The Rattlebag

2015-06-11T07:14:00.003+01:00

Trying a few things out :-

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdnoadXyY3FZxnamVExgflDME3fVJXhcq

Please feel free to comment or share

THANKS

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT

2015-01-19T07:49:00.003+00:00

Those of you who like to read my work please pop along to Simon's Poetry and Prose Group on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/groups/963191493709163/. I tend to post more work on there at the moment.

Thanks for your patience

Simon

P.S I will continue to post the odd piece on here if you'd rather not venture onto Fb

Fade

2014-12-21T07:07:00.002+00:00

She was slight to begin with.

Pared down by worry,

Three kids and an errant husband

Who carried grass seed in his pocket.

Illness took the rest

until pills were the only food

I could push through purse-string lips

before inertia set her blood like stone

There were moments

when a young girl fell back into life

like a failed ghost

with hot ‘how dare you’ eyes.

Then, the words ‘let me go’!

became my own

She dared cancer try its luck

and take anything from a body

that had nothing left.

Right on cue an evil limpet

clamped its self to her fifth rib

where an empty breast used to sit

Stupid tumour starved to death

just before she did

prised off by some thoughtful surgeon

during luncheon

popped into formalin and filed away

just before she was

Dominoes ( Last night, vandals destroyed 150 headstones and monuments in a quiet village cemetery)

2014-12-12T14:06:00.001+00:00

A domino theory, proved

in a pub-less, peaceful place

devoid of faded spots

and the back to back clack

of six on six.

No airless gym

with varnished floor

buffed to perfection

and filled with wooden warriors

as yet un-toppled

by the deftest finger flick

local wall-sitters,

bored with easy kickings,

bus shelters

and laminated kiosks

wearing chap cider smiles

to 'impress the birds'.

moved on to the Graveyard

Follow my leader,

off-ground tick,

stepping, stoned, as

Dr Martens gripped the granite

smearing dated marble tombs.

First the ancients snapped.

Jutting yellow tongues

tasting their last meal

of rubber sole and grassy heel

Then the newly fixed and planted.

Presiding over some

hammock of earth,

cement still wet.

The jumbled names lay shattered

like a broken-biscuit jigsaw .

A dazed daughter

and weeping widow

exchanged a piece of sky

for a piece of son.......

Yvonne

2014-12-05T09:12:00.000+00:00

My heart came of age

One balmy sports day

When Yvonne won the hundred.

Her quiet perspiration made me sweat out loud.

I ached to touch her,

Not like my signed England cricket bat

Somewhere between my Princess Leia Poster

And our slate-grey Persian cat

Her buttocks rose like new proved dough

Held high with braided hair.

So thick and tight the

Gloss oozed out like blackberries

Wrung through muslin.

I never braved her orbit

But glimpsed her second hand

On the backs of spoons and polished floors,

In a finger-smudged brass escutcheon

Or the yawn of a classroom door

I the savant, she my time

Penning the need for her on every lesson.

Skirting conversations, like

An expectant father fielding questions,

Flies undone.

Years later

Tight with drink and starving

I found Yvonne shovelling chips to midnight bums,

Air thick with grease and chat-up lies.

Head bowed low,

Staring into boiling fat.

In the back room,

Pressed hard against a frosted pane

A young boy wore my face

With no appetite for pity

Wishing he was still at school

Invisible

2014-11-21T14:43:00.001+00:00

Sometimes when I venture out for a newspaper or a carton of milk I feel as though another tiny part of me has disappeared. This gradual body depletion is difficult to quantify as I know I’m still virtually the same person I was yesterday, with the possible exception of an extra grey hair or newfound wrinkle. It’s as though the more routine and predictable my journeys are the more insignificant I become. Perhaps I should attempt to halt or even reverse this slow disappearing act with a naked one-man-band impersonation in the dead of night?

It also seems as though the less I interact with my surroundings the more the invisibility is accelerated. A hearty ‘good morning’ or ‘lovely weather today’ with any complete stranger tells me I’m still here. It’s when I refuse to engage with my fellow humans or choose to hide myself under hats, and behind sunglasses that the situation is exacerbated.

Certain senior citizens can slip through our observational nets without even trying. Their body language, gait, and dress all conspire to render them a kind of walking background noise. A particular brand of adolescent filters out these urban ghosts because they refuse to accept or believe that one day they too will be shuffling towards Tesco’s with a beige and orange shopping trolley wondering if they remembered to lock the front door or turn off the cooker. Either that or they see no personal advantage from elderly interaction.

If I stopped going out would anyone miss me? I could always don a disguise such as a false beard or wig and discover for myself. I’d frequent my usual haunts and say something like:

“Whatever happened to that middle aged guy who used to come in here day after day for his paper and carton of milk? The newsagent might scratch his head or frown and say:

“Oh you mean that quiet fella who wore the same drab clothes? Dunno, praps he moved away or died?” Not exactly a heartfelt eulogy is it? Mind you, I could always stick up for the mute fashion disaster with some heartfelt anecdote or even suddenly unmask myself with a jubilant “Fooled Ya!”

I think some days we feel more anonymous than ever, wearing our transience or disconnection like a heavy overcoat. I also think we prefer to make a conscious decision to emerge from our prospective dwellings ‘camouflaged and unremarkable’ or not at all, because we don’t wish to stand out and be noticed. We can’t all be in the limelight at the same time. Sometimes it’s infinitely more preferable to watch a firework display than to try and be the firework itself.

A few years ago, I wrote a poem about an elderly man who was released from a mental health establishment to fend for himself in the community. Sure, he was told he had the backup of a CPN (Community Psychiatric Nurse) twenty four seven, but this man had fallen into a daily routine so entrenched that no one was ever going to alter him. Unlike me, he was extremely visible, until one day he completely disappeared. Below is my tribute to him.

Noel

Noel Coward lives in our street.

Each day at nine he promenades

wearing his best Oxfam smoking jacket,

recently died fawn slacks

And beige slippers

First he pats his pockets,

before taking out an imaginary cigarillo

clamping one hand to his forehead,

mouthing “ooh silly me” and,

realising fags are normally filter first

removes it, bows and re-inserts.

Once lit, he stands at the pedestrian crossing

on Prospect Road parodying an old prostitute,

soliciting winks from passers’ by,

Taking great sucks of his pincer’ed butt

Like a reverse breathalyser

Blowing pseudo-smoke rings at traffic cops

His gait is something to behold.

