Its early mornings I like best

Sitting on the back door step

Hands clasped around a hot mug of coffee

One of the cats smooching

So quiet you can almost imagine you live out in the countryside.

That stillness, that dripping dew stillness

And a suggestion of mist-smell in your nostrils

The garden all greens, browns, yellows

A flash of pink somewhere from a determined carnation

And the bright red sharp-shine of berries

Catching your eye as you drink it all in with the coffee.

A sudden squabble of sparrows swoops for the bits of bread

Gangster starlings sit in the silver birch, rapping

Whilst an indifferent robin watches

from the handle of an abandoned spade.

Then church bells somewhere chime the hour

An inbound plane drones

A police siren, a cacophony of car music

The sparrows scatter

The coffee’s cold.