I watch the footage on iplayer
Hear the voices scream out
See the injured bleeding, dying
A strip of land between Egypt
And Israël- owned, desired

Then I see Brunhilda
secretary to
Gobbels talking
About Evil and injustice
About there being no god
See the Second World War
Footage.
I think of the meaning
Of having a home
And despair at
Humankind

Love Mary

Upon many a dusty ledge
Laden with dried out heads
Of flower stalks and silken
Shine, stood in silent scent
That little *** of mine.

Mary ***

And so it went on sale in Knightsbridge
A little gallery hardly seen
A painting of a ceramic ***
Tiny with two eyes
Pallid in the beam.

The man bought it for its thoughts
That led him in a quiet dream
Of places where he use to hide
Memories of shelves and spaces
And childhood’s magic theme.

Love Mary ***

Standing on the bridge looking down stream
The sunlight a curtain through weeping leaf
Trailing their ends in the moving slowness
Of a shallow children filled patch of crystal.

Love Mary **

The tide came in and beached our feet
Surrounded then with sharps and stones
Our clothing wetted and sand filled
Long plaits dipped in the salty green.

The sea swishes and swirles its bubbles
Deep orche the slippery seaweed floats
Waves luxurious wigglets top the depth
Watch we did in awe and felt the swell.

Love Mary ***

If travel be not in the head
What else can its name be
For the imagination is how
We see and travel a concept
That moves in picture books.

Mary **

I have to travel in my head
Travel when tucked in bed
Around the country’s edge
Remembering all my friends.

Love Mary x

The wonders of a morning
Is watching Evelyn dress
She does it as slow as a feather
Falling from a great Oak tree.

Each item of clothing lifted
From the floor where it rested
Pants, socks t-shirt, pinafore,
Cardigan, shoes, coat.

The show complete
The child ready for school
Shows her shells
From her small collection
Ammonite, cowie, conch and
Waves goodbye.

Love Maryxxx

What a beautiful mouth you have
And so we beat our boats against
The currents ceaslessly reinventing
Ourselves in the knowledge that
Nothing much really matters
And you don’t have to worry
About flies or parents just
Cleanliness.

And this is how we do it on
The steps of Morocco in grass
Skirts and a sombrero under
A blue sky with tomorrow
Waving goodbye.

Love Mary **

Sailor sail on by today
And cowboy hold me
I will love all that is you
And the tree will stay in
The night sky.

Love Mary ***

‘ Lies in white Coates ‘

Love Mary x

Daddy got ill whilst making a cake
An Easter cake for Easter Day
He bent his tummy and said ouch
And to the hospital had to go.

His family was very worried
To see sick daddy in pain
His appendix had to come out
Outside it began to rain.o,

At ten o’clock they wheeled him down
To pop out his grisly tummy bone
Sewn back together neat and bright
He was soon to be driven home.

For days his poor throat was ever so sore
He could hardly talk
All swollen down the Ulvula
Could not but mutter a word.

Evelyn said she would take great care
Of her daddy whilst he was sick
Gradually his throat got better
And he began to talk and do tricks.

Love Grandma, Mum.

Always to the left she was
Behind in age to her sister
Grace, Emily Westbrook
Second set in class, the Bs.

Being younger meant she
Did her exams a year later
Went to Brownies a year later
But Betty Rose married first.

Love Mary ***

She gathered her gloves from top bookcase
Those fingerless ones knitted by a friend in
Grey and blue, slidding them along the rail
To keep her hands clean and warm, cabled.

Love Mary ***

You can say much by saying very little
You can say everything by saying nought.

Love Mary xxxx

Understanding that you can rarely change things
It is best just to forget and simply go on in doubt
Hope rides its own journey on the back of a bike
Children  send photos and come round to watch.

This is the itinerary of the invalided life and care
It stretches to the isles of the church and the roses
To the solicitude of waiting for door bell rappings
To ‘End Game’and all its imagination of the reality.

Love Mary xxxx

He did not drink
But sat at the bar
Waiting for her potato
The one she had daily.

Their life, the pub, he.
The potato was a food
To alleviate the painful
He gave it with his love.

Love Mary ***

No longer do I walk on the quiet land
Or watch the tree buds on Spring days
For I am lost to those things forever so
And am star dust to the earthly soul.

Love Mary xxxxx

He made his own garden from the words
Planting the raspberries that she gave him
The two roses, red and white now strong
And an Acer reached a height of ten feet
In the middle an oblong grass lawn grew
Edged with daffodils and crocuses to multiply
A few pots blossomed with a variety of plants
And the fairy of love and charity stood watch.

