HELEN KAMPFNER

ReSolutionary

Dreams and aspirations poise

Like Tom Daley

Arms outstretched and toes curled

Over a cliff edge promise of excitement and change

They dive

Into the New Year

Only to flounder in the shallows

Of dwindling discipline and morbid motivation

The old ways resurface

Smug-smiling

Safe for another year

Thanks Alex, and thanks for the prompt too. I must be a gloomy person but I found a happy competition made my mind go blank. But it’s good to have to think a bit.

A Winter Dragon

Snow in the north, south, east, and west, but none here. Fran had been promised snow by the television and the app on her phone, but here she sat, four days from Christmas, freezing cold, not a cloud in the sky, and the sun shining. She wiggled the feet of her onesie into Mum’s fleece boots and, as quietly as possible, slipped o…[Read more]

Ahhh! Hangs head in shame. I don’t know where November went either. Made a start but never finished. I vote that Alex keeps the competition and we all have another try for December.

I’m so sorry, Alex. I don’t know where November went 🤷‍♀️

I wouldn’t want to make this an Eric Clapton debate, but it seems to me that there’s a huge divide between acknowledging an error, and expressing remorse for it. Clapton clearly sees himself as having made mistakes, especially the outburst on stage in Birmingham in 1976, but although I’ve seen numerous purported apologies from him, they all amount…[Read more]

You do write these blogs so well, Richard. This one is the best written and most engrossing take on a musician that I’ve read in ages.

I have the Complete Recordings. I bought them some years back, not because of my own journeying into blues, but because somebody who did more than my superficial browsing suggested I should. All I can say is that…[Read more]

Two super entries, both darkly entertaining. Perfect for a Halloween mood, maybe.

Alex, love your dry style. I’ve been in that hotel and ironed that shirt for a meeting. Even drunk those beers. Never been in an earthquake though, unless you count the feeble growling that “hit” the south of England a few years back – much like a truck driving by.…[Read more]

UNTITLED 452 words

A leaf, the colour of burnt sugar, dried and curled into the shape of a piranha’s open maw, drifted across the path in front of her. Good. Enough of a breeze, then, to keep her cool. The last thing she wanted after her run was to turn up at Jake’s night out with a face the colour of a baboon’s bum. She checked her watch…[Read more]