I am in my mid-40s, married with three children. I live in Cradley Heath, West Midlands. 
For several years now, I have been a house-husband whilst trying to find the time to write. 
Before that, I was – briefly – a mature student at Hull University studying English and Philosophy, 
dropping out after one year.
For ten years before that, I worked at the Midlands Electricity Board, putting the bills in envelopes.
I have had poems published in Eclipse, Envoi, Poetry Nottingham International, 
Raw Edge and some accepted for publication in other magazines.
I have had several short stories Cherry-picked by the editors at abctales.com (http://www.abctales.com), 



 

Headstones

The headstone fallen, broken and then lost
In high forgotten grass, the brighter weeds
Where only busy insects and the occasional fox
Wanders by. There is only distant birdsong
And the sudden flash of butterfly wings.

Even the body is long gone, bare bones
Only the bones, the dry bones in clean earth.

Who knows the right spell to cast, to tell
The lost story of how these bones lived,
And this is how she once danced all night
A teenager in her first white ballgown,
And here is the old woman clutching
A frightening bible to her faded breast
Waiting for that final knock
On the half-closed door of her heart.

Should we remember them all,
Recite the ancient names around a fire?
Tell stories to keep the night away?

Tell stories; all we can do is tell stories
And hope to remember all the names.



Old Monsters

There were stars out there once for us.
Standing on these cold hillsides, 
We could see only the covering sky.
Not satisfied with the limits of ordinary sight
We desired to know what lay beyond the dark.
But gravity always drags us down
To crawl through these ravaged lands
To hunt and to prey on each other.
It is far easier to fall than to fly.

There could be a chance of stepping outside,
Of taking a step beyond these confines,
If only we could remember the art 
Of how to dare, how to desire flight.
If we were not trapped here,
Lost down amongst these ruins,
In a land haunted by the ghost 
Of a language separated from thought, 
Wandering though these wrecked lands
Without the ability to speak 
Of pain, loneliness and distance.

These bare hillsides are deserted and dark
As the valleys begin to light up the night
With glowing orange ribbons of brightness
Connecting the pools of white light
And the somnolent ancient monsters stir
Out of the old darkness and shadows
To slowly begin their crawl through the night.

We had almost forgotten these ancient fears
Before they came lurching from the dark,
Back to disfigure our idle dreams.



The Sculpture

The rusted tank by the roadside,
Grass, even a few flowers, growing
Around and up through the turret.
Its broken-backed gun barrel reaches
Like a pleading, dying hand.

Two skeleton-thin children,
Dressed in rags, clamber over it
As though it is a rock formation
Rising up from the ground,
Or some playground apparatus
Donated by wealthy benevolence.

It has lost its meaning as a weapon,
The children no longer run from it.
It is an obstacle, an item, a landmark.
It could even be a sculpture.

Did the teenage boy who fired 
The missile that blew it apart, 
Destroyed its meaning,
The knight that killed the dragon,
Ever realise that he became an artist?



To Dust

I fall slowly down 
To lie on dead ground 
And be forgotten.

I turn to dust 
And am spread out 
Everywhere on dry dead winds.

Then that young woman daydream walking 
Of her marriage dread 
Steps forward, through my dust.

I stick to the hard-worn skin of her walking soles 
And become the dust of a vague memory
She washes from the end of her weary day.



The Wind is a Child

The wind is a child
Wanting to play with all it finds;
Leaves, rubbish, hats and umbrellas.

The wind is a child
With a child's tantrums destroying easily,
Knocking down for the patient parent to rebuild.

The wind is a child
Knowing a child's joy in creating storms in water
Just to see the sea's raging torment.

The wind is a child
Bringing cool laughter on a stilled summer day.
Playing softly over the parched grass.

The wind is a child
Teasing flowers, laughing with the butterflies
And bringing fresh promise of what could be.