Thursday, March 31, 2011

Nirvana of Shangri-La

* Nirvana of Shangri-La *
The waters will refresh
The geese will nourish
Eels consume dried skin
Creams smooth age's wrinkles
All the things of this place
This nirvana of Shangri-La
Beautuous place of youth restored
Never find a reason to leave
For here all joy and fellowship exists
All loving reaches zenith's peak
This nirvana of Shangri-La
Where we woould rest content.

Sail

+-SAIL-+
If we escape the rugged rocks
Set our sails to wind
Avoid threat of beaching on these shoals
Put space between us and shore
Ride the ocean currents broad and blue
Explore wide safe horizons
Travel where we would travel
Unbound unheld unleashed
All the joys of love and peace
To ourselves be true and open
Such voyage in our life taken.

Fool arise

* fool arise *
Raking through the rubble
Where my heart should be
Demolished by some home truths
I spoke of to myself
Such a surge of despair
Breathing taken in uneven gasps
A choking strangling emotion
As if all my body toxic
Emotions been given physical form
Throat is hard and constricted
Feel my entire face slip down
Edges of mouth drop and curl
Forehead wear a permanent defeated frown
All the greatness and duty done
Cannot hide this humiliation
From the one from which should be hid
From yourself the foolish clown
Who had thought it mattered what he did.

Every

*+ every +*
Every night he comes home
Between the hours of five and six
Spent best part of his day at work
Seeking an escape and a kiss
Simple pleasures in a ruthless life
Thhe threadmill uncertain ever at work
Each employee one downturn away from
Trying to recover financially before another one
Prices always steadily creeping up
Wages never changing
The hammer and the anvil
And he poor sod between
Hoping for the best
Trying to lead astutely
The best life he can lead
Of assistance to everyone
And never seeking help
Even as he drowns
Even as world consumes
Last vestiges of pride and self.

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Un-Belief-ness

* un-belief-ness *
Lack of clarity of my belief
Brought into sharper focus by
The wood cut certainty of your own
Is so difficult to fight or accept
Certainities you mandate as obvious
When I hang in nothingness
Unsupported and undirected
Beliefs based on most recent surge of thought
Unable to place borders on my own thoughts
For to do so would be to limit
Potential for greater growth beyond a point
At which you say it is self evident
I and any other should stop
You request I have a point at which love end
A fence to keep those others back
Divide the world by gender and s*xu*l practices
Where rationality ceases take all else on faith
This is what your certainty brings it seems
A strong line of pickets in the vastness
A castle to protect from enemies
But if all who don't think as you
Are condemned and closed out
Then how can you ever grow
Beyond the point you find yourself
And it is then I think my lack
My spinning compass needle of fact and faith
May not allow me peaceful rest
Neither does it yield and surrender
Accept one truth as supreme
When there are so many others presented
All of which you state should be resented
For they are false and yours is truth
Through they proclaim the same
And none of you can bring truth
Say I must make my decision based on faith
Which seems little less than valid
For all of you have the faith I lack
And once more I am returned
To the unsupported belief I manage
As best I can without structure or plan
Wondering if more belief is better
Or less provides greater opportunity
To find the something true I feel I lack.

Objections to established social-working model

*objections to established social-working model*
Tie me to this holding bar
Enabling me to keep balance as train rocks
Feet are flat and aching
On a crowded train without a seat
This daily arduous commute I make
My thoughts locked in myself
Alongside so many fellow workdrone kin
Not enjoying for one millisecond part
Crowded so close into armpit
The over perfuming a gas attack
And some personal hygiene plainly lack
Others have personal demons to keep at bay
Start the morning alcoholically to get them through the day
These scents makes nausea the prevailing condition
This entire trip seems an absurd act of contrition
For what or why I have no idea
Perhaps for the acts of ancestors
Who built this social and business model
Requiring every work day I must get on
These cattle cars with rest of docile herd
To earn our pay to give away
In payment for the roof above our heads
The groceries which feed us
Electricity to give us light and heat
Water which is pumped to the door
All these things I have to pay for
I wonder how it once was
When a spear the only possession
A basket to gather berries
Two flints for fire and furs to warm you
All you needed to bear
The journey was to hunting grounds
It was prehistoric and free
No sore feet from mindless standing
No perfumed hair spray attacks
Perhaps we should dump this civilised life
And regress to prehistoric acts.

Autumn days

* Autumn Days *
The cloud is a smeared veneer of grey
World isolated and drawn back
The ionosphere is out of sight
And the cool air grips bodies warm
Makes us think of warm beds and hot breakfasts
Which we have undertaken to miss
To catch a train into heart of a city
Where our working day awaits
Behind a counter or a workstation
So many battery chickens in our cages
Producing our ergs of work
In someone else's greater destiny
And wondering if we take a break
Rain from clouds will shake
Drown every thread of wear
Soak our skin and plaster hair
As clouds low and heavy gather
We wait the harder storms of autumn
As the days of sunlight shorten.

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

* Payment due *

* payment due *
Death finds you short
One great adventurous life
You had always thought
Be time enough for that
Turns out your time was briefer
The debt collector came unexpected
Reaper of Souls at your door
No smile or tears showed
This is fact of life
It ends and becomes extinct
Think of yourself as a Dodo
The only one left
Before time is bereft
Before Death is at your door
Bill for life in hand
And you find yourself
One great adventurous life short.

Mystique unwound

*mystique unwound*
The way in which your made
The parts many united to beauty form
Curve of hip and lift of chin
Smile of lips full and inviting
Eyes alive with life's mystique
The many questions we would seek
To answer in immersing self in charms of each other
Drink you skin with eyes wide open
Commit self to be your best lover
Travel further in our charmed bed
Than ever travelled hence
To answer questions set deep in head
Wound around each other as straw and twine
Hear heartbeat of one who is mine
Sprawled and in scents and sweat anointed
Made holy in this sacred heart
Sacrament of our trust shared
And prayers in passion's tongues dared
Spiritual experiences do not come
Much more intensely or purely than that
As explore the line of your neck and brow
Search your eyes to learn how
You know me better than any other could
With life perfectly consummated good
All questions and answers it seems
Found in you oh Muse of dreams.

Visions of Empire

*Visions of Empire*
Shout down the loud voices of disdain
Ride forward in fair weather or in rain
The world's environment you cannot control
Your own perception and moods is yours to mould
Beyond the Serpentine's silver snaking reaches
Beyond the gold grained Cornwall beaches
In the mountains where rivers are born
And men of old chased sheep to be shorn
Where spears against mountain peaks are dwarfed
And men and snow are easy bought
Beyond refinements of civilisation soft
In the realms of Hindu Kush you find me
Battling the elements and tribesmen
Opening the way for commerce and education
Bringing forward flag of King and Country
Claiming all for those still safe at home
And if my adventuring should ever cease
Or I am struck down with cruel disease
I know others will follow my lead
And for empire fight and bleed
Or else why does our nation call itself great
If unwilling to challenge life and battle fate.

Running wild

*running wild*
My thoughts are running rabid dog wild
Unable to be brought under control
No rationality to their intensity
A rebellion against the stillness I seek
As if all the things I must do this week
Must be done this very moment
As if every idea I ever thought
Must be acted upon in this instant
Pick up the phone and call people
Go and have a hit of tennis
Go for a walk for ten miles or more
Such a flow of agitation building
This energy I must centre and release
Before this energy grounded cease
Dissipate and leave me an empty shell
From adrenalin heights descend to hell
So with thoughts a dervish whirling
And energy transient unfurling
I slop down my coffee hot
And go wandering before active thoughts stop.

