Lie gently back in the air and close your eyes
Take hold of my hand and together let’s dream
See an emerald world glistening in promise
Of a crystal clear morning rising from the east
Or the calm dusk sinking in flames in the west
It matters not if our dream is one within hearts
That makes hands hold tight and soft lips touch…
Awakening dreams shared that grow into one soul
Taking the remaining days together and never parted
Time is short, the world vast and you are mine forever

Comes the dawn; so tread softly
With dew cooled feet that walk
Across the velvet, grassy rise
To the summit of an eastern hill
As the birds awake and sing
Of the earth and the sun’s rising
In its music a heart finds peace
As the world awakes to a new day

I was I was not and yet...
Dragons breathed doom
And my face now burns
For my time has long gone
Yet each new day is balm
Born in dawn on a sunrise
That softens each day to dusk
To sleep to dream and to rest
To enjoy the new tomorrow

Spring slowly breathes life into the world around us. Hills and plains stretch to the horizon and shimmer with a new found purpose and slowly across the land all the creatures return, awake or are born. Spring with her gentle warmth and tepid rains bring forth the palest green shoots from the long bare wood and slowly they will unfurl to a deeper shade of a green that conjures thoughts of the greatest health and vitality. Flowers shall scent the air and reflect the gold of the climbing sun and pour a joy into my heart. The air rushes in and settles clear and calm over misty mornings that belie later clear blue skies where birds swim and call to long lost loves or striving perhaps to make a new union that shall last for life. For the world is ever a wonder to me and I see the beauty of all my springs so far with rapture.

This is what havoc i wreaked today

Saturday went to Chester Zoo

Just in case we are getting ahead of the winter here is something I wrote in 2001

Sunday 04.03.2001

It is a gloriously cloudless blue sky. The sun slanting between the trees and over the graves looks so special. The cemetery still has snow and there is this amazing holly bush that is still dripping with the reddest berries. It is quite the most beautiful mixture of sun, white snow and green evergreens. All the birds are singing and the thought comes to me “where have they all come from to celebrate the day with me? The floor beneath my feet is littered with fallen husks from the Beech trees. The beech mast is devoid of seed now and the brown husks crinkle and crackle under my feet like cocoa shells and the thought comes what great mulch they would make if I could gather up enough. I remember the hard work of collecting leaves one year. I am leaving the cemetery now and heading to the park. Wow it’s a bit slippery underfoot. It is a wide tree lined street with large Victorian houses with massive gardens. How they knew how to build my love and we shall walk along here when you come. Now I turn into the little lane that runs up the side of the park. I like this little lane for it always feels to me I am walking in a time long past where there is no tarmac or streetlights. The path takes me to the field but I cannot cross. Sadly I turn and head back to the cemetery to walk up the hill that way.

The pictures are to cheer you up after the grey prose...hope they work!

This is my kind of picture...stunning (from the readers section at Sky)

Soft must I tread through human dissolution?
Across a world transmuted to waste and ash
In madness and pain none can heal nor touch
Nor offer solace to the minds already in torment
For soon we shall all follow as the truth runs out…
And we see a life less than minds have imagined
It is the great, dark, echoing sadness of this age
That man must fall so low down in earthly regard
While across the cosmos where we may not see
The universal imperative, grave and sad, smiles
For its greatest terror (us) has now turned inward
For we could have walked long among the stars
But content are we to take our paradise here and..
Destroy its prideful, ancient beauty from within
The monsters we fear roam in no guise of men
From the seas we came and to them we return
As the ice melts and the earth warms we...
Wait for the turn of days some call rapture
For that is the legacy of our ancient beliefs
In saviours and prophets and currency
When only belief in love eternal was necessary

Or.....

