WINTER'S ARRIVAL ~ Just Ever So Slightly Premature
TƒS & TƒW 2023
WINTER'S ARRIVAL ~ Just Ever So Slightly Premature
THE FOUR SEASONS
and
THE FOUR WINDS
On a Train
7.30am
Blackpool North to Preston
via
Poulton le Fylde
Part Two
Tuesday, 13 October 2009
The first frosts
in the hollow of the meadow,
Hides steaming,
Train teeming.
Ice blue skies over
Poulton le Fylde,
A warm start though
back at 16 Lord Street
twenty minutes
down the line behind me.
Winter’s back has turned on
19 Warton now, her damage done.
Neatly and with her relish for shock
and exposure on ill-prepared commuters,
freeze-grips gloveless hands
along the coast in Blackpool North,
chilling last night’s
momentarily redundant
illuminations.
Oh what fun!
What delight this is …
Winter muses,
breathing ice on her
immaculate Varnished Nails…
The spires of Preston
On the grim horizon,
On this cold and cheerless
October morning.
Preston!
Where Autumn disdains
to trail her skirts,
But succumbs to her
objectionable bedfellow.
No winds today!
No scurrying skirts around
people’s feet.
No fun at all.
Winter has arrived
in all her iced-vice-like splendour.
For her it is a game.
For Nature and humankind
Winter is anything but a game.
Winter’s game is simple.
Cold and crisp
Biting into every bone.
Her onslaught
on winter garments
bought in Primark haste,
for other purchases tho’
Debenhams,
M&S and Waitrose
IF Recession allows it!
Girls regret
that indecisive moment
not to put on tights this morning.
In retrospect grasping,
At long last,
Grandma’s
common-sense and wisdom.
Huh! I won’t be caught napping
again!…
she wisely discerns,
Her boyfriend’s ridicule, regardless.
Down the long
beguiling sounding Carriage
a host of identical thoughts,
Akin to a squadron
flying in close formation…
He’s three sheet’s
to the wind by the time
it’s time for taxis
anyway!!
Her eye wanders
and catches three-sheets
entrancing her
and is flushed.
Slipping her phone
elusively into the
womb of her coat,
Her body quivers
remembering three-sheets’
Silk smooth skin,
the oil between them,
His tented hair engulfing.
Oh dear. A very hot flush!
Travelling inland,
the beach receding,
frosted fields increasing.
A yellow star
in the eastern sky arising
with wisps of cloud
and elongated vapour trails,
the hint, she decides,
of angel’s wings
converging on
the Port of Liverpool.
Yes!… she muses…
That’s how I like to see them
with my creative imagination
… mmmm …
she purrs
I think I might write a book one day.
They must be ten thousand meters high!
She muses afresh,
And senses bemusement.
… Gran would say that was
thirty-two thousand feet…
Erm. I think Gran’s right.
I like that… it’s more impressive.
She twirls her hair,
her hands are bare.
Cold terraced rooves
with endless chimney stacks,
and walls beloved by rail engineers
of yester-year.
Preston here!
Her eye wanders
and catches three-sheets
entrancing her
and is flushed.
Slipping her phone
elusively into the
womb of her coat,
Her body quivers
remembering three-sheets’
Silk smooth skin,
the oil between them,
His tented hair engulfing.
Oh dear. A very hot flush!
Preston here!
I say again, This is Preston.
Please check you have your belongings.
Tread carefully on the Platform
Winter seems to have arrived with a vengeance this morning.
19 October 2023
All Rights Reserved
LIVERPOOL
© 2023 Kenneth Thomas Webb
Digital Artwork by KTW
Ken Webb is a writer and proofreader. His website, kennwebb.com, showcases his work as a writer, blogger and podcaster, resting on his successive careers as a police officer, progressing to a junior lawyer in succession and trusts as a Fellow of the Institute of Legal Executives, a retired officer with the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, and latterly, for three years, the owner and editor of two lifestyle magazines in Liverpool.
He also just handed over a successful two year chairmanship in Gloucestershire with Cheltenham Regency Probus.
Pandemic aside, he spends his time equally between his city, Liverpool, and the county of his birth, Gloucestershire.
In this fast-paced present age, proof-reading is essential. And this skill also occasionally leads to copy-editing writers’ manuscripts for submission to publishers and also student and post graduate dissertations.
