Love without

Love

When first I saw your soulful face,
Then wished I most to you embrace.
I wished as well to clothe you in
The sacred images within.

To find a home for love without;
To fold my dreams all round about
Your loving body and your face
Were covered in such joy and grace.

But now my dreams are cast aside
The world of meaning denied life.
What seemed most precious now is fled…
And I lie sleepless in my bed.

What is the world when unadorned
With all that in my heart I’ve formed?
There is no meaning I can trace.
As in a mother’s empty face.

On these grey rocks my path is hard.
From paradise, my self is barred.
To struggle or to grief succumb
When this dark day of mourning’s done?

Into His dazzling darkness dart
My dreams and love like dying sparks.
Into His Mystery now so fair
I’ll cast both hope and my despair.

Thus my dreams will be transformed
To show themselves in other forms.
What feels a loss may foretell growth.
On my hope,I’ll take an oath

That nothing in my life is waste,
That I have not for phantasms chased.
And you are human,as am I.
Let’s live again until we die

My copse has turned into a wood

So my copse has ripened to a wood
How many living creatures dwell within?
The shades of green, the sunshine, and the Good

Once we had three apple trees,a glut
Today, too old to fruit, they stand there still
My copse has turned into a little wood

Neighbours hint that I get my trees cut
Yet these leaves of green make my heart full
The shades of green, the sun the wind ,the gods

Once we read there was a total Flood
Now we have the bush fires and their will
Still, my copse has turned into a wood

Trees have their green sap where we have blood
They will never wound, will never kill
The shades of green, the sun the wind ,the gods

Just like Eve and Adam we may sin
The maple waves away my mental pain
My copse has turned into my private wood
The shades of green, the long path.Come, my Love.

The silent paths


“

I have walked the silent paths of grief
Sunless,dreary,cold and all alone.


I have slept on beds of winter leaves.

I know that death’s a greedy starving thief.
Although my heart weeps and my joy has gone.
I have never felt I was deceived.

I have learned that human life is brief.
I have learned by sorrow we’re undone.
I have sifted earth and what’s beneath.

I have felt the dark emotions seethe
I’ve felt cruelly burned by glaring sun.
I have learned the geography of grief.

I wait in sorrow for this life to cease
Yet some are never loved by anyone
I have dreamed in beds of winter leaves

Unconsoled grief can make us dumb
Into our hearts, we drag the ice that numbs
I have walked the silent paths of grief
I have made my bed on winter leaves

Ancient houses

Hidden in the sprawl of suburbs green,
Extended semis,kitchens full of tools
Ancient houses where the long lost dreamed

Visited by Tudor king and queen
Here to hunt,to gain release from rule
Hidden in the sprawl of suburbs green

Keats’s autumn mists and mellow streams
Where children loved to fish in dark cool, pools
Edged by houses where the long gone dreamed

In new kitchens, butcher’s sharp knives gleam
See tall fridges where the meat is cooled
Common in the sprawl of suburbs green

Busy parents don’t hear children scream.
Welcome to the demons of misrule
In the houses where no-one can dream

Now time is racing, pauses are for fools
Post and pre, our modern life is cruel
Hidden in the sprawl of suburbs green
Ancient houses, would that I could dream,

When the doctor calls and can’t waste time

Hello I am calling from the doctor’s surgery

Someone told us that you are feeling rather low. Are you planning to commit suicide?

No I’ve never been very good at planning I believe in spontaneity

Well are you thinking about it?

Dr I think you need help. Have you heard of Heisenberg uncertainty principle? My

I’m not certain.

That’s the thing nobody is certain. We might plan to commit suicide at 4pm and then 0 we might see the ice cream van coming down the streetm

So you would rather have an ice cream then die at 4 p.m.?

Well I could have the ice cream now and then commit suicide at five p.m. unless something else happens like my husband comes home from work and wants to go to bed with me.

What before he to’s even had a shower?

Sometimes men can’t wait

How about having sex in the shower?

It’s too wet for me

Anyways the doctor wants to know if I’m planning to die soon.

Tell her to make a novena and see where her God will reveal the truth.

But it’s so uncertain isn’t it because even if you’re planning something you can change your mind because maybe you’re doing it because you want to write a novel and you’re living out the action in your own real life first to see how it goes and if you’re satisfied with it you can write it all down and make it into a novel and make a lot of money out of it!

I don’t know what Heisenberg would have thought but as is no longer here we just ignore that.

