On my way to buy a morning paper #85

Squealing of gulls
winding of well-handles
needing oiled.

5.55 a.m. From my office window

Early morning pink
like cotton-bolls
short lived
and quickly fade to palest grey.

On my way to buy a morning paper #84

On returning from the still-shadowed cool
the warmth of the house
more welcoming than stifling
I kept my cardigan on.,

Awake

Thrown up from beneath the Hamnavoe

white against a blue-black sea

an endless chorus of can-can dancers

froth of lacy petticoats

legs lengthening.

On my way to buy a morning paper #83

I know the name for them is not begonias

(but cannot currently recall what the right one is)

and, remembering sun-bleached crèpe paper

(used for 1950s shop window dressings),

dislike them for the colour-fading of their flowers.

On my way to buy a morning paper #82

Reading this week about ravens –

the death of one, the threat should they all leave –

the crumpled blackness in the centre of the road

brought apprehension.

Closer, small relief:

only a gold-lettered M&S bag,

recently discarded.

Keep fooling me

Long-dead apples
shrivelled and brown
cling to bare branches -
chilly winter birds.

On my way to buy a morning paper #81

Car-shape dryness
in otherwise wet road
signifies an overnight stay
its placing -
anonymous, unclaimed -
suggesting illicit,
adulterous.
I look around and wonder
'Who?'

On my way to buy a morning paper #80

Traffic louder than expected
Cropped council mower circles in the grass
Full moon growing slowly larger
as it declines.

On my way to buy a morning paper #79

Hydrangea bush

Over-crowded blooms

suffocating venous crimson  

crushed and crinkle-edged with gold

leaves poison gossip green.

Holding the potential drama

       of a Victorian drawing room,