Freed for what

*+Freed for what+*
With toyota pick ups mounted with machine guns
And foolhardy courage and looted rifles
This ragtag freedom army fights
What they see will come to exist after
I have no way of knowing
I think now they fight to avoid the slaughter
Which would result if Gaddafi rules on
They fight for the benefit of
Their children who could at anytime be stopped
Declared an enemy of the state
And then be locked away and forgotten
For dictators need no legality
Beyond that which their army can see
And often find dictators are surrounded
By the bullyboy enforcers proud
Of how they can flout any law
Lock up your children and steal your food
Take your wife and bury you in unmarked grave
I fear what these East Libyans may find
When civil war concluded and comes the time
To decide the rhythm law and rhyme
Of new Libya freed and proud
Democracy is a capricious whore
Serves whoever wants it more
And if unwilling to fight for it
Or hold it to closely in rigid claws
Will pale and sigh and cease to be
Instead a dictatorship at first aspirational
A perfect religious state
Or though old hat a people's state
Ruled by the people with all wealth equal
Gradually though there are those
Who wish to offer devotion to another God
Or desire to make more money than the other sod
And so it starts again
The division between those who rule
And those who are oppressed
Turns out those aspirational states
Know once power given shall not be shared
And the rules grow stronger and prison lists longer
Until is not longer till many wonder
Why they swapped one dictator for another?

Blossom from Other Earth

+Blossom, from Other Earth+
Hey Blossom I dreamt again of old day Earth
The planet from which we were birthed
A single sun hung in the sky
A moon revolved and pulled tides
The seas there alive with life
No need for purifiers for the water
No need to wear the rad block out cream
A perfect place in perfect position
Far enough from Sun for perfect climate
No need to spend half the year in shelters
And when on surface body doesn't constant swelter
Fruit in colours like the discs show
And I saw snow and icebergs
Was then a great and tranquil place
This birth planet of human race
And we who have been cast to here
For our crimes Earth will not bear
An escape valve for decaying world
And now they say our world is better than theirs
As Earth's atmosphere strains to hold effulent
Of the fortunate 2% affluent
The water there is processed now
And seas empty of life
Orchards barren and crazed deserts are
Where once the land was rich and fair
Seems our world new and all the others imperfect
On which we struggle to make our lives
Are the only future made
As perfect golden Earth to late to save
A world once bestowed with paradise's grace
Oh Blossom it has been squandered by human race.

Monday, March 28, 2011

Sun's farewell

* Sun's farewell *
These last days demand
We celebrate Sun's farewell
And Sun it seems is trying to depart
On the best possible note
To give us heart for months ahead
When shorter days shall rule
Sun be briskly up then down
In-between hours of chill shadows
Darkness of the days
Infect and dim our souls
And so the Sun beams today
Giving confidence that many months ahead
In golden chariot cross clear sky
The golden king shall again fly
Unless there is some cosmic shock
The Sun decide to collapse inward
Or solar flares send outward at us
Wipe fragile life from this world
Make oceans boil and mountains curl
And make those of us last to depart
Curse the Sun for its false cold heart.

Mussolini should have known

*Mussolini should have known*
If all the trains run on time
Doesn't mean a hill of pennies
If where you are travelling to
Doesn't mean a hill of pennies to you
If all the people you would like to meet
Are not at conclusion of your trip
If some you would seek time with
Have not caught your interested drift
Or perhaps having noted you
Have decided to look right through
Any devotions you seek to devote
Plainly state you mis-direct affectation
And any future relationship you can see
Shall be unrequited and over needy
And so you take the train home
Even through it doesn't mean a hill of pennies
If you are there or here
Or in mind-numbing transit.

ever free?

*ever free?*
Ever escaped down the rabbit hole
Which Lewis Carroll dug
The rabbit hole down which he cast
Sweet Alice and her precocious ways
Ever travelled along the path
Not oft chosen by easy sated majority
Perhaps it is a longer winding track
More treacherous to your chances of survival
Maybe in such adventures and dangers
Find your reasons to not extinguish life's flame
Is this the malady which governs those
Who returned from fighting cannot settle
Who see the world around them stale
Thirst still for excitement and rush
Of the world where all was not set
Where stability was measured by the moments or minutes
And life by hazards constantly beset
The nomad life or gypsy ways
The never know where day end will find you
Have you ever ventured so
Purse to light by half
And at evensong no welcoming light in sight
Freer than any bird of flight
Freer than the family man
Tied to house and childs and wife
Free from all between the heavens and the seas
Knowing if you should fall down a Lewishian rabbit hole
There would be none this side of there
In a chapel a mourning candle light
For your unencumbered soul's lone plight.

Seed to reality

*seed to reality*
Stretch consciousness to extremes
Escape reality into world of dreams
Plant through the unconscious
Seeds of what dreams could be
If brought to fulfilment in reality
Brush back the dust of doubt
Rail against storms of objections
Set the seeds in fertile thought
And watch the dream become unlikely
And from there shift to maybe
Leap the hurdles and through hoops dive
Sweat the blood to keep dream alive
And from maybe elevate to possibility
Onto the possible shores of achievability
Lacking all but grit and dreams
Climb the bars of potential goals
Take likelihood a step further each day
Until it is reality of success you see
The dream is fixed and solid
For all to see and judge
And then is time to dream anew
Set a new vision precious to reach for
A new dream into reality create for all to view.

Those almost days

*those almost days*
The day grows longer as I think
Of all the almost brinks
On which I teetered far to often
Never sure if this will soften
Axe if it should fall
There is no more
Than I can ever care
The thoughts tumble out
Prickly they dare
Raised voices in act of shouting
Emotions constant we are looting
As if our marriage were
Germany strickened as Red Army evens up the score
No one wins and we get to bed
Licking our wounds holding our heads
Angry bears so distraught with the other
Having fought and wrestled to this standstill
I often wonder why we bother
Are those lagoons of peace worth this constant war
Maybe we should end it all
Unleash the apocalypse we have been waiting for
Thinking our marriage isn't our style
After 17 years I think time to change the thinking
Admit it may not fit perfectly
It is the fashion we have decided to wear
Goes so well with our personalities
And the grey washing through our hair
Perhaps detente could lead to a new Spring
A new world order agreement
Let's pull down those battered walls
Which we set up to defend ourselves
Fill in the trenches and spike the guns for now
If it doesn't work out
We can always find someone else to torture
Or lose ourselves in drink and drugs
Shorten life by extremes
Until one morning we don't wake up
And all is done and completed
Endings can be so sudden and so quick.

Heard the new

---just heard the news---

I heard the news, it chilled my heart
Another story of, another marriage falling apart
Hadn't thought it likely, another seismic shifting through
All the relationships I know, seems I never really knew
How would we, set our sails if we fell
Is our relationship for sale, and for what would we sell
I can't believe my ears are hearing
These words both of you must have been fearing
A final step and out the door
Broken crockery and dreams on kitchen floor
The times we had, now consigned to history
Hope you both can rebuild, escape this present misery

I heard the news, it chilled my heart
I don't know what to say, don't know with whom to start
Villains all and innocent, no charges can be brought
The ease of mind you once held, has degenerated into suffering thought
I would hold a light to guide, tell you how to make the best of
But I have no idea, as my patronising thoughts would make clear
This is a puzzle, must work through yourself
To reintroduce self to society, or sit safely on a shelf
The heart can be bruised, for all its strength is no rock
At its most vulnerable, can quake at every tiny aftershock
I heard the news, it chilled my heart
When I heard it straight, that you two would part.

