A cheeky robin sat upon brambles
Its red breast puffed and bright
Had fed on scraps from birdtables
A little king at rest.

Love Mary ***

Straight and crooked thinking
Where did it all begin
A history of falsehoods
Lies continually begin.

Sad that we are no better
In 2019, Brexit just a shambles
Takes all the politicians time
A house full of fallacious crimes.

Love Mary **

My Invisible friend.

If I pass you bye on that day,
Please don’t judge me as I rush away.
If I fail to see you,
Don’t presume I even knew
How to discover or trace you...

Call my name my heart will soar.....

My invisible friend no more...

Lemon drops and Jam face
Were two rather unusual little girls
They spent their days in a tree house
In their rather small garden
With a single white rose
And an upturned flower ***
With a plant called the ‘Bride’
An unwanted Christmas present
Yet to be planted by their father.

The two old cats had recently died
Which created a few weeks of sadness
And a house without paws or biscuit
Trays and an empty end of the couch.
Christmas now over the girls took
Some toys to the tree house
Including their iPads and drawing paper,
Pens etc...

Lemon drops had long fair bunches
And was very thin with big blue eyes
She did not like new foods and spat
Them out sometimes she was always
Drawing funny people and loved fluffy
Animals. She had a papier mâché
Enormous ladybird on her bedroom wall
She wanted to be an artist when older
Like her two grandparents.
Grandma Mary had bought her a Sasha
Doll which she had dressed once
In silver pixie boots and a red school
Dress, blue hat and cardigan.
They both loved each other.
Daddy was her best toy.

Jam cheeks bounced about with
Long golden ringlets and a big happy
Smile. She wore baby suits and a striped
Floppy hat in yellow and black.
Mummy was getting
Her some shoes to wear to avoid
Wet feet in the garden.
She loved eating her food
And made people laugh
Including mummy who she
Kissed and cuddled a lot.

To be continued...

Love Mary Grandma xxxx

Just big enough for Sundays was Cyril
In his grey shirt and v neck sweater
Following his wife up the road, closely,
He helped carry the shopping from the red bus
The few minutes walk home;
Then as it was Sunday, chicken roast
Then meringue, fruit and cream.

The sitting room was comfy
With two brown velour chairs
Cyril and Joyce sat together
One in each chair to watch the box.

Love Mary ***

The child asked the rainbow man
If he ever cried and why
Lifting a big drop of rain
He let it splash at her feet
And now she knew why
The rainbow man cried.

LoveMary ***

Far out a small seabird called
Across the peaks and troughs
It was lost, laying out timely
Memories in its mind
Ones to carry carefully
In the dark night.
Beruffled and brave no longer
In the the harsh storm
Trailing its tail feathers
In an attempt to reach
The bliss of oblivion
And curl up forever.

Love Mary ***

Ballooons bouncing between the stars
Little ladybirds lighting the Lily path
Whirligigs whizzing near an open door
Aconites in ascension this Winter hour.

Love Mary ***

It is so sad when the weather is bad
And you can’t go out and the freeze does bite
And the dogs stay in with basket bins
The children play upstairs today
It is so sad when the weather is bad .

Love Mary **

The tree widened in front of my eyes
Covered itself in green ivy leaves
Fingers grew out from the stump top
Up it went to the sky as in Fangorn
The fantasy wood in Tolkien.

I stood at the foot looking upwards
And thinking, if I climbed it in my
Clark’s sandels, what would I find?
So off I went, slowly, holding tightly
To the spiral stems of green...

Love Mary ***

Stop it sister keep bending your toes
They will be all crooked don’t you know
Where are you shoes, silver like mine?
And pink socks with bows at the top
Stop it sister keep bending your toes.

Love big sister .
Xxxxx

The ladybird queen in spotted black
And dark wings floating down her back
Leant leisurely over the bedroom frame
This ladybird might one day leave home.


She lifted gown of crimson silk
And hopped around as if bespoke  
The dress stretched to her biggest toe
And golden hair about her glowed.

Oh darling ladybird I do love thee
To see you dancing fair and free
On your highest bedroom wall
A special insects for us all.

Love to Evelyn ***

White legs enter the sea
As Icarus falls from the
Sun baked clouds
His feathered wings melt
And then disintegrate.

The day is clear, calm
Not noticed as he falls, silently,
Into deepest waters of bay
All busied themselves
The light craft sails on.

The fisherman’s line stretched
The shepherd gazes at the sky
The bowsmen drives his horse
And birds spiralled overhead
Sailing boats bob in blue.

This is how it is in the land
Where no one is noticed
Brueghel and Auden knew
The hardship of reality
A sad perpetuating song.