From the winters skeletal might
Ever increasing circles of light
Bring the northern retreat of night
Set the bloodied Polar bears to flight

The artic year has ushered in spring
Snow has stopped, ice no longer king
When Belugas smile and Narwhals sing
Thousands of geese return on the wing

Ever increasing circles of light
Bring the northern retreat of night
When Belugas smile and Narwhals sing
The artic year has ushered in spring

A spring sunrise creates the diminution of the winter ice and glints in the bloodied footsteps of polar bears fleeing; advancing fluid seas.

A spring sunrise creates
The diminution of winter ice
Glints in bloodied footsteps
Of polar bears fleeing
The advancing fluid sea.

How cute is this picture from the Sky site?

Last one folks

Morris and his wife Esther went to the state fair every year, and every year Morris would say, 'Esther, I’d like to ride in that helicopter.' Esther always replied, 'I know Morris, but that helicopter ride is fifty dollars, and fifty dollars is fifty dollars' One year Esther and Morris went to the fair, and Morris said, 'Esther, I'm 85 years old. If I don’t ride that helicopter, I might never get another chance.' To this, Esther replied, 'Morris that helicopter ride is fifty dollars, and fifty dollars is fifty dollars.' The pilot overheard the couple and said, ‘Folks I’ll make you a deal. I'll take the both of you for a ride. If you can stay quiet for the entire ride and not say a word, I won't charge you! But if you say one word, it’s fifty dollars.' Morris and Esther agreed and up they went. The pilot did all kinds of fancy manoeuvres, but not a word was heard. He did his daredevil tricks over and over again, but still not a word. When they landed, the pilot turned to Morris and said, 'By golly, I did everything I could to get you to yell out, but you didn't. I'm impressed!' Morris replied, 'Well, to tell you the truth, I almost said something when Esther fell out, but you know, fifty dollars is fifty dollars!'

Another one (a giro is a welfare payment method)

Should the UK Adopt The Euro?

A cross-section survey of 1000 people in the poorest parts of the UK , were asked if they thought Britain should change its currency to the Euro.

99% said no, they were very happy with the Giro.

Let's have a joke for a change

MY LIVING WILL

Last night, my friend and I were sitting in the living room and I said to him, "I never want to live in a vegetative state, dependent on some machine and fluids from a bottle. If that ever happens, just pull the plug." He got up, unplugged the Computer, and threw out my wine.

Soft drawn breath escapes in plumes of moisture
Through a mouth held expectant and captive to cool air
This February night in the midst of winters embrace
It takes away our frustration of the darker nights
With the promise of a lighter heart with coming spring
It is so close we can almost now hear its awakening
Listen intently to the beating of your eager heart
And begin to mark time away in this declining season
For the race is up and the world once again renews
And I would see it all, every blade of grass and sunbeam
For I have waited a winter to taste these changing days

Wednesday 11th Feb. 2009

We’ve been having a reasonable spell of weather after the snow that fell at the weekend. I’ve been feeding the birds as usual but there is a Mistle Thrush with a really bad attitude that has all but driven all the other birds away. It sits in the tree and swoops down hawk-like onto the Robins and blackbirds below. My bird book says this is normal but I have never seen such a grumpy old thing before. Don’t understand it....look it up here. Its Latin name is Turdus viscivorus so I guess that figures.

http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/m/mistlethrush/index.asp

Fortune takes the hand and walks it
Across time and thought into a dream
Where music invades thoughts and
Rhythm drives the soul into ecstasy

Enjoy the music and imagine better days
When youth beckoned and melodious songs
Echoed in the breast as a sirocco wind to burst free
And rise in a melody of warm hope for everyone

The world my love is not as it was then
Too many things must now change too fast
Yet the music shall remain through it all
Just as you shall; as you sing to me tonight

I have been outside this morning and the dawn sky is a wonderful pale blue drawn with high light feathered clouds and I see the moon clear and bright and almost completed. I can hear the first birds stirring and the air is sweet, clean and cold but that just heightens the senses in the morning air. I stood there awhile loving every moment. A lone wood pigeon soared and dived in the morning sky above the sycamore tree and I so feel the same, for every day I am flying free and safe wrapped in love. For I find like the wonder of a morning we need love just to survive and enjoy the day. It is the dawn that rises in my heart and also the setting evening sun that blazes across a dusk sky into night.