Friday, March 25, 2011

Who needs clones.

*Who needs clones*
Escape these chains of thought which bind
The good views and bad news and formaldehyde
Endless repetitions of how I thought before
Eternal clash of stability against being in a rut
The never finding a way out
The eternally dissolute lay-about
Uncompleting every deed or act
Not full at all and thoughts bereft
Of other tracks in which to move
Same groove same rut same sameness torturing
Escape the way I am or did become
Escape the tomorrows which will be
Same as this day become
To repeat or to escape and freedom clasp
Except freedom never truly lasts
As the gaoler I constant seek to escape
Is myself and my thoughts
No distance can I place between
The thoughts of now I possess
Or the thoughts tomorrow I might confess
I am ever as I was and ever be
A sameness to my person
A sameness to endure for eternity.

Grumpy heart words

*grumpy heart words*
There are protests my heart demands
Are made clear to all I know
A despair at lack of civility
The seeming ignorance of fairness prevails
In every city on every footpath
If you walk 5 abreast
Leave a space through which others can move
And if a bus or train or tram stops
Don't try and get on till you have let the others off
Don't natter loudly on your phone in a public place
For usually your life is such a bore
As for swearing with every second word
It is not tough or show street smarts
Merely reflects your general boorishness
And if you want to get insensible early in the day
Stink of beer and cigarettes and urine foul
Do not be surprised if other object
Personal hygiene is not something you should ever stop
If you are driving inattentively
Relying on all around to watch out for you
Expecting them to have abilities of telepathy
To know you are turning when you don't indicate
Or going straight through a STOP sign because you are late
Then their reaction is not road rage
It is an expression of their distaste
To be involved with such a waste of living space
And though you may not care
For the darling children over whom you watch
The dirt and general noise they bring
Stench of nappies unchanged
Is not something others need to bear
Be prepared to tell them no
And take them out of the cinema if they scream
Think of others around you who paid
To hear your swearing shushing screaming words
When they expected to hear what was on the screen
Live your life as if
A community large we all are
A community who if good manners show
Will be so much more pleasant to bear.

Admiring

* admiring *
I can't architect your buildings
In manner they have been architected
With swooping roof-lines and proportions graceful
My eye can only admire such

I cannot draw you a sketch
Of pencil and pen lines fine
Which upon the viewing springs to life
Captures moment in art sublime
My eye can only admire such

I can't chisel sculpt or carve
In manner of artisans great of old
Anatomically correct and graceful
Opposed to gravity with sweet lines
Which draw the eye and make you admire
Beauty of form released from stone or wood
My eye can only admire such

And then it comes to seeing you
A living breathing celestial beauty
Whose lines are full and curved and true
Whose warmth extrudes across any room
Whose lush soft lips burn and make my heart race
Who cannot fail to move with grace
Sweet of soul and kind of heart
Most of all feel passion deep within
Which stirs you when we begin
To express ourselves and aspire
To be as beautiful in love
As the beauty we admire.

*cleansing memories*

*Cleansing memories*
Wipe your mind down
A sterile cloth in bleach dipped stroke
Across memories raw and troubled
Open yourself in crucifixion pose
Hands opens tendons of arms trembling
A crown of thorns force upon your head
Allow these solvents to soak in deep
Rid you of these aching memories
Which pillage rest from sleep
Leave you restless to always be moving
As if these memories were a rash
Or infestation of bed mites biting
And by your movement shake them free
By living life at speed of sound
Escape the life already lived
Does not work and never did
The memories dark stalk and tease
So throw yourself open wide
Allow the bleach of forgetfulness inside
Scrubs yourself till there is no more
Every surface scraped clean of memories
Your own name barely to be found
The life you lead no more
And new life start from state of null
Living life from point of naivety
And begin afresh memories accumulation
Which shall infest your thoughts and sleep
Until again you reach the stage
For a bleach wash crucifixion.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

In shift

* in shift *
Dead dolls in the backyard
Dismembered Barbies and zombie baby borns
Signs of a shift from little girl
To hormone twisted teenage explorer
Challenger of status quo
Revolutionary against parental oppressers
Dreamer with a tongue of scorn
Idealist and non-believer
All the contradictions sided
By another contradiction leaping
Certain of everything and nothing
Lethargic with bursts of energy phenomenal
This is where she stands in journey's path
Neither completely there
Or halfway back to start
Adult thoughts in a child's body
In conflict ever with child thoughts in an adults body
This is the person still exploring
Deploring world and accepting world
All the world hers to take
And not ever sure its worth the price of admission.

Skip your soul

*** skip your soul ***
Dance your heart and lift your feet
Skip your soul to music's beat
Adore your hopes and love your love
For all is good in heavens above
And if the world turn sour and dark
Recall the dance to lift your heart
For present woes can be extinguished
In a moment despair vanquished
By a smile or soul skiiping to music's beat
So dance your heart and lift your feet.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

To hell

*to hell*
War hell and vitamins
Fed up with waiting for the call
Blades edged so keen
We cut against each other
Boredom rubs us all raw
Ship tosses in the sea
Our landing field on water
Our blessed escape from slaughter
And the planes tucked away
Till signal received to say
Mission action confirmed
Targets assigned for delivery
So much hidden meaning
In words bureaucratically clumsy
To avoid saying blow them all to hell.

Angels

** Angels **
Angels in the water
Reflections flicker by
Silver winged madonnas
Sweet of face and grace in flight
Celestial visions bright
Steal my breath away
Those angels in the water
Benevolence and prayerful manner
Heaven's serenity rests there
So true they swoop lightly
Across the crystal H two O
Blessing bestowed with each wing stroke
Steal my bless away
Those angels in the water.

The fear

+_ the fear _+
All I can hope
Between trough and rut
Is to accomplish something
Find some laughter in my heart
Keep despair at bay
Get some Sun upon my face
Perhaps bring a smile or two
To those who are surrounding
And keep on swimming
Avoid this fear of drowning
Let alone worry about life's sharks
Those unexpected catastrophes
Which might tear all order in apart
Cause my faith in self to seep away
Bring forward inevitable decay
Set me plunging swifter deeper
Beyond the reach of any saviour
Beyond the reach of my self
Into a dark abyss complete
Depression become a permanent mark
Upon my shattered mental health
The person I always fear most of all
Is the person I may become my self.

Day beyond

* day beyond *
Awkwardly march to sunset
All the death of time and joy
Together burn in fused dis-iillusion
Tomorrow is a day beyond
The last day of our lives.

