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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 25/09/2026

Happy #PoemsAbout folks, here's my quick contribution to #DeadLetters - will check back later to read others! Thanks @thebrokenspine.co.uk #poetry #poetrycommunity

Correspondence

every day of summer
I wrote you a letter
heartbeats
hand shaking
ink staining my fingers

I still have them
at the bottom
of a box
at the back
of the attic

I look out
over the sea
and wonder
how this day would feel
if I had posted them

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 18/09/2026

Good morning everyone, still not finding time to write much this week but did manage this draft poem for #poemsabout #strays. Will pop back later to read others! #poetry #poetrycommunity

Education

you showed no interest
or aptitude
for angles, Angles
Saxons or parallels
more the flames
licking the classroom walls
before they expelled you

forty years later
your social media
hate-filled ignorance
smoke screen across the stars
denying our rainbow reality

I imagine
a life spent running
towards where
from what
you neither know
nor care

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 11/09/2026

Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk @thebrokenspine.co.uk for this week's #PoemsAbout #FaultLines, here's something short and sweet... will check in on others later! #poetry

Before the divorce we ate canapés

this must be your muse
the artist asked me
sparkling wine in hand
as we small talked
the gallery opening

no, I said
this is my wife
have you met?

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 02/09/2026

Finishing the final changes to a 50,000 manuscript before it heads to the editor and I head for a plane - the perfect time to share this photo... He's a forest bug (a type of shield bug)... he lives in the forest and looks like he has a shield on his back. What's not to love?

Photograph of a forest bug on a jacket. A forest bug is a species of shield bug and he's dark brown with what looks like a shield on his back.

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 31/08/2026

Hey Jen @jenthorne.bsky.social, thanks for the excellent #PromptCombo #Morning; had a few false starts on this one, so here goes! #poetry #poetrycommunity

Tidemarks

mussel shells crack
under your feet
the beach
stretches away
on an ebb tide

in the first
crack of dawn
as the birds
call out
I reach for you

a memory
persists

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 28/08/2026

Sharing a wee #poem for #PoemsAbout #EndOfSummer (which ironically has only just started up here!) - thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk & @thebrokenspine.co.uk and everyone else for the fantastic poems! #poetry #poetrycommunity

Fall

The electricity crackled
like summer storms
on high-tension lines.

I saw only us,
a future,
that promise;

never noticed
your true name
was Autumn

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 27/08/2026

Tha làn-ghealach an Lùnastail ag èirigh thairis air Linne Shlèite…

Photograph of the full moon rising over the Sound of Sleat, Isle of Skye

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 25/08/2026

Taken me a day to come up with something for #PromptCombo #era (and it's still a bit tenuous 😳). Thanks @rfsmith.bsky.social for the challenge! #poems #poetrycommunity #writingcommunity

Espresso

this machine
has followed me
across continents
and around my kitchen
for more than twenty years

it is fickle
scolding the grounds
when it suits
yet sensitive and vain
it spits out morning

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 20/08/2026

Here's a random animal picture of a Madagascan hissing cockroach I took the other day. It's a marvelous creature, grows up to 7.5cm long and (as the name suggests) it hisses (loudly). A handsome chap, don't you think?

Photograph of a Madagascan hissing cockroach climbing up a branch

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 17/08/2026

Back to #PromptCombo after some time away and this wonderful prompt from @thewombwellrainbow.bsky.social - #12Lines! Here's my offering, prompted by a chance encounter with a thylacine* last week... (*other animals made extinct by humans are available) #poetry #poetrycommunity

Poem text with photograph of thylacine:

Extinction

as a way of undoing
the misery caused by mankind
thylacinus cynocephalus bakes cakes
he waits for them too rise

the kettle always on for a pot of tea
I am the grivencatcher he tells me
in a low wolf-like bass growl
a perpetual reminder of

fish drift past the open window
resist the urge to follow
the air is no longer fit to breathe
now it’s your turn, unless

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 31/07/2026

Good morning everyone, still not much writing time but always good to write something about trains, so here's a wee draft for #PoemsAbout #LastTrain. Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk @thebrokenspine.co.uk as always! #poem #poetrycommunity

Late train to Dundee

I run for a seat as
the day slides shut.
Ticket gates, the noise,
wheels feeling for grip.

A coal-black city evaporating,
tenement stone, brick, darkness,
the bridge where the city is lost.
And you.

Steel and diesel, dark fields blur.
My palm on the cold glass.
At Inverkeithing the line forks,
as the land begins to open.

Through salt-hardened towns:
Dalgety Bay, Aberdour, Burntisland.
Shuttered fronts,
sea-worn stone.

Then harbour lights, iron hush.
This river holds no shape
until the final curve,
and you.

