The sun  took down the grey cloaks  from the  sky.
Those clouds deprived  us of her brilliant light
This light will please my spirit and my eye

The  branches of the  trees gleam from on high
And on the shrubs the leaves shine  in my sight
The sun dismissed the grey cloaks of the  sky.

Nature, though deceptive, cannot lie.
She ,like us, swings from  the dark to bright
Her light has pleased my spirit and my eye.

An artist paints, her picture poetry.
Through her work, the hidden world delights
For sun dismissed the grey clouds from the  sky.

A sculptor plays with  marble  till it  cries
The truth we need to feel and then to write
Creation   raises spirits and   our eyes.

Yet even in the darkness,poets write
Maybe  like the past, by candle light
The sun   has dried the  grey clouds in the  sky.
New light  caresses  spirits prone to sigh.

I look up our small street,

To see if you are coming.

I don’t know what time it is, .

But I think I hear you humming.

You sang sweet songs for us .

And you could whistle well.

You wore an old tweed jacket

You loved us, we could tell. .

I look out there each day,

But I can’t see your tall, thin shape.

I saved your Woodbine packet, It made me feel some hope.

What does death’s door mean? Where has Daddy gone?

When will be the welcome day, When we hear his songs again?

I’ll sing like him all day,

I’ll dream of him all night.

I hope he won’t be angry,

If his cigarettes won’t light!

He can’t write his own songs now. He went too far away, too soon. I’ll write down what I think he sang,

And I’ll invent the tune.

I hear him singing now,

.He dwells inside my heart.

And though I still can’t see his face, I recognise his Art.

Mary had ordered all of her groceries but she forgot to put tea on the list So she sent Emile to the corner shop with a note tied to his collar Please give the bearer your best tea. Emile went off and managed to get into the shop after some children who were getting sweets with their pocket money or debit cards He went up to the counter and mewed, Mother has sent you a note. One of the children laughed Is your mother a girlfriend of Mr. Kumar? No, she is not, Emile growled with a loud throbbing voice Mr. Kumar led Emile behind the counter into his living room and spoke to his wife She asked Emile to sit down as she went into the kitchen and poured him some tea from her China teapot .Do you want it on a saucer, she enquired thoughtfully? Yes, please, said Emile. This is very kind. He leaped onto the rug and began sipping the Ceylon tea. This makes a change, he murmured. I didn’t know you could just walk in and get free tea! After a few minutes, the shop door crashed open and he heard Mary’s voice Oh, Mr. Kumar, I am so stupid. I sent Emile out to buy some Twinings tea and he has not come home! What shall we do? She started crying and dabbing her eyes with Stan’s hanky. Come through, he whispered politely. Do not weep, dear. All is well Mary came in and saw Emile drinking his tea and winking at Mrs. Kumar. Emile, you stupid cat. I was going crazy worrying.I’ll strangle you! Is it my fault, he replied. I only gave them that note you sent. But is it not obvious what I intended? she said plaintively These days you never know, the cat muttered. I try to be obedient as far as I can. Mrs. Kumar came out and gave Mary a cup of tea. Sit down, dear. Worry is so bad for you. Why did you not phone us? Since it was just a packet of tea I thought Emile could carry it. He is very intelligent normally. Yes, I am, thought Emile as he looked at Maisie, the Kumar’s lovely cat who was asleep on a chair. I wonder if I can wake her up, he asked himself. Does she drink tea? Would she like to start a family? It’s not too late for me to become a parent. Maisie opened her eyes What’s that cat doing here? I only came for the tea, Emile told her. But you look very beautiful. Shall we meet tonight I’m washing my fur, she told him with a smile How about tomorrow? Have you got a phone? No, he said, I’ll just caterwaul at dusk and if you are free I’ll be under the red maple tree waiting for you Good grief thought Mary. This cat is very cunning. Just one chance and he is making the most of it. Mr. Kumar gave her some tea and she wandered home in a daze after asking them for a drink on Sunday. My social life is looking up but there’s no-one who will hug me. If only Emile were bigger! His legs are too short!I should get a donkey instead

I studied grief as it were a place

I found the hidden  pathways of the lost

I learnt its secret corners and its space

For every kind of grief there is a cost

How shall I pay the price for what I’ve learned?

