I watched a lorry
coming down the Route de Lesterps.
One of those rumbling lumbering lorries
that so disturbed your morning sleep
and for an instant, a moment’s thought,
I wanted
to dash out between our cars
to run into its onrushing path
to come to you
to leave behind the pain
the need to know
to know not the how
but the inexplicable why.
In the end, I stood there
and watched it pass,
I counted the raindrops as they fell
and as time restarted
turned and returned to our home.
Kim Helen James
9:29
7th October 2024
Behind the slightly misted pane, I sit
alone: outside a bared and boney limb
of sycamore is splayed with branches split
their flimsy leaves like floppy goldfish swim.
As autumn's copper shards then slowly leach
magenta tones, the fawn or paley blotched
remnants are tossed when passing lorries screach.
The seething swirl of leaves is slowly watched:
each fingered form in sprawled and spiky pose
regains a shape in fury's frenzied flight.
Each leaf like hands with purple veins expose
a spider web like twisting ammonite.
In these times of plenty
I see some dreadful scenes,
Yesterday a girl too poor
To have holes in her jeans.
I felt for that lassie
For I know the passion
That the young seem to feel
About following the fashion.
She could’ve cut her own but
Imagine the shame, poor thing
If her friends had discovered
She wasn’t wearing the real thing
Just a homemade attempt and
Just not in anyway the same
As that authentic hole that
Carried a Designer’s name.
In these days of austerity
It’s come sadly to pass
They’ve reined in hopes
Of the working class.
It’s Austerity for the poor,
Tax breaks for the rich,
And, like it or not,
Life’s just a .
Just count your blessings
For Brexit’s on track
And Fat Boris the liar has
Given us our country back.
Those folk in Europe
Are all jealous as hell
For they all now know
It’s all working so well
Ignore the long queues
Of lorries waiting at Dover
It’s all just Fake News and
The Brexit crisis long over.
It’s just nostalgia now
For times that have been
When any ordinary lass could
Afford Designer holes in her jeans.
Our Lorries on roads don’t worry
Moving slow like not in hurry
Traffic in peak hours so sorry
We cowboys on this side of the pond
Get out of bed with boots and spurs on
To ride our bucking bronco golden stallions
As you mount your nags on the weak side of the ocean
Yes, we snicker as you call elevators 'lifts'
And your truckers call a semi a 'lorry'
But daring to call a cop or a smokey a 'bobby' ~
Odds bodkins, bloke! Please say that you're sorry!
THE LAST ONE
It’s very cold up North, the ice stretches for miles.
There’s a knock at my window, oh!
It’s my better half, and he smiles.
“Come in” I said, “Come in and be quick!
Put your sack down and flick, off the snow.
You’ve been a long time, how did it go?”
He sat shivering by the fire, rubbing his hands,
“Don’t tell me!” I said, “More white vans!”
“I don’t know how they expect you to deliver alright,
With their drones, flying past your ears, all night!
I’ve been sat here with the elves, worrying how you’d go,
And would Rudolph’s nose, have a bright enough glow?
What’s that you say? He had to land on the ground!
I’m not surprised with all that wi-fi around.
His route finder nose is all that you have,
It is really time you got a new sat-nav.
Next year, forget Earth, with its carbon, lorries and cars,
It’s Amazon, its Ebay. It’s time to try Mars!
Now look at your cheeks, they’re all rough and red,
Here’s your nightgown and cap, it’s time for your bed.
You go, and have a right good doze,
An’ think on, them Martians have never had,
A SANTA CLAUS!”
Looking out of the window
I see nothing.
View to eastern hills,
Blocked by lorries, carrying soldiers
In combat-fatigues,
My town looks like a fortress.
In my room,
Cramped with books and history,
Surrounded by dusty calendars,
I wage a war for freedom
From captivity,
Wishing for a breath of green air.
In this prison of thoughts,
I close my eyes and remember
Golden calendulas, cactuses with tiny red blooms,
Whispering orchids and giggling ferns
You once tendered in distant time,
In a faraway garden.