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 16/07/2026

A bit early I know, but I'm travelling tomorrow and been rubbish at posting poems lately 😀 Here's a wee contribution for #PoemsAbout #ExitWounds I wrote in the tiny spaces of the week. Hope you like it and thanks to @alanparrywriter.co.uk @thebrokenspine.co.uk! #poems #poetry #writingcommunity

Southwesterly gale eight

you watch water
spit
from the kettle

hissing
as it hits
the stove

a tap
dripping
into silence

salt spray on windows
darkness past colour
and you
sit
alone

the bed unmade
drinks gone cold
words
scalding
scarring

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 15/07/2026

Apologies for the radio silence on here - no #poems, no posts! Been busy with start of school holidays and visitors. The weather this week in #Skye is magical. It wasn't last week but that was good for a moody sea and sky pic on a deserted Skye beach (I'm not telling you where!)

Moody sky and a calm sea from a very stony beach on the Isle of Skye

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 06/07/2026

My #poem for #PromptCombo #Bestiary this week; Each-usige, a kelpie or waterhorse. Not a friend of any young girl by the side of the loch... Thanks @janpsolivagant.bsky.social ant.bsky.social for a challenging theme! #poetrycommunity #poetry

Each-uisge

you sit and watch me
from under the water
follow my movement
the way my hair
catches on sunlight
you cannot embrace

I see you
know you are there
feel the cold of the loch
a shape
waiting to ride out
across the land

I sit and watch you
you have tried this before
I did not fall
fail or falter
and will not now

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 03/07/2026

Good morning everyone, here's my offering for #PoemsAbout #CheapMotels. Thanks as ever to @alanparrywriter.co.uk @thebrokenspine.co.uk for the prompt! Will duck back later to read everyone else's #poems! #poetry #writingcommunity

Broke

the weekend we drove
south, hard
across the border
dust on the dashboard
cheap gas, cold beers
the radio spitting
bad news and love songs

a low bar,
half‑lit, half‑legal
above the slow, grey sea
a cheap motel in Ensenada
thin walls, neon bleed
salt in the sheets
sirens inland
dogs barking at nothing

broken glass
broken souls
broke / drunk / certain
by the time
we hit the 805
iceplant flowering
in the cracked verge

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 29/06/2026

Here's a very quick something for #promptcombo #monument. Such a great first prompt, @jenthorne.bsky.social! Not had much time for writing (or socmed!) the last few weeks but reading about native tree seed collection (we have some of them planted here) and thought it was perfect for the prompt!

Monument

the bleak mountainside
straining to reach
holding out a hand
to find this fallen harvest
holding out for the hope
that what they find
will grow
the next generation

as the world collapses
from greed and selfish acquisitions
these tiny seeds
become a new start
journeying
to our hillside
for my son to know
when he grows old

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 19/06/2026

Friday already and another challenging #PoemsAbout #OutAfterMidnight. Thanks @thebrokenspine.co.uk, hope you like my reminiscence of Manchester in the mid-80s! #poetry #writingcommunity

Bloom Street

no curfew, no plans
look around, look away
night in a rainy city
bus station shadows

sodium lights
voices crack
down steep stairs
dissolving into spaces

where we hide
in plain sight
from those people
who never understand

push open doors
they lead us
to our selves

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 12/06/2026

Genuinely struggled to do anything with this week's #poemsabout #WrongBody, but finally came up with this! Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk as always for the prompt! Will look forward to reading others later! #poems #poetry

Issue

my father’s hands
that thing he did
when words failed him

I catch myself
mid-gesture

the mirror shows
his shoulders
his jaw
how loss settles
in a face

I wear this body
like a coat
left at the door
by someone
my father never knew

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 08/06/2026

Another fantastic #promptcombo this week - #NothingMakesSenseNowadays. Thanks for this one Paul @thewombwellrainbow.bsky.social and the chance to channel some grumpiness! #poetrycommunity

Lineage

the grandchildren of men
who died fighting nazis
raise an arm
and hiss at difference

their hatred charged
by those who prey
on ignorance
and the grievances

of the children who voted
for Margaret Thatcher
who promised them
a better world

she lied
as this new lot do
when they pretend
they’re on your side

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 04/06/2026

Genuinely don't know if the wee man is called IrnBru, Whisky or Buckfast...

