When we are the warp without the weft
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
Joy will return one day
Another way, a place, another mind

. From time and place and season I feel lost,
Disorientated , missing tracks well worn.
Do not suppose I’m unaware of cost,
Nor label me with adjectives of scorn.
For usual paths lead to the usual place
. The safest way to live and perhaps to die.
But wandering through the woods I find new space
And in wild grasses with the fox I lie.
Through distant trees, i see a way to go
as narrow as a slit in pallid stonm
This is my destined way, I seem to know
And courage rises even as I moan.
Remember when we’re lost , we may then find
Another way,a place,another mind
Very wise post about writing by Kenneth Samson

https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/1018466/posts/2628020068
“As much as we might admire what is fresh and innovative, we all learn by imitating patterns,” writes Irina Dumitrescu in The Times Literary Supplement. “To be called ‘formulaic’ is no compliment, but whenever people express themselves or take action in the world, they rely on familiar formulas.” It’s true. For her review-essay, Dumitrescu reads 5 books about writing and explores how writing advice is caught in a paradox: to get people to communicate clearly, logically, and find their own voices, instruction must first teach them rules and provide enough room to learn by copying. This is why most of us writers begin by imitating established writers. We find someone whose style or subject reflects our own – someone in whom we hear our ideal selves, someone who sounds like we want to sound one day – and we mimic them. This could start with a parent, move to a cool friend, then end with a famous novelist or memoirst, before we emerge from the pupae of literary infancy. In other words, to facilitate originality, we must teach formula, encourage imitation, and push for eventual independence. She explores the value of craft, structure, exploration, and formula, and the way sticking to rules erodes a writer’s style, their character, even the essence of the art. She contrasts John Warner’s book Why They Can’t Write: Killing the Five-Paragraph Essay and Other Necessities with the book Writing to Persuade, by The New York Times‘ previous op-ed editor, Trish Hall.
Click the link at the top
We walked the Cleveland Hills when love was new
The places I associate with you,
Durham in the deepest, whitest frost
The places that I dream of what we knew
We walked the Cleveland Hills when love was new
Saw icy windows in your parent’s house.
The places I associate with you
Lincoln floodlit, threw me to my knees….
We crossed the Humber in midwinter lost
The places that I dream of, that we knew
Christmas time your mother felt so blue
We walked the sea edge Redcar,Saltburn first .
The places I associate with you
But where’ve you gone and why is there no clue?
I travel in my dreams ,with you impressed.
The places I associate with you,
The spaces where we travelled ,where are you?
The space between Eternity and loss
The space between Eternity and loss
Shows in a long wave when someone dies
With inner eye, we see past the abyss
With human hearts we fear whom we shall miss
Tell ourselves strange stories,even lies
Of gaps between Eternity and loss
Our education was a mite remiss
The rules are pressed, the truth may well just fly
With inner eye, we see past the abyss
As the life we had come down to this,
When love rolled like the tide in a great sigh
No gap between eternity and bliss
My imagination you dismiss
For as a golden horse, you leapt so high
The inner eye, will see past the abyss
So now we stumble on without a cry
Yet one day all mankind must say ,Goodbye
What grace between Eternity and loss
Shows us how to cross the great abyss?
Murdered children
The ecstasy of evil grips our minds
Hypnotized by violence counter signed.
Can bad deeds be undone by doing worse?
Lay the bodies out, there is no hearse
The danger of the men who know God’s mind.
And so to their own evil they are blind
The foolishness of lust for wealth and flesh
The death of every heart the hate the crash.
We cannot see we’re caught up with the words
Illiteracy would be better for the herd
Yes we are like sheep without a guide.
Was it to make war that Jesus died?
Oh love and morals, kindness are forgot.
On this earth where murdered children rot
No sound, no touch, no smell, no sight, no seeing.
In fields of lushest buttercups we ‘d lie
We’d watch the clouds as gently they blew by.
Love was born we thought would never die.
But you are gone, and so I sadly sigh
That love itself remains without your form.
Yet tears of loss enfold me like a storm.
I knew you’d never hurt or do me harm.
I felt your smile’s embrace, so wide, so warm.
How is the world,now emptied of your being?
No sound, no touch, no smell, no sight, no seeing.
How is the world when you have gone ahead
Yet I must linger in this empty bed?
Yet those who’ved loved are grateful for that gift
Our sorrow is that life itself’s too swift
On the motorbike
There were three of us on this motorbike,
Father Dan with me,
And he had Jesus in his bag.
That makes the total three.
Transubstantiation, oh my Lord
I looked at his black bag.
Is Jesus inside there, I thought?
Should it have a tag?
It’s a secret never told
Father Dan gave it me to hold.
So I had Jesus in my lap,
No wonder now I feel a gap.
We zoomed off up an unmade road
As fast as Dan could go.
I felt bewildered and bemused,
I loved my Daddy so.
Father Dan took back his bag,
And went inside our house.
I got my marbles out to roll,
I feared I’d see a mouse.
So Three of had taken a ride
And after that, my Dad had died.
Father Dan said Mass today
Still with Jesus, so I cried.
Playing in the street while our dad died
While the priest annointed him with oils
I played in the gutter all alone
I hoped to find the marbles we had lost
Or from the melted tar to pluck a stone
The summer was so hot the cobbles baked
Looking like a row of fresh made loaves
There were no fishes in the millstream’s rush
Nor a place where bread and Saviour rose
I found a florin in the cobbled street
I found two marbles lying near a grid
I found a daisy squashed in a wide crack
I saw a spider hanged in its own web
To summarise ,my father went away
The Queen was crowned and we just tried to play
Light bulb
Ode to a lightbulb
Oh,light bulb foreseen by our God
Save us all from darkness’ rod
You are our Saviour as foretold
In prophecy by ancients bold.
We will worship you at night
When sunken is the sun so bright.
We’ll watch TV and Kindle fire
No more to play shall we aspire.
We’ll wear ourselves out watching screens,
As from a can we eat baked beans
We’ll send for pizzas with our phones
With which we never feel alone.
We might talk to our partner dear
Though to text is easier.
We see the neon street lights gleam
Where once we saw the moon’s cold beams
And in bed we read our books
With a kindle or a nook
We put beneath out pillows fair
I phones which we long to hear
Can one have too much new light?
From technology some take flight
For gone are seasons, and their fruit
As our computer we reboot.
New potatoes all year round
Avocados once quite rare
Now are seem ‘most everywhere.
Melons,grapes and fresh green peas
As the birds sing,life’s a breeze.
Oh light bulbs,fluorescent tubes
Electric candle, light is cubed.
We thank you for extended days
Maybe we’ll find time for prayers.
God is great in mystery
No light bulb can help us see.
In silence,darkness, meditate
Wonder what will be our fate.
As retribution for our wrong
Satan stabs us with his prongs
He needs no more light in hell
The fiery furnace cooks as well.
Is it worth his pain to know the truth?
They don’t mention when you study maths
Consistency,completeness and their lack
For with any set of axioms there are gaps
Another world, a place, another map
Discoveries that shocked, past reason’s grasp
The man who crossed the hurdles in his path
Godel paid for this by going mad
Is it worth his pain to know the truth?
I wonder if the politics of fear
Will prove completely nothing is a cure
The axiomatic system of dark arts
Is not enough , brings more pain to endure
For maths is simple when compared to life
Where ugly feelings like dark demons writhe
It’s not hard is it?

