‪the calm tides of summer filling the bays of your mind‬

‪hills of smiles without a cloud in the sky‬

‪supper upon the lowing of the sun‬

‪dreaming dreaming‬

‪of midnights‬

‪summer‬

‪sunny‬

‪boy‬

childhood 

digging up the hamster

to see the bones 

1958

1958

there i’ve said it

it’s a date 

and when these poems say a date

i try to imagine

all there is to recall 

and all the time i am never sure

but a date is a date set 

and that one and only date sets the mould 

of this or that poem

the poet set it atop of the poem

so it’s important to say the date

the date the date the date

the one and only

there i’ve said it

let’s move on to it

the poem

and forget the date for now

the words will set the date 

and i’ll remember the day i read

it - the date of the poem 

there i’ve said it

12th November 1958

and roy fisher wrote it

package holiday

charon crossing acheron 

book now

the chiseller

the chiseller 

we thought we could science away

the epidemics of don’t mind me

i’m just a little morose today  for

life is ours and we are here to stay 

and all this nature thing a me bob

it bloody well gets in the way

and bugger me - oh i say 

this eulogy

won’t fit on my tombstone

and the chiseller is dead

we’ve missed the bus

‪we’ve missed the bus

the bus stop’s memoir‬

‪was entitled ‘time’s tableau’ ‬

‪it remembers those days when ‬

‪two arrived together‬

‪but ‬

‪is referring now to passengers‬

‪on their way to death’s masked ball‬

‪even the graffiti is faded - for‬

‪what can it say about corvid?‬

‪bugger all and all‬

‪is smeared in tears‬

much later

the setting sun is wrapped 

and taken home

tears

‪tears

the tragedy of mankind‬
‪captured in your brief lines‬
‪the sparcity of the enormity‬
‪that is eternity‬
‪the questions‬
‪eternally unanswered‬
‪eternally sought‬
‪the runes of dried tears‬
‪of sadness never read‬
‪by the tears of happiness ‬
‪until they change‬
‪too late in the day‬

(For John Guzlowski)

the writings shed

the writings shed 

and now i imagine‬

‪not the summer writing shed‬

‪all things placed‬

‪but the door window closed shed‬

‪full of smoke and fetid words‬

‪fighting for survival‬

‪squeezed by the rain‬

‪running some drying‬

‪to be read the world over‬

‪always in the sunshine‬

‪never in the rain

laid low

underneath of the either sides
is where imagination rides
who laid it thus from A to B
it wasn’t you it wasn’t me
walk on by on the other side
but which side? you decide
go on - you decide

why four

‪this was what four was for‬
‪but i rushed away for five‬
‪i thought i would be more alive‬
‪and now they have locked the door‬

squirrelled

squirrelled

mid morning

already it is hot

the geraniums share a joke

daisies open up

the lavender dozes

plums are ripening

apples are dropping

and the pears 

well the pears are the pears

or so the runner beans tell

the nasturtiums 

and the dancing butterflies

and the gossip of gnats

over weeping potato haulms

yes 

it is high summer my friend

my garden hat slipping

over my closing eyes 

aye son aye

high summers just are

are they not

even when

the cat has shit on the grass

attracting the blue bottles and 

the green bottles but but

such beauty 

cannot spoil this day

it is squirrelled away 

for winter

that old photograph

‪that old photograph 

it’s gone‬

‪  i still have it‬

‪but it’s gone‬

‪  but i still have it‬

‪look ‬

‪  you have it‬

‪you had it‬

‪  see‬

‪look‬

‪it’s gone‬

sunday

sunday 

locked in dogs

barking at the moon

feral builders

nailing the afternoon 

visitors pollinating 

the promenade seats

dead men’s elegies 

where the widows meet

afternoon chatter

needling the groove

stuck and stuttering 

it’s time to move

on to where

the cabbage whites are dancing

over nasturtium flowers 

poppies growing taller 

in the midday hours

the cat stretching long

on the wooden decking

i dream of the old days

in the sand dunes necking

and when dusk

the shunter 

ushers me inside

i think of billy bunter 

ahh

this is where i abide

i’m building a haiku hermitage

i’m building a haiku hermitage 

a haiku hermitage for one

when all the bad news rages

i’ll sit there in the sun

and when the war is over

whether lost or won

i’ll write another poem

to set beside this one

and then I’ll look across the valley

to the sunset in the west

and chant myself to sleep

home   home   home

is best

why not

why  not

self-replicating

on this ball of iron

closer to death

than the sequalae 

of global warming

yet still worrying

asking why

why ask of it

when comes oblivion

asking yourself

why

asking

and receiving no reply

other than the echo

why

and ran - i did

and ran - i did

first i collected the tadpoles

from the well across the fields

then i tickled sticklebacks

from the little pluck dicing stones

roach came next enticed with dough

under a float upon the pluck

then running the flashing brook trout

with worms where the water weeds flow

meandering slow past llansamlet church

where grandpa is buried low

then of course the coarse fish pike and perch

in the tennant canal reeded blind

by the docks where the sea fish flow

hooking pouting and whiting and flatties

on the west pier where the night rats know

that the moon stones will be awash at full tide

when the dock lights shiver - you know

and a fist of rag worm wrapped in sand and cloth 
holds every boy‘s long hope upon the bay

aye

i’ve caught them all in my time

when as a child i caught time itself

running with the hares and kestrels

flying across the shivery-shakes 
and heather’s dusty flowers

     and lizards 
          and frogs 
               and toads

and bank voles in the mounds of grass

and water voles with streaming their Vs

down from heol las

never ever did i think 

that this 
one day 

would be just a dream 

for

i seem to have run out of bait my son

although i am running closer to my soil

where the sun is warm under grasses tall

and the breeze - well it’s just that breeze

that dried blood on bloody knees 

sleeping under the long sky

as deep as a big fishes lair

over the weir time has rock dashed

and the sun is setting in red sails fair

across an ocean with no destination

i am sailing there - with there there now

for yes   oh yes

i am sailing there and there

bloody help

bloody help

our blood

is not our blood

or our ancestor’s

blood

or our scion’s

blood

or

for that matter

blood at all

it is of the soil

of the toil

of time’s

bloody time

The Chelsea hotel

The Chelsea hotel

‪ the length of time’s tear‬

‪in the bite of a double shot‬

‪downed now‬

‪in staggering words‬

‪down sleep’s slurred lines‬

‪laid to rest‬

‪bible bright ‬

‪in that singular goodnight‬

have you ever wanted to be

have you ever wanted to be

have you ever wanted to be that man

the one with the stick

you know - the one with the metal pole

who listens to your stopcock 

out in the road

with his ear to the shiny wooden cup

at the end of his decision

or the man with his hands on the handles

of the surging tube that goes up and down 

up and splurging down in the storm drain

that keeps the kids enthralled

or the man with the shiny wooden pole

with the pig’s tail hook that darns

the the coupling links between the trucks

with such deft luck that barely at moment 

between the buffers shine bouncing the 

chains tight in a juddering offwego 

or the man in the moon

who is so superfluously superior

that he doesn’t even exist

i’d like to be a bit on the dark side

of an espresso light

ah well 

here they come with the medication trolley

better sign off now 

or they’ll think i’m off my trolley

again

strange morning

strange morning

outside

mum pecks the bum of a baby dunnock

dunno why 

but the cat goes bonkers

and they fly