Taj Mahal

Aged four I had

Its picture on my wall

Cut from some cereal packet

but them forgot that till,

some 46 years later,

my heart stopped,

simply stopped and

missed a beat

as I turned under

its red brick arch and

saw its white jewelled beauty

for the first time

and remembered

My Mother's Garden

The peony's growing on blackened soil
Your gardener's faith is that
you can ignore the rot
and still it will bloom scarlet


the roots are tangled
sometimes I just want to lift and split
bring in clean air,
replant and start afresh

for that I need you to say
sorry for your failures, with no
angry guilt, so I can start
forgiving you, while you're still here