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Christmas Tableau

December 12, 2025December 12, 2025humanist55

Rowland Hilder trees
pepper the landscape
and last week’s snow drifts
still lie in the shade
of the drystone walls
of the Yorkshire Dales

Farmers bring out feed
for the hungry sheep
kids complain now schools
have reopened
but coming Christmas
buzz is in the air

Householders spaff light
in competition
to claim the prize for
showiest display
of unnecessary
Xmas symbolism

and “Once upon a
midnight clear” is lost
to light pollution
and so for Twelve Days
each village will glow
with Christmas fever…

How should we weigh up
cultural tradition
against the cost to
the environment
– consumerism
out of all control

Let’s strip it all back
to the heart of things
remember that love
is of the essence
and all we need to
light up our landscape…

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Laura Bloomsbury in Meeting the Bar: Critique and Craft, invites us to paint a poetic tableau using a fixed poetry style entitled The Tableau – created by Emily Romano in October of 2008

Poetry Style:

5 beats/syllables per line

1 or more verses

6 lines per verse

A Tapestry of Trouble…

December 12, 2025December 12, 2025humanist55

Two crowds of demonstrators
facing off across double lines
of harassed, interfacing riot police
each crowd spouting the bias
of whichever media feed dogs
have been pushing their buttons
there is much darning (and worse)
as the police struggle to keep
them hemmed in whilst a journo
darts in and tries to buttonhole
some talking heads for the news
needles his victims to say something
outrageous but the crowd gathers
round and rips into the man with
the microphone, who wishes he
was home this Saturday afternoon
taking a nap instead of mining
this admittedly rich seam of
newsworthy division – newsworthy
though hardly novel – politicians
of both sides have been dog-whistling
immigration to whip up votes
for decades – a pattern that no amount
of careful work with a seam picker
– will undo and ease the tensions…

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, lillian in Poetics, invites us to use a list of words from the world of sewing, albeit with a different meanings…

Depression

December 10, 2025December 10, 2025humanist55

The granites and schists of my dark and stubborn country form the bedrock of woe that has lasted a lifetime, just waiting to poke through the drift that was built up in more active days. The strata built of depositing a family, laying down a career, the metamorphosis from one relationship to another and the occasional intrusion or outflow of molten anger or passion, built a land that seemed impregnable. But tears are relentless and oceans rise and fall, cutting into the margins and then came the ice age of retirement, the weight of ice depressing the whole and stripping all away except that bedrock and leaving even that, scarred and scratched, rounded into the low hills of the bed where I lay and even the black dog has no energy to venture out on the soggy moors that cover the degraded granite hills.

“The granites and schists
Of my dark and stubborn country.”

–Nan Shepherd, “The Hill Burns”
from In the Cairngorms (Edinburgh: The Moray Press, 1934)

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, merrildsmith in Prosery, invites us to write a piece of prose poetry in no more than 144 words and using the given quote above. I should say that the subject of this piece is not my experience but that of someone close to me. As a student of Geology (and Geography) I am aware that Scotland, which is where you find the Cairngorms, has had a remarkable persistence through many geological ages and each age has added layers which may subsequently been removed in another geological age – I am not sure whether this does not give an ultimately optimistic view of things even if it requires a timescale in which we humans may turn out to be but a flash in the pan. Anyway, a metaphor suggested itself with this prompt… I hope it does not bring anyone down…

Life Goes On

December 5, 2025December 5, 2025humanist55

Heather Cox Richardson sours
my morning with further news
of the outrageous disregard
for law which is building a
classic dictatorship and
encouraging other wannabe
authoritarians around the world.

I leave to do the weeks shopping
my neighbour, supervised
by his wife, is remodelling
a wooden box into a trug
for an exhibition of snowdrops
to be held in February.
Life goes on…

© Andrew Wilson, 2025

Today is Open Link Night over at dVerse Poets Pub which today is hosted by Björn Rudberg (brudberg) – a chance to post a poem of our own choice…

Dragonkind

December 3, 2025December 3, 2025humanist55

What should a dragon look like
whose myth should we believe?

Western myth has them dark green
plausible giant lizards with wings

Oriental Dragons scarcely feature wings
but writh through the skies like golden smoke

Tolkien’s Smaug rains fire from the sky
in revenge for a small burglar of his golden hoard

Chinese dragons do not hoard, but dispense good fortune
benevolently, celestial controllers of weather for good harvests

Chinese dragons’ benevolence is claimed as ancestral by emperors
dark dragons lurk in the empty spaces at the edge of Western consciousness

Whose myth should we believe
– what should a dragon look like?