Just before night fell snow
It came as an opaque swarm of...
Swirling white winter bees
Dancing around my head
With a sting of ice that...
Shattered watery venom on...
A warm brow and then
Ran away to the ground.

Hope you like these 2 pictures of the view from the bridge over the canal at skipton. I would have taken more but the battery ran out...oh the rewards of proper preparation .
The 5 p's 'Prior planning prevents piss poor performance'

Count the grains of sand on a beach
Or the airborne pollen out of reach
Kick through leaves in a forest with flair
Then watch them float down through the air
Take all memories that have made us smile
And think of me sometimes once in a while

Can you catch a snowflake?
In your palm like a small bird
It sits light as air and silent
Waiting for the night
Like a feathered phantom
To take solace in the shadow
Seeking comfort in its close kin
Huddling to ameliorate the cold
Safe in the mass of warmth
Throughout the long night
That has come

I caught a snowflake tonight
And it burnt my hand
For no matter how I tried
I could not stop it fading
Into another form
Like I and you shall
One day when the sky
Turns blue and the sun rises
For the snow falls and
I shall stay a little longer
Just till the summer

Wednesday 4th Feb 2009

You may have read we had some snow the other day...well it seemed to bypass most of Lancashire which was a bit annoying. Still we may get some more tonight with luck. It’s been pretty quiet here but time is racing into February so soon. The whole economic thing has abated a little so I’m thankful for that and although work is still quiet and Nick’s shop is quieter things seem a little bit more positive. I wonder what we’ll be writing about this time next year. Probably reminiscing about what it was like to have a job.

Still (and I say this every year,) wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a summer all to oneself. To rise with the sun in the east and fall sleep with the moon rising silvered on the horizon. To spend day’s outdoors recounting memories and observing every facet of a land I have walked all my life and yet know I have missed so many things. To be in tune completely with the rhythm of the passing lengthening days and changing seasons and to let my soul fly free out into the world. To write ceaselessly and think without limit...that is my wish.

Loves first meeting
Shall stop time’s fleeting,
Dance across a lifetime
That looked toward open sky
With a huge heart of hope
For as light quickens to dusk
Yet my eyes still see
That beauty illuminated by day
Though closed to the eyes
Is still all around in the dark

For my soul is alight
To the wonder of you
And I should never be blind…
While arms can hold me
From so far away
And I shall think always
When shall the rain stop?
I know not, for weather is
Wild, untamed and none
But the wise may say

What time a change comes
When heavens will open
Sweep away the grey
Ushering deepest blue folds
Awash with golden sunlight.
Yet rain may stop one day
When we are together
If only within our hearts and minds
So we may be at peace
A little while

For the world hurts sometimes
And its pain is felt by all
Who live and breathe.
I share its pain now as do you
But joy is returned in sharing
In your love and warmth.
For the world is a lonely place
Filled with billions of us and yet
In all those masses of population
Gaia’s arrow wounded us both

And we endure and grow
And ultimately we will heal all

Soft she comes in robes of white
To take the world in freezing flight
The moon is risen the sun sunk low
All that remains is the direction to go

Under trees should I tread softest feet?
Or on crops in fields now smothered neat
The cold revives and awakens the man
When snow is hard then is birthed the man

The sky cools and a milky expanse hangs expectant and soon snowflakes fall like soft white flakes of ash under a rising moon as winter extends a hand into the night air and freezes its heart. Birds tremor and still retreating into the deepest parts of trees and bushes and there they shall stay till the day calls them forth again. What do they dream and imagine through the long and lonely night? Tomorrow I shall place buttered brioche and vostizza currants on the wall and let them think that Christmas has come again. Just because I can and somebody should.