SATURDAY 31st OCTOBER 2009.

The Halloween scene has been
In overdrive here this year;
Every little corner store has stuffed
Itself full of plastic hats and face masks,
And parents have been tugged until empty
Collecting them along with pumpkins,
And who the hell eats those in England.
And it’s not even a tradition in these parts,
Unlike Mischievous night,
Which follows it,
And Bonfire night immediately after that.
It seems to have been slipped into the schedule
Simply to bump up sales figures as the purchase of
Fireworks has been falling since the noise Police
Curtailed their availability.
Five years ago rockets flew from late
September, and fire crackers were
Slung over every hedge, accompanied by shouts
Of ‘Incoming’, but the naysayers have clamped down
On them and now they barely fizzle for ten minutes.
Still I’ll have a handful ready should
Any shoddily dressed wretch of a witch or
Goole town ghost propose to trick or
Treat me on my doorstep.

FRIDAY 30th OCTOBER 2009.

Her velvet dressed kiss
Withstood the bristle of my face
To place itself where intended,
And the sackcloth of my
Posture prospered at the touch.

A germ of colour was
Nourished and stretched across
The colourless; a frost was thawed
And treated to the warmth
That only comes from another.

Stooped and stolen
Shoulders commuted with the aims
Of their creator, and a spine,
So hard to find before,
Emerged from previous curves worn.

Love would never lean so
Low again to advance a mouth, or
Stand to reach, and freely clamp me
To the land I’d given
Forfeiture to instead of title;

For I thought only the idle
Cushioned themselves in the confined
Dimensions of the Earth’s good surface;
Born and bred and spread
Over every certain contour met,

Whilst I had hidden skyward;
Wandered on the scent of mechanisms
Risen from the stew once mixed with
Elemental breath, instead
Of breathing my being into it.

THURSDAY 29th OCTOBER 2009.

She’s a mother,
A daughter,
A sister,

And is proud
Of this list.

She also has
A mother,
A daughter,
A sister,

And is good
At these kinships.

But there’s one
Association
That is missing
From the ticket,

That she isn’t
Any good at,

Or particularly
Proud of,

And that is
Spouse.

WEDNESDAY 28th OCTOBER 2009.

The daughter and I getting giddy at the
Thought of new outfits for Harry; on the town
With a pocket full of finance and a keen
Eye out for what he doesn’t know he wants,
But we do. And when we think we’ve cracked it,
And our basket’s full, a glint catches an eye’s corner;
On the table, a navy blue puffed jacket, not his size,
But breathlessly we check beneath until we’ve caught
Our prize and then into the net it goes. We take him
To a hamburger restaurant for his bottle, but he doesn’t
Want simple milk supplements, he’s eyed the pile of
Meat patties and his eyes are no bigger than his belly,
So he sucks the juice from one corner and the producers
Of fast food appear to have another follower at their altar,
Regardless of whether he eats healthily for six days a week.

Stacked and packed and paid and out into
The pre-Christmas pantomime of the streets
We go, needling our way through the flow of
This bedraggled mass of South Yorkshire’s
Track suited finest; all mulling whether to buy now
And save time or wait for more fortune later, when the
Markets will be overflowing with bargains. The
Food stalls already are: an arsenal of every seasonal
Vegetable stacked in pyramids and traditional wooden
Boxes; a veritable cacophony of western staples straining
Traders’ patience and appealing for your table and, hidden
Inside the old Corn store, everything except the hooves, hides
And horns of animals are sliced for every conceivable palette,
And I just know this ballet of ours will run until my kids are full,
And my wallet bemoans the fact that I didn’t pack it well enough.

TUESDAY 27th OCTOBER 2009.

I’m trying to find myself.

Somewhere along the sad paths
I seem to have lost my way.

As with most people
I never intended to journey there,
But now I’m floundering.

Even if I’d skirted a verge or two
In the past I always drew back
And made the best of happiness
However beggarly attended.

But for some reason,
Recently,
I appear to have strayed
Too far into their range; the pull
Of some indignity must have
Distracted me,
Sufficiently,
To allow my feet to wander,
And now they’ve shed their steps
And cannot retrace them.

