NOT REALLY A STRANGER

I don't know what the right term is

For this kind of tide

It is high but not stormy

Grey flecked with white

Slightly misty, bad tempered

I get the feeling it would like

To burst through the walls

And drown me quietly

I stare through the windows

Of a seafront bistro

Designed to show the bay

At its best to visitors

But the waves ...

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    A MAN HOLDING HIS HORSE

    Poor Dai never got the hang of it,

    At school in our first lesson

    On art appreciation

    We studied

    'A Man Holding His Horse'

    By George Stubbs.

    The teacher issued us

    With notebooks

    In which to record

    Feelings and impressions

    Arising from the painting.

    Dai wrote...

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 ILLUSION

 Just for a while

 The feel of summer,

 Fields of sunflowers,

 Light dazzling,

 Heat caressing,

 France not Cheshire

 Kind of summer.

 Smell of lusty earth,

 Taste of young wine

 That won't travel,

 Freshness of fruit

 And vegetables,

 Proudly displayed

 On market stalls.

 Just for a while

 The illusion of summer,

 Ou...

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A TIDAL RELATIONSHIP

Ours was a tidal relationship,

It ebbed and flowed

Over hidden shipwrecks,

Sometimes calm,

Sometimes smashing defences,

Opening cuts on beaches

Then healing them

With the soothing sand

That fills each wound.

Ours was an unsteady relationship,

Seaweed covered driftwood

Slid beneath our feet

As we slipped and stumbled

Over the flots...

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BANER GLYNDWR

Steel the gauntlet

Sharp the blade

Hot the conflict

Fierce the raid.

From the mountains

We came down

Barred their passage

To each town.

Fired our arrows

Flung our spears

Red their faces

Bloody tears.

Drove them far

From our land

We fought bravely

Hand to hand.

Baner Glyndwr

Owain’s flag

Flying now

Fr...

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EVACUATING HEREFORD

From Fir Tree Lane junction and the Straight Mile

Near where World War Two hand grenades were found,

They shut roads and placed a cordon around

So they could make things safe army style;

People were moved out of homes for a while

Taking all their pets, every cat and hound;

As warning cones were put down on the ground,

A real nuisance there was hardl...

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 BETWEEN TWO STONES

 Horses raced here

 Until the railway

 Cut the field in half

 Between two stones

 And a third

 No longer standing.

 The first excavation

 Proved this to be true

 From the clay pipes

 And wine bottles

 Now cleaned

 And catalogued.

 More recent surveys

 Using methods

 Geophysical

 Indicated the presence

 Of se...

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