for Martin

            for Martin

   when they ask of him

        as they surely will

   then we will surely say

~ he swam against the tide ~

bound and bidden

 bound and bidden

tongue tied on convolvulus 

i am really in a bind

butterflies on the buddleia

run rings around my mind

faeries and nymphs 

lisp along in time with me

tongue tied on hieroglyphs

carved on the old tree

but hey up look here see

there’s a flower virgin white

wrapped around me tight 

in this cool summer’s shady lee

wreck on

 wreck on

someone

kids i reckon

have removed all my pebble poems 

from the promenade seats

thrown them into the sea

i reckon

it was a full tide yesterday evening

and this moved them

and my poems moved them

i reckon

never mind they will emerge at low water

and someone will find them

saying oh look a poem

i reckon

what do you reckon

shadow lands a question

 shadow lands a question

i ask my shadow

what is in the gap between us

what connects us

is it something in the light beam

or is it there in the dark but we cannot see it

i spread my hands in supplication 

so does my shadow

you tell me says ditto’s shadow

                            tap dancing

                        with my shadow

                         in the footlights

a haibun

 we smoked pipes made from the stems of Japanese knotweed cut just below a joint (no pun!) and used a hollow side stem as the mouth piece ~ in went a dried weed of unknown abstraction ~ horrible but also horribly grown up ish ~ whenever i smell it a time machine malfunctions

there was a WWII gun bunker that had a subterranean alcove with a corrugated roof ~ cleft torn through to the turf ~ so we lit a fire inside and timed our fortitude in there by streaming eyes and brochospasm

                            kids well i ask you

what didn’t end up killing us 

made us more daring

it’s nice to talk

 it’s nice to talk

this morning 

sun upon a blank slate

across BlueSky a hand reached

and warm chalk wrote

her reply

and handed back the chalk

it’s nice to talk

once my dad

 once my dad

made me a vial of smoke

by blowing his cigarette breath 

through a straw under water

and into a vial which 

when opened

disappeared in a puff

and enough to say

that once

i caught the word 

sad