So help me.

Please.

Won’t you throw what lines you can,
Or organize a party to fan out
And encounter me.

I would appreciate it,
And thank you personally.

MONDAY 26th OCTOBER 2009.

I poured a better mood
And washed the wreck of
My bird pecked face, laving deeply
Enough to scrape star lit whiskers away.

Taking a tumbler full
Of stronger stuff from its bottle
I set to make a mention of my day,
Though nothing untoward had braved it.

Still there was a duty
To the future, to be cute about
The past, or maybe spit to be spat
At a particular part of it worth the matter.

I sat in a non sequined
Garment unable to find one
Good answer for the page’s rancor,
Though what caused its anger I don’t know:

I had done my dance
For the day, medicated my
Rage with enough cynicism to kiss
It better and whetted a protestor’s appetite,

But still inspiration
Failed my quill, and as the
Deadline of night fast approached
I had to use notes I’d taken yesterday instead.

SUNDAY 25th OCTOBER 2009.

Fall
And roll back the clock
For another hour in time’s line,
And if you do it
At two this morning,
And stay awake,
You get to live those sixty minutes again
And make amends
For any mistakes made;
You get to take another swing
At things.
So when the phone rings
You may fancy not
Answering it,
And when she says no
You’ll be ready for the blow
And know when
The conversation ends,
And what’s around the bend
Will not offend anymore
As every green light
Will be brighter.
So enjoy these post
Midnight ghosts
As you only get them once a year.

SATURDAY 24th OCTOBER 2009.

I’ve always loved a belly met
And have brass rubbings of them all:
The ones I rather would forget,
The ones I can’t recall;
The sainted virginal expanse,
The whore’s from the rocky road;
The tightest tucked into its pants,
The one that overflows.

A lattice work of hills and vales;
The vein work of a woman’s coat,
Upon my paper all are traced
Awaiting future notes:
This one deserves a perfect mark;
This other an even seven;
This next was taken in the dark,
A zero out of ten.

And what I left for ladies loved
I barely have to ponder on,
A chart of times spent up above
Or when they rapt were on;
For in control I rarely made
It dry into a Chapter House,
But underneath my name was saved;
A saddle to espouse.

So all the women I have known,
Whichever base we made it to,
I wish you love if you’re alone,
And happiness if wooed,
And when I find the time to look
At my collection of etchings,
I often wish I’d not mistook
Wonderful for wretched.

FRIDAY 23rd OCTOBER 2009.

In a dip
Was a drop
Of my love
Lost,

And
Unnoticed
I floated
Along,

But upon
A bump into
You I found
Its need

And
Reached into
My bag for
Its hand,

But it
Wasn’t there,
And we stood
Dumb,

And
Because of
Neglect you
Left,

And the
Dip, with its
Drop, grew
Deeper.

THURSDAY 22nd OCTOBER 2009.

Nothing tastes better
Than the petal of a top lip,
Bitten into and bottled;
Nothing lunges like the bottom one,
After been forgotten,
Oft the first one sipped.

Nothing licks like another’s tongue
Longing for the touch of yours
In order to turn itself into a lover’s;
Nothing makes more noise than
The tortoise shell throat it
Tends to swell from when called.

Nothing takes more time to
Distill than the swill from your
Mouth into hers through lips and teeth;
Nothing sieves like the sediment
Extracted from the given drops of
Mouth watered lust pushed back.

Nothing rises and falls like her
Breath, once flush with freshness,
And eventually swept of finesse;
Nothing improves like the loose
Nature of love once caught in
My double wing tipped print.

Nothing sticks like that kiss
Missed for so long and wished
Into existence with its symphonies;
Nothing plays longer or stays
Stronger than the last one made
Before other music soothes.

WEDNESDAY 21st OCTOBER 2009.

Oh the poor offspring,
With all the vitality of ichor in their
Veins but none of the reins
To enable them to steer it a clear course.

