid a visit, they moved me away

far from the guns and oceans of clay

and that’s where I worked till the fighting was done

and repatriation at last was begun.

 

I returned with the horses, all older than I,

whose spirits were left with their comrades to die.

Five hundred thousand died in that mire,

and who knows what anguish, to survivors transpire.

 

But time took all those veterans, leaving just me

and I still see no future, that will set horses free,

The only small glimmer, is the vehicles they’re inventing

so the need to breed Horses, may be less unrelenting.

 

So the future of our kind, which the signs all agree,

will see our numbers whittled down, faster than the tree.

Said Ned “This paints a picture, too sad to contemplate,

why did ‘Big Horse in the Sky’ saddle us with such a fate?”

 

“Very droll” said Ben, “I like a sense of humour,

but there’s more to ‘Big Horse in the Sky’ he isn’t just a rumour.

He attends our final needs for the round-up in the sky

and there we’ll roam in freedom, where none will master you or I.

But until that day arrives, it will never leave my mind,

that for all those awful people, some were very kind,

And that includes the people that now own you and me,

so goodnight and happy dreams, like your future here will be.”

 

God’s Wonders to Perform

Once the world sparkled like a crystal,

all its waters glittered and were clear,

creatures teemed the lands in freedom

long before the trap and spear.

 

Life held magic all were touched by,

where is it now and all those creatures,

lost in sacrifice upon the altar,

to those who changed the worldly features.

 

Farewell world, sparkling like a crystal,

goodbye waters flourishing and clear,

adieu the natural world and creatures,

God’s wonders to perform is why we’re here.

 

Iconoclast

Weald thy hammer shatter false design,

Winter quake and lash to no avail,

Spring’s bringer strikes away the icy time.

 

Patrimony

There’s an abstract jigsaw puzzle

within the minds of most mankind,

with pieces forced together,

calculatedly assigned.

 

So this fallacious picture

of what’s purported to be real,

is the heritage of every child,

the truth from it to steal.

 

Too few will reach their closing days

that flung the picture to the ground,

then placed with care, each piece together,

where they should rightfully be found.

 

One Step Forward and Two Steps Back

The smart apes left the jungle

and built another one,

wore rose tinted glasses

whilst they used the gun.

Many words were spoken

in favour of their kind,

keeping thoughts assured

they had a moral mind.

“Stock in trade” excuses

when things were going wrong,

more anachronistic lyrics

and futile wearied song.The apes that weren’t so smart

stayed right where they were,

never wore rose glasses

that carry such a slur,

devised no superstition

to make a mind ensnared,

what you saw was what you got,

what was real stayed unimpaired.

Never wrecked their world

or the world of others,

also kept to nature’s rules

unlike their smart brothers.

 

Sophistry

The common consensus

will always insist

that certain realities

do not exist.

 

Whilst what is unreal

it doesn’t resist,

in common consensus

the two things persist.

 

Born in the Image

Born in the image......

so it must be blessed,

a dangerous pedestal

upon which to rest.

What takes on a mantle

of that which it’s not,

something festers within

and won’t be forgot.

 

What’s covered, is smothered

and cannot get air,

What’s unventilated

will fester and flair.

What carries errors

Nature then spurns,

She has her laws

of flawed returns.

 

Blood’s Thicker than Water

I heard a man say blood’s thicker than water,

he had a bad son and an even worse daughter,

he fought by their sides although they were wrong,

spreading rancour and hurt where it didn’t belong.

 

I heard people say blood’s thicker than water,

Their country is right, give others no quarter.

They’ll fight for their cause, they’re never wrong,

spreading rancour and hurt where it doesn’t belong.

 

I heard a lone voice; blood’s not thicker than water,

in my home, I am not an injustice supporter;

my country when right, but never when wrong,

I’ll spread no rancour and hurt, where it doesn’t belong.

 

Ambivalent Species

Sanity and shadow twin,

creative and the ruining.

Nations into greatness bloom

lesser things they also groom.