Cyrano Tweets

* Cyrano Tweets*
Cyrano De Bergerac
He of prominent hooter
And flashing blade and wit
What would he now tweet to his divine Roxanne
Would he find confidence in electronic anonymity
To express his heart's undiluted thoughts
Follow at RapierWit@Gascogne
Or would he still stumble
Believe his visage so confronting and humble
Be still unable to tweet to Roxanne sweet
For fear she would demand
A photo from he who charms
And as every mobile has a camera
Every laptop and every digital device
What excuses would he invent
To this image delivery to circumvent
Perhaps a mask or shots which cover
His enormous nose from his lover
Shots taken when it is to dark or light
His shadow with other shadows merged
So his nose outline does not fright
Perhaps Cyrano be a wiz at photoshop
And so his offensive nose could lop
Replace with a neater carrier of snot
A tight trim beak not this Concorde front
But how could Cyrano ever meet her without causing affront
When his nose photos lies are in place
Lies as obvious as nose upon his face
And Roxanne in reality probably would confuse
Her Cyrano for another of more graceful face
A perfect specimen of Gascogne manhood
Recently arrived in town and unbetrothed
Unsuited to words or civilised places
Yet who finds self in Roxanne's good graces
And calling he upon Cyrano
To deliver the words which flow
And Cyrano never been a braver man
Agrees to this cowardly plan
So at last Roxanne might read his tweets
As he expresses all he dreams in sleep
Discovers his words have gained her heart
But another plays the lover's part
And in this world so image conscious
Is it really likely Roxanne would ever Cyrano desire
For his facebook profile needs two pages
So profusely does his nose escape screen cages
And when he has no hands or feet
With his nose can peck away to tweet
140 characters in a minute flat
Few fingers could ever beat that
Cyrano and his tweets
Soul crushed and heart of love so meek
This roaring witty tweeting tyrant
Swordsman without equal
Laid low by Cupid's arrows
And Roxanne's beauty without compare.

*no sheep for sleep*

*no sheep for sleep*
Demands about sheep
Prancing through green fields of sleep
Count them one and all
In hope the numeracy will bore
Send you off to town of snore
What if you find it interesting
Calves of fit sheep enticing
How then to find sleep
And if fences sheep won't leap
No bounding order for how they move
Need to whistle up sheep dogs
Some order from imaginary sheep demand
Make these sheep at your command
Strutting now in jack-boots
Fascist sheep are arrogantly here
Wool changed from white to black
A baa-ing force of occupation
Geneva's laws they ignore
Such atrocities they perform
Catch the farmer hiding in the barn
Attach a rubber ring to his genitals
Neutering will be the result
Herd the dogs into tiny kennels
Then separately each is shot
This no way to dream yourself to sleep
Such obscenities bring you back to waking
No more are you ready for sleep
And no confidence in your heart
For the goodness of sheep.

Snow time

*+-_ Snow Time _-+*
I can't hold a snowflake
Melts too soon against my skin
But make good with fistful of snow
Which is of greater benefit
For snowflakes too slight to throw
Need an accumulation of snowflakes
In a lump formed
To make a decent snowball
To hold lightly in your hand
Then find the right moment
Send missile on its way
Imagine you are David facing Goliath
Or a meteor about to strike
And heft the snowball upward
And send it towards the bike
A difficult shot for sure
A moving target almost out of sight
Watch the arched trajectory
Physics at its best
A most elegant equation
Speed and arch and time
The weight and shape of snowball
In your thoughts did all combine
Then a message sent from your brain
To your arm to throw
All these ideas race through your head
As see the snowball flow
Against gravity and wind resistance
Towards the point at which
It meets the cyclist's with a thud
Unexpectedness knocks cyclist's from their seat
And as they fall ground-ward
Into drift of snowflakes soft
Hear your laughter as you run off
Unable to hold a single snowflake
But many accurately you can toss.

*silver tales*

*silver tales*
Cross my palm with silver
Grubby arthritic hand shaking
And soothsayer bribe elicits
A cryptic telling of the future
Pinpoints desires in all of us
Hints of joy and sorrow
Secret plans complete
And those things you have put off
Since before tomorrow was distant yesterday
Will be achieved just you see
To acclamation and respect
And as our society measures such
In fiscal financial rewards
The money will cascade upon you
Your dreams of riches gained
Earned and deserved
And with these goals achieve
The rounding of character and life
Which you had placed on hold
So the soothsayer says
And you leave the tent rejoicing
Pause a while in a daze at your good fortune
Hear the soothsayer with another
Telling of their future
Of what they will achieve
And of their great good fortune
Hear the words again
Only moments before delivered to your ears
Grimly set your shoulders straight
Barge through carnival crowd
Life is all a con
Success another name for fate.

Exitway

*exitway*
Drifting epitaphs
Squander these last moments
In treacled sentimentality
Ignoring what was and would have been
For you shall not talk ill of dead
Their best aspects must remain
To those of us here to inspire
Even Mussolini kept the trains on time
And was a good boy to his mother
Had impeccable manners
Once served his country valiantly
As they fire up the jets
The coffin on runway stands
Though is more exitway
Nothing but ashes will be coming back
Final goodbyes compulsory
So learned psychiatrists demand
Grief must have its markers
And this is a major one of those
To see the corpse and acknowledge
Except in dreams shall no more know
For all the heat to come
The skin is so chill
No heating pulse resides
Such emptiness behind those eyes
For another the dam breaks
Either mood or moment is too much
Trickling streams of tears uncontrollably flow
I hold my own back inside
To control and not collapse
My goodbyes all been said
Lying in our marriage bed
A gulf in sleep I cannot span
The desolation of waking in an empty room
I am sure I shall bang around
In this world which was ours
For more than a few years
Noting pasting years and seasons
By anniversaries and birthdays uncelebrated
By the fact as coffin rolls
I want join you not let you go
Fling myself upon your funeral pyre
Do as Vikings did
Instead I stand and numbly watch
Not even noting as
My own dam breaks apart
And tears of grief again are flowing.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

* Starlight column *

* starlight column *
Young music rising
Freed from swamp of angst
A starlight column raised
Of love found
Of dreams beckoning
Of hopes rising in joy
Of new beginnings new belief
In self in world in all
Especially not in those
Who declare hope dead
Who wear hangman frowns
The tired of yesteryear
Whatever you may have thought
Any challenges you overcame
Are history now and forever
A new light shines
A starlight column raised
This old world through young eyes seen
Hopes untried and undiluted
Sparkling shining rising hope
In which all world dipped can change
All doors closed be opened
Even night sky dark find illumination
In starlight column raised.

The what

*the what*
Reap a cyclonic convection of unmanaged wind
To batter yourself against a tall fixed brick dividing structure
To cast your troubles upon indifferent saline brine
How metaphors could so simply stumble
If we but allowed blessed verbosity its extremes
Took our cue not from Shakespeare
With his wily dramagurist ways
Instead let our hearts find direction
In the by-laws of local councils
The indictments of the courts
Regulations of maritime safety or the tax department
Then we would find writing worthy of
Middle level management across the land
The type of writing any worker could aspire to
No fear of being outshone by another
Writing beaten within an inch of it doesn't matter
Slapped down to be suckered up
Or as a cure for a particularly vicious case of insomnia
That is what we would find
As Romeo once said
"Hello what is this sudden illumination casting back the shadows of night
when dawn is still someway off".

So many reasons

*so many reasons*
There are so many reasons
To despise each and every season
Summer bakes you hot
Spring has no sense or reason
Autumn chills my blood
And Winter is full of snot and mud
Most of all of course
Every season is full of people
Yapping squealing greedy ugly people
Devoid of grace or manners
Ready to show allegiance to wildest banners
Every slogan of madness followed
Or the politician's promises most hollow
No more sense than a kelpie
Who cannot help but chase the postie
And how they squander everything
Water land time and friends
These people without restraints
These people all sinners never saints
Everyone thinking they are better
More significant than ever
Merely another triumphant ant
Upon this ant hill grand-standing
Waiting for the brushing crushing shoe
The end of all they will ever know
And every season there are more
Shrill mediocre intellectually poor
At the edge of my sanity clawing
Full of bravado insubstantial
And mortal actions inconsequential
From year start to year end
In every year my presence they offend
Squabbling stinking and puerile
Less aware than the most juvenile
Unaware that all they have and ever be
Is always four depised seasons long
and then total oblivion and obscurity.

