Sunday 31 May 2009

SUNDAY 31st MAY 2009.

I lay with a star
Once slung in Leo’s constellation,
Once tamed by nature’s shape,
Once and for all a version of modernity
And now at last at home.

She lays with a fool
Once eagerly awaited by the crowd,
Once fruit strewn by another,
Once upon a time a fairy tale’s saviour
Now in awe of his own.

We lay upon the ground
Once proud to see us sliding by,
Once kicking evolution’s loss,
Once happily ever after ended when
It was left alone.

It lays against the grain,
One heart of matter’s vacuum surge,
Once spat out of dust particles,
Once a moment of the sky and soon to
Return to its dome.

Saturday 30 May 2009

SATURDAY 30th MAY 2009.

The greatest of all games is today;
The primal football final; the one
All others aspire to be, and, hopefully,
As good a match as Seventy Nine,
Regardless of the challengers.

You may prefer the cold World Cup,
Or Champions League shenanigans,
Or even other sporting shortbread
Rolled flat and spread over weeks,
Leaking points and attraction,

Or not take to any sport at all,
Preferring to pepper your day
With saltier fare, or rarer pursuits,
From artists and parties less likely
To start a fight if they should fail you,

Or while away your time in political
Analysis, paralyzed by a system
Designed to assist us but tampered
With along its way from Cromwell’s
Commonwealth of sense.

But I’ll spend this afternoon recalling
The FA Cup I love, that seems to
Last all day, and I’ll cry when ‘Abide
With Me’ washes the memory of
My father over Wembly again.

Friday 29 May 2009

FRIDAY 29th MAY 2009.

I’ve been thinking a lot about sex lately,
Awake, asleep or in-between,
Straight or bi or bent,
Admitted, barred or rent,
Black or white or blue,
Old, young or yet due,
Future, past and present
Good, bad, indifferent,
Animal, mineral, plant,
In mouth or arse or hand;
Mine, yours, anybody’s.

Thursday 28 May 2009

THURSDAY 28th MAY 2009.

A malady made
From the graven images
Of modern data,
And spewed out of the backpacks
Of shock jock politicians.

And all consuming
Their veneration debate;
Exclusive chambers
Bar sensible shakers in
Favour of those who won’t move,

And sprinkle ancient
Carpets with fresh smelling dust
To be snorted at
And huffed up with what buttons
And beads can be squeezed from us,

Whose rage, once frozen,
Now vents melt water over
Any official
Unlucky enough to stand
On their behalf this summer.

Wednesday 27 May 2009

WEDNESDAY 27th MAY 2009.

The streets are awash with strangers these days,
And it’s not their fault they are seen that way,
After all we look unfamiliar to them
And we have always lived here;
In between the rain and drains,
Riding the road and trying to remember
Why we never sought its freedom.

Keeping an ageless faith in our heirlooms,
Even though we’ve sold their size for more rooms,
All the while advising visitors that their worth
Could never be replaced,
Until one with the right price
Happens by to provide his money’s services,
And our memories are erased.

So give the land to immigration’s shore;
It knows the value of a shelter’s walls,
And will not take for granted the handed batons
Of a generation’s efforts,
Or drop them for offerings
More transient, and ultimately patterned
By a tribe's short sightedness.

Tuesday 26 May 2009

TUESDAY 26th MAY 2009.

No other comfort but dew
Will do.

No safer salve than ample
Shallows.

Nothing swallowed but flowing
Pureness.

Always left long enough to
Winter.

Distilled and filtered in the
Hillside.

Flat, or fizzed with Antarctic
Carbon.

Tapped and trapped in glasses
As ice.

Company for the finest
Whisky.

Monday 25 May 2009

MONDAY 25th MAY 2009.

It’s jealousy central in here this morning
As our two mongrels vie for attention
On the bed and eventually kick me
Out of it in time to get fed and watered.

There’s a television riven down the
Middle by the meddling of children
Who can’t decide which channel’s
Worth the prize of their attention.

The missus is split between getting
Dressed before or after lunch, and
Settles for the latter by which time
The supper’s due and she’s moored,

And I’m undecided why I ever cried
My way back into her arms, but then
I lay in them and realize the sides of
Such issues are not always clear cut.

Sunday 24 May 2009

SUNDAY 24th MAY 2009

Dads were made to be wrapped around their daughter’s fingers,
Or so I’m led to believe, by her.
And though she’s up town sourcing monkey boys, with
Their bellies out, I’m supposed to approve;
Expected to neglect the facts of life that so
Readily accompany such hunting;
Required to arrive after the mother’s been twisted
Around her digits and feigns all knowledge
Of it until after she’s fled the shed,
And am asked to fast track it.
Well I refuse to be moved; to be complicit in her
Visits; to endorse her performance,
Sanction her thanklessness.
And when told to grow up and allow her to do
As she chooses I’ll assert the virtues
Of virgins, and urge her to
Become one.

Saturday 23 May 2009

SATURDAY 23rd MAY 2009.

Just because there’s another body
Doesn’t mean you’re going to lose
Some of your love;
We will make more love,
And beads of that will spill on
You as well, adding to
Your belt.

The routes of our labour tunnel
Deeper than the view of them,
And work they do,
And will shore up for you
Any doubt of our commitment
To the space our scrape
Has made.

And should another form be
Heralded, to add to our tally,
Then they too will
Claim a stake in us until
Our romance with inertia has
The chance to double its
Knuckle drag.

So blessed creature let me
Lead you to the garden where
The seeds are plenty;
Where the empty vision
Screens the bustle of increasing
Love in increments too
Small to see.

Friday 22 May 2009

FRIDAY 22nd MAY 2009.

A week long posting push,
And everything I’ve squirreled away
This year has been exhumed and used,
And though my time at the front, at the coal face,
Has been well spent, it’s hardly leant itself to income.

But that’s good to go, as
I’d rather be learning to sew words
Together than cracking black rocks in the
Ground or shuffling invoices between the greedy
And needless thoroughfares we go round in deference.

I’ve slaked the tax man’s
Thirst enough to earn myself a
Worthy space at the first available trough
Without his stink in it, and begin to fill it with
My lifetimes single minded low and high delights.

My sentence is supported
By what inheritance accorded me
And mine its time, and it’s been managed
Well enough to support us and find enough stuff
To keep the little one amused even if he eats and shits

All day and doesn’t quite
Have the legs to use it yet. Colonel
Giraffe is looking after him as he sleeps, and
All comfort’s keeps and armies would do no better
By his cerulean eyes than my bold labours have enabled.

Thursday 21 May 2009

THURSDAY 21st MAY 2009.

How quick we are to criticize kids for
Ignorant endeavours, when some old
Folks cruise as witlessly. On the bus
This morning an old girl refused to
Move her industrial barrow, which was
Taking up extra space, in favour of my
Baby’s pram. There was sufficient room for
Her, and, Chinese puzzle like, two smaller
Pushchairs would have shuffled and made
More for all, but she wasn’t having any of it,
Even though I’d asked politely.

She started spouting about her charitable
Deeds, to justify her actions, and the town’s
Need of her, and seemed to imply this
Gave her the right to sit at the front of
The class with her feet on the teacher’s
Table. I insisted that my kid, barely seven
Week old, was not looking for anything
Other than equal bus rights, but she implied
We should be walking anyway, as she had
Done with hers back in the days before colour,
And roads had not been stoned. I maneuvered to
The side and realized that the past must
Have been a harsh place to live if it
Was peopled with hags like her.

WEDNESDAY 20th MAY 2009.

The only reason they’re contrite is they were caught,
And the only reason for that is reportage.
The only reason this grates is our
Distaste for lewd stories,
But if not in this case
We would still be
Chasing tales.

TUESDAY 19th MAY 2009.

Morning brought me shelter
From the storm of its forebear
Where I’d managed to talk to
People at once without voice,
And even screens don’t flicker
As they used to, announcing your
Transmissions. And telephones
Sit idle in their beds as mobiles have
Finally usurped the said, although
They are finger friendlier these days as
Text seems to have replaced speech, and
Even where a semblance of proper type
Remains it’s been reduced to 140 characters
Or less. It would appear communication has
Been over taken by imprints from the skin,
And only crime scene officers grin.

MONDAY 18th MAY 2009.

There used to be a time when I was
Fussy about the arse I was squeezing,
But now any surface is pleasing,
Any size tempting and teasing
My stopped clock.

SUNDAY 17th MAY 2009.

The baby looks adorable,
Of course he does,
He’s my by product.
-----
A fierce standing order
Committed to its purse
Fleecing me each month.
-----
Universal umbrage,
Dark matters in discussion,
Sleuths everywhere.
-----
A nappy full of trouble,
Wipes in other room,
Baby in the shit.
-----
The daughter's projecting,
Everyone’s on the hoof,
Only one exit
-----
A Sunday done with weeks,
Indifferent service bait,
Another bite due.
-----

SATURDAY 16th MAY 2009.

If she comes through the door there’ll be trouble,
As we’re all set to boil and to bubble:
There’s a scatter of toys on the floorboards
And the disc in the player is hardcore.

There are parts of our clothing with teeth marks
That have fallen where they were last ripped at,
And an undisclosed number of scratches
Designating the hitter and catcher.

There’s a tube that’s been squeezed of it substance,
That we’ve used for its power to husband
The friction that sticks to our hurrying
And makes it a chore to go scurrying.

So to counter the threat of disturbance
We’ve gathered the rest of the furniture
And blocked up the door and its entering
To allow us to focus on censored things.

And if by the afternoon nothing’s heard
Then could be the daughter has been disturbed
By some fool whilst she was attempting to
Discover the things that old lovers do.

FRIDAY 15th MAY 2009.

We appear to be entangled,
Although we are apart;
It must be quantum reckoning
Connecting our hearts:

Always in the same place,
But never there once sought,
Measured observations
Unable to report

The state of our nature,
Regardless how we’re bred;
Does love survive when close at hand
Or die when it’s widespread.

THURSDAY 14th MAY 2009.

Six bridges
There and back
To attract my attention
From the road to the water below
Their peaks, and appeal to my weaknesses.

Low slung
Between the keen
Surfaces the street’s pace
Manages its anger in order to
Avoid drawing drowning noise from me.

Though so
Stooped no loop
Has laced itself or cast a
Shadow over my lowered head,
And will not thrill me with its making:

A bit grizzly
I may be but lately
More thoughts of shore
Have welled than dwelling
On the underside of sorrel tides;

Pensive men
Have often craved
A thought from water’s
Source without recourse to
Muddying its many puddles.

