Yorkshire Writers' Lunch

  (Sonnet)   I can’t wear that hat, it makes my face fat Baring the shoulder makes me look older ©  Heidi Dp  |  Dreamstime Stock Photos Why do you want me to dress up bolder? Mutton dressed lamb is not where I’m at. Try it on, lover; don’t think of the price, Add scarf or coat if weather is colder You look quite the part (that’s what I told her) I swear on my life, it makes you look nice. But fabric’s flimsy, my waist is thicker… Then take all off, right down to the knicker I’ll admire your fine body without a snigger All wrinkles smoothed by candle’s flicker. Close your eyes gently ‘fore you grow older And feel my soft sigh on your bare shoulder.

“I am perfectly imperfect.”   That is my new mantra.  It has taken me 41 years to reach this point of being.  It is so enlightening and uplifting and is helping me feel happier and more confident in every aspect of my life, including my writing. I always enjoyed writing stories and poems from an early age, and in those early days without any fear of whether I was “good enough” to call myself a writer.  It is what I did and what I loved.  I always dreamed of being like Jo from Little Women.  Why then did I change my original path and pursue a career in law instead?   At some point in my childhood I remember my Dad saying “Nothing is worth doing if you don’t do it well.”  To put it in context, he was talking about cleaning the wooden floor in our living room.  He was dissatisfied with what he called my “port hole cleaning”.  As is the way with children, I took that on board as a message for how I should be in everything I did....

Here is an untitled poem I wrote in 2012.  It was written in sonnet form for a creative writing class.   My son carefully reaches for his bricks knocking yesterday’s creation to the floor. Then stops mid-crawl with wide eyes and inspects a tiny speck of dirt beside the door. Outside he sits quite still so he can stare at tree-shapes and the wobbling washing line with pegged white sheets that billow in the air. Then he lifts up his arms because he can. I learn from him that stillness between action is what we need to grow.  He’s offering a gift; each moment is an invitation to see how ordinary things can sing. Remembering his eyes I see it now: Those sheets were ship’s white sails, the lawn its bow. At the time I was focussed on it as a technical exercise and managed to keep to a strict rhyme scheme and metre.  Rereading it recently I thought it worked as a technical exercise but that the word choices wer...

  A short story inspired by the above photo.   “So it’s just a little luncheon party…”   Simone was saying and Claudette’s eyes were glazing over, in the way they always did when her friend regaled her with the long list of social events that she was going to or hosting.   Claudette sipped her red wine and thought about the painting she was working on.   Just hearing about Simone’s hectic social plans made her feel exhausted.            That’s another reason I didn’t marry, she thought to herself.   The endless parties and suppers and entertaining would have bored her rigid.   A film producer’s wife, Simone had happily immersed herself into Parisian society and it was all her old school friend seemed to talk about these days.   Claudette was a painter, a free spirit and a solitary animal.   She liked nothing better than dining alone in a restaurant with a good book for a companion. ...

The tick-tocking of the clock reminds me how long each dragging second takes to release its hold on time and hand over to the next.  The red second hand slips down the clock face.  It is not allowed to pause at the bottom before it must begin its uphill trek once more.  If I watch it, one minute is an eternity.  I take my gaze away and concentrate on the task in hand.  When I look back at the clock a few minutes later, or so it seems, I feel sure that it has cheated me and skipped forward twenty-fold, extinguishing many precious minutes of my time. I look down once more at the question paper and the words jump about on the page.  I stare at them and they settle down, allowing me to see into them.  I reach into my mind.  Nothing there. And then suddenly, butterfly thoughts are released and they fly around in all directions, bumping into each other within the confines of my brain.  I wait for a moment until, one by one, they come to rest...

Harz stared up at the building on the edge of the ring-road, oblivious to the roar of passing traffic behind him. The street ahead looked like a normal, attractive, old-town avenue, the lime trees in full leaf, people sitting at tables drinking from coffee cups and beer glasses. Harz felt anything but normal.  He was trying to screw up the courage to go through the large wooden doors. The only other time he’d entered the building had been twenty five years ago, under armed escort. They’d been gathering at the church – the Nickolaikirche – for weeks, to speak out freely, a small sanctuary in a city of surveillance. He remembered clearly what they’d been told that evening. If you’re arrested, don’t struggle, don’t be violent, just shout out your name so we know who you are and hold your candle tightly in your two outstretched hands. They’re less likely to attack you if you’re holding a candle. And it had worked. He hadn’t been assaulted. He’d been arrested and taken to th...

First thing: the drone of a motorcycle, the rattle of shutters being raised, someone pushing a trolley along the street, full to the brim with bottles of water. A man calls out a greeting to his neighbour, who crosses the street towards him. They stand together, strenuously discussing the news, the weather, food, family - who knows? It’s not a language I understand beyond the stock phrases - hello, goodbye, please, thank you, the bill etc. The street is shiny - did it rain last night or has it been cleaned? The sky is bright blue, the sort of blue that proves you’re on holiday, the sort of blue that promises a dry, warm day. Street-watching: a plethora of smells - cigarette smoke, diesel, drains, plus coffee, jasmine, ozone, garlic, oregano. Bread oven at full pelt, the queue pushing out the door and into the street. A stray dog lollops past, he’s carrying a plastic bag as if it contains all his worldly possessions. He disappears down a side street. There’s a guy sat on the chur...