I get out my sewing gear
In the quiet times of life,
When I need to mend the tears,
Torn by stress and strife.

I hold my soul so carefully
And gaze at every part.
I hope that light will come to me
As I wonder how to start,

.I take my needle out
With love thread through its heart,
I scrutinize each inch.
And then I start to stitch.

In the quietness of the night
You heal me all the time
You talk to me in dreams
And I write them down in rhymes.

Another day will come
And more fractures form.
That’s all part of life
Strife ,and mend, and strife.

Keep that cocoon whole,
Till the soul’s completely there.
Then through its love-sewn folds
A butterfly will flare.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/feb/16/how-to-have-better-arguments-social-media-politics-conflict

When a debate becomes volatile and dysfunctional, it’s often because someone in the conversation feels they are not getting the face they deserve. This helps to explain the pervasiveness of bad temper on social media, which can sometimes feel like a status competition in which the currency is attention. On Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, anyone can get likes, retweets or new followers – in theory. But although there are exceptions, it is actually very hard for people who are not already celebrities to build a following. Gulled by the promise of high status, users then get angry when status is denied. Social media appears to give everyone an equal chance of being heard. In reality, it is geared to reward a tiny minority with massive amounts of attention, while the majority has very little. The system is rigged.

The places in between were much too wide

Yet i struggled on until I found

The touch of love, the hands that touched my sides ll

Across the floors the feet of dancers glide

All the time our feet must touch the ground

The spaces in between where much too wide

The touch of love the hands that held my sides

Was this why Jesus was at last betrayed

And in the distance I could hear sweet sounds

The place is in between were much too wide.

And then my feelings rose like one great tide

The suchness of your love, oh hands oh sides

And so onto the crucifix we’re bound

To live with love and pain and to be found

The places in between we’re not too wide

I felt your arms around me side to side

I wish I’d given up the whole idea

Shakespeare’l muttered as he wrote king Lear.

Who am I to tell folks what to do.?

I’d rather be a cobbler mending shoes..

Who will want to read about bad luck

Choices foolish as the day they struck?

Why not give up thinking of good works.

Who will read the Bible else the Kirk?

I wonder why I taught myself to write

. Instead of having fun with something light.

There’s something other lives inside our soul

Its wishes are quite different from our own.

Giving up the gossip is good news

Giving up the likes and counting views.

The word of someone thoughtful counts far more

1000 views are no more than a score

When the sun is high and bright and strong
We feel that it will always be the same
But when we live on earth we know we’re wrong
And for that darkness we have got a name

Now in England we have lights and screens
We do not fear the dark,the devils’ night
But often in the winter we will dream
Of summer heat and places full of light

The steps at Aldeburgh where we saw the sea
The cliffs at Lyme and Charmouth in the spring
But from such places I dread memory
The pain of loss is hard and no child brings

Now the sky is lilac in the dusk
In creation I find what I trust

Oh, lidded kettle boil me water fast
I cannot live without your heated blast
Your spout is small but perfect for its use
And, as your lid is hinged. it can’t get lost

An electric kettle made by Russell Hobbs
A teapot with a spout and lid with knob
Are what the Britons need in times of storm
If crisis comes, we need tea hot,not warm

I don’t object to diverse kettle brands.
We had a coal fire once with kettle stand.
Its metal black from soot and burned by coke
We made our neighbours tea which seemed to smoke.

Ah,kettle ,instrument of civil life
We cannot boil our water on a knife

Everything good is play: everything creative is play

How I miss my playmate and brother P. And my sister also. 

Still I remember our adventures 

And I remember our  risky games

When our senses are full of vitality and our minds are full of new ideas then life is full like a ripe apple. 

I have eaten of the apple

And I am glad

As poetry itself can’t earn me fl cash

Ill live on sausage meat and buttery mash

I’ll have to take cocaine to get some words

A sentence here and there, a paper charred

What would happen if  the poets went on strike

And  got some other work from their old bikes

Then there’d be a flatness to our talk

. No more  would our words dance, they’d have to walk.