WEDNESDAY 13th MAY 2009.

Stillness
And silence;
A little warmth.
A pillow
And the kindness
It affords.

Still
And silent;
Fair warmed.
Filling
The eye of
A storm.

Stilled
And silenced;
Less warm.
Killed
By a violent
Pause.

TUESDAY 12th MAY 2009.

You can’t grow
Rolled up in a ball
So he stretched to let
Gestation in,
And now he’s out he
Continues to reach
For the height that
Freedom seeks;
Finding his feet,
Even though he’s a
Tall lad, and falling
For love never had
From his mother and dad
Who tore strips
And spat names from
Their lips that landed
Alongside his crib,
And never left his side
For a kiss from thereon.
And sometimes
He heard it as pitter pat,
And sometimes different to that.

MONDAY 11th MAY 2009.

If nothing works in words
Then nothing’s worth the work.
This is my evidence,
And you bear the bits of it
That have escaped from the storm
And mystery of my device;
Finally gathered from the separate
Gantries you’ve managed to call your
Own and collected within the same
Framework for the first time in ages
To view my address and attempt witness.

A rain storm’s worth of mortal
Men and women cindered from
The same cloud but lingered
Too long on the journey from it
To join in the mixing bowl, though now
Flowed together once swashed
Upon the road’s holding surface.
Called by mouth and hearing made in
Order to look upon my performance
And pass verdict that requires neither
Majority nor absolute vote to support it.

SUNDAY 10th MAY 2009.

This is the first considered thing that has happened
To me since the worst event sealed my resistance,
So where does this leave me?
Swinging from extremes to accommodate an emotion
Or indifferent to ordinary days and the painted
Grins of their inhabitants.

Were I but partly a smart man or a member of a fool’s
Group I might be able to reconcile the difference,
But being of average skin
I feel the equivalent pull of sun and moon, and settle for
The fettles that they offer, until fouled by the physics
Of birth and death’s visits,

Who in their rush to educate me must surely have delayed
The pace of their appearance in order to admit the issues
Of condition, and allow the
Frowns of time’s vacation to rebound in the light of
Tired simplicity whilst charging me with strength
Enough for benchmarks.

So if this be told then maybe all the spoils of war
Wrought tolerance have been bothered on
Me to measure mine against
The grains of sameness that fall from the faces of
The faithful whenever they contend with the
Different ends of life.

SATURDAY 9th MAY 2009.

The guy with the shiniest car in the street
Has reasons he keeps it so neat,
As across from him, row upon row,
Are curtain less windows
Where women constantly change.

Some shed clothes quicker than skin,
Whilst others age from within,
Yet more switch their makeup and hair
To match their affairs
And leave vision little to arrange.

And all on show in checker box holes
From him to tick when available,
In rain, snow or shine you’ll find him
Cleaning and climbing
All over his automobile,

Heedless of the fact that the motor and
Its motions have been broken
For several years now, and floundered
Outside his ground, and his
Licence has long been repealed.

FRIDAY 8th MAY 2009.

I think I’ve got pram envy
Studying the varieties we didn’t buy;
Watching three wheelers and free
Turning push chairs that use
Less effort than ours,
And even when satisfied
We bought the right chassis the
Colour of another passing induces
Invidia and reduces me to
Green eyed need;
Another tab to add to
The slow list of jealousies
I’ll admit to, although there
Must be yet unknown ones to meet
And keep quiet about, and
No doubt before my child is crawling
There’ll be strollers and high chairs
And more imaginatively named frames
That will require another good choice
In order to avoid covetousness.

THURSDAY 7th MAY 2009.

Half the people in this town
Care for the other half
Who can’t, and I remember a time
When those in need were treated to
Professional help;
Intentional fellows.

I recall
Every ball kicked,
And fallen wicket….
Every fake bullet casing
Spat out in the back lane.

But a plague is purged in isolation once identified and seized,
And exposure to it controlled until its fuel is consumed and
It relinquishes the cloak of cold sweat that connected us to
Each other for the briefest of moments,

And this light picks
Up the pits
Of our skin,
And the knowledge that at the end of everything
Only the ruthless will survive.

I barely care enough
To stay in the first place,
So leaving won’t faze me.

WEDNESDAY 6th MAY 2009.

The baby’s bubbling away nicely
On his daily cycle of food and refuse,
Sleep and denial, in-between switches
Of style from all in one jim jams to two piece
Suits, and naked rolls on changing mats when
Nappy town is visited with wishes that it wasn’t.

He’s gaining the weight other people
Are desperate to lose, and he’s not all that
Choosy how; either milk maid’s juice or the
Chalky produce of conglomerates boxed for the
Bulging shelves of super markets, where it’s stacked
Next to the other crap you’re supposed to buy ten of.

Already a member of the purchase
Race before he was born, although that was
More my fault as I tried to ensure that he would
Be the best dressed baby on the ward; with the dandiest
Pram, the prettiest crib and the fairest parents, once they’d
Treated themselves to brand new threads for his nursery visits.

But he sleeps with the peace of the
Feted, celebrating his place regardless of
Payments made; in spite of them indeed. Breezing
Through these moments of pre-birth, until his due date is
Upon us and passed, and he’s already gassed up enough to read the
Change of daily life no matter how his daft father’s parchment looks.

TUESDAY 5th MAY 2009.

I tried,
But I guess trying implies
It wasn’t working in the first place.
So I walked
Away again without a
Fight, as I’ve always been able to do,
And won’t
Repute my decision till
An hour or two after I’ve woken up.
It’s only in
Retrospect that battles
Seem worthy of further campaign,
And only
Then once I’ve managed
To remain able and sane for a while.
Reflection
Is a wondrous invention,
Allowing all manner of revisions;
All sides of
Engagements to be
Studied, and conclusions muddled,
And regret
Dished up until you’re
In its debt and ready to indemnify.
So I try a
Step back, only to stand
In the hole pitted land you had left,
And realize,
Amid the conflict’s yield,
That I already paid in full up front.

MONDAY 4th MAY 2009.

Spoilt to the point of fracture,
Where even the slightest contraction of voice
Or harsh choice of words
Would crack her.

And told no she exhibits
Resistance, and explicitly so, closing down any
Vocal roads she usually
Motors along;

Sitting still before
Flickering slowly until heating her features with
Uncontrollable moan
Fired flushes

And then standing
In staggers, and banging her way to the toilet
To vomit a response as
Loudly as possible;

Where eventually her
Mother pursues to soothe away any emotion
That may have escaped,
And placate her pain;

Condemning dad
For his audacity and imagining his refusal away
Before allowing whatever
Request had fetched it.

SUNDAY 3rd MAY 2009.

The wind blew across the mouth piece of
His mobile and scattered his words down the street.
What was left of his voice shrank further away and
Found him drowning in a public house’s froth.
After a while he sounded brighter, saying the sun
Had come out to energize what must be a solar phone;
Pity the shit he had to say was hardly worth the
Call anyway, but then again my pithy bits have no
Prose and I do hope his Irish alcoholic leg improves,
And my back doesn’t deteriorate any further than
Bed rest, though I guess the only thing to assist either
Would be a four day drink free session, but whether
That would be worth it pains more to ponder than
The actualities of random afflictions.

SATURDAY 2nd MAY 2009.

You look like my dad,
I said to my child;
Funny that,
He replied,
As you look like mine.

We debated a while,
Till he fell asleep,
Then I took the time
To complete
My comparison sheet:

His eyes are the same,
And his comb over,
Though his name
Is older
Than either.

In fact it’s my granddad’s,
So I know what will be:
This child will stand
Over me
As my age increases;

The father of the man,
With a son of his own,
Whose further wingspan
Will be flown
Over and over again.

FRIDAY 1ST MAY 2009.

Looking back
At the tracks
Left in the blossom covered path where your pram passed
I noted some
Buds floating
From the tall tree stems through open window frames,

And people,
By the steeple
Of the run down church, were trying to stay alert
In order
To ward the
New seasons beading for good housekeeping reasons;

In motions
Promoted
By the boisterous traffic the last of spring’s ashes
Spiral down
In idle bounds
And gather till swept by those out collecting,

But where left
To the breath
Of negligent winds they lay and bind
And print
The things
That for this single morning called after falling.

THURSDAY 30th APRIL 2009.

So the local rag has gone down the ‘Hate Crime’ route
As police brutality obviously doesn’t suit
The local Labour council’s view of events
Regardless of eye-witness comments.

We were there as others were shovelled and shoved,
And you simply cannot refute this stuff,
Regardless of what is officially reported
Or brushed under the privy’s inordinate carpets,

As with little whispers in journalist’s ears
The wishes of peasants upon the frontier
Are overlooked in favour of protecting
The image of political correction.

S0 facts have been fictioned to fit the headlines,
In spite of the number of folks at the time,
And all you will read is what has been written
About the awful indigenous people of Britain.

So be careful what you now type or then text
As the message you send may arrive auto checked
And the thoughts in your head will then be availed
Of their hidden agendas, and land you in jail.

WEDNESDAY 29th APRIL 2009.

That fucking coward Brown has had to make concessions in order to
Avoid a potential defeat when the Ghurkha’s issue is voted upon
This afternoon: a revue, and no deportations whilst doing so; what a
Spineless moron this man is; not only has he invariably made the wrong
Choices during his brief tenure (not going for an election in Nov 2007,
Scrapping the 10p tax band etc) but he's also backtracked quicker than a
Tyre fitter who's fixed the wrong ring - what the hell we’ve done as a
Nation to deserve this fool I’ll never know - surely some subterranean
European nation's misdemeanours are greater than ours to have
Warranted his twisted, slack jawed face; but no, we got him, on the back
Of Blair bailing, and without contest. Oh my Lord I despair; everybody
Needs to get out there and vote next time around because if they don't
Then the same old shameful suffrage will afford a similar result.

(Apparently they were defeated on the motion, so there are some good
Folk left, only the 4th time since 1997 and with the expenses vote due
Tomorrow. Time for a vote of no confidence perhaps, or will they use
Swine flu to distract us from their disasters....)

TUESDAY 28th APRIL 2009.

