I learnt

I learnt not to throw a tennis ball indoors. That’s how you shatter a ginger jar. I also learnt one should not break a violin bow. Did I snap it or cause the hairs to explode? If your nose is running, and your mother is pinning your ballet costume don’t move. If she pins you,

A quiet night preludes the festivities

‘Tis the night before I head off to find Christmas. with an inflatable bed and homemade biscuits. All through this lodging there is hardly a clatter; only Depeche Mode on my laptop and my landlady’s patter. To the front door she shuffles and hooks up the chain. Yesterday’s outside, while we’re bolted in. 22/12/13 —

At the right age

People start to ask questions they really have no right to pose   At a point, they expect you to be studying. Let it be known: a non-graduate works shifts and packs plastic bags.   Since 2008, so do graduates with four degrees. But people will still ask, What do you do? They mean are

An Artist Works

Evening, 31 August 1822 Above, the ungraspable in grey or white or sometimes black, I read now is wrought of Forms, this water overhead. What Science seeks to calibrate quickens my palette, hand and knife and revives my boyish eyes to see pictures in the sky. — The series of cloud studies painted by John

A definition, notably for the cloud-dwelling artists

Success is speaking to the people who matter, In networking when due. Waste no time on a satyr. Success is doing what you should for Work, for Security, for Good. It’s silence when your speech would rattle, And indifference to a pointless battle. Success is deafness to all that’s ugly, But sympathy if your deed’s

Half-a-dozen, a wildcard plus one

A few recent poems have orbited around summer. 29°C captures some moments from the July heatwave. Another Summer’s Day explores more delights of the warmer season. Summer food and outdoor eating, which we enjoy at such times with childlike relish, are enacted by the child characters who feature in Packed Lunches and Summermelon. Tightly Sealed and Look At draw on observations of ordinary

Summermelon

In which the superhero of pre-used words makes a re-appearance The superhero of pre-used words met watermelon boy. It was summer. They had pips to spit But also fruit to eat and The superhero of pre-used words and watermelon boy arrived at the driveway, 3 quite sharp. Between them half a shell of watery sweet

Packed Lunches

Waitrose produced a cheese-stick from Morrison’s ham and cheese Banana Republic eats chippings of biltong Tesco cries “I got Twix” and holds up a packet of Walkers H+M forks leftover chicken (à la King) from a Tupperware M & S is eating pre-sliced apples from a palm-sized packet Tesco is now eating a carrot stick

Night-Star of Sirius, Eastern Cape

With light that is brown between the toes and shines on the river banks, it twinkles in the sunlight. Star of Sirius, lapping Star of Sirius, life star, watery star carrying children over your tide swaying rushes embracing fish holding frogs Star of Sirius. Night-star of Sirius twinkling in the sunlight, carrying promise. Grahamstown, 2008

1,000 Scientific Facts

A Thousand Scientific Facts about the sea Watch the mist-spray drift towards the dunes: A mother is out with her children. The daughter plays with the dog breaking foam And the little boy sits beside on a rock. There are bluebottles along the shore today; many cuttlefish shells; a dead penguin, his flippers laid out