What day would I go back to?

All the days in our lives,

Stretch out at first, then shrink,

Behind us, gone.

No rewind button for life,

No voicemail recording our every word.

Gone, long ago,  barely remembered. ..

What day would I go back to?

To hear parents voices again, and tell them

How much I loved them?

Or the first day at school, tell myself not to be so shy?

Trying to make perfume from rose petals as a child

Or older, wiser, learning to drive.

Time travel is a one way street, into the future.

If I could go back I would be pleased to meet you again.

Maybe visit a few less railways,

And see the sea a few more times.

Go back to holidays in Devon.

If I could go back I would say,

Don’t take that awful job,

Stay safe and well.

Don’t waste your life for a pay packet,

Let’s live and love.

 

The live and dead tree

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The live and dead tree sits hard on the ground.

One twist of bark still attached…

Like Ivy clinging to the trunk,

Twisted knotted rope like round and taut.

 

Green leaves, large and serrated, sprout out,

Twigs and branches caught in the embrace,

Dead wood holds up life to the sun,

Wise, wide trunk so aged.

 

How did you die?

We’re you struck, hit, broken, by wind or storm?

Did you find disease in your skin?

Is the clinging umbilicus of your wooden baby your clone?

 

Your age is ancient, your body skeletal.

Your upper limbs and branches peeled of all skin.

But still you sit hard on the ground,

Immortal, in a way reborn.

Smile

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I came across this last week. It was something I doodled when I was at work and I had it stuck on my computer for a few years…. that tiny little hand/paw trying to hold things together…the mouth stretched wide, with huge jaws…

It says smile,  but really it was a grimace, a smile through gritted teeth. I was feeling very low but didn’t want to tell anyone. It was about work, and people, but I used to just get on with things. I wouldn’t let them know they were getting to me. I would just look at this drawing and smile.

Sweet smile you tear at my mouth,

You pull the sides upwards into a rictus grin.

Corners pulled up like a weight lifter raising kilos above his head.

Crocodile smile?  No, more of a dinosaur grin…

Ancient, creaking, trying not to give in to atrophy.

Smile for the camera, twist your lips, show your teeth.

No don’t cry! Grin!