Yorkshire Writers' Lunch

Farewell, my dear children.  Look at me one last time, then turn away and don’t look back.  Look out over the ocean and let your thoughts follow your gaze out towards the horizon. If you could reach out and dip your hand into the deep waters which hold your future, you may find that your grasp will bring forth pearls.  Or your fingers may be bitten by the sharp crab claws of fate.  Or both.  I hope that whatever life has to show you, you will find, above all things, balance.  Balance in every aspect of your life.  It is the key to success and happiness.  I have not been able to achieve balance for myself.  I have emerald gowns aplenty, yet not enough food for you, my sons and daughters. As I cast you out across the seas, I ask one thing of you.  Send your children back to me.  And your children’s children. Just let them stay with me for a while and I will return them to your adopted homeland. So keep going, beyond...

She was only a girl when they left. My grandmother Pointed on the map, to the faintest dot in the square of blue And it seemed to me to be made of the sea itself. So alone, So far from its orientating neighbour it could be anywhere Or nowhere. A speck outside the sheltering embrace of the Hebrides Flung into the fierce Atlantic, It is a place I have never seen, never touched, Yet I felt the bite of the salt and the spray in my lungs. She told me of the infinite sky and the scoured land And I felt the spring of heather and of kelp under my feet And heard the clamour of gannets. She told me of the squat houses crouched along the shore Now roofless, Home to wild-eyed sheep, Moss reclaiming the stones in a smothering shroud. She told me how they left their doors unlocked, and a gift - A handful of oats For their strange and zealous gods Who were as much of the wind and waves as of The Book Laid open at Exodus, And I wonder If their flight ...

Oncoming cars in the middle of the road - my father dear, insurance man, to me advice bestowed: keep looking out for traffic, don’t stare at girls in woad. Damn! Oncoming bus in the middle of the road. Oncoming bus in the middle of the road - keep your brakes well serviced, make sure your speed has slowed. Concentrate that one-track mind, read the Highway Code. Cripes! Oncoming truck in the middle of the road. Oncoming truck in the middle of the road - watch how you handle that articulated load. Make sure those mounds of much are well and truly stowed. Blast! Oncoming girl in the middle of the road. Oncoming girl in the middle of the road - Elegant and fashionable, and in a bluish mode. I offer her a careful ride towards her chic abode, and now there’s children playing in the middle of the road. Oncoming child in the middle of the road - always fear an accident from any episode. Drive as if you’re going to meet a drink-fuelled Mr Toad ...

“Never look into the fire,” my grandfather used to say, “you’ll see witches in there.”  And I did, as my eyes were drawn into the orange core, on Saturday night.  I had to avert my gaze, as I thought of what at one time might lie at the middle of such a pyre, and my back and shoulders prickled with that familiar pang of guilt and confusion, and I thought, as I always do, “Why are we all here?” Remember, remember, the fifth of November, Gunpowder treason and plot, I see no reason, why gunpowder treason, Should ever be forgot. It is the same moral dilemma, each year.   Do we embrace this odd, macabre tradition, join in and make the best of it, or stay away completely?   Are we denying our children something special by not joining the crowds who have been drawn to this event for over four hundred years?   We have avoided it for many years.   Our daughter is almost 8, our son almost 6.   They’ve seen fireworks through the window at home, at ...