What kind of work could an old poet obtain ?

Could I be a scarecrow in the rain?

Could I be a nurse and help the sick

I could study clocks,how do they tick?

Yet all I have that is unique to me

Is my  own words that flow,the silver sea

And in the sea of words we float with joy

Do not drown but give your words employ

Even were it crime to play with words

The sound of a new rhyme coulf still occur.

What are the words that form our dialogue

Merry bright and free thermse are my drug

 

I miss the flock of geese by that

once flew by

Making sunlit patterns in

The sky

Everything is still and silent are the birds

The river does not murmur as the geese alight

What of this to capture in my little words

For darkness will come early stealing our eyesight.

Oh,Alfred,my beloved,do not go
Do not leave, but warmth to me bestow,
Lie beside me in my bed all night
Succour me when stormy dreams affright.

Oh,Alfred,-’tis your eyes that turn me on
The green and golden light is never gone.
Affection constant, touch and feeling shared.
I am not embarrassed when you stare.

For you , the gallant male, have often seen
My naked form well lit by Jove’s sunbeams
And if I wear a gown of wincyette
You love it as it’s nice for paws of cat.

Alfred ,we can’t marry yet I fear.
Cats can’t read the Book of Common Prayer.

The story of Mary Hobson

https://www.rbth.com/arts/literature/2016/04/22/learning-russian-has-given-me-a-whole-new-life_587093

Too old for cold,I stand, now ,against the hedge,
Watching the snowflakes in the glare of neon street lights.
Darkness has come early,and I think of country uplands and huddled sheep.
On Salisbury Plain,shepherds watched their flocks
Just as in Bethlehem two thousand years before,
And then,exactly when?
“Between the wars”,it stopped. Now we know there is no “Between the wars”.
And who decided
To cull the sheep and shepherds and the space for kindness ?
Now that same Plain still exists,but banned
And closed to human-kind,
For bombs ,not wombs
Nor for birth of lamb ,nor gypsy child ,nor Saviour
Where would He go today?

?

In your last days you held the rosary beads I sent you

I didn’t know until you told me that it helped you in the night

Now I’m wearing your shoes, and I’ve got a rosary the same as I gave you

I feel you are near

But now we aren’t allowed to meet in person

I won’t forget you

How can I forget you when you’ve always been here since I was one and a half years old?

I won’t forget you but something in the air tonight evokes you

If you are a comforting presence to those you left behind

That’s not a bad thing is it?

We can’t touch you or see you but we can send you we can almost feel you

The connection is very touching and tender

While I’m alive stay near me

What a blow it was to hear your diagnosis

And to know I could not take away your suffering

In the the pain was too much for you

And I didn’t want you to go on and suffering

I have never been so close to anyone in the last few years

Now we see through a glass darkly but then we shall see face to face

Cut sentences in half to solve the prison crisis

Well if we have to.

Cut a sentence in half.

How accurate does

This has to be?

Is it the number of letters

All the number of words which is used to determine

The middle of a sentence? 1

How accurate 

does it have to be?

I’m not sure what this has got to do with a prisons crisis but believe me if I write a very very long sentence or a very short sentence I did not really believe it’s going to make the slices difference to the 500 people put into prison after the orb was riots last summer in Southport and another areas mainly in the north of England.

What do you

Think?

A million children died,children of beloved renown.

Silent spite.

Holy rite.

Shepherds flocks.

Vicars frocks.

Three Wii Men.

We three Kings of Haunting and War.

Will you Kings donate your crowns?

Oh little drink of bed time cheer.

When will Horlicks get up here?

Faith of our Fathers,time for a rethink?

the Vatican hotline’s on the blink.

God test thee,holy gentlemen.

Wait till Jesus comes again.

Was Mary after a council flat?

Oh,yes,Joseph mentioned that.

God didn’t marry her, for if he had.

He’d have had to buy her,her own pad.

Fancy,Jesus is illegitimate.

Make sure he gets no benefits
.
Oh,mother’s mind is in full spate.

where will it all end at this rate?

