Awake on the city’s lines
Birds sing karaoke, out of time
To Night’s electric dirty
Diesel dittied backing beats,
Dawn turns up unannounced,
And turns up the original track,
Instantly everything syncs back
Into perfect harmony, as usual.
sun
In his tale of two cities Dickens said ‘The day came coldly, like a dead face out of the sky’
What is there to fill this grey day?
Is there someone for whom
It is not grey, is there someone
Who switches on the lights with
Every blink? Is there a place
In this grey city where life flows
Strong and people are enjoying
Their work and loving themselves
And seeing light in every eye even
Though the sun’s switched off?
Tending Towards Generosity
Why do we sow and water a patch
We do not own? Is it because we
Know that we and Peace are jeopardised
If our sunflower seeds are left to grow smug
Beside barren pods who cannot
See the sun, blinded by jealousy and
Deranged by the thirst that comes
From sharing Earth with thicker
Roots than theirs can ever be?
In tending to what is not ours, Nature does
Not credit us with generosity, She understands
How truly selfish are her fans,
To share the water, Earth and Sun
Is not Love but preservation of a self
That needs the nourishment that
Giving gives the giver to feed the
Craving for that gratitude and Love
That fills us when we have enough to eat but
Goes lactic as we grow hungry, keen to steal
And fence what we once gave and scattered.
Don’t let pain
Take the pain away
Take it down to the
High ground up ahead
To a place where it
Can breathe and exhale
Out the ache, the
Trapped strain that
Congests the brain and
Turn that clot of blackness,
Redundant coal to prism-like
Beauty like a pyramid,
Newly carved and decked
In adamite to brilliant the
Sun-strong beams that
Radiate sight.
Please take it away, shaft
It through this day to scratch
The surface of the next dawn
With a clean mark that says
Today is new and so are you,
Pain free- falling blissfully in
Light on a sirocco billow
Cushioned as you drop from
Branch to branch and bounce
Around with each new song.
Now it is waning
The pain in the feet
The sweat in the head
The crowd are dispersing
After relentless applause
In the sinus’ crammed stalls.
Making their way through
The limbs, women trailing behind,
Queuing under the Ladies sign
Written in tear duct pink
While the men go full surge
Ahead, keen to be first out,
At the nail-gates cold blue
Iron, into the night to hail
A cab home.
How to tell him?
How to tell him
I’m not going to
Age well? I’m
Aging now, in the
Night, in the dark
These hands, these
Feet are swelling
And wrinkling. These
Warts are growing
These ears and nose
And eyes are growing
Into eternity till
They no longer hear
Or see or feel like
They used to to
Him or me.
How to tell him that
My face, decaying,
Is still my own, although
It looks different,
Misshapen somehow,
Compared to Yesterday’s,
When the sun beamed down
In its Vitamin D and
He looked through
My eyes and into
My soul with
Blind desire, giving in
To me
Yesterday I felt
Him charge me
Up – Electrolysis
In my veins, an
Electrical murmur
Through my limbs
But not my own.
Today that buzz
Is gone, the current
Lingers but grows
Weak until crash,
Boom, none.
Alone again, in
My midnight well.
Time drips slow
Again and my
Head drops, held
Between my elbows,
On my knees
Feet throb hot
On the cold floor,
Hands grown cold
And sweaty, jaw
And teeth creak
On rusting hinges
And Youth seems
Lost to the Light
High up,
Above.
A Morning, Late November
Rod of silver
Wand struck
Soft on my head
Of thoughts laced
With sweet, dripping
Nectar beads
Sweet, dripping
Nectar drop.
The Sun shines
Nourishment on
Me on the bedclothes
And my day dawns
Thick, cool, clear
And tinged with
Autumn, crusts
Of the year, left to crumble, crunch
And pile their juices into compost
Fodder for the Spring.
I rise to meet
These orange-browns,
Lights dangling,
Lights drifting, drunken
Twirling through
The gusts,
Traffic wardens flick them off.
(26th November 2009)
A Day in the Year of an Ox
Yoke heavy
Nostrils singeing
In the Sun,
Glistening with fresh
Snotty sweat,
Black with deep flesh.
Track trodden, soft
And stodgy, bouldered
Thickly, sticky stoned.
Stoic foam it drips
And slips from tongue
To lip and lower,
Down, the rim of hairy
Fur, the hoary jaw,
The bull’s sound-
Piece, it grunts.
Loud it feels that
It could groan but
No, its eyes are down
And grooves
Cut fissures in
The soul as soil
Is churned and
Churned
And churned.
[6th October]
Being Every Day 