How did the strands get mixed anyway…
Did they feed infected fowl to pigs
Then sleep with them…
Were conditions so unsanitary
As to make contagion fateful…
Were samples fused in search of
Cures and lost by occidental specialists,
Or intentionally released to realize
A security clampdown based upon a bio-terror threat…
And once in place and settled
Will the sneeze beaters chase you
From the streets and police seize
You from your sick beds to be dragged along
To isolation wards; there to be left and overlooked like
The skeletal remains of that forgotten prisoner
Model we had as kids,
And will we all be wandering round in
Face masks looking like pop stars from the past
And forgetting to ask whether there is
A legitimate reason to do so,
Or will the difference between drift
And shift confuse us.

MONDAY 27th APRIL 2009.

She’s a cock wrangler
And fastens them with a handsome
Lasso; strangling a little
Whilst changing from dangling
To hanging basket worthy,
And managing the girth
With more rope when
Necessary.

Herding with persuasion
And, once firm, versed with fodder
And watered well until
Fit to burst; then pandered to
Until restitution calls for
Them to finish business
And settle down in
Meekness.

SUNDAY 26th APRIL 2009.

Off shopping again
But must remember:
Skinny jeans only look good on girls
With skinny genes.

SATURDAY 25th APRIL 2009.

I’d been asleep,
And woke up to a disturbance
In the street, where upon a look I
Saw cousins and uncles arrested for
Breach of the peace when it seemed the
Same had already been broached on
Account of some foreigner brandishing
A kitchen knife at a kid.

After being screamed at
By a bald little hobby bobby looking
Mother fucker, and the coppers going all
G20 on the locals, the Bill will no doubt have
Their hands full for a while as this has been
Brewing for some time now and they’re
Going to have to stand guard all
Night in the streets;

The same ones we were
Told so vocally to vacate for the
Sake of our liberty, and where Les
Just happens to live, and there will be
Some fun this summer if it’s sunny, and
We live that long to see it, as swine flu
Is spreading, though the breed round here
Seem to be fevered already.

FRIDAY 24th APRIL 2009.

Come out into the open to contend your affairs;
If you’ve a grievance relieve yourself
Of it, don’t spit from a distance.
Don’t hide in the shadows,
Behind incomprehensible agendas
Or beneath the homespun skirts of virtue
You use to justify your actions;
Scuttling in tunnels between buildings,
Covering women in belts,
Popping up to launch rockets from schools
Or tend to engines.
Or are those who exist to worship you
Not cohesive enough to muster their arms
For the field; are their marbles not battle hardened
Enough to offer much in the way of discipline
Or are your coat tails too tattered to
Carry them to war.

THURSDAY 23rd APRIL 2009.

Cry “God for Harry, England and St. George” I have
Imprinted on my heart’s door, across the collars
Of my soul’s clothing and fairy light lit along
The walls of my enlightenment. And now I find
Its meaning leaning more on me for my support;
Imploring my participation and awaiting my
First move towards the inevitable glory of today.

And whilst lying in the shadow of his flag, shape
Shifting in his pants, he said to me “Daddy this is
For your own” and so we visited my father’s stone
And placed the saint’s cross upon the soil amid the
Roses we had brought; arrayed in red and white
As if a brave Knight’s chest had bled its holy
Blood for preservation on his grave’s virgin cloth.

And though the beasts of myths and ruse are
Queuing to accuse we will not be made the
Scapegoat of their spokesmen, and will not yield
To the apologists who would have us suffer
The guilt of ages for simply standing with our
Own flag in our hands and demanding a proper
Slot in the calendar for its waving and savouring.

WEDNESDAY 22nd APRIL 2009.

She’s a slow leak in her right breast
And a standpipe on the left,
There are several milking vessels
Being sterilized to death;

Stout aiding lactation
As fenugreek is not creating
And anise is stimulating
Childhood visions of class hatred.

And it’s budget day so no doubt
Cash matters will be flouted,
And maybe bad debts outed,
In-between his feeding habits;

For he’s thriving very proudly,
And today weighed over five pounds,
So the mixture going down him
Must be finding fertile ground.

TUESDAY 21st APRIL 2009.

I sat upon the climate’s brim and watched the turmoil turn within
Where headlessly the people hurled themselves against their ageless world
Whose sudden changes panicked them into believing nigh were ends,
While poultry chuckled in it sheds, trim shoulders still supporting heads;

They’d seen the changes down the years and learned to use them to appear
As if they hadn’t got a clue instead of knowing what to do,
But man, in damaging his tree, had dug its roots incessantly,
And filled the holes with stolen soil until the barren Earth recoiled;

Who’d viewed its surface engineer a rarely rivaled biosphere,
And evolution sputter on towards dominion.
But just when all seemed set to last mankind’s new pious die was cast
That spat out flesh perpetually and fed upon old loyalties,

Then looked around for more, once dined, and found a flat horizon line,
So sitting on their spoils of war declared more grandly than before;
Engaging gravely in the act of fortifying their impact
And leveling the lesser tribes until the strongest ones survived.

And now we face the final drape, upon the world of our landscape,
Who’s finally called credit in, and started shedding current skin;
So when the eco lobby leaps or anti smoking coppers creep
Remember nothing will out stay us except eternal Gaia.

MONDAY 20th APRIL 2009.

I do adore
Azure more
Than crowded skies
Of swollen eyes
And though I love
The clouds above
The endless sea
Calls down to me,

For in this land,
Of endless man,
The lack of space
Is commonplace
And room to lay
Beneath airways
Is hard to find,
And sore to mind;

So blow the horn
Until foresworn
And clear the field
Of mist revealed,
For in those heights
Can urbanites
At last find peace
And sphere to breath.

SUNDAY 19th APRIL 2009.

A granite span of skin,
Hung from brow to chin,
Demanding to be thinner
Than its years.

A river’s coat of motion
Looking for an ocean
But lacking the devotion
To appear.

A valley full of gullies,
Where water ran unsullied,
Now emptied by the bullying
Of weather.

An ecosystem’s mission
To understand cold fission
And substitute the missing
Feathers.

The secret evolution,
From Rex to execution,
And lizard to pollution
Of the skies,

And in the huts that set us free
The future’s foot has utterly
Crushed the last of subtleties
Allies.

SATURDAY 18th APRIL 2009.

God’s never ending texture caught me unawares
And stretched the leftovers of my imagination beyond
Their worn bonds; making most vivid all the givens I’ve
Been blessed with and providing more; edging all
My borders with relief, embossing corners barley
Briefed to greet them and seamlessly
Leaking grains right through to reach further
Than they ever dared before. Over the far fetched
Boundary I found myself, dovecoted by the
Missing bits of sentience I’ve searched for all
My life; coloured in the fullest band and standing
Without need of ledge or legs or feet to heed me
Forward as support is forth, and forth is all I ever
Dreamed it would be. Calls from another me, a summer’s
Seam, enriched with simile’s best speech and screaming
Ceaselessly; birth’s first touch, stood’s first steps
Crept forward into the wonder of a world that should
Have been and will surely come to pass after this ball enjoys
Its benefits too much to stop itself collapsing under one slave’s gravity.

FRIDAY 17th APRIL 2009.

Induce me do,
And stir me from this stupor
That suits me but is ruining my routine.

Shift me please,
Dig me in the belly where I
Fell from lack of food and have some room.

Squeeze me quickly,
Else I kiss more slowly than
I did when I was prone in need of your love.

Wet my whistle,
So I’ll blow more regularly
And remind my workers of their shirking.

Will me forward,
So the more exhorted my
Labour is the less I’ll be reminded of yours.

Push me harder,
But not into the pavement
Where my backbone longs to shave a space.

Pick me up
And place me to one side
Allowing you to take my turn again,

And once you’ve
Stood my stint send me out to
Gather up more baby goods to keep us going.

THURSDAY 16th APRIL 2009.

With every second’s beckoning,
Every moment’s hold,
Every instant spent
I have held,
And will so fend off spite’s soft kiss
Indefinitely.
Its silent strike,
Its irresistible mission,
Underpinning everything with
Frisson, whose pivots balance
Awfully and bitter splinters have already
Offered their services where cracks
Have crept into the mainframe;
Promising an end of headaches all
For one wicked wish,
One slipped risk, regardless
Of requirement, eliciting desires
Never felt in sense’s realm and
Never needed in my own
Defence except against the
Venom of self’s angst.

WEDNESDAY 15th APRIL 2009.

I will save my son from the world,
But thereafter I cannot guarantee
Its safety from him. He may make
Recompense for all deeds done
Against his, and spare no sound
In their defence. No persuasion
Made will be stepped over in
Haste of statement. There will be no
Stone worth turning to for protection
And no cove left vacant for those
Known to shelter in. Hounds will
Be let loose in our name to war
Upon the aimless, and the blameless
Will be freed to find their feet at
Last. The past will be celebrated and
The credit of the present will be paid
In full to further its advance and there
Will be no cowed man left to owe a
Debt. This will be the future our fathers
Failed to get, and its calendar will
Run in honour of their glory; its story
Will be told for bowed heads to hold
Themselves up against in hope. And
History will finally be reclaimed
For us: the untold busted, the lusted
After lowlifes, the dusted over tribes
Whose only crime was to be birthed
In lower clothes than those who have
Assumed this land as their apparel.

TUESDAY 14th APRIL 2009.

The field frowns
As dandelion clowns gather
In their spring troupes and
Daisies graze their way across it
While nettles and doc leaves
Compete to greet a bare foot’s fall,
And feet are aplenty this season.
Dogs drop their dirty litter along
The verges, if accompanied, amongst
The green sheaths if not, and man tramples
Through the brambles whilst he can.
Hawthorn and Elderberry swell
As new green leaves reclaim economic
Analogies for themselves, appealing for
Attention amidst the blossom’s glitter.
Between the banks the river handles
Beautifully, biding its tides, as longshoremen
Thank it for employment in these shallow times,
And shiver when the wind reminds them of it.
The sun settles scores as bets are drawn on its
Endurance to offset debts from the previous years’
Floods, and in the distance, from the council hubs,
Recently aroused, and incalcitrant vans, gear up once more
To carry their payload of mowers to get the better of every little
Blade of grass regardless of whether they’ve seen the warning signs.

MONDAY 13th APRIL 2009.

A day in lieu of another that is always week ended
And has become bleaker down the years; seen but
Not observed, its message unheard and, although
Its home along the calendar may change, the
Opportunities offered are always accepted with
The same open hands that take it without
Consideration anymore. The events represented
By these holy days have been replaced with
More mercantile concerns: for the children, who
Have learned to look forward to its vacation and
With the expectation of a relative’s reward, and
Adults for the certainty of four days break from
Work. Still, we skive less than most other lands,
And work longer when we can, so surely our daily
Sacrifices merit a little indulgence each Easter.

