BERNARD PEARSON: His work appears in many publications, including; Aesthetica Magazine, The Edinburgh Review, Crossways, The Gentian, Nymphs The Poetry Village, Beneath The Fever, The Beach Hut Little stone In 2017 a selection of his poetry ‘In Free Fall’ was published by Leaf by Leaf Press. In 2019 he won second prize in The Aurora Prize for Writing.

On a Summer’s Day

I remember I was climbing
Towards the nugget elbow
Of an old oak tree, safer than
Elm or the whip of a sycamore
When the full draft of the muck
Being spread across the field
Nearly knocked me from my purpose
I grasped a branch full of the leaf curl
And the egg and cup of several acorns
Before my balance was restored.
I looked across the field,
To a dark copse of aspen
Where two men, a father perhaps,
And his truculent son,
Were tossing sheep
From a stone wall into an old river
Receptive to such practices,
(The river not the sheep),
For here she had flowed for
A thousand years.
She collected the beasts
And bundled them
Baptised now, onto a muddy,
Bank, where they struggled blinking
into the light
While I resumed my journey
Looking for nests in a nestless tree.

Adolescence

I'm a tadpole with no tail
to wag like a dog,
I have a feeling
I might be a frog

Inclusion

The ground does not discriminate
It does not love, it does not hate,
 It accepts you warts and all,
Fat or thin, short or Tall,
Straight and trans, gay or bi
All Find equality when they die.
Poor as well as very rich
Are welcomed in that final ditch
The only thing   it cannot hold
Is the love you gave and received
Before the day that you grew cold.