 

And strange it is a tiny few

can hoodwink millions through and through,

for those that rule are those that war,

what’s lower down, won’t know the score.

 

Softened up with propaganda,

disinformation dressed in candour,

thus hosts confront ‘till none will yield

in enmity upon the field.

 

Then shadow throws its loaded dice

and sanity will pay the price.

 

The Bovine Child

I was a child who was born with a dream,

who needed a mother and fields quiet and green.

But I’m a commodity trapped in a crate,

as tender white flesh with a hideous fate.

 

The beasts from the shadows are stalking the lands,

brutes with electrical prods in their hands,

Is everyone deaf to our abattoir screams,

are we flesh on a plate and that’s all it means?

 

Agreeing Kind

The tacitly agreeing kind,

adjunctive to another’s mind.

 

Along a Separate Way

The family of creatures

set upon this earth to live,

were an integrated whole,

taking no more than they give.

 

But evolution took one species

along a separate way,

that endowed these privileged creatures

with over weaning sway.

 

They plundered all before them

including their own kind,

raped the land, the sea, the air;

to their future they were blind.

 

These creatures had a conscience

its purpose to constrain,

but they devised devices

to circumvent its mental pain.

 

Their faiths gave useful service

as self deceive creations,

as sanctuaries where consciences

acquired dispensations.

 

Tenets of Reason

My colour creed or nation’s crimes,

were theirs that did them,

not yours or mine.

 

my colour creed or nation’s virtues,

were theirs that earned them,

not yours or mine.

 

Thought’s Great Ocean

Thought’s great ocean,

a myriad data interplay,

Every mind swims therein

and determines its own way.

 

Currents fierce abyssal depths,

the way that’s sought by some,

the safety of the shallows

is where the shoalers come.

 

Along the foaming shores

is where illusions lie,

where unsupportive bubbles burst

leaving flounders high and dry.

 

Cross-fertilising issues,

ever-new evolving shapes,

exalted forms, plebeian too,

to play their part each escapes.

 

Truth is a Bird

Truth is a bird with a beautiful song

that never is heard, where it doesn’t belong,

truth is the Phoenix that rises in some,

known for the company it is among.

 

But there are birds that fly very low,

mendacity over their tongues seem to flow,

sowing the air with a discordant squawk,

birds of a feather, tongues with a fork.

 

The Arrogance of Office

What wishes to own will tell you it serves,

lavish and pomp for itself it reserves,

no matter the system, no matter its name,

bureaucracies play their time-honoured game.

 

Societies fleeced, pockets are lined

by those that build palaces for their own kind.

Officialdom low and officialdom high,

burgeoning presences going awry.

 

The loss to the few whose motives are pure,

their credit enhances the other kind’s lure,

ingenuous populace farmed for a crop

by confidence tricksters that climb to the top.

 

A Secret Ploy

A secret to another’s ear was lent

and begged to stay where it was sent.

My chosen one was known to prate

and secrets sure to resonate.

 

I knew this ear, a leaking barrel

and its mouth, with want to carol.

Through every ear, off every tongue

as secret as a church bell rung.

 

Now I await upon fruition

those words I sent upon their mission,

and whence my pigeon to its nest,

‘twill see how wise I did invest.

 

Vengeful Demeter

Most every living creature,

every plant and every tree,

part of an integrated system

‘pon Earth’s epidermery.

 

Its air, its water and its land,

part of the same equation,

to view this mechanistically

’tis hoped has validation.

 

For everything upon the earth

unites as one machine,

resolves its own malfunctions,

such things have always been.

 

Now its parts are being damaged,

many more have been destroyed,

the machinery is rumbling,

more to come it can’t avoid.

 

The blame lies with one species

that’s long defaulted on its rent,

with little heed to others’ needs,

’tis over-numbered, over-spent.

 

But planet earth’s not sentient,

of what’s upon its skin,

what dies or thrives is ineffective

to its orbit or its spin.

 

When Apprentices Play

Whilst the Wizard went off for a very long stay,

the apprentice was having a magical day,

but playing alone can be limited fun,

so he read from the book and a spell was begun.

