SHE MAKES ME DAILY.

Half of me is in the relative security of my pure
And tutored land,
Which has made me stand like granite
Through
The loss of a father
And profit
Of a son;

But the other part of me,
The sure and true and softly proven half,
Is in a jar
In the far land,
Kept vestal
By her,
And treasured beyond worth,

And she completes me every time we speak,
Whether nestled
In the once in a lifetime love we’ve shaped
Or wrestling
Each others’ opinion
To winter’s
Mat,

And need meets need
Between the separated pieces of me,
As my heart,
Once hardened,
And torn in two,
Is renewed
By her undying beauty.

BE PICKY WHO YOU LISTEN TO.

You can push back
Or forward,
Or more ways
Than these,

But you’ll never move with ease
Until you’ve fully
Released yourself
From the overwhelming
Sense
Of dread
That you’ve pulled
Along with you
For years;

Since your fears
Were named for you
By discord’s
Broadcasters

And the last scraps of
Your anchor
Were scraped
Of their allaying weight,
And
The great
Bits of your backbone
Snapped and cast
You adrift

Amidst the quicksand
Of hampering
Sounds from the mouths
Of fools.

JUST ANOTHER DAY.

Now I knew
It was going to be one of those days
Because it didn’t start well,
As the previous night had ended badly
And I hardly
Caught sleep’s attention,

And once I woke,
And poked my cornered legs
From the bed,
I warded them down the landing,
Only to be stranded,
As the first thing I encountered was the baby shouting,
As always,
But for some reason,
Now,
He sounded more resounding
And severe
Than ever,

And once downstairs
My fears were proven true,
As he proceeded to dissect my routines,
And wreck my best efforts to restore them,
And the morning was lost before breakfast was over,
And I still had to dress him,
And shower,
And negotiate potty training,
And the play group,
Before shopping
And hopping off the merry-go-round
For a minute
In order to go for a piss myself;
Still I could be a canary in a coal mine,
Couldn’t I...

WHY NO ONE ANSWERS ANYMORE

Man created the New World
So that God wouldn’t have to be troubled,
And His judgement
Could be pushed aside,
And as pilgrims and pagans
Descended upon it
They dispensed
With its indigenous nations,
Whose own spirits,
Warmer at night
Than the imported
Bottled varieties,
Were swiftly
Defeated
By the heathens
Who wielded their version
Keener,

But God
Has had his fill
Of shrilling harpies
And willing evangelicals
Since being conjured
From the fastness of his castle,
Where he’d lounged for so long
Since creation
Had depleted his resolve,
And after seeing puritans
Scouring these lands of man
He pulled the corner of his cover
Ever tighter over
His eyes
And decided
That the best thing to do
Would be to leave them to it.

MODERATE OPERATIVE.

Recently
There’s been a slow down
Of incentive,
Of invention;
A departure from the star chart,
Or maybe there’s existed
A whisper of excitement,
An increase in delight,
A definate turn of preferred pallete,

But I guess it all depends upon
Where you’re coming from
In the first place,
And I have
To address
The fact
That I generally putter along
On the flat line,
The horizontal cockle,
Neither jumping manically above it
Nor lunging too far below

And although there are occasional peaks,
And periodic troughs,
There are not enough
To speak
Grandly of them,
Or in their turn
Burn their appearance
Into a consistent blister of either,
But as I could be wallowing
In a slump’s dungeon
I suppose that’s not such a bad thing.

ONCE AND FUTURE HUB.

