64
Human League on my iPod
Zooming synth rockets me back
To my 80s childhood
Endless yellow edged summers
Like the old photographs
Me in pastel dresses
With ribbons in my hair
deep snow drift winters
Always outside, all weathers
Climbing trees, riding bikes
Running everywhere
Never time to walk
Time measured in seasons
Tadpole season, conker season
Term time and holidays
Piano practice and Sunday school
Seems so long ago and just like yesterday.
65
"Old steam train passing"
The train driver told us
Over the PA
We craned our necks
Expecting what?
Big shiny engine
Chugging out billowy clouds?
Sooty kerchiefed engineers
Waving from the foot plate?
Dragons nesting in the fire
As more coal was furiously shovelled in?
Or just a rather small steam train
Followed by ornate carriage
Looking lonely on the track
As we rocketed past.
66
Gathering in the night
The sky folds in on its self
Revealing a planet
Hanging like a hot air balloon
Waiting, watching a never blinking eye
Of my alien nightmare
Recurring but shifting in nature
Always feeling the same
Wonder and terror in equal measure.
67
A confection of blossom
Frothing effortless fecundity
A smothering of bees
And the honey sweet scent drips
Bewitching passers by to stop
Admire your brazenness
Take pictures of you against
Deep blue sky and marvel
At your delicate,
Gone in a weekend beauty.
Flirt
68
I'm accompanied on my walk by
The larks tinkling feedback loop
Punctuated by the chirps and whistles
Of field birds unknown to me
Then out of nowhere the keen of a gull
Far from the sea but still speaking of it
Lifting my spirits like the white horse surf
Until a grumpy crow gets heavy
With gruff growling caw caws
Seeing off the gull back to his sea,
As I turn down the lane I enter garden-bird-land
The blackbird gossips and the bluetits giggle
From roof tops and blossom trees
Gardens buzzing with bird talk and song
And deep in the hedge a wood pigeon grumbles
That it won't be long until the return of the swifts.
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