What do you feel
when a rock of ages
tumbles into the the sea
when something you relied on
sat upon, learned from and
leaned on for good counsel
that you needed to be
reassured and feel secured
and rooted in your trials, to be
there regardless, even if you were
somewhere else entirely ... or not
a rock that’s been there for always
this life just entered the realms
of leavened legend and lore
knocking at the gates of Neverland.
What can you say
when someone asks you
“how do you feel?” about such a
controversial, yet conversational
challenging, yet charming
pragmatic, yet princely
daring and duke-it-out
yet dutiful and dashing
outspoken, yet outgoing
much loved, yet likeable rogue.
Why didn’t you expect it? Why
did it suddenly become
the least wanted wish
after all this time, taken
for granted, yet forgotten
in the background, yet difficult
to ignore. What else would we
impossibly say ... or want?
What do you do
when time freezes
into glacial slo-mo
a clip from an epic film
a moment when child-like
uncomprehending
self-preserving denial
an innocent hope of
one more time, again
please, please, please
let’s go to sea once more
reflect, respect, deflect
the imperative
to understand
the inevitable change
What did we learn
in the aftermath, if you spent
an incalculable time, not wasted
in the shadows, but replete with
so much energy, so much given
simply feted pre-modern man
as modern as tomorrow
as modest as any soul, with
a zest for knowledge, that
when least expected, rocked
the best brains, with a power
to convene the greatest minds
of Gods and Engineers, who
would change the World,
where it mattered not who
you are, as much as what
truly interests and moves you
to take what privilege you have
and use it to serve, continually
to learn so much, care so much
about advancing the causes
conserving of species of ... even
one less seemingly insignificant
precious life on Earth.
Written in the immediate aftermath of the death of the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip, Consort of Queen Elizabeth II.
“Life is short and art long, the crisis fleeting, experience penniless and decision difficult”
~ Hippocrates.
As a young man, John was sporting and fit. It was then as much his recreational therapy as a cappella harmony singing, music, walking in the hills and writing is now. Playing Rugby Union for over twenty years, encouraged in the early days by a school that was run on the same lines and ethos as that famous Scottish public school, Gordonstoun, where our own headmaster had been as a senior master. This gave shape and discipline to a sometimes precarious early life.
His fitness was enhanced not only by playing rugby, but also by working part time jobs in farming, as a leather factory packer and security guard, but probably not helped, for a short time, selling ice cream!
His professional working life was spent as a Metallurgical Engineer, Marketing Manager, Export Sales Manager, Implementation Manager and Managing Director of his own company. Thirty five years spent, apparently in a creative desert, raising a family, pursuing a career and helping to pay the bills, probably enriched his experience, because his renaissance, on retirement, realised a hidden creative talent as a writer of prose and poetry. He also enjoys music, with a piano and a fifty-two year old Yamaha FG140 acoustic guitar. He sings bass in three a cappella harmony groups: as a founding member of a mixed voice chamber choir, Fox Valley Voices and barbershop quartets. He is also a member of one of the top barbershop choruses in the UK, Hallmark of Harmony (stage name of the Sheffield Barbershop Harmony Club), who, for the eighth time in 41 years, became UK Champions in 2019. He is also a would be (once upon a time or 'has been') photographer with drawers full of his own history, and an occasional, but lapsed 'film' maker. In his other life, he doubles as a Husband, Father, Grandfather, Brother, Uncle, Cousin, Friend and Family man.
What he writes is sometimes autobiographical, often political, sometimes dark and frequently pins his colours to the mast of climate change and how a few humans are trashing the Earth. In 2013, he published an anthology of the poetry (including his own) of an international group of poets, who met on Twitter in 2011. He produced, edited and steered the product of this work, "Petrichor Rising", to publication by Aquillrelle.
His sort of strap-line reads: “ iWrite iSing iDance iChi iVolunteer ”
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