It won’t take long
Before you spew that black disgust
In torrents down the loo.
Now relax again
Oh what elation
You may now wonder why you never tried the wonder
Of tobacco chunda.
Crow
You can’t trust a crow
They laughed at me freezing in the snow.
Boots all frosted
Wet and sodden
Fingers and toes
Iced to the bone.
Laugh crow laugh
You wouldn’t help me if I fell
Frozen in the snow.
Even if you could you wouldn’t
You’re a crow.
A shiny black hearted crow
Who looks good in the snow
Who flies with the wind
And laughs
At those below.
You can’t trust a crow
You know.
Fat Cats
If you feed the birds
You feed the rats
If you feed the rats
The cat gets fat
There are no words
To stop a cat
From getting rather fat.
And soon the cat
Becomes a rat
And eats your food
That’s rude !
So you take a loan
To save your home
From being eaten by the rat.
But
The rat is smart
Without a heart
And puts you on the street.
You get divorced
The kids flunk school
You go insane
And down the drain
Wishing you had fed a mule
And not a bird
Who fed a rat
That made the greedy cat get fat.
Fishy Business
Tomorrow never knows a fish
As it might end up
A kitchen dish.
They partied hard last night
These fish,
Kept me up until first light
‘Get the good times in’
They said
‘Make a noise
And have a fight.’
Let them play
I say
It’s not for us
To stop them
Being gay.
But this morning the pond is still
Not a sight
Of last night’s fight.
They’ve bottomed out
Refuse to show
Lying low
Pretending
They are fish.
The Zero King Goes Fishing
A lonely girl on heat
Went fishing on the beach
To catch a loving fish
Who seemed somewhat out of reach.
She cast her line far and deep
Baited good with scent so fine
That even Zeus
Would not to resist,
So what chance was there for a simple loving fish?
Lured and caught and now lying on a beach
Under a spell by the Zero King’s feet.
She took him home for tea
But couldn’t knock him on the head.
Hungry, she took him up to bed
The Wasp Keeper
Blackberries and wasps
On a hot summer’s day.
Finger stinging good
If you get in their way.
Sweet juicy goo
Drunk as a skunk
Or a wasp in this case.
I once kept them as pets
Fourteen nests at once.
Here’s the art:
Cut the nest out and place gently in a box
Come back at midnight and your catch will be home
Seal the lid in one quick swoop
Take them home and leave until anger has turned to exhaustion.
Maybe at nine the next morning
Make a gentle hole
And pour in some honey
As they fly out
They’re no longer angry
And soon work out their new home without need of compass or map.
But if you open the box the night before
They are fury itself and are soon lost and gone
To lament and perish before stinging the neighbour’s dog.
They never stung me once,
I could even open the boxes and have a good look
That’s a true story by the way.
Neverland
Though perils
Wait
And often lay
Hidden deep
In Biscay Bay
The words of poems
Find their way
Across an ocean
Of furious spray
Where white caps break
All night and day
Until
The words
Are cast ashore,
A journey’s end
They travel no more.
And here they lay
In Florida Bay
A helping hand
Called
Neverland.
Chapter 5: The Light of Being
Emptiness
Have you ever heard the sound of rain
On a raven’s wing
Or an echo fade to silence
Like ripples coming onto shore.
And when it’s gone and there seems no more
It’s that empty space
I move,
One thousand fibres shaking
Vibrating
Coming back to shore.
The Girl Who Wouldn’t Be
Wisps of mist
Transparent shadows
Vaporising.
And as I try to grasp at what
Or who you are
You turn
And go back and out to sea
Less you manifest
And quiver
In the sunshine
Of a bright and brand new
Endless
Burning day.
The River
The future doesn’t wait
It just arrives
Like an endless river
Flowing through a storm.
It doesn’t ask
And it doesn’t care
So whatever you do
You’d better beware
Coz
Nothing stands still
And nothing is real,
Just fragments of dreaming
Is
All that you are.
Chapel Bank
In the vast corn coloured plain
Sits a hill,
A tiny bump
That only ancient locals or gifted travellers
May ever come to know.
And on this spot
A faded yellow grave stone
Hides in shade
Under sprawling maple
Whose roots feed deep
On times so very long ago.
You can see the whole world from here,
360 degrees
Of uninterrupted views.
So you go there
And be
Amazed.
A Rainbow’s End
The shimmer of a rainbow
going into ground.
I move towards this apparition
that science claims we can never meet.
But, I did
And stepped right in
a giant soap bubble of multi coloured hues
It’s true for me
But true may never be for you.
Chapter 6: Words
Words
If words were birds
They’d be
Ravens’ claws
Shredding
Hard won
Sensibilities.
You can stomp your feet
Have a total hissy fit,
How dare you
Write such dross.
You’ve pierced our hearts
Upset
Our fine tuned
Apple carts.
I hear you clear
Precious dear
But words are words
Not big black scary birds.
So to use some favourite phrase of mine
Out of time
But I like the line:
Go and sling your hook
And take another nosey look.
To Lets or not to Let’s
Kidnapped by pirates
Long ago on a wild Saragossa sea,
Chained and Shackled
And thrown in a smelly Hold
We pleaded for our lives:
“Oh please kidnappers - Let us go”
But they just cruelly laughed.
So we tried again
“Oh please kidnappers – Let’s go”
“Go where?”
Was the baffled response.
“Anywhere but here”
“We’re sorry but you can’t go anywhere
Not with that damned stupid Apostrophe”
“Oh.”
So we removed that damned Apostrophe and used it as a key.
With the shackles gone and us ready to roll
We said:
“Lets go guys”
And they said:
“Sure – you fancy some Kentucky Fry?”
The Broken Perfect
My headset’s broke.
That’s not perfect
But it should be so.