I’ll write a sonnet it’s not hard, is it
The hardest thing is how to begin it.
Once you start, it’s hard to stop.
One sonnet might be, in fact, a crop.
I used to write five poems a day.
I seemed to know just what to say
Yet too much talking can disturb.
The gentle angels are perturbed
In Suffolk is an ancient church
Above the altar small birds perch
The angels hang down from the roof
The faces grave convey the truth.
I tried to write but did it work?
Wisdom dwells where angels lurk
Your face is etched upon my cc heart
Your face is etched upon my heart.
I knew you in the morning light
Love is wise but never smart.
We have no need of others charts
In the mornings and the night
Your face is etched upon my heart.
As we waken sleep departs
To see your face is my delight
Love is wise and sometimes smart
Intuition, craft is art
Love is silent, hatred fights
Your face is etched upon my heart
Human Love can see in part
Face to face we’ll see aright
Love is wise love is not smart
Your face is etched upon my heart.
Love is wise but never smart
Is love blind? Who etched the lines?
Sacred, human, love is kind
Onto refugees we put his face
Climbing up the hill with a great Cross
The tortured God recalls his childhood days
Now he faces death and total loss
Did Jesus fear his mission and its cost
Would humans ever learn to see his way
Climbing up the hill with a great Cross
Crucified, beheaded, killed by us
John the Baptist,Jesus,Jews have paid
Did Jesus fear his Mission and its cost
How we love the baby, yet we’re lost
Was it ever true that we are saved?
Climbing up the hills with our own cross
Where is God’s great spirit, Holy Ghost
Alienated from the human race?
Did Jesus fear his Mission and its cost
Shall we ever see that Holy Face
Onto refugees it has been placed
Climbing up the hill like Sisyphus
He repeats his actions, feels his loss
Thank you for your mobile face