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Lisa or Li in Poetics invites us to write about Legendary Creatures. I should remind you that I am an Old Dragon – a former pupil at The Dragon School, Oxford…

This is Crete…

November 20, 2025November 21, 2025humanist55

We wake up to air as clear as water
sit on the terrace under the Carob tree
as the shadows move across the mountain
whose spine looks like a sleeping dragon
warming its reptilian blood in the morning sun
waiting its moment to arise and shake itself
free of olive groves, villas, and prickly pears

Plants are waging a defensive war
against heat and drought and hungry creatures
not only cacti, but the cups of Mediterranean
Acorns are tough and scaled with prickles
and dark green gloss or pale silver green
dress the trees from Olive to Eucalyptus

The absence of people, as Cretans
hide indoors in COVID lockdown caution
makes us feel like the last people on earth
as we drive the back roads where we are scarcely likely
to be caught by policemen sleeping somnolent in their station
in the Winter midday hour – blazing fierce, this close to Africa

No tourists to disturb the hibernating hoteliers
piles of nested chairs congregate in corners of kafenio courtyards
but supermarkets still shelter cars from the sun
while masked customers complete their weekly shop
but masks don’t stop the swapping of sparse gossip
at the open-air market—fruit and vegetables piled high as ever

This is Crete in COVID lockdown Winter
hotter than a British summer and dry
except for the occasional storm when Greek gods play bagatelle
bouncing thunderballs around the mountains
and drenching the lands in torrential rain
flash flooding the dry gorges and riverbeds

We steep like teabags in the many moods
from spectacular sunrises bursting up from cliff-bounded sea
sunrays angling through the odd cloudy day
resting tourist boats on the sparkling bay
awaiting their turn at the boatyard beauty parlour
purple bloom on ripening black olives

Family bubbles emerge for the olive harvest
for some things in life must go on as normal
and for a few weeks, the groves are as busy
as the centipedes that appear each morning on the terrace
– there is knocking down of olives, bonfiring the prunings
blueing the air with smoke plumes – testament to the busyness

And afterwards, the empty garden chairs doze off again
underneath the olive trees…

This is Crete

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Jennifer Wagner, hosted by Grace in Poetics, invites us ti write about Local Wonders in the shadow of Ted Kooser’s poem – So This Is Nebraska

Friendship

November 14, 2025November 15, 2025humanist55

What is the pot of truth to which we cleave?
Friendship is the balm that gets us through life
Soothes us when injured by all means of strife.

Whatever injury makes us now grieve
– For upsets and perils are always rife
What is the pot of truth to which we cleave?
Friendship is the balm that gets us through life

So turn to your friends and never you grieve
Be you troubled by husband, children, wife
True friends cut through troubles like a sharp knife
What is the pot of truth to which we cleave?
Friendship is the balm that gets us through life
Soothes us when injured by all means of strife.

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Laura Bloomsbury in Meeting the Bar: Critique and Craft invites us to write a Chaucerian Roundel with the following form:-

13 lines
3 stanzas divided into 3 lines (tercet); 4 lines (quatrain) 6 lines (sestet)
rhyme scheme: A B1 B2/a b A B1/a b b A B1 B2
usually 10 syllables per line as iambic pentameter

Postscript! – I wondered if there was a translator app. for Chaucerian (Middle) English and there is at https://openl.io/translate/middle-english
Here is Friendship translated…

What is the pot of soth to which we cleven?
Frendshipe is the baume that bringeth us thurgh lyf,
It soothen us whan we ben hurt by alle manere of stryf.

What so ever harm maketh us now to grieven
– For distresses and perils ben ever ryf,
What is the pot of soth to which we cleven?
Frendshipe is the baume that bringeth us thurgh lyf.

Therfore turn thee to thy frendes and never thee grieven,
Be thou troubled by husbonde, children, or wyf,
Trewe frendes sheren through wo as with sharp knyf.
What is the pot of soth to which we cleven?
Frendshipe is the baume that bringeth us thurgh lyf,
It soothen us whan we ben hurt by alle manere of stryf.

Round the Bend…

November 13, 2025November 13, 2025humanist55

I might even have dipped my toes
In the water of surfing
if I’d just stopped working sooner
left more time to get to Knock airport
if I’d chosen the main road instead of the back road
if I had been travelling slower
even though the road was dry
if the farmer had trimmed the hedge
on the blind bend
if the tractor was not pulling a wide trailer
if it hadn’t rained two days before
if the drain under the road wasn’t blocked
if I hadn’t braked just where
the water flowed across the road
if the van hadn’t skidded on the slick
I wouldn’t have worn this splint
for twenty-five years
I might not have done some teaching
I might not have become a draughtsman
I might not have moved back to England
I wouldn’t have opened that restaurant
joined choirs, made frozen yoghurt
made this house out of a stable
lived this life beyond the bend…

