Saturday 31 August 2019

and then ...

and then ...

and then that orange glow
that extends no further than 
the cross bar of the lamppost 
that holds a bicycle tyre above 
a puddled yellow shuffling
at my feet

and then the lake of darkness under 
the underpass, under (obviously)
the last railway bridge galvanised at 
the edge of town in the darkness 
that hides nothing but my fears 

and then the pub with no lights
hiding around the corner with
shotgun galvanised shutters perforated 
like a string vest smoking in the
moonlight of an age 

and then 
I am galvanised to ...
                



Monday 26 August 2019

A body of opinion

A body of opinion

What few curves doth desire arouse
in the garden of life’s delights?
And what high time at thine hour’s peak
doth the future of mine espouse?
And what in youth’s eye did
pose the invite, upon the run
of a sun’s domed year, sky blue 
in the thought of nothing, but this day,
for all of our tomorrows.

Sunday 25 August 2019

the sea escapes

the sea escapes 

with what voice does the sea speak?
  sometimes in deceit,
  sometimes of sorrow.
placid in dreams rocking the cradle
of trust’s love upon a sparkling lie,
upon a depth of tears, even
when in a deep depression, 
fleet of flotsam 
along the shorelines,
of a certain restitution.

Sunday 18 August 2019

Time’s time

Above time’s wishing well,
the reflections of childhood
call on every character who trod
the warm stones of those roads;
calling to ask: where are you now?

Every stone in periphery’s eye
calls down childhood’s village days,
where are you now?

The colours on the oiled water
draining the white gutters of the
tears that fell under the slag tips,
or ran in the dereliction of hope.

In every sulphur culvert,
in every trespass on the land
of the factory owner’s deep pockets.
The toil of youth ground down to
pub smoking hackhards,
dead on their feet.

And still love’s lemon juices flowed
in the old songs - as they are doing still;
but then they were the misty eyes behind
which all the pulls of life conspired to
lay together under the moon’s sheets,
in silence finger tipped.

The knowing of the walked streets as the 
vein’s back hand down all the 
‘no you cannot’ days, when
‘we bloody well will’ days tore
hope into shreds, and left no truth in one’s
second glance at each other’s recognition.

How these images melt in memory’s furnace,
nostalgia’s pastiche of every smile that
turned everything on its head and relearnt
that the lump in the throat, that every held breath,
every feeling of nowness, every spooning couple
that walked that walk of time towards their time,
was doomed.

This tattoo is grimed with the cinders of ambition,
is penned in the abattoir fields,
is waiting upon the end of these days,
reborn in nostalgia, but dying in memories
of the good old days. 

See this village hanging on the slag tips,
throbbing to industry’s engine, the
the doorstepped people twisting 
fate’s tourniquet, tighter and bloodless
tighter on the artery of their doom.
Boom, boom, boom, the iron men hammer
their bread and dripping, billycan days,
looking down to the day’s end and
the tomorrow of that doom’s own clock.

The boundary condition of slag’s black hole,
six pit’s well where a dropped stone never
arrived; where all hillsides above the village
drop down to the river’s escape, to the railway’s
visiting scream. 

Such it is.

Such an awful heaven,
such an awful hell,
such it was then,
and always will be.





no
is a big word
                      yes
is a big word
no

Wednesday 14 August 2019

was that you

was that you 
                      at the other end of the day

I did wave
                 but you were lost in thought

pity
       it could have been

Sunday 11 August 2019

rain

rain

train spotting 
on a wet platform 
in a child’s long mac
I can still taste 
the futility of the day
the numbness of time 
passing so slowly 
that even to this day 
I remember the boredom 
before battle commenced

Tuesday 6 August 2019

love in love’s mind

love in love’s mind

love in love’s mind here renew 
all my loving thoughts of you 
when across the seas and far away
here in my heart you will always stay 

see the moon see the stars
they are mine they are yours
take my hand in love’s mind again
write the words my heart to stain

spin around and rest deep my arms
for soon time will be passed the time
for home again and safe from harms
then - I will be yours you will be mine 

don’t answer my finger upon your lips
just look here in my eyes 
take my hands upon your hips
just sigh those sighs those sighs

Monday 5 August 2019

A strange poem


from a testes mind
vesicle seminal words
ejaculated in verse
run away to lonesome corners
await the gestation of Icarus

three stone sculptors on the downs

three stone sculptors on the downs

the shells’ chalk spoke
of finding you down the eons
that have passed times counting,
and still the resonance of thought
found hiding under these downs of 
time carved so that we three, 
we have thee now for our while,
so tarry do and in tarry 
let us talk

Sunday 4 August 2019

why?

why?

when all the kind words have barbs
that stick in the throat of sympathy
when tears are too dry to flow
and tomorrow’s sunrise seems so far away

and then poetry says ...

come and sit quietly with me
and let me put my arm around you

zummer

zummer

a breeze of bees
stirs the lavender seas
on the springboards scents of 

Friday 2 August 2019

no sting

no sting

I yearn to die
                   and never
be found
                no last note
 or nuffin’
no one to remember


       I forgot