Not quite John Cleese from the ministry

more a speed skater in slow-mo

who trips over an imaginary toe

and slews to a teetering stop

I heard he feigned death

in Granton Park,

doing a very convincing heart attack.

Trouble was, the pretend Paramedic

Arrived too late

As did the imaginary undertaker, leaving

an eight-year-old girl feeding swans

to mark the body

face down in the lake

with two soggy rounds of bread

and a mouldy bap

Fine

2014-11-11T19:24:00.000+00:00

Fine is for weather and leather, like new

Fine is for trinkets and diamonds like dew

Fine is for lying, when platitudes suit

Fine is for proving an engineer’s truth

Fine is for wining and dining and such

Fine is for sex- tales, ol honesty’s crutch

Fine is the tip-toe to madness and back

Fine is the heart-ache that screams ‘Heart attack!’

Fine is the wife who perpetually wants

Fine is the stitch on the silk of her pants

Fine is like ‘nice’ when applied to our lives

A shortcut for boredom, a home for our lies

Fine is for weather

And leather, like new

Fine is for trinkets and diamonds like you

2014-08-23T15:31:00.000+01:00

I wrote this a few years ago when I was putting together a children's Poetry Anthology called 'Stepping on Jellyfish'.

Feet

Funny things feet
You often see them in the street
Pacing, trotting, sliding, gliding
Housed in leather
Tied up
Neat

Ugly things feet
Mine are veiny pale and smelly
Like mini corpses
Or sleeping ghosts
Fed up of too much Telly

Useful things feet
Runners need them
Models feed them
Babies suck them
Cus they're good to eat

Ticklish things feet
Pins'n needles
Feathers, fingers
Keep them on their toes

Awkward things feet
Especially if you're drunk or tiddly
One insists, "I know the way"
The others half asleep.......

Good Writing

2014-07-09T08:50:00.000+01:00

Good writers are like hen’s teeth. It’s relatively easy to report or relay information on a subject the writer has a background in. It’s much harder to take any subject matter and serve it up in a way that is both entertaining and informative. Good writing, unlike grammar, punctuation and spelling cannot be taught. Sure, creative writing courses are filled to the gunnels with wannabe wordsmiths convinced they’ll be the next J.K Rowling or Phillip Pullman. I should know I’ve attended the good, the bad and the downright appalling. Good writing should appear effortless to the reader when in reality the author has spent hours ruthlessly editing and tinkering with his or her work to make it the best it can be. It should be concise, immediate and pull the reader in.

I also believe good writing should take risks. The English language is constantly evolving and growing as more words in common usage make their way into the OED. Writers are no longer constrained by traditional sentence structure or punctuation and the best of new writing illustrates this. Poets are literary ‘test pilots’ who are constantly pushing the envelope by challenging the status quo. Great poets lead us through an unfamiliar, almost alien landscape where we don’t have a clue what’s around the next stanza. They are in effect striving to produce ‘The Lorenzo’s Oil’ of Literature. This is distilled into being by a fair amount of nail-hitting, atom-splitting and advanced rabbit-out-of-the-hat-ology. It usually begins with a rendering of pain, joy or poignancy by trimming off fatty irrelevance and scratching out insipid detail.

At some point that will-o-the-wisp ‘The Muse’ usually helps out, but this relies on the conscious and subconscious getting along and we writers know they have a reputation for caprice and ephemerally bad behaviour. Finally, and most importantly you need to imagine your poem trying to describe to some heartless alien how your first kiss felt, not forgetting to be beautifully vague and leave curious voids on the page.

It can also be difficult to pace one’s writing correctly. Cadence and rhythm are vital in carrying a story forward. If a writer runs hell for leather through the first few paragraphs it soon collapses in a wheezing heap after only a few pages. Conversely, if they choose to wade through treacle with long leaden sentences then readers tend to extricate themselves before the end of the first chapter. It’s all about balance. Readers relish the quiet calm interludes just as much as the frenetic action scenes. The best books make us walk, jog and race along with them giving our minds a comprehensive workout as we travel towards the last page.

Finally, and in my mind most importantly, all good short stories and novels need big believable characters in order to exist and to thrive. I operate on the principle of character first, story second. Victoria Wood once said “Great characters can be lifted and placed in any situation without any loss of impact or plot deterioration” I know she was referring to situation comedy, but the rules still apply to both short and longer works of fiction. If you can nail a character in the first page then the reader will want to stay with them till the last sentence. You only need to look at the works of Dickens to appreciate the sheer beauty of perfectly crafted characters that burn brightly in our memory long after the story has faded away

Do?

2014-06-21T13:36:00.000+01:00

Do fishes dream of growing legs

And skating in the park

Do hippo’s wish their mouths were small

Not cavernous and dark

Do cheetahs ever blow a fuse

When running at top speed

Do elephant’s sometimes forget

They left their trunk to feed

Do Camels spit because

They saw a young boy do it first

And when frogs are blowing up their faces

Does the odd one burst

Does a falcon always spot its prey

When falling from the sky

Or does it sometimes blink too fast

With a tear it cannot cry

Do swallows really fall sleep

Upon the wing at night

And if they do, who tucks them in

All safe and snug and tight

10 minutes

2014-06-06T17:04:00.001+01:00

We met at a Service Station

Somewhere off the M6

She, with London eyes and a Bradford smile

Me, with kitbag and case

Headed for Basic Training, beasting and half-arsed-bonding

She threw me a smile.

A lazy, scented lasso slipped over my heart

And reeled me in

We talked of Mum’s tears

And Dad’s warm, ‘Just in case’ scrunched up notes

Palmed off between a lengthy hug.

Nodding sisters’ eager to claim bedrooms

Before the front door, slammed shut.

I gave her a lift as far as Watford

Two hours tried on 10 minutes for size

And liked the fit.

In the need to be heard

Neither of us really listened

To what the other said.

Except perhaps the space between words

Where hope, love and luck

Reside

And where possibilities queue

Like children

Showing off at their own birthday party

Mime

2014-03-30T08:33:00.000+01:00

Noel Coward lives in our street.

Each day at nine he promenades

wearing his best Oxfam smoking jacket,

recently died fawn slacks

and slippers

First he pats his pockets,

Before taking out an imaginary cigarette

Clamping one hand to his forehead,

And mouthing “ooh, silly me”,

realising fags are normally filter first

he removes it, bows and re-inserts.

