verily i say

verily i say

working families 

hard working families 

very hard working families 

very very hard working families 

very very very hard working families 

verily i say unto you

very very very very very very very very very 

anchors

 anchors

carrying a name

over all the years

and it never gets lighter 

so many anchors

in the past

as mine slips

away

votes

            votes

             remember

you cannot take a vote back

                oh yes 

    you can vote again 

but things have changed

    you changed them

the coming

 the coming

sometimes

the sea stutters

at the anger of it all

overwhelming 

the rocks are abashed

by such harsh love

the coast’s eroded trust

crumbles all belonging 

all sliding deep inside

until the deep down

erupts 

waiting

 waiting

the book is half brown / half beige

it has been in the sun 

my nose deep in the tent of it

waiting / wanting

bikowski will take me somewhere

sooner than later 

the sun comes out

i keep the book waiting

gulp scream

 gulp scream

the (gulp!) stream is fast slowing down

and life’s dream is also going

down we go but (hey oh!) here we go

some other organism will grab the chance

to dance its life away

take you partners 

one two three

for death’s step 

hee hee hee

roaring

 roaring

and they say

the roar of the waves is nothing 

but the bursting of millions of tiny bubbles

and i thought

the roar of the world

is nothing but millions of hearts bursting

the roar against which silence can still a heart

and all hearts turn that way

and so the mist

 and so the mist

one’s thoughts turn back to the just before

it came down

and then ponders the just after 

it clears away

as the now deepens and deepens

on which eventually 

everything depends

empirical

 empirical

an older girl

to a small girl crying on a horse

going around and around 

"stop crying and trot on!"

and in that moment

an empire was conceived

dylan thomas in a chair with a fag

 dylan thomas in a chair with a fag

it’s the fag isn’t it

chomped in the blown corner

making way for the mouthed words

exhaled frown yet to crease that young brow

where the fish words garner thoughts

that glow and fade

drop like blown ash

his mind as far away as the fields

in the tobacco shop on st helen’s road

in reply to the poem “Noah’s Raven”

 in reply to the poem “Noah’s Raven” 