Why did God not want to wed?

I don’t know,he never said.

But someone told me he is dead.

That’s just a rumour some nerd spread.

God is still in us today.

But something always blocks His say.

I spent my life with books on how to live
Then when death was near I really did
I saw the little smile on my friend’s face
I saw the shining eyes, the lost embrace
I gathered up these books and threw them out
I wasted time in thought and curious doubt
Let’s leave our heads alone and use our sense
To hear a bird sing to enthrall his spouse
To see a swallow dip and fly away\
To see a little orange butterfly
Sailing like a flower across the sky
The silken skin of children and their gl

What did all those sermons do?
Did they say he was a Jew?
Oh, Jesus.
Did he want the First Crusade
It is his blood the priest creates
Lord Jesus.
I don’t like the way things are
I am getting tired of war
Kill Jesus.
What has human wisdom done
From Wittgenstein to Abraham?
Cripes, Jesus!
Does research improve our lives
As for grants, the scholars strive?
Ask Jesus.
We may have chemotherapy
Radiation, history.
Where’s Jesus?
You’d think that after all the years
We’d have used up all our tears
Sweet Jesus.
Love your neighbour as yourself
Give 10 % of all your wealth
Aye, Jesus
.Do what’s better, not what’s worse
I see another fragrant hearse.
It’s Jesus.
See the plastic Crucifix
See him dying with dry lips
Bend your knees, confess your sins
Otherwise, the Devil wins
Not Jesus
.We destroy the good we hate
Envy writhes and with pride mates.
The progeny will wreck the earth
Eden’s burning as drones pass.
No, Jesus.No Jesus.
Know Jesus.

The cyclamen, the lily and the earth
The potted plants ,green leaves , distil the air
The lily is for peace. the rose for worth

Let no human live in pain or cursed
Let the golden light en-wrap them here
The cyclamen, the lily and the earth

The waxy flowers of cyclamen bring mirth
Bring gratitude in winter when all’s bare
The lily is for peace. the rose for worth

I feel my hands are reaching for a brush
The watercolour paints bring their allure
The cyclamen, the lily and the earth

Then I see a flower trod on and crushed
It seems to bleed like Jesus,tears my eye.
The lily is for peace. the rose for worth

Nature has its truth and so do I
Many times I weep, bewail and cry
The cyclamen, the lily and the earth
The lily is for peace. the rose for birth

I remember playing with your face

Standing on your knee I saw you smile

With my childish fingers I would trace

Laughter lines and lips and how you smiled

I put my little hands on either side

And pushed your mouth together small and wide.

Then I laughed with joy that’l still abides

In the memory of our morning lives

Your eyes were blue and smiling like the sky

I loved to see you happy, see your joy

All to soon the Shadows would come by

And take away my dad your loving boy.

Yet in these little memories I can rest

Knowing my beginning was the best

A strange flawed beauty  caught my naked eye
As if some  monstrous beast is hiding near
Where deep rose clouds   hang from a darker sky

Now the rose has gone and all is grey
The night will fall and sorrow is our fare
A  shattered beauty caught by mirrored eye

Yet underneath  night sorrow there is joy
The wisdom of the  ages  does not stare
Though deep rose clouds   hang from a darker sky

Now I see some gold spread unalloyed
The artist we can worship ,love, revere
 Beauty, fearless, caught  in mirrored eye

Nature in her way will never lie
Yet she can kill  what humans   hold most dear
While deep rose clouds   hang from a near night sky

In the clouds of sadness faces leer
Hallucinations look but cannot jeer
Such beauty ,numinous ,affects my eye
While deep rose clouds  sing from a darkening sky

 

 

This icy axe has cut my heart in two

Never will I be a whole again.

Though still I cherish memories of you

The pain affects my heart, where is the clue?