 

With a wave of his wand, he made more of his kind,

but they did the same, he was caught in a bind,

he could see there would soon be nowhere to stand,

so he sent them in groups to every known land.

 

But once they were there, they had to be fed,

they eat with a vengeance, the animals fled.

Soon some of the lands had little to eat

and only a few, were more than replete.

 

Their numbers kept growing, increasing the score,

five point five billion, at the year ninety four.

In scarcely four decades, their numbers would double

and bring in their wake, some unthinkable trouble.

 

The air and the seas and the lands felt the strain,

some lands weren’t so green, they were losing their rain,

there were things going wrong, wherever they turned,

warm places went cold, cool places were burned.

They prayed and they hoped, the Wizard would hear,

for without intervention, their end seemed quite clear,

but the Wizard was late, and he didn’t stay,

for everything living, had perished away.

 

Dream Time

When numbers few did here abound,

’twas from their dreams all answers found.

Numbers waxed through course of time,

conspiring to the dream’s decline.

 

The more that numbers did enlarge,

the more that chaos then took charge:

no longer each with guiding vision,

having fallen foul of thought revision.

 

’Twas those with self reward in mind

that sowed the seeds that served their kind,

inventing fearful superstition,

mind entrapment was their mission.

 

Engineering thoughts collective

to rout free minds that were perceptive,

time expanded on this theme,

all thoughts were trained which way to lean.

 

Through gulf of time, false thoughts ingrain,

life of their own they then attain,

in future far ‘twill still survive,

for cultural lees keeps them alive.

 

Few will care so few will find

the answer left so far behind.

The first scant numbers of our kind,

each owned an individuated mind.

 

Large numbers now are here to stay,

much gain from thoughts that interplay.

Distortions from collective view

ensures that there are losses too.

 

Upon those within a shared domain

must be some fair collective claim,

unseen by mind not quite in focus,

collective claim is often bogus.

 

The route to individuated mind

is not an easy one to find,

for every modern mind still wears

antiquity’s coverted snares.

 

A snare will hold a mind entirely,

but not the one prone to enquiry.

Light to shed and things to find

in darker places of the mind.

 

One’s way will otherwise be blind,

the intrigues of another’s mind.

 

Objective Mind

The phase of man’s objective mind

is displayed by what he leaves behind.

Palæolithic man left scarce a thing

and less, by those pre-dating him.

 

Leaps of time into the future

found man a more creative creature.

His mind through time had grown a tool

to subjugate his world and rule

 

Wilted Dreams

Of fleeting youth that went amiss,

of fancies skipped from that and this,

of idle hopes that flit away,

of wastage mourned in latter day.

 

Some will Make their Mark

Some will make their mark

from what they have within,

whilst others ‘hitch their wagon’

to some others bid to win.

 

Some ‘don’t give a hoot’ for anything

come poverty or fame,

some choose the easy road and fail,

life’s winners then, they blame.

 

Some give time to serving others

that some exploit with no disdain.

Animals to some, are creatures to abuse

though deference to dumb creatures

is the road that others choose.

 

Social Sub-structures

Take a shortcut to nowhere,

get to nowhere very fast,

choose your special nowhere,

the choices, are vast.

 

Decide which one entices

and get the special deal,

get away from somewhere,

somewheres are too real.

 

Shortcuts are a business

for manipulating clients,

even those most circumspect

fall prey to this science.

 

Disinformation is its style,

it keeps the business sound

but of course it’s nothing new

it’s always been around.

 

There’s not a social structure,

not riddled from inception

nor a democratic label,

not more covert in deception.

 

A Young Soldiers Epitaph 1914-1918

With a foe all around, that freely marauders,

and limbs that refused to take his mind’s orders,

was a youth; with mind shocked to the edge of its borders.

Mud past his ankles in a foul smelling trench;

parched lips and throat, that no water could quench.

Field glasses only yesterday

brought the enemy so near,

many, quite as young as he;

their faces mirroring his fear.