Love Mary xxxx

The man and boy meet the mists
Between hawthorn hedges thorn
Fellow travellers on the wet road
Grandfather and grandson hold
Hands and feel the excitement of
This December gaily trudge along.

Love Mary ***

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

Love Mary ***

It is almost dark through the curtains
The cold creeps around my bed frame
Where sleep in no longer restful times

Soon the visitors will come to the door
And I will try my best to offer warmth
But the difficulty will be much a climb

I say sorry that, today, one cannot give
And whisper across the room my quiet
While they can only imagine, love notes.

And on the floor the two children play
Beautiful in their Christmas costumes
Blonde and flaxen haired in the lights .

I managed to give out warmth then.

Love Mary ***

I really did not know what they meant
Standing on the outside
Like nothing was of importance
Other than the coming along
The day splattered with rain
Spreading the newly bared earth
The weeded area with breathing
And the afternoon sprang tears
While **** Robin
Sang his song.

And the wall came tumbling down
Together we watched it fall
Red bricks cemented tumbled
On the street floor.

So we called in the builder to see
What he could do
Stuck it up again with lots of glue.


And now it looks perfect apart
From a zigzag line
Which is rather attractive
Where the new cement dried.

And the wall came tumbling down
In the garden of our house.

Love Mary ***

And so today lay sleepier amongst
The coverings grey
Hearing windy breezes on
The chimney *** blow
Knowing the shining of the
Night sky
And the trespassing moon
Told of the eleventh hour
My fading fairy lisping.

My childish heart
Beat on the hour
With music and with songs
Gathered everything I had
Placed them in a bag
So if the daisies call
And snowdrops lift a head
All the wonders for me
At the bottom of my bed.

Love Mary **

The Darkling Thrush.

I leant upon a coppice gate,
When Frost was spectre-gray,
And Winter's dregs made desolate The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh Had sought their household fires.
The land's sharp features seemed to me The Century's corpse outleant,
Its crypt the cloudy canopy, *
The wind its death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth Seemed fervourless as I.
At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead,
In a full-hearted evensong Of joy illimited.
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt and small, With blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul Upon the growing gloom.
So little cause for carolings Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew, And I was unaware.

31 December 1900

By Thomas Hardy

It seemed like the pink rose
Would stay out forever
Swaying over the path
In the damp December air.

The garden was in disarray
With a multitude of debris
Left from Autumn
Green covering of growing.

But the pink rose did not tire
Sought in its shrivelled  beauty
The thirst of the rain fall
And moments of crisp sunshine.

Love Mary ***

Never knew, never heard
Or saw or felt so exposed
By those who trampled on
My bones, just so hurt, Bert.

Love Mary **

Oh little garden new this year
The beginning just begun
The seeds and saplings planted
To start a journey long.

This gift of nature to another
Was given out of love
So they may know what I have
And also know my love.

Love Mary x

The snow berries are out tonight
In corded rows of silent lights
They decorate the tallest hedge
Float across a mission to address.

Little people stop and stare
Their wonder full of mystery
Then home to gather round tree
A yearly Christmas fantasy.

Love Mary ***


Love Mary x

If you close your eyes
You will remember how
We wrapped together
In the cold dark night.

How we walked the park
As the leaves fell down
How we spun around
You never let me down.

My one and only Ro.

Love Mary xxxo

The day bites in through my window
A brightness of sunshine reflects
Crossed lines on my wall, oblong
Birds sing no songs these days
Waiting for Van Gogh’s Starry Sky
And the faith of a good man.

Love Mary ***

Two voices catch together
Round the kitchen door
Neither spelt out what
Love could be or try to
See.

Love Mary ***

Every time you berate me
You show how little
You have learnt in this life
I feel sorry for you
That wisdom did not
Find you but love did.

Love Mary xxxx

‘True knowledge exists in knowing
you know nothing’.

Love Mary ***

I dangle like the Willow tree
Few of leaf and spiralling
The dance of the finalists
Caught in Winter sneeze.

So much beauty holds on
Asters like gold buttons
Scarlet hollyhock flower
So swished by rain drops.

Of Purple leaf cherry plum
Bringing Spring’s first blossom
Branches brushed in white
Against a colbalt cold sky.

Love Mary ***

Oh I love your dancing
Tapping out the beats
Joe Sugg with Dianne
Red hair to the roots.

Quirk of the Charleston
Bad boy of the Street
Thatcher of countryside
Took Strickly by sweep.


Love Mary 2018

I like hedges long, short, slim, wide
Curving round bends on ends
It has to be Privet, smells divine
Like a strange type of wine.

Outside mansions or on council estates
Scruffy and woody where leaves flake
Cut into chickens or kangaroo topiary
Covered in Christmas lights at night.

I just love Hedges.