Love Mary xxxx

Oh Lisa daughter of the fallen,
Come hither so I may bless you
For what you give with your
Carers’ hands and gentle smile
Is greater than imaginable.

I thank you with my frail heart
And my thin hand and voice
You came to me on Easter Sunday
And again on Easter Monday
Bringing your gifts.

Love Mary

We spend our lives learning how to say goodbye
All that we love and are familiar is to be slipping
And the treasures on the wall will go to others so
I will not be sad for all will continue in the gardens.

Love Mary ***

Claim that place that we shared
Heap your heart with our days
Sit patiently on that seat of yours
Where the yellow roses flower.

Each morning dip your fingers
In the books of love and live
You are my dearest daughter
Who glad I was that she came.

Love Mummy xxxxx

Bewilderment watered in her small hands
The sky filtered its rays through the blinds
Sitting in solicitude sufffereing sunk down
In the days that past it renounced its truth.

Love Mary ***

Breaking into the garden shed
The children found a collection
Of old toys, so glad to see them
Washed and restored they play
Taking squirrel for a walk and
Putting up the old tent to hide .

Love Mummy ***

She would toddle off unaccompanied
In a short Summer dress and cardigan
That few brisk yards across the close
It would be early and the child small.

This was a regular feature of dailies
And the old man and little girl had
Great fun in his large back garden
With tea and a marmite sandwich.

Love Mum xxxx

Running outstretched to meet the birds
As they took flight at the field’s edge
Faces brimmed over with bright light
Pink boots left the ground, jumping
And hearts filled with the watching.

Love Maryxxx

The little bank by the stream was wet
Wet with the tears of ages, of centuries
And the children came with
Their sailing boats
To watch the ducks
And eat blackberries
The years past with daffodils
With Wordsworth
With Giselle
Until the end of time.

Love Mary **

So it is with our fortunes on our backs
Tapering the edges of life we continue
Never really understanding the naked
Flame as it enfolds, wraps us forever a
Moment to standstraight and say come.

Love Mary

The little girl
Who wondered
What
Other people did
With elastic
Bands.

Love Mary ***

He was in the garden
It had been a long time
Pulling against the weeds
His elderly mother in a chair
Reading the newspaper.

The woman watched on
Pallid in the light
They helped each other
It was Spring, bulbs out
The news was about Brexit.

Love Mary

People just fooling around
With others minds
Bending what was standing straight
Crushing crooked the uncluttered
Web of simplicity until one is blind
Please in this desperate hour
Open the windows of awareness
Where the Spring bulbs flower.

Love Mary

Some gals just want men to give them babies
And clean the gutters.




Love Mary xxxx

It is an ordinary Tuesday morning
The walkers regular in their time
Carrying shopping bags
On their way to the supermarket.

It is that gap between the old and new
When people buy bargains in shops
Left over items, later to be discarded
Or sold on eBay or local based sites.

But this Tuesday will have no ending
That can be rejoiced in the roadways
For it ends with a goodbye as I slide
To Spring in a bare cardboard coffin.

Love Mary **

It may take years for poetry to be acknowledged but when it is
Great truths unfold that leave one tremulous with beauty and
Awareness so great that the world turns in disbelief.
Somehow there are no other legistrators of the truth for all are
Selfinterested and infested.
So dear poets write for humanity that your words touch those servants of change.
Altering understanding
To the reality of nature’s innocence and the wickedness of
history and humankind.


Love Mary xxxxx

Finding you ‘Tumbleweed’ was such a gift
A heart exposed, a gentle kiss
Laughter and smiles in the morn
The fun of joy each day reborn.

Build me your world in a picture
Of animals with big soft eyes
Remember how I loved you
Talking as you ate your breakfast.

Love Grandma xxxx

The little girl with the mop of hair
Floated onto her chair to eat from
Her dolphin bowl the milky cereal
And chewey red vitamin pill.

It was still dull outside and the room
Grey colour. She had to get dressed
For school. Put on her school items.
It took a long time to get ready.

Evelyn talked all through breakfast
So the Cheerios went down slowly
Then to the dressing task for school
Off came her pyjamas with a kick
On went knickers , socks and shirt
Next grey pinafore and red cardigan
She was ready only shoes and coat
A pink light coat as it was Springtime
Warm and blossoms on the trees.

Daddy held hands with Evelyn
As they passed the swing park
The sheds and fields on the way to school
And they talked about all the things
They could imagine about this new day.