Crippled by doubt
As they are without sufficient social hold
To know how to respond to
The simplest rings life sets for jumping thru.

Slipped of restraints
Or indifferent triffids spitting out spores
And barely moving at all to do it;
Blinded by the lights whilst being hit.

Few words learned;
Nothing remotely resembling poetry
To say; barely a note above
Shopping lists passed between hands.

Swelled by a wealth
Of information and intelligent enough
To use it to achieve ends,
But unsure what to do with them once met.

Either mannered and
Tanned; educated along standard lines
And helped at home by
The strongest shoulders available to cry on

Or the errant, who do not
Have parents, or whose prove poor and
Appalling when there, and
Useless when not, unable to make it on time.

TUESDAY 20th OCTOBER 2009.

There’s a drone outside in
Need of a breath,
A permanent tone,
A plane going over,
And over,
A UFO hoping
To be noticed,
A ship’s horn mourning
The afternoon.
I checked it out:
At the end of the street
Machinery and men
Were eating into it;
Not simply resurfacing the road,
But peeling
Back inches of history
In table sized slabs,
And were currently down to flat caps and cobbles
And horse drawn trap marks.
They appeared determined and equipped
To strip deeper in whatever quest drove them:
Searching for body parts,
Or looking for the Mayor’s lost key maybe,
Or simply scraping to set a better foundation;
Either way the fuckers woke me up.

MONDAY 19th OCTOBER 2009.

Two teeth peeking
Out of his little mouth
As mine weaken
In my cavern of howling,
Echoing from the
Wrecked levels of old age
Whilst his kingdom is
The sinecure of youth’s stage;
Baby waves carrying
Him from his slot sided cot
To the barriers in the
Harbour of our Camelot,
Further from myth
And more readable
By the light of his
Eyes in evening’s lull.

A real world incursion
Of our cyber lives
Turned our new versions
Into merchandise;
Incapable of simple tasks
Without instructions,
Or the collection of facts
With actual functions.
He’s already got himself
A heartlist of lovers
Lined up to be shelved
And left up above;
A hit list of us ready
To bust out of the
Modern headspace
We’ve endowed.

SUNDAY 18th OCTOBER 2009.

The rug was barely growing
Between my toes when it
Was whipped from beneath me this time,
And
All I had was a nasty little
Friction burn on the soles
Of my feet instead of a floor scorched face
And,
Left standing, I am better
Placed to survey the scenery
And see the eventual peace pipe arriving.

Because it will, because it
Always has, attached to
A contrite hand cupping its love wood bowl,
And
Stuffed with the finest filler
She’s willing to blend from
The ends of the previous evening’s cigarettes,
And
This is the life she offers:
Yesterday’s leftovers; poked
And prodded into tomorrow’s brand new coat.

SATURDAY 17th OCTOBER 2009.

They don’t listen from distance,
Or focus up close,
And the mission you’re risking
Is token at most,
As the fate of your labour
Is scorched of reward
And baiting the graves
Only war can afford.

And soon after its draught has
Blown over your cove
All your rafters of laughter
Will soak up their load,
And the sound of surroundings
Will alter and stall
As all around town
Only morticians call.

So remain where the danger
Is smothered by stone
And exchanges can safely
Be moulded alone,
And the touch of another
Is scrawled on the walls
For such is the love
Only forced exile draws.

FRIDAY 16th OCTOBER 2009.

Another day in the bank;
Another 24 hours to draw on when life thaws
And thankfulness calls.

Somewhere in its minutes
Will be a memory to skim; a remembrance of
Something worth returning to.

Another copper for the small
Change bottle that, alone, is worthless metal
But together a veteran’s decoration.

Steam cleaned and picked of
Rusted links: her dancing in Christmas knickers
As opposed to soiled summer pants;

Stealing a spider’s lunch from
Its web instead of becoming it; seeing ahead of
Events before being read and fled from;

Going to bed and waking refreshed
Rather than having your mind reset, and generally
Bettering oneself before the lenses’ inspection.