Thanks for all those calls and letters
Thanks for caring that I’m here.
In my darkest, lonesome moments
These replies will keep you near.
Thanks for answering all my emails
Thank you for the hours you give.
Thanks for sharing heartfelt thoughts
And being so generous with your love.
Thank you for your wit and grace,
Thank for your funny face.
Thank you for your deep blue gaze and
Thank you for your warm embrace.
Thank you,thank you,thank you,thank.
Love you,love you,love you,Love.
Thank you,thank you,thanks to you,
Because,because,because.
Because
Why you can never forget temporarily

10th of March 2026
You have got an appointment with the consultant on Friday 3rd of April 11am
March12
please confirm your ability to come to the appointment or rebook or cancel cancel using the following code numbers
March 13th
thank you for confirming
March the 20th don’t forget you have an appointment third April
April the first don’t forget you have an appointment Friday the 3rd of April
April 1st you have a letter from the hospital please click this link
1st of April dear madam we are sorry to tell you that your appointment has been cancelled
April the first later in the day
Don’t forget you have an appointment Friday 3rd of April
2 April
Notification you have got another letter from the hospital
You have got an appointment with the consultant
Notification
you have got a text message from the hospital please confirm your ability to come to your appointment to rebook or cancel
Such gentle words can break our sullen bonds

A word that’s spoken by a friend can reach
Can touch, can move, can embrace in its sounds
The inner soul where its vibrations teach.
When cut off, silent,after sad defeat
Such gentle words can break our sullen bonds
A word that’s spoken by a friend can reach.
We must not torture nor torment in speech
Our heart, the centre of our morbid wounds
The inner soul with its vibrations speaks..
From our eye, a tear springs with relief
From imprisoned sulking, jump with a great bound!
A word that’s spoken by a friend can reach.
Muscles weaken,but the mind stays fleet
Humour and its cousins are our clowns
The inner soul by its athletics speaks.
I smile and smile yet rarely do I frown
For I will rise up, even when low down
A word that by a friend can reach,provoke
In our souls ,deep memories will evo
The sky in spring
The sky in spring in autumn looks the same
In spring it gives us joy, in fall we’re glum.
And so we play on in our little games.
The inbetween is hard to give a name.
Transitions, changes, fear of what’s to come.
The sky in spring in autumn looks the same
Have the gods deserted, who’s to blame?
If we cannot share our hearts go numb.
So we play on in our little games.
The human heart and mind are often lame.
Angered by the movements of the sun
The sky in spring in autumn looks the same
Can the spirits of our hearts be tamed?
Obsessive thoughts will linger and rerub
So we play on in our little game’s
In spring life starts again, then what’s to come
But summer heat the flowers the bees that hum
The sky in spring and autumn looks the same
Round and round we go, for life’s a game
The first butterfly