Modern paupers all

*modern paupers all*
Bash the walls
Burn yourself and cut
Dope and stone yourself insensible
Alienate responses human
Become a zombie of now
Nihilistic fatalistic pessimist
A modern corporate drone
In indentured servitude
Paying off an education
Valued as valueless by all and one
Proven unable to get a job
And degrees in knowledge
Trumped by popular culture
Catch cries and memorable quotes
From Twilight and The Simpsons
All those great ideals projected
Dreams of a better world expected
Ambitions for a better life
The potential educators assured existed
Seem to have achieved less than bliss
Less than life lived you just subsist
Never richer than before bills paid
Born with nothing and promised all
Seems shall die a disillusioned pauper
Tossed into a weary pauper's grave.

not

____+ not +___
Don't you know I'm not crying
These tears a form of lying
Shan't miss you when you are gone
Be good when all we were is done
The days we once shared together
Will become memories of never

Don't you know I'm not crying
These tears a form of lying
So we had some laughs and jars
We would never have gone that far
And your hair still falls black as night
And your red rouged lips still bright

Don't you know I'm not crying
These tears a form of lying
Your friends easily I will relinquish
Unable from strangers your family to distinguish
And they have all come to see you lying here
In your favourite dress and a green ribbon in your hair

Don't you know I'm not crying
These tears a form of lying
For inside my heart is ashes
My mouth as dry as road to Damacus
Tonight we lay you down to rest eternal
And I go to a new life dark and infernal.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Muse or Mud

*Muse or Mud*
Ah Muse come to me
Your lips of fire ignite
Passion being other inside of me
Set my thoughts to higher plains
Pass me vistas broader than
These clumsy lowlands where I stand
Stilted blocked and silted up
My thoughts have no love or grace
Boulders square which cannot fall
Even if the bluebirds nested in my hair
Sunshine bright lit my bones from inside
Or a catastrophe tumbled me over World's edge
I would not stir or rise or insight seek
Rather register mere cynical expectation
That this is how this world is wrought
As all daily lessons previous taught
My opinion is deadly correct
So Muse arrive and inspire
No outward guidance can magic work
I need your inner touch on my thoughts
Desire the ease with which you can transport
This struggling peasant of barren words
To greater deeds and inspired serves
To lift the thoughts of those who read
These thoughts which to find I bleed
They never having need for the Muse
Without you alongside my typing is an abuse
I channel nothing but this stinking mud
Which blocks my thoughts and dulls my blood.

As Orwell saw

* as Orwell saw *
I saw the most recent revolution on tv
The people against the State
Trying to learn how to use the weapons of war
Before it is too late
Self consciously forming ranks
Dressed in clothes of the street
Fumbling comically with the bigger weapons
George Orwell remembered such well
The Catalonians of whom he wrote
Best intentions in their hearts
And the worse for all their freedoms
An anarchy of leadership
For the people united need no orders
People united need no plan
They think to stand together will be enough
To show their willingness to die
Will win the battlefield
And the soldiers of the State
Forced or paid to fight and bleed
Know upon the battlefield
Might is the only right you need
Logistics will defeat good intentions
And disorganised patriots die as easily
As men who fight for gold
These thoughts I think as I watch
Another people resisting oppression
Seeking justice they rise up
And I hope they find the State frail
A State incompetent and bankrupt
Else all the graveyards in their cities freed
Soon be filled with martyrs free.

Other Odysseys

For Charles Sheen.

*+_ Other Odysseys _+*
Your colours brashly peacock
Arrogance of thought
Tied to mast by fools
Ears un-stopped with wax
Sweet dementia of the chorus
Forever playing upon your soul
How did it feel once you were
Safely ensconced with Penelope
Did you still hear those sirens singing
Lying in your wedding bed
Those deceitful alluring tunes
Still trapped inside your head
Is this the chorus of fame
A warning analogy to us all
Beware the beauty you hear
Seduction of the soul
All pleasures are not joyous
And oft more expensively bought
Than price at which their sold
To be famous for an instant
Or five years or even ten
Then to live with fame collared
Around your life without escape
All the mistakes you ever made pursue you
The part you play is set
This siren has charmed you well
You never feel a thing
Grow into a beautiful grotesque
Everything you ever want you get
Till suffer from over-indulgence
You drown and die ignominiously
In sea of fame in which you sail
As did all those other sailors
Who fame enthralled and made rocks forget.

Faded

*faded*
Your smile is lost
In daily worries
Your colour fades
As old photos do
Twinkle in your eye
To better judgement dips
All these markers found
Dealings of having been around
Seen the dreams and broken promises
Wonder if it were better then
When you believed more of them
When your smile in warm embrace
Fill a room with joy and laughter
Now you don't compare your dreams
Instead transposed to bricks and mortar
The suburban plague has you now
Chronic fatigue of the heart
The lonely canyons of the mall
All the things you buy
The got to go things to do
The time back you cannot purchase
No matter how hard you try
Your smile is lost
And kilometres on treadmill won't
Return you to where you were
The days have passed and worn off
Veneer of innocence and wonder
All which was looks different now
The reasons for rising seem strange
To spend your time in strangers company
With whom you have no common thread
Better to lie longer in your bed
Capture fragments of dreams were once
Knit them together like quilt bedpsread
Wrap them around your body cold
Your body tired and body cold
All the life you knew washed
And how your smile bright faded.

Bush track

*Bush track*
Turn me out and turn me back
The soft heartbeat of bush track
Laughter of kookaburra far over head
Whisper of gums rubbing leaves
Scruff of gravel underfoot
Call of bellbird somewhere off
Tramping down a bush track
Turn me out and turn me back.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Tired

*tired*
Tired eyes see
Empty vessels creep
against Moon tide rage
To edge of dying night
Velvet underground shade
Clinging to star coat tails
This end of seasons rapid
Bound in night's cloak
Lost horizons battered
Empty vessels creep
Tired eyes close
And so we turn to sleep.

Friday, March 18, 2011

The knowledge

*+the knowledge+*
The knowledge the old man gasped
He was brown as teak and knotted
Remaining sparse white hair wild on his head
The knowledge he croaked out
Obviously trying to pass on some wisdom
Perhaps a guilty secret in his head
Maybe location of Maltese Falcon
Whatever it was meant nought to me
On minimum wages to mop the floors
Strip beds of used sheets for the laundry
And other manner of menial tasks
I had no interest in babble incoherent
Hoarse whispers of the knowledge
No longer appealed to me
I had given up on dreams and hopes
Instead watched the clock as I shuffled about
His frail white liver-spotted hand reached for me
Almost relying on gravity to bridge the gap
The knowledge impatiently he breathed
His feeble grasp unable to hold hem of my shirt
Whatever knowledge was or would be
I could very plainly see
Would not serve to save him now
Crossed threshold to Death's waiting room
Soon his sheets for laundry would be free
And I turned my ipod up again
And followed my mop out of his room
Ignoring his no more audible pleas
Of the knowledge he had for me.

