Sunday 31 May 2009
Saturday 30 May 2009
AUC Tour
Sorry to spam everyone but I'm taking tea with Caroline Smailes at her BLOG today. Come and say hello, and try the Yunnan tea.
Labels:
An Ungodly Child,
Harold and Jasfoup,
Rachel Green
Friday 29 May 2009
Thursday 28 May 2009
Morning Mist
Wednesday 27 May 2009
Thoughts upon an Overgrown Grave on a Hillside
If it was left to me to tend a grave
laid within some lonely cemetery
where I, perhaps, walked with my dogs and gave
passing thought to those who died before me;
I would not decorate the weathered stone
with plastic bowls nor acrylic flowers
but instead, secure that I could dig down
to several feet and pass the hours
by constructing dreams of gardens once held
to be so quaint -- an Englishman’s delight
but not of mighty trees that rip and meld
the ancient stone with earth and block the light
of Heaven from your shady six-foot plot
but plant instead violas, ere you rot.
Tuesday 26 May 2009
Before the Soldiers Came
Do you remember the city
when it was young?
When factories claimed the suburbs
and the crows wore gasmasks;
grubbing in the trees
for the delicate prize
of a blackbird’s egg
or a piece of road kill.
I remember soot and coal
and father’s rifle on the hearth
and stealing bullets
to lay on the train tracks.
And Robbie Atkinson
coughing up blood
when we left him by the canal.
when it was young?
When factories claimed the suburbs
and the crows wore gasmasks;
grubbing in the trees
for the delicate prize
of a blackbird’s egg
or a piece of road kill.
I remember soot and coal
and father’s rifle on the hearth
and stealing bullets
to lay on the train tracks.
And Robbie Atkinson
coughing up blood
when we left him by the canal.
Monday 25 May 2009
None so Blind
She had a vulpine set to her features
and a debonair posture as she talked
to the guests. “Are we not all beautiful creatures?”
she enquired as a newcomer walked
to the bar and opened a bottle of gin,
trampling the host’s tourniquet dreams with a twist
of lemon and a discursive argument laid, chin
uppermost, on the parquet floor. Alas, he missed
excising the saturnine smile by a fraction
of a constipated colloquy. “No
problem,” he said. “I’ll schedule a faction
of irritable surgeons to cut and sew
the doldrums in your mother’s soul.” The look
she gave him, priceless; his gift to her: a book.
and a debonair posture as she talked
to the guests. “Are we not all beautiful creatures?”
she enquired as a newcomer walked
to the bar and opened a bottle of gin,
trampling the host’s tourniquet dreams with a twist
of lemon and a discursive argument laid, chin
uppermost, on the parquet floor. Alas, he missed
excising the saturnine smile by a fraction
of a constipated colloquy. “No
problem,” he said. “I’ll schedule a faction
of irritable surgeons to cut and sew
the doldrums in your mother’s soul.” The look
she gave him, priceless; his gift to her: a book.
Sunday 24 May 2009
Saturday 23 May 2009
Free to good home: The Outlaw Demon Wails
NOTE: This is the SAME BOOK as Where Demons Dare (Rachel Morgan 6)
just under a different title. That's why I have a pristine copy.
just under a different title. That's why I have a pristine copy.
One of the authors I read avidly is Kim Harrison. It's urban fantasy too, though a little different to An Ungodly Child.
I have a brand new copy of Kim Harrison's The Outlaw Demon Wails (Rachel Morgan 6)
to give away to a commenter. Obviously, it'd be nice if you'd plug An Ungodly Child on your blog but I'm not insisting on it. I'll send it anywhere in the world at my expense. I love Teryy Pratchett, and reading him was part of the process of creating my style of writing.
So please comment, tell your friends to comment, and tell them they should read me, too.
Winner to be picked at mid-day on Saturday 30th May
Last weeks winner of The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents was Cassandra. Please send me an address to send it :)
Lucifer’s Witness
I answered the door before she knocked –
a business suit in blue and grey;
a gay pink scarf carefully selected
to portray friendliness
and her friend,
who nodded and smiled.
I accepted a Watchtower
and a book on the life of David
and asked about Lucifer,
whereupon her friend shook her head
and she said.:
“It’s too late for that.”
a business suit in blue and grey;
a gay pink scarf carefully selected
to portray friendliness
and her friend,
who nodded and smiled.
I accepted a Watchtower
and a book on the life of David
and asked about Lucifer,
whereupon her friend shook her head
and she said.:
“It’s too late for that.”
Friday 22 May 2009
the transformation of paradise
Thursday 21 May 2009
Cold Tea
He wished for peace
away from his wife’s soap operas,
the neighbourhood gossip,
the constant babysitting for children
who just wanted peace themselves.
He had his greenhouse
and his potting shed
full of cans of kerosene
and petrol for the mower he’d had forty years
and the tools he rubbed with an oily rag
on Sunday afternoons
as he listened to the radio four play.
They found him at six
when he didn’t come in
for his ham sandwich and jam tart.
He was sitting on his compost heap.
Alone with yesterday’s grass clippings
and the warm embrace of nettles.
Wednesday 20 May 2009
Tuesday 19 May 2009
A Mouthful of Tentacles
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