Dear LPG,

I am, and will continue to offer some of my poems for post on the LPG website over the coming months.  Sometimes they can be quite long, and sometimes quite ‘political’ and critical.  As a prelude I have started by choosing a few, which I think, are not such!

In my continued efforts to get the nations pensioners sharing their rhymed contemplations with internet surfers, and the rest of the LPG readers, I would like to offer following verse.

 I saw a neighbour at the bottom of the road, a young boy who attracts my attention whenever he is there.  His sense of concentration as he stood waiting patiently caught my eye, and I wrote FINGERS.

His mum told me later that he is autistic and, like other such children, often looks at his fingers.

FINGERS

He was six or seven.

He scootered fast

And stopped well.

What to do

Till Mum caught up?

Look at my fingers.

They bend, they stretch,

Make shapes

Or shadows.

Have I four or five?

Four, if only because

Thumbs are different.

But all work together

To steer the scooter

This way and that.

Shadows on the wall

Made by fingers and thumb.

Scary birds

Secret signs and signals.

I do like my fingers.

Foster Murphy 30^th July 2019.