The blood transparent does not leave a stain

This icy axe has cut my heart in two

The grief of death is worse than feeling blue

It’s worse than migraine worse  than feeling shame

Though still I cherish memories of you

So I will love your children in lieu

And with my writing make my feelings tame

An icy axe has cut my heart in two

Sometimes in a dream I hear your name

I waken up mysteriously feeling blame

An Icy axe did cut my heart in two

I’ll cultivate the memories, loving you

I’m frequently impressed when I remember sayings adages, things my mother used to say which are often related to bodily states

When I couldn’t find my glasses I was searching nervously or frantically and only found them when I gave up…..

I remembered my mother saying

You can’t see, for looking.

This is very interesting because like language itself and the developments from it these are coming from the lips of ordinary People. And they’re recognisinhg something which is only in the last hundred years been scientifically described I believe.

There are two kinds of seeing

Very focussed seeing.. narrow purposive vision… This is when we’ve got some thing which our mind is pinned on to and we ignore everything else apart from that very narrow bit of the world that we see very intently. We can also switch into this when we’re under stress, severe stress sometimes.

Then there is the way that the owl must look when it is looking from the tree for something to eat

Wide vision where you’re not focusing sharply on any individual spot in the landscape but your eyes widened and you’re scanning the whole at once. When the owl sees something then he or she must switch into the sharply focused mode and swoop down to catch the little beast that was spotted so the owl could have something to eat

I think artists also will be familiar with this. The eye muscles have to be relaxed which  will happen spontaneously when necessary or sometimes you can do it deliberately. There are breathing techniques and relaxation techniques which can switch into this mode

Going back to the adage

You can’t see for looking.

See refers to broad vision with the eye muscles relaxed

And ,cleverly, looking refers to sharply focused vision

So if you’re looking too hard you can’t see

Well it took me 48 hours to find my glasses

I had taken them off in my bedroom to put some sunscreen on my face and then I couldn’t find them

I was looking in the bedroom for them

But when I found them they were downstairs in the sitting room

I wasn’t even trying to find them them and I’d given up completely

My old ones are adequate for most purposes but nevertheless if you if you wear glasses you know that having the ones you’re used to especially for reading is really very important and some of us feel incomplete without them.

I’m always grateful when I find something and I often look up at the sky and say

Thank you.

And thank you to all those human beings that came before us and left us wisdom in these sayings. And this was long before they were schools and universities and other learning organizations.

I sometimes think that we are getting less intelligence as time goes on.

The face that was familiar is no more
Lost like butterflies that wind destroys
And I sit alone by this closed door

From this anguish take me,I implore
Hoping that my prayer will not annoy.
The face that was familiar is no more

All the years have vanished from my store
With the empty future ,love destroyed
As I sit alone by this closed door

As days pass by, truth and pain conjoin
Love is never evil but conveys
The face that was familiar is no more

With nature’s rhythm, we touch on the benign
Loss and even sin are cast away
As I decide to open this closed door

So I travel down the path of day
Good will, acceptance come, I pray
The face that was familiar is no more.
Kindness, love and courage can restore.

My old blue fountain pen allows

The ink across the page to flow

Like wet paint from the artist’s brush,

And words come in a rush.

Enchanted by the hand that writes,

Bewitched by art, beauty alights.

The script is like a music score

Through which we pass as through a door.

Imagination’s home.

As,mysteriously.to you, to me,

The spirits of our hearts are tamed,

By rhythms of pen,of brush,of mind.

They enter vision quite unplanned,

Like moths to flutter softly round

Fire joined heart and hand.

The pen slows down,the hand goes still

And just as dreams at daybreak will,

They shrink,they disappear,they’re gone.

I almost caught that one!

I  miss you though I’ve never met you yet.

I miss you though we’ve had no tete a tete

I dream of you at night when I’m in bed

I wonder what it is we haven’t said.

imagine I could love you should we meet

I invented you and think you look quite neat.

You must have feelings for what is the good.

Aristotle Plato said we should.

Ethics and the principles of love

Guide us like the stars do from above.

Those who cannot read stars fall to sin.

Sometimes Satan and his forces win.

If I got to see you I would know

The eternal Life is now for those who’re low.

From above I saw the TV set

Our life is just a moment on the net