Over the Garden Wall

There are scurrying’s and scrapings

In our neighbour’s plot beyond

A brick wall shrouded mystery

Builder’s dungarees are donned

Squeaky wheels and gravel grinds

Curious heaving grunts and groans

Planks of wood its understood

Give barrow gangways over stones

My wife stood on my shoulders high

Too understand the build upon

Maybe a shed or swimming pool

Or lines to hang their washing on

Dedicated to Jonathan Duggleby and his mysterious spirit level

Get Up Get Out it's Saturday

Saturday a choosing day

A perky day for what’s on next

Doing recreation things

Dodging states of being vexed

Letting go of tiring manacles

That weigh your UP’s into way downs

Lifting highs to see blue skies

For now forgetting glares and frowns

Invade arcades and market squares

Where smiles attract the shopping habit

On this the day of most things possible

Even if you’re feeling wabbit

Yes! It is a word check out the link below

Oxford Dictionaries Word Link

Four and Free in Fifty-Three

Out there 

in my homeward lane

On the range

of all I see

Faces pass me 

on their way

I  see them 

they don't see me

With nothing much 

to do or say

I stealthy watch

and shadow listen

Waiting for

if only when

To see more clearly 

what I’m missing

How do people

get that way

Too hard to smile 

on pavement walks

Living lives 

in struggle strives

Where lack of money

loudly talks

Email Order

Oversized undersized

Colour match not quite

It looked so good on Instagram

On me a proper fright

Something broken on the way

I asked for three it came as two

Wide of the mark so nowhere near

In spite of that it just wont do

Always nice receiving stuff

So much fun with each unpack

Everyday it seems a birthday treat

All those returns I’m sending back

Story Source: Financial Times

UK retailers count the cost of returns

Unwanted parcels add £60bn a year squeeze on stores as they cater to changing consumer patterns

Twig

 A stirring in the undergrowth

Where the seed has found a home

Digging in creating roots

From where so many lives will roam

A fragment of a message sent

But just enough to write a book

To found a library on many shelves

Unencumbered in a nook

Should your flowers pass this way

There is a feast they can partake

To share the best of all good things

Though not at all a piece of cake

Fruit Shoe Shuffle

I’m making fruity music

The sweetest heavy melon sound

Rockaberry lemon twist

Peach Melba underground

Mango Groves a groovy tone 

Of compote compositions

A tango treat to trifle with

In pineapple push conditions

Moonlight Sultana opus

In the key of Vitamin C 

Dance marmalade in orangeade 

Calypso Rumtopf melody

Blank Page Game

Blank pages wait to have their say

Describing pictures found in prose

Connecting thoughts collected

Like games of playing ‘I propose’

Fun is found in writing anything

And keeps a pencil flowing free

With much pleasure and good measure

Words can write eternity

Blank pages are a staircase

An unknown house of voices soft

A climbing up direction lane

To its far higher level loft

Disturbance

Turmoil turns a grinding mill

To change the way of things

Nothing may remain the same

Not even emperors and kings

Every story ever told

A passageway to other words

Must find a brand new language

Diced or cubed in thirds preferred

Each lesson will be learned again

Although each outcome rearranged

For what it was we did back then

For other reasons now is changed

Frank Le Valet

We’ve used our car beyond its means

Taken liberties with dust

Transporting waste with too much haste

To where a clean out is a must

We’ve called on Frank Le Valet

Gold star spic and span reviver

To give our car the kiss of life

Our spit and polish grime out driver

With magnetic micro fibre mitt

Lifting spots from something rotten

Carpets and upholstery fresh

All smear invaders soon forgotten

Deodorised aromatised 

Returns our driving place to be

To last at least four seasons long

Frank Le Valet’s guarantee

Reef Knots

Days go by at passing pace

In a thrown together clutch

Filled with notes that slip and side

When first thoughts mattered much

Looking back and some amending

Making changes brand new starts

Each gaze returns another phrase

A total sum of missing parts

The search goes on relentlessly 

For other ways that one might speak

Avoiding padding out monotony

With a trite reduction tweak

Until the message clarifies

Leaving readers eyes to gauge

That time spent in this open book

Invites the turning of a page

Too Much To Ask

Pouring quarts in pint pots

Overfilling carry bags

Talking nineteen to the dozen

As the weight of meaning sags

Decanting water in the wine

Will cause flagging in the flagons

Lifting bulky swinging things

Ends up fulfilling rigid wagons

When all we need is just enough

To leave more time for hanging loose

Riding rough shod over rocky roads

Puts worn down strains on out of use

Rambling Rove

Wandering is wonderful 

Around the foreign climes

Enjoying sun simplicity

Clearly in the best of times

Visiting the other worlds

When toil is far behind

A visitor just passing through

No one paying any mind

Going there is very pleasant

But coming back is being free

Keep in mind a heart desiring
Needs to have a homestead key

To our good neighbour Marylin (Tammy Cline)

Time Untied

Is that the time already? Oh well.

We have a garden sundial

In shadow-tracing local time

Whenever here on garden leave

Our drifting clock needs never chime

Moments filled with mindfulness

Colours draped on placid plants

Trees and birds sing harmonies

To the multitude who dance

Sitting neatly in alignment

Where the sunshine peaks each day
Barely minding our position

With its hide and seek display

Sunrays in their timely turn

Leave us free in restful while

Accepting how we come and go

Around our guiding light sundial

After many years in oour garden we decided that it was time to move on without it due to size and plcement required. Of course there are many great sundial poems and one of my favourites is "The sundial at Wells College". Nevertheless, I couldn't resist my little farewell ditty to this old friend in our midst.