SUNDAY 12th APRIL 2009.

And so I rise and will not fall again.
Not for solitude and its visitors or the enthusiastic
Travelers who refuse brooding. I won’t be folded into
The mixture of wisdoms that have supplanted sense
Or those invented religions that have annexed the countries
Of the soul; the vanity of animated shells will not cover
Me and smothering in analogue comfort will not be done.
My store will be lightened of unnecessary items and no
More will be bought with credit’s length or money’s tongue.
I will refuse the ever present impulse that teases my
Resolve and beat its signal back; the lull of silence
Will not lure me into ruination nor a babbling mouth
Cast out my worth unduly; my actions will not
Come back to haunt me or my house and I
Will rise again tomorrow to the same.

I will rise this way and will not fall for
Those known or the undiscovered others yet to be;
The ill met will not better me or the intended enemy.
Neither my nearest friend or extended acquaintance shall
Make me incapable and family hanging from the sore thorns
Of my tree will not block my advancing path. All the soldiers of the
State, and its disgrace, prostrated nose to tail, or in the flailing
Rapture of their service, shall not herd me into their corral for my
Man management, and the lesser messengers and lost apostles, in awe
Of bosses, who attempt an adulator’s cause, will find no reward at
The ends of my strength. All images and sketches, television’s
Edges, staged and improvised performances; all commissions
And enforced renditions, all coarse labour and fine art will fail
To part me from my feet, or fill my seat with soil, for I
Will only fall for one, and that is thee my son.

SATURDAY 11th APRIL 2009.

It’s all tits to the pump as
He can’t get a grip on a nipple
And we’re shipping hands;
I had to cough up a cup full
Myself as his mother was
Swamped with demand.
There’s a supplement from
A box that once mixed
Has the texture of piss
And isn’t sliding down like
The draught stuff that’s worth
More than gold dust should,
And it’s a small kitchen that
Fills up quickly and the
Dishes don’t make it easier:
Switching positions between
Their misuse and their
Willingness to please us,
While the front door keeps
Begging us all to hold
Firm as attackers bang it
Asking after an audience
With the new king and forcing
Backyard smokers to damn it,
But the hounds prowl the
Foreground and ensure only
The well known are allowed,
Giving a few vital seconds to
Settle a full tum, empty a bum
And lash all our loose breasts down.

FRIDAY 10th APRIL 2009.

We craved him
And bred him,
Braved him
And shed him,
Paved in gold all of his paths,

Bathed him
And fed him,
Swathed him
In bedding,
And made for him all aftermaths.

He waived
Water treading,
And swayed
In the heavens,
And bade us to share of his bath,

He saved us from
Dreading,
And gave us
A heading
That wandered away from our wrath.

THURSDAY 9th APRIL 2009.

So why did we go,
And when did we go,
And what did we do when we got there,
And where are we now,
And how do we know
The reasons assuming we’re not there.

Was instinct applied
And, if not allied,
Was aptitude boosted to brew it,
Or was knowledge got
To bolster the rot
That set it soon after we knew it.

Or did we, in thrall,
Survey one and all,
And follow the hardiest hunters,
And suffer the fate
That accelerates
Upon every fullest accomplice,

And find a remiss,
And no one to kiss,
And nothing to hang on our walls,
Or did we decide
To find our own ride
And exit before the landfall.

WEDNESDAY 8th APRIL 2009.

It’s a nosy old day
As the cold wind blows each way,
Sniffing everything’s business;
Searching for a response
From the faults of man
And the cracks in all walls;
Shifting the dust
And junk on the ground,
Sweeping its creases
And hounding animals
In their holes;
But if only it had whistled
Up to my side first I would have
Told it all it needed to know,
About how He is
Coming home and that it
Needs to ease its harassment
Otherwise it will have
Me to answer to.

TUESDAY 7th APRIL 2009.

Upon this central spindle of England
Has history turned;
Within my Yorkshire’s walls has
This country fought its
Wars and earned its
Rewards.

Because of my father
Is its importance formed, because
Of me is its legacy
Set in stone and because of my
Son will it be known
Forever.

MONDAY 6th APRIL 2009.

The shoals follow tail to tail
Beneath the new blue seascape of the sky;
Mobile hung from heights
Beyond on slender rain stems of string
And dazzling as they spin in
Slow rotating motion; nudging one
Another as if refueling the future
With their cargoes before disappearing
Past the skyline’s arc.

And queuing, scatter like
Behind them, tinged in sunlight, come
The young; whispering their
Positions to the next and giggling in the
Brilliant contrast of the endless
Untouchable colour of their element;
Sifting air and passing it’s
Vitality along to any lucky enough
To gaze up and gather it;

For there is a face, and here is a
Place for its framing for all the old ladies
And those able to trace and make
Names up, and underneath propellers
And engines weave their
Machines in and out of a profile’s mouth
And announce their arrival to the
Rest of humanity stirring in the land of
Perfect ignorance.

SUNDAY 5th APRIL 2009.

I wavered here,
Wobbled over there,
And for the longest time I cherished
Every transient acquisition,
The perishable transmission of objects,
Whose shapes scraped their noise
Against me and convinced me of
My stability.
I feared at distance
The haunted certainty of eventuality,
But near resistance wore gaunt urgency
And its skeletal shafts captured my
Heart for themselves and fractured that part
Of resolve that welcomed the inevitable
End, deceiving me into believing
Today would hold.
But if there was a loop
To be caught,
To be fastened on a door, I wore it
About me and snagged it, and now, after
Being bound and uncovered by the
Beloved left in the wake my abjectness,
The one thing is here, the obvious
And overdue,
And, although
I was unable to cut his cord,
He clipped mine,
And I can now return to
The ordinary locker box
Of life.

SATURDAY 4th APRIL 2009.

There’s a crack of a noise off centre
That must be a TV tube drying,
Or the juice in the wires retiring,
Or the floorboards and wall mortar lying unevenly,

But it’s increasingly raising the tension
As it could be an old neighbour dying,
Or a burglar at the lock prying,
Or a government acolyte spying deceivingly,

And it follows wherever I venture,
So it may be a creature replying
To another one overhead flying,
Or a third in the bushes that’s eying to season me.

It’s even been heard in the trenches
Of other folks homes underlying
The facts that my friends are requiring
Me to stay out of their firing line’s reasoning.

So now to avoid its attention
I wear phones in my ears amplifying
A music stream that is supplying
A constant diversion that’s trying its breeze on me.

FRIDAY 3rd APRIL 2009.

Occasionally a phrase escapes the page,
Falls through,
Jumps off,
Evaporates;
When a once hesitant connection of sentences
Suddenly appears certain,
Fending for themselves,
Quenching the thirst for more
Objective architecture,
A foreshore between extremes,
And you realize the line that has
Caught you is not as you thought,
And all that you knew is not.

THURSDAY 2nd APRIL 2009.

Been rushing around like a blue arsed fly,
Like a honey bee seeking a hive;
A man on a mission
Trusting intuition,
A bride running late,
The early bird’s skate,
With sweat’s wettest lustre,
All tongue tied and flustered,
A pace from a trot,
Essentials forgot:
Like decent nutrition
Or an item’s addition,
Or a fresh set of clothes
On a body un-hosed,
With a lazy shave’s fuzz
And adrenaline’s buzz.
And I’m stoked up on coke
Belching cigarette smoke,
And my thoughts are a jumble,
And knees set to crumble,
And I’m urgent to hold him
But am certain he’s coping
Cause his mum’s there to view him
And nurses are cooing,
And the midwives were faultless
And ward care exalted
And my new boy is polished
And fear abolished
And my wife a delight
And daughter enlightened
And I’m a new dad
A little ahead of time.

WEDNESDAY 1st APRIL 2009.

I like it me,
He like it he,
She like it she,
We like it we.

Wednesday 20 May 2009

TUESDAY 31st MARCH 2009. (a recap….)

British summertime has started with a blast
As the big yellow sky ball is blazing the path
Of its ripeness for all to see,
And riding us of the previous tail chasing
Seasons that sprang from the haste
Of yesterday’s corners.........

In the kitchen I tried to slide by
The freshly gained frame of my wife,
But she's surfing the bottom drawer,
And her rear is more
Than the narrow channel
Of the galley can take,
And making it impossible.......

I've got a hundred hungry pounds in my pocket,
And I'm trying to stop it
Consuming the first thing it finds
To occupy its time...........

Counting contractions in the back of a car.........

It’s high, I said,
Not very, she replied,
High enough to break your fall, I furthered,
Aye, she said.........

Four and a half hours from start to drop.........

He’s a little early, but at least he will live
Five weeks longer than most other folks.........

His face is paper thin
And my fingers will need
Elbow skin to feel it..........

His ears are unfolding slowly,
Filling with milk..........

I leaned back at a forty five degree angle
So I could follow the smell of my feet........

I’ve got to meet a man about a pint of beer,
He says it isn’t vital but it might be near..........

He’s not a pet or a possession,
But something better..........

A pit full of potential pot holes to fall in;
A shit load of sequential stepping stones.......

*MONDAY 30th MARCH 2009.*

Harry’s here….

SUNDAY 29th MARCH 2009.

The true eternal vault of life and death
Concluded shifts into the space bereft
Of colour for its followers to kneel
In honour of the stimulant’s appeal.

The blue forbade the children of the storm
From ruining its new communion,
And laureates performed their given tasks
Responding to the questions people asked:

“Will hither be the promised land of old,
Or wither once its virtues are controlled;
Can language handle what it is we see
Or will it strand itself upon the breeze”.

And in response unpainted words were used
To console the unsure and bemused:
Great love and life and duty avalanched
Whilst up above the beautiful advanced;

Sweeping any awkwardness before it,
Keeping friends and enemies accorded,
And honestly informing the remains
Of those who wished for things to stay the same.

The latitude of heaven came to hell,
The attitudes of all between them fell,
And in the ev’ning saturation stayed
To leaven out the fates of the afraid.

SATURDAY 28th MARCH 2009.

A bang that was big;
A hand in the gig.

Physical laws coincide;
Mystical paws fix the rides.

Stars coalesce and explode;
Smartly compressed to bear load.

