A Tramp

Where are you going,

Walking down the street,

Pushing that old barrow

Through sun, rain or sleet?

Were you ever young

With friends, maybe a sweetheart?

You sort through dustbins.

Could you have felt Cupid’s dart?

You knock on a door for water,

On another for milk and tea;

You drink your tea on the pavement

In the shade of a roadside tree.

What made you take to the road,

To walk through your life like this

Alone? Have you no one

In the world you miss

On your long treks, no one

Who awaits your return? Where

Can you go when you have no friends,

No loving comfort? Do you despair?

What’ll be your end?

Death under some wayside hedge,

Or in a prison cell, perhaps?

What first drove a wedge

Between you and us?

You’ll go on your lone way

Towards Eternity. Who’ll

Miss you when you reach your last day?

The Old Royal Daffodil

I went on holiday to the Isle of Sheppey when I was a child (many years ago), boarding the ship at the end of Southend pier and leaving it at Sheerness. This was a most exciting way to travel to one's holiday destination.

A View from the London Eye

I took this view from the London Eye a few years ago. I wondered before hand how I should feel in the Eye but found the experience wonderful once I was in.
This picture could be clearer but I am glad to have it as a memory.

Spring

Hyacinths, the very essence of Spring, what we all need after a long and gloomy winter.

A Day In the Brecon Beacons

Reaching the mountain top
Was a worthwhile attainment;
Aching footed and out of breath
We sat in enveloped in the joy of it
While the winging larks filled
The air with their summer song.
The surrounding azure vault
Stretched away to infinity,
And we were replete with satisfaction.
Maternal ewes with attendant lambs
Roamed the green distance
While far below diminutive vehicles
Sped on their frantic, fuming way,
Leaving the hills to us.

thebreconbeacons

Away With You Wild Winter

Away with you wild winter,
We are welcoming the Spring,
Snowdrops, crocuses gleam the garden,
Sweet birds are on the wing.

Warmth of sun’s bright beams
Swelling Life’s new growth,
Slanting rain-spears softly falling
Fill flower buds, leaf buds, both.

Winter-thin hedgehogs venture
Forth for fattening food,
Snouting about the burgeoning garden,
Searching in rotten wood

For insects fat and juicy
To strengthen their frail, thin blood,
To help them find their prickly mates
And bring forth plump, fresh, broods.

Sing joy for advancing Springtime,
Farewell to Winter’s woe.
Hail to the whole of Creation’s wonder
And the seasons’ rotational flow.

Awaywithyouwildwinter

The Launderette

The washing whirls round
Seemingly endlessly;
In the air the constant sound
Of busy machinery.
Young lovers kiss while they wait;
Life-worn women
Fold their washing.
Are they late? they wonder
For the children from school,
The husbands from work.
An old woman smokes by a drier
Full of tumbling clothes,
While toddlers run and laugh
And one lone man packs a machine.

I wrote this some years ago. There are not many of the launderettes now, I think.

Blogs

Blogs seem to be taking up rather a lot of my time lately. I am not sure if this is a good thing or not.