Spring

She sent me tulips
The tulips pushed the primroses away
They took the pot from these innocuous plants Nature is not kind in such display The powerful plants can do just what they want. However, I admire their flowers of red
The shape is elegant, the colour clear.
And had they been in a much bigger bed.
Both flowers would give us pleasure without fear.
And now magnolias pink my eyes adore
Two of them I see from off the bus.
A visual parable, a story for
The short sweet life of all including us.
We deceive ourselves in order to survive.
But shallowness makes trivia of our lives
Urinary Tract Infections (UTI) – The Urology Foundation
The flowers
The flowers you brought me one day died.
And you died.
I am here alone.
Oh, where are you?
My tears are watering the grass.
The ants dance about in intricate movements
The flowers will die again
Fear and a grief
How insecure I feel now I’m bereft .
How grief feels more like fear than I had known
What can this world mean when you have left?
That panic grips the heart, I’d never guessed.
I wish my suffering heart would turn to stone
How insecure I feel now I’m bereft.
Through these awful thoughts my mind will drift
Alone, alone, unloved, alone alone.
What can this just world mean, when you have left?
The nonsense and the sense flow by me swift
How insecure I feel now I’m bereft.
In this my writing there is not much craft.
My fingers shrink and feel like corpse’s bones
What does this sombre world mean since you’ve left?
How can we live when all we love is gone?
We create it, live until we’re done
How insecure we feel when we’re bereft
The pillars of our world have fallen, demons laughed.
So I would know the way to kingdom come
I learned the maps of all the counties here
The contour lines, the rivers and the meres
Then I learned the street maps and train lines
New golf courses built on old coal mines
I traced all of the A roads with my thumb
So I would know the way to kingdom come
I marvelled at cross -Pennine Motorways
And thought that our Lord God must be amazed
Then I followed coastline paths and cliffs
I gazed until my eyes became quite stiff.
Finally the weather maps and clouds
And restaurants where cats are not allowed
At last I knew enough to start to walk.
If only I had known I am a hawk.
In between two raindrops
Some evenings, the sky turned pink
We were happy, lying in the grass
watching the sun set,
arms around each other.
Seemed like eternal life had come
Earlier than forecast
.
Those weathermen are often wrong!
They need new training.
I shall remember you
in that timeless moment
in between two raindrops,
in between two tears
A Negative Freedom: Thirteen Poets on Formal Verse
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/a-negative-freedom-thirteen-poets-on-formal-verse/
Among the many reasons poets choose to write formal poetry in the 21st century is an intuitive distaste for the imitative fallacy. To write about chaos, one need not write chaotically. It’s only a minor paradox to say that discipline and constraint unlock freedom. Steele goes on to say that form-minded poets are assumed to believe that “the universe is a nice, neat, orderly place.” On the contrary, he says:
I suspect that most people who write in forms feel that the obvious disorder and chaos of the world afflict us intensely, coming
The night train
We’re all going on the night train journey
Full of strange and lovely sights
We’re all going on the night train journey
So we have the brightest lights
We’re all going on the night train journey
We don’t pay for our own seats
We’re all going on the night train journey
We’re companions discreet
We’re all going on the night train journey
When we die, is this the route?
We’re all going on the night train journey
Wear pyjamas not a suit
We’re all going on the night train journey
Might we find our mom and dad?
We’re all going on the night train journey
All the living, and the dead
We’re all going on the night train journey
Circulating like our blood
We’re all going on the night train journey
Joan of Arc needs Noah’s Flood
We’re all going on the night train journey
Who creates us, makes our form?
We’re all going on the night train journey
Heal us ,we are people,torn
The rhythms of love
We fell into a rhythm as we walked
Arm in arm we wandered as we talked
We looked into folks’ windows as dusk came
Tried to guess their furnishings and names
Some had nothing but the ironing stacked
Others had the furniture we lacked
I bought a chest of drawers for three pounds
We had a double bed where our cat lounged
I bought a little table made of oak
Fifty pence at auction, go for broke!
A few old armchairs covered in green cloth
Too severe to be a home for moths
Now I look at pictures on the walls
I see the sun turn mauve as down dusk falls
Images both simple and robust
One a choice the other nature’s lust
I see my sofa like a treasure ship
I lie upon it dreaming humorous quips
I dream of journeys on the little train
That signifies what sleep means to my brain
The rocking chair is empty of the cat
I see one in my garden, not my lap.
I try to tame this immigrant I like
I shall give him food and call him Mike.
Oh,dear that is my brother, will he mind?
I know he loves the birds, and cats do bite
He is not living here in my old road
Otherwise he’ll hear me shouting “Claude”
Perhaps I’ll call the cat Tamara Jane
In case they’re very sensitive to names
For I know not the gender of the beast
They may be quite fluid at the least
Now my husband cannot calm me down
I’d like his verdict on my new nightgown
But all I can remember is that rhythm
I fell into walking out with him