Primal life moves from the soup;
A man, and his wife eating fruit.

An ageless unfurling of shapes;
An urgent world curbing debate.

Intelligence stumbling out;
The felling of fences and doubt.

Theories and dreams to bequeath;
Fears and screaming and death.

A return to eternal abstraction;
Earning infernal reactions.

A collective consciousness;
A selective ombudsman.

FRIDAY 27th MARCH 2009.

Indifference the position
And committing it volition,
But addressing it,
Confessing it,
The mission.

A lack of love is muted
Or the gap of age imputed,
But the force of it,
The cause of it,
Unrooted.

Only direction is detected,
And its terminus infected,
And the consequence
Is common sense
Rejected.

THURSDAY 26th MARCH 2009.

The nursery is green with a white ceiling sky
And jelly bean creatures appear on the border.
On one wall Rousseau’s monkeys peek out,
On another soft toys gaze down from cloth pockets.

There are palm tree islands in opposite corners
Whose beaches are adorned with more fauna;
Whilst a chest of drawers beneath a cloakroom
Shelf supports a further gang of vivid animals.

A hanging basket of big nosed muts at one end
Falls beside a safari lodge window and sill
Where on a lazy Siberian tiger smiles wryly,
And the light’s retirement strikes a perfect balance.

An American invention sits on the floor and
Spills a tune or two, or a heartbeat’s warmth, while
Projecting slowly spinning images of starry skies
And ocean depths and florid forest glades.

Mobiles and sticky backed pictures compliment
The overall look of this introductory jungle,
And there on the carpet, after rash feet fell in
Wet paint, dog footprints complete the scene.

WEDNESDAY 25th MARCH 2009.

Interacting with a pre-decimal civilization,
One before the watershed,
Dumb to evolution,
Rudimentary.

Directing events of an essential nature,
Aiming for my high latitude,
Staking a makeover,
Claiming it all.

Thrusting the rusted engines much further,
Pushing their belief in mine,
Confiding in no one,
Desiring the win.

Spending my faith on reserves of theirs,
Spelling orders to be averred,
Hills to be got over,
Foe to get into.

Picking the victory from their broken feet,
Seating its crown on my head,
Resting hauled laurels,
Peacefully me.

TUESDAY 24th MARCH 2009.

The wait is in the flavour
As the taste is in the labour
And the work is preparation,
Training fingers to be nimble,
Dancing in-between the blades
That rain down as the situation
Has been scheduled for a window
Smashed especially to nurture it
As there wasn’t one this morning
When it crashed you without warning
Into her as unaware as you,
Who is catering as we now speak.

MONDAY 23rd MARCH 2009.

The once remarkably calm waters of the dock
Are chopping higher than even the North Sea
Must be on such a blusterous day. Fabricated waves
Are smashing into the breakwaters of the walls with
Such a force as to send their spray into my face
As I delicately inch over the lock gate bridge.

Landed on Bond Island side I wind my way
Around warehouses, trying to stay between the
Lines set down for my protection, regardless of
The fact the buildings are likely to shed slate leaves
Upon my head. And rounding a corner the
Gale taunts me to tempt the crossing again;

Which I will have to do in setting back for
Second coats on nursery walls, but the closest
Lamp post is now signaling the wind’s impatience
By swinging from side to side like a fair ground
Ride and frightening me just a touch as the
Structure holding the Ouse back is so exposed.

And all the red and yellow flowers marking
The boundary of this year’s particularly keen
Spring must be wondering if they should forget
More growth until the start of British Summer
Time, but I guess we’ll have to face
The prevailing winds together until then.

SUNDAY 22ND MARCH 2009.

Falling for a broken chin
Between my handlebars
As that fine lass across the lane
Was begging to be smitten,
And I to be lighter than air,
But there’s no impressing
Some folks,
Even piled up on the road
With blood bonding tears
To the piss in my pants,
And the hands of friends
Should have been back patting
My acrobatics
Instead the fists of neighbours are waving
At me as others lift me to a car
Seat for a more sombre
Ride to the hospital,
Where that sweet girl’s
Mother sews me back together
Again and puts me on the wall
For another attempt.

SATURDAY 21st MARCH 2009.

I want paradise,
The whole reprise;
The headland of a happy ending.
Birdsong of the dawn in my sails all day
And the slit red sky of delight every sunset.

The fortune of every cookie;
The fullest English breakfast twice
Accompanied by pudding and a cigarette.
The buxom and the fucker who is slender
And ritual monogamy unfolding between both.

The finest single malt,
Multiplied and doubled;
Its first beak spilled drink
Trickling along the buttress of my tongue
Whilst lodging an appeal against the siege that sears me.

The cramp of orgasm
Fastened to anatomy and
Never settling for a lesser context;
That sweetest of mists that lingers on a freshly
Wettened cunt and cannot ever be mistaken for anything else,

And all the knowledge
That I never held dear enough
When love told me it was so; when loathing
Scolded me for weakness and pitched me forward
In order to avoid being completely broken, when I wanted to be busted.

FRIDAY 20th MARCH 2009.

The Vernal equinox occurs today,
Officially the first day of spring
(Northern Hemisphere),
Whilst British Summertime begins
On the 29th March, (Next Weekend,
United Kingdom.)
So that leaves the birds and the bees,
The flowers and trees
And hibernating animals underneath
Just over a week
To get their shit together,
Find a mate,
Woo her,
Do her
And get ready for the sun.
Poor old spring,
Getting thinner each year,
And, especially after this winter’s
Star turn, likely to be forgotten
As quickly as it begun.

THURSDAY 19th MARCH 2009.

Right, so the newest Polish food
Outlet in the high street was reported
In the paper for turning away English
Speaking customers. Now either the
People running this show are slow or
They simply don’t know where they are.
This is not some rural Lincolnshire hamlet,
Overrun with émigrés, this is Goole son,
And these fools will be lucky to have a store
Standing by the end of the week, let alone
A single window pane in one piece.
Some people simply don’t understand
That when you mix six thousand migrants
With twenty thousand down trodden indigenous
Yorkshire folk, and try to impose anything upon
Them, you’re asking for trouble, bound to get it
And twice as likely as not the locals will be
Accused of being racist, and is there any
Fucking wonder when they’ve been
Shitten on for years by every
Incontinent expert.

TUESDAY 17th MARCH 2009.

I drank in proportion to the chores done,
And found myself trying to bend the clouds out of the way
Of the sun that was somewhere above. Upon the work of
An obviously more industrious person than I the sky
Awoke and shed its suffocating bed dress and
The people in the street approved:
“When I look there are colours everywhere”
Said a child to his mother,
“My feet are hotter for it”
Said another, and I’m thinking, if I’ve managed
The function of my life without trying for this long, what could
I have done with a little effort, a bit more composure, instead
Of dozing in the day too often and feeling self satisfied
With the smallest achievement. The sun staggers,
And bedraggles us, then scrapes us
Off the earth, shaping and re-baking until
Warmed through once more,
And I, for one, would like
To applaud its faith.

WEDNESDAY 18th MARCH 2009.

Painted window frames today,
And in best Twitter fashion,
Told those who would follow
Of my new found passion,
Although if a follower
Should ask for my service
I’d advise them to follow
Someone more deserving,
As my brush strokes are shaky,
And liquid applied
Is painted too thickly,
And failing to dry,
And my masking tape usage
Is unlikely to please
Those dudes who use ligne claire
With consummate ease.
So I’ll not go on boasting
Too loudly all week,
As no doubt all the seals by
Tomorrow will leak,
And I’ll have to envisage
A perfect rendition
Of windowsill sitting
In my composition.

MONDAY 16th MARCH 2009.

Issuing my thoughts for the day
Over the broad internet makes
My rancid little life feel fresher;
Less indebted to the exploits of
Others I assume are having all
The fun and more endurable as
I bubble on in the cauldron of the
Common man.

Standing the understandable for
As long as we can is an admirable
Feat, but sometimes we need to
Bolster the homestead with a bit
More ambition, and if the situation
Requires an opinion, an emotion,
Then I for one am prepared to
Promote it,

And if you don’t want to, or are
Not prepared to discuss it, then I
Must suffer it upon the never
Tired eyes of the wired world and
Hope for a bite of approval to move
Me more than any interactions
With the physical aspects of man
Ever have.

SUNDAY 15th MARCH 2009.

We’ll make a fort of it once more
Now we’ve smashed France.
We will topple Scotland
And wreck the Welsh;
Frighten Ireland
And belittle Italy,
And when those southern countries
Come to town let’s do them down too,
And Jonno’s strength will reflect itself
At length in every Englishman’s manner…

(Or for that matter any Kiwi or Springbok,
Or other foreign player’s we’ve managed to
Purloin, and let’s face it every nation has been
Snaffling the part born and residential for
Ages: Pacific Island All Blacks, strangely
Named Japanese and sausage fingered
Aussies from afar, so why not us….)

SATURDAY 14th MARCH 2009.

So once again the daughter’s out shopping, only
This time on an away day school strip to London,
And, get this right, on the busiest day of the week,
Down the busiest street in Europe, the fizzy things
Masquerading as teachers have allowed the 14
To 15 year olds to roam the streets unsupervised
On the proviso that if lost they use their mobiles
To seek assistance. That must be why she called
Me then and said she wasn’t sure where the tube
Station in Oxford Street was, but thought it might be
Near Harrods, as her mate and her had to meet the
Group there in an hour. Her and a single, solitary friend
Going walkabout down that road with only a phone
To turn to in case of mishaps. But I guess that’s because
These things have empowered the young ones into
Thinking themselves all grown up, and our school
Staff have handily accepted that, but if lost, or battery
Flattened, then these same teens would revert to nothing
More than the little missing kiddies they used to be,
In the days before invention, lacking any kind of
Common sense as there’s no curriculum for that and
Hardly an adult worth their salt employed to teach it.

FRIDAY 13th MARCH 2009.

Gold Cup day and the bookies are
Full of those old cunts with nothing
Better to do than crunch inside the place
Because of the race’s excuse; their old
Ladies having been left to wander the aisles
Of next door superstores alone, except for
The ubiquitous grandkids asking where
Granddad went to spend their treat money.

The old bugger’s got a double on
The go, and his first horse has just
Come home, so fuck granny and her
Self inflicted addiction to her first son’s
Young ‘uns; one week’s pocket money
Will be better spent should Barber Shop
Romp it and then she can shove her
Moaning up her arse as he’ll have a grand.

