1243

Brake failure

Do I give thanks that I'm stuck on this train

With not a clue when it will start again,

Given the brakes have jammed and they don't know

How or when we're liable to go?

We could be here all night, which might be fun,

But I'm already hungry and I've run

Out of things to read, or things to do

Except that I am writing this for you;

Because you gave me this brief interlude,

A little test, knowing I could be rude,

Blaming the driver, guard, demanding why

They're forcing our blood pressure far too high.

            Then, just as this sonnet has no more to say,

            The driver says it's fixed - we're on our way!

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 31.1.25

1333a

        Miracles are a problem;

                 Believe one

And you have to believe them all. 

1333b

          Trees in the morning mist

             Backlit by winter sun;

Blackened bones bathed in bright gold.

Brian Hick January 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 29.1.25

1336 

New Year 2014

The New Year promises a world where care

            Is offset by daytime TV

            More Dr Who and cookery

To fill the hours and turn us from despair,

While I look back at all my numbered verse

            So carefully catalogued; some printed

            Years ago, some newly minted;

All neatly paged, the good beside the worse,

As if the very act of printing off

            Each numbered poem, page by page,

            Good or ill, bland or sage,

Would validate their purpose well enough,

But will a finder after many years

          Sense their virtue as he reads

           Turning over all the leaves

Impressed by volume, rather than ideas? 

Brian Hick January 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 27.1.25

 1332

A snatch of

Fingal's cave

While I'm driving to the Post Office.

 A memory of

Proms heard

On the radio long before we married.

A fleeting warmth

On a damp morning.

Brian Hick January 2014

©copyright Sally Hick 24.1.25

 1335

Boxing Day 2013

Suddenly it's over

And the noise, and bustle and the expectation

Fade into wrapping paper, cold turkey and sprouts.

Peace, so sung about, descends

On our streets where lights still flash in silence,

Waiting for the New Year to erupt

And move us on to weeks of work,

Winter greyness and normality.

Shopping returns to the Tesco list

Of stuff we always buy,

Confounded only when they move the aisles.

And church? The slight excitement of the snow

Which trapped the preacher outside Tunbridge Wells

Is soon forgotten in the round

Of meetings, practices and minor arguments.

And Christmas? Just another passing phase -

A date, a day to get through like the rest?

Or did this Christmas shock us a bit,

Realising God is here with us,

Though we so often act

As if Jesus were for Christmas -

Not for life.

Brian Hick December 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 22.1.25

 1242

This

Is this for me - this silence of the snow

            This calm of early morning light

            This gentle easing of the night

Before the winter sun begins to glow?

Is this for me -  this distant blackbird's call

            The silvered trees above the road

            The shimmer of their chilly load

Expectant of the morning's new snow fall?

Is this for me - this sunlight on the hills

            This flock all facing the same way

            Grazing at the break of day

Along the freezing rivulets and gills?

Is this for me - this amplitude of space,

            This joy, this sense that everything

            That is, flows from the eternal spring

Nurtured by your outpouring of grace?

Brian Hick January 2013

Sally Hick 20.1.25

1241

If I had brought an I-pad for the trip,

Instead of looking calmly at the view,

I'd be finding lots of things to do

Like reading emails, surfing, letting rip

While scanning page by page things I don't need,

Celebrities of whom I've never heard,

Scandals from every corner of the world,

None of it worth the time it takes to read.

So here I am, the only one in sight,

Looking, listening to what is here

Rather than entranced, from ear to ear,

By thumping bass-lines, or the warlords' fight.

How odd to find myself alone, again;

The only one who knows he's on a train.

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 17.1.25 

 1240

There's snow in the air and ice upon the rut;

Skeletal forms, unmoving and unmoved,

Stark reminders of Death's scything cut.

There's snow in the air.

Grey the street and grey the sky, amazed

By silence after all the Christmas glut

Of ice-rink carols and town centres' paved

With wooden huts, bratwurst, the gentle phut

Of hand-cranked roundabouts; all now passed

Dark as ashes from the Yule - but

There's snow in the air.

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 15.1.25

 1238

Old Curmudgeon

Contuncious all the way to Birmingham

With children squibbling up and down the aisles;

Red headed stockers in their red-lined worlds,

Furiously stabbling ipads all the whilst

Oblivious to the noticles for quiet

The mutters from retired, Tonbridge Walls,

Who bought his ticket thirteen weeks ago

Hoping to read his book on Bulgan Smalls;

But no, the snozzing chorus and the slap

Of well filed finger nails on viral screens

Skirp his thoughts and purpulate his mind

Till losing his contribulation, screams

            Can't you read, you blasterds - it's the law

            No I-saws here - who won the bloody war?

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 13.1.25

 1239

Sushi on the train

Then bavette before Bridge

Britten and Elgar.

Perfick!

After fish knives and

Forks, we have a drinks cupboard;

Oh how middle class.

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 10.1.25

 1237

This pub must be in

The Mediterranean;

No one speaks English

But the Polish man

At the bar knows I'm hoping

For another glass.

Wine

Is an international

Language.

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 8.1.25

 1236

    To be honest

       I needed

     A small child

          Then

The links between

   Digital projector

            And

       Computer

 Would have taken

    Two minutes

           Not

      Two hours

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 6.1.25

1235

New Year 2013

The old year ended in a fit of squalls

Lashing rain and wind from off the sea

Keeping us indoors to clear the dregs

Of staling Christmas cake and cold turkey.

But the new-year's sun rose undefiled

To warm the downlands and our winter hearts

As we strode out to Alfriston, across

Firle Beacon, Bostlal Hill and parts

So muddy that we'd rather not recall

Their dank reality, preferring more

The joy of fierce light from out the east

And life returning from cold earth's core.

            No larks above, but our way is clear

            As we set out to face this brand new year.

Brian Hick January 2013

©copyright Sally Hick 3.1.25

 1234

Boxing Day

The cat is on the windowsill, the sky is turning blue

And somewhere up in heaven you are wondering what to do

Now evolution's settled and everything's in place

And you've turned the whole thing over to the restless human race.

Perhaps you've let things slide a bit, putting up your feet

After all the effort of creating in the heat

Worm and woodlouse, whale and whelk,

Reindeer, caribou, gnu and elk,

Lion, leopard, wolf and fox,

Sheep and goat and cow and ox;

And then the glory of your strife

Man and woman came to life.

But, wait a moment, was that really such a good idea

Given what has happened since you made us appear?

Just look at all the mess we've made, the violence, the war,

The massacres, the genocides, the trampling of the poor,

The arrogance, the cons, the lies, the tyranny, the law -

For even law can be abused and set against the few

Who would seek the greater good and make all things new.

Was mankind such a god idea when you look at what we've done

And so much of it simply in the name of having fun?

How many of us really yearn to fight the foreign foe

Or insist that our ideas are better, and we'd go

To any lengths to prove the point, even if we had

To murder half the human race before we all went mad?

If Jesus came with love and peace, why are we still fighting,

And if you are the only God, why is life so frightening,

With Jew and Muslim, Buddhist, Christian, Zoroastrian, who

All claim to know you best, and know what is true?

Perhaps I'll wait the still small voice, the silence which will show

Me that you are still around, and which way I should go

In all this mess, this omni-shambles, which might just be okay

If I should sense, when all seems dark, a Light to show the Way.

Brian Hick December 2012

©copyright Sally Hick 1.1.25