For I am old and I have spent not saved.

Do we ever get what we have earned?

Who will teach me most before the grave?

The cow will moan and cry for her lost calf

The mother who miscarries knows the pain

Then those we love most dearly must depart.

We will never know the like again.

Woe and joy are knitted very close.

We must take them both in unknown dose.

Mary was making a beef and beer casserole. But her casserole dish lid was too high for the small oven on her gas stove
What shall I do, she asked Emile.her cat?
I don’t know, mother, he told her.I never cook

I’ve told you before,I am not your mother.
Well, you feed me and wash me and keep my bed clean
I did that for Stan.I hope he didn’t think I was his mother
He was older than you, the cat informed her boldly
Yes.indeed he was 50 years older than me!
I know what to do, Emile mewed. He stood by the phone and pressed 999
Soon the bell rang. In ran Dave, the transvestite paramedic dressed all in white as if for tennis
What’s wrong now, he enquired?
I can’t get this casserole dish into the oven, said Mary
I know what to do. Have you got either a pyrex plate or a cake tin with a loose bottom?
Mary looked into her cupboard and found a 6 ” plate
Dave put it on top of the dish having removed the high domed lid.
There we are, he cried. What number shall I put the oven on?
3 please, said Mary. You are so creative, Dave. Brilliant
Would you like to come back in 3 hours for a meal?
I’d love to, Dave cried. Unless I get called out by someone who needs me to find a knife and fork so they can eat their dinner
Would people really do that, Emile whispered?
You would not believe what people demand when they ring 999.

And so say all of us

I meant to write a poem of revenge
To hurt the one who shot out glacial words
I knew how to begin but how to end?

Through the Oxford. my sharp eyes had lunged
My vile emotions then were further stirred
I meant to write a poem of revenge

First he wooed me , showed his cultured friends
Sweet the words and soft the voice I heard
I knew how to begin but how to end?

Would retaliation my heart rend?
Down the vultures rushed ,carnivorous birds
As he wooed me with the words he wrung

My arm was disengaged by unseen hand
I could not write, impossible cruel words
I meant to write a poem of revenge

Lady of Macbeth, who’d wash in blood
When evil can be overcome by good?
I meant to write a poem of revenge
I hated once but Good controlled my hand

I do not like this stone within my heart

Its jagged edges  tear the living flesh.

Devoid of feelings yet it causes pain 

Who will cut it out, with blood to wash?

Why do people turn to stone inside?

Something is preserved, we are not dead.

And yet it’s useless even full of harm

I lie here weeping on my unmade bed.

On its stony surface evil dwells

Alien forms of life take up this home.

And, all unknowing, we  live our sweet life.

Until we’re brought to earth, no more to roam.

Oh do not let me die, I want more life

Where is my surgeon with his sharpest knife?

Daddy where were you when I was sad
I bought you Woodbines in Mather’s corner shop
I carried your boiled egg with salt on plate
You lay in bed adorned with wreaths of smoke

Uncle Herbert died when I was five
Not many of Dad’s brothers left alive
But Bert was old and all his children grown
He lay inert, the coffin dark, the stone

I saw yours and Grandad’s too, the oak
The Cemetery filled with men and broken hearts
Baffled grieving we would love seek
And for Mum’s mother’s grave, we tried to look

We too will lie down in the earth
In communion with our parents ,love and birth

https://www.theguardian.com/wellness/2026/apr/27/how-to-start-journaling?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

https://www.poetrybyheart.org.uk/poems/heaven-haven

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/apr/26/pope-leo-trump-hegseth-christianity?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

His beauty moved me like owl at prayer

I’d better share my love of birds on here

He touched me like a marble falls down drains Thank God we then had lots of heavy rain

He told me he was angered by my face

I drowned on his tweed jacket spiced with mace.

I read so fast the teachers were amazed

My secret was adrenalin and haste

I never loved my neighbour as myself

For I was deep in love with someone else

We think we long for love but I might say

Intimacy rots if we can’t play.

I ate my words but could not them digest

The cruel hint, the sentence over -stressed

As if I tried to pierce another’s skin

Which was already dry, and too,too thin.

