~

the merriment and joyful

banter of a warm afternoon

reluctantly surrenders to a

calmer susurrus before dusk,

it is time for good food, fine wine

and meaningful conversation,

thoughts soon idle towards

hopes wishes and dreams,

and the young who still have

much to discover about

themselves, openly chart

their many aspirations as if

bidding for tricks at cards,

as I listen to this foreplay

I am mindful to revisit those 

keen intentions of my youth

that valiantly tried but failed 

to shape my course,

two generations on I hear

different futures avidly dreamt 

and wonder just how much 

the game has really changed

*

© Graham R Sherwood 06/26

~

this city breathes

differently, a constant

low register pulse

the watchful parental 

growl of an ever-alert

mothership, 

an ethereal force field 

visible only in ultra-violet

shimmers across the city’s 

steely glass skeletal shell,

there were farmsteads here 

once, rooted in this rich 

dark soil, small villages 

heartbeats, identities

with their own songs, true 

strong names chiselled 

into stone from the 

Domesday Book and 

beyond, homesteads 

once to the manor born,

one seismic cosmic event, 

one alien cultural collision, 

supernatural, radical urban decree, 

city status, life would 

never be the same

*

© Graham R Sherwood 05/26

~

the enduring daily magic

and mystical extravaganza

of sunrise and sunset,

the beautifully discordant

harmonies of birdsong at dawn,

the herbaceous ripe tang

of freshly cut grasses 

with the soporific aromas 

of warm rain on soil,

the ambivalence and industry

of ants and honeybees and

the precision of the artwork

spun into a spider’s web,

although I am life’s pauper 

I share all this and not 

one penny spent

*

© Graham R Sherwood 05/26

things that change swiftly 

can often go unnoticed,

more so those that evolve

slowly, imperceptibly,

~

in youth a man is strong, 

dependable, responsible, 

but with age he unwittingly 

allows himself to become 

someone else’s dubious 

responsibility,

~

striding blindly forward 

he approaches the hidden 

transitional precipice, 

a vertiginous chasm

above a useless utopia

where he forfeits the heft

of fatherhood by crossing 

the waiting Rubicon

*

© Graham R Sherwood 05/26

(I am blessed to be able to meet regularly with a group of old junior school friends. Now in our mid-seventies having gone our separate ways in our teens, we are re-learning each others stories, triumphs and disasters)

~

each month we learn

more from one another,

fragments of our own

personal histories

laid bare freely as if

through exorcism, at

this old place we once

prayed in as children,

as we swim in this warm

bathtub of memories 

a revelatory, astonished

‘I don’t remember that’ 

will cut the air and thus 

another stitch is woven

to our tapestry of youth,

winsome smiles become 

inquisitive frowns as we

understand each other’s 

pasts more clearly,

this bond is special, 

we know we are lucky

*

© Graham R Sherwood 05/26

~

I wake to the hum

of her breathing, warm,

reassuring, long soft 

draughts almost choral, 

my troublesome knee

delivers an anxious but

cordial twinge requesting

an artificial replacement,

it’s a dull Monday,

banks are closed and 

of course, it rains,

she will be cross as there 

are still beans and tomatoes

to plant, we’re giving 

Tasman and Tumbling Tom 

a go this year, everything

outside seems earlier

after the benign winter,

there’s no need to rush so 

I will let her lie

and make tea later

*

© Graham R Sherwood 05/26

~

Puebla Pathos 

(her/she/they)

critics would say that

I just picked her up, 

honestly, I still wonder

myself why I did, it’s 

a fractious relationship 

flowing mostly one way,

I give her the benefit of 

my ever curious doubt, 

due to her sculptured

body and deep brown 

bronzed and shiny skin,

mostly it’s confessional

I can tell her anything 

were she a nun, she

surely be a silent order,

I’m not a religious man

but belief is good,

isn’t it?

*

© Graham R Sherwood 04/26

~

an expression 

writers know,

a frenzy of creation

when words drip

freely from the nib,

like falling coins

and must be quickly 

gathered up and 

spent swiftly, lest

they tumble down

the drain, 

forever lost.

*

© Graham R Sherwood 04/26

~

we were young

the music played

each of us

had a choice,

love or war

flowers or fear

so young but we  

had to choose,

they sang of surf

and sunshine

fear of the bomb 

and nothing left after,

free love or folklore

anthems or heroes

we were young 

the music played

and we chose

being too young 

to care

*

© Graham R Sherwood 04/26

~

occasionally you can taste it in the air

a distant unpleasant tang of smoke, metal 

dirt and flesh, a sure sign a war lies just

over the horizon,

were we to be honest life has been good 

for so long and it is easy to forget one’s 

table manners

now the peaceful hum of life

we have enjoyed has begun to growl, rumbling 

like a hungry complaining stomach demanding food,

few still alive remember the last feeding frenzy,

the violence to decide those that were to be fed 

and those left for dead, no doubt war will come

and with it a famine of tolerance,

an empty tomb of common sense

and the immoral debris of man’s polluted avarice

* 

© Graham R Sherwood 04/26