Love Mary **

Little one when the Cuckoo calls
And the roof shivers with tiny feet
You snuggle in so close
I can’t exaggerate the heat
Of love .

Ten pink toes peep from your gown
I look at your fingers Summer brown
And the curls on your head turning
Round like golden apple peelings
And we smile .

Love Mary xxxx

Sit with me in the darkness
On the edge of the eiderdown
As your fingers turn the pages
Let me be who I am.

The fairies fly from pages
And the horses ride to town
My love for you is greater
Than the stars on my wall.

Love Mary ***

Betrayal is the limitation of thought
Its perspective allows incorrections
Arrogance caused by inexperience
Disasters catapult false fabrications.

The little chapel stands at Walpole
Owned by the independents
Here the grass in the churchyard
Flutters those who knew too well.

Love Mary ***

So well, let the clowns come on
Dusty in their fancy clothes
Take the time to give to friends
And the orchestra digress.

For love rolls out the barrels
Children gather in the park
The famous climb ladders
And woodpeckers eat grass.

This world is uneven
strutting ancient band
Lost forever in Autumn
Leaves golden brown.

In the arms of Madonna’s
Is the future queen
And what you are is
Not what you get.

Love Mary

More sad than any lost child
Or desperate soul
Walking the long road
To nowhere.

Find in your hearts
What is good and kind
And together feast
Unhindered by pain.


Love Mary xxxx

Taking to the marshes
Holding my Brueghel
Book
His pictures show
Cruelty and indifference
I love him for that
For in cruelty is all
That goodness intended,
Gone bad
Just like a Chardin Apple
So in the painting
‘The fall of Icarus’,
Where all around there is
Indifference
We know
That this may have been us
Or may happen to us
When no one looked or cared.

And in ‘Hunters in the snow’,
The cart ran over
The girl went hungry
While others fun themselves
Ate and made merry
Others died from want.

In the marshes
They found him
Swept up from
The sea.


Love Mary xxx2018 december

A ball of prickles sheared close
A sculpture in a park
Yellow segmented flower
With opening bud
A harsh world as
Hard as any prickle
A phone call to a newspaper
Editor
A cry for help
Lies in the light
Organisation
No trust
May this world
Treat you all
Much better
Stars in the night.

Love Mary ***

A woman walks to her post office
In her hand she holds a parcel
In the parcel there is a present
The present is for a far off friend.

On the way open Winter jasmine
Its flowers and bud bright lemon
Celebrate in the spruce green leaf
A nativity scene stands on a shelf.

Love Mary **

I never found that secret word
To explain their ways to me
It stumbled on every step
And all the places a maid could be.

The reason for this misunderstanding
I really do not know
Somewhere in the trajectories
It bent itself to ‘no’.

Oh how this yawned my heart
To be misunderstood
A whole life of searching
And left as firewood.

Love Mary ***

The Winter song lay on the carpet
Its notes the colours of fallen glass
Stained from a Summer’s heating
Brilliant in the sunshine’s blast.

Fear me not those the leafless call
This tune is overturned and brown
My whiskers are curled with bows
And my hair combings of grey ***.

Love Mary xxxx

Bronze through Autumn
Light strings across path
Leaf as nugget on branch
And me running to meet
The boy of my dreams
Through shadowed steps.

Love Mary **

Temporal Fugue  :)
Down to the mill
stone to stone to grind
as chaff removed from harvest
the wisdom of better times.


Thank you Mary ***

Its what in darkness gives light
So how to find a fountain
My wisdom now fail and withered
Be close to times that gathered
The wheat in gleeful arms to home.

Love Mary xxxx

The Lonliness of that road
Leading to a point
Ending in finality
Finishing quite frank.

It is green and far to be seen
Closed equilateral triangle
Destination, deciduous
Leaf, never to regrow.

Love Mary **

A single tree against a blue sky
A single tree
That is Me.


Love Mary ***

Lime green light
Shines softly through the breaks
As each bush stalks into day
Walking the wilderness road
Distilled morning moves the sun
Under a diagonal sprayed sky.

There is a mystery here to make
Taken along telegraph lines
Colours carried across space
White wistful clouds
Rise up towards the majestic
Mauveness and morning awakes.

Love Mary ***

I could not vote for you
My heart was with the lame
Pretty maids in open frocks
I could not but fuel pain.

So in shocked surprise my vote
Was cast ruefully
And where perfection danced
My vote ran away.

Love Mary ***

And I know you
In my flowery nightgown
On your feet I do stand
We climb together
The stairway
And my hair falls
All around.

Oh such beauty is this love
Of a mother for her child
As she bends just to kiss her
Turn the light off at the wall.

For what is treasured
In the moment
Will ever remain
Of our closeness
Mother and daughter
A joyous refrain.



Love Mary ***