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 01/06/2026

Another great #PromptCombo prompt this week - #MaidenVoyage from @janpsolivagant.bsky.social, thanks Jan! Here's something new to share for it! #poems #poetrycommunity

Landfall in heavy seas

sailing out of the storm
I make for landfall
in heavy seas
finding your shore lush

with green inland valleys
the fjords deepening
bottle-blue waters shimmer
beneath the keel

I lean into the wind
following the flight
of birds
drawing me closer

drawing us
together
as we become
our own safe harbour

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 25/05/2026

Thanks very much @dragonslayerma.bsky.social for this week's #PromptCombo #Pray - it feels like rich earth to be digging! Here's a very quickly written offering! #poetry #poems

Pray

for hope
for redemption
to save
your ravaged soul

your gods
are not mine
your gods
are corrupt

their mortal intermediaries
in it for themselves
lives of luxury
bigotry and control

small people
scared
of who we might
become

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 22/05/2026

Still a but time-constrained this week, so here's something I wrote earlier that feels like a good fit for #PoemsAbout #BearingWitness. Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk for the prompt and I'll try and read others later! #Poetry #Poems #WritingCommunity

Sunday morning

a knock at the door
my father downstairs
my brother and I
peer over the banister

in the hall below
a policeman
has taken off his helmet
is telling my father

that she is dead

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 18/05/2026

Catching up after a week away and sharing a poem from my latest collection (link in bio) for #promptcombo theme #home this week. Thanks @rfsmith.bsky.social for the prompt and look forward to reading others! #poetry #prompt #writingcommunity

The kitchen

the old formica table
washing hanging on a winter’s day
shelling peas on the back steps
this room did not change
with the passing years

it was a place where we would meet
at dark of dawn and
dimming of the day
to listen and to talk
to feel quietly loved
Radio 4 and the Archers a constant
morning paper scattered

it is a room I have not seen
for many years
and is like you
a part of who I am

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 14/05/2026

Captured in full working plumage (in the Italian Chamber of Deputies)…

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 08/05/2026

Been thinking about #PoemsAbout #NamesNotNumbers for a few days and came up with this (title paraphrases a certain politician of the time). Not my usual! Thanks @thebrokenspine.co.uk @alanparrywriter.co.uk! Driving south now so will catch up! #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity

There was no alternative

unemployment grew
by six-hundred thousand
but numbers hide the journey
it was much worse in between
a million and a half jobs gone
in manufacturing alone

child poverty more than doubled
taxes helped the high earners
benefits languished
then disappeared
factories silenced
strikers beaten

look around
the dole office queue
mates from school
standing in line
work boots and cash in hand
a few hours when you could

sign on when you’re told
wait for your giro
sixty quid a fortnight
that’s what you got
don’t spend it all at once
a pound a pint
and the bus fare home

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 04/05/2026

Wow, @victoriaspires.bsky.social, that's quite a #PromptCombo, #InTheStyleOf has to be the trickiest yet! I've no idea if I've even got close to the brief with this one but it was fun trying! Looking forward to reading everyone as the week goes on! #poems #poetry #blueskypoets #writingcommunity

Kei te toe tonu te whenua (The land remains)

I feel some days
caught in
a poem, a story
where you exist
alone in memory

the main protagonists
(you know who you are)
linger on high hills
on open moorland
echo in the slow drip of the bush

a city street in a place
I had almost forgotten
and here
in the briefest
of poems

ka ngaro atu i te tirohanga
engari kei te mau tonu te whenua
(we disappear from sight
but the land remains)

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 28/04/2026

Hello #PromptCombo #BlueskyPoets, here's my #TotemTree offering for this week - took a while to get anything! Thanks @janpsolivagant.bsky.social for the challenge! #poems #poetrycommunity

I wish for a forest

you have an anchor
a tree you call
your own
somewhere
you return

there is no forest
holding my dreams
only the blank pages
of a life lived
in motion

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 24/04/2026

Here's a quick offering for #PoemsAbout #SignalLoss (Ruru/Morepork is a New Zealand owl, a guardian between this world and the other). Thanks to @thebrokenspine.co.uk for the prompt - aa busy morning here so will read others later! #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity

Hine ruru

last night
dreaming
you were lost
I was alone

as the morepork
rhythmically offered
condolences
her presence

kaitiaki on the bridge
between two worlds
speaks
to the living

and to me
as she becomes
the only voice
I hear

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 20/04/2026

Good morning @dragonslayerma.bsky.social, what a great #PromptCombo - #NatureHasWeapons. This true story came to mind so sharing it before diving into meetings. Slightly less serious than my usual poems! #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity #writingcommunity

The dog encounters a hedgehog for the first time

it was…
the size of a bear
a large bear
teeth
glinting in moonlight

spikes…
everywhere
like knitting needles
only longer
sharper

I saw it off
chased it away
well
I would have
if it hadn’t
prickled my nose

…ouch

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 17/04/2026

Here's my offering for this week's #poemsabout on #gravity. Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk / @thebrokenspine.co.uk for the prompt! Looking forward to reading everyone elses! #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity

Inertia

I fall
for you
in ways
not explained
by Newton’s apple

I fall
out of
my senses
eventually
falling out of love

descending
from your orbit
until the
gravitational force
decreases

inevitably
returning
to the hard earth
bruised
but not abashed

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 13/04/2026

In these parts, there is less distance between this world and others. Many thanks @rfsmith.bsky.social for the excuse to write about it for #PromptCombo #Visions, inspired also by this morning's encounter with one of our resident woodcock! #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity #scottishpoetry

She returns

familiar bass beats
of woodcock wings
low across heather

where earth
meets rock
meets the sky
where the air shimmers
separates

where voices carry
from the earth below
the sky above
in the vibration
of this land

she returns
as the world
quiets

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 12/04/2026

A bleak, black-and-white kind of day on Skye, what you can feel from the photos is the wind!

Cuillin hills from Sligachan, Isle of Skye on a bleak wind-swept day

Red Cuillin from Sligachan, Isle of Skye on a bleak wind-swept day

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 10/04/2026

Turns out the #FragmentsFriday I posted last week was the perfect opening to this week's #PoemsAbout #EdgeOfKnowing! So now I do know where that was going! Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk / @thebrokenspine.co.uk for the prompt! #poems #poetry #blueskypoetry

Stepping stones

I put you on a shelf
with the other saints
ready to forget
your transgressions

all the shadows
the silence
your stories
your lies

tomorrow
we will cross the river
on stepping stones
made of broken promises

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 03/04/2026

As we've no #PoemsAbout this week, I'm going to share this little starting piece for @blackboughpoetry.bsky.social #fragmentsfriday instead... sprang into my head walking the hound this morning, I wonder where it's going to go... #poems #poetry #blueskypoets #poetrycommunity #wrtingcommunity

I put you on the shelf
with the other saints
ready to forget
your transgressions
but not forgive

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 30/03/2026

Going minimalist for this week's #promptcombo #allowed, hope you like it! Thanks to @thewombwellrainbow.bsky.social for another excellent prompt #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity #writingcommunity

You are

enough.

You are
allowed.

Ignore
all messages
to the contrary.

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 27/03/2026

Here's a very rough start to something (maybe) for #fragmentsfriday - describes today's weather up here rather well too! Thanks @blackboughpoetry.bsky.social & @matthewmcsmith.bsky.social for hosting! #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity

dawn
by the shoreline
luminescence recedes
light rises
as the wind shifts
and skies darken

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 27/03/2026

A wee poem looking forward to spring for #PoemsAbout #Inbloom this week. Bit of a busy day ahead so will read others when I can later! Thanks @alanparrywriter.co.uk / @thebrokenspine.co.uk for a fine seasonal prompt :-) #poems #poetry #poetrycommunity #writingcommunity

Our ghost

lights in the atmosphere
stirring stardust
waking a chorus
of winter birds

your presence aches
longing surrounds me
in your waking
my anticipation
of warmth
of desire

soon now
we will see
flowers bloom
the sea’s colours
lifting us into spring
into possibility

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 23/03/2026

Good morning #poetrycommunity, thanks to @janpsolivagant.bsky.social for this week's #promptcombo theme of #nothing, and apologies for the rather gloomy response! Looking forward to reading what others come up with! #poems #poetry #writingcommunity

Nothing

you stand there in full fury
once again I have transgressed
another unmet expectation
a wound skilfully reopened
yet I feel nothing

I stand here wondering why
I stand here
and don’t just walk away
the future is a darkened room
and feeling nothing

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 20/03/2026

Thanks once again @alanparrywriter.co.uk & @thebrokenspine.co.uk for another excellent #PoemsAbout. This week is #Melt... here's a little something I wrote for it! #poems #poetry #PoetryCommunity

Reclamation

your body learns
to rest against mine
tired of looking the other way
your gaze softens, settles

the threshold reached
resistance is replaced
with the closeness
you cried for

no longer defence, not survival
you are learning again
the tenderness of touch

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 16/03/2026

Yes, the latter, I'm afraid.. and quite a fine set of ears he has too 😂

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Andy Williamson @andywilliamson.com · 09/03/2026

Ju's #promptcombo #free40 this morning was tricky! I had a go at something seasonal, trying to remember that the real world rests and restores regardless of human ignorance and stupidity. Thanks @hool415.bsky.social for the prompt I'll try to read others later! #poems #poetry #writingcommunity

Soon there will be lambs

signs of spring
light chasing
calves chasing each other

even the fallen trees
bring new life
soon there will be lambs

wild garlic
transforms the woods
nettles regrow

the world beyond
desolate
cold

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