THE FRENZY

Decisions on where you’ll be and with whom required, long before the winter clock. Before autumn leaves fall, supermarket shelves were cleared for seasonal stock. Write the lists, rack your brains for inspiration to ask that annual question “what present for you?”  Number of cards counted for relations, friends, colleagues, neighbours and the tradesmen too? […]

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THE ELEVENTH

 There is a just one number that has come to signify more for me than any other, Touching emotions difficult to describe such as the love for one’s partner or a mother. Side by side the double singular digits mark that hour, that date and month to end a war of madness. It is then […]

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ATLANTIC VIEW

They sailed West to find the East. They took their culture, religion and rule, First to trade, then convert and later conquer, In quest of riches, of tobacco, spices and gold. Now the tide turns from that New World to Old. No longer is it the journey that we fear. But what is it that […]

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LAND OF MY FATHERS

 One last glimpse at that vast expanse, beautiful in all weathers, at low and high tide. Suspended above the Severn’s swirling depths, I peer down on its waters which represent that wide divide. Soon the welcome that marks the border to this similar but different land.  Confronted now with dual language signs to preach a […]

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HOPE IN A GREY DECADE

 In those grey days that only pensioners now remember, When discarded ration books gave way to mortgage application, Still in a boy’s world with little awareness of that other gender, No insight of current affairs, personal finance, or global realisation.   Cricket outside the garage doors or sailing toy boats on the shallow pond, We […]

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THIS RIVER

 Some amble aimlessly along its overgrown banks to rid themselves of life’s anxieties and stress. Others walk their dogs to propel balls on it for man’s closest friend to submerge, paddle and retrieve. A fisherman sits patiently, attaches bait and casts his line on to it to make his catch before release. The adolescents dare […]

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MY LONDON

                                                 MY LONDON                                         by Nicholas Prosser  What is it that draws me like a magnet to its concentrated centre? At first it was the zoo with our membership, three free tickets to enter.                                 There was that school trip to The Tower, the museum and Royal tombs in the Abbey.  All this by bus […]

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A PARADISE THAT IS ENGLAND

Through the high hedges that hug the narrow winding road, Meandering through a colourful tapestry of fields and woods, the river flows, determined to its mouth. A smoking chimney aloof, above the thatched cottage, a tall spire towers above the grey stone church. To the village shop, residents flock for their daily needs, they eat […]

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