When I was a kid
The stalls
In the Market Hall
Were made of moveable slabs of plastic,
Salmon coloured and glacier mint shaped,
And draped with the scrawniest adornments,
But containing the rarest produce around:
Whether confectionary collected
From the four corners of factory floors
Or American comic books stacked so high
That the proprietor didn’t have a clue about their value,
Or traders with similar gifts to thrift stores
But without the charitable clout behind them,
And whose ephemera had more memories
Than the customers who should have
Recollected selling it months ago.
And along the seductive rows of fresh produce
There was always an unknown fruit
Or vegetable that made you wonder how edible it was
Or whether it belonged to a different store completely.
And heat was provided by several levitated radiators
That seemed to throw their glow ever angrier
And dared you to care that they barked at you
Without grates to contain their favours,
But then they appeared so high as to be outside
The remit of the building’s ceiling,
And sparked by sun-fire itself,
And the old Victorian bazaar
Was only open at the weekend
And seemed to end no sooner than begun,
Or so I recall,
And all in all
Its business was richer
To me back then,
But I was only
Ten.

LITTLE DICKY BIRDS.

Apparently,
Sometime in the mid Nineties,
Peter and Paul flew away
From the nursery
They were roosting in,
And haven’t been seen since.

Come to think of it
Neither have Andrew, or Matthew or Martin or Mark,
And standing nowhere near them
Are Phillip and Michael and Steven,
And even
David and Darren and Danny and Gary
Are absent,
As are with Robert and Roger and Simon and Luke,
And Richard himself,
And John,
Of all people,
Has gone
Too,
Along with Rodney and Raymond,
Who, let’s be honest,
Weren’t all that famous even then.

But what is peculiar,
Amongst the modern monikers of Jaiden and Kaidan,
And the superstar cadres of Dylans and Lennons,
Are the collection of flowing cognomens,
Like Harry and Freddie and Georgey and Billy
Along with Archie, a Ronnie, a Charley or two,
Thrown in with Jacky and Harvey and Olly anew;
So I guess what we’ll have to do,
In order to entice that little flock back,
Is either rename them,
Or wait for a Bible revival,
And don’t even get me started on the
Charlottes and...

BRIDGING THE MIDDLE.

Let us lay
Face to face
And do something intimate,
Like drip spit between our tongues,
Or lick lips until numb
Or press thumbs into the recesses of our necks
And,
Before sex
Takes us,
Make a pact
To act better when
Not in so familiar a position,
And then maybe when languishing
In the atrocious abyss
Caused by distance,
And the contempt it lends itself to
When patience can’t wait any longer,
We can recall
Being enthralled
By each other,
And recover composure
Long enough
To remember how long
Our far-flung
Love
Has lasted,
And how its confidential pledges
Endlessly close
Whatever remoteness
Comes
Between us.

BEHIND.

Let me spank
Your bottom
As we dance
Round a totem pole
In forgotten
Roles
To a beat
Whose heat
Is metered
Out
To the sound
Of shouting
And pleasure,
And then let me measure
My lust
Against the dust
That has
Covered
Love’s
Cause,
To the wild applause
Of all
As I follow
Your glowing
Arse
In the dark.

TOGETHER APART.

I’d been searching for her
From year to year,
Without knowledge of a name,
Or location,
Or even an appearance
Or presence,

And suddenly I found her,
Over the airwaves,
And lodged an immediate appeal
For leniency
With the fates that had kept
Us apart thus far,

And in its timely kindness
It granted to us
The opportunity to cement love
To life’s hide,
And hop across continents
Whilst biding it,

And so with thanks in hand
We gladly landed
Upon strands of charcoal runways
That tumbled
Out of the clouded skies
Between us

And greeted each new visit
As if a wish
Were freshly granted and banked,
And used its credit
To get us more time
For the next.

THE ONLY MORAL RESPONSE.

Whether you strap yourself
To a worthy cause
Or source
More
To follow yours,
You’ll
At least
Manage
More feast
Than famine,
And ensure
Few
Hours
Remain
Aimless
Whilst
Gaining
The best
Education
Available
As the fringes
Singe
To reveal
That the zeal
Of bigots
Triggers
Raw eagerness
From ordinary mortals.

MEN-OF-WAR.