The one advantage of feeling low is you can’t go any further down

He that is down need fear no fall

He that is low no pride

Wow you’re getting poetic

And if you’re at the top you can’t go any higher so you have to come down

The hand upon my tiller

Come back to me, my sweetheart
Don’t leave me all alone.
Come back to me, my darling
I can’t believe you’ ve gone.
I’m crying ‘cos I’m feeling blue again.
I’m crying’cos I’m falling like a stone.

Oh, let me tempt you with my beauty
And my voice forever young.
Let me tempt you with my spirit
My laughter and my songs.
I’m crying ‘cos I never did you wrong.
I’m crying ‘cos with you I  still belong.

I thought maybe I’d follow,
To see where you have gone
But there’s a hand upon this tiller
That is not mine alone.
I’m crying ‘cos I wrote this old blue song.
I’m crying ‘cos I’ve been lonely for too long.

The hand upon my tiller
The mystery of the dark
The unknown one who lives in me
And sings like a skylark.
I’m singing ‘cos I wrote you a new song.
I’m singing ‘cos the cat ain’t got my tongue.

He liked my husband’s shoulder dear


I dream at nights of my old friends
My husband and his loving hands
I dream of all the cats we had
Alfred who slept on the bed
He laid his head upon my foot
As I wrote a poem of love
Jimmy who was small and black
She bit my hand if I got up
I did not wish to wet the bed
She did not understand a word I said
The last night here she gazed at me
I think she knew she would not be
Lucky was the nervous one
Black and white , apartheid none
He liked my husband’s shoulder dear
He draped himself and lost all fear
Now the cats have all gone off
I am frightened by my cough
My husband comes to me at night
Fortunately he cannot bite
He touches me with tenderness
Smiles and wished me,God Bless.
When I waken I feel lost
So I have to wear a watch
I seem to have no solid self
I feel nervous of those elves
I don’t mind an angel fierce


He could rub my aching feet
I will have no other man
They are frightened of women
They don’t like to lose at Chess
They don’t like to wash my dress
They will brush my winter coat
Never ask me what I wrote
I do not wish to anger men
They might shout and bawl again
I think maybe I will turn gay
Ask a lady, what to say?
They may not understand my needs
Killing flowers to help the weeds
Talking all the weary night
On the whole they’re parasites
Also they may menstruate
I can’t give them seeds to take
So they will leave and get a man
This is where it all began
Eve and Adam,God and man
Cain and Abel, apple flan
Noah and his Ark so fine
I wish I had one in the rain
I wonder when the world will end?
I am old so be my friend

Our eyes will melt and souls combine.

Down daisied fields, sweet grasses grow
Down these green fields, I know, I know.
In unploughed, fields where wild flowers blow
We’ll meet again, I Iove you so.

It was in the first soft summer light
I saw you standing, face so bright.
I saw you by the drystone wall.
I never doubted you at all.

When Meadows bright all bloom again
I know we’ll see you coming then.
in sunny fields where wildflowers hide
I know my love is by my side.

Oh,come, dear heart, do not delay.
We are not long till in the clay.
I’ll stand upon the beacon here
And never rest, till you are near.

When flowering buds all open wide
When bees to poppies swiftly glide.
When your dear heart is pressed to mine
Our eyes will melt and souls combine.

Oh, where are you, my dearest one
All too soon our lives are gone
I gaze across the fields and hills.
As sunset-sky with flames is filled.

When buttercups and celandine
Beckon to me in my dreams.
When apple blossom fills the tree
I believe, with love I’ll see.

Silverdale

I wish we were in Silverdale again

The meadow full of flowers,the nettle’s sting

The boarding house,the hedges rich with song..

The sketch pad,ink, the birthday pen

My brother’s humour and his wacky games

I miss his buoyant face, his eyes untamed

At least he’s not in prison doing time.

I liked the way he misprounced my name.

I wish we were on Windermere today

The bouncing sun,the blossoms rich display

Come back now I love you anyway

My heart was stabbed with death,you went away

I saw your shadow cycling in black rain.

May we help each other with the pain?

The world’s hollow like a shell

I’m in deep now,never been this deep before
The world’s hollow like a shell and I’m out its door.
In so deep, the ocean has its own startled floor.
I’m down,down.down.never been so dark , so more

I can’t rightly tell how I got where I am
I think I had an accident,fell over, then I swam.
Sometimes it’s a loss, be times it’s my man.
I guess I only do it cos I know some folk can.

I don’t know if the joy is worth the pain
Would I choose to relive if, I was born again?
The deep joy is the amazing gain.
But the sorrow is damn sad, let’s admit it plain.

