Hitch hiking - How to Cope WIth Mud

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 if ever you’re standing

before a big mud patch

and you need to cross it

but  you’re wearing the wrong shoes,

it’s possible to stick out your thumb

and so attract the attention of

a passing hippo

who will give you a safe ride on its back.

However, as payment

it will bite off your thumb,

so you can only ever have

two hippo rides in your life,

and if you take them both,

you’ll need to cope without thumbs.

Autumn into Winter

autumn tree -
red leaves discarded
shrugging off the year

On seeing my cat sitting in a leafless tree

Jack! have you noticed

the leaves have all blown away?

you are not concealed!

Jack Frost

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 Let me

Touch your fingers,

Nip your nose,

Creep round your red ears,

Pinch your stamping toes,

Crick crack.

Let me

Draw white lines

On your window panes,

And freeze the water

That drips down the drains,

Crick crack.

Let me

Paint your grass

With my frozen hand,

And shiver through the branches

That leafless stand,

Crick crack.

Let me                                                                               

Cloud your breath,

As you walk along fast,

I’m your frosty friend,

Until Winter’s past,

Crick crack.

These photos were taken in this week - last year.

A Haiku For My Cat

perfectly balanced

he sleeps across my shoulders

tail wrapped round my neck

under a blue moon

brushstrokes sweeping over maps

half folded on the untidy table,

pages merge on the silvered canvas,

boundaries slide,

roads are unfurling,

mountain and valley liquid now,

towns flow and swish,

a new landscape shimmers,

and its happening outside too.

Humpty Dumpty and the Forest of Doom

Humpty gazes at the celery forest.
All he has to do is jump down off the wall,
then he can go and explore.