Daniel Kemp

Mum was in the kitchen,
Dad was on the loo.
Jimmy was in the hallway,
He was kissing auntie Pru.

The dog was in the bathtub,
The cat was climbing a rope.
The canary was screaming blue murder,
As the dog hit the cat with a bar of soap!

The cat dived into the water.
The dog jumped onto the loo.
Dad ran into the hallway
And hit Jimmy with his shoe.

Mum grabbed her sister by the collar,
‘Leave my son alone,’ she yelled.
The cat ran down the stairs dripping water.
As mum opened the door and Pru was expelled.

The dog made his way into the kitchen,
Where the cat lay damp but at peace.
Jimmy was the centre of mum’s attention,
But there was a knock on the door from her niece!

Pru’s daughter had come to avenge her mother
Who she thought had been insulted and spurned.
It was all of them who she was really after,
As there was a lesson that needed to be learned.

‘Mum was here on a peaceful mission.
She came to wish young Jimmy good luck.
He’s off to the sea tomorrow morning,
But your minds are full of muck.’

Mum went back to her kitchen.
Dad went out to his shed.
The police called the very next morning
And found seven bodies laying dead.

The moral of this story is the most obvious.
Keep an eye on auntie Pru.
But if you must have altercations,
Lock the door to the privy and the loo.

© 2019, Daniel Kemp. All rights reserved.

Love has no conscience
Love takes no blame.
Love can take a heart
Love knows no shame.

© 2019, Daniel Kemp All rights reserved.

To suspend oneself in silence.
To contemplate what’s real.
To ignore what has happened.
To pray for things to heal.

When life moves on regardless
Leaving you detached and alone.
What is there left for you to cling to,
Other than the past that you have known.

Some things in life are irreparable
But not a heart that’s on its own.
If love was cruel and is now ended.
That heart is as hard as stone.

To leave behind what cannot be mended.
To leave what you can no longer feel.
To accept what is finished and over.
To acknowledge that life’s an ordeal.

© 2019 Daniel Kemp All rights reserved

This week, here in the UK, we celebrate the seven-hundredth wedding anniversary of Sage and Onion.

The two were married in a cauldron when a banquet was being prepared for King Gareth-Barry of Wales, at Castle Dunsinane, when he was entertaining King Duncan of Ireland and King Cardun of Norway.

It was Garth-Barry’s turn to host this annual occasion and then to supervise the forthcoming….‘Face Powdering Contest.’

(Think about it, all three nations have strange peculiarities and it was 1319!)

The tournament was to be staged in the nearby tiny village of Macbethy, famous for its competitive pigeons!

In order to tenderise these tough but fit Welsh birds, sage and onion were smeared on the flesh and then added to the usual cooking wine, made from leeks, sheep, and daffodils, in which they were to be poached.

At the end of the meal, which was enjoyed by all, both King Gareth-Barry’s son, Prince Carwyn and his Queen, Queen Faulkner died! (I know it’s a strange name for a girl, but that’s not my fault. Blame history) They had been using a forerunner to toothpicks, razor-sharp twigs, to remove the succulent remaining meat from the pigeon’s bones, but then, accidentally– swallowed them; whole!

Garth-Barry blamed the cook and her maid. In a violent temper, he burned them both, scattering their ashes on a nearby impoverished field.

HOWEVER…………………..Stay focused, I’m getting there.

An exact year from that tragic night a vast crop of aromatic sage, along with ripe onions, miraculously appeared from the hitherto barren ground. This sent the locals into a joyous dance of drunken merriment and glee. (It doesn’t take much) Such was their excitement nobody noticed King Gareth-Barry fall from his horse under a combined barrage of English, Scottish and Irish arrows, whilst riding towards the party. Annoyed at the noise the Welsh partygoers were making, the neighbours had invaded.

Thus was the beginning of the legend surrounding The Powder Plot.

Now, every November 5th, bundles of dried sage with chopped onion are tied to fireworks and ceremoniously set-off, whilst facing in the direction of Wales, in a United Kingdom attempt at appeasing the wrath of King Gareth-Barry.

If prior to reading this, you believed that Catholics or, perish the thought, Shakespeare had any connection to November 5th or Castle Dunisnane and Macbethy, you have now been enlightened!

© 2019, Daniel Kemp All rights reserved.

The crows fly low on a day such as this,
As the cold eats the air then blows it out as a mist.
Branches are naked their leaves almost gone,
Leaving birds all huddled in a whimpering throng.

The stream tumbles over its icy bed.
As autumn lays finished now burying its dead.
Winter strikes hard as its gavel strikes,
And its wind blows through you at your bones it bites.

Short cold days with longer colder nights,
Inside we sit with the fires alight.
Roasting chestnuts with a glass of wine.
For all its faults winter can be a splendid time.

First spring, then summer now autumn fades,
As the chill of winter invades our days.
Snow-covered pastures, a scene to behold
New life to breathe beyond what’s old.

© 2019, Daniel Kemp All rights reserved.