Herring House: Stories and Other Writing

  Thank you my friends. Thank you for giving all of us what we need to live. Thank you for the things we need to eat. Thank you for keeping me warm, Thank you for keeping me cool. Thank you for your beauty. Thank you for holding me as a child, for being a place to meet and sometimes to get lost.  We even named some of you, you know so much fun we had together. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I've not seen you enough.  I've seen you but I've not spend time with you.  I hope I do soon. You are worth more than gold. You're even waving at me every time I see you from afar. You are an amazing friend, provider. All my love, Daniel.

  An experimental group poetry experience - courtesy of Jason Parr - some of the results are below: One serious person laughed up on a laptop screen - already taken 3 years - still waiting, contemplating an empty cupboard by the seashore in the sand dunes.  Two legs walking through ahes, hot embers flashing, burning. The dead Toreador loses spark and sense, tomorrow is at an end.  Three weeks in one dash camera - all the last touches for the better effect of a picture frame depicting a man and his many inventions, in the garden, in the sunshine.  Four days before the Easter eggs were scrambled, chicks roasted, his brother came to visit him, bringing popcorn. The microwave went on and a number of years passed fuill of a wonderful grace and dinners.  The winding tree, Simon with camouflage and the beauty of spring singing from beneath. On the sunny side of the green, the lady stands proud. A flash of red amidst the green trying to make out what you have seen. T...

  I see the sea, I see a strip club, I see a pier, I see a hut, I see a dog, says Dave. NOTICING The sky is almost void of cloud, vapour trails follow three planes silently in flight. The sun is glistening on a calm sea. Britannia Pier is deserted and sleeping, The cool sea breezde turns the silent wind turbines. All of a sudden, a crowd of people come round the corner, you can hear the people chatting and the sound of baby buggies being pushed.  A lady sits ion the beach, watching her little boy with his bucket and spade, playing in the sand.  Council men are working in the toielts and there is a fleeting aroma of chemicals.  Alan The wind mills in the sea - flowing to the wind amile offshore, moving from West to East - a golden beach stretches for miles with some tiny sand dunes. The Deck Chair house is not open which is weird on a day like this with the sun blazing.  Behind me people prepare for a game of bowls on lush green grass. The quietness of the beach ...

  Standing on the edge of the falls, my mind was more active not because of the view but the movement.  I felt it all through my body, it made me feel unsafe but excited at the same time, surrounded by granite rock beaten by the torrent of rushing water which was wild then the water fell to earth. There was no big splash it just seemed like light mist falling on a still pond and disappearing into a small tame river. It didn’t make sense how could so much water came over the horseshoe shaped falls forever but leaves something so calm and beautiful.   Simon

  I was waking by the side of the Thames when I saw a man collecting mud in buckets. I asked what he was doing. And he said he was doing art with it – and asked me if I would help him back to his workshop as the buckets were heavy.   I said yes, and as we were walking back, I asked him when he started making art out of mud. ‘About 20 years ago,’ he said he’d done hundreds of pieces using mud. After about twenty minutes we reached his studio which was a rundown building in the back streets of London. I walked through the broken door into a room with white boards covering the brick walls and sheets covered the floor with dried mud. When we put the buckets down, he asked me if I wanted to try it. He passed me some overalls, gloves and a mask and I started out on a small board, drawing with the mud.   It was really relaxing which surprised me because I am not the best at drawing, but when I’d finished, he came over and asked me to take a step back and look at what I h...

  The table  that the blank white pieces of paper rest on that I can feel as my hand slides over the cold surface. The flowing lines of the tree that lived and reproduced on the surface is cold and reflects the light streaming  through the window. People walking past in silence the traffic drownuing them out. Do they notice me?  No I think not. But life isn't all about me. It is all about life on this little planet we live on  in the universe. Heather