And then it crossed his mind;

how many men on either side

were hounded till they volunteered

for a muddy trench in which to hide.

He remembered his home village,

a quiet and friendly place:

oh, how it soured at the break of war,

when he was labelled with disgrace.

He could see the bands still playing

and the posters everywhere,

and those that he’d respected,

that began to point and glare,

saying "Listen to me lad,

stay civilian if you dare,

and we will turn your life

into a living nightmare."

 

His liberty was signed away that day,

a liberty already lost,

to find himself with the game recruits,

that had no vision of the cost.

 

His thoughts stopped there,

and none came later:

All that marked his place,

was an ugly smoking crater.

 

 

A young soldier left the trenches,

and very soon was back

to the village where he used to live,

where they turned his good name black.

His mother’s cottage door stood open,

lots of people were inside,

and as he walked among them,

he heard their whisperings that lied.

"We shall miss him very much

he gave us so much pride

but why did he make the sacrifice,

to fight with soldiers side by side?"

 

A frown appeared upon his face,

for not a single one

had raised a head towards him,

as he put down his pack and gun.

 

His sad mother’s eyes stared through him,

as though he were not there:

the truth then dawned upon him;

it was more than he could bear.

 

Come on Jack, said a voice from the door,

there’s only heartbreak for you here

and turning round, saw a dear old friend,

who’d lost his life more than a year.

 

As they wandered out the gateway,

the old friend told the boy,

You have happiness and peace ahead,

that no-one can destroy.

 

Footnote:

Behind status, age and gender,

hide some so smugly safe,

with hearts that are not tender.

These charnel house purveyors,

from sidelines safely prattle;

driving others to unwanted battle.

 

Limbo Thoughts

A stranded thought, that were it so,

such thought alone is thought misspent,

a fruit left withered on the vine.

But thought that shared convictions force,

not stranded and immobile lies,

a union instead, whereby merit may,

its own momentum thus occasion.

 

Filial Blindness

Filial blindness kith and kin,

darker secrets kept within,

truth can touch a tender zone

when it arrives too close to home.

 

The Mischief Maker

The mischief maker

spreads the unjust guilt

to make advantage

in their favour tilt.

 

Fifty Voices

Fifty voices in accord

Fifty different reasons.

 

Nature’s Fruit

All those on Nature’s fruit that feeds,

is expected they attend her needs,

whilst all attend to this provision,

Nature makes no price revision.

 

Homo Proselytiser

A concept comes from an unknown place,

displays itself metaphysically in space.

 

A mind that acts to this suggestion

with probity not felt in question,

will systemise through its neurology

and interface its physiology.

 

Thus from a process introspective

abstracts manifest themselves objective.

 

He Neither Felt nor Cared

Swans collected in their hundred

upon the country mere,

autumn’s sun was weakening,

soon winter would be here.

Then without a warning,

a hunter from the shore

squeezed the trigger of his rifle:

a swan knew life, no more.

 

It lay upon the waters,

its head beneath a wing,

all the others crowded ‘round it

and did the selfsame thing.

 

So the hunter with the rifle

took a life he could have spared,

inflicting pain upon the rest

and neither felt nor cared.

 

Apologist

A protection from the real

through the unreal,

an avoidance

with which others have to deal.

 

Sometimes Consciously, Sometimes Not

Fallen demi-gods abound

in their cerebral seas,

the ‘mark of Cain’ upon them

through ways that they malfease.

 

Convictions are the seabed

they drop their anchors in,

specious ones are quicksands

from there the drifts begin.

 

These hazards in cerebral seas

with perfidious Stygian crews,

pirates of the inner waters

with wider ones to choose.

 

But these are only abstracts,

and abstracts that aren’t shared

are but hazards to their owners,

nothing else could be impaired.

 

But abstracts seek expression

in a wider sense

and manifest objective

converting thoughts into events.

 

Thus the tenuous Æolian seas

fall prey to the stygian crews

to maraud the wide objective world

for victims to abuse.

