PETER JONES - POEMS

​Peter took up serious writing after he retired from lecturing in employment law.
A couple of years ago, he won second price in Wrexham’s Carnival of Words Short Story Competition.  He also took part in the Carnival’s poetry baton. 
Peter performed at the Festival this year and has performed across North Wales and in Liverpool.
In 2018 he was shortlisted for the Robert Graves Poetry Prize.
Peter was a chapter contributor in the academic book ‘The Prince: Power and Persuasion in FE’, published by University College London.
He has had flash fiction stories and poems published in community arts pamphlets and has been published on the on-line Facebook page Poetry24.
He is currently one of the editors for the forthcoming (2019) Chester Poets anthology.
Peter is a member of the writing group Hawarden Ink, (based at the Gladstone Library), Pinboard Writers, (who meet at the Daniel Owen Centre in Mold), and Chester Poets.

---

London Laughs
​

​In the crowded coffee house
She laughs
The laughter of happiness
With eyes and mouth and body
Like her voice
It's lost
To the background hub
The phone held to her ear
Anticipation filling the air
Playing with the empty cup
And cake crumbs on the plate
People come and go
She stays
She laughs
 
In the lonely park
She laughs
The empty laugh
Sadness or madness
In her eyes
Her body sways
And people pass
Ignore the old coffee cup
Holding a few coppers
Her dog
The only one showing emotion
Her voice is lost to the passers by
The air is filled with hopelessness
She laughs
 

A Day As Each Day
​

Like time itself
And tides that ceaselessly ebb and flow,
The charnel house waits for no ma
         - nor woman, nor child.  

 
No lessons learnt from history,
As they say,
Despite the fall of youth
Year after year after year.
 
And, in the home,
Now, as then,
The sadness creeps and people cry
Tear upon tear upon tear.
 
A century past,
And, three score and ten,
Yet still they fall and lie in fields afar
          - dead parents of each child.  


No battle cry, no trench, no charge,
No parachute, sniper or tank,
But the drone flies overhead
Near so near so near.
 
As, from the sky,
With military might,
Destruction unforetold brings
Fear and fear and fear.
 
Yet still we march
And wave our flags,
Sing songs of victory
           -  and dry the tears of the child.
​

​

The Hotel
​

​Reddened stone facade shines,
lit from the recent rain.
People come and they go.
The doorman tips his hat.
 
I watch from the pier head.
Honeymoon memories
seep through my every thought.
The sun begins to shine,
light breezes shift the clouds.
My mood is not lifted.
I resolve to go in.
The doorman tips his hat.
 
Polished marble entrance
holds glittering brass works,
chequered floors where we trod.
The register looks new,
The key rack's still the same,
I look for room eighteen,
The key's not on the hook.
The receptionist smiles,
I nod, return the smile.
I turn look out the door.
The doorman tips his hat.
 
The dining room beckons,
I order a coffee,
weak and white with sugar.
Not the table we used,
by the corner window.
Sad thoughts but no new tears.
Paying the bill I leave.
The doorman tips his hat.

The Garden
​

​Apples lie rotting amongst the brown and yellow grass
Rusty petals from late roses lie scattered like macabre confetti
The hanging gate creaks in the early winter wind
And the ageing path crumbles
 
Dark silver clouds begin to brood and promise the deluge
A lonely crow looking at the scene below
Shares the chimney pot with a sapling
Beneath the naked trees leaves race field mice to their lair
 
A couple of squirrels cavort and ignore the dark clad human
As she fumbles for the key in her raincoat pocket
And approaches the back door which echoes the song of the gate
The house is hushed but is not quite dead

Snow on Snow
​

​In this world you turned to look and see
the darkening of those skies.
Bleak and grey and heavy on our hearts.
Mid-winter has a cruel edge.
 
Frosty weather chills the bones,
wind tugs and bites at loose clothing
made worse by poverty. And each
moan, in turn, chills our souls as the
 
earth hardens.  In your eye and mine we see him
stood, a dark shadow ‘gainst the whiteness.
Hard frost has all but killed his world,
as winter tightens its grip, like
iron bands frozen on barrels.
 
Water is a deathly pale,
like shards of glass.
A dangerous playground for children.
Stone, cold to the touch, whitens the world.
 
Snow carpets the ground as if it
had a mission to complete.
Fallen branches lay unpicked, covered by the
snow. The fires will not burn bright.
On everything we see
snow has rested its blanket.
 
Snow has brought its muffling.
On our lips, words are whispered.
Snow brings its own rules.
 
In every house children huddle,
the fires are fed with twigs.
Bleak outside, bleak inside.
Mid-winter demands sacrifices.
 
Long winters, now, as long
ago, swap death for life in spring.