There were Moon Jelly fish
At the exhibition,
On a corner,
In a huge tube of water,

And as we rounded it
We were grounded
By its stature,
And the zigzag tracks of
The translucent bags
Inside

Swimming to
Within
A tentacle’s length
Of each other,
But always managing
To avoid contact,

And in a mischievous mood
I stared,
Waiting for a careless
Leg
To brush too close
To another
And uncover
The true nature
Of these creatures;

Waiting to see one guy
Retaliate,
And the whole thing ignite,
Like a Western bar-fight.

MORE SUPPLIED THAN DEMANDED.

So I didn’t grab what I could have had
When the opportunity to do so was closer
Than my nose,

And I never wished to fish that well again
Even though folks told me their bait was taken
Quite easily,

And that’s fine by me because my sea
Chose to row me along a different course
From those ones,

And I willingly allowed the more crowded
Boats to go by when their speed was greedier
Than my paddles,

But I’m happy I got to dabble with
Amphetamine laced pace and was taken
By calmer times

To different places and climes where the
Tastes are less mined and more sporting rods
Are used,

And where love has a chance to infuse
More slowly and grow more holy because
Of its leisure

And a man doesn’t measure his wealth
By the strength of his stock but by the accounts
Of others.

THE IMPACT OF INACTION.

There are worlds
Within the walls
Of this one
That are further removed from mine
Than any celestial body could ever be,
More impossible to imagine than
The lost mysteries of antiquity
And more obvious than the rising
Sanctity of the anticipated sun.

But when searched for,
When sought,
When energy
Has leant to me its last emergency reserves,
I’ve been unable to gauge these realms
With any certainty worth the term,
Indeed I’ve been incapable of holding open
The golden silk of my veiled eyes
Long enough to analyse them.

And this tenacious failure
To fulfil my ability,
This illiteracy,
Has left me without knowledge enough
To populate these places of solace
That have orbited at intervals,
And cornered me in auditoriums more fierce
And creased than any gladiatorial hall
Could have cut into my features.

MY BOY GOES UP TO BED.

As we steered towards
The living room door,
Heading
For bed,
He said
“Harry off to wake the dark up”

And I couldn’t put
Anything better myself,
As he set off
Up the stairs,
With his breezy
Knees

And elbows
Throwing
His weight
Up straight,
Free
Of any encumbrance,

Like the dance
Of a tranced out
Tripper,
Or a snipped
In half
Spider,

And striding
He went into his room
Where the gloom
Was dismissed
With a kiss
To my lips.

REASONS NOT TO LEAVE THE NIGHT.

My desk top box
Is slowing
And glowing
As it hisses steam

And light switches
Glisten
As they flick off
And shock

And there’s no languishing
In the bath
As it’s more suitable
For removing soot

And I’m stuck
In the inevitable rut
Of doing
And not doing stuff

As the suited
Beauty
Of the day lays
Itself before me

And socks sit
Beside my shoes
As I choose
Whether to use them

Or stay in bed
Another twenty minutes
With its
Comfortable love.

UPS AND DOWNS.

My parcel
Had hardly
Been packaged,
And booked,
Before a big brown truck
Arrived to collect it,
And as soon as I sat
At the computer
The tracking
Had it
Arrived, checked and despatched
From Donnington
And on its way over the Atlantic,
And the next trick,
As if by magic,
And quicker than Star Trek technology,
Had it arriving in Philly
Where it’s
Air Way Bill
Was scanned again
And sent
On its way to Chicago
Via Rockford and Palatine, Illinois,
Where the boys
On site
Must have had a rough night
Watching Superbowl 46
Because as we speak
It has still to be delivered,
To my love,
Even though it’s been
Scheduled
For such
Since early this morning.

MY SOVEREIGN.

So here’s a little piece
For she
Who has been
The ever present
Spirit of this nation
For the duration
Of my life,
And a few years beyond that;

Existing
On the peripheries
Of all our lives,
But enriching them,
And many more,
With her tireless devotion
To our welfare
And the lands we rest upon.

Inextricably linked
To the position she holds,
And bettering
Its heritage
With every modern moment
That passes
Before her
Never changing agency,

But also with the knowledge
That as every year
Speeds away
It’s one more since
Her beloved father died,
And so to this bride of history I wish
A glistening anniversary,
And many more.

