Category Archives: Nostalgia

PLACES

Sun-dappled clearings below rising, noisy, moisture-dripping RAINFOREST

Bleached, slowly shifting, unforgivingly dry, arid desert SAND DUNES

Silky-lush, verdant green, daisy spotted, pasture grass MEADOWS

Wild, boggy-damp, jig-sawn, cold and mist covered MOORLAND

Panoramic, soaring, towering, snow-capped, MOUNTAIN RANGES

Quilted, orderly-fenced, multicoloured, arable-cropped FIELDS

Weather-beaten, crumbling, boundary-guarding, nest strewn CLIFFTOPS

Endless, restless, fathomless, blue/green/grey, untamed OCEANS

…..

High rise, noise-polluted, concrete-crowded CITY CENTRES

Fissured, rock-scarred, unkempt, abandoned, exhausted QUARRIES

Blotting, stinking-rotten, poison-filled, synthetic WASTE TIPS

Hidden, radiation-spewing, millennium-lasting NUCLEAR DUMPS

Blasted, shattered, depopulated, flattened, inhuman WAR ZONES

Sprawling, unwanted, shanty housed, hungry, REFUGEE ENCAMPMENTS

Silver tongued, lip-serviced, self-serving, sterile POLITICAL ARENAS

Climate-changed, overpopulated, resource-depleted, mismanaged EARTH.

Football’s Lost Magic

Kicking a worn-out ball around the streets

The lucky ones did the same in a park

It was something to do with your mates

Better that having a lark

….

Jumpers or coats for the goal posts

Boots were your ordinary shoes

A ‘strip’ was out of the question

The oldest had the right to ‘choose’

….

The’ game’ itself had no special aura

Except the playing, and those you played with

This was the stuff of friendships

Building bonds, being collaborative

….

Then school taught the art of competition

Sides became teams and you needed to win

The result was what now mattered

The captain became the team kingpin

….

Commercialism entered the equation

The best could win money and fame

These became goals in themselves

The green-eyed god had its claws on the game

….

Fast cars, loose women, high living

Dreams of the working classes

A career for the few with real promise

Aspired to with rose tinted glasses

Remember

When Covid has, at last, gone

When public places once more throng

Recall with sorrow those we lost

As countries count the final cost

 

Then talk of all the brave and true

Who selflessly thought of you

Not going out was hard enough

Many faced challenges much more tough

 

Medics, police and essential folk

Donned again their professional yolk

Their lives at risk to safeguard yours

No choice but adventure out of doors

 

REMEMBER well the sacrifice

Of HEROES who did not think twice

One Day

One day I will be gone.

That is not a day I fear,

nor one I want others to feel sorrow or regret.

If, on that day, you think of me, do not regard the how or why;

but note, if you will, the when

Remember, if you can, any smiles and laughter,

not frowns and sadness

Mark any things done passing well;

not the failures

Those were my burden, one I no longer bear

Do not pick up any part of that; let it die with me.

Knowing you, in some measure,

you will have been a part of my life, and I am grateful for that.

Loving you, know that you made my life all the better to live,

and I love you the more for it, for all eternity

Go forward, then, positively;

live your own life as well as you can

Be happy and try to share that with others.

BBC Anticlockwise Forecast for Seas around the British Isles

Thames, Humber, German Bight;

Fog remaining overnight

Fisher, Dogger, Tyne and Forth;

Strong winds abating from the north

 

Stormy soon in Cromarty and Viking

Continued, rapid lightning striking

Further west to north Fair Isle;

Visibility steady at over one mile

 

More north west in the Faeroes

Pressure falling; a strong gale blows

Contrast this south west in Bailey

Pressure is increasing daily

 

For those south east in Hebrides

Expect to sail on heavy seas

In Malin and nearby Rockall

Westerly blizzards are to fall

 

Further south into Shannon

Blasting winds like cannon

Calmer waters in Fastnet

Should provide a safer bet

 

Expected shortly across Lundy

A high of 1050; Sunday

Storm force 10, now in Sole

Building 11, on the whole

 

Further south across Fitzroy

Sunny spells to enjoy

But further east, in Biscay

Rougher seas and blowing spray

 

Plymouth, Portland, Wight and Dover

Temperatures rising, hurricane over

This concludes today’s forecast

Dear Auntie Beeb, may it long last

INSIGHT

Time fades the clarity of young sight

Form and colours, once clear and bright

Now cloudy shapes through opaque lenses

Only real through different senses

 

But there is yet a way to see

Unlocking memories, like a key

Those who look within the mind

Can access images of every kind

 

For age improves the inner eye

Which knows the beauty of days gone by

Recalling scenes of timeless splendour

Precious moments to engender

 

Sun kissed seas of sapphire blues

Northern lights’ ephemeral hues

Distant horizons glowing red

Thunderous storm-skies shaded lead

 

Mists rising in dawn’s early light

Silver-rimmed clouds scudding in flight

Diamond sparkling rainbow dew

Dappled rays shaded canopies through

 

Countless twinkling stars above

A glint in the eyes of one you love

Shimmering heat haze under the sun

A smile on the lips of anyone

Rav(ages) of Time

Body; once lithe, now weary and weakening

Memories; once clear, now fossilised and fading

Faculties; once keen, now base and blunt

Senses; once sharp, now unreliable and uncertain

Voice; once resounding, now timorous and trembling

Gait; once certain, now wavering and wobbly

Hands; once steady, now capricious and clumsy

Friends; once constant, now flagging and fickle

House; once pristine, now dusty and damp

Garden; once welcoming, now disregarded and decayed

Future; once limitless, now finite and fixed