Missing C. Poor C. How I worry about his bowels. I sobbed when he left. ‘Nervous blubbing’ W. called it. Baked small loaves, giblet pie, sat on wall and sewed shifts. W. up by sheepfold, then wasted his mind on the magazines. Mary H. rode over. She looked very fat and well. Fed her parkin. […]

If a man make a better mousetrap than his neighbour, the world will beat a path to his door – Emerson   Our neighbourhood cook Lao Wang was a kind of saint – arriving every morning on his bicycle at the moon-gate, with soft felt slippers and brows arched like the Monkey King, bringing the […]

Waking up to a sticking-out horse head happily. The closeness of his animal body, the neighing and whole brown beauty of him framed against the barn yard wall. I cannot tell you the colour of his eyes and when I do think shepherd he is but a vague shadow beneath a darkened window standing guard […]

A new word for a new world, for once avoiding dead gods or anything safely curled cosily in on itself. Perhaps an everyday noun at random, like ‘machine’, ‘shelf’, ‘window’? Even that won’t stop the word worriers. What we need is a clean name that’ll drop on us like new kinds of rain. I leave […]

Why? We don’t know you, though we hear the rapid knocking of your voice through the wall,   and see you walking silently up the High Road ushering a gaggle of grandchildren before you,   Maharani on an elephant swaying through the jungle. Sometimes, you even raise an enigmatic smile,   then carry on, your […]