Now-a-days

Temptation loses its allure,
yields to instant gratification,
the blink between want and have.

Liberal mores assuage
the tide of guilt and remorse
that scuppered yesterday’s sinner.

‘Trespass’ descended
from common parlance;
archaic.

We take what we fancy,
pick’n’mix bags at the ready,
appetites unbridled,
our collective conscience
oblivious, untainted.

© Helen McIntosh

 All rights reserved

Visitors

Regret is the man left standing
at her front door, locked.
Sadness, his cousin, slithers
across the threshold on dark days
to foment with Worry and Doubt.

Wide-armed is the greeting 
for Hope and Felicity,
the welcome as warm as
her freshly baked bread.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved 

Reflections

You weep your leaves into
water's lap below,
a flotilla of sienna, vermilion, gold.

Your boughs, near naked now,
reach up and out,
your sculptural fluidity mirrored below

all wreathed in shafts of Autumn sunlight.
The windows of my mind treasure
this memento of your resplendence.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

My foot

Plastered and elevated
I'm crutched and hutched,

my arse grows roots
(and bottomly toots).

Then They vote Brexit,
I'm told: 'don't flex it!'

A hobbling five weeks
and my foot really reeks

and then is released...

(nearly there)

... to another black beast

but this boot can drive
in six weeks I'll arrive.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Curmudgeonly Me?

From across the kitchen table
your kindliness becomes you.

The soup is homemade, nutritious
and piping hot. To the grumbling growl
of an empty tum, you lean forward,
chin pitched deep over trough, and
hoover in an appreciative symphony of
blow, suck, slurp.

I seethe and breathe:
‘Don’t do that!’

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Unforeseen

Heaped in a doorway, the trappings of 

homelessness absorb the rain and
rejection of passersby.

An oak, gnarled barren limbs devoid of leaf,
rests unseen by parkland walkers
preoccupied with beauty.

In Spring, green buds of unforeseen hope emerge;
a lad stops to chat, hands him
a coffee and burger.

© Helen McIntosh

May 2016

All rights reserved

The dearly departed

A Cornish cove at magnolia time,

wildflower paths zigzag to water’s edge
and cherished church
within whose orb the beloved recline
beneath their worthy epitaph,
lest we forget.

Where is the graveyard of the less lovable,
the curmudgeonly and mean?
Is it that we blossom in memoriam?

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Suffer the Children

Young human beings, children but not quite
without fear, hunger, and family woes,
in an unjust world fragmented and trite.

Innocence plundered, crushed spirit their plight,
where’s the parental protection for those
young human beings, children but not quite?

Camilla of Kids Co outspoken forthright
floats hope love and fun to those in the throes
of an unjust world fragmented and trite.

An army of helpers paint their world bright,
need fosters kinsfolk of sisters and bro’s
young human beings, children but not quite.

Cut welfare, rife rumour, venomous spite
as carrion crows pick peck at their foes
in an unjust world fragmented and trite.

Kids Co shut down. We’ll rage wild at the night
riven by shame for their lost tomorrows
young human beings, children but not quite,
in an unjust world fragmented and trite.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved
August 2015

Merry-go-round

Primary coloured carousel
relic of yesteryear
with curlicue fonted canopy
encircling its lit interior
and golden dancing ponies
and dragon scaled chariots
their barley sugar poles
clasped tight by tiny hands
as round and round and up and down
they spin to the fairground organ
whirling on the wheel of life.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved
December 2015

Out

Cast out.

Their sin?

To have fanned the flames of fear and paranoia,
diseased and untouchable,
the curse of certain contagion.
Then, their act of survival stigmatised:

Ostracised

by extended family (orphaned as they are),
friends, landlords, mosques, football clubs,
market stallholders, motorbike taxi drivers, et al.

Leprous Ebola outcast.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved
November 2015

Getting there

Embedded memories direct her course

from home to work to town to friends;

spot place and time

what’s where and when.

Some days, an intruder -

the feathered Image Tangler -

alights in the shadows of her

hippocampus

to peck, fret, fray,

before flitting with her lucid maps,

to leave her nearly-knowing.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Alter ego

To live swathed by the textured
cloak of heritage.
Secure and sure.
Resolute.
Dependable.
Known to all
but one’s self.

Then

To favour a consummation of life,
inter-twining the gossamer weft
of daily happenstance
with the warp thread of entity:
as ephemeral a dance
as motes on a sunbeam.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Breaking news

Middle-class cocoon,

ironing,

listening to Radio 4.

‘Tsunami’,

she announced.

Curious word?

Distant tropical sea-bed

arched by subterranean quake,

water wall avalanche

erupts on halcyon shores,

wielding drowned destruction.

Unfathomable loss:

more women than men,

more children still.

Ship beached miles inland,

incongruous in memoriam.

Laundry stashed, fragrant,

in airing cupboard.

© Helen McIntosh

All rights reserved

Metamorphosis

With perfect poise

he enters stage left,

placing the suitcase aside,

inconsequential

while gymnasts perform

pirouettes and arabesques,

svelte nymph

unfurls, spreads chrysalis-like

from case cocoon,

tumbling, twisting, wheeling

silken ribbon blazing

from baton waving

abstract fluidity

across blank canvas

to end again

repackaged and recycled

to perform anew

tomorrow.

  

© Helen McIntosh

All rights reserved

Beyond belief?

Letters posted in fireplaces?
Jingling red-nosed reindeers
Streaming through skies?
Rubicund Santa
Shimmying down chimneys
To delight and surprise?
Turkeys voting for Christmas,
Getting stuffed en route;
Piggies wriggling in blankets,
Devils astride horseback;
Filthy lucre buried
Deep in puddings boiled?
A virgin birth and…
Three wise men?

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Breaking up (c2025)

Democratic devolution.

Union dissolution.

Country separation

played out in bars by young Jocks.

‘Us’ll keep

oor oil, lochs, midges ’n whiskies

oor free degrees, pills and parkin’.

Youse got Sterlin’ and bankers,

City and Westminster wankers.

We’ll see youse doon the Wall, Jimmy,

wi’ yer passport,

’n oor farewell

Glesgee Kiss.’

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved

Family Union

An unlikely gathering:
dad, step-dad, children, partners, me.

Clouds to horizon stretch,
parting,
sunshine reigns.

Picnic to delight
and share
in grassy cliff-top hollow.

Offshore dolphins
play
to spectators' joy.

Swifts wheel
on insect prey;
butterflies float.

Our unexpected blessings.

© Helen McIntosh
All rights reserved