 

Priorities

Minds dimmed self-fettered light

unspurred to compass bright around,

and what prioritised, be deemed as less

to its fading shadowed edge is found.

 

Conscience Hath Its Dues

Think well the wounds to others giving,

for conscience keeps these wounds reliving.

Before the eyes past sins there hanging,

like chimeras in a dream haranguing.

 

Refractory Material

Young minds by older ones are moulded

to foster or curtail the potential there enfolded.

Eventually these minds are to their owners ceded

as refractory material, that to reshaping stay unheeded.

 

The Last Smile

Whilst looking at things in the way that they’re not,

the things that they are will not be forgot,

For the things that they’re not, may work for a while,

but the things that they are will have the last smile.

 

The Pendant Way

Stepping down whilst others sleep

into the caverns dark and deep,

where stars are not the ones we knew

nor moon that bathes the unknown view.

 

Where clouds we’ve known have never crept

upon this place and then have wept,

where music is the unknown tune,

its words the unremembered rune.

 

Fickle too, the way it wings

to hidden places, nameless things.

Upon the knowing, darkness smiles

despite its all uncovered wiles,

but shadows growl with all their might

‘pon those that enter cowed in fright.

 

Chimeras though, must earn their keep

that their appetites remain replete,

but the spectre of the darkness flees

when dawn’s contrary lights it sees,

to their hidden places they repair

or lose their charge as never there,

and come those eastern rising rays

the feet that came, retread their ways.

 

Then, those that must, in that diurnal bright

will make of it, a more infernal light,

and thus the pendant moon in sequence brings

that they re-meet of vengeful somniatory things.

 

Honey Pot Syndrome

There are very many bees

preferring different honey

with interests not upon

the type that’s sweet and runny.

 

There’s varied kinds of honey pots

not difficult to find,

though bees that seek to sample

mustn’t show they’re so inclined.

 

For a reason that’s unique

to every single bee

some will only rarely taste

whilst others fill with glee.

 

This leaves one to concede

that bees that do such roving

are something other than they seem

masqueraded in bees’ clothing.

 

Parallax

Separate views from separate places

falsifying Cynosures placement in the sky,

Cynosure in dextra and sinistra places,

Predetermined minds conditioning the eye.

 

Gambit

White knights of mythology

and nannied ideology,

the endless stream of deity

and its reliant laity.

 

Expected ones to purge our sin,

where on earth did this begin?

ideas designed for going wrong

on earth indeed is where they’re from.

 

Such second party intervention

is misdirecting our attention,

for what we do is what we are,

no White Knight comes from afar.

 

White Knights come from within,

that is where they’ve always been,

we also have a Black Knight

for harrying the White.

 

You and I control the two,

Black or White; it’s up to you.

Knights are often in disguise,

we therefore need discerning eyes.

 

But in the end we have free will,

deciding on the one to kill.

 

Whilst Minds Remain Adjunctive

Nature has her arsenal,

weapons of all kind,

for harrying her progeny,

lest they slip behind.

 

We owe a debt of gratitude

to her weapons - dog and cat,

and all the other carnivores

through time, kept skilled and fat.

 

They were major players

in shaping evolution,

Nature’s heresy of numbers

received their contribution.

 

Quality control, also was a feature,

encouraging the best to thrive,

those that didn’t make the grade

were seldom sanctioned to survive.

 

Carnivores had more to add

for they supplied the fear,

giving all intelligence

an evolutionary steer.

 

Nature’s creatures of the wild,

lest they became defunctive,

were performing to Her larger plan,

whilst minds remained adjunctive.

 

Had Nature never cleaned her stable,

plumped for short term woolly notions,

life’s varieties and qualities

would have suffered poison potions.

 

All forms of life are brief,

thus all are short time thinkers,

whilst Nature on the other hand

is not hindered by such blinkers.

Now should another plan arrive,

not of Nature’s derivation,

She’d simply watch it fall apart,

then re-affirm administration.

 

Door Openers

The good, bad and the careless,

a combination that’s relentless;

It is every nation’s mixture

at every level is this picture.

