Unspoken Understanding

We share unspoken words my love and I

And love unspoken, through our circumstances,

But I know when I look into her eyes

Or snatch some loving, quickly-glimpsed half-glances

That she feels how I feel and in her smile

I see my joy reflected on her face

And transmit loving thoughts to her a while

To bolster sweet remembrance of the place

Where we spent time together unobserved,

Ecstatic in our union, free as birds,

Stayed separate from a world that's too demanding

And kept our special silent bond preserved.

I do not need to speak the three key words:

We have a deep unspoken understanding.

(© Ian Yearsley, 2006-9)

RSI [Repetitive Strain Injury]

I once was normal, just like you,

Could read and write and type and tie,

But now I sit and steam and stew

With RSI.

I cannot hold a book or pen.

My keyboard kills with every touch.

'You'll never tie tight knots again.'

Thanks very much.

I cannot text on mobile phones

Or change the channels watching Sky

Or fill out forms for cycle loans

With RSI.

I cannot use a knife or fork

Or do up buttons on my shirts.

At heavy jugs I quickly baulk:

It always hurts.

'A yuppie illness! It will heal!'

Uncaring ignorami lie,

Not knowing all the pain I feel

With RSI.

My life has changed completely now:

I cannot drive, I cannot mow,

I drink through straws and think of how

I'm always low.

I am not normal anymore

And many days I wish to die,

For nothing is worth living for

With RSI.

(© Ian Yearsley, 2006-9)

Two Englands

There are two Englands.

The England of the countryside,

Of village life and national pride,

Of market towns and horse-drawn ploughs,

Of fields of corn and Friesian cows,

Of Sunday roasts and warming fires,

Of evening walks by timber byres,

Of family life, of fun-filled yule,

Innate respect, the walk to school,

A Fifties England, slow and free,

Its sense of real community

Still lingering in hearts and minds,

In hedgerow birds and streamside finds,

A rural world that warms the soul

And offers comfort, makes one whole.

This is the England I have known,

And yet our England's grown...

There are two Englands.

The England of the urban sprawl,

Of concrete blocks both bland and tall,

Of commerce and of global trade,

Of lies, deceit and money made,

Of charmless streets and rowdy bars,

Of noisy, air-polluting cars

Which, worshipped God-like, rule our lives,

Of thug-like kids who carry knives.

Post-Fifties England has no soul:

A characterless concrete bowl

Of anger, angst and arguments,

Materialism, indolence,

Of wanting more for doing less,

Of immigrants, red tape and stress,

An alien England I abhor

And don't want any more.

There are two Englands.

And when my generation's done,

There'll be just one.

(© Ian Yearsley, 2006-9)