Weather

Hunched, tramp and heron
stare intently at ice and
review their next meal.

Bethlehem

Herod feared the birth,
Walls now prison the site, but
Love's message endures.

A year on

Darkness has lifted
Grief and spirit have retuned,
The tunnel's light, found.

Project fruition

Vocally brassy,
Stage fright acute, new actors
Psyche up to conquer.

Hedgerow

Shades...

Brave, remaining leaves

You too, will soon be cast off:

Our destinies touch.

Salt marshes

The wind reed-whispers,

gulls grumble, mud burps:

'marsh music' ....

shattered by jets.

Haiku

Sucked into quicksands
of memory, a life line
is given - of laughter.

East coast erosion

Waves corkscrew along

the beach, chewing the cliff's feet -

spitting its sandy gain.

Liu Xiaobo

Silence the words,
Lock up the speaker
BUT
The peace prize opens the cage.

North Norfolk

Loved landscape, lonely
now of its close family draw:
Have the ties untied?

Trend setters

Fragile wing beauty

with op art patterns, shaping

fashion butterflies.

Cycle

Fading, the old moon
cradles the new in its arms:
Hope born from the past.

A large red damselfly

Syria

Lost epoques leave scars

layered like filo pastry

on Damascus' present.

Resafe

Half hidden in the sand

is a place of martrydom:

Brave acts still witness.

On the road to Aleppo
Stony desert, but

Children wave, we smile, unite

and move on. Salaam.

Haiku

Arms stretched in welcome,
swathed in green and shimmering;
dear friend; stately oak.

Mourning

Their voices are stilled;
they speak differently now,
fine tuning the loss.

Haiku

Wrinkles on water,
Dragonflies play, a frog stares,
Beneath, algae chokes.

Yellow

Landscape

Green, yellow, brown, yes -
but blue? A field of sky;
Different - like pink mud.

Seeing

With shut eyes, he glimpsed
another space where hope and
truth lay untrampled.

Shrewsbury patterns

Lost words refound

A random dandy,
tripping the streets,
pose daudling
being a fopdoodle.

Forest of sails

Crossing the line

The Greenwood

New leaves in sunlight
cast lime light across the glade -
zebra stripes in greens.

The Ark

Loved places are sold,
so 'home' moves to memory -
boats slip their moorings.

The Lord Nelson

Hung

We've hung around - lots -
Hung washing, men, ham, but now
We've hung parliament.

A May verge

Haiku

Trees have their lacy tops on
In a shade of green
Good for trees - not walls!

Volcano

Aircraft are grounded
and the world is resized as
travellers need new routes.

Bike ride

Matress, loo, paint, pipes
Dumped on the hedgerow like black
Stains on wedding clothes.

Moving on

Walk with tide and tern

on mud, marsh, creek and wave edge;

loved places, farewell.

A Sequence

Ideas clash, words flow

Books are written,

Minds meet;

Joy reads them -

Fear burns them.

Margaret de Bibbesworth

Her names endures in
brass and farm: status then,
A fleeting thought now.

Helen of Troy

Was it worth it?
Beauty's eternal celeb but -
Raped, blamed and blood steeped.

Mother's day 2010

No green shoots dress trees

this year,

No daffodils blaze,

Mum's not here either.

Driving or Life?

A crater yawns - swerve -
a crack, zig, hole, zag ....abyss....
Trapped between pitfalls.

Leaf colour

Husband = exercise bike: Me = the real thing

What's he missing? Space,

Catkins, views, raw air, puddles -

bet he's warmer though!

Love

Time and winds carve sands

to desert roses - like love -

exquisite flowering.

Haiku

The year's cycle is
memories' stumbling block now
that you are not here.

Haiku

Bright, white snowdrops ease
Shrunk, winter souls like a
Hot bath for stiff limbs.

St Albans Abbey

Sophocles

Was this the head whose

brain wrote Oedipus - a life

scarred by hidden acts?

Haiku

Turbulent water
has quietened now leaving wakes
of edged memories.

The Dream of the Non Pianist

The silent piano

Quivers with joy, like the crowd,

As I start Bach's fugue.

Style

Words of grace and care
Live long unlike e-mail
Utility speak.

John

My father died in November 2009. The following three haikus span the time just before his death to now. The first one encapsulates what I consider to be his last significant words - to me at least.

"Moving on".

Nutshell words

from a mind still aware

though the body fails.

3.11.09

A parentless year:

We're the oldest now -

in new clothes which are too big.

3.1.10

Rueful, I muse on

questions I didn't ask,

phone calls i can't make

now.

13.1.10