Now as

--- Now As ---
Now as I think
Now as I am dreaming
Passing through this day
Taking the moments gazing
Lost in moments inbetween
Seeing sky bright and blue and green
All of those memories crowding in
Making me what I am this moment
Setting path of joy or daily torment
Every scent and vision brings forth
Another emotion constant taught
By the mind caught spiralling
On turning steps out of breath
Rest neither for me or the wicked
As I think
As I am dreaming
As past is present all over again.

Keeping the status quo

*keeping the status quo*
Single earpiece in listening
Doesn't connect to an ipod
Bulging pockets in jackets
Too heavy and bulky for phone or wallet
Always short haircuts and slight stubble
Of the over casual forgettable stalker
The SAS ASIS CIA FSB MI6 operative
Listening for the fall of evidence
Processing the entry exit points
Every room a puzzle to be disassembled
In case a hurried exit needed
Following the daily orders
Of who is the current state enemy
Tomorrow or in five years they may be elected
Their beliefs become acceptable
Be held as right to all of society
For now they are the"rock the boaters"
Unaligned radical forward thinkers talking
The ones for whom the special operatives
And the secret police licences
Are most especially made
To inform those who are establishment today
What these new leaders of change are doing
And for how much longer
The old ideas and present masters
Can keep the world in their hands
Continue the privilege of this status quo
Or if the watchers watching
Need to become operatives acting
Reduce potential new leaders of social order
To a single paragraph fatal car crash
Or a freak bath drowning accident.

1984 now

* 1984 now *
Set the traps in your mind
Unwind the string for following
Hear the hollow calling
Spies and secret police watching
Clothes a shade too casual
Scruffed shoes from fast walking
Unusual couples more interested in you than each other
The dripping tap of paranoia
A half open window closes as you walk by
Tourists capturing you in their photos
A van which never moves in your street
Your own face watching you in reflection
The quislings and collaborators all around
Footsteps down the hallway empty when you check
Strange calls in middle of the night
People walking their dogs too slowly
Cars slowing down as they go by
Low helicopter over-flights many
Unusual pauses in cashregisters as you shop
Familiar faces you cannot place
People moving close on public transport
All the wrong rhythms to everything
Where paranoid means self aware
And the faceless authorities tug the strings.

Such waves of sorrow

+ such waves of sorrow +
I cannot express waves of sorrow
Lumps of cement in gut
Foul taste ionised in my mouth
Thoughts sluggish slow with dread
At thinking of sacrifices made
Those soon dead so very very brave
Knowing the dangers as geiger counters
This radioactive hell shrilly register
For all incompetence and lack of leadership
For the deceiving of world and media
Were not jobs they did
Their only one to cool reactor down
Save as many as they could
Lay down their lives for common good
It was never meant to be this way
They core and air never meant to meet
The unthinkable did occur
Not one catastrophe but both
Earthquake and tsunami in ordered magnitude
Beyond what the plant could stand
Still it stood and bore the brunt
And those Fukushima Fifty did not flee
Even as fires and explosions saw
As radiation invisible ate at them
As desperate plans in desperation they actioned
To cease the radioactive reaction
Knowing the consequences as they toiled
To themselves yet never recoiled
Hoses splashing sea water against such fury
Become so radioactive in caskets lead need to bury
These selfless heroes trying to save as many as they could
Laying down their lives for the common good.

Made for Japan

**made for Japan**
They ought to consider hanging
The men who wrote the safety plan
The Fukushima fifty have no choice
Their true emotions cannot voice
Work until they die
Become so irradiated we cannot even try
To save their shortened lives
When to heroic burial they go
Before a nation full of woe
Coffins lead lined and smothered in cement
For our protection this radiation containment
Ironic to think they would be alive
Others also would have survived
If reactor's original containment had been ample
Their sacrifice for Japan not needed to have been made.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Want to hear

**want to hear**
I want to hear some good news
A burst of happier views
The reports are full of death and despair
Higher radiation levels in the air
Now snow is falling over catastrophe
Nature trying to hide so we can't see
All the destruction Nature set to be
A balance being sought by our Gaia host
Had enough of freeloaders damaging the world
With shakes and tremors tries to get us off
Doesn't realise the thousands killed
We replenish without trying at all
So many our breeding makes Gaia ill
Tomorrow more Gaia can slay
Our own petty disputes kill more every day
On roads and in cancer wards others die
Statistics of reflecting risks of how we live
Yet still we propagate positive
Breeding over edge of arable tracts
Consuming more than can be sustained
These dire facts clog my brain
The unsustainability of what we do
Fish from oceans vanish
Species not farmed become extinct
Droughts occurring with crushing regularity
How long till famine where never seen
Such vulgarity that we commit
An assisted suicide of the entire race
For a car burgers and a bigger house
So you can see how I need
To hear some good upbeat news
Microcosm joy to hide macro gloom
Express some happier views
Perhaps the snow can dampen
Radioactivity slowly rising
Maybe water levels are boring
But after floods more sustainable
Perhaps the rebuilding has already become
Show us hope for a better day
A hint we might decide to follow a better way.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Project manager's mantra

+**project manager's mantra**+
Uncertainty demands
Flexibility and agility
A mind able to adjust
Free flowing not stuck
Rigidity in focus
Not rigidity in action
The best laid plans alter
Greatest efforts may falter
Between today and tomorrow
Much change and maybe sorrow
Inexplicable might be
Decisions made that you see
Aim is to embrace
Not feel out of place
Turn focus ever homeward
Undistracted and unrewarded
Moving the craft
From doom through to safety
Agile and flexible
Adaptable and communicable
The project manager's mantra
To ride the plan home.

Endure

*+-__endure__-+*
The passion the fire
Tsunami like strength
From such a placid lake
The dream the inspiration
Vision Moses prophetic
From such a dull bore
The hopes the endurance
Stamina herculean in effort
From such a flawed vessel
All these things and more
Expected in love and war
Not noticed in peace
Or expected beyond
Altar and honeymoon
As if all before drove to this place
And then all energies were erased
Dull mind expended all spirit
Muscles fatigued and deadened
Vessel flawed returned to fail
Why should it be
Expected failure will occur
Ignore the premonitions
The doomsayers and vultures
The never do good sayers
Now is your time
To take yoke and plough on
Survive not abandon
For the next day and next
All you need to survive
Starting alive each day
Plot out course to safely ending the next.

Not closing

* not closing *
In your face I glimpse
As it closes to me
The disappointment I have not
Made some indefinable entreaty
As you think I pay more attention
To those others in my sight
When in fact I am as shy as you
For I sense the luminosity you hide
If felt secure and given trust
How quickly you would magnificent blaze
Raze the world of these non-entities
To find the woman cowering in the girl
Bring her out into the world
A kiss and passions ignite
Desires suppressed to surface rise
In private place private thoughts
Given audience and nirvana wrought
As see you quietly hide further away
I submerge and do the same today
Two almost perfect people for each other
Never rising to dare to be with another
We sit over empty coffee cups tables apart
Never moving to close the emptiness of the heart.