But the tension’s increasing in the
Turf accountant’s shed, as more fall
Through the door, or hang out the back
Smoking fags, vying to see if her Majesty’s
Horse can give them all a boost as they
Bet what little lay off money they’ve got
Left in order to show the bag at home how
Careful they’ve been not to piss it all up the wall.

THURSDAY 12th MARCH 2009.

Stripped another hypocrite from my
Back catalogue, and feel better for it,
As now my sky is cloud hung
Only when I choose to order one.

And the cuckoos who roosted in my
Days have given way to nights with
Those I used to know as time
Has lost its strung puppets to slumber.

As like the few in Amsterdam who
Ran frantically from building to
Building, Benny Hill like,
And I had to watch and whine,

Or on my wedding night when I
Criticized someone’s pharmacist and
They took it to heart and froze
Any conversation on the road home,

Or when they came to visit after their
Wife left, and we sat at the kitchen
Table ordering whisky and bacon
Debating the breakup, and I had to laugh.

Don’t suffer fools who doubt your motives
With new sensitivities; especially when
You’ve supported their view through it all and
They’ve hardly been a sounding board for yours.

WEDNESDAY 11th MARCH 2009.

Kick back,
Hit back,
Accuse other people.
It’s my doing;
Yeah I made you
Drink till you were full
And tumble in the street;
I forced you to relieve yourself of
Responsibility for your daughter,
And now it’s my fault your house
Is not in order, and she’s unresponsive to
Your wishes. Fuck me it must be easy being
You; centred and still whilst the whole world
Rolls down hill and clatters at the walls of
Your stability; battles for a window in your
Schedule, a sill to sit on and be enlightened
In your ways. The daze of your perception
Educating us and strengthening our understanding
Of the finer points of functional drunkenness.
Oh it must be grand; that wanded hand of yours
That waves and makes a wonderland
Of the waste ground around your picketed
Pock mark and shovels what
Is left unloved behind you when you
Blunder on; fitting this day more than
Me; this place of excess; this time of
Due intemperance; this world that shoos
The rueful from the eye line whilst claiming
Innocence and blaming others.

TUESDAY 10th MARCH 2009.

Ten years ago today,
At around 4 PM,
I was about as far along the evolutionary
Path as I have ever been;
About as stable and as happy as finance would ever
Have me as a friend;
As industrious as business would ever wish me,
And as unloved as a thieving libertine could ever be.
And then I met her,
And the whole thing exploded in a brilliant,
But uncontrollable,
Impulse,
Which,
As these things are wont to do,
Burned every scrap of future fuel in two weeks worth of pleasure
And left me the time since to measure the distance.

MONDAY 9th MARCH 2009.

The starers and watchers,
Constantly crossing your path,
With nothing to do but view you
With something approaching contempt;
Without irony in them or satirical jibe passing by;

Strangers exchanging a
Split second’s aim and instantly
Thinking of labels to place on each
Other, and pigeon holes to stuff them in,
And suffer their vision no longer than necessary.

Only yesterday a small
Street wretch fetched up in
Front of me and refused to move,
And when I placed a guiding hand above
His head in order to ward him I was accused of abuse.

Suffice to say the charge
Came from another couple of
Pint sized gawkers, a street away,
Who saw exactly what they wanted to,
And have probably practiced this on folk before,

But my case is rested that
We all are attested to the truth
Of others and the uselessness of intervals,
But I come at it from the position of a witness
Too and have seen all sides of this avarice in action.

SUNDAY 8th MARCH 2009.

I always judge a fuck by its lover,
But since we have all been united
By common whores then I guess
That’s my clichés done for today
And I can be on my way into
Tomorrow in the hope of finding
Better prose for my crusade
Against this continual wanton
Rush into self destruction.

SATURDAY 7th MARCH 2009.

Took the daughter to Donny this
Morning in order to outfit her
For a London trip next weekend,
But, although she insists she
Loves the ubiquitous cheap
Shops, she only came away
With a single pair of jeans and the
Realization that she’s a bigger
Size than she thought she was,
Or maybe their cut of cloth is
Not as generous to compensate
For the savings. And the next
Time she asks if I’ll take her
I’ll tell her to go bug her Aunty
And leave me in peace, as her
Kind of uncertainty I don’t need
And can no longer be bothered
With, and the only thing that
Stinks worse than her dodgy
Choice is the Council of this
South Yorkshire town,
Or I guess that could be the
Brackish attraction of its
Crumbling fish market.

FRIDAY 6th MARCH 2009.

The ceiling dripped liquid distilled from
The forms huddled over a loaded table top; pawing at
The dominos arranged there and
The smoking pit in
The middle, and balancing back and forth on
The metal legs of used school chairs. Everything had
The colour of whisky or nicotine stained skin as
The game ended and began without want.
The pieces were boxed, and money was eventually won, whilst in
The burnt light a pack of cards was split and
The respective number dealt before
The game disappeared under another lung struck mist.
The time changed but
The people remained unaware of
The world beyond
The chained emergency exit until
The old allotment rooster coughed and
The landlord sent them shuffling across
The linoleum floor and out
The front porch for home.

THURSDAY 5th MARCH 2009.

They’re going to make more money
To flood the system with,
Even if they run out of printing ink,
And its accomplices,
But that won’t to stop them, as
They quantitatively ease,
As they’ll complete their new liquidity
With pastels, chalk or cheese.

And what will become of new runs,
Once flushed into the old,
Will they energize investment or
Disappear down piss holes;
Because that’s where current finance
Appears to have flowed,
And the future whereabouts of it
Will no doubt stay unknown.

Billions will be swapped for Government
Gilts and corporate bonds
On behalf of parties still thinking
Invincible thoughts,
But if this current stimulus does not
Do what it ought to
Then there will be nothing left to
Help bail out the water.

WEDNESDAY 4th MARCH 2009.

I wasn’t prepared
To get
My hair
Wet,
So I got it cut,
For two quid,
And now there’s less to fret
About and I can go out
At ease,
And even the breezy
And blustery stuff
Won’t ruffle it,
And though the cold
May corrode my old scalp
It shan’t dampen my language,
Which should stand me in good
Stead in the post office
Queue.

TUESDAY 3rd MARCH 2009.

This side of the street weighs less than previous years
As two of its heavier aged residents have passed away,
And their accumulated service has been lost, inclining
Those across the road of a more transient approach
To feel bewildered as they step upon the scales.

But their presence is a constant in the ever changing
Factors that combine to keep the home fired hearths
Ablaze, as they’re always being referred to, and
Their wisdom called upon, when any indecisive
Stoker pokes around the mantlepiece ashamed.

And after darkest winter has applied its starkest
Interval, and tinder box technicians are fatigued,
Then more than ever knowledge of the hardiest
Abilities will be needed to allow their kin to carry on
In ways acceptable to modern mannered standards;

So that if a swarthy stranger or a carrier of foreign
Tongues, or passenger of circumstance, comes by,
Then at least a well fuelled boiler and a meal made
From its toiling will provide them with an anecdote
To banish any thoughts they have of us as clueless.

MONDAY 2nd MARCH 2009.

Happy pigs
Taste better
On the trot,
As do roaming
Chickens and
Emancipated sheep;
Cattle grow more flovoursome
Lowing freely on their hill tops,
Whilst dainty footed dear hop a
Tenderer footstep in the forest veil,
Avoiding the fleet of meat eaters or the
Growing shoals of the recently opted out
Whose soluble materials are dumped
Onto compost heaps to feed their
Garden’s needs, and packaging is
Placed into its own blue bin for
Recycling and selling
On to some fool
Country who’ll
Start the whole
Sad travesty
Over again.

SUNDAY 1st MARCH 2009.

It’s got to be
Silver
Steel grey,
Slate blue,
Sage;
Brushed metal
Surfaced
And burnished
With ordinary
Plate.
Worn plainly
Against splendid
Cloth or gamely
Adorned upon
Stale forms
In order to
Enhance them;
Bought sanely
And sold only
When time
Commands;
Ending practices
By spending
Penury in
Passionate
Dress for a
Change.

SATURDAY 28th FEBRUARY 2009.

Are they firm?
Or do they fall,
Flop,
Flap?
Do you flip them
When you fish them
Out their bags?
Are they full
Or underfunded?
Wonder wired,
Wall to wall,
Or loose tools
Inside a sack like
Shirt
Desired by
Awful tradesmen
Fawning at their
Corners,
Baying at their shore,
Calling out for more
Whilst flooring
You in anger
For your refusal
To allow them in,
Or are they flashed
For cash,
And asked for it.
Or sternly moulded?
Fixed and folded
Under armpits
In defence of
Further realms.

FRIDAY 27th FEBRUARY 2009.

Mum had a great birthday,
And, although there were no
Whistles and bells, or swinging
Monkeys, we still managed to eat
Out a little, buy the baby a bunch
Of stuff, and watch Mr. Eastwood’s
Latest in glorious high definition,
Although the fat bitch serving
Tickets took the piss a bit.

THURSDAY 26th FEBRUARY 2009.

She allowed us to be greedy;
To be aspirational and without status;
To achieve without needing agreement
And reach for endeavours denied us so long by
The self titled mighty of the land,
Who had gambled granteds on our behalves
For centuries. And we little people appreciated
The opportunities offered and took
Them upon our squared shoulders and
Surpassed expectations. Neighbours and
Strangers were treated equally as their heads
Were stone stepped onto and bet back, and once
Peaks had been reached we surveyed our lot
From tower tops higher than others and
Considered us accomplished. And after
A relatively short while we forged a new
England to replace the outdated,
And forgot ourselves well.

WEDNESDAY 25th FEBRUARY 2009.

Went to the dictionary for the
The word,
The word for her,
But the word for her was gone.
So I called up the man,
The library man,
But the phone was cold.
So I walked down the street,
The museum’s street,
And its doors were wide,
And the library man was deep
Inside the depths beneath
Which kept secrets
Sought when times
Were deeper.
And he stood hung over
Open books and papers
Labelled strangely,
Apparently awaiting me,
And when I asked him for the
Word he said a hundred
Men before me had
It requested first,
And unfortunately it’s use,
Long saved for utter fools,
Had been consumed,
And lesser tools would
Have to do
Instead.

MONDAY 23rd FEBRUARY 2009.

