So much to appreciate in Ayscoughfee Hall.
It’s a very pleasant experience to wander around the grounds of Ayscoughfee Hall in Spalding, Lincolnshire.
The water features are particularly enjoyable for all ages – and especially the ducks!
And there’s a nice cafe nearby too.
Visitors to Spalding in south Lincolnshire usually do a double take when they see the name, ‘Ayscoughfee’, relating to the wonderful late medieval building in the town centre.
Locals naturally all know it’s pronounced ‘Ascoffey’!
Once you get over that hurdle, there is much to admire in this Lincolnshire gem. There are wonderful gardens, monuments, an aviary, a museum and a cafe.
More pictures will follow soon.
Rain
He was looking at the rivulets
stuttering down the glass,
ignoring the sodden cat on the windowsill
and the puddles in the grass.
Sitting down, I braced myself:
He’d say it wouldn’t do any harm.
I suppose it was his way of seeing things
when in the safe and warm.
Never mind that spring was passing,
never mind that I’d forked the grass over
for five darn days on end,
to drain away the numerous ponds.
Yet still there are some who insist
that we are the lucky ones!
So I put on my best April gear,
braving the cold and the wet.
I had to get out of his face, you see,
to hear some pessimism instead,
about the weather, the world,
or the state of this or that.
Sadly though, I have to say,
rain makes even the shy ones talk,
though they’d better watch out —
because I’ll be stabbing with my fork!
poem and image © copyright df barker 2012
The Poppy Murders
They have gone,
all the poppies. Gone.
Please, don’t look at me like that,
it was none of my doing and
besides, there’s too many seeds.
You would have to sift the soil
to find them all, believe me,
and you know I’m not that patient.
It’s not that I hate them, who would?
So delicate and bright,
like bloodied tissue, though
they did rather crowd the lavender
last year you must admit,
sort of snuffed it out if I recall.
In the end, with a heavy heart
I had to dig it out, remember?
So, yes, maybe I did strip them back,
(just a touch, with a scythe),
merely to protect, you understand,
that last remaining lavender bush.
And after all, we should be satisfied
that the poppy grows wild
almost anywhere. Except here.
Not anymore.
image and poem © copyright dfbarker 2012
**poem first published in poetry collection ‘Anonymous Lines’, available at amazon.com
* image is sketch in oil
*it’s so cold here I needed something to remind me of heat!
Cameo
The morning is like copper,
a veiled threat in the sky.
We find ourselves among
patches of green poking through
a dusting of snow, scents of
woodsmoke hanging in the air.
I watch your smile break as
a blackbird alights on a bare branch,
a morsel of bread in his beak.
I shiver, adjust my coat
to find the ruff strangely
around my neck. You turn
round to see what troubles me,
your dark mantle twirling behind,
the lightness of your collar setting off
that burning gleam in your eyes,
windows on some other world.
We saunter through a sleeping garden,
hints of the dead season clinging
to brittle bushes like a bitter denial.
Standing in front of me, your soft
words are scarcely understood,
yet inwardly known. Your laugh
sends out clouds which resolve
to a gentle cough, gloved fingers
touching your chest. Without a word,
I usher you inside towards the fire
which greets us with soothing heat.
We shall warm our toes together
in its fading glow
poem and image © copyright David Francis Barker 2012
The image is from a watercolour, completed several years ago.
Ciscography 