Once lit, he stands at the pedestrian crossing

on Weston Road, parodying an old prostitute,

soliciting winks from passers’ by,

taking great sucks at his pincer’d butt

like a reverse Breathalyzer

and blows smoke rings at traffic cops

His gait is something to behold.

Not quite John Cleese from the ministry

more a speed skater in slow-mo

who trips over an imaginary toe

And skids to a teetering stop

I heard he feigned death,

doing a very convincing heart attack.

Trouble was, the pretend Paramedic

arrived too late

as did the invented undertaker, leaving

an eight-year-old girl feeding swans

to mark the body

face down in the lake

with two soggy rounds of bread

and a moldy bap

My Shadow

2014-03-21T09:20:00.000+00:00

My shadow leads I follow

It falls behind I wait

Like a Mum with a toddler

I know it’s me

But still I question its authenticity

Grilling it for signs of street lit fakery

Or airbrushed incredulity

When the moon is full

And the sky clear

My bold shadow walks purposefully on

While I slope behind.

Is darkness its enemy?

Or is it a merely a meeting of many

Gossiping about our fragile selves

Then sleeping

Like so many dogs have done

At the foot of my bed.

The Bright Eyes of Summer

2014-03-14T19:54:00.001+00:00

Si-mon? Dad said, softly

and I knew, between the syllables

a life had gone

In the background

mums’ cries rose then fell

as grief dropped, then carried her off

again.

I listened, shock congealing

staring into the bright eyes of summer

supplanting my unsightly face with

a short business-like shower.

I gently lowered the receiver

like a stunned sparrow

I hit the front door head on, like a drunk

flung it open

sleep-running my way down some hostile lane

towards a Pub,

I forget its name.

The landlord poured me a dark brown drink

sighing, saying England were 223 for 7

I nodded

thinking how Sam hated driving

and that freaks who gawped at car wrecks

wanted hanging

The Last Snowflake

2014-01-23T19:20:00.001+00:00

At Cloud Central, things were getting interesting. The cloud in question was so full of water, it kept hitting the tops of tall buildings and hills as it dragged its heavy cargo across the countryside. If clouds could talk this one would be swearing, a lot.

Inside, all the tiny droplets of water were waiting. They stood in long rows like nervous soldiers, looking for signs from their cloud mother that it would soon be time to go.

Unfortunately, a few impatient drops couldn’t wait for Momma’s big green light, so they just jumped anyway and hoped for the best. The cloud hardly felt a thing as a few thousand droplets all joined hands and shouted ‘Geronimo’!

Sadly, the cold North Wind was far too busy making pretty patterns on a large lake to notice the kamikaze bunch as they slipped past him, catching a team of practising footballers by surprise. The coach tried to put up his large golfing brolly, but the shower was over before it opened.

High above in the heavily pregnant cloud, the light switched from red to amber and five billion babies all shouted ‘Yes!’

“Any second now” said Sam, a fat little female, shaking like a watery jelly. She didn’t have to wait long. The amber light flickered, dimmed and was replaced by a bright green “GO”. The mother cloud thought about adding some special effects, like thunder or lightening. After all it was nearly Christmas. At the very last second she decided against it, so as not to frighten a large herd of cow’s right underneath her trailing skirts.

Right on cue, the North wind stopped doodling and went to meet the latest batch of wannabe snowflakes. A migrating flock of Canada Geese put pay to the dreams of a few thousand, as they sliced through them in a huge grey arrow formation. Luckily, Sam wasn’t amongst this first wave. She was busy trying to unstick herself from a small red spider that had hitched a ride over from France.

“You need to shake your third leg, not your fourth!” screamed Sam, pulling and twisting as hard as she could. The spider was far too busy repairing a small hole in his cobweb parachute to hear her.

“This cannot be happening to me”. Yelled Sam. Come on, or I’ll miss my chance!” She could see all her brothers and sisters below her, whooping with excitement. Finally, the spider stepped back to examine his handiwork and felt a little trickle of water on the hairs of his third leg, so he shook her off.

“Ye-s!” yelled Sam, feeling the air rushing past her chubby little body as she fought to stay in shape.

“They never mentioned this at flight school.” Every few seconds her arms and legs would break free and Sam had to suck them back in again before they left her body for good.

A few thousand feet below, the North Wind was working his magic. He liked this part of the job, because he got to create something amazing for a change. Most of the time he just pushed stuff about, like some old caretaker pushing an icy broom. Talking of ice, he started blowing gently on the water babies, as though they were pollen. Little by little the soft squidgy droplets began to freeze. He gave them tiny transparent bones from which new hands and feet started to sprout.

He also loved the sound they made as they froze - like someone rubbing the side of a balloon. A billion or so laughing, squeaking snowflakes is a noise the wind never wants to forget.

Sam was getting closer. She squeezed herself into a narrow spikey shape so she could fall a bit faster. It seemed to be working. The wind got louder and louder. Above the streets and houses, flurries of just - born snowflakes whirled and danced. Some stuck to chimney pots and TV aerials. Others banded together in clumps, for safety.

The earliest arrivals sacrificed themselves, melting into the tarmac like tiny white ghosts. Before long though, they stopped melting and started settling. Delicate lace footprints began appearing on the streets and pavements as more and more snowflakes were born.

And then, as quick as it had begun, the snowflakes stopped falling. People looked up into the sky, their mouths wide open, as if to say “is that it?” The North Wind stopped blowing too and had a quick look around to check for any stragglers.

“Hey! Yelled Sam, as loud as she could. Wait for me!” It was too late; the North Wind sighed deeply and started to move away. This was a disaster for Sam. She’d come so far. It couldn’t end like this, it just couldn’t.

Now, as a rule, an empty-headed cloud isn’t the most reliable of mothers, but for some reason this one had very good hearing. She heard Sam’s tiny voice and decided to help out. Even though it was most definitely ‘against the rules’ she produced a small bolt of lightning and fired it right in front of the winds face.

“What the... said the North Wind looking upwards. Doesn’t she read her own memos?” As he looked up he caught sight of something twinkling in the sunlight. He moved a little higher and saw a small, fairly insignificant water droplet falling like a dart.

“There’s always one.” Said the wind, smiling broadly. He took a deep breath, as though he was about to blow down a large tree and let fly. By the time it reached Sam it wasn’t half as strong, and she felt herself changing as she fell to earth.