and yet

we think we know him

we think we see him

but he says no

blackness hidden by blackness

our questions muffled

even the dove in your eye 

has a black floater that

you cannot follow

if you follow me

there is no way back

from that sinking

nuts

 nuts

it is hard is it not

to crack one’s heart like this 

to open it up 

to garner the kernel 

to burn with the shells

a slowly warming a memory

of days settling like ashes

warm

even when fading grey

and blown away

stinging your eyes

as they always do

abridged

 abridged

these rhythms 

the ebb and flow of tides

the sun and the moon race

each returned breath

the pendulum of time

flowing under the bridge

taking the water stars to sea

the turning away and the returning to

these thoughts that everyone has

but you take pen to paper

again and again

gareth’s photos of tenby

 gareth’s photos of tenby 

the bloody indian ink is running out

changed to the red dye of summit else

this custard on a raspberry tart 

call it art this camera man

has once again 

pinned the butterfly

the beauty that is 

ten out of ten be 

sure

dead sparrow days

 dead sparrow days

i saw those sparrows

bereft of song

stuck in the melted tar

by the broken grindstone

that once sharpened the knives

of their long-lost song

well there you are

a childhood said

let them lie and rot away

just one day

in black and amber laid

an old man now his due has paid 

writing

 writing

kettling the words 

with my sheepdog brain

cornering the flock 

within the margins of a doubt

hieroglyphicating the squiggles 

of a giggling mind

upon the flagellation of a page 

a thought breaks out

a painting of a snow scene on twitter

 a painting of a snow scene on twitter 

the snow is moving

           in this painting 

which is also moving

because the dogs are running

and the birds take flight

or are alighting

along the footsteps 

steps the hedge in berries

and lies buried the hare

where not one whisker moves

as much as this scene moves me

manic

 manic

monarchy 

nothing but a husk 

around the seed of an idea

that has long withered

a crusted and mildewed rind

than stinks to their highnessed heaven

tenby at dusk

 tenby at dusk

the light strolling out to sea

on a dark night 

the day’s clothes discarded

that reoccurring death of promises

taken alone

transferred to the dawn of a reconsideration 

as sure as the sun rises

the town will greet with warmth

of the prodigal’s return

she took the morning photos

 she took the morning photos 

wrapped in the coarse blanket of night

walking hand in hand 

by the early sea

before the sun rises

the lights have a language

somewhere between joy and sorrow

between paddled toes and licked lips

breathe deeply

she said …

uttory despicable

 uttory despicable

under the carapace of democracy

the parasites are sucking us dry

bones will be all that’s left of us

the ‘way we were’ just a memory

as they pupate on distant shores

under distant suns

glad confident mornings

for them

no more for us

time for DDT

democratic 

defenestration 

today

damned

 damned 

the pit pony pulled the dram

and the dram and the dram

and the dram

the pit pony pulled the dram

and the dram and the dram

and the dram

now the last pavilion

 now the last pavilion

before we were but now’t

for it is now that

we are born into

we live in

              we die in

and then we are but now’t again

that smell

that smell

that removal of fear even the fear of death itself

childhood’s wild plant dried in a corn pipe

smelling of the back of a mind

of a place located in time and space

and yet a virtual consciousness that

is gone as soon as it is turned to

ashes floating down into a rough wind

gone in the drying of a tear

in a questioning every time

every time realising it was just once

just one time and again and again

that smell haunts my touch of the live plant

in a desert of understanding i burn

every thing every time

you will not understand 

or that plant

or sadly

even me

rat spit

 rat spit

i lickspittled the lock

and now i can’t get out

of this bukowski room

plastered with his poems

drunk with fags 

and terrible (y)

nice women 

oh

b fucking low

fucking sssski 

write me out of here and down the road

if only to get you some booze

you down and out bastard

wake up

am i

 am i 

i’m getting old

two thin old ladies just told me

lady one:  i always take a pea in a winter sea swim because it’s warm

lady two:  it is easy to tell a tom cat has large testicles

behold the wisdom of old age

pebble poems

 pebble poems

there was this pebble poet

he wasn’t very good

sometimes he wrote on pebbles

sometimes he wrote on wood

of all the passers by you see

on that promenade above the sea

some thought him mad

but some were glad

to have that little lift you see

to think a thought that day

to stop and ponder on the words

on the seats above the bay

some were written black on white

some were white on black

but once his haiku brain switched on

there was never no going back

every day he takes his swim

warm or cold its the same to him

every day he writes a pebble

some are good some are terrible

but off they go warm and pocketed

all around the world its said

there many pebbles on the beach

just the thoughts that are out of reach

until this poet picks his brains

and write his thoughts upon the runes

some are funny some are rude

none are suitable for a prude

so dear passerby he says

stop and pick up a pebble or wood

turn it over in your hand and mind

you never know it could be good

and i would think you ever so kind

i would

until it isn’t

 until it isn’t

see that house 

with a sofa there and a chair by there 

the television and a picture on the wall

well it wasn’t always like that

once 

long ago

it was a shell with scaffolding 

on my way home i went inside

and the rough boys from up the ‘bony’

decided to rough me up in an alcove

which i guess now is a nice cupboard in the hall

and i hollered at them all loud like

and sped cloven-hoofed across the fields and away

in the way turning sometimes emptiness quells

and the sun comes out low across the grasses

and the flash cards of childhood reset in an instant

and instantly it is hidden until now i tell 

it isn’t

walking the dog

 walking the dog

over the dog lake mountains

the black sky spoke of rain

and the slopes that blew the wind out 

strode down a long day grassed in vain

to a hearthside of boots and steam

and coffee cupped in cold hands

by a fire of a long lost dream

wot?

 wot?

what did you say

you can’t remember

i thought you said that 

you couldn’t remember

but i can’t remember

on a tenby evening

 on a tenby evening

dream catchers imagine

those blue black red lobster claws

glistening under that light

or on dinner tables laid to linen

boated blue the streets move sleep

to one side of the curtains’ lights

the downing of the blues from sky to sea

tides decide on the turn of a coined phrase

maybe

jesus!

 jesus !

the wrong word can crucify you

take stigmata for example

or paradise 

vinegar or crown

rend

darkness

does a ‘right’ word even exist

look ~ here is the hole it left

when we took it down