grief

 grief

for what can words say 

     of breakdown

in a way  we know that

  they can’t

but words are not all we have 

  between us

there is my hand on your shoulder

as you shudder

and mutter some other words

intelligible only to my touch

for comfort 

is all 

            alone

mumbling of mumbles

 mumbling of mumbles 

down the long down streets under a castle cupped in sun

run the pubbed and chappeled ways all the way to a bay 

of days cockled and mudded far and away way out out 

to a tideline lost in the haze of a believing that 

by this evening it will be lapping the sea wall

opposite the mermaid and the pilot and the georges 

of the infamous mumbles mile while we wander 

as aimless as aimless was meant to be at our inhalations 

of salt and vinegar on fish and chips and of course 

go on my son and have another one for the crazy golf is

of course as coloured as any sunset through the

leaves of the trees that purloin the gulled boats

drawn up high and mightily dry and rattling their lanyards

at even the slightest breeze that counts our steps

along the promenade at southend to end at

the end of the pier show of fisher if-men and a

lifeboat tolled of untold tragedies and a gift shop 

of parodies and a pub of melodies in chorus to

the high bells on a swell pulling on anchor chains

and buoys as yellow as mustard on any hot dog 

that could not compete or any of the flowerbed’s 

pretensions from the council east of the slipways

green slimed slipping and mothered under the shrieks 

of kids and dogs cross-leashed in their growling at

the end of a day’s outing totally satiated by the

realisation that the names of the rocks might just

trail a sea tendril or two way back to the true

oystercatcher days before the fields were housed

with these wandering lanes spidering all the way

up to that very same castle pale in the milk moon

watering down the village lanes to slumbering seas

beaches and everything that made this a day

the preternatural being and seeing that everything 

has been done and done proper like all day long

and all in just the tide of one day’s long excursion 

the sea splits its trousers

 the sea splits its trousers

the sea splits its trousers

a rip as long as the long curves

tear back along the white repair

sitting just there on the flotsam line

with a wet behind and feet drawn up

on the jagged rocks black there

standing on a feather and the broken shells

walking backward along the bladder wrack

popping the questions can you see it

the magic fish the red crab on the horizon

of my return in jest upon a white horse

charging no fee to gallop along

into the sunset of a red beaming

or the dawn of the such and such

of a surreal realisation 

two held breaths

 two held breaths

1.

sometimes

you need to slide in a sinus forceps

slowly   ever       so    slowly 

into the loin of a poem

open the prongs and let the pus

a kidney dish (or two  maybe)

from a mind infected with turmoil

a draining of the cold fires

the exhalation of a held breath

pus somewhere

pus nowhere

sub-phrenic

i heard that said

it had me in stitches 

gave me hiccups 

so i held my breath

2.

there is an ancient poem

that has carried a held breath

for ten thousand years

                    here take it

                    now 

                    close it

i have replaced the breath

ten thousand years made me gasp 

and i feel so ancient today

tomorrow is another day

they always say

                           but

ten thousand years

is a long time 

to hold a breath

sometimes

                      sometimes 

sometimes my poetry is boiling like mud 

spatulating   flatulating   bubbling

releasing puffs of sulpherated nonsense 

to no great height or beauty 

                      and

other times it is like a geyser

hot glass calm and clear blue

of inestimable depth then

                  whoosh 

a rainbow as high as the sky is

reduced on mountains in a stream

of words so cold they could cut you

                in between 

in between i wait and wait

to discover who’s pulse

the effluvia dances to

who is there   where   when

                  whoosh

we sometimes catch a glimpse 

                  whoosh

since the sun gave birth to day

 since the sun gave birth to day

at the swelling of the thigh’s gap

where the pheromones fall softly

in one’s mind nothing that can be

fulfilled by looking upon this falling

or the replication of time and time again

can be thought of in any coherent way

other than the overwhelming knowing that

onward is the only way forward

as the waves flow over the divining thought

that waters under the earth are the font 

of these tears at the beauty of belonging

where the genome says now go we do

and to do thou likewise is the consummation 

over every trajectory throughout history

since the sun gave birth to day

autumn in laugharne

 ‪autumn in laugharne 

in river wrapped‬

‪and poetry rapt‬

‪drawn down around a castle‬

‪a spot of sun‬

‪in a hedge field spun‬

‪away from all the hassle‬

‪let us hunker down‬

‪in this fair town‬

‪through all the snows of winter‬

‪and breathe the mulled‬

‪wine of the pulled twine‬

‪of this our christmas glitter‬