Category: Every Day Life

Andrew

Andrew, I met you

At Cleveleys writing group

You have such a bright, warm smile

And your poetry is beautiful and funny

And always entertaining.

Everyone respects and likes you

And your calm and wise demeanour

Make people and poets in equal measure

Gravitate towards you

Because you are generous and kind and warm

But you only give advice

When people seek it

And you support and inspire endlessly.

You encouraged me to write more

You appreciate and enjoy everyone’s poetry

You were diagnosed with cancer

Last month

And within a matter of weeks

I have lost a dear and valuable friend,

Who I was only just beginning to know.

I talk about you in the present tense

Because I feel as if you’re still here.

Here is some of Andrew’s work

Highwaymen Of 2020

We have become highwaymen and women

With our masks pulled tight

Over our nose and mouth

Now, we are in disguise

(But weren’t we always)

Wearing these things are either

An asthmatics nightmare

Or

A rapists delight

False smiles that don’t reach the eyes

Can be hidden

As well as manic grins

And angry little pouts

All of our foibles, now safely

Under that little piece of cloth

The opposite is also true

You can see

The twinkle in the eye

Of the genuine smile.

I’m Not Breaking Promises

I’m not breaking promises

To myself anymore

I’m not slamming my fingers

In the door anymore

I’m not sabotaging the things

That are good for me

I’m not holding on

To the ‘pain-body‘

I’m not saying God

Won’t give me wings

‘Cos now I know

That he forgives me things

There’s so much more

That He will do

I just really need

To forgive others too.

And it’s time to stop

The sackcloth and ashes

It’s time to stop

The thousand lashes

It’s time…

I stopped the war.

I’m not breaking promises

To myself anymore.

Loneliness, suddenly.

Because I can’t hug people, I suddenly really want to hug people, and yet, I’ve never really been a people person. Maybe I will be after this.

And, because I can’t talk to people face to face…I suddenly want to talk to people. I never really thought about it too much before., the human touch, and how we all need it.

Today, while necessity shopping, a lovely lady of senior years, wearing bright blue plastic gloves greeted me with a cheery ‘Good Morning’, from across the road. That meant a lot. People will beat it somehow. They find a way. Suddenly, I was a dry sponge, that soaked up any water coming my way. Strange, how much it warmed my soul. I felt a connection, and again, just a minute later, a tattooed young man, all bristling muscles, in his front garden, hosing it clean, water flooding out his gate, touching the toes of my boots, said ‘Hello,’

Hello.’ I answered, and again, my mood lifted just a little, just enough to get through another day.

Social distancing maybe. Voice distancing? Na.

Again, that strange warmth…glow whatever. People find a way. They always find a way. Thank God.

Lies

Lies are the thoughts

We think in our heads

Making us sleep when

We go to bed

Lies are the hopes

That cushion our lives

That turn our violent screams

Into sighs

Lies are the corpses

In the beautiful tomb

That make us believe

We are back In the womb

They are so pretty

Sweet little lies

They make us believe

What we see

With our eyes

But lies are a thousand

Wishes untrue

Lies are the death wish

In me and you.

Only Minds Are Meeting

What’s the point of a shower

And smelling like a flower

And having scented power

Of a freshly washed bod?

What’s the point of a wash

When no-one gives a toss

It’s a load of bosh

When stinky flesh is quashed

Does a tree still sound

When it falls to the ground

And there’s no-one there to hear?

Well, the same surely goes

If there is no nose

To smell a rose

That might be there.

But, I’ll do it for myself

And my hygiene health

And the perfumed wealth

Of a non smelly self.

Won’t hang like a bum

Accumulating scum

Scrub it all new

And smell like morning dew.

We can mess around with mud

And wallow in the crud

We can do what we dare

‘Cos there’s no-one there to care

(As long as we wash our hands at the end of it)

Oh, but in these lazy days

Of Covid crazy haze

If these four walls could talk

They would surely squawk

But hey, I can go for a walk

ONCE A DAY!

Still, I think I’ll just Twitter

Forget about being fitter

I’d much rather be eating

‘Cos sanity is fleeting

And only minds are meeting

Just now.

.

Ginger and The Lemon Pip

Today, I noticed a ginger spider sitting on my kitchen worktop hugging a lemon pip. I had squeezed lemons the night before and one pip must have popped out and I hadn’t noticed it. The worktop colour is very similar to the pip colour. Anyway, I blew on Ginger to see if Ginger was alive. Usually when you breathe on insects or spiders, they run for the hills, or dance in the breeze (of your breath). Ginger didn’t move. Is Ginger dead, I thought, or is Ginger just playing dead? I blew on Ginger again and once more for good luck. Nothing. Ginger didn’t move, neither did the pip. Are you calling my bluff? Maybe if I go away and come back again, you might not be there. I decided I would give Ginger some space. Like when a tree falls in a forest and nobody is there, would Ginger leave while no-one was there to experience Ginger’s leaving? So, I went away for a decent amount of time, about fifteen minutes, and when I returned, Lo and Behold, Ginger was indeed gone and so was the pip! Ginger took the pip and fooled me good and proper, called my bluff. Of course, it could have gone two ways for Ginger. She/he could have been bludgeoned to death while he/she played dead, or was carelessly and fatally scooped into the sink, or into a dustbin. Ginger could have met with several horrible deaths, but instead, trusted fate, took a chance, took a risk and played dead, and it paid off. A lesson to us I think. And Ginger and Lemon do go together.

Translation Errors

Displayed on a fence in a wild duck sanctuary in Vietnam, ‘Please Be Afraid Of The Rabbit’

There was also another sign which said, ‘Take nothing but memories, leave nothing but footprints, kill nothing but ducks.’

In the Far East,

‘Drink here, if not wishing to die yet.’

‘Guests note, there will be a fire on Monday but not to worry.’

‘Please walk in a dangerous way’ I’m sure we’ve all done this at some point.

‘Make room for the psychos’ (discovered in a carpark)

‘There are no naked men here’ (on a restaurant door)

Darn it!

Translation errors sourced from Chris Pascoes Fun Tales, Signs Of Madness, My Weekly