We’re just sitting,
Watching the world go by,
Watching people
In posh frocks
And clean suits.
Top hats
And rolled umbrellas
Dance across the lawn,
As my tea cup
Sits snugly in my hand.
Crisp military uniforms
Mingle with begowned clerics
As their harlequin colours
Cover the greenness
Of the damp grass.
And the band plays
Yellows, greens
Reds and blues
Overshadowed
By the grey
London skies.
Blue hat and coat appears,
And walks the line,
Greeting the great and good,
Who’s egos
Are bigger than their hats.
Us?
We’re just sitting,
Watching the people,
Watching the world go by,
On a July afternoon,
In the Queen’s back garden
While the band plays.
©Alan McKean
After our visit to The Queen’s Garden Party, July 2009
Author: Alan McKean
Promenade
I’ve just posted a poem called “Promenade”, but it is really a small collection of haiku that I wrote over a period of time, and then cobbled them all together into a single piece, but keeping the haiku format.
I hope it works
Alan
Promenade
Dowdy seaside town
With its mile of tacky shops
Twixt station and beach
A bucket and spade
On a crowded Blackpool beach.
Childhood memories.
The incoming tide
Washes sandcastles away.
Buggrit! Start again.
Rock pools full of life
Await the incoming tide
To refresh that life.
The sea, a soft blue
Covers the rocks and beaches,
Until the next low tide.
Wet sand and ice cream,
Pennies in the slot machines,
Pier end performers.
Tired audience
And faded comedians.
October pier end.
©Alan McKean. January 2008
Blog
I’ve just posted another painting by my friend Simon Footitt, called “Lighthouse”. I don’t know if he calls it that, but it fits the verse I wrote for it.
I will probably have a few more of Simon’s paintings posted on here in the next week or so.
Enjoy
Alan
Lighthouse
A finger of brick and light
Standing proud on the headland,
Watching
The beach
Watching
The rolling grey waters
Watching
The ships at sea
Sharing the warmth and safety
Of its shining beam,
Guiding clear
Or welcoming home.
The lighthouse keeper
Sits,
And ponders…………
“that bloody tree needs cutting!”
©Alan McKean, 18 January 2026
© Simon Footitt (painting)
Perspective
What if
Our universe
Was someone else’s strange quark
Imagine
A galaxy
The size of a Muon
Picture
Our solar system
In a Florence flask
Consider
The Oort Cloud
Does it keep us in, or others out?
Maybe
Our reality
Is nowt long by bugger all wide
Is our existence
Just stringing us along
Or
Are we just becoming
Entangled
In the here and there?
God knows
©Alan McKean
December 2019
Perspective
A bit of an odd post this one, as it combines my interest in poetry/haiku, with my interest in science and cosmology, albeit at an amateur level (for both).
See what you think
Alan
Ghosts
Stepping out of the grey day
Into the moonlight,
I dance
With the ghosts
of my past
beneath the moon,
my life and old friends
swirl and dance,
to the sound
of tintinnabulating moonbeams
as they bounce
off old memories
beneath the starlight
of the shining dark
Dreams?
They can wait,
The future
Will turn them into memories
When the time is right
© Alan McKean February 2021
The girl in the window
Arms resting on knees,
The girl in the window
Stares out
Over the landscape below
Watching the lives
Of the people,
Watching the life
Of the valley,
Through the changing year.
Seeing life
Through a glass wall,
Without the need
Of joining in.
Safe
©Alan McKean.
©Emi Cook (painting)
The girl in the window
This is the last of Emi Cook’s paintings for now, and is a rather wistful piece.
I don’t really think I need to say much more really.
Alan