Atticus at Home

My cat, the overachiever

 

My cat is fat and I won't say he's lazy, but if he 'were to sleep another 30 minutes during the day, he'd be officially dead.

He's almost twenty pounds and showed little interest in

the affairs of the world...

till I painted this picture for him,

“It's all about setting goals for yourself”, I said ,”And reaching your full potential”.

“Blah, Blah, Blah,” was his reply ,coughing up a fur ball.

But I see now he's gone on a diet and just last week I heard

music coming from his room.

“What's that “? I asked my son and he said,

“It's the cat , he's taken up the mandolin,

and he's not half bad”!

A lesson for the ages ,

never underestimate the power of art.

Japanesque Girl 1: The Raincatcher

 

Japanesque Girl 2: The Wave

 

No Poem

Japanesque Girl 3: The Walking Tree

 

No Poem

Love's Young Dream

 

Her perfection unmarred

by a hole in her dress

we floated around

to the band and the stars

leased to us

by the young summer night.

And we vowed and we promised

as if we knew what it meant.

But she couldn't be flawless

she had never been tested...

and I had a button fly off my sleeve.

Street Ghosts (Sisters of Mercy)

 

Walking past the welders' flare,

their shadows cast wet darkness on

Port Glasgow's bang head cobbles.

I know , I saw them and was afraid to tell

not knowing if they would approve.

 

Through Friday night pubs they sailed

with non shiny brochures

and all dark and mischievous deeds

would lose their aroma

falling uncontested in their wake.

 

And faces in a state of grace

could and did

smooth wrinkles on the brows of

shipyard men,

for nothing else they

knew but truth and pity

in this under achieving town

where neither stayed too long.

 

I know , I saw them and was afraid to tell.

The Dog Walkers

 

I was fond of Judith and she me.

She walked other people's dogs long before it was a bona fide occupation.

We would walk the moorlands above Port Glasgow, overlooking the beautiful River Clyde

with the dogs leaping and cavorting in the heather.

 

It was my first love and I could foresee a pleasant life together with her.

But I seemed to fall out of favour with the beautiful

Judith, and we drifted apart.

It's maybe just as well...

she always made my leash too tight.

The Interlopers

 

There never seemed to be a time

when they weren't there.

Like nagging doubts or gentle prods

reminders that things are not as they appeared

Unfinished business perhaps,

a task unresolved,

a faint blur on the periphery

borne manfully with little fuss

and no complaint.

 

I keep the secret naturally.

A buzzing in my ear ,

a small stone in my shoe

small price to pay when sometimes

as the yoke of intolerable cliché

grinds over me as ice age rock,

and normality chokes like tsunami wave,

they glide across my eyes

as flocks of pure white swans

The Letter

 

From the lawyer perhaps..

'Just been left that cottage in Dorset

which she's always loved'.

Or a rare book she's been looking for ...

just been found in a booksellers nearby.

It's good news... I think.

A proposal of marriage ...

which may or may not be good news.

 

But it could be bleak. A death !

People are always dying.

I fear it could be bleak.

The end of a romance.

Termination of employment.

It may just be of course be

the heating bill.

The Tryst

 

No Poem

Autumn

 

Falling away from a shining season

when we walked the High Street

with hope and a well stitched plan.

A ceaseless bird

with notions that were also mine

glinting in its eye,

sings thoughtfully in a bleak back yard.

So Autumn,

faithless tart that she is

comes to wrench the sun lost leaves

from indignant tree.

 

Her fine hair billowing

with myriad colour,

fine teeth that soon will bite my neck

and peck the eye from spawning fish.

Let her flash her rotted red lipped smile

as death and her legions sing

their annual hymn,

her mouth is a cold betrayal.

 But It Matches the Sofa

 

No Poem

Lady in Red Hat

 

Who is she ? By the forsythia

immune to my foolish longing

which I wear

like a pocket watch

chained to my chest.

Yet she knows an oak leaf

tumbling in the dark

of the forest sleeping

or a bird's small shadow

kissing her hat of burnt sienna.

Three Moons

 

Washed up on the shore

of a distant memory.

More.

A time when there were more,

pulling at the tides.

More.

For lovers to hang a wish on.

More.

For those ladies of ancient worship

to dance in churchyard ruins.

More.

Light to gather mushrooms by

and pin the creeping thief.

 

A trailing scent of long lost summers

when there were once three moons.

Waiting for a Bus on Alpha Centauri

 

In the town of Olron lives someone

and I go there when the suns all shine

to be together and to laugh.

Strolling in the dark red grass of City Park

we talk of planets yet unknown

where others walk and dream as we

and rest below a purple tree.

 

When all the moons are waxing

we spoon in the cool

and wonder if there's love

that thralls the sense

out there

in that strange and bitter cosmos.