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2025 Reflections
Happy New Year. 2025 was an amazing year – though it tested my mettle at times. It gave generously, then asked for patience. It offered light, and occasionally checked whether I could carry it. Some days were simple. Some were lessons disguised as weight. What carried me through wasn’t strength on display, but the quieter kind – the kind that sits with you and doesn’t rush the hard parts. I’m grateful for the family and friends who stood beside Natalie and I, steady when the ground shifted, present when answers were thin. This was the year I stopped mistaking resilience for doing everything alone. I wrote from inside the moment…
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Are You OK?
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What You Don’t See (But Refuse to Notice)
A sequence Author’s Note: This sequence is drawn from lived experience of navigating public space, healthcare, and transport as a disabled couple. It is not written to invite sympathy, but to demand attention — particularly to the moments where voices are ignored, time is rushed, and need is mistaken for inconvenience. The poems speak in more than one voice because life does. I. What You Don’t See (But Refuse to Notice) On the outsideI’m fine.Standing.Breathing.Passing. Inside, everything hurtsfrom being held togetherfor your comfort. One wintry evening at Chester StationI had to shout.Not because I wanted to.Because no one moved. A crowd pressed in,eyes forward,bags wide,space guarded like property. I raised…
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From Silence, We Turn
The world hums.Phones glow.Everyone’s talking —but no one’s listening. A mother pleads, unheard.A neighbour’s grief drifts past like static.Sirens blur into laughterfrom somewhere else.We keep walking. “Are you there?”“Do you listen?”The questions echo off glassand fall into silence. Even out in the fieldsyou can still hear it —that low, electric buzz.Engines. Screens.The hum that never stops. This is what it’s come to:so much noise,and yet nothing worth hearing. Then—a pause.A light through the door.Blue and gold.Warm hands.A chair pulled out for someone new. Here, people listen.Really listen.No filters.No noise.Just space. A wheel turns —not the metal kind,but one made of kindness,steady and shared. This is Rotary.Not power.Not pride.Just people showing…
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Wyt ti’n gwrando?
Rwyf eisoes wedi sôn am leisiau —pa mor anodd yw torri drwy’r môr o sŵn.Ond mae’n rhaid imi ofyn eto:Wyt ti’n gwrando? Wyt ti’n gwrando ar dy wraig, dy ŵr,dy bartner, dy blant? Wnest ti wrando ar dy rieni?Dy neiniau, dy deidiau?Dy ewythrod, dy fodrybedd? Wyt ti’n gwrando ar dy gydweithwyr,dy ffrindiau, dy fyfyrwyr? Rwy’n gwrando. Dyna fy ngwaith —gwrando.Rhywun i ddibynnu arno,i rannu chwerthin,i glywed dy stori. Ond gad inni droi’r drol am ennyd. Wyt ti’n gwrando arna i? Rwyt ti’n gwrando nawr,yn darllen hyn,yn dilyn y geiriau. Ond wyt ti wir yn talu sylw? Nid yw’r byd yn mynnu gwrandawyr.Rydyn ni oll yn gaeth yn ein swigod bach.A’r…
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Are You OK?
“Are you OK?” asked the nurse, as machines hummed and lights glared. The patient, yellow-tinged, weary, lay silent while the world hurried around her — fluids, paracetamol, antibiotics, needles and scans, the mystery of illness written in her blood. And what of her husband? Inside: fear, exhaustion, despair. Outside: armour of calm, the warrior, the rock at her bedside. Is he OK? She is not ordinary — if such a word belongs to anyone. Her body a puzzle of conditions that weave together into fragility, into fight. Is she OK? Days blur into nights. Corridors become home, moved from ward to ward, sleep fractured by monitors’ beeps, by rubies of…
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Status
“What’s on your mind?”Shut up, Facebook.I’m not here to spill my soulinto another scrolling feed. I’m talking about status—not likes, not clicks,but standing in society.It’s not what you know,it’s who you know. Some chase it,some wear it like armour.Once they’ve got it,they don’t care what you think—because they’ve arrived.And we? We’re just the plebs. But what does it buy you?A pedestal, higher than the rest?Snobbery. Foolishness.Lavishness. Loneliness. Status isn’t all it seems.You can hold it in your handand still be hollow—always learning, never teaching. Status whispers:you’re too good for common people now.But you weren’t born into it—you clawed it from power’s grip. Now you stand apart,a black sheep in a…
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Are You There?
We’ve all been there—drifting into the abyss,slipping out of place,until reality claws us back,kicking, screaming, unwilling. And what a reality it is. A world that hums,a world that races,people trapped inside their own little bubbles.Obsessed with drama.Drowning in demands. Your voice bounces,echoes,lost in the hollow chamber of noise.And you ask yourself—“Does anyone even hear me?” Meanwhile—someone lies in a hospital bed.Alone. Mum.Dad.Nain.Taid.Aunty. Uncle.Brother. Sister. Too far to visit.Too busy to call.Are their families there for them?The answer? … No. And when a stranger collapses in front of you,are you there? When someone is dragged to the ground,their voice cut short—are you there? No. Most turn their faces away.Most step over…
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The Greatest Gathering
They called it The Greatest Gathering —and it lived up to the name. Two hundred years of railway historydrawn togetherfor three golden days in August, 2025. From the proud, early locomotivesbreathing steam like whispers of the past,to the gleam of the newest innovationspromising the future —we saw it all. Derby stood at the heart of it,Alstom’s gates flung wide,welcoming thousandswith the warmth of old friends. Steam, diesel, electric —past, present, and future —shoulder to shoulder,sharing the same summer air. It was never just for trainspotters.Families wandered,railway staff beamed,friends gathered under the banners of two centuries. There was something for every eye and every hand —content creators, artists, and Iall capturing…
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Do You Listen?
Do you listen? I’ve spoken before about voices —how it’s hard to be heard in a sea of noise.But I need to ask again:Do you listen? Do you listen to your wife,your husband,your partner,your children? Did you listen to your parents?Your grandparents?Your aunts and uncles? Do you listen to your colleagues,your students,your friends? I do. That’s what I do —I listen.I’m someone to rely on,to laugh with,to tell your story to. But let’s turn the tables for a moment. Would you listen to me? You’re listening now, I know.Reading this.Following along. But are you really paying attention? Society doesn’t want people to listen.We’re all too wrapped up in our own…
