WEATHERED WANDERINGS:

We wander from birth to death down weathered days,

Seasons leading us through a confusing & changing maze,

Dewy ancient Avalonic mists and whispering biblical breeze,

Icy gales that grip the soul & whistling winds that squeeze.

Tormenting tornadoes and clumsy clouds that spitefully spit,

Twisters tantalizing and mulberry skies that rend and split,

Soft hazy days of blown wasps, breezy bees & summer warm,

And whipped raspberry whisperings of dusk & soft cherry dawns.

Dreary droughts of endless aridity that burn and sorely cripple,

Fuzzy, furry mirages, optically waving from lakes of distant ripple,

Hurdy-gurdy hurricanes, where we´re hungrily hurriedly whipped,

Leaving everything within her wake, totally and rudely stripped.

Winds that taunts us laughingly, with terrible teasing & tickling gale,

Bringing with her gifts, those of cruel wet tears & stones of icy hail,

And when we become complacent, then storms are sent by Thor,

Who with mighty lightening-finger, roars & dictates & states his law.

The weathered life-long walking of our weary wanton wandering,

The wonderful windy whippings of our winding woeful wendings,

And what fun we had in our playful & waffling wellied washings,

In the new-rain-splashed lanes, in our widdle- puddled sloshings.

Winter brings the silent snowy showings that lilts & softly glisters,

Summer shows us sunny days that just sit, melt & slowly blisters,

Autumn ends Hades heat, soothing sunburn & relieving the pain,

Spring arrives with sunny days & the pitter-patter of soft new rain.

The Hamatan, Sirocco & zephyr’s whispering winds lullingly blow,

Thermals aloft, waft eagles in & out, then in the distance, off they go,

While we wend our weary way down life´s battered weathered road,

Until we are blown away & unhitched from life´s passing & heavy load.

HANDS:

Born as tight, pink fingered furled shell,

Accompanied by fisted frustrated natal yell,

Grasping, kneading at new mother´s breast,

Unfurling with sweaty fluff and sublime rest,

These tiny little hands clasped in prayer innate,

Curled fingers tightly holding life´s unknown fate.

Muddy and grubby with earth´s blessed clod,

Cracked nail, blistered and besmirched with sod,

Gripping slugs and snails and snot picked deep,

Childhood treasures through little fingers seep.

 Dusk & rinsed of day´s murk and all games played,

On little knees, pink fingers folded, &“God bless” prayed.

Time grew and brought petting petulant teenager years,

Of confusion, painted talons, the tantrums & the tears,

And always posed in ready-for- a- fight, of knuckled fist,

Those trusting little hands, now gone & sorely missed,

Now with rhythmic be-ringed fingers & tattooed hands,

Clenched tight, the searching of the soul & distant lands.

The career & the business of earning an honest wage,

Hands shaken, of deals done on screen & written page,

Hands in grease, dust, suds, grit, & life’s lubricating oil,

Years passing for working hands in endless necessary toil,

The elusive prayers now fleeting for lack of adult time,

Hands now not folded, just a passing in restless mime.

Now sporting golden band of the precious words “I do”,

Ever caressing, ever loving, ever trustful & forever true,

Babe´s tears & toddler´s fears, with love, softly wiped away,

By those gentle hands, that will forever, close & nearby stay,

“Please Lord, with these humble hands, I kneel to you & plead,

To protect my little family close & to never let them bleed”.

The end is nigh & these age-mottled hands now sadly tire,

Gnarled, scarred, deeply veined & totally without desire,

Hold this old hand of mine in yours & tell me it´s all been fun,

And lovingly, gently caress this hand with the softly ebbing sun,

I put these old lived hands together now, as life & death entwine,

Thanking you with them folded, I now pray for one last & final time.

BLIND DATES:

Blind dates, blind me, blind men,

If I´ve dated one, I´ve dated ten,

And not because I´ve wanted to,

But because my mother said, “Sue”,

Then she followed with a list of why,

I ought to date and wed and so my

Dating game began:

Chinless wonders and dauntless dandies,

Stupid dolts, idiots and namby pambies,

Mean miserly scrooges and inflated egos,

Foreign dark men with fit sultry amigos,

Young ones, old ones and one with a limp,

The hairy, the bald, the skinny, the fat oily blimp,

The mummy´s boys, cry babies, wimps & bullies,

And those turning up in granny´s knitted woolies,

I was wended, wafted and wooed through meals,

Squeezed into tight sexy dresses and painful killer heels,

And not a single one ticked all mother´s hopeful boxes,

They all came in sheepskins, the wolves and sly foxes,

Just as I gave up, desperate of all positive hope,

Not even prayers in church, nor audience with the Pope,

Then one day at work, from my desk, looking up I spied,

In walked “the one”, waddling in from side to side,

With pillowed tummy under his too short coat,

And a straggly red beard like that of an old billy- goat,

Peering at me through the glasses on the end of his nose,

And clutched in sweaty stubby fingers, he carried a red rose,

I´d found my diamond amidst the smooth & the rough,

After scratching through all the banal and superficial stuff,

And my mother sighed at last, but with resigned relief,

That although he wasn´t a Lord, at least he wasn’t a thief.

THE PENSIONER:

Shuffling cold down the grey Main Street,

To collect meager pension on old sore feet,

Raindrops on lined unshaved grizzled cheek,

From few pitiful pennies, a life he tries to eke.

Once he had a beautiful wife and a lovely home,

And children too, son and daughter to call his own,

His wife now beneath the earth´s mantle of death,

His heirs ambitiously absorbed by city´s cold breath.

Friends dissipated together with his working life,

The silence in his hovel he can cut with a knife,

The hollow echoing in his confused ageing mind,

Makes it hard in this world, for him to seek & find.

In his old grey days of fumbling & dreams sublime,

He finds no purpose, no reason nor logical rhyme,

And in his ancient silence of long-days & wasted time,

He walks in death´s footsteps, leaving footprints divine.

THE RIVER:

You tiptoe daintily with ebbing willing footsteps flowing,

Chattering to winded leaves dancing in the breezes blowing,

Riveting and rabbiting, brimming, trilling and sweetly rilling,

Bubbling and bumbling, burping and gurglingly icily chilling,

Where the swilling cheeky brown otter dives and deeply swims,

And the turquoise dragonfly softly and gently over surface skims,

Where the windy tearful weeping willows wincingly & wetly dip,

And where on the giggling surface, dainty fireflies trip and skip,

Where gaudy bejeweled kingfishers dive and elegantly swoop,

Where likely birds fly and in their bills, fish they pinch and scoop,

River, running through green foliaged forest´s entwined lacy holes,

Quenching meadows, fields, bluebell woods and lush leafy souls,

Meandering, wandering and whispering, since ancient times begun,

Swelling, pregnant in snow and rain and defying the cruel summer sun,

Running down my cheek and sighing secrets within my blaséd ear,

Cheered on by rivulet, brook, pond, lake and applauding weir,

Run free, run wild, laugh and gurgle, run on my pretty liquid friend,

And keep on running, never stopping, run on until time´s timely end.