I’m in deep and it’s over my head
What was I thinking of,when I fell out of that bed?
I look up and the sea’s so turquoise like that mist is red
When we get good and mad and wish some loon was dead.

At first, it was all just black,black pain
But from the bottom of the well, I looked up with awed love again.
That’s when I recalled,feelings are deep and sane
Joy is much greater when we’re in the deep,deep zone.

I dunno if I’m ever comin’ out.
We can’t control it,ain’t that what life’s all about?
I’ll never love with innocence again,nor not feel doubt.
But I’m no teapot and the devil ain’t got my spout.

I’m swimming and the ocean’s so mysteriously bright
Down here we don’t have no day nor no night
Fish nudge me with big grins and teeth white
Sea flowers fondle me and whisper,turn off that light

Smokey Essex cornfields, insects’ pyres

While my husband kissed me in our bed
Our cat would  lounge on top and lick his head
No matter what gyrations that cat saw
All he did was pat us with his paws
The happy days of learning  how to feel
How to entertain with spicy meals
Of walking by warm rivers hand in hand
Watching coots and moorhens ,washing pans
Buying an old kettle, then a house
Driving  out to Ongar ,stubble fires
Smokey Essex cornfields, insects’ pyres
Driving  down the Saxon Cliffs at Hythe
Soft teal Sea,Capel le Ferne, men’s eyes
Happy  in a cottage in the wilds
I sang like some  small bird, we walked for miles
Kersey where the ducks bathe in the street
Kissing in the hedges was so sweet
Getting  our own garden, growing beans
Growing spinach, lettuce and snap peas
Picking  our blackcurrants, making tea
Making jam from raspberries. yes please
This proves that when you marry you need pans
Cooking  dinners  talking with our friends
Wearing jeans and  hair so long it flowed
My husband liked to brush it till it glowed
I dream some nights my hair is still like that
And how  the cat slept with his paws in it
How his father died and mother grieved
Life is not all positive, we see.
On we went and love  was what we grew
Though anger  did rise up and strain the glue
First the cat died, then my man went too
Can’t I adopt a beast  from Whipsnade Zoo?

Beautiful nature photographs by Mike Flemming

dragon2birds1

http://home.btconnect.com/mike.flemming/butterfl.htm

Mike has been taking photos all his life but  now has more time to do it.Why don’t you get a camera or use your phone and  start a new hobby? I do  it although I have no technical skills.Again my technical skills in art are not very good but I still like to try.

scan00032.jpg

Essex UK.Drawing by Katherine

But a prayer could ascend to its height.

Great Bardfield and Dunmow by meadows  of blue
Linseed and poppies delight
Narrow lanes curving  are leading us to
The Essex  of Constable ‘s sight

At Manningtree swans  jostle near the  stone edge
I recall we have seen them in flight
Like a god might descend  to fulfill an old pledge;
A humbling  and marvellous sight.

In Dedham,  all’s still and wisteria  hangs
From a house with the door painted white.
The church was  quite empty and no bell was rung
But a prayer could ascend to its height.

After the quiet of the village out here
The A12  was revealed as a blight
We crossed it then  turned down a lane that was near
We drove home  in the  cool of the night.

Windmills not turning and churches not used
Yet  a  beauty to charm and delight
No mills  as in Yorkshire,no  hills  to denude.
Long Melford and Eleigh ,oh wait!

We know much more than we think

I should have studied cryptic crosswords first

Before I turn my mind to writing verse.

How could I bedazzle readers’ eyes

Hinting at the mysteries inside?

I should have studied Dante and John

Donne

Or Sylvia Plath and Emily Dickinson.

I should have gone to Eton or St Paul’s

then I could think in Greek by shadowed walls.

We have to make good use of all we know

Don’t keep crying out and calling More

Infinite the treasures of each mind

When like a little child we make designs.

On the seashore with the infants play

The grains of sand are infinite today

What bank did Jesus save in?

I spent my adult life in puzzles mazed
No more to play in parks or climb green hills
Wondering was it true that Jesus saves.

On green hills, the Herdwick sheep would graze
While in the town, the people swallowed pills
I spent my adult life in puzzles mazed

On the sunny side,old people prayed
For pensions were too small to pay the bills;
Some wondered in which Bank the Saviour saved

I may have been obsessive in my ways
Keeping my accounts was quite a drill
I spent my entire life in puzzles mazed

How many sins.such thoughts would prey
Of self torture,I have had my fill
Wondering is it true that Jesus saves

Jerusalem upon its rocky hill
Cannot show but maybe it can tell
I spent my adult life in puzzles mazed
Wondering if it’s true that Jesus saves.

