I friend told me today, that

one of our own is dying, and

realisation seeps stealthily

through to my core in

a dark eureka moment

that punches my chest,

old people die not us

not one from our old street

and him not seventy summers,

our recent reunion still fresh,

endless memories tumble

pell-mell,

so recently re-found to be

lost again so soon,

it would be so simple

to feel old, life wasted,

God’s waiting room has

many vacant chairs,

so fancifully, we hatch

a plan, a midnight immolation

on the football centre-circle

him in his nomad’s shirt

dirty boots on top of the pyre

feet facing goal

it’s how he’d want to go

*

© Graham R Sherwood 02/22

we duly cowered 

inside as instructed

save for the idiots

cavorting on the beach

some amongst the waves,

this wind blows cruel music

a screaming banshee 

undefinable, indescribable

as the taste of water

or the colour of steam,

such ferocious anger 

assigned a woman

Eunice, more befitting 

a demure librarian

wronged and revengeful,

a callous tenacity

akin to a thousand warriors

directing devastation

from her watchful chair,

so, we pay in reparations

build fences, plant trees

give thanks for leniency

and of course, mourn our dead

*

© Graham R Sherwood 02/22

spotters called it the loco

a bridge we straddled

to get bathed in coal 

smoke and steam

playing chicken

whilst patiently waiting 

for the signals to change

down for south, up for north

oh! the keen anticipation,

known as 15A in those days

it was nothing special,

we’d buy a 2d ticket, 

squeeze through the fence 

behind platform 6, 

skirt the sidings trying

not to get caught

slip through the roundhouse

then cross over to the sheds,

we thought nothing of it

back then, all of us kids did it

Spud, Nelly, Josh and me,

dog-eared Ian Allen book 

tucked in our back pockets

duffle bags, Tizer, sandwich

and a chocolate yo-yo

if it was pocket-money day,

these days the bridge is no-go,

too busy, too narrow, mad traffic,

never any kids there now

and they’re building a new road

and excavating the roundhouse

razed to rubble in the ‘70s,

and then all these years later, 

a lifetime in a blink,

in the local news

Wellingborough sheds become

an archaeological dig, 

even the new relief route

is named Roundhouse Road,

alas, nowadays not a kid in sight

no steam, no grime, no grease

just the crackle and hum

of electricity in the wires

and Time-Team scratching

the earth to rediscover

my childhood

*

© Graham Sherwood 02/22

I wanted to believe in you,

after doting on your languid beauty,

such nubile poise and

sleek effortless fragility,

you are fearless

in daring balletic flight

elegant as an ice swan,

but grace became disgrace

having given yourself to us

you sold yourself to them,

now with a haunted frown

they hunt you down

and we are bereft, confused,

as the mirrors of fame splinter

leaving the stench of tainted smoke,

you fight for breath

how could they use you so?

*

© Graham R Sherwood 02/22

I knew he was dead

the frantic call, some

twenty minutes before

I started my journey

planted that seed, which

grew, fertile in thought soup,

I had not stared death full

in the face before

so, I weighed the likelihood

of my novice reaction

as the landscape scrolled

by unnoticed,

he looked peaceful 

unsmiling, not serene

but somehow, relieved

and at the same time

embarrassed at the fuss 

he was causing

by his sudden departure,

I didn’t kiss him at first, I

merely slid my hands under 

the sheet searching to cup his hand,

then something strange,

my finger stroked his wristwatch

still working, still pulsing

unaware of its new obsolescence,

time gently keeping time

for no-one.

*

© Graham R Sherwood 02/22

as we set off to walk home, 

I asked her to hold my hand,

after a short search I found her fingers

nestled in the sleeve of her winter coat,

she asked why I wanted to hold her hand

because when you’re older, I said

you won’t want to hold my hand anymore,

but I’ll always hold your hand Papa

she said solemnly,

well, your mum used to

hold my hand when

she was my little girl

but she doesn’t anymore

she holds your daddy’s hand instead,

well I’ll always hold your hand 

even when I’m twenty-one

she said emphatically,

so, I gently squeezed hers, saying

I’ll always hold your hand Bea,

wherever you are, however old,

even when you cannot see me anymore

I’ll always hold your hand

*

© Graham R Sherwood 02/22

a chaotic angular skyscape

silhouettes the threadbare watercolour wash

of charcoal grey, that pales and

rinses to a thin milk blue

the colour of cold skin,

across the silent city

a fresh newly-minted dawn

nudges rich salmon-pink streaks

skyward in celebration

of my first yawn of the day,

I am not ready for this splendour

and stand at my window, disbelief

hanging guiltily from my open mouth,

I heed the shepherd’s warning, and stumble

to my ablutions, my feet like ice

bristling on the tiled floor,

water abruptly slaps me awake

and I submit, the rubicon crossed

the Tuesday bugle calls, awake!

absentmindedly I see the foolish pigeon

before I hear the sickening thud

its brief voyeurism at the window

its tumble into the pruned rose bed

its final blank wide-eyed corpse

tiny breast feathers shiver

an apologetic Mexican wave

*

© Graham R Sherwood 02/22

we shake hands to take our leave

in a clumsy round-robin

then hurriedly search for keys 

to make our way home 

for teatime as instructed

as we did when children,

we once lived nearby 

adjacent streets, all the same houses

but now different towns

in our own homes,

this year full of 70th birthdays

each of us chalking-off another

just like our schooldays,

but these meetings, these reunions

are special, precious, 

not one of us knowing how many remain,

we have aged and have nothing left to prove

life’s gifts and challenges of no import

our paths have differed 

as has our luck, money, lovers, 

but we have all arrived here

in the twilight to share our stories

*

© Graham R Sherwood 01/22

I flit back there occasionally,

like a moth to a flame 

in chaotic unplanned visits 

with scant regularity,

everywhere looks older, crumbling 

unsteady, as are the people I once knew

their youth once fresh, 

now like the milk I once delivered 

as a lad, turned sour,

the streets too seem narrower, 

shorter, dirtier, choked 

by poorly parked cars

half on, half off the kerb,

sadly there’s no longer the smells either 

of leather, paraffin, bonfires, fags, faggots

that bookended my childhood,

but something does remain, intact

a friendly wistful cynicism,

a self-mocking realism

that keeps you in your place

but overall, the look

the look that’s never left me

the look that tells others

this is where I came from.

*

© Graham R Sherwood 01/22

a lightly frosted grape-skin bloom

sits powdery silver on the grass,

peckish fieldfare, driven off the fens

by today’s rapier chill

stand muttering as old fellows

waiting for the pub,

reluctantly the garage door squeals

its rusty winter complaint

and emits a draughty shudder 

as I roll it back,

it’s time to wake the drowsy sloes

gin-slumbering on the darkest shelf

stow Christmas baubles for another year

clean old tools, sort sundry nuts and bolts

but Jack Frost’s needling pinch

swiftly chokes my departing zeal, and

turning wistfully, with one last apologetic glance

I beat retreat until the Spring

with books, red wine and roaring fires 

*

© Graham R Sherwood 01/22