Winning poem

My poem won first prize in the Writelink Spring Fever contest so I'm tickled pink.

Here it is

THE HOMECOMING [Promise of Spring]

“I’m sober,” he said, “and I love you.

Come home.”

And the pines on the mountain

danced with branches outspread

in a green ecstasy,

the birds sang Ode To Joy

and rebellious hope

flooded the sky and fields.

The forest flared

with green flames,

harps sang in every stream

and waterfalls thundered applause.

Homeward I sped

through Betws and Blaenau,

through Rhaedr reeling along

in a rusty old van

with wings on its wheels.

Over the Severn,

a fairytale drawbridge

hung from the heavens

on silver blue chains.

The motorway gleamed

in the moonlight and rain

and the city lights

seemed like spun gold

as I sped to my home,

just a house in a terrace

but now promised land;

the doors opened wide

and there he stood waiting –

with bottle in hand.

Introducing me

This is me as I appear as writer of the month on Ukauthors website for November

Born in 1932 in Kent [the bit that got swallowed up in Greater London]. Has been writing on and off all her life in between earning a precarious living mostly as a language teacher, and for 20 years running an international centre in Exeter – a spare time job that involved a 365 day working year, no money, impossible invitations to everywhere in the world and meeting an amazing variety of interesting people .
I moved to Wales in 1985 thus fulfilling a long cherished dream and now live in an ancient farmhouse in Cwm Prysor with two sheepdogs, four cats, three sheep and assorted ducks. I still teach [occasionally], paint and write. My adopted land seems to have reawakened my muse.

Here is my home page there http://www.ukauthors.com/modules.php?name=Your_Account&op=userinfo&bypass=1&uname=teifii

and here is my website with my books and collie dogs http://www.merilang.com

An update on my sheepdog training.

Nov 21

This is a continuation of my journal on my website, where anyone who has been following it will know that Dyfi [pronounced Dovey like the River Dyfi] is a very beautiful but impetuous collie dog wished on me by a local farmer, who probably decided that competing with Dyfi's excitement and passion about sheep was too much like hard work.

Earlier episodes can be found here http://www.meirionnydd.f9.co.uk/daf.blog/blog.htm

Dyfi has been with me over a year now and he has at last learnt enough to be trusted off the lead with the sheep. Now that the grass has stopped growing, the sheep get hay and sheep musesli every morning. Dyfi waits impatiently at the gate

Then we go into the pig sty and he guards the entrance while I dish up breakfast.

The sheep wait outside behaving themsleves until we leave. Felix is a bit naughty and sometimes thumps Dyfi on his nose so it is a sort of stand off but Dyfi behaves perfectly. I'm very proud of him and he loves getting his praise eacg morning after the operation is complete.