Thousands of mental health patients readmitted within a month in England

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/jan/12/thousands-of-mental-health-patients-readmitted-within-a-month-in-england?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

I am ashamed of this country and the way we treat people with mental health problems and their families who are among the most vulnerable people in this country and they were unlike to make compliance because of their health and their suffering

Fiery air

Autumn time in Essex  where we drove
When farmers burned the stubble of the corn
The earth itself was  fiery  like young love
The smokey air rose like a  cloud  new born

The Kentish  landlocked   cliffs  are  wide and steep
The farmers grow  their grain on land beneath
And there too we  have seen the holy fire
The flames  and smoke arrest me with desire

The earth and soil, the  harvest  we find there
Give me joy  both full of wheat or bare
Why did burning stubble   make me glow?
These images affect the heart’s deep core

Now  fires are banned., they damage our pure air
And I   did not like the murder of the hare

Smokey Essex cornfields, insects’ pyres

While my husband kissed me in our bed
Our cat would lounge on top and lick his head
No matter what gyrations that cat saw
All he did was pat us with his paws
The happy days of learning how to feel
How to entertain withv spicy meals
Of walking by warm rivers hand in hand
Watching coots and moorhens ,washing pans
Buying an old kettle, then a house
Driving out to Ongar ,stubble fires
Smokey Essex cornfields, insects’ pyres
Driving down the Saxon Cliffs at Hythe
Soft teal Sea,Capel le Ferne, men’s eyes
Happy in a cottage in the wilds
I sang like some small bird, we walked for miles
Kersey where the ducks bathe in the street
Kissing in the hedges was so sweet
Getting our own garden, growing beans
Growing spinach, lettuce and snap peas
Picking our blackcurrants, making tea
Making jam from raspberries. yes please
This proves that when you marry you need pans
Cooking dinners talking with our friends
Wearing jeans and hair so long it flowed
My husband liked to brush it till it glowed
I dream some nights my hair is still like that
And how the cat slept with his paws in it
How his father died and mother grieved
Life is not all positive, we see.
On we went and love was what we grew
Though anger did rise up and strain the glue
First the cat died, then my man went too
Can’t I adopt a beast from Whipsnade Zoo?

Our street

I see the pavement and each well cracked stone

I know the privet hedge now soft with rain

I plucked a leaf I sipped its moisture green

I saw the window with its one cracked pane

the ginger cat once sat outside the door.

He sucked the eggs laid by our neighbour’s hens

He ate the budgie while we were at school

My mother never fed him, bought no tins.

No children play upon this once bright Street

No marbles roll the gutters, no boys play.

Skipping ropes abandoned, slowly rot

The past has left few Shadows for today.

In my mind I see the ancient scene

Children sing the rhymes, the coltsfoot gleams

Beef olives: a true comfort food | Feature | Jamie Oliver

https://www.jamieoliver.com/features/beef-olives-true-comfort-food/

Give me food and give me drink.

I’ll tell the truth, just give me ink.

I had a husband in my bed

I confess that he is dead

Give me water give me wine

Tell the world that you are mine

I love a man I love a lad

I love my cat, for he is bad

The Cleveland hills

I lose myself in heather scented earth
The sun, the sky, the happenstance of you
No more to be a rival for love’s birth

The bees fly in and out of mirth
The distant Tees,the farms, the longer view
I lose myself in heather scented earth

What is life if not experienced first?
To lie in arms of love,to feel renewed
No more to be a zealot for love’s birth

We roll towards the edge, the ending cliff
Are saved by buzzing bees from avenue
We lose ourselves in heather scented earth

Never will there be another mist
A fog of love that fills the endless pews
No more to be a beggar for love’s birth

We sunk into the soil and out of view
We knew each other well, till we were through
I lose myself in darkly scented earth
No more to be a threat to love’s new birth

He said I can keep the box

Mary was in the teal coloured kitchen of her almost detached house making a jam sponge pudding when the doorbell rang.She wiped her hands on her new purple trousers because she didn’t want to dirty a clean towel.
She found her colleague Dr Rosa Benchez standing nervously outside shivering
Come in , Mary cried.