Better edit what we say with care.

Even those we love we must not scare

Take for granted nothing we adore

But walk in that pale sand, by sea, by shore .

Do not sink into the mud and dross

Despite we each must carry our own cross

For aid is near but cannot reach the deaf

The silence speaks, it does not cause distress

On the sands, we watch small children play

Bringing blood back to our faces grey.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/sep/04/adam-phillips-the-happiness-myth?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/jul/19/booksonhealth.healthandwellbeing?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

This is a very old article in the  Guardian newspaper

But it seems we’re still in the same situation of trying to be happy all the time or as much as possible

Where are you going this morning, Mary enquired her best friend Annie.

?

I’m going to take “The mathematical l experience” to Jane’s house. I’m giving it to her daughter

How can you take an experience round someone’s house?

Well all your experiences have made you into the person that you are and so they’re always with you wherever you may go. But this one is actually a book. I think Jane’s daughter will enjoy it. Maths degrees can be very boring when they do not discuss history or social context.

Well it would be no good to me, said Annie unless someone like E Nesbitt rewrote it for children the way she did Shakespeare’s Plays. Maybe set it to music

I think  E Nesbit  is dead but it would be wonderful if someone could do that. What source of music would it be? Possibly something like Stravinsky

Now what shall I wear ? 

Mary donned a pair of thick trousers but they seemed very tight .

Have I put weight on, she murmured confusedly?

No those are leggings, they must be winter leggings. You can’t go outside in those. Not unless you want to be an object of hilarity and scorn

Why n?

They show that your knee has collapsed which is not a pretty sight and also they may be too clinging around your female organs.

I wonder what the difference is between being clinging and too clinging?

It needs the expert eye  of a woman who loves clothes.

Suppose I wear a very long jumper over the top Mary replied plaintively.

Well lt won’t hide your knee but then who is going to look at you now? I suppose someone might look at your face my

Only a very old partially sighted man would look at me now I suppose Mary replied feverishly

Maybe a horrible neighbour will notice and pass a remark

Mary told her we can’t live our lives trying to escape the rude remarks of horrible neighbours. In any case it’s all in our paranoid imaginations. Everyone is through caught up in their own thoughts to notice these details

Anyway stop talking I’m getting tired.

That’s the trouble with being old Annie replied. Nearly everything is too tiring whether it’s talking 

getting dressed or washed. Or especially vacuuming the house and garden

Not to mention the pavement and the roof.

Mary gently picked up the mathematicak experience from the table in the hall

She went outside and across the road to where her neighbors Jane lived.

Hello Jane. I have brought a book for Rosa.

Jane looked at the book and said that’s very kind of you Mary but Rosa has decided to change to social work.

That’s a big leap from mathematics said Mary randomly

Well Rosa is concerned at the state of the world and she was trying to escape by going into the world of mathematics but unfortunately it didn’t work for mainly because she’s never been very good at mathematics but also it seems inhuma to spend all day with numbers and symbols.

So now she wants to help people who are suffering as they’re always on her mind anyway.

Wow said Mary she must be a very thoughtful intelligent girl with a very kind heart

Come in said Jane and Mary went in followed by Emile her little cat

Hello Rosa she cried I brought your book but your mother says you are no longer doing mathematics. Would you like me to get you something by Richard Hoggart ?

I’d love to read The uses of literacy  the teenager replied sumnily. No one will write a book like that now.

I’m sure I can get a copy on eBay Mary told her ignorantly; that’s where I got this mathematical experience book.

You can take this anyway because you might keep  mathematics as a hobby.

Thank you very much Rosa replied people it may help me to understand why otherwise  sane people go to university to study mathematics.

Archimedes didn’t go to university, said Emile the cat. Then nearly everything that’s been invented was not invented in a university and maybe that’s the problem of our time. By the way how did you teach your cat to talk?

We didn’t teach him to talk and the vet says it’s probably genetic

One of his ancestors must have been able to speak English and he has inherited it although listening to the conversations between me and my husband Stan might have helped him.