So this is what it’s like – being a snowflake? She thought, as she stared wide-eyed at the new icy ball gown forming around her. The kind North Wind sighed for the last time and blew off to make some mischief with a so-called windproof skyscraper.

In back gardens all over town, children were already throwing snowballs and making snowmen and women, while their parents took them gloves and hot cups of tea. In one particular house though, there were no children playing, nor were there any signs of life, at all. Sam was almost at the ground, and she too sighed and smiled like the North Wind, because her only wish had finally been granted and she didn’t mind what happened next.

On the top floor of the dark, silent house a window creaked open and a rather wrinkly hand came out. The hand belonged to a very sad old lady who had just lost her husband. She shivered at the cold air on her hand and was just about to pull it in when she squinted up into the sky.

“It can’t be.” She said, screwing up her red-rimmed eyes.

“You’d better believe it!” shouted Sam as she threw out her tiny frosted arms and legs. The old lady slowly opened her fingers and watched as Sam came to rest on her cold bony hand. A face that had cried so many tears the night before, cried one more just as Sam, the last little snowflake melted away.

Snake Eyes

2013-11-26T21:12:00.003+00:00

Mirrors are curious things. Monica's was no exception. It had started life in the Penny-Wise furniture shop on Frenton Street. Then, its reflections were fairly mundane and transitory, consisting of an uninterrupted view of three table legs, one wicker chair and the occasional browsing shin. That was until Monica caught her ankle on its splintered frame as she made a balletic attempt to inspect a rusting tumble drier, sandwiched between a Welsh dresser and a rather dubious mahogany fireplace.

"Jee-sus!'' she screamed, rubbing her injured leg whilst hopping on the other one.

''Can I help you at all?'' enquired an elderly gentleman; wearing faded brown overalls complete with sawdust epaulets and paint-splash buttons. ''Are you hurt? Do you need assistance? Are you bleeding?''

The questions flowed from his lips without waiting for answers. It was though he'd been rehearsing in private, and now that the curtains were up, he'd succumbed to stage fright and fluffed his lines. During the interrogation Monica backed into a table, brushed off the dust and sat down, tugging at the hem of her black micro mini which barely covered her thighs. She attempted to cross her legs, but a cast iron sewing machine prevented her from doing so.

"This place is a bloody health hazard. How is anyone expected to find anything? I only came in for a tumble drier and got assaulted by a...''

She paused, picking up the offending article...

''Poxy Mirror!''

One of the gilt brackets at the top had captured a little tag of skin and stocking, which flapped as she waved it.

"Please madam. That is a valuable Japanese lacquered mirror. It shouldn't be in here.'' May I?'' He shuffled towards her, shimmying through the slalom of jagged corners and jutting nails, with consummate ease. The note of urgency in the old man's voice, coupled with the speed at which he crossed the room unsettled Monica. Something tugged at a buried memory, something familiar. It was like a blind tasting, she recognised the flavour but not the food. Before it could crystallise, the shopkeeper snatched the mirror away, and began polishing it with a piece of rag he'd pulled from a deep front pocket.

"Excuse me!'' she protested. If I'd only known it was a valuable antique, I wouldn't have bled all over it.”

He propped the mirror on his knee and continued polishing, with light deft strokes, stopping every now and then to breathe on the glass. The silence was punctuated by the oil-hungry squeal of the letter box followed by a dull thud on the doormat.

“Excuse me madam”, said the old man, bowing slightly. He carefully placed the freshly polished mirror in a vacant magazine rack before going to collect the mail. Monica decided against picking it up in case she lost a finger. She bent down to examine her injury and was relieved to discover a small triangular graze close to an old scar. She stroked it, feeling the ridge of dead skin under her fingertips and remembered how it had happened. She was about twelve or thirteen and was trying on a pair of her mother’s tights and high heels. She stood facing a full-length mirror admiring herself in rucked and wrinkled 20 denier, pursing her lips like a page three model. It was when she attempted a full 360 degree twirl that the pedals of a retired exercise bike found her ankles and left three deep lacerations. It wasn’t the stitches that frightened her, but the removal of the tights which were enmeshed with her own dried blood. Soaking only helped a little.

“Right, where were we?” said the shopkeeper clutching a large brown envelope to his chest.

“Tumble drier?”

“No, sorry. We only sell Objet D’art and bric-a-brac. Try Henshaws four doors down.” He turned and started to walk away before Monica could answer.

“Don’t worry your bald little head about me. I’m fine” she whispered, checking her makeup in the door of a small bathroom cabinet. She couldn’t be bothered to tell him she was leaning against a tumble drier, albeit a very ancient and corroded one. As she tried to fathom the best route out of the musty little death trap, she felt a cool draught at the back of her neck. The fire exit was propped open by an old washing machine and she slipped out before the old man could accuse her of loitering. While she tried to get her bearings she noticed the passage was lined with hundreds of old mirrors. It was like some vast looking glass graveyard.

“There must be at least a thousand years of bad luck lying around?” Some of the mirrors looked antique, and, had it not been for the ravages of the British climate Monica was sure some of them might have been salvageable.

“What a waste.” She said. “Mind you, perhaps the old git’s got a thing for old mirrors. When he gets bored with one it ends up here to rot with the rest of them.” She smiled, and saw the shape of a car bonnet flash accross the bottom of the alleyway. Her thoughts switched from mirrors to the hunt for a new, old tumble drier. What was the name of that place? Hentons? Hendons? Henshaws, that was it.

As she negotiated the bags of rubbish and discarded mirrors, her ankle started to sting a little. Instinctively, she bent down to see if the blood had super glued itself to her tights. It had. While she was down there, trying to tease the nylon away from her skin she noticed something glinting in the sunlight. Reaching over she pulled back a dirty plastic bag and saw it was the very same instrument of torture that had caused her injury. What’s it doing out here? He can’t be tired of it already? She lifted the deceptively heavy frame up to check it still held a piece of her ankle, which it did. He was right; the mirror was probably at least a hundred years old and lacked the flawless finish of modern, mass produced versions. Near the gold frame, some of the silvering had flaked off, which added to its appeal. Quickly, she wrapped it in the polythene bag and teetered out into the busy street, turning left instead of right to avoid the old man’s shop window. For a small mirror it was deceptively heavy, and the sharp wall brackets soon dug into her fingers.