Tartan hearts

* tartan hearts *
Oh woven tartan flying
Potential haggis baaing
All the heather blooming
And bagpipes aural braying
This must be Scotland
Land of high roads and low
Where friends compete on different paths
To be there before you
And when a moon full blazes
The excretions of Burns unleashed
As if an ability to churn consonants and vowels
Murder the language of the occupiers
As if so much stinking silage
Deserved Burns be greatly respected
When in fact at any other time
Have been pushed back to hedgerow or pub
To teach or drown his sorrows
To act as if the Scotland of imagination
Had never been and had never succumbed
To those philistine invaders from the South
With their stereotypes of how the Scots must be
As if every kilt and sporran
Meant more to Scots than freedom
Offering fashions irreconcilable
As the Judas silver
For accepting a Southern monarch
With southern lords and soldiers
Who now could partake of Northern lands
And run the locals from their plots
Bring in cattle on emptied land
To chew and dullily gaze
As the children of Scotland starved.

Real heroics teach

*real heroics teach*
In the school rooms of the nation
Is this constant abomination
The reading of works fantastic
Be no help in economy elastic
These students heads are filled
With things never lived never killed
We teach them imaginary wonder
When real life they should ponder
Understand the value of employment
In making your first million such enjoyment
In providing for society's needs
A sense of satisfaction which feeds
All your encounters with comrades proud
Who exult your successes out loud
The world acknowledges all you have done
Engineer lawyer carpenter or humdrum
Provided duty and service sterling
Such a better way to make a living
Than playing games and slacking off
Being an adolescent of stunted growth
When so much more to set forth
A world to explore not realms of fantasy
Loyalty to community not whimsy
This is where education should lead
To address this real world need
Be a hero building and curing
Be an adventurer enduring
All the world can cast at you in spite
Your achievements let them write
In legend your life immortalise
And make friendship and love your greatest prize.

Modern tundra

* modern tundra *
I heard your call
I was on the tundra
Or some modern equivalent of dull concrete
Nothing lived there
Birds and animals banished
Whole world exposed to wind
Others walking past
First appear scarecrow stark on horizon
So your call was appreciated
Brought humanity back to my thoughts
Which had been numbed by this nothingness
Battered by concrete solidness
As if what I was
Marked by what I crossed
Feet made sore bashing across
Unyielding unfeeling slabs
Fortunately your call lifted me
My feet skipped lightly cross
The hardness of world and life
Joyous thoughts lightening my load
Bestowing a smile on my thoughts.

All through soul flows

** All Through Soul Flows**
A sewer or aqueduct
My soul channels life's experiences
Both the pure and sweet
The first time doings
Exhilaration of naïve completion
And the darker sorrowful seeds
The demands a craven heart needs
The deceits and follies ignorant
Dire corruptions repugnant
The days of too much wine
Looser thoughts and actions non divine
Through the soul all does flow
And I wonder whence it goes
Do I escape unstained by this current tainted
Am I by time undone or completed
Is soul a simple filter without regard
For what flows through good or bad
For what flows sad or joyous bright
Does my soul at what flows through
Turn diamond brilliant or pitch black as night.

Limits set

+*+*limits set*+*+
My bravery has limits set
Is not strong enough I will bet
For each of these natural horrors been
Televised to my soul I have seen
Make me quake and such sorrow feel
Such death and destruction far to real
No fairytale better afters
No final punch line laughter
Instead the teams searching for bodies gone
No rescuing in this debris to be done
Townships of the dead not dying
Tears helpless cast out by the crying
No majesty in nature's power
A tyrannical abuse tastes sour
No villains here only victims
No answers spoken only hymns sung.

To half mast lower

+to half mast lower+
Set half mast the flags
Cancel the carnivals
Allow workers to stay at home
Ignore the chores to be done
Place black cloth cross the Sun
For the end is complete
The dead are dead and we are weak
We live and act and carry on
Though emptied are those sea port towns
Buildings razed and ships found
Pushed across the shore into town
And under debris piled all around
Those who were alive can be found
Too slow or unlucky or never knew
The sea rose as earth shook
Three kilometres of fractured break
Sent a surge water fast as siren's cry
No chance for weak infirm too old too young
Without assistance of able bodied all are gone
And if able bodied tarried too long
In those places more coastal than inland
They do share with those they tried to save
The same stinking muddy churned up grave.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Tsunami

Tsunami +

The sea has risen up and caught us
Flattened levelled butchered and tortured us
Brought forth a world of nightmare
Turned our towns into matchsticks
Imperiously brushed aside our transport
Toppled trains and twisted tracks
Washed roads away and cars in piles dumped
Lifted ships from sea and in town centres beached

The sea has risen up and caught us
For simple things be thankful taught us
For running water and electricity
For neighbours friends and family
For these the sea has taken
In its wrath our hearts broken
The work of years in moments destroyed
Love precious taken and removed.

The sea has risen up and caught us
For our hubris a cost wrought upon us
Ignorance or emotion has no grace
All who stood before waves did erase
Too old or too young sea did not care
Only you were before path of water there
The morning shows an alien place
Devoid of life or dwellings or a known face.

The sea has risen up and caught us
The sea has risen up and taught us
There is more strength than we can hold
In Nature when it is bold
The earth can quake and sea boil
Then where is safety for we who toil
Not at water's edge or in building high
For Nature shall in anger fly
Bring forth the depths upon the land
Smack down the skyscrapers with a mighty hand

The sea has risen up and caught us
The sea has risen up and taught us
The tears we shed are more sea stirring
The tears for those we love past caring.

other self

*other self*
You will not save me
Your words cannot raise me
Neither witch nor angel
Brazen temptress or virgin maid
You are none and all
Projected upon and exploring
Every role and every you
The smiles smoulder
Your laughter filled
Lines of body haunt
Imaginations masculine pliable
You are not hindrance or weight
Nor champion or guardian
You are composed of same matter
As flesh and blood and muscle as me
You observe Nature's same laws
Gravity Time or sight and sound
By our limits governed
Even as our natures seek to overcome
Extend our mastery over all
Dispute the rulership of others
You are not breakfast or dinner
Nor famine or pestilence
I perceive you as I see
Not as you may in heart be
We each tangle ourselves
In nuanced communications woven
Through every word and pause
In how we stand and move and turn
We yearn and burn and play self as fool
We obey and we break every rule
For Love of another
Is neither for old or young
The wicked or innocent equal
Ensnared by emotions greater
Than our human frames can contain or hold
Is no surprise we try and make our other
Container of all our hopes
Well of all our fears
A breathing Pandora's box
More valuable than our own lives
Which curiosity drives us forward
To pry open and explore.

*after the quakes*

*after the quakes*
What changes these
Distilled tempers frozen
Lazy fuming discontentment drifts
Nature has set against humanity
Places all quarrels in perspective
Darkness of hates set aside
As jungle animals before a fire
Band together and see
World has razed evidence of humanity
Our ordered termite mound towns
Public thoroughfares straights clogged
Mud and debris and bodies
The sea has come and acted
All those statistics of risk meaningless
Stating how often a disaster is expected
For the raw figures do not protect
Cannot shield the wicked or innocent
From the disaster's effects
For all our mastery of numbers
A few thousand dead
A potential nuclear meltdown
Indicates highest human hubris
We all may yet glow
Deepest fears be realised
As core temperatures grow hotter
And Nature patiently waits
To strike at our majestic misconceptions
Of how we rule unchallenged
Have subjugated this wild world completely .