© Andrew Wilson, 2025

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Melissa Lemay in Poetics invites us to write about pivotal moments in our lives…

Destruction and Redemption

November 8, 2025November 8, 2025humanist55

Poetry Postcard Festival 2025 Received Postcard Cento

I: Destruction

People are waking in the night
hearts racing, blood pounding
dreams, fantasies, deceptions, escape
The future is – unexplainable
I try not to disturb them
when I slowly reach my hand toward
the culture that informed my values…
Cruel and crude, greedy old man
— shouting, destroying
the Bad King who demands from him,
the Good Kingdom
his world has become much smaller
a pretty close second
Puppets! Who is pulling the strings?
Like my heart, they did not weep
another missed connection, warped, failed
shouting colour into gray
streets where no one listens
the beauty of the Badlands

We know so little – despite knowing so much
Consumption society has chewed up
spit out this vast and beautiful continent.
transported in cardboard boxes
to lockers at Hub Food
discouraged now as our progress is torn down,
a government being dismantled
thinking then it can’t happen here. But it does
I’m not sure there is enough of me today
bobbing movement of nature
you are missed daily
somewhere unknown,
another world away;
it was there
….no more
what if I told you
still, I hope for forgiveness…
the suggestion of brokenness
the promise of wholeness
we are all a part of everything
– I can’t help hoping

II: Redemption
if humans could fly,
would we ever walk?
around my imagination
whatever you want’s okay!
I close my eyes
and breathe in fireweed
your magic encapsulates me
waiting for the perfect day
that clear blue sky
is here year round
stairway to heaven
sun drops sparkle air
to reach, always, for the light
someone is thinking of me
remembering gratitude’s
call to learn what
was above and
below
today’s sun reluctantly begins
to set…

Poets and lines:-
Penelope Moffet 1-2, Jerrold Narland 3, Kerfe Roig 4, Susan Montgomery 5-6, Lawrence Pevec 7, Nancy R. Parr 8-9, Emily Bernhardt 10-11, Anon. 12, Grant Swados 13, Margie Ripperger 14, Anon. 15, Akua Lezli Hope 16, Jeannine Jordan 17-18, , Mary Mueller 19, Cassandra Bissel 20, Suzanne Harris 21-22, Karen Keltz 23-24, Ruth Vanklstine 25-26, Laura Gamache 27, Anon. 28, Lulu 29, Dava Wharton 30, Margaret Roncone 31-32, Rebecca 33-34, Muriel Karrr 35, Lisa Humphrey 36, Anon. 37-38, Nitya Prema 39, Karen Loeb 40, Amy Leonard 41-42, Donita Ries 43, Sandra Gadjewski 44, Diana Kolpak 45-46, Margaret Hill-Daniels 47, Cathy Wetter 48, Mary Skeen 49-50, Lynn Caldwell 51, Susan Vespoli 52, Julie Naslund 53, Angela Marie Ebba 54, Lula 55, P. O’Neill 56-58,Pence 59.

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Björn Rudberg (brudberg) in OpenLinkNight invites us to submit a poem of our choice…

This cento poem takes lines from all the postcard poems I received during the July-August Poetry Postcard Festival (POPoFest) run by Cascadia Poetics LAB out of Seattle, USA. Most of the participants are American but it seems that many want to send a postcard to poets elsewhere and so all the no-US poets are sent out on a separate list – so that I, as a UK resident, was lucky enough to receive 24 from my Group 4 list and 19 “bonus ” cards from the International list.

Taking a line from each, two poems emerged, which I have chosen to present as Parts 1 & 2 since the bleakness of the first needs amelioration by the optimism of the second…

Serendipitously, Björn’s optional prompt on this occasion was the writing of letters and the idea of the POPoFest, is to write Epistolary poems to the recipient that reference the image on the postcard, to write spontaneously without editing. I chose to reclaim my painting skills this year and sent 31 original paintings out, one of which is shown below…

Collaborators in the Craft

November 5, 2025November 5, 2025humanist55

You have done it on your own
the craft of poetry
garnering your words
identifying your voice
never mixing metaphors
unless you mean to
accenting with alliteration
tackling subjects
from waxing lyrical about nature
to sounding the clarion calls
to activism in a world gone mad…

Now, why not try the delights
of collaboration…
a dance á deux
a menage á trois
an orgy of poesie
with multiple poets
if you will
bat stanzas back and forth
ekphrast a painting
or photograph by a friend
why do it on your own
when you can do it together
become a collaborator…

Ten months ago, our very own Melissa Lemay, started an online journal of collaborative poetry, Collaborature so why not head over there and have a gander at all the exciting poems that have been submitted and then reach out to another poet to have a go at collaboration…

Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Lisa or Li in Poetics invites us to write about Getting Crafty…