Then another childhood memory chose to re-surface. This time she was twelve. It was cold and dark. Martin, her brother was walking in front of her. She could see the breath-smoke rising from his head as he talked. They were carrying an old sash window, that weighed a ton. Martin kept assuring her they were nearly at the bonfire, and when they got there she could smash the window if she wanted to. She remembered thinking why on earth have I agreed to be his slave for the night? Then the agony in her fingers dragged her back to reality.

The tumble drier will have to wait, she thought. I’ll drop this off first, before I get a blister. Thankfully her flat was only three streets away. Each time someone walked past she experienced a strange rush of nervous excitement, as she imagined a cat burglar might, returning home with some priceless air loom tucked inside his tight leather jacket. Once inside the flat she unwrapped her swag and had a proper look at it. Monica loved the way the glass rippled slightly, like warm toffee, as well as the tiny air bubbles locked-in for over a century. For someone so obsessed with her own physical appearance one might imagine her being repulsed by such an imperfect ornament. A quick scan around her spotless, minimalist flat would do nothing to suggest otherwise.

The frame was filthy, so she rubbed at it with the corner of a damp serviette. At first the stubborn grime refused to budge, but gradually a few patches of gold started to appear. She rubbed a little harder, and two tiny red dots emerged. They were smooth and hard, like beads or possibly drops of coloured lacquer. This fuelled her curiosity even more, so she decided to wheel out the big guns, in the form of an old tooth brush and a pan of hot soapy water. She’d read some article in Cosmopolitan or Country Life, during a fairly mediocre manicure, about restoring antiques. It cautioned against over cleaning, so she bit the bullet and soaked first before gently brushing off the dirt.

Each passing minute revealed another bit of the strange eastern design. If she held it one way it resembled a Chinese stylised Dragon, but if she turned it round it looked like a mythical sea monster coming up for air. She expected it to feel hard and unyielding to the touch, but it was almost like stroking the skin of a living reptile, slightly leathery and almost warm. Monica assumed it was warm because of the water, but when she dipped her finger in the pan, the liquid was stone cold.

She glanced up and saw a mobile phone vibrating its way along the edge of her glass coffee table. A well-timed lunge and grab stopped it from committing suicide on the polished parquet floor. Her friend Sophie’s face grinned back at her from the screen and Monica realised she was very late for her Wednesday Pilates class. Ordinarily she’d have taken the call and traded shopping stories with her, but for some reason she rejected it and went back to studying the mirror.

“It’s only Pilates. Sophie will understand.” Said Monica, tracing her finger along the serpents body. By rotating the frame she realised it was composed of not one, but four monsters all chasing each other towards eternity, or their next meal, whichever came first.

“Now, the next question is where to put you?” she said, pursing her lips. Only one of the four walls held any decoration. Gordon, an ex-boyfriend (who just happened to be an artist) had donated his own abstract landscape painting. Monica squinted at it, tilting her head slightly. She failed to see any of the ‘wanton desolation’ or ‘stark hopelessness’ he kept banging on about. She thought it looked more like someone attempting to cover up a crack in the wall with a gob of Polly filler. The only reason she’d agreed to put it there in the first place, was so as not to hurt his feelings, and because it was one of his much smaller works. Taking it down made her feel purged of any residual fondness for gorgeous Gordon.

“Sophie will lap you up” she said, sliding the picture behind her white leather settee. Luckily, the hooks were still intact, as were the brackets on the back of the mirror.

“Your next mission Monica, should you decide to accept it is to hang the bloody thing up.” The words were spoken in her best Sean Connery Glaswegian accent, which, on reflection she felt was a little too Rab C Nesbitt.

“Now Gordon, where did you leave my stepladder?” she said, walking from room to room, randomly opening doors and cupboards like a lazy house burglar. In the bedroom, feeling very irritated by her own lack of practical know how, she fell onto the King Sized divan, shouting swear words into the goose down pillow and beating her tiny fists on the duvet. Once the tantrum was over she jumped off the bed, grabbed her faux Louis XIII chair from under the secretaire and dragged it behind her like a spoilt child dragging a well-loved teddy bear.

“How hard can it be?” she said, placing the chair under the marble fireplace and stepping gingerly onto the hand-stitched upholstery. By standing on tip-toe she could just touch the wall mounting.

“Hmmm, I need more height. I wonder?” She rocked the chair backwards and forwards until it started to jump a few inches. Eventually, it became wedged under the mantelpiece. From there she used the back struts as a rudimentary ladder and climbed up onto the fireplace. Even though she’d used her new found initiative in assuming the role of handyman there was a fatal flaw in her approach. Unless, by some miracle she’d suddenly become Mary Poppins, no amount of frantic waving would cause the mirror to fly up into her hands.

“Bloody hell!” she shouted, almost losing her balance on the polished Carrera marble. Then, calmly, with her back to the wall she narrowed her eyes, did a slow neck roll, took a deep breath and dived off the mantelpiece. Three seconds before she made the decision to jump something happened to the mirror. One of the lacquered serpent’s red eyes began to glow, like the standby light on a TV. At the very same time, Monica experienced a warm feeling in the pit of her stomach which spread upwards into her chest and arms. She suddenly felt as though she could do anything she wanted, and what she wanted to do right that very second was take flight.

If someone, say for arguments sake her friend Sophie, had popped over for a chat and had had the foresight to capture the moment on film, she might have dismissed Monica’s blood-red eyes as a common photographic anomaly. Alas there was no Sophie, no camera and no anomaly. Monica’s eyes burned with the same intensity as the serpents, right up to the point she should have landed on the settee’s soft leather cushions. Instead, her confidence vanished at the exact moment the fire in both sets of eyes went out. She overshot it by three feet, hitting the back wall head on. Monica’s neck snapped, like someone breaking a fistful of spaghetti.

A few minutes later, her phone vibrated again and Sophie’s smiling face appeared. When it stopped buzzing an altogether different sound took over. Sophie, or for that matter Monica may have said it sounded like a dried face-pack cracking, possibly because of uncontrollable laughter or a deep frown.

One of the serpents circling the frame began to swell, as though someone was slowly inflating it. The tail thickened and twitched as it grew. Then the jaws began to rise like a pair of minute bellows drawing life into the creature. It shed it’s man-made skin of gold paint and varnish, revealing a glistening jade green body stamped with black diamonds. It lifted its head and tasted the air with a flicking pink arrow and slithered off its wooden prison. As it skidded over the mirror, it hissed at it’s own reflection and went in search of its first proper meal in a very long time.