Just occasionally,
So very rarely,
I remember an emotion,
A moment I had;
A ghost to hold onto
Of a person who was
And will never be again,
Who slips through my fingers
Whilst I attempt them:
I apply pressure to the tension
In the centre of my palm, on the
Basis of remembrance, and am left
Defenceless before emptying my hand.

The petitioning
Of a wish has
Not transfigured its list
Into solids, and
It took the time of
An average two hundred
Metre walk to perform the
Task. And now when I stand the
Altitude fails me to my seat,
And weakens the feet that have
Been my saviours, but it’s how we
Deal with it that counts, as some will
Fall while others won’t even strive to height.

TUESDAY 24th FEBRUARY 2009.

Brick by shrinking brick
We build our little kingdoms,
Smaller than before, but we
Still rule within them: the
Plumb lined and the planed,
The spirit levelled heavens
Generated by our gains whose
Residents never stray
Even as their landscape
Lessens and tightens its belt.

A little kid in the corner is
Picking the fluff off a liquorice
Sweet and humming away
To himself whilst being
Ignored by his parents; a
Never before seen breed
Of dog does the same to
Its balls as the freedom bell
Tolls for all to hear but no one
Takes up its just cause as their own.

The landing lights are
On all night; I know, I stay
Awake to watch them.
Children sleeping safe
Across the street whilst
Monsters skirt the alleyways
And ply their trade far from
The spaces under beds, and
We leave ourselves a mess
To clean up once we have retired.

SUNDAY 22nd FEBRUARY 2009.

One day less like that
And I’ll be happy;
One more torture to reward me
With its passing;
One call forwarded
To me whilst in transit
And immediately answered.

Turning round for home,
And quickly with it,
In anticipation of my beauty’s
Return fixture;
Wrapped in fresh skin
To begin another journey,
And more than fingertip worthy.

The loss on the faces of the
Recently wakened
When they scan the horizon
And ask why it's frightening
Then shelter in the
Arms of an elder love
They’ve become accustomed to;

I much prefer more abstract
Partners to the
Personal, they cling less
Needily each day,
And what they have
To give me may be relatively
Minor, but I’m inclined to mind it.

SATURDAY 21st FEBRUARY 2009.

Work went first,
Then transport, residence,
Spouse and friendships.
The sights and sounds,
Tastes, smells and pliables
Of my life were collected
Together and separately
Sold to accommodate lodging
In a one roomed home.
I lay on a cot in a corner
Beneath the sun running in
Through one long window
And withdrew all sense from
The ends of myself whilst
Searing extremities. Fingers
And toes, hands, feet, arms
And legs left and my torso
Slowed, and within brain
Basements my wandering spirit
Carved a crawlspace towards
The cave where my seed lived
In candle light. Decisions
Were left sender less until
The final light was blown and
All conclusions tolled, and
What was known of me
Fell freely sanctioned.

FRIDAY 20th FEBRUARY 2009.

A thing with pinned and needled feet
Stampedes upon the cushion of my brain
Then rests its legs.
It tacks a second time
And shakes me from a dream of
Freshly broken frost.
Half awake it makes me more
By banging on a tooth,
And visions of further carnage
In my cavities ensue.
“My ship will be
Crippled”
I say,
“Or develop a terrible malady.”
But nothing to bother, or swell
Over decks,
Except one more little
Cog lost to the system that neither
Man nor stanchion can
Handle, and
The whole thing will give, as
There’s no wiggle room left,
And what strength there
Was will shed any
Flexibility
Confirming the broke
State of its nature.

THURSDAY 19th FEBRUARY 2009.

I’m going to join the Dad’s club and scrag it from the inside;
It looks to be full of pensioners anyway, though it does say it’s
Open to grandparents and anyone else, caring for kids, who
Is male and able, so maybe it is full of the remnants of men
From the town whose main use has ground to a halt
And would welcome a bit of support.

Old revolutionaries and socialists and trade union stalwarts
Never die they just infect the next generation with their
Vitriol, and if I can help their cause with a little anarchy,
Whilst learning how to plant seeds in the skulls of our
Little ones, then my job is done and we can all grow
Old knowing the future will be safe.

But my scheme presupposes the disinterest of the women
Folk, and as the mid-wife we’ve just seen is as pregnant as
My lady then that may just scupper any attempt at
Insurrection launched and I’ll have to go back to
The drawing board in order to reorganize the
Revival of the multitudes of residual men.

WEDNESDAY 18th FEBRUARY 2009.

Innards and the muck of such
Cover the battle field while
The shanks and hands of gutted
Combatants are further from the
Engagement; whilst in the home
Town lanes the torsos of the fallen
Lay having found some final
Strength to cast their heads
Back to the huts they came from.

The minds and moods, which sent
Them out to vent their steam
Upon each other, order crowds
Out of porch doorways to receive
The news. Huddled and held they
Blend together to view the worst
Whilst being told that triumph
Is about to return from the front
Being fought in their very name,

But after the words have arrived,
And been sieved through the
Lives of those risen to meet them,
They flurry and flake their truth
Onto the ruins of the bunkered,
Still encumbered in their bolt holes,
Who are unwilling to clear roof
Tops that are now settled deeper
With the death soot of sweepers.

TUESDAY 17th FEBRUARY 2009.

He dreams a sea of creatures into being,
And onto lands of plants and animals,
Upon a turning world of shifting genes,
About a rather normal star,
Towards the stellar tip of things,
A spiral arm’s length from the rest,
Within a galaxy that spins
Around eternal emptiness.
The sleeper wakes and soon forgets
Until he makes to dream the next.

MONDAY 16th FEBRUARY 2009.

It is for the past
of my parents,

The present
of my wife,

And the future
of my children.

SUNDAY 15th FEBRUARY 2009.

I never married my first love,
Although I should have,
As I thought there would be
More souls along,
But I was wrong,
There was only one,
And she has gone,
Though I’m left with the
Knowledge that some
Other solid individual
Sacrificed his own ideal
Paramour for her,
So at least there’s
More than me with
This feeling.

SATURDAY 14th FEBRUARY 2009.

A dip in breathing
Where a drop of breath seems to leave me
Once inside; a slip,
On exiting, is propped between those ribs
That receive me.

Thin ink reigns,
Exhibiting the fact that I was complicit in
The letter’s flesh,
Where thinking is enacted in the spray of
Humbled wishes

By flicking at
The fractions that inhabit the dictionary’s
Attic; picking
Up the facts I feel have added my flash to
Their rich care.

And brushed of
Bruises, and their busted tissue layers, I’ve
Set my mention;
Rushing off to rust now it’s been posted to
A listing prayer.

So rip a page of
Your own, and rope it to mine to conduct
Our story; tipped
And soaped in the waters of the word and
It’s beloved book.

FRIDAY 13th FEBRUARY 2009.

A mess;
Age screams to be
Cleaned before death.

A breath;
Less blessing after
The fall of confession.

A dread;
Full premonition
Afforded a bequest.

A cross;
Word of return
Bound and embossed.

THURSDAY 12th FEBRUARY 2009.

All the trees are Hockney’s on the
Way to Castle Hill up to the High
Street of South Cave until a road
That flows beneath a stranded span
Of branches, shed of summer canopies,
And to the slopes where rough ploughed
Gouges run between steps of deadened snow.

By a little village that has forgiven
Time’s forgetfulness but would never
Let its guard down in the winter’s nest
Now settled, and whose salted streets
Have seasonally survived the worst these
Hinter Wolds and long ranged roads have
Thrown at it through readied years of exile.

Beyond the bare crowned tops we
Reach the start of Cottingham and on
Beside a traveller’s camp that’s been set
Fast for years, thanking our driver
For her knowledge of these parts, before
The sprawling order of the Ward greets us
With more attendees than we, the soon to be:

The unlucky shoved who, but for an b
Age ago, would have bourne their child
In their own town had fools not pulled
Down delivery rooms and replaced them
With old folk’s homes that came too late
For those in need, whose care in the community
Used to mean exactly that, and not day trips away.

WEDNESDAY 11th FEBRUARY 2009.

Death fled the field as men forgot to fear him
And their corpseless crop propagated the cosmos;
Defiling life wherever met, and bettering it,
And finalizing settlements to soothe lost trenches,
Whilst the reaper was left the husks of abandoned
Animals to collect until remorse overcame him.

He wandered his boneless home half hoping for
A human soul to brandish a calcareous digit at
And condemn for their wanton and rapacious
Ways, but all he found was sinless alien fibre
That once enlivened the farthest stars and fell
After the march of man brought utter mindlessness.

For an age the same as time spent sequencing
Creation’s chart the shadow land was rid of man,
And barren though it was it sighed itself relief,
And the mighty river of the boatman flowed
A little slower and sweetened soil where it once
Sped on after offloading bitter hopeless wretches,

And as the cloaked accountant unrobed himself
For the first time he breathed his last breath upon
A bed set by the Ferryman. And, as Death laid
Himself to rest, the creatures of the universe,
Usurped by greedy people, gathered round to wish
Him safe across the Styx before it froze for good.

TUESDAY 10th FEBRUARY 2009.

If age should care
To race me I would lose,
But if it turns to face
Me, and so chose
Not to replace
Me with fresh news,
I would approve.

But so far in resurgence
I have failed
To catch the eye of servants
Of the tale,
And emergence
Is in the sails
That sweep away,

And my unspent
Appearance on the ship
For all intents
And purpose will eclipse
The summed events
Along the trip
Exhibited.

MONDAY 9th FEBRUARY 2009.

Of all the hours left to pass
The ones you want utmost to last
Are those that miss your autograph
Whilst fleeting.

And try you might to halt their time
They’re gone before you’ve counter signed
The page they left to underline
Your meeting.

Their stories flit too quick to note
The worthiness that wisdom wrote
About the sense of overcoats
In winter,

Whose harshness is the nearest jar,
And keenest wish the farthest star,
And darkest hush the hardest part
Fell into.

And pictures took cannot recall
Exactly how the moment stalled
And touch and taste are not at all
Effective,

Whilst sound diminishes inside
And scent declines to advertise
Itself upon the winded isle
Selected.

SUNDAY 8th FEBRUARY 2009.

A heart caught against its cage,
Its beat stuck in a throat;
A breath soiled and words spilt
Upon the coat
Of journeys end,
Whose road
Has worn so many feet
Away to blood
And bone.
And skin stitched
In repair has understood
The use of
Wood
And leather strips replacing
Fabric
That has been lost
In order
To shore up the
Wishes of floored
Visitors.