Love Grandma xxxx

A little girl sat at breakfast eating
Her cheerios with a straw
She commented about all things
In her upsy downsy voice
The world seemed so colourful
As she smiled at her sock animals
And the plastic mammoth by her plate.

She was nearly always late for school
As there was just too much to say
But daddy and her usually made it
Evelyn loved school but was equally
Happy at home with her family
She drew beautifully images of animals
From a television programme, it helped,
They were so friendly with big eyes.
She was an unusual four year old.

Love Grandma  Mary ***

Where do we meet?
Can it be said
You have the same words
In your head
Or ideas reframed
Do your eyes drop tears
And your hands reach out
To touch the soil
Do we ever meet?
Different voices in the wind.

Love Mary **

The grass cut winter short
Fog frozen on the briar
Parables use to be told
In the fields far below.

Taking the long way round
As coldness turned to frost
Finding that our hearts do melt
As a whistling stirs the throat.

Love Mary

The grass yellow topped wet Winter
Separates forming trodden pathway
Between overhanging bare branches
A child might squeeze cautious now
The damp hangs like crystal pearls
Through we peep.

Love Mary ***

The road of the White garden
Stretching down the side of the old brick wall
Where all the shrubs and plants were white
And cherries hung in clusters from the trees.

In my imagination I had returned
Bringing all my memories
The flowers, trees, birds, tea houses
The pretty playing children, lollies
Best dresses and shoes, skipping rope
My collection of dolls, ‘blueyes’, ‘Rosebud’
The ducks and swans, families, friends.
This was my childhood and here I will
Stay in the grounds of safety and beauty.

Life is short but the memories linger
Floating in the air, carrying scents of
Fragrances Of a time now gone.


Love Mary ***

The Wild Swans at Coole.
BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
The trees are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
Upon the brimming water among the stones
Are nine-and-fifty swans.

The nineteenth autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count;
I saw, before I had well finished,
All suddenly mount
And scatter wheeling in great broken rings
Upon their clamorous wings.

I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
All's changed since I, hearing at twilight,
The first time on this shore,
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread.

Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold
Companionable streams or climb the air;
Their hearts have not grown old;
Passion or conquest, wander where they will,
Attend upon them still.

But now they drift on the still water,
Mysterious, beautiful;
Among what rushes will they build,
By what lake's edge or pool
Delight men's eyes when I awake some day
To find they have flown away?

Bought from Clements on a cold afternoon
A coachbuilt navy Silvercross pram
For my third and beautiful little lamb
And when she was born at six pounds thirteen
I wrapped her tight and placed her inside
She had long black hair brushed in a peak
And more lovelier a sight could not be reached
And destiny played out its days and more lovelier
She became each day and now at forty- four
Has four to love and tender and put in seats of cars
Not gigantic coachbuilt stars.

Love Mummy ***

When we go aboating on the Norfolk Broads
Taking all our memories from the years before
As from childhood after the Second World War
Holidays were a speciality greatly to be adored
A prized commodity, a delight to be taken right
So going aboating on the Norfolk Broads was all.

Love Mary

Lavender lays where the spider cries
On the gravel path by the lawn
The licacious tree spills its leaves
And the spider runs around.

If I could give you a book of thistledown
Lined in sashes of jade silk
And edged in purple squares
Your days fill every page
And every day be you.

Love Mary

Along the path walked Bluebell
Her face a rosy glow
She marched like a soldier boy
Going to a show.

On her head golden curls
She wore a bright red coat
And happiness lay all about
Where the little child dwelt.

Love Grandma xxxx

I saw the Silver swan
Open her wings, glistening
On the top of a white stage
It was noble, stately, nightly
And the stage a circular pond
Let me flow softly, smoothly
Watching the Silver swan glide
Mysterious, beautiful
Silver swan I will swim to you
For with you I am entranced
Mounting a lovelet of songs
Under a starry sky.


Love Mary

Why Winter more watery
Are your tears?
Thay hold to the silence
Of the music that stopped.

A rose and a clementine
A muscician and a clown
A Curate with a Bible
These gatherings we are.

Love Mary ***

Beautiful black girls
With their fuzzie hair
Arms in abundance
Rich golden words
Oh how they give
Speaking of mandkind
Let me dance with you
Our knees pat and beat
Fingers tough together
Then the music speaks.

Why said the plain looking man
Whose feet clipped the lanes
Is this world so corrupt and cruel
Has it always been this way?

Up in the apple tree a bluetit sang
And robin answered ‘yes’ friend
It’s always been wrong
But freely we sing for you.

Love Mary x