CLICKING AWAY.

There’s an old colonial castle
Where the latest and greatest dry out,
Once they’ve wasted the good will they’ve built,

And there they are hoisted up amidst the ceiling rafters,
Where the drafts are keen,
Whilst beneath
The smouldering ash of hickory logs
Is poked to keep its smoke alive,
And allow its fog to rise
And modify
The maladies
That have clipped the crisp
And tender mental states above.

And isn’t it a pity
That all the love in the world
Cannot be used to bathe them in once burnt

By the blistering lights of society’s exposure,
And the shutter speeds
Of the needy,
Who wring the ink
From the photographs
They steal
In order to sell
And allow them to dwell
In American heaven
Instead of everyone else’s hell.

THE FINE LINES OF DESIGN.

I’m operating at maximum capacity,
And there’s simply no wiggle room available should
A solar storm of almighty proportions hit
And overload my already shredded mettle,
Or if a seasonal affliction were stick to me
It would probably appear as severe as Lassa fever
And leave me bleeding on the inside,

And if hunger lunged at an importune moment
I fear that thirst would curse its damnable luck
And fuck me twice as fast as voracity,
Or were persons of a questionable nature
Able to attract fate’s vapour and veil their intentions
No doubt I would fall for their ruse
And be abused without power to refuse them.

All my friends are somebody else’s,
Although all my life is available for everybody’s lenses,
And I find my intentions strengthened
Even as my means have been ended expensively,
And once upon a time I had a purpose
But somewhere down the line I lost it, and what worse is
I found one yesterday in a place I’d not been for twenty years,

So it seems that the streams of my struggle
Have doubled and now bubble relentlessly
At the banks and the fences I’ve extensively erected,
And I don’t have enough fingers to fill all the holes
And even though I’d crawl naked over a whole hill of coal
To secure the purity of my goals
I fear a fire could extinguish my desires overnight.

RUMOURS IN THE AIR.

I know what we’ll do,
Once my day is done,
And yours has just begun:
We’ll tell each other tales of us
And keep them from ourselves;

So when the moon
Is looming
Over me,
As if
For whispers
Soft,
I’ll rustle up a juicy bit of gossip

And in the crossing
Borders of luminosity,
That often nocturnal orb
Will gravitate towards the
Golden one and pass it on,

And as the sun
Is coming
Up to you,
As though
To wish you
Well,
It will spill my tittle-tattle in your ear,

And so you’ll know
The thoughts I grow,
And can repeat your own
For me to hear at sunrise,
And neither of us will be wiser.

ROUTINES.

I’ll have to break his gate closing habit
Otherwise he’ll be wandering
The neighbourhood
Looking for any front gardens
To harden
Against stranger danger,
Although maybe that’s my paranoia
Projected upon his employments,
Even as he bellows hello to anyone he meets
And eats up their coos.

Still his gracious nature
Whilst journeying is most welcome,
Especially since his household behaviour
Is becoming more discourteous:
Commanding those who allow him to,
And needing things speedily,
And his rolls,
When told NO,
Are worthy of any gymnastic activity’s gold,
And lividly announced.

And it takes me an age
To get him safely caged up in his bed these days,
As he needs reading to,
And tucking in,
And once I cuddle him goodnight,
And make to escape,
He flings his bedclothes over
And demands Daddy wrap him now,
And after half a dozen more coverings and kisses
My quotidian existence ends again.

COATING.

Please spare me a warm thought
From your windy city,
Whilst you paint
And make beauty;
Chewing
To keep fluid
The beautiful
Colours
You use,
And heating
The sheets
Of canvas
With a grand splash,
Then standing back
In order to track
The next wrist
Flicks
That will kindle
The inklings
Of images
In your head
And singe
Them into
The textures
You’ve stretched
Across
This once plain piece of cloth,
That,
Sufficiently wrapped,
Should keep
Me
From freezing
Just fine.