Hindsight is more abundant than its
Quickly redundant brother, as eternity lasts longer
Than the time you spend acquiring your wishes,

But there’s no safe haven, for that's the
Trouble with end of the world incidents, they're everywhere,
And unwilling to spare even the sweetest dreamers.

THURSDAY 15th OCTOBER 2009.

I swallowed the sun and moon.
Digested them overnight
And replaced them the following day.

No one noticed as it was
Particularly overcast, and I have
Sufficient energy to hold down
Dual roles.

So when the world bowls over
The pins of starlight, I am the patterns
On its face, and your place upon it

And when evening comes
Again, and you look for inspiration,
I will be there as well to render
You fulfilled.

And you who live around
The corners of Earth’s surface need
Fear no more from neglect,

As on all sides I rise to greet you
On your way through the future,
And will ensure you’re saluted
Day and night.

WEDNESDAY 14th OCTOBER 2009.

The clear blue sky
Fooled me,
This Goole morning,
As a chill in the air
Spilled
Its cold silk
Down my neck,
And the
Effect was immediate:
Feet, that
Had eagerly
Greeted the sun
Moments earlier,
Shaved daybreak’s
Dust from the pavement
As they rushed
Back inside to
Address
My wardrobe better.
But upon
Attempting my
Journey again
The heavy grey scarf,
I now wore,
Was courted
By the still shrill
Light of autumn
And sweat followed
The previous textile’s
Course beneath my
Collar; It seems we
Can’t yet secure
Temperature’s
Honour.

TUESDAY 13TH OCTOBER 2009.

A beautiful herringbone sky;
A tidal beach up above,
New rippled sheets,
Corrugated steel,
The creases of an old man,
Blue paint peeling in the sun,
Water colours seeking each other,
Leaking into a lover’s mouth,
Speaking as one,
Tongues tied and spun,
Bed hiding even as night’s done,
Day’s features shunned,
Fun stumbled upon with a stranger,
A stage spun with cotton,
Age humbled and softened,
Fading from top to bottom,
Forgotten and lost,
Hot from the cost of
The cold back porch,
Frost clotting eye lashes
Casting a herringbone sky.

MONDAY 12th OCTOBER 2009.

When I used to manage the events
Of an excitable social life
I always worried that they would end too soon;
That a premature future would crash through
Whatever I was doing.
Enjoyment menaced
By the attendant sentence of time
Calling last orders or no more;
Seeping into the present and distracting
Me enough to cause resentment,
And sufficiently molest my mouth
So as to announce unhappiness,
Thus ending the evening and fulfilling
The worst of my previous misgivings.
And so a prophecy once sheltered by
The sensible canvass of self becomes strengthened,
And quenches itself, once the faculties
Raised against it are racked with doubt,
And I ended up not going
Out anymore for fear of coming back
Before the cock crows with no chance
Of standing and delighting in time’s flow.

SUNDAY 11th OCTOBER 2009.

Sunday tumbles out of Saturday’s mouth
And shouts Please;
Leave me alone.
Slumped in the space between the pressure
Cooker’s release valve and
It’s heating;
Just where it works the best, with rest's credit
Pledged for everybody’s
Use and accrual.

But do we listen? Do we heed the strident
Cries of anguish in
Its provision?
No; we steam straight thru evening’s skin
And into its dawn
Calling for more:
More wine, more weed, more sake to slake
The hunger of our
Wide desires;

Scuttling from the must have beens and
Surely weres and
Happening
Upon its morning without a following to
Honour our excess,
And its effects,
And expecting Sunday to pamper us
Until the working
Week dampens.

SATURDAY 10th OCTOBER 2009.