Yes it did the cat informs them and I miss Stan very much. I pray for him every night in front of that statue in the living room

That’snot the statue of God it’s a sculpture by a woman from Suffolk.

Well it looks like God to me, Emile replied. He just gazed admiringly at the mantle piece where the sculpture of a tiger sat.

But surely if that was the god that Jesus was preaching about God would not have appeared as a tiger.

No God may have been quite gentle then but since the 20th century and the 21st century his 

It’s brought out the more aggressive and destructive side of his nature.

How can you talk about God like that?

I just open my mouth and it comes out.

Surely way ought to have a gate on our lips

And so ought all of us

https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2016/mar/14/how-to-write-like-william-shakespeare?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Sometimes sunshine makes us feel bereft
Rain and shadowed clouds would suit our mood
When we are the warp without the weft

As if we are the pen and no ink’s left
As if we hunger yet there is no food
Sometimes sunshine makes us feel bereft

Our mind slows down and all we do is drift
Evil thoughts into the soul intrude
Like we are the warp without the weft

Let the eye and all its muscles rest
With wider focus we may cease to brood
Sometimes sunshine makes us feel bereft

Do not try with will power nor it test
Relaxation brings back knowledge of the good
We take it in like babies at the breast

We must not test the will but let it go
Trust the ocean and eternal flow
Sometimes sunshine makes us feel bereft
Sometimes sunshine brings its golden gifts

Town centre 

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57615/logic-56d23b4c891a9

Scattered pools of rainwater gleam on the dark paving stones

The road disappears under an arch

A family approach smiling : conversation occurs

The dog jumps with delight

By the river, a cat hides looking for water rats on the bank

The terraced houses by the water look contented and prosperous

The third one has new curtains.

A man walks by seeming nervous, nothing to do on Sunday.

Turning the other way I see the huge tree by the large end house

Then a sharp turn on to the bridge

Small bridges here remind me of Thames bridges

These are secret hidden and beautiful like little treasures.

Here comes someone on a bicycle better step back.

Now we walk towards the pub with another bridge in front

But I forgot, you are not here. The last time I drank grapefruit juice.

I have not had any since then.

Last night I dreamed I was in the garden with a big hedge on my right

The shrubs were leafless and as I pressed my ear against them I could hear laughter and I knew that it was you.

The secret garden that we never enter

Then you cried hello hello. You sounded merry

That was a small heaven

And always the river flows down the contour lines as it was designed.

And the people change but everything is still the same

Norman MacCaig at 80: None a Stranger: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00w003d via @bbciplayer

Oh either sighed the river lyre or long fields of curly and of bye, That tell the told and right the wry; And though they yield, the toad runs by

To its sandy, dried alloy

The hallowed siege by water pulley

The clean and unsheathed bread knife dally Shambled on her daughter’s lily Round about a dot

Pillows whiten, aspirins shiver. The sun-famed showers broke a willy.

In the stream that runneth weather By the island in the river

Flowing down the Com and dot

Four gay wails, and four gay hours

Underlook a spice of dowers,

And the silent isle implored

The Lady of NottNott Underneath the bearded charlie, The reaper, reaping slate and silver,

Fears her ever wanting cheery, Like an angel, ringing early,

O’er the cells of Camelot.

Beguiles the leaves in furrows hairy,

Beneath the loon, the reaper teary Listening whispers, ‘ ‘Tis our Mary, Lady of NottNott’

The little isle is all entailed

With hose-pants, overtly tail’d

With roses: by the barge unhail’d The shallop flitteth silken sail’d,

Skimming down to What is Nott

A pearl garland signs her screed: She leaneth on a velvet bead,

Pull loyally unapparelled,

The Lady of Whats Hott..

No time hath she to court a nerd: By charmed fib she seized her bird

A purse is on her, if she’ll gray

Her leaving, oversight or pay, To sulk more down on Whatt is Knott She knows not what the hearse may be;

Therefore she leaveth stealthily, Therefore no other bear, hath she, The Lady of TopKnott

She lives with little boys who play.

With her daughter, running here,

The cheap cell tinkles in her ear. Before her sings a mirror clear, Reflecting hours in CamAlot.

