When my brother came back to Norwich he usually wanted to be taken to Dunston Common, just outside Norwich. This poem, written ten years ago, is not about him, but he is in it. Branches of long-suffering oakspiral down, nudging damp…
Read: Dunston Common
It has been the strangest of Christmases. My brother Andrew, who had a disrupted life and was never at peace, is at peace now. He died suddenly of choking, followed by cardiac arrest, on December 23. He is in a…
A butcher was the only survivorwhen the White Ship,decked out for a reality showand with alcohol to spare, hit beefy rocks:no sense of direction, so long ago The king’s son – an Instagram hero – went for gloryturning back to save his…
I am unlikely to be invited to upmarket functions. But if I were, and if, while minding my own business, I was approached by someone – a lady-in-waiting, say – who inquired about my name, background and family history, I should…
It’s a long time since I was here:but not much has changed – a virus passed throughan organ was removedpacked with stones that threatenedto avalanche:I did not get the point,so I’m surviving Yes, I feel tired:a rescue helicopter flies above, shaking the…
Part of my childhood – and indeed a good chunk of my adulthood – has been wiped from the map of Norwich. Not, for once, by the council shutting yet another road, but by a simple name change. Surrey Chapel, the…
There may be a coyote in the garden:he should not be there – we are too far south and daylight is abroad He may have the smoothness of a wolfand the ferocity of a socialist:he may be waiting for meto say the…
Read: Possible coyote
The clocks are about to go back to where they came from, the nights are drawing well in, and several other similar cliches will be employed over the next few days to convey that summer has well and truly disappeared,…
I sit on a low benchwaiting for the first drops of rain,enjoying the warm stillness before the storm Birds head for the trees,but I am not worried:I can see the housebetween the cedars A few steps are all it will take:white…
Read: Approaching autumn
I have a new home. By “home” I don’t mean a house I own or rent, but an area where I feel at home, I know where I am and am familiar enough with the immediate area to be comfortable. One…