Accident

We talk about his death as if it was his fault, as if it were avoidable. It's easier that way.

7.30am

a crown-shaped tree crowded with golden leaves basking in the golden autumn light

magazine article

a gardener reminds me our world is running out

Going home

An argument explodes into the car as if an artery has been gashed.

Empty tree

Only a few yellow-ochre leaves left flapping on the tree, not clinging on but resting their flat bodies on the wind.

Valley of the Dolls

Watching a made-for-TV biopic about Jacqueline Susann I cry for her but mostly for myself.

Goldcrest

Tiny bird with a streak of pollen-gold across his crown, he peeps a note so high you have to stand on your tip-toes to hear it.

Bramble

Two raggedy blossoms, torn pink scraps, remain amongst the mouldering shrivelled fruit.

against the wall

the ghostly face of a pansy leaves a smear of yellow on the dark

on the kitchen floor

a congealed drop of spaghetti sauce looks like something else

Look more closely

Not a hedgehog but a good sized rat, hunched underneath the bird feeder and munching away as grain rains down on him.

A single yellow leaf

Against a background of shifting zebra-stripe pampas grass shadows, a single yellow leaf sashays down onto the gravel.

Cut

Mushrooming clouds of sweet-rot grass aroma plume from the groaning, stuttering strimmer.

a glob of light

a glob of light wobbles as the blade of grass flickers in the breeze

evening

the headlights swing into the drive and a hedgehog runs in all the wrong directions, finally disappearing into the dark corners of the evening

labrador

in a stuck traffic jam, the man in the passenger seat invites his labrador forwards, puts his arm around his neck and rumples the skin on his scalp

this

this silver nail, this painted sill, this cinnamon flame, this brilliant wonder-ful life

Mushroom spotting

Only two centimetres tall, a smooth dark chocolate pileus and a straight narrow stipe. Upside-down it - the chocolate hat's pulled under like a shower-cap and everso neatly rims the pure-white gills.

bird

a blue-ish/bluey-green/green-ish bird with real peacock tail feathers and beady black plastic eyes, stashed under the bed until they sell Christmas trees

Charity shop

Her steamer has just leaked water all over the floor. They 'couldn't do without it', it 'brings the clothes up nice'.

Man at desk

He sits with one knee bent, his ankle resting on his lap, and brushes his fingers across the hair on his shin and back again. His hand moves absentmindedly, has a mind of its own.

Very-small-boy-in-a-bright-green-raincoat's father

'Now you're all wet, you chump. No more puddles for you.'

Park, Wokingham

The pavement is scattered with the shadows of sycamore leaves, as if they've been carefully placed and a paler colour sprayed all around them. The wind lifts a cloud of yellow leaves from the tree across the park.

happy birthday to me

with my new binoculars: a coal tit, a white stripe marking his crown

a mouthful of blue smoke

a mouthful of blue smoke leakes from the halfway-wound-down window and sits in the air before letting go of itself

self-harm

she'd cut into her breasts so deeply, she'd be 'leapfrogged through triage' to the front of the queue

outside inside

after slotting fifty fritillary bulbs into the hard dark earth I leave a trail of wet cut grass in four different rooms before I look behind me

John the lawn-mowing-man

The front of his overalls are held up with string.

traces of light

wisps of spiderweb drift past on the breeze

driving, late

fine rain blurs the night, spray blooms from the tarmac

Late

The blackberries are all swollen and squishy now or shrunken, mouldering, finished, but the tip of this branch has chosen October to let out bright pink hopeful blossoms.