Would you like a cup of tea? You need to sit by the fire and get warmer
I’d love that, Rosa said politely but distantly
A few minutes later they were sitting looking out of the bay window watching a blackbird sitting on the fence;they hoped it would start to sing
May I talk to you,Mary? I have got rather more agitated than ever before

.I am wondering if I need counselling or maybe shooting, she joked morosely
OK,said Mary cautiously.Has anything unusual happened ?
Yes, my sister has had her driving license taken away because of big panic attacks she had crossing the Humber Bridge …. you know how huge it is.She got out of the car and screamed,Help! Help!
That was dangerous with so much traffic about
She is furious and says we live in a Nazi state and is writing to the Times
Well, it can happen that you lose your licence,Mary said,but when she has learned to deal with the attacks she can re-apply and get her license back.Simple things like not eating and being tired can bring that on so I have heard.And fear of fear, too.
As well as that,Rosa said,my son has got a recurrence of cancer and is going onto some new drug-type chemo.My ex husband is very distressed and so am I as it was unexpected.
And even worse my new fiance Prof. Charlie Blogge has broken off our engagement with no reason.I can’t think of any at all.Shall I ever trust a man again?
He said I can keep the ring which is a blue sapphire ,supposedly, but when I had it valued they said I was mistaken and you can buy them on amazon for £57 and less.
So she took off the ring and hurled it into Mary’s coal fire where it looked very nice as it got hotter and hotter glowing like a lighthouse off Portland Bill in a sea storm or a banger about to explode

Good grief, said Mary.No wonder you are agitated.We may have to phone Dave the bisexual lovable paramedic available on the NHS 24 hours a day.Or we could have our hair permed and dyed red instead, she murmured to herself
Which of these events bothers you most,Rosa? She continued gently while hoping she would cope.
It is my own feelings that worry me most.I wake up feeling very sad and nervous;I wonder if I am having a breakdown.Then I feel worse as I turn it over in my mind trying to decide what to do.Then I get up and get food into me and think it all over and over again while drinking my tea.
Well, you know it is normal to feel sad, anxious or distraught when bad things happen,Mary told her.
But most people look happy when I see them in the town , Rosa shouted angrily
That is because being outside they put on a mask.They could be feeling worse than you.Anyway, why bother about that? We are all different.Some people think I am very calm but they don’t see me when I’m not.I go stiff like a piece of wood.Then I pass out
So what do you do? Rosa asked her nervously,twirling a golden ringlet around her finger as she watched her engagement ring melt in the fire.
I don’t do anything,Mary said.This is one of the fundamental errors in our society that action is needed for so many things and especially for negative feelings.But it’s usually part of life.Things pass.
I pretend I have a big round box inside me and I let the anxiety live in there nice and cosy until my mind has absorbed and dealt with the pain.Once my box was quite small but it has grown bigger now and so it has room for mad or bad feelings.I do little tasks and listen to music.
Then if I feel really bad I listen to Leonard Cohen and tell myself, he had it worse.But he made money out of it! Not that you can make money out of yours. though it’s worth musing about
Well,Rosa replied.Thank you,Mary.I am glad I am not the only one who feels so anxious sometimes.I shall try to get a box like yours.
You are welcome,said Mary jovially.Come round on Sunday for tea.Emile is out hunting but he loves to see you and so do I
The women hugged cautiously and Rosa went out looking less cold and nervous as she bravely carried her box away .It was invisible to the people walking nearby

The cyclamen the lily

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

Love’s victory

Turn back, live again, he asked of me
Do not wander in the darkness anymore
One false move might give death victory

We are each connected to that tree
The sunlit top, the roots hid in earth’s floor
Come back, live again, he asked of me

While we live, we’ll live with dignity
Not scrabbling for the gold in blood and gore
One more step will give hate victory

The kindness of the golden light was clear
And left sweet feelings in my heart’s deep core
Come back, live your life, he then soothed me

Do not wonder now why you are here
We’re here to live and living shall restore
What our suffering self has found so dear

I had never seen the Light before
Only Christ the Tyger with his roar
Come back, live through pain, he asked of me
That first step will give love victory

A winter’s day

L

Grey, damp, dark, a winter day describe,

Though sunshine comes with white and wintry frost.

While on my paper curving shapes inscribe

The alphabet I learned at childhood’s cost

Humankind can’t bear too much of night

Hallucinations,dreams, symbols confused.

We like the sunny sky where birds take flight.

In warmth soft air, our tension are defused.

Accepting night is one of our sad tasks

Light and dark needs balance in this world

In the light of sun. our sorrow’s masked

We feel false ecstasy as colors swirl.

God created light and darkness first

Their divided unity is blessed