So guess who won the “First moron to
Shoot at the moon” award,
And more than a million dollars from
A decision by daft Norwegians.
There’s no figuring things out sometimes;
I’ve been threading genetic material,
Beading blood cells, filling in the
Blanks born of paper and still I can’t
Find myself in the mixture;
Apart from a small lottery win
On Wednesday nobody’s reimbursing
Me for my achievements, either realized
Or yet to be. Though to be fair to financial
Advantages my disappointments are less
Because of the paucity of my expectations.
I’ve hit them with big fists, with images;
I’ve cricked a neck from cell phone texts;
Numb thumbs and questions about grammatical veracity.
Though I’m better off than that poor little boxer dog
I saw locked in a car, no wonder they look so glum;
His indented chin resting on the window’s cold door,
Waiting for his owner to show.
Two nights ago I tried to lasso a goose flying south,
But I missed and hit a swan in a pond,
The same one I’ve been trying to get out of all my life
But keep coming back to; this apple’s not
Fallen far from the tree, he’s still in the fucking thing.
I guess I may have attacked my batteries and
Risked being fixed to the spot.
But it’s my spot, and I
Dare say I’m prepared
To drop penniless
For it.

FRIDAY 9th OCTOBER 2009.

Somewhere above this shivering land there’s a cloud waiting
For your weather beaten head.

An enclosure covered with steam and more fitting your station;
To idle in as you refuel your life.

Where ideas of temporary location are lost in the vastness of
Ocean drawn mist and its kisses.

Where the sagacities of facts are left behind and a shattered
Mind is welcome to wander.

Stripped of material pities and petty commitments, and steeped
In a fresh crust of citrus.

A place to unlace the material of your skin stretched features
And mingle with the ancient.

Soaking up the life blood of neighborhoods further afield than
Three blocks away, and unpaved,

And sacred in its make-up: seminal in element and eternal in
Furnishing coal for the soul.

THURSDAY 8th OCTOBER 2009.

Dare a foot out of the eiderdown
To see what kind of cold awaits;
Share the operation with another
And together collate the data.
If both agree it would be folly
To fall out of the bed right now
Roll over closer to your honey
And share your warmth aloud.

Set a time to check again and
Draw straws of hair to choose
Who should dip a warm toe out,
And don’t forget to let her lose.
And if she shivers like a river
Run over rapids to a waterfall
Let her know she’ll be forgiven
For releasing the beds warmth.

And if she’s freezing on return
Warm her with a wrestle hold,
And soon her feathers will burn
And heat your nest once more.
As afternoon and evening pass
Arrange to make a food trip,
Quickly with a kitchen dash
And back before the mood slips.

A day in bed cannot be bought,
And partners can’t be bettered;
The world of work’s an afterthought
Compared to leisure’s sweating.
And guilty found or innocent,
Of wrapping tight and hiding,
You can justify your fainéance
When frigidity is rising.

WEDNESDAY 7th October 2009.

I met you at work, and sat as you
Finished; helping you with your coat
And opening doors. We fought
Our way through the crush and I walked you home
Against your wishes, although you
Didn’t complain too much. At the perimeter
Of your bedroom window you asked
That we keep out of sight of for awhile.

I expressed my fondness for you,
And you teased me for my affection,
Then teased me with yours,
Slipping the tip of your tongue between your lips,
And tapping it against mine;
Prizing them open and tramping around
My mouth, capturing my script,
And gasping at the strength of it.

The length of your own talk walked
It’s way into me, and urgently we took
To the side of the road, which
Closed at our request. The rest was a blur of half
Caught words, terms of lust
And fast love fluffed, immersed in the
Rush, and the twitching of curbed
Hedgerows matched those of curtains.

TUESDAY 6th OCTOBER 2009.

Here in the heart
Are messages to send;
Kept in cells and
Awaiting oxygen.

There in the head
Are reception halls;
Impatient for words
To be aired and installed.

In between are those
Who would deny exchange,
And it’s our purpose
To ensure they’re restrained:

Framed in the space
Of the world’s looking glass,
And out of the way
Of our breath’s path;

For in spite of fools
Grouped to diminish us
We will prove
Ourselves windowless.

MONDAY 5th OCTOBER 2009.