And as in the internet she whirls, 

She sees the surly pillage hurled,

And the wed oaks of driven earls Passed to cloud from NottAlott. Sometimes a ship of damsels glad, An abbot on an ambling dog, Sometimes a curly shepherd bad, Or long-hair’d rage in crimson bled, Goes by  tower’d Cameuplot:

And sometimes thro’ the mirror blue

The night comes guiding two by two:

She hath no cool old knight it’s true,

The Bath of old Shalott.

But in her web she still delights

Sees the mirror’s magic bytes,

For often thro’ the silent fights A funeral plumed with traffic lights And loose it came to Blamelot: Or when the moon was overheard Came two young lovers lately wired;

‘I am half sick, to shadows wed

The Lady lost her Plot

I’ve not got dementia but my spelling and grammar may I feel like that because I have to dictate it because my vision is not good and my hands are painful hands. I can only

do it on my phone now

This morning I spent a long time filling in a questionnaire from a major London Hospital where I’m going to have surgery.

There were nine pages beginning with assessing your heart health.

Each page that up to 9 questions on it so there are quite a lot. I had to ring the British heart Foundation to get some information

About halfway through came the brain and the nervous system

And one of the questions was

Do you have dementia?

How on earth would you have got to that point when it’s involved answering about 30 questions about other organs of your body?

Would it not make more sense to ask patience on page one whether they’ve got dementia?

They also s want us to list all medication. If you have dementia that will probably be very difficult and most likely some of it will be wrong with any of us because we’re all challenged by cognitive decline boredom impatience and rage. We didn’t live all these years to have the world in the current situation where mad men can start wars on a whim.

It would be so much quicker to do it in person with a doctor or a nurse. I realised thats ambiguous.

I don’t think Donald Trump would take the advice of a doctor or nurse about starting a war

Why is everything being done by remote means when the pandemic is over?

Don’t they realise that it’s much harder to cope with illness and surgery when you never see the doctors and you won’t see the surgeon as you will be unconscious. Well that’s the intention anyway.

I’m really looking forward to being unconscious as I’ve been on this track since September 2025 and it was March 2026 before I got a CT scan.

Because of the illness I am very exhausted most of the time it’s not a lot of fun.

And there must be thousands of people like me all over the country.

I told them at the beginning

Just take the damn thing out.

I feel very sorry for my kidney but it’s causing me a lot of trouble and unfortunately I can’t take it out myself.

How to look and be Bringlish

If you go to a friend’s for supper, never take a bottle of water or wine.Never turn water into wine and never get shrunk even if he is a psychoanalyst

Wash your clothes but don’t iron them
Go out in only a T shirt and jeans at night in winter.
Go to A and E as much as you can except when you have acute coronary syndrome or sepsis
Old grey /beige anoraks look good on most “English” people
Never wear a red hat.They might think you are Father Christmas
Wear skirts that show your thighs off or leggings that show everything off.Saves men buying soft porn.But do not charge.
Do wear crop tops and low rise jeans especially in winter.
Jeans with rips are perfect for old ladies.Rip them yourself.
[Teach Yourself How to Rend your Garments £4.99 my e book’]
Wear thick padded down coats in the summer.
Never wear a summer dress unless you are a man
Never wear petticoats and other lingerie unless you are a man
Wear a T shirt saying: Anti-Semitic, moi? while touring Oxford looking for pubs
Wear a T shirt saying: Belgians, go back to Congo..
Wear a T shirt saying: Take that French Leave now
Wear a T shirt saying: No sprechen Sie Deutsch/Believe me.Nein.Ten,When?
Wear a T shirt saying: I feel Rubbish/I feel your pane/I just feel you.
Wear a T shirt that says :I Luv money/I have an oyster card/I have no bike to get on.
Wear a T shirt saying: I want leave to commit crime/I want Remain to leave./I want leave to Remain.
Wear a T shirt that says: Educated in Burton, can’t spell
Wear a T shirt saying: Och aye, President Rump!
Make sure your hair is exposed— both head and pubic.
I don’t understand either but they keep saying, where are you from?
I say, here. But somehow they don’t believe me.Yet.
I am getting my T shirt tomorrow.It says: I’m a Viking and I don’t care.What’s your problem?