Brecht, back in industrial Germany, after a trip to the countryside, gazed through the sooty air at the grubby rows of houses and said,...

So it gets to you, too, Almodovar the pain in the locked spine and sadness, as you bend on the forestage listening, to your rounds of...

Clearances? Don’t like the term, a Highland chief protests in chiselled English voice. The English did not clear Scots out. They went...

Here in this quiet house all sleep, And I give time to memory, Hang a sepia photo on a wall, Pull sketches on brown paper From a drawer. What use? some say, Never look over your shoulder Shun all nostalgia. Yet I resurrect the face Of this man of no account To anyone now but me. Uncle Bert loved all he did, Was always good to be with. He had large mechanic's hands, Strong, though his feet were bad, What with carrying a man's load At sixteen in that factory (His Ma gave that f

An oily smear on a still pool. A friend obliquely watching Drew close and said: How beautiful! Perceive the rainbow pattern On the...

I drive into the wind in border country and quickly traverse names upon the map I'd thought large towns, but find dwindled to mere...

Speracedes Easter '91 Seeking a quiet grave In the evening light We took the lower road Where the old lavoirs stand And the stream still...

Ice-pick gone, feet first, face down, Malory slid, clawed at the scree, Skewed to a halt, humped miles up, Like a cuttle bone on a beach,...

Two figures stood waving goodbye, The man, my father, one foot in the gutter, Watery blue eyes more apt to fix on nothing But fixing now...

Who can deny hubris when writing of love? Who can define its quality, its chemistry? Would some kind of litmus test explain elusive...

The objects are not beautiful The rooms not well proportioned, The house not chosen for itself, But for what could be seen from within....

The large and paunchy man, with straddled legs and slippered feet, paddling across a hotel floor to sit because he cannot stand, evokes...

In circumstances such as war, Patriots white lies deplore. They speak sincerely from the heart (In war there is less need of art) Pride...

Epiphany Flecks of rain adorn the glass; a fluttering chaffinch clings to a swinging twig; Atlantic winds buffet each leafless bush, and...

The clock of his life had a slow tick And a large surprised white face, Which was seldom seen, Since it went better Face downward. It...

A late letter for Margaret So you have slipped away, Margaret, bequeathing us warm memories which will last our days (you had a rough...

Father found a letter to my mother from a soldier who had been at home when Father was away. Mother quite denied that more than...

for Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth The echoes of a gift thought lost haunt the approach of age as a forgotten page...

If you regret you did not open the many doors you knocked on, reproach yourself for that regret, some doors are mere illusion. Life's...

Looking at you now, light falling, wondering what you are thinking, bent forward in profile, old, yes, but somehow beautiful, although...