I REALISED earlier in the year, what a lucky man I am. My granddaughter and my great-granddaughters were visiting me from Alderney in the Channel Islands, and I decided to take them to Haigh Hall, Wigan. ("And he who gives a child a treat, makes joy bells ring in Heaven's street" -- John Masefield).

The children were busy on the swings and roundabouts. I felt contented ("Happy is he that is happy in his children" D Fergusson).

I was looking across at some trees, my granddaughter remarked "You're a lucky man Grandad, you can see a tree." I thought she was referring to my eyesight, but she explained. "Most people look at a tree but do not see it -- its beauty, form, colour, different from other trees, different through the year, and in different weather." I realised she was right ("A fool sees not the same tree as a wise man sees" James Blake), ("Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" John Stone).

I am lucky that I was educated to see and appreciate the beauty of nature ("Tis education forms the common mind, just as the twig is bent, the tree inclined" Alexander Pope). ("Also nature is but art" also Pope). At 78 I am lucky I can still enjoy hill walking ("As good luck would have it" Shakespeare -- Wives of Windsor).

Luckily I have time to look at a tree ("What is this life if full of care, we have no time to stand and stare" Wm Davies), ("Better to be born lucky than rich" Clarke).

I am also lucky to have such wonderful grandchildren and great-grandchildren ("Children are a poor man's riches" Fergusson).

I think that I will never see,

A poem lovely as a tree.

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree. (Joyce Kilmer).

I suppose I am lucky to have learned to love poetry too.

George K Brown

Barncroft Road,

Farnworth, Bolton