 

Wherever good gains upper hand,

a fatal flaw works to disband,

it edges order into grief,

whilst unconscious its mischief.

 

Only good see some in fellowkind,

excuse their sins for peace of mind.

Innocuous though they may seem,

their history is short of gleam.

 

Unending does such view bedevil,

social fabrics at every level.

Those with such unbalanced view,

their inner virtue they undo.

 

Door openers their historic roll,

exploiters, passports to their goal.

Karl Marx had unbalanced view,

Millions followed, bad empires grew.

 

Such concepts grounded in emotion,

is toying with a dangerous notion.

 

Counterfeit Reason

Hubris covert, sometimes not,

diverse in type and needs,

endemic to its species

on which it mainly feeds.

 

Covets creatures things or both,

incomplete when its alone,

for Monarchs without subjects

sit upon a futile throne.

 

Self apotheosis has both

large and lesser kinds,

though congruence with ability

elects the niche it finds.

 

Insinuation is its stratagem

when it feigns respectability,

the ingenuously blind oblige

their part in culpability.

 

Useful Tools

Faith in things not rationalised,

products of the mind unwise.

Keeping myths and faiths abrewing

follows history’s road to ruin.

 

Myth and faiths are “stock in trade”,

useful tools at the despot’s aid,

for tyranny doth constant leer

through history both far and near.

 

Aposteriori

Looking back in time two hundred years,

they had some strange uncivilised ideas.

But they looked back and did the same,

each generation makes this claim.

 

When our todays are yesteryears,

‘twill be the time our turn appears.

Thus a common and recurring theme

that time and change does not redeem.

 

This natural affinity for curious premises,

turns cause into folly and effect into nemesis.

 

These events are symptomatic

of a penchant for delusion

where cause and effect is deemed

an unwarranted intrusion.

 

Man’s psychology is littered

with these cloisters of futility,

whose antecedence claim the future

as a pawn for its utility.

 

The Covert Jungle

The creatures of the jungle

where everything is real,

nothing has delusions

lest it becomes a meal.

 

But, some forsook the real world,

they brought the jungle too,

dressed it in illusions

to project a better view.

 

Tailored their delusions

to cover every aspect,

every one contributed

even those most circumspect.

 

Some became so far detached

in victimising truth,

that error was their champion

more red in claw and tooth.

 

Then delusion had decided

that goodness was inherent

and the predatory were products

of the disciplining parent.

 

So the predator was treated

as though it were the prey

and the jungle held its breath

at the dawning of this day.

 

No Hyenas to be ravening,

now they were treated kind,

compassion shown to predators

makes them disinclined.

 

This act of transformation

for compassion to awaken,

made Hyenas very happy

that delusion was mistaken.

 

The years rolled into decades,

trouble didn’t shrink; it grew,

nurtured by delusion

that couldn’t change its view.

 

Repositories of Heart and Mind

Like attracts to like,

each to their own kind,

fraternal inward-looking worlds,

self attendingly aligned.

Thus congeries of minute worlds

on the macrocosmic face,

repositories of heart and mind

in a manufactured place.

 

The World to Which we Repair

Touch not our thoughts or our ideas

nor clutter your paradigm into our ears.

The shutters are up to stifle the flow

and keep out the voice that disturbs status quo.

 

We have our worlds to which we repair,

try bringing the real world to us if you dare.

 

Images of Deceit

Every image from the past can be deceitful,

each one has many functions it fulfils,

for images through time have many masters,

gaining potency derived from managed skills.

 

Images are used for swaying nations,

collectivising thoughts for channelled flow,

such images express a specious promise

and demand returns exceeding quid quo pro.

 

When Reality has Died

Nothing that’s within, is what it seems without

when perceptions are projections with verity in doubt.

Actions follow thoughts inextricably they’re tied,

negativity the next of kin when reality has died.

 

Is It Not Surprising

Is it not surprising

that we have conflicting views

when we each have past exposure

to unique and varied views.

 

Thus perceptions of each person

come out a different way,

so obtaining common view

requires lots of sway.