I woke.
A weight pressing on my chest.
In fact I’d slept on my front.
My body conspiring against me.
Breathing shifting from easy to drifting in and out of old air bags,
Which don’t inflate, but collapse, as I crash.
My length bending awkwardly, extending more so.
Knees twisting before, or after, my torso.
And all of it forced where once it was not.
Thoughts infected by my body’s directions.
Fears steered into dead end dark alleys hiding unspeakable maladies.
Fretting myself sweat less until I can’t rest
And taking tablets for stress.
Pills for ills I don’t have but have been convinced of
By this selfish shell of mine,
That, no matter how hard I urge, will not work as designed.
Health invented by wealth conscious fools
Won’t bloom on my frame,
No matter how much fertilizer is worked in,
Or booze consumed or smoke blown,
Or lovers uncovered.
And so I choke
Alone.

SUNDAY 4th OCTOBER 2009.

You can take the seasons of life,
Of husband and wife;
Of mother and daughter,
Woman and son,
Brother and sister
And other sibling options.

You can reason with a dad and his girl,
The teen and her Pa,
But the bond that is stronger,
That is longer
Than charts,
Is the one between a father and his boy,
Immortality’s envoy.
The child and the man,
The patriarch and his mark on the world.
The heir and
His parent;
The reality of
Life stretched beyond him.
The essence of Man.
The blessing of a scion.

And you beautiful ladies,
Who cradled and made us,
You can have all the rest
To digest at your leisure,
But we’ll claim the best
And be blessed by his treasure.

SATURDAY 3rd OCTOBER 2009.

What people did next was to sleep.
A process was perfected which
Allowed them to rest for years at
A time without ageing; being woken
Every Olympics or so, living a few weeks,
And sleeping once more; thereby
Passing some bad times in slumber
And effectively living longer.
After a while they chose to wake
Every decade, and preparations were
Made, and as they dreamt ever longer
Events the world changed around
Their tents, and once shaken from sleep
They proceeded to repeat the pattern.
Eventually they awoke every century,
And there were less folks to mention
It as most chose to do the same,
And the world looked less human and
All the more groomed for it. The dreamers
Were keener to return to their eternal
Adventures, spending longer and longer
Entrenched in their ethereal worlds,
Whilst the material one entered a
Golden age. After millennia there
Weren’t any men or women left to
Notice that the surface had coated
Them in a perpetual cocoon of womb
Like existence. The monitors blinked
For an eon before thinking better, and
Winked out, and nobody announced it.

FRIDAY 2nd OCTOBER 2009.

A small family of leaves huddle beneath my front door step,
Refugees of the season,
As a plastic bag hovercraft goes past my gate, hastened by
A more endorsed wind.

The wide screen window behind the television shows life in
More than high definition,
As the holly’s outline pierces even from this distance and the
Rose’s thorns warn likewise.

A pomegranate, ripped open on the pavement, shows its pips,
Virginal and simultaneously erotic,
While spiders, heightened by the dry summer, strut their stuff
Looking for love, and frighten instead.

Things change quickly in the country, and the town, surrounded
By such, suffers much for its concrete beach,
And we free people, squashed into brick worked life rafts, draft
Proofed and insular, hunker down for darker nights.

And the surrounding sea, once criticized for hounding land and
Eating into our tiny vineyards and apple orchards, has
Pulled back its tides and packed its waves away, giving up its
Bitten sands, and left for other shores more civilized than ours.

THURSDAY 1st OCTOBER 2009.

Harry passed his first six months
As evening fastened itself over the last of September’s sun,
And since he came to join this crusade
Against the pointless he’s made the greatest changes even
As the country’s collective chest is tighter,
Its breathing is lighter, its dilating eyes are highlighting fear,
For Harry has blessed us with half a year,
And if we’re still unable to leave a meaty comment alone,
Or condone the achievements of a receding
Government, these things pale into insignificance against
The twenty six weeks he’s given us.

And though my health is worse and
My purse more pillaged by villainous ministers, announcing
Change, arranged against these
Developments are the elements of my words; firmer for my
Son’s accompaniment, more certain
Than a won event and urgent in their furtherance of purpose,
And whatever perilous times line up against
Me as long as his hand is in mine, and his smile behind, then
All the meagerness of people employed to lead
Will be defeated by the simplicity of describing how much
More his life means to me than theirs.