Turning

Turning around
I look out way past yesterday
streamlining my head
for tomorrow’s possibles.
Now these clothes, they grew into me
I’d swear I never bought them
had them wrapped and under-armed
removed those plastic tags
and stacked them
vertical in the wardrobe.
But the mirror tells me I did.
My Dad would’ve worn those
beige shorts, un-ticked deck shoes
an hour from a boat, two from the sea.
But I have them on, comfortably,
easily chilling into couldn’t care less.

Funny how you remember, or I do
tastes of childhood,
spring grass, mud, glue,
match heads, raw macaroni,
cooking chocolate, blood, newspaper,
quite a surprise we ever grew up.
I survived poking my fingers
into the live socket,
the guy who tried to drown me
at a scout pool,
that edgy man who
dragged me to the floor and put
his broken glass to my throat.
Everyone has them,
the breakdowns too,
yet many go unnoticed,
and from expanding life
as far from my father
as it would stretch to, I rest here.
Quoting his sayings,
blinking his eyes
and wearing his
bloody deck shoes, mind you
licking butter and sugar
from this cake bowl,
these pumps feel
real good.

Jerry Pike

Desert Tableau

Weary and hot just after dawn
aboard a train in Rajasthan.
half asleep, I raised the blind
and saw a village judder past
with barely more than twenty huts
scattered over empty sand.
A scrawny dog ran
towards the blank horizon,
purposeful as Larkin's bowler.
What thoughts,silent and faint
flickered through its simple mind?
Who saw that it arrived?


Peter Keeble

Highland Clearance

They came at dawning
down the glen,
ill-tempered, yawning
lowland men.

They spoke a tongue
1 could not catch,
then flame was flung
into our thatch,

And still returning
in my dreams,
1 smell the burning,
hear the screams.

John Waddell

Closing My Eyes

Closing my eyes
an aeroplane dances to the fore
a backdrop breeze
pastes it there
while splayed out voices
surround me
in compulsive chat.

I hear the sun
talking things up
bullying people into smiles
they never owned.
A pit bull, panting for air
serrates the atmosphere.
There are no solos here,
except the mad lad
who grins alone.
Drinking up their ecstasy
by the pint
I Sauté my emotions in beer
like a holiday maker
beached and calm.

About me, groups in cliché
plod out memories
and problems,
and louder problems
as each cider sinks,
and they are talked-out
assassinated,
then removed
to that bottom office draw
by the biscuit tin.

Removing my glasses now
the world creeps closer, realer,
even the blurs look touchable,
till at last I’m slipping along
not quite centre stage
just off
piste.

Jerry Pike

Plane Panic

Know your weakness, know its horror,
know the dried out mouth and terror.
Buckle up and breathe more slowly,
watch the fields recede beneath your
trembling feet with staring eyes and
pray for safety in the upper
air as surging engines stumble
flattening out above the cirrus.

Placid for a while at least now
seek forgetfulness in epics
set in Rome or other eras
bound to that, our earthly surface.

Start to cower as we descend,
falling leaden to the planet,
plunging at the roofs and tarmac.
Now, beside yourself with shaking,
hyperventilate, deny this
sharp decline and screaming danger
begging that the shuddering hull and
wheels at last return you safely,
silent, certain, grounded, flightless.

Peter Keeble

November Rain

November Rain


November rain came slanting down
upon the streets of Harrow town,
and very probably it fell
upon the Pinner streets as well,
and, maybe, - how was 1 to know?
on Paddington and Pimlico,
or even all the country over
from John 0' Groats' House down to Dover.
But anyhow in Station Road
the drains and gutters overflowed.
A river flooded down the street,
and 1 was soaked from head to feet.
And now I'm shivering and sneezing,
and sometimes hot, and sometimes freezing.
My handkerchief is soaked right through.
A-tish! A-tish! A-tish! Atchoo!

John Waddell