 

Information all around us

of vast and varied kind,

but not absorbed or used the same

by any single mind.

 

The totality of all of this

gives each a different bias,

but there is a hurdle still

with ambivalence to ply us.

 

Our apperceptual issue

just in qualitative terms

is at variance between us all,

thus discord it affirms.

 

 

The Odyssey of the Bicameral Mind

Antic Hay

In batches people will coalesce

but Nature’s plan this won’t transgress,

whilst close-knit groups each other glower,

enlightenment small hope to flower.

Strange notions rise in such conditions

to be enshrined within traditions.

In the unreal so many wallow,

so sets the stage for what must follow.

 

Thus tensions build as they are fanned

by those with personal gain at hand.

When major conflicts then ensue

not only bad, but good comes too.

Fresh currents flush out stagnancies,

thus keeping stirred the human brew,

some enlightenment might then accrue.

 

Homo Catalyst

Through a process interactive

appears a product that’s promotive

to the human life collective;

though such presence can invite invective,

‘tis out of step with thoughts collective.

This re-shaper of the status quo is individuation,

the eroder of things parochial is this differentiation,

It represents the seed stock from which wisdom can arise

and this is the only source that will so proselytise.

 

The Image Wins the Eye

Concern for personal image

is an awareness consequence,

so those upon the wrong road

for sake of image built defence.

Character duality was the form it took,

one to conceal the other, safe behind a specious look.

 

The Advent of Consciousness

Since the advent of our consciousness

less bad things should arise,

though in truth with scant concern

it does more to barbarise

the fauna from the land,

from the sea and from the skies.

 

These malpractice acts of consciousness;

this is what is signifies.

That in becoming conscious,

that to conceptualise,

put people at a forked road

they chose the road that was not wise.

This new found abstract split-off

of the primal human mind

was secured to the future,

its secrets to unwind,

expansively creative

few limits would it find.

 

Evolution’s Seeds of Devolution

Paradoxically people who favoured the wrong road

are those whose baser instincts

enlightenment does not erode.

Therefore static to remain rooted in the past

whilst their conceptual faculty

moves to the future fast,

generating unique notions

formulations that surpass.

 

Dual Control, but who’s Driving

A prime function of consciousness

is that it should intercede

to keep in check base instincts

that from its partner could proceed.

 

But a person on the wrong road

is one whose primitive holds sway,

deaf to its apperceptive faculty

that could show the better way.

 

So through time the evolution

of consciousness accrues

more weapons to its primitive

as power to abuse.

Index with Category

 

 

Grandfather’s Legacy - Short Story

 