Clean Sheets

 

Larry Loophole he’s your man

When you find you’re stuck in mud

He’s got ways that will amaze

The lawyers and m'lud

He’ll work your ticket for you

If your card is marked and skanky

He’ll sort the scene fresh bright and clean

Brush out signs of hanky-panky

Larry Loophole reads between the lines

A telling way with wayward flaws

With legal ease undoes with legal keys

Setting free the get out clause

Many times you’ll find apparently

Upsets right angles in the square

For a total sum he’ll overcome

With grace and favour savoir faire

So if your plea is "wasn't me"

Your real intention never meant

With loophole wax restating facts

He finds that way out precedent

CLOSED DOWN

All the shops are closing

As we imagine what we buy

No need for blister packaging

No longer need Security Guy

Light fingers have nowhere to lift

Around the empty market square

Empty shelves replaced by tablet screens

Only time is going spare

Marketing remains a visual thing

Shopping centres lose their spot

Real estate to circumnavigate

Dead cash machines no parking lot

All the deals you’ll ever need

Entice you at a lower cost

Apart from storing all this stuff

All other overheads are lost

Silent streets as people plasticise

Sit in gardens catching sun

Watching others doing nothing much

Now that all the doing’s done

Very Moving

Funny how the space we need

Reduces more and more to less

Our home hotel needs fewer rooms

Much less of household stress

Although there are exciting aspects

One can’t help feeling quite uneasy

Too much new can seem like much ado

In a travelling state of queasy

I’ve checked our local pharmacist

Who couldn’t cure our transit ills

Apart from head or backache pain

Cannot prescribe us Moving Pills

So off we go to elsewhere doors

On the new street where we live

To often walk with brand new talk

Overcoming our misgive 

Ultimately Me Maybe

Depending on my viewpoint

Where all my fragments aim to be

Temporarily a state of mine

That for the moment I call me

In my mass of matters forming

Vibrating day and night

I conduct myself a symphony

In my orchestra of light

If I focus on each moment set

For this while I will agree

That circumstantial evidence

Cannot prove the whole of me

Right now I’m certain I exist

But how I got here bugs me most

In good faith accepting who I am

Is so much more than Pepper’s Ghost


LINK _ Pepper’s ghost: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Shoddy Goods

Oh look at that a viscious weed

Such a pest persistent

They grow in gangs immortal

Taking over unrepentant

Tough as nails embedded 

Living arrow tips high flown

Bowling greens or football fields

Garden bullies overgrown

Nothing weedy about the weed

No matter what abuse we throw

Nasty nips or demon drips

Before we know it back they grow

Racketeers of tennis courts

They are the top one hundred seeds

Fairway travellers to the greens

The hole in one goes to the weeds

We love our playhouse shrubbery

Our garden green room suits our needs

Front row seats in royal boxes

Spot backstage chorus lines of weeds

Is human hatred of unwanted plants

A most unnatural stance to take

For standing guard in graveyards everywhere

Stand finest weeds all wide-awake

Out There

Night crowds writhing

move the dark

Incandescent in the gloom

Warble muffled 

in a heavy glow

Where the lonely have no room

Talking has

no sound in there

Rhythmic beats

are felt not heard

Eyes not looking anywhere

Touch the hot

unspoken word

In this palace of disparities

Atmosphere 

is taking charge

Creating vibrant

brand new rules

For those absorbed 

in those at large

The Very Idea

 A head case full of fragile husks

That float around my inner eye

Packed with many possibilities

Some of which I’m prone to try

These pearls may stay until I see

Or disappear just when I do

A fluky meet of something sweet

Leaving me in wistful rue

If I could make a thoughtful net

To capture these impressions

To keep for when I need them most

Welcome groups in neat processions

But like a flavoured dish enjoyed

Not a morsel left to waste

When served up old no longer bold

I like to wrap them ice-encased 

Early Hours

I’m writing for the empty page

In early hours of any type

Until a nudge of something comes

A likely inspiration ripe

Whilst waiting for a perfect line

My aimless listlessness creeps in

Spreading doubts that lack of content

Maybe committing writing sin

I write it all down anyway

Then read it back for just in case

Pausing while I wait for something else

Maybe some steps I might retrace

But then the eyelid droop malaise

Puts paid to any hope of plot

Perhaps this rhyme another time

Will be much more than what it’s not 

Calamical

You could call it a disaster

A tragic mishap combination

As a builder shuffled up the plank

A concrete setting situation

Wheelbarrow finely centred

Right angled geometrical

One foot behind each taken step

Calculating mathematical

But taking calls and sending text

Can cause a teeter in one’s trek

Sparking off the unexpected trip

A sinking dip up to the neck

Grabbing quick the plank and handlebar

Stepping slowly from the mire

Laced with rubble-covered splattering

And matching concrete grey attire

Emergent scary from “The Dark Lagoon”

As best-laid plans became a trough

Scattered chunks from hard stuck lumps

That water force could not wash off

Alas the Medic couldn't bring around

The hardened figure stiffened quick

Now a headstone buried standing proud 

This builder now a concrete brick