SATURDAY 7th FEBRUARY 2009.

Hardly a bastion of virtue:
Excluded from every joint in town,
But the one the locals would defend
As he makes their lives more tolerable.
He is the court fool who paints everyone
Else in fresher colours, and makes them
Feel a little better about their own
Cold lives, and the rugby starts
Today, with his head.

I will never get used to
Mutilation, but then again if I do
I guess I’m in trouble, and incidentally
It’s no friendlier up North; we just say it is
To give us the edge over those in the smoke.
And those people next door, they may be
Our neighbours, but even the ancient,
Who have lived there for ages,
Are barley comradely.

I fall out with people every
Few weeks or so, and it’s not that
I want to; it’s just that they feel me
Different, or see less clearly, and I can’t
Ever be several layers of me. I’ve been the
Worst of us, our intricacies; the known and
Lonesome bliss, a bucket full of piss and
For it I’ll probably die in a ditch with
A big fat bitch having wished it.

FRIDAY 6th FEBRUARY 2009.

Our intellect was supposed to protect
Us from our instincts, but, although bolder
In scope, the brain’s aim has always lost out
To the accuracy of anatomy’s power.

Where we have thought ourselves above
The heads of other herds our bodies have
Invariably dragged us down amongst
The hooves and proved us unlearned;

Whenever cased in our altruism the
Base has always risen to reflect our self
Satisfied sacrifice back at us and shown
Us what lowly plaudits we’ve bought;

However cleverer than the next beast
We’ve thought us we have consistently
Woven stupidity into the framework
Of confirming such circumstances.

Our beliefs have been our weaknesses,
And deferential nods to paganism’s
Chieftains have stripped their spectral
Messages of any integral worth,

And in their names have we wrought the
Worst of ourselves across the world’s
Surface in support of eternal life and
Damned our fellow animals to death.

THURSDAY 5th FEBRUARY 2009.

I went down a back alley path as
The snow had failed to hold there
And the surface was firm, unlike the
Lazy pavement melting underfoot in the
High street and slippery to boot and shoe.
All the gritters have been sold, we’ve been told,

Due to global warmth, and a lack
Of grit is evident in folks as well as
Roads, as everything slides by whilst
Salted chips accompany fried fish. And
Pity the poor forecasters, who not only have
To battle accuracy in their trade, but these days

Are shoved out into blizzards to
Convey just how bad it is. Still it’s
Warm in here and here I’ll stay, since
I’ve managed to traverse the worst winter
Conditions in two decades with a further week’s
Supply of food and fuel, to sit and watch the impact

Upon interest rates, with calls for
More to fall, and shake my head in
Disbelief at the state we’re in. And with
No answers forthcoming I guess the gang in
Charge will keep up the tempo of their drumming
Until run out next summer in time for other flutterings.

WEDNESDAY 4th FEBRUARY 2009.

I think they’ve found me,
I think I’m doomed,
For now they’ll hound me,
Until consumed.

A strobe lit ceiling,
A car door slammed,
And I fall reeling
From fate’s demand.

There goes the front door,
There goes it twice,
If it goes once more
It won’t suffice.

So now I’m down stairs,
So there’s no flight:
The back leads nowhere,
And I need light,

From which there’s silence,
From this dark hour,
But with dawn, violence,
Will me devour.

A voice calls outside,
A pressing roar,
“Is that the midwife?”
“No, she’s next door....”

TUESDAY 3rd FEBRUARY 2009.

Nobody should be talking about changing the sport’s format;
Simply where to get the sponsorship from.
Get the bookies in to back it;
Everybody’s betting anyway so why not,
Because since smoking money was outlawed
The game has baulked whilst others have flown
As they’ve had a man with a plan.
And don’t deride the players who ask
Where their wages will come from in a year;
Engage them, encourage them; they’re
The product after all and are quite aware
That their chosen profession can’t continue to fund
Itself as it’s governing body’s war chest is not bottomless.
So when darts throws a new tournament into the mix each year,
And has six million quid up for grabs, look at why
That is, and you might find the answer if you’re
Able to search under the table top you’ve
Been resting upon since the glory days of the eighties.

MONDAY 2nd FEBRUARY 2009.

When it snows
Nothing goes
In this land;
On the road,
Or below,
Or wing spanned.

One in five
Duck and dive
In their beds,
And divide
All the lies
To be said,

But the flakes
Are awake
And prepared
To parade
Till all sleighs
Are ensnared,

And leave us
More reasons
To mutter
How even
The seasons
Are shuttered.

SUNDAY 1st FEBRUARY 2009.

We’re all going to need protection
When the shit storm hits, and I don’t
Mean throwing names against sticks and stones,
But sudden thunder from a blunderbuss
And lightning from a rod. It might seem
Out of keeping, and quite irresponsible, to
Want a gun when knives are flashing gaily
Every day, but our doom is out there, just
Beyond the horizon, and it’s creeping slowly closer.

Hard cash cannot buy much security
These days, and money will not suffice
Against the mob once prices drop and food is too
Expensive to produce, or incentives to do
So unavailable, whilst painting pollen onto
Plants and trees when bees have gone may
Work in China where labour is abundant and
Cheaply wielded, but the prolls in the west,
Who assume they’re the best, won’t be happy with that.

Only well greased weapons and the ability
To get them for defence of the family will
Separate you from the unarmed and enable more
Than a blank look when up close to a loaded
One. The living oblivious die easily so allow
Them their comfort whilst doing so, as you go
About your business of watching the shrivelling
Sky for signs of a tightening fist, and stand
Ready to wrap your own around a bone handled barrel.

SATURDAY 31st JANUARY 2009.

Upon the shelves are juxtaposed
Old games with books and videos,
And vinyl albums next to those
Composed on compact discs.

More films are stored on DVD’s
And on the floor are shells for these
Where children’s fingers lazily
Have left them without risk.

And also crunching underfoot
Are scraps of skin and nails long cut
Amidst tin cans and smoker’s butts
Exhausted before dawn,

Whose elevated light reveals
The aggregate that has congealed
Around a sleeper’s cracking heels
About to be withdrawn,

As daybreak brings a time to search
For golden things to be besmirched,
Or stolen from the nearest church,
To keep his venerated,

By all the magpies that amass
Within his urban hourglass,
And turn into an underclass
That can’t be excavated.

FRIDAY 30th JANUARY 2009.

You’re unhappy when I’m absent,
I’m too angry when I’m there,
I suggest we keep our distance,
You propose we go elsewhere,

But there are no installations
For the likes of you and me,
And no soul of arbitration
To accord us parity,

But unless we seek concessions,
Or are big enough to give them,
Then there’ll be no further meshing
Of our independent wisdoms,

And from distance you’ll lament me,
And a wanderer I’ll remain,
And what could have been invented
Will forever stay unnamed.

THURSDAY 29th JANUARY 2009.

Liberalism has shirked responsibility for the autonomies
It has engineered, and now that the shackles of the state
Have been cracked by the debaters of enslavement, and
Buried in the basement of antiquity, the unrestrained
Have overwhelmed the bleeding freedom seekers: confusing
Their curriculums by refusing to behave accordingly. As
The columns of authority have rotted from being got at
From below, and the ceilings they supported bowed and
Crumbled, their dust has settled at street level where it
Has stayed to swathe the new unruly. Once there was a
Unified doctrine to abide by and be proud of, regardless of
Achievement or perceived class consciousness, and now there
Are sixty million personal opinions to account for, and without
Guidance from family or school or church or state the loose
Multitudes are doing what they wish and getting away
With it as nothing is curtailing it. Erudition, and its mouth
Piece, articulation, have been lost along the way from
Whatever makeshift cradles people spill from these days
To the streets, and you can tell by the age and number of
Children wandering around them that my generation led
The charge into dysfunction that has left them drunken and
Dumb. Alas time passing may have improved our standards,
And we’ve marvelled at the advances, but common sense and
Wit seem to have been sacrificed upon technology's altar.
So when we ask why, and cry for solutions, and gather
Round the usual to supply them, we should look at each
Other in the room and question whether our good intentions
Are thus or just a way of absolving our own little unloved
Childhoods where we crept at the edge of the pack.

WEDNESDAY 28th JANUARY 2009.

There’s a house of medicine near me,
Built twenty years ago, where few
Procedures occupy their time.

Its size implies the opposite but once
Inside you find yourself within
A maze of winding corridors

Where people follow coloured
Lines upon the floor all day.
You’ll see a similar face

Wandering the place whenever you
Endeavour treatment of your own,
And they never stop to answer

Your requests as they’re all chasing
Snakes alone. And eventually
You realize the structure’s

Full of halls, and doors to further malls,
Where folk trudge ever forward to
A slew of waiting rooms to rest

Before continuing their quest until
They find they’re out front once
Again in need of nothing new,

And believably healed, and everybody
On the board applauds its bustle
And efficient turnaround.

TUESDAY 27th JANUARY 2009.

There’ll soon be extra legs in the bed
Once the scion that is going wild
Under his mother’s belly lining
Slides free,

And when he kicked me for the first
Time I felt why he’s being heralded
By all the women in
The family,

And although I’ve tried to hide my
Feelings, in case fate’s temptation
Intervenes, I can barely wait
For him to be.

MONDAY 26th JANUARY 2009.

We came back together and
Our loneliness was halved;
This is you, said the sleuth,
Who had traced us and
Placed us at time’s disposal
To hold us and solder as when
We were boldly foolproof,
When young and incumbent,
Before we tore the glue from
Our sides and were left to
Our lives without the other’s
Truth to prove community.

SUNDAY 25th JANUARY 2009.

I’m by the cruel bramble bush
Which no longer tries to spear me
From its uneasy perch upon the welder’s
Fence, as its limbs have been diminished by
This year’s befitting winter, and are withered
In antipathy because of it. And really a back
Lane is no place for nature to renew itself
Anyway, although I shift the dog along
To avoid the possibility of its frozen
Thorns and am thanked by a jolt
That accompanies his recall of
The two mutts further on.

At least I remember the last time
He tangled with these branches and
Raked his back, even if he doesn’t, and
I also know how close he’ll get to the
Other hounds’ compound before
Wailing away from its growls.

He’s a lovely fellow, but
Not as bright as his brother,
Who doesn’t go out much these
Days, and lives all the longer for
It, and when I get the youngster
To my Mother’s he’ll likely be
Lauded as if he won his
Fight with fear.