Yorkshire Writers' Lunch

War A skein of geese flies silently, majestically in the red glow of evening, their v shape in unison, like a squadron of war planes performing at an air show … Below, the smouldering of jagged buildings fills the air with acrid smells of twisted metal, burning people, long dead,  gaping mouths, sightless eyes. Dogs hungrily investigate, choose from a menu. Harsh wind skitters newspapers across the square, give some semblance of privacy to bodies as they are unknowingly covered. A defeated, bedraggled soldier walks past unseeing lost in his own thoughts, gripping a photograph, town raped, razed to the ground plundered, murdered left to rot. The red sky in this particular frame is not made by mother nature for it will still be there for days as the ceaseless roar continues to wreak its havoc, death and destruction. Horrific scenes of war play out daily, globally ghastly, unthinkable to any right-minded human. The rest of us should remember how lucky we are. Give thanks ...

  (Memorial to Commonwealth servicemen killed during the Battles of the Aisne and Marne in 1918 who have no known grave. Soissons, France). She would have known. She was his mother. She would have felt his pain. Her mind held on to an image she had conjured of him. Dazed, lost, left by someone in a cottage or a farmhouse away from the guns. Foreign voices whispering questions he didn’t understand, unable to remember his name or where he was. Armed with the weapon of denial, she fought off despair and the lure of mourning. Weeks later, she saw him. Standing at the sink, she looked towards the gently rising Pennine hills and fields crossed by snaking stonewalls. He was there, at the bottom of the garden by the wall, his back towards her. When the sunlight caught the tips of his ears, she cried out and lifted her hand to knock at the window but the sun faltered and his image dissolved, extinguished by the late summer light. She turned to see if he had come into the kitchen. Wipi...

Afghanistan falls Lives destroyed and torn apart A sad, bleak future.