The intercom buzzed twice, stopped and then buzzed again. The small black and white monitor above the phone flickered into life revealing a young woman standing next to the security gate waving frantically at the camera. Then Monica’s phone vibrated into life, and from behind the sofa the serpent lifted its head and hissed loudly as if to say “go away, can’t you see I’m busy!”

Jenny's Sledge

2013-11-12T17:15:00.001+00:00

On the first day it snowed very heavily and very quickly, as though the snow itself had something to prove. On the second day it wasn’t quite so keen, and by the third it was very much an ‘Oh, do I have to’ sort of affair, when anyone could count each lonely snowflake – if they felt that way inclined.

Professor Medwin (the third) did exactly that. He laid out an enormous black ‘snow catcher’ on his five acre field and sat up all night with a hot flask of rum and coffee counting flakes. When he got to three thousand he lost his voice and fell asleep, and was soon dreaming about receiving some big flashy award in the shape of a giant gold snowflake.

Most of the children in the little village of Meedham were all snowed out. They’d thrown snowballs till their fingers were numb and made so many snowmen and women that they outnumbered the villagers two to one. The one thing they hadn’t done was sledge.

It wasn’t as though there was a shortage of hills, or snow for that matter. It was mainly because of the ‘incident with the Lord Mayor’ which meant that all sledging was banned for the next five years. Anyone caught with a car inner tube or a tea tray would have it taken away and placed in an empty police cell until after the ban. There were even sledge police who patrolled the village in hollowed out snowmen disguises, so they could spy on any would-be sledgers with super-powered binoculars and beefed-up microphones

They were quite easy to spot, with radio aerials poking out the top of their round snowy heads and large glass eyes that blinked in the winter sunshine. Even ‘accidental sledging’ was frowned upon, and children and old people were encouraged to wear huge heated boots that hissed when they walked, leaving large steaming footprints wherever they went.

That was four years ago.

Jenny was exactly twelve years old and had never even seen a sledge. She’d seen home videos of her Brother Albert sledging down Bandstand Hill with Mum and Dad. She always paused the film at the bit where Alby shot through some old guy’s legs and scattered a group of people like skittles. Even though she knew what was coming she still roared with laughter and pushed her nose into the TV Screen when he ploughed into the small crowd.

Dad had promised to build her the best sledge in the world, once the ban was lifted. She even bought a special ‘1 year to go’ calendar so she could cross of the remaining days with a thick red marker pen. Today was day number 350, and she felt 15 days was ample time to build a super-fast, show-stopping sledge. After seventy four pleases fourteen car washes and countless dog walking, he finally gave in.

“I’m gonna get a sle-edge, I’m gonna get a sle-edge” sang Jenny, doing that ‘stirring with a large wooden spoon’ victory dance that girls of a certain age like to do. Meanwhile, her father started thumbing through the yellow pages for flat-pack sledges. It turned out there weren’t any such businesses and even those companies that did do flat pack furniture hadn’t got anything remotely sledge like. It was no good; he’d have to go round all the second hand shops in the village and look for an old sledge to do up. How hard could it be? A pot of varnish, some rust remover and a few new screws would surely transform any creaking, wonky death-trap into a sleek snow-lovin missile.

The huge ‘DO NOT DISTURB – MASTER SLEDGE BUILDER AT WORK’ sign, propped up against the garage doors only made things worse. Instead of acting as a deterrent it turned his daughter into a proper ‘Peeping Jenny’.

“Da-ad, is it finished yet? I think the snow’s melting.” Inside, Dad sat in his old battered armchair banging a plank of wood with the head of a broken hammer, sighing heavily.

“Not quite Jen. You don’t want me to rush and spoil it do you?” Jenny’s face hatched another frown, and she kicked at the snow.

“Spose not. I don’t mind if it’s not the best sledge in the world. The second best will do fine – honest.” This made her father’s voice change from a confident deep baritone to a rather strained tenor.

On day 364 Jenny could hardly contain herself. In terms of nervous excitement, Christmas Day was a walk in the park compared to this. Each time she tried to steer her Dad towards the ‘big unveil’ he steered her back to safer territory like cute boys and X-Factor. In the end, her mum beat her to the punch line.

“For heaven’s sake Roger, is it finished or not? The forecast says it’s going to turn to slush by Friday.” Roger winced at the mention of the ‘S’ word and waited for Jenny’s reaction.

“Slush! Slush! If it melts I’m going to live with Candice. Her Dad’s built her and her brother a sledge each. And they’re convinced theirs are the 2 fastest toboggans in Meedham.” She glared at her Dad before storming out of the room. Roger felt like the Grinch who’d stolen Christmas and Easter. He decided to take the dog for a long walk, so he could think what to do next.

Brinks, the podgy Labrador was already on his third dream and had to be tipped out of his giant padded life-raft. Roger clipped on his extendable lead and dragged him out of the house. The night was cold and clear and the moon looked so big and so near that he almost ducked underneath it as he closed the front door. He liked this time of day. The roads were quiet. He also liked sneaking a peek through the windows of the houses as he trudged along. Brinks was slowly coming out of unconsciousness and began sniffing his favourite yellow snow. Roger realised he hadn’t got any poop bags in his pocket, so every time Brinks approached a lamp post he yanked him away.

On the edge of the village he decided to walk as far as the canal and come back via the new gated estate, so he could check the football scores on the big plasma tellies. He passed a large Skip and Brinks started doing that ‘special walk’ that all dog owners dread.

“Brinks! No! Not here! It was too late, Brinks meant business. After an awkward thirty seconds with lots of whistling and pacing, Brinks scratched a hole through the snow and started pulling like a homesick Husky. Roger almost fell over, and steadied himself on the top of the skip. As he stood up he noticed something sticking out from under a large plaster board. He tilted his head sideways and couldn’t make his mind up whether it was a rocking chair or a… He leaned in a little closer. It was a sledge. A very old, rusty sledge, but a sledge nonetheless. By now, Brinks was straining and grunting and Roger was almost pulled off his feet.

“Brinks! Stop that!” The tension in the lead relaxed a bit, and Brinks sat down. Roger had a quick look around to check no-one was about, before hauling the sledge out of the skip. It was definitely a two-seater and had the words DAVOS painted in black along both runners. He placed it on the snow and tied the dog lead to the front.