Anecdotes and Poetry

Gentle Clouds and Other Things -  Poetic

Fond Memories -  Poetic

Either Way, a Price to Pay -  Philosophical

Yesteryear’s Dreams -  Poetic

She Shames the sun - .Poetic

Primordial Mysterium - Philosophical

Should I Trust These Eyes - Romantic

Pussy’s Deliberations Upon Paws and Effect - Humorous

Callow Eyes - Philosophical

Where Love Is - Romantic

Simulacrum Diurnal Dream - Paranormal

Extraordinary Happenings at Tallabudgera Creek - True

Fair Dismissal - Humorous

A Fisherman’s Tale - True - Humorous

The World is a Stage – Act One - Poetic

The World is a State – Act Two - Poetic

New for Old - Philosophical

I Bring You One You May not Know - Poetic

Innocence Lost - True

The Old Painting - Paranormal

The Old Painting II - Paranormal

The Old Painting III - Paranormal

The Giver Taketh - Imaginative

Nocturnal Spy - Poetic

Minds Abstract Processes - Psychology

Felis Australis - True

The Evacuee - True Memories

Except the soul - Imaginative

Unrequited Love - Romantic

We Will Wing on its Sighs - Philosophical

The Secret of the Special Tree - True Memories

Transient Words - Psychological

This Vision Hath My Constancy - Romantic

Absence Makes - Psychology

Paw Old Me - Humorous

Brief Allotted Whiles - Nostalgic

Portents Lie in Imagery Bound - Psychology

Those of Grace - Poignant

Feelings - Poignant

A Thrush’s Song - Poignant

The Cat and the Wizard - Philosophical

Cats Are Stress Relieving - Humorous

Soggy Kids - True Memories

Aeolus - Nature

Labyrinth - Psychology

All is Relative - Nature

Nature’s Golden Rule - Psychology

Our Time Will Come - Romantic

Imaginations - Psychology

Dids’t Grant Without Mine Asking - Imagination

The Black Shepherd Cat - True Paranormal

One Extra for the Night - True Memories

Off to Foreign Climes - True Memories

Polar Seasons - Psychology

Arcane Vibes - Nature

An ‘Other Worldly’ Encounter - Paranormal

The Party and Other Things - True Humorous

Nothing is Infallible - Psychology

The Construction Business - Psychology

Happy School Days - True Humorous

Ticking Clocks - Psychology

Voices of the Heart - Psychology

The Jimmy Riddle - True Humorous

A Dogalogue of Misfortune - True Humorous

Purchasing Power - True Humorous

 

Step Into the Rainbow

(Dissertation & Accompanying verse)

 

Faustian Bargain - Psychology

What Hides from Light - Psychology

Ned and Ben and the Great War - Poignant

God’s Wonders to Perform - Nature

 Iconoclast - Psychology

Patrimony - Psychology

One Step Forward & Two Steps Back - Philosophical

Sophistry - Psychology

Born in the Image - Psychology

Blood’s Thicker than Water - Psychology

Ambivalent Species - Psychology

The Bovine Child - Poignant

Agreeing Kind - Pychology

Along a Separate Way - Psychology

Tenets of Reason - Psychology

Thoughts Great Ocean - Imaginative

Truth is a Bird - Imaginative

The Arrogance of Office - Psychology

A Secret Ploy - Psychology

Vengeful Demeter - Nature

When Apprentices Play - Psychology

Dream Time - Psychology

Objective Mind - Psychology

Wilted Dreams - Imaginative

Some Will Make Their Mark -  Psychology

Social Sub Structures - Psychology

A Young Soldiers Epitaph 1914-18 - Poignant

Limbo Thoughts - Psychology

Filial Blindness - Psychology

The Mischief Maker - Psychology

Fifty Voices - Psychology

Nature’s Fruit - Psychology

Homo Proselytiser - Paranormal

He Neither Felt Nor Cared - Poignant

Apologist - Psychology

Sometimes Consciously, Sometimes Not - Psychology

Priorities - Psychology

Conscience Hath its Dues - Psychology

Refractory Material - Psychology

Last Smile The - Psychology

Pendant Way The - Imaginative

Honeypot Syndrome - Psychology

Parallax - Psychology

Gambit - Psychology

Whilst Minds Remain Adjunctive - Nature

Door Openers - Psychology

Counterfeit Reason - Psychology

Useful Tools - Psychology

Aposteriori - Psychology

Covert Jungle The - Psychology

Repositories of Heart and Mind - Psychology

World to Which we Repair The - Psychology

Images of Deceit - Psychology

When Reality Has Died - Psychology

Is it not Surprising? - Psychology

 

Odyssey of the Bicameral Mind The

 

Antic Hay - Psychology

Homo Catalyst - Psychology

The Image Wins the Eye - Psychology

The Advent of Consciousness - Psychology

Evolution’s Seeds of Devolution - Psychology

Dual Control, but who’s Driving - Psychology  

Further Information

For other information written or recorded by Colin Brookfield please refer to my website from the address bar and not the Search Engine:

 

www.colinbrookfield.co.uk

Facebook: Colin Brookfield (Brookie)

 

YouTube Channel:

The Satanic Conspiracy

The Wizards Apprentice

The Ambivalent Gene (Parts 1 and 2)

Pet Door Alert

The Curse of Ignorance

Animal Welfare in Cyprus (Anne Brookfield)

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Tag der Veröffentlichung: 16.07.2020

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