Tag Archives: free verse

A Thoughtful New Goodreads Review of Shadows and Birdsong

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I was very touched to read this new review of Shadows and Birdsong on Goodreads. Andrew Frank — who describes himself as “not a great follower of poetry” — found the book while sitting alone in a pub, and connected deeply with several poems.

He writes about:

  • “Umbrella” — a chance encounter that might have become something meaningful
  • “A Blackbird Sings” — which he reads as the pain of a long‑lost lover
  • “The Lady Behind the Bar” — a moment of emotional contrast between someone moving forward and someone feeling stuck

He ends with a gentle invitation: he’s still sitting in the bar with a copy, happy to discuss the poems further.

You can read his full review here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8934320938

To Walk Barefoot

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To walk through acorns

On Autumn lawns

While barefoot

Would give me pleasure

In this gentle weather.

 

But they might shut me up

Where the air

Is replete with bleach

And fluorescent lights

Burn day and night.

 

I would long for birdsong

And lawns

Littered with acorns.

 

I should walk barefoot.

I would attract strange looks.

But there would be no hospital ward.

To confine me.

Just the reward

Of autumn grass

Under my feet.

 

 

I should go

Before old time defeats

All I am

And see

 

Temporarily

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The heat has passed,

Temporarily.

The rain

Turns the grass

Green again.

 

Autumn draws near.

Another year

Will come.

But, if I am no longer here

Will it still be so?

 

Philosophers go

Down rabbit holes.

While I see

The rain

Has brought the greenery

Back again.

And I feel happy,

Temporarily.

I Have Sat on Bar Stools

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I have sat on bar stools

As fools

Pontificate in love and hate.

 

From on high,  I

Have judged women and men

Thinking myself superior to them

 

 

Yet in the quiet

Of morning time

I rhyme

Of imperfect man

And I who am

As them.

After the Rol Play (Fiction)

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We role played.

Afterwards you stayed

And spoke of your childhood

Which, on the whole, was good.

 

Then you told me

Of a family friend’s knee …

 

But now you are at university

And all that was long ago,

And besides, you do not know

Whether it was really so.

And of course you are free

To say “no”

To me

 

It happened years ago

And I have no responsibility

For what he may

Or may not have done.

 

 

Its just fun

To engage in role play.

No harm is done

Or so we say

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Early Morning

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Sitting in just

My boxer shorts

In the cool of a summer morning,

I think on is and ought.

 

 

I touch

My own skin.

And think how thin

Is the veil

That separates me

From the eternity

Of dust

 

Consumer

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A man in a sweet shop chooses

From a menu online.

The sweets are divine

The website says

So no-one loses.

 

The candy arrives

In pretty bows

And wrapping

Fragile as flowers.

 

He knows

How it goes:

The tapping of heels

Bring deals

Of sugar sweet

He can’t keep,

While the website

Offers fleeting delights

Of fresh flowers

He takes,

But his thirst

Remains unslaked

My Younger Self

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I sit here

Drinking beer

Alone at home

In this dying heatwave

Unable to forget

What I could not save.

 

 

As I drink

I think

Of girls who padded like cats

Around my bachelor’s flat

In their bare feet.

 

 

We drank wine

And, sometimes

I would find

A kind

Of comfort in a stranger’s arms.

 

A few  left charms behind.

A hairband

I kept in a drawer,

Though I saw her no more.

 

I returned hair extensions.

There was no pretention

Of love.

 

Drinking my beer

I look back on half wasted years.

There where tears and laughter

But what comes after …

 

Perhaps I can find

A sort of tenderness

Tinged with regret.

 

 

I can not forget

And sometimes wonder

What they remember

Of me

In the Quiet Time

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In the quiet time

Before I go online

I see the sunshine

Fall on my office walls.

 

If I could stay

And watch the sunlight play

I would be happy,

Temporarily.

 

I have seen another January

Come and go

And trust I will see

The coming spring

Bring flowers to me.

 

 

But man’s hours

Are brief as flowers

And I may go

And not know

January or spring

The Human Heart and Art

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In the early morning

Before the birds are heard

I think on light

And dark

And how the human heart

Makes art.

For we are light

And dark