“Mush Brinks! Mush!” Brinks looked back over his shoulder, his tongue fell out the corner of his mouth and he lay down.

“Come on Brinks. Home!” This seemed to do the trick. Brinks heaved himself up and started walking. Roger thought he’d better not sit on the sledge in case Brinks had a heart attack, so he walked alongside, kicking the runners to get it back on track. The grooves left by the sledge slowly changed from rust to beige, until by the time they reached the house they were standard snow colour. Roger also noticed that he didn’t have to steer the sledge as often and it glided almost noiselessly across the icy pavements. In fact a couple of times it went so fast it hit Brinks up the bottom, making him yelp with surprise.

Roger picked the sledge up and was amazed how light it was, as though the journey home had burned off a few woody calories. He placed it on the garage floor behind his armchair, and closed the heavy doors. Tomorrow he would assess the damage. With any luck, by lunchtime Jenny would be shooting down Bandstand hill like it was her very own Cresta Run.

That night neither Roger nor Jenny slept very well. Every time Roger turned to the right Jenny turned to the left, like very bad synchronised snoozers. At 6am they met on the landing, muttered ‘morning’ to each other, before going their separate ways.

Roger left a note on the kitchen table. It said:

IN GARAGE WAXING RUNNERS – WOULD LOVE A COFFEE AND 2 ROUNDS OF TOAST AT 10AM. P.S NO PEEKING JENNY.

In the daylight the rescued sledge looked even better. It was a vintage wooden toboggan fixed together with wooden dowels. The only none wooden bits were two strips of polished steel riveted to the runners. The varnish had flaked off here and there, but that could be easily fixed. Roger opted for a more modern, distressed finish and scrubbed the whole thing with a coarse wire brush.

For some reason, Brinks had decided to follow Roger into the garage and if he didn’t know any better he was sure the dog looked a little slimmer.

“It must be all that pulling you did last night boy”. He gave Brinks a friendly pat on the head and set the sledge down on the ground. “I think my work here is done Brinks.” The dog went over to the sledge, sniffed it, growled and then barked once before backing away.

“What’s up lad, can you smell another dog?” Brinks was out of the garage before Roger had finished speaking. He threw an old towel over his new baby and went to find Jenny and her Mother. He didn’t have to go far, as they were standing outside the garage comforting Brinks, who was whimpering softly.

“Right, said Roger. Would the Meedham Ladies Bobsleigh team care to inspect their new beast?” He opened both doors and gestured for them to follow. With a rather tuneless trumpet fanfare and his best bullfighters flourish he swished back the towel.

“Da-da!” Jenny ran forward and immediately sat on it, jamming both her feet into the upward curve of the runners.

“It’s big isn’t it Mum?” Her mother smiled, folded her arms and raised both eyebrows.

“Where d’you get it? Junk shop or Skip?”

“I, I … found it in a skip, near the canal. It was in a terrible state. I had to virtually rebuild it and make all the dowels…” The look on mum’s face had ‘pull the other one’ written all over it. Jenny was too busy negotiating imaginary obstacles on her maiden run to notice the parental stand-off. She didn’t see her Dad placing an index finger to his lips, or Mum unfolding her arms to give Roger a grade 1 hug.

“We need some string, on the front. So I can pull Davos along” said Jenny, getting off the sledge and running her fingers over the name on the side. Her Dad did another, quieter ‘da-da!’ and produced a pair of pink leather bootlaces tied together. He looped the ends around the runners and carried it out of the garage. As soon as the runners hit snow Jenny was away, up the drive, pulling her sledge and whistling

“You’d better get after her, Master Sledge Builder.” Roger mimed ‘thank you’ and started running. He finally caught up with her as she rounded the bend near the police station. All the policemen were in the garden having a big bonfire. Jenny wasn’t quite old enough for irony, but she still thought it odd to see them throwing Snowmen into the flames, and doing a sort of weird fist-pumping war dance.

“I can’t see many sledges”. Said her Dad, slightly out of puff.

“I must have scared them off.” Said Jenny, laughing. A few minutes later they both realised why there weren’t any sledges in the streets.

At the entrance to Meedham Park they could see Bandstand Hill covered with people, most of them pulling sledges. There were home-made sledges, plastic car-shaped sledges, sledges in the shape of animals, as well as padded bin bags and old tea trays. Presiding over this ‘Sledge Fest’ was the Mayors number two. The Mayor didn’t want to tempt fate and risk another repeat ‘incident’ so he barked orders at the little man through a megaphone from the safety of his swanky limousine.

Jenny and Roger made it to the top of the hill just as the Deputy snipped the red ribbon strung between the bandstand and a large oak tree.

“Happy sledging!” shouted the deputy. His good wishes were drowned out by the deafening sound of two hundred excited children and parents all screaming “Go!” Jenny and her Dad squeezed onto Davos and started scooting along using their feet. Whether it was their combined weight or the fact there was a slight incline before the crest, who knows. By the time they got to the down slope, most of the sledges were being pulled back up for a second run. Jenny felt silly inching down the hill in her two man hearse and snatched the laces off her Father when she got to the bottom.

“This is not how I imagined it!” she said, marching back up the hill without him.

“You go on your own. I’ll wait here with my camera and capture your big finish.” Jenny wasn’t listening. She felt so embarrassed she could almost taste it. When she did get to the top, Candice and her brother Charles were waiting for her.

“What sort of stupid name is Davos?” said Candice, pointing at Jenny’s sledge.

“Is it Swedish for loser”, said Charles, moulding a fresh snowball.

“Actually it’s in Switzerland and is Europe’s highest town.” Where did that come from? Thought Jenny as she lined Davos up next to the ‘smug twins’. She bent down to tie her laces, and when she stood up Davos had slid sideways off the crest of the hill, coming to rest underneath the oak tree.

“Fancy a race?’’ said Candice, grinning like an idiot.

“Just you and me then” said Jenny. She looked over to where Davos had stopped. “I’ll start over there, if that’s ok with you?”

“Start where you like. I’ll see you at the bottom.” Candice pushed past Charles and jumped onto her sledge, lying face down. She ordered her brother to give her a push start. Jenny hadn’t time to call her a rotten cheat. She ran down to Davos and did her own running start. The sledge hardly moved at first, sinking into the deep snow, and Jenny had to do a sort of swimming action to get any movement at all. Meanwhile Candice had just disappeared from view and was already flying down the hill.

