Bamberry

I've read somewhere oriental bamboo

is the fastest growing plant on Earth

but for this summer it won't be true

because, despite the prolonged dearth

of rain in England, continual sun

with record heat, deep rots in clay

have all combined together to run

a new contender into play.

My blackberry plant, though lacking charms,

just like some giant, deep sea squid,

has outflung all its grasping arms

to post its oriental bid.

I never would have believed a plant

could grow so fast and overwhelm

all other foliage that can't

escape this tyrant's realm.

Garden Centre

The slaughtered are arranged in rows,

displayed so everybody sees

a kind of genocide that shows

the massacre of christmas trees.

The castle of the ego is assaulted

on all sides by images and ideas.

The guarding walls are slowly undermined,

the moat drained dry by prejudice and fears.

The citadel of ego is bombarded

relentlessly by missiles from above.

Besieged by banners, only ignoring sleepers,

uncaptured, blind and deaf, survive in love.

Tweets 6

New driving habit

----------------------

Now that the price of petrol's so damn high

whenever possible I do my best to try

and cut my driving costs the most -

wherever I can I coast.

For some women a man's

just the means to an end

if his love will extend

to the children she plans.

Not all abilities decline with age.

Some indeed may actually improve.

Although self-confidence may slip a stage,

self-delusion makes an upward move.

Companionship is animal.

Love is uniquely human.

Spending money to make life easy

gives less satisfaction than

successfully struggling cheaply.

For some people chores are a burden,

just a waste of time.

For others they're a godsend,

a way to fill up time.

The camera never lies ?

-----------------------------

Why is it, I wonder,

that my face looks better

in my bathroom mirror

than in my camera ?

The gym transmutes inactive lethargy

into healthy satisfying fatigue.

Like the mediaeval Philosophers' Stone

a gympass is a precious gymstone.

Why spend a fortune on a fancy watch

instead of a quid on a lapel badge

to say just the same  -  'I am rich'.

I spread a piece of bread with butter,

layered it with jam,

topped it off with runny honey,

(makes a change from spam)

sliced it into two but fumbled,

dropped them on the ground.

Typical of lifelong luck -

both landed spread side down. 

Forget about Frankenstein, Dracula, dragons,

werewolves and wiches, ogres and bogeymen.

Ditch djinns, dinosaurs, ghouls, zombies and demons -

the most malevolent monsters are humans.

We see and hear and read so much

about our environmental problems

but still ignore the elephant in the room.

We know so much about global warming,

air pollution, species extinction,

plastics in the sea - predictions of doom.

Yet still the tusker is unrecognised

in our worries about our ailing Earth

while we search for cures amid prevailing gloom.

But is it ours, this jewel of Earth?

For sure, humanity's so dominant

we treat it like some family heirloom.

Yet we have really stolen it,

usurped it with so many people

that other forms of life have little room.

The elephant is human population

and it's not enough to slow its growth;

we urgently need to reduce it - and soon !

Why aren't all the world's governments

keenly promoting birth control

with free contraceptive pills and condoms?

Will it need wars or worldwide plagues

to cull our rampant humanity?

Perhaps over-using antibiotics is a boon

for all the Earth's non-human life

if a global pandemic decimates

mankind one minute before high noon.

Is human misery on such  scale

the ultimate price we'll have to pay

to enable a healthier planet to bloom?

Otherwise there'll be no room

for that ostracised elephant in the room.