Filling in the blnks,
Personalising the crwd,
Identfyng objects
Hgh in the gathering clouds.
Forevr seeking patterns,
Our brains instinctivly,
Fill in all the gaps, to mke
Snse of what they see.
This is our superpowr,
Our mnd’s great party trck,
Unless there’s no connecton,
And then we come unstck.
All that said, I’ve never been good at the missing vowels round in Only Connect…
(24.11.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash
‘I’m going to ABBA tomorrow’, he said
Fantastic, I replied. I’d heard
so many good things about the show,
and how the holograms seemed so real.
Not having seen the gig myself,
and wanting to add to the conversation,
I started to talk about a show
that I’d just seen the night before.
I saw a jolt upon his face,
a mental change of gear, but ever
composed and mindful of the other,
he quickly engaged with what I’d said.
Realising, perhaps, that I had moved
too quickly from his coming joy,
I returned the conversation to
our quartet of Seventies songsters.
His features creased a merry crease,
‘I must have miscommunicated,
I didn’t mean the sequinned Swedes,
but Aber as in Aberystwyth!
The moral of this mutual blunder?
The danger of assuming shared
perception, a common understanding,
obvious isn’t always so.
A comic conversation from this morning that makes a perfect illustration.
(23.11.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by Andrew Ebrahim on Unsplash
A hidden beauty disguised beneath
time’s veil, erosion and graffitti,
tucked behind irrational fear and
under hope’s blind shadow sat.
Hatred rails against it, whilst
vainglorious proclamation rants,
but come what may, in quiet
stillness, unmoved and firm it stands.
But just because we wish its change
and close our eyes, place fingers into
ears and make such childish noises,
there is no metamorphosis.
And from its judgement seat the truth
returns our judgement back on us
and casts its verdict cold and clear,
untouched by lies and ignorance.
A response to recent assertions in the public arena.
(25.09.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by Hennie Stander on Unsplash
A Bacon Sandwich:
Two slices of bread with meat in between,
The perfect blend (forgive me veggies),
Both perfectly complementing each other.
A Marken Sandwich:
Two gospel stories intertwined,
The second tucked inside the first,
Giving meaning to each other.
A Human Sandwich:
The symbiotic network
That comes from living in community,
Identify found in relation to each other.
We’re looking at Mark’s Gospel at church and how he structures his narrative to communicate to us. Tonight we talked about the Marken Sandwich.
(18.09.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by amirali mirhashemian on Unsplash
‘I’m trying to carve out time’.
What a strange phrase that is,
as if time were a solid
block of wood or stone.
It’s true that running out
of time can be like running
headlong into a wall,
immutable and solid.
But can time be chiselled into
shape? Be forced into
a form that fits our hopes?
Have violence done upon it?
Surely time is fluid?
It simply runs around
one’s fingers, flows away,
oblivious to our lives.
Today, reflection upon the book ‘The Unhurried Pastor’ and the constant demand of deadlines, has had me thinking about the nature of time.
(15.09.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by its cataline on Unsplash
A late night stop at the services
having just found the M4 was closed.
‘I guess you see all sorts in here?’ I asked.
‘Yes’, replied the woman in Costa,
‘The weird and the wonderful!’ She laughed.
I left with a life saving coffee,
wondering which, if either, was me.
A long day helping my daughter decorating. Diverted on the way home.
(28.07.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by Blake Verdoorn on Unsplash
An honest conversation,
A sharing of opinions,
Through letting our guards down,
And trusting one another.
Revealing ignorance,
And asking searching questions,
Opening to the other,
Two heads better than one.
I’ve had a day of activities and meetings today. A common thread has been a series of cracking conversations where we’ve genuinely learnt from each other.
(02.04.25)
The other night we gathered.
Not around a fire like
our predecessors but
around the table with
the plan of telling tales.
We started with the story
of our days. We shared frustrations
our triumphs, hopes and dreams;
wielding brushes to paint
the scene we wanted seen.
And then our make-believe.
A painting of a haunted house
investigated by
our alter-egos, bravely
searching for the truth.
Its strange, but when I hang
these portraits side by side,
there’s no denying that
the brushstrokes are the same.
Two different worlds connected.
Today the news, more stories.
A splash of colour here
a daub of darkness there,
all vying for opinion,
surreal, unreal or real?
Stories within stories.
Landscapes created by
our conflict. Colours clash
and mix, until we find
some truth emerging from them.
What is truth? I suspect that’s the question of our age. I’m increasingly aware of how we reveal and hide the truth within the stories that we tell.
(20.03.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by Ahmed Raza Kz on Unsplash
Best laid plans and all…
I said I wouldn’t do this
But hey, queue one up
It’s been a full day today. Sometimes you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.
(27.01.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo by José Martín Ramírez Carrasco on Unsplash
Sometimes a simple name can conjure a sound,
produce a tone or mood, or evoke a colour.
Try John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock,
Cannonball Adderley, Wayne Shorter, Charlie Parker.
Say them out loud to enter a world now gone,
where bands chase the elusive rhythm of
adrenaline beating, coloured black and white,
and tinted blue.
Spent this afternoon working to a soundtrack of Blue Note Jazz.
(26.01.25)
© Ben Quant 2025
Photo William P. Gottlieb, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Ode for the Day 
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