old people’s home

 old people’s home

the snake silence

writhes between them

looking for someone to wrap tight

to squeeze the living daylights out of them

strike

 strike

there was a street light outside my childhood home

when it went out my dad used to give it a kick

it would come back on   red at first then a golden light

he’s long dead now so is that street light

the bulbs have all changed

the corrugated posts are concrete smooth 

gone the green metal posts

i have moved on

a painting of

 a painting of

the sadness of two lemons

shrivelling slowly in the corner of a room

the zest leaves with the dusted sunbeam

the light goes out in a small corner of things

it is a beautiful bowl

someone said

once

ramble ye not ~ a preamble

 ramble ye not ~ a preamble

modern times

softness is hardening 

the romantic poets are past

there may be some room for softness 

but it is dancing on the head of a needle

patience at the end-times has run out of time

pain awakes from the dullness of pain

there is no time to shilly-shally or nicey-nicey words

wake up lads and lasses the attitude of lassitude  

will not even tolerate smart-alec words such as those

the rapier smiles as it slides in with a wink

as the bloody poems drop to their knees 

longing is no longer permitted

give it to me straight doc 

look me in the eye and see the shutters rattle

the alarms ringing

the tyrant’s gun pointing

bite the fingernails of words until their quicks bleed

jump up arms and legs akimbo and scream 

and keep on screaming 

for screaming is now the norrrrrm

until maybe  just maybe  one word will stop you in your tracks

pin that word to your brow as a shibboleth 

and throw all else to the dogs of past oeuvres

let us all walk about with those words pinned and

pointing and nodding at each other’s insight 

that   yes

we are the poems now 

for the poets are dead

we are the badgering dodgems the brownian motion

of the disintegrating molecules of rectitude 

there is now the piercing light of understanding 

that all is black and that dark-energy needs few sobriquets 

few false emotions as euphemisms for stark reality

how many moths do you need to see that it is a light burning

the filament of understanding has seared my retina

the only words i see now are glowing under my eye lids 

the blind cannot see so why shout

the deaf cannot hear so why point the word flashlight

ah woe is me is an anagram of ahem woe is me

ahem  cough cough  ahem 

oh i say

why such a long poem to say that poetry’s need is a succinct underscore

surely one word would have sufficed instead of this rambling

try …….

THE END

OK have it your way it is two words!! ~ but then …

nothing ………..

  

the children’s author’s illustrations

 the children’s author’s illustrations

the enrichment of imagination

for the illumination of insight

see i told you 

see the signs under his signature

he was here

off you go now

write me often

of your adventures 

as you turn the pages of this book

when i was a child

 when i was a child

when i was a child

people died

and i grew up

pulling away

a day

became a night

twinkle twinkle little star

how i wonder what you are 

how i wondered what you were

they never said

they never did

they never do

dark rooms

and aspidistras

purple silk tablecloths

curtains drawn

all week

out of respect 

the parlour dour 

the midnight hour

westminster chimes

they were dark days

incoming

 incoming 

the tide fills the bay

slowly like an intake of breath

allowing the evening to flow into dusk

lights will soon wink under these stars

the lighthouse will call the town 

down to the Mumbles

summer 

such a fine time to dine

on the foreshore of tomorrow 

for tonight the tide is full in

the bunting hangs still 

soft music drifts

come

let us stroll to the mermaid tavern

do you remember when we …

here take this flag

 here take this flag

the flags we flew 

are tattered now

we didn’t know then 

but we sure do now 

they labelled the flag ‘flag’

so we should know when it is time

to make their castles in the air

to fly their flags of war

pick a coloured spade my lads

time and again the trenches be dug

it’s all over the top for you my lads

tally-ho 

my lads

tally-ho

granchester meadows

 granchester meadows 

organ    music 

     undulating 

across the meadows 

flies 

rising and falling

the trout 

taking

upon a summer lake 

thoughts 

    slowly 

meandering

see you sea me

see you sea me

we see the sea

we cannot see

what we wrote upon the sand

you and me

the castles we built

the flags we flew

are washed away 

today           today

all we have left

is you and me

waving at each other

across death’s sea 

that’s sandy

 that’s sandy

i wrote a poem on a pebble

the sea erased the poem

but the pebble remained

for a while

then it became sandpaper

and sanded a pebble 

ready for a poem

the quill of an albatross 

dipped in a sea of ink

and words flew