It’s simple past
But no one knows.
I’m in America
My tongue’s gone slow.
Eat a sandwich
And let the tense lie low.
My headset has broken
This tense has woken.
But being perfect
Sure aint worth it.
Poetry
I’m not a poet
Just don’t have
That sentiment.
I’m
A word assembler
Who understands
Our common
Shared perception.
Build the prose
onto the page
To often
Find rejection.
Dear Sly
Smile as you cheat and you lie
To get what you can.
A bit like your brother Cunning who’s always
running some kind of scheme or clever plan.
And here’s Crafty
Distant cousin of these ruthless brothers above.
Crafty might even fall in love
Might even smile
With his crafty whiles,
While his old chum
Who’s friends with your Mum
And everyone else’s Mum
Is called Wily,
Who thinks on his feet
Learnt on the street
But won’t talk to Devious
Who’s more than mischievous
And not such a genius
And bit of a brute
Unlike Astute
Who is sharp and aware,
A bit like Wily,
But Wily likes to dare.
Jade
Latin lips
Linguistic kiss
Twisted tongue
That’s never missed.
A magic spell
Speaks me well
Horrible verbs
Turn to friendly words.
My ABC
Starts to list
Let English vanish
As you teach me Spanish.
Pandora’s Chocolate Box
Oooh the Temptation of a Belgium chocolate box
It Tempts me every day
Through the window on my way to work.
And then one day the door is open
That Tantalising smell so gorgeous
Makes me drool, and shake and shiver to my bones.
I’m hooked and Lured and utterly Seduced as I walk on in and take a bite
Of its irresistible delights.
You Tempt me
Tantalise me with your smell
Make me drool, and shake and shiver to my bones.
It’s no good
I’m hooked and Lured and utterly Seduced as I take a bite
Of your irresistible delights.
Can I have some more ?
The Light of Being
There’s a Glimmer of hope out there.
You can just see it, faint but there
Like a ship far out on the night’s horizon.
It doesn’t Dazzle like a car’s bright headlights
Or Dazzle like a beauty would,
It just Glimmers like dying embers in the fire
Alive with hope to burn again.
And on that night time seascape
The moon reflects the movement of the waves,
That’s Shimmering, but it could be day
With the sun reflecting and vibrating on anything that moves,
Like leaves Shimmering in the breeze and midday sunshine
Or hazy shadows dancing in the wind
Or that lustful Shimmer in your Gleaming eyes.
And if they Gleam they are Shiny like new, catching the light
For all to see.
And
Sometimes things Glint, a very quick sparkle of a Shiny thing,
Or a mischievous Glint in someone’s look or eye,
Or they Glow which is more than Glimmer but with warmth like a Glowing fire,
Or a Glowing smile of satisfaction on your Dazzling face.
And if something Sparkles, it’s bright and light like a fairy with a magic wand and Sparkling fairy dust.
And if it Twinkles it’s like a star, a small Sparkle turning on and off.
And if these words disappear
The world is pitch black and as boring as hell !
The Reader
If you are here
Inside this text
Shall
Assume
That you were fed
The ABC
To help express
The Me Me Me
Inside your head.
With words in your ear
What choice but be
A thing called me.
We’ve all been had !
I hear you say
Our drinks were laced
From outer spac
e
And the words are spells
Confused as hell.
We’ve been had!
I hear you say.
That’s right Old Boy
And absolutely barking mad.
Slippery Fish
It’s Baffling trying to work out Baffle
You’re stuck, can’t work it out at all
You need some clever help to solve this puzzle.
You could be Flummoxed
Hit a brick wall
A bit shocked and confused
Don’t worry, it will pass in time.
All that may be Perplexing
Your intellect is a mess
Keep trying, you’ll work it out in the end.
If you find all the above Confusing
Which is a general mind mess
Where you really don’t know right from left
Just cut yourself some slack,
For
No one else knows the difference between these words
They are as Bewildered as you
Scratching their heads
Shrugging their shoulders
Confounded by this group of dissidents
Which might mean a bit angry, upset, confused and exacerbated all at the same time.
Now go sling your hook, have beer and send these words to oblivion !
Chapter 7: General
A Scottish Herd
The relatives are out to lunch
Barking mad if you ask me.
They were made that way
I hear you say
Down in the hay
The Catholic way.
The relatives are out to lunch
Hail to the Marys
Away with the fairies.
But don’t say a word
For
Mum’s the word
To breed
The herd
Inside the herd.
Hebridean
Tiddy McCrackers and Barking Mad Haddock
Live on their island zoo.
Stuck out of the way
In the surf and the spray
It’s a very nice place to stay.
They sleep in a cave
Just under a wave
And right where they lay
Is an angry sting ray.
They run wild and amok
Along with their stock
On black cows that bay
They charge through the hay.
This spins you no yarn
It’s true to its charm
There’s deer and a tarn
So no need to mock
But please shut the lock !
One Last Bender
Well, it was a bender perhaps, but short lived it seems.
A weekend in re-hab
Is merely the day after the bender before.
Sounds as if you have very nearly finished
With this stuff you call bender
Because something else inside you
Is now called a mender.
And as the benders
Get smaller
And the menders get taller
I dare you to leave your castle
And the shadows
That gnaw you.
Surf’s Up
Surf’s up
So catch the wave
There may not be another one
For ten years
Or more
If ever.
So catch the wave
Or flounder in the water.
And if you find yourself
Splashing around
Just waiting, waiting, waiting
Swim to shore
And find another beach
To catch your wave
To wonderland.
When fortune shines
Some people find
A hundred waves on a hundred shores.
While others wait
And nothing comes
At all.
And as those who wait and wait and wait
Missing out and lost to sea,
What they haven’t seen
Are the hundred waves