Saturday 28 September 2019

cheesy?

cheesy?

what cheese is that?

i’m unsure.

mature unsure?

or

mild unsure?

that’s immature!

sure?

Friday 27 September 2019

point of view

point of view

often we think a view is poetry
we try to write it - and fail
we have to go inside
and write what it is about outside
that moves us and
drives us inward
inside out 

Wednesday 25 September 2019

truth

truth

to the poet every poem is the truth
every reader sees their truth in the poem
it cannot be that all their ‘truth’ is the truth
but who knows what defines the truth
birth and death are true - the rest is illusion
and the biggest illusion is truth
ergo we go again

Saturday 14 September 2019

On the line to six pit junction

On the line to six pit junction

See how the 67 saddle tank train 
steams under the footbridge
of Upper Bank station aged and plain,
hard by the ridge on the ridge
of the knife-grinder’s stone,
forlorn, and tar-stuck, and wasted alone.

Listen to the wagon works clattering
the riveter’s rat a tat-tatting,
the engine shed’s chattering,
steaming out of this and thating,
wiped on the mutton cloth smelling of oil
tucked into grey dungarees softening in toil.

Past Aaron Thomases, joinery, factory,
hoppity hopping to the spawning well,
chick-weeded, deep-springing, the refractory
newts in clay pits that chits such an horrible smell,
urgent upon the boys long, long forays,
down all of their collecting and wandering ways.

Then inside the crossings warm guardian box
drinking the tea of adulterated chatting,
firesided boys learning of populi vox 
of signals raised, to this and thating,
settling into the spotting of green, and brass,
the castles, the earls, and the Britannia class.

And on to much more and more beside
the rail track, sleepered so long and so straight,
spring-welled, frog-spawned, a rising tide,
of pouring fields falling through the wooden gate,
of the rickety ruins down on their day,
chimneys’ long-fallen, along the falling way.

Beside the trucked sidings’ of the slinking fox,
to where, deep in sleep, the sixth pit lies,
across from the mainline and the signalling box.
the old school above a quarry implies 
that all of the slagged fossils were foundry bred,
tipped high upon the furnaces in priory red.

Then the bottomless pond, the infamous Pluck,
fished and splashed, or when in winter iced,
demanded that children try their infamous luck, by
throwing splinters of ice, hammered and spliced.
And growing in the children is the slow registering,
that by doing nothing you are doing everything.

Friday 13 September 2019

oh bloody hell!

oh bloody hell!

when you die
you’ll no longer exist;
I’ll remember you of course;
but that will not be you,
will it!
that will be my construct of you -

oh bloody hell!

ache

ache

in this face there is an ache
a parchment over the grave
countenance of loss
who was he that left such
a whole shadow
who’s tears fail to fill or
to assuage a grief so deep 
that tomorrow is lost in
the rictus memory’s embrace

hypercritical

hypercritical 

posit now, how each generation,
proclaim that love be the critical factor,
that is feeding this fast-breeder reactor;
running forever without attenuation, 
even in the self-consuming fires,
of all that the selfish gene desires. 

Tuesday 10 September 2019

feverfew

feverfew 

yes the schoolyard 
the big yard
the one at the top
with the steps down to 
the bottom yard the one
with the two shelters and
the door to sixty year old
kisses in the cloakroom 

yes i remember it as if it
was tomorrow and we were singing 
  one more day of sin 
  one more day of sorrow 
  one more day in this lousy old dump 
  for we are breaking up tomorrow 

do you remember

MR SPEAKER

MR SPEAKER 

order order
in any particular order 
there is there 
order order

Monday 9 September 2019

Said ...

Said ...

All behind like Brown’s cows (mum)

Half a crown postal order 
and a thruppeny stamp.
An ounce of Golden Virginia
and a packet of cigarette papers. (Dad)

He thinks his shit is chocolate. (Mum)

Old so and so - he died! (Dad)

Never say:
Up Mike’s behind the wall paper!
Or gor blimey!
Laughing leads to crying.(mum)

(Mum and Dad) 
No sooner said - than dead.

What can I say?

Martyn

With me, John, Dave, and Ray,
all the talk is of yesterday;
when dear Martyn made it five,
and would do so now, if he were still alive.
So raise your glasses to the four of us,
and to Martyn’s spirit on the early bus;
while me, John, Dave, and Ray,
remember many a better day.


Saturday 7 September 2019

dear old england

dear old england 

dear old england 
you are in my bones
deep and hard
a patriotic unicorn
a cabal that
stirs the marrow
of harrow and eton 
all those
mountains of the moon
at the sunset of our
hopes and prayers
oh god
it does and all

with mute tears
i sink to my knees

Hook, line and sinker

Hook, line and sinker

What paternoster have I swallowed,
that has hooked me in the guts, through
this skein of skin? Such a fine
thread that holds me be-muscled 
to the rock’s jest, seething with 
its promises for tomorrow, 
and the words that will set words free.