“Come on Davos! You can do it”. As soon as Jenny placed her hands back on the sledge something very strange happened. She felt as though the sledge was rising up through the snow. As it started to lift, the speed increased. The loud creaking stopped and was replaced by a sort of soft whishing sound, like the sound the reeds made next to the canal when a light breeze blew in. Jenny glanced over at Candice, who was still way in front. Then, she felt a jolt in her back and had to hang on for dear life. The whishing stopped and all Jenny could see were the other sledges going backwards. She felt the icy wind pushing against her face, and for one brief moment she thought she might break free from the ground altogether.

Her father didn’t press the shutter on his camera phone, because he never saw her. He did see a red blur fly past him and thought it was just a piece of the giant ribbon blown by the wind. Jenny came to a stop half way up the next hill and rolled off Davos, breathing hard. She gazed up into the blue sky, until the face of her Father loomed over the top of her.

“Did, did you get me?” said Jenny, smiling broadly, her hands still frozen in the ‘hanging on position’.

“Erm, I think so.”

“Well did you or didn’t you?” Roger felt a shiver run down his spine because Jenny sounded just like her mother.

“Not really”, said Roger sheepishly. Jenny got to her feet, brushed the snow off herself and looked back up the hill. She looked first left and then right. Where are my tracks? She thought. Her Dad was busy examining Davos. He was ninety nine per cent positive he hadn’t varnished it. He gleamed, like a brand new, fresh out of the wrapper sledge. The painted lettering along the side looked almost wet. The runners shimmered like polished silver and Roger thought he could smell fresh Pine resin.

Candice slunk into view, shook Jenny’s hand and slunk away, muttering something about ‘a fix’. Jenny didn’t pay her much attention. She just gazed back up the hill with her mouth open and pointed. The last few flakes of snow slowly turned first to sleet and then rain.

When everyone else had gone, the only people left at the bottom of Bandstand Hill were Jenny and her father, sitting silently next to each other on Davos. Both of them were staring back up the hill as patches of grass started to appear through the grey slush.

The rain was falling quite heavily now, and the Mayors Limo glided past with the back window down.

“It’s raining you know. Haven’t you got a home to go to?” No one answered. Neither Roger nor Jenny seemed that bothered by the downpour. They just stared up the steep hill, looked at each other and smiled.

Weir Thoughts

2013-11-04T18:44:00.002+00:00

It began with a slow freezing

My emotions frostbitten

into unfeeling.

Robots have it easy

doing but not knowing.

Repetition till extinction

I, on the other hand

stopped on the 1^st of August 2006

pronounced dead by my wife

who could not smell the decay

until it was too late.

She propped me up

And doused me in compassion

Before hauling my body out of bed

Like some bad tempered ventriloquist.

I remember seeing her mouth

Shouting obscenities.

So much spit in the words

Stupid! and shit!

Hot tears sliding off my chin

All I could think of

Was one question

searing my mind like

An SAS make or break

Interrogation.

Does some water never leave the weir?

The Fifth

2013-11-03T19:27:00.004+00:00

Last night, bonfires blazed

While rockets dizzied the stars.

Today, all is grey and forgotten.

A bored child kicks at a charred Guy

And slits open the spent skin

Of a Roman candle.

2013-10-30T08:14:00.002+00:00

http://www.rspb.org.uk/groups/northstaffordshire/news/340309/

The North Staffs branch of the RSPB have produced a book of poetry celebrating local wildlife. I'm one of the contributors. If you'd like a copy please click on the link and hey-presto.

Cheers

P.S I don't normally do plugs or links, but in this case it's a writing plug, so, what the hell. Take it or leave it.

P.P.S Please.

Shop Talk

2013-09-27T08:46:00.000+01:00

Shop Talk (1)

Due to popular demand, (an old lady who breezed in to the shop, failed to rent anything and said I should be a writer) I have decide to distill, condense and generally compress the funnier conversations, incidents and observations into a weekly blog-type format. So here goes :-

Thursday

All quiet until about 7pm, whereupon a couple came into the shop arguing about which dvd to select. The woman, an elfin be-pierced beauty, smelling like a 10 stone bath-bomb, demanded that her lust for blood be satisfied, or as she put it "What ave you got with ghosts and lots of blood in?" As she uttered these words I noticed her eyes brighten and both fists clench. Her roaming, gawky partner tutted loudly and shook his head. I dread customers who ask my opinion on must-see Horror flicks. My stock answer is something along the lines of "I'm afraid I don't watch much horror, but this is a popular rental." At this point I select a film at random and wave it around a bit. "Seen it." replied the elf, crouching down to peruse the older films. Clearly out of my filmic comfort zone I clutch at straws, churning out titles like a captured soldier, fearing imminent torture. While she rummages, he grabs two of the latest releases and slams them down on the counter. "Come on, we haven't got time for this!" he barks, thrusting a fiver in my direction. I ask for his membership details and deposit the warm, crumpled note in the till. The woman stands up, takes the two films and glares at the man, hand on hip. "Not these again. I don't know why we get two anyway. You always fall asleep before the end." I smile like an unpaid Marriage Guidance Counsellor and they both leave.

There are two types of housefly - Those that buzz in through an open window at speed, do a quick reccy of the place and then leave. The other type, those locked-in, lazy, brazen, blighters that crawl over every surface, probably realising their wings are now redundant. A swarm of these has taken over the shop. I attempt to ambush them with all manner of swatting implements - newspapers, flip-flops, tea-towels and all of my limbs, without success. They are probably the most fragrant insects on the planet, relishing the clouds of choking Febreze that I spray at them. Their favourite haunt is my laptop screen. Whether it's the warmth that attracts them, or the bright images I'm unsure. They even have the temerity to pause, clean their wings and legs while my quivering hand hovers inches above them. Enough is enough!Tomorrow, I'm going to buy some runny honey and lure them to a sticky end. Do flies like honey?

More Roaches Pics

2013-07-01T11:51:00.000+01:00

A few more pics of the Roaches, taken a couple of years ago.

Far Off Sadness

2013-06-04T07:54:00.000+01:00

This far-off sadness

Waits on a hill, until it sees

My burning house

Then it runs

Like a mother would

Towards the flames

Screaming my name

Over and over

Poem Pigeon Share an existing poem

2013-05-22T11:51:00.001+01:00

Poem Pigeon Share an existing poem

2013-05-20T11:21:00.001+01:00

Poem Pigeon Share an existing poem