SEPTEMBER IS THE LOVELIEST MONTH
September is the loveliest month.
The sky is on permanent fire
The trees painted many colours
Burnished, it seems, with pure desire
In the park, ducks glide silently by
And the always busy seagulls
Resemble sea-planes
Coming in to land from on high
Whilst near the dozing oak tree
The squirrels nutmeg each other
Each acorn hoarded
For the soon-to-come cold weather.
Your arm in mine
We stroll down the park
Heading towards the sunset
Home before dark.

Pics from Crawley Irish Festival 26/08/2018

my latest book  WORKING FOR THE SUBBY is available on Amazon

GOD HAS NO RELIGION

God has no religion

He is neither Christian

Jewish

Hindu

Islamic

Catholic

Protestant

Or 100 other so-called faiths

God has no country

Nor is head of any State

Has no Pope

Nor vicar

Imam

Or Rabbi

God does not wear robes

Or vestments

Has no Commandments or Sacraments

God does not fight wars

But gave us free will

To fight our own battles

Adam and Eve never existed, except metaphorically

Just like Harry Potter

God is a just God

God does not go to church

God is just God

VINNY JONES

‘Mr Jones’, said the referee,

‘You cannot kick lumps off

You opponent all the time’.

‘Quite right’, replied Vinny,

‘Occasionally I head-butt ‘em’.

BOBBY MOORE

A mere sweeper he was not.

His timely interventions left

A myriad footballing eunichs in his wake.

Prompting the question…

What good are strikers without balls?

   GAZZA

I went for a slash

And the whole team followed us

Then stood around in idle contentment

While I shook the last drops from me knob.

We footballers always hunt in packs.

   RODNEY MARSH

Hi!

I’m Rodney,

Fly me.

SILENCE AT THE BAR

The old man grimaced and silently imbibed his pint

His withered wife glared her whole life at him

And pointedly moved to a seat

At the far end of the joint

Two sons, forty and finicky,

Silently contemplated the following day’s races

While the daughter and son-in-law,

Long run out of things to say,

Blew smoke in each other’s faces.

Only the children were living;

The girl was chandelier-swinging

And the boy was table-top walking.

“Shhh!” said the mother,

“be quiet you two rascals,

We can’t seem to hear ourselves talking”

get your copy free now!  (a review – good or bad – would be appreciated)

JOHNJO…is the study of a man from the cradle to the grave. Forced to go on the run from his Comeragh hill farm at an early age, Johnjo washes up in Lincolnshire in war-time England. Working on farms, and often finding himself treated worse than the prisoners-of-war, he goes on the run again. And so begins a life-long association with ‘the lump’ – the dark underbelly of the construction industry. From building motorways and living in camps you ‘wouldn’t keep a decent dog in’, we eventually find him working in London for a ‘subby’ called Bannaher – not having been home to Ireland for more than thirty years. Disillusioned and bitter at having been ground down by the harshness of his life, he, nevertheless, hangs on to a few sparks of defiance. The final straw comes when he sees his friend (lover?) buried alive in the trench they are working in, and he embarks on a rebellious ‘last hurrah

JUST WALKING

Walking…just walking

Away from the hum and drum

Away from the hub and bub

Away from the whine and grind of this rusty city

Couldn’t take it, they will say

Well, let them

This place isn’t all it’s cracked up to be

I saw a man today selling boxes to homeless people

Business was brisk

Did you know that the stone from the Pyramids

Would build a wall round England ten feet tall?

They say John the Baptist was gay

Funny the thoughts that come into your head when you’re walking

There was an old woman who lived in a hovel

She didn’t have any shoes but no one cared

She fell down one day

The hospital put her in a trolley for a few weeks

Then sent her away

Back to her hovel, her piss-stained bed, her broken radio

Her clock that didn’t tick, her bare cupboards, her solitary chair

Carried her up three flights, stood her in front of a walking frame

Said ‘take care of yourself, dear’

The whole fucking world anaesthetised by indifference

Emily wrote only one book, WUTHERING HEIGHTS, and is world famous because of it. Yet, she wrote and published many poems in her short life and hardly anybody knows it.  She published a book of poems with  her sisters Charlotte and Anne, called POEMS OF CURRER, ELLIS AND ACTON BELL, which initially sold only 2 copies. This is one of those poems

No Coward Soul Is Mine

No coward soul is mine,
No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere:
I see Heaven’s glories shine,
And faith shines equal, arming me from Fear.

O God within my breast,
Almighty, ever-present Deity!
Life – that in me hast rest,
As I – Undying Life – have power in Thee!

Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men’s hearts, unutterably vain;
Worthless as withered weeds
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by Thine infinity;
So surely anchored on
The steadfast rock of immortality.

With wide-embracing love
Thy Spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates and rears

Though Earth and moon were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou wert left alone,
Every Existence would exist in Thee.

There is not room for Death,
Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou – Thou art Being and Breath,
And what Thou art may never be destroyed.

Happy birthday Emily.