Thus I ignore the walls.
We are Black Ants: how many times must lorries grind us?
Before we get extinct!
How many times must chickens peck on us?
Before the number is reduced!
How many times must our kind mourn?
Before our rights are guaranteed!
How many times must floods flash us away?
Before the world knows we exist!
Dandom Randomness
What else will I see out of my story?
I’ve seen a guy blown away.
Where’s my guinea pig?
In the boarded up pub in the fog.
Your film is so yesterday,
full of sex and violence.
One foot man no boot.
It’s dark when the flash bulbs go out.
Frick brutality embrace toe kissing.
I’ve no time for four false Gods.
You gotta be real.
We worship one another.
You photograph roundabouts,
I snap lampposts.
Mailbox in desert.
No, there are eight.
Blonds are from tomorrow.
For the price of the wind.
You’re so paranoid.
Have you thought it’s the company you keep?
Point course correction to where?
Ninjas in the dustbin lorries.
They wait, waiting to break the law of any country, they rush in their thousands to gain access to the tunnel**. Why, what do they envisage is at the end, a pot of gold, reality is another camp, until they are sent back to country of origin. These are the poor people who have tried to reach the shores of the UK. Spent their meagre savings to reach this goal,
it stands for freedom
dark mouth, with forbidden depth……
sign says your welcome
** referring to the Tunnel at Calais that connects UK to rest of Europe, thousands of refugees are waiting to enter illegally by storming the tunnel or hiding in back of a lorries. So Sad.
CHOKE POINT
Our roads are at choke point
as traffic descends into gridlock chaos.
Cars, lorries, buses and vans
all bumper to bumper in a traffic
jam ten miles long. This is a vision
of the technological world
in which we live where both man
and machine grind to a halt.
On the bleak street
not a blade of grass,
only dust
from the lorries,
the cement mixers.
A year later
I see a bud appearing,
by Autumn
this one golden blade
has grown tall.
The sound of a swishing oat seed
cheers me up
in grubby flatland.
Thursday morning
Day aff
Time to have a think...
Down the M9
To Edinburgh
And walk across the Forth Bridge.
In the car
It's not very far
Only 26 miles,
Last day of sun
A'fore it rains a ton
Time for a few wee smiles.
Wind in hair
We must be there
Across the Firth of Forth,
Batteries charge
As the bridge looms large
So does the presence of the Lord.
Forth rail bridge
The diesel sings
As trains float over its tracks,
The red tinged steel
Matches the sun's feel
As it works on our head and backs.
The path looks long
The curve rolls on
Approaching Queensferry north,
Cable and steel
Engineering congealed
On the magnificent Firth of Forth.
The bird's eye view
With the seagull crew
Reveal the Firth's glory,
Where the bridges float
With the sailing boats
On this Edinburgh prairie.
Clock turns one
The walk is done
We leave the water and lorries,
Waste some time
Write another rhyme
As my wife and I smell the coffee.
Open cast yard
Black rain filtered down the cobble stone catching the moon almost making a white streak of what looked like paint as it found the large grated drains
As morning came transformations of colours form as oil slick from the Lorries brightly covered concrete bays and the smell of sweet coal raising steam from the heat of the sun and the guard man at the gate grin pains
The architecture of the tall green bins made of steel house the coal in structure always there on the landscape proud useful but I heard a boy got stuck in one and was crushed by the weight when coal picking and I hear his screams every time I hear the screeching of the lines on the trains
See every place or small town has a short cut and the coal yard was ours and whether we used it or not I will always remember the birds singing and the sun rising with the rain pouring and the boy screaming but now it’s not there any more and no one can pass through apart from thoughts in me remains
clear-eyed springs
unfold her wings
trumpet the joyful
sound of
cherry blossom trees
while
sharing her
branches
with
shiny black yellow
and
red breasted
lorries of the spring
oh lord
when
i
hear heaven sing
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