This dark this city

++this dark this city++
This dark this city
Streets awash with alcohol
Violence a constant companion
Nihilism of the youth
No way forward or back
Only this present misery
Setting fire to the world
Crushing all about them
For this insignificant victory
Brief and pyrrhic
Insubstantial as the night
By tonight all be reset
The brooding punch drunk teens
Steroid loaded nightclub security
And the once were tribal
Hanging on the edged
Older and slyer waiting
To pounce upon these young lions
Blinded by their thoughts of immortality
Not to see the dangers lurking
The future they are building
When they will no longer be the strong
Instead be new prey
For the violent hedonistic nihilists
Marching in their wake
As Moon swallowed by night clouds
Hides stains on the streets
The vomit blood and piss merge
In this dark this city.

Friday, March 11, 2011

Wondrous world

* wondrous world *
I think of things wondrous
I encounter everyday
The smile of the barista
As he bids everyone gooday
The slowly flowing Yarra
Permanently colour of milk in tea
Swooping birds above choralling
The love of a good dog
Wonder of an aircraft
So many parts to get off the ground
Dis-assembled they are landlocked
As much slaves as we to gravity
How a tshirt made over there
And transported across half the world
Sold in a shop paying rent
With staff who must earn wages
Can cost less than a fruit muffin
I devour in moment's forgetfulness
How the Sun elopes each and every night
Leaves us with silver stars twinkling in sky black
Running in the morning
Seeing mist as cotton wrapped
Around the bare skin of the eucalyptus
Growing tall and straight
Holders of the oil
Which make our bushfires inferno
When Summer wind gusts blowtorch hot
There is such wonder in the differences
Of the faces many that I see
Each of us seeking out
Our own path to divinity
I wonder at the wars
When we have poverty to fight
I wonder at the politics of extremes
Which denies our human rights
I wonder why we worry that oil will run out
When commonsense is in greater short supply
I feel the breath in my lungs
Intricacies of bones and muscle
Which drive and control my fingers
As nimbly try and type
I wonder at these thoughts
Translated into written words
Surge of electric impulses
A biological mass of water
All these cells as a brain together form
Calling on memories and sight
Reaching out for the Muse
I find such wonder in close to everything
I sense the person that is you
The complexity and beauty
Elegance of equation stated
The unique soul without compare
In the wonder that is you.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

return of you

** return of you **
So easy in imagination
To bring you in again
Though been years seems only days
My questing fingers and lips recall
Joy of your closeness
Fullness of the heart to meet
And in passion desire treat
All those thoughts previous raised
In words your charms so highly praised
Now in living flesh made carnal truth
Of passion and love this proof
In embrace and kiss reality carved
Imagination's figment found to be
So much less than this real ground
A rush in pulse and time
Our lips our bodies in delighted rhyme
Rhythm set to Earth's spin
Time set aside and made immobile
As again I call you in
The taste so sweet of warm skin
Heels lying across my back
Night air delicious feeds appetite
A memory and yet more
A moment of truth lodged
Deep in essence of me
Woven into my veins
Become part of my dna
Those moments brief together
Relived can illuminate darkest day.

Spotlight burnt

** spotlight burnt **
You silly stupid bitch
You mindless male moron
Being a person who is mentioned
On twitter magazines and tv
Does not make you better
to be flavour of month or moment
Does not mean you are totally removed
From the rules of society
Just means people will take vivacious interest
In your detachment from reality
Initially find intriguing and humorous
As you spin out of control
Then be worried and alarmed
As your world completely collapses
As the naughty becomes outrageous
Before tragically just becoming sad
As the reality you refuse to acknowledge
Closes in on you
As full consequences of your actions
Devastate all you are or ever were
And everyone flees before the whirr
Of you spinning faster beyond control
The inevitable crash growing closer
The doom as cracks pulled wider
As the smile becomes suitably manic
The madness eating through the surface
Fed by drugs or fame or money
The mortal bounds having been reached
All parameters of commonsense breached
You are untouchable you declare
And in truth none desire to touch you
The mutant broken howling walking corpse
The insominiac pill popping media whore
The shadow of the human being that was
A freak still willing or unwillingly on show
A moral lesson to us all
To walk carefully along the cliff
Not to plunge blindly over the edge
Because for all the lovely views
To loose your footing is suicide.

A female fantastical

* a female fantastical *
All those Durban daughters
Veldt beauties succulent
Stalk like lionesses
The fun they will get
Sweet Charlotte sirens
Southern belles chorus
Kissed by sun and have accents
Made for having fun
Inuit lasses classy
Always ice on hand for drinks
Polar Sun tans completely even
Soft toned skin and whitest teeth
Pretty Parisian pollsters
In long boots and skirts
Attitude by Bardot minx
Fashion by their own views
Lilting Glasgow girls
All red curls and eyelashes
Fed on porridge strong
Always so right for doing wrong
Wounded London ladies mellow
Waiting for their princes
Ready to undo hair and graces
In loving pull so many faces
Melbourne maidens made for kissing
Their parents were adventurers
Crossing oceans for the pleasure
Of Southern hemisphere love affairs
All these ladies women and broads
Seeking pleasure and some fun
Believers in their destiny
Apostles of Lauperism
Even as they are kissing
Each and every one
Have no lines for gender
Think Katy Perry a prude
For kissing only one girl
And squawking about it rudely
For manners are important
As is a good time and fun
Their adventures constant and winding
As they seek their only one.

on Cows

*+* on Cows *+*
On cows I should write
Of Devonshire black patched and white
Or Herefords with ginger heads large
Brahmans pleasantly sub-continental
Swinging udders often full
To produce our dairy products daily
Requires a visit to cow shed mechanised
Where milk so white and rich the prize
Is channelled to waiting tanker
For our breakfast or tea
The white liquid on which we exist
A valuable protein drink we would miss
If all the cows were not there
Or chose one day to go on strike
To the world of milk deprive
No more cheese yoghurt or cream
If the herds should turn mean
Launch a cloven hoof revolution
Dispute with humanity evolution
Demand their rights as true bovine
Declare themselves as images divine
The Hindus already treat them so
The cows wonder why the rest so slow
Return their milk or pay the bill
Otherwise no more lactating cows will
This is what in future may occur
If we do not to demands demure
To acknowledge cow-ship rights
Lead to all kinds of fights
Thankfully cows are so sensible
No love of conduct reprehensible
Seek not to rule our world
Prefer see milk in cheese curd
And regularly need to seek relief
Of full udders else there be grief.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

tundra thaw

*+ tundra thaw +*
In your tundra of love
Frozen still and waiting
Global climate change warming
A de-frosting beyond all reason
Break apart your heart
Thaw the scar fissures of ice
Allow you to come apart
So greater benefits can accrue
Of love and passion and all you are due
Shall not begin without the change
Loosen your grip on winter caution
Thermostat of happiness change
Move yourself from polar circle
To warmth more temperate or tropical
And burst to flower then
Love locked unbound from ice
And luxuriate in gulf stream flow
Of relationships true glow.

Trying

* trying *
Trying trying trying
To find inspiration
Seeking muse to create
Briiliance from perspiration
Oh lay not my lines
With doldrum words
I seek to amaze and feelings engender
Have lines as Botticelli cupid curves
I seek the stuff of clouds
Ethereal and yet so real
Feel it falling on your head
And I seek your heart to feel
Pounding of the pulse of lines
Life to be lived poem cries
Trying tying life's many vines
From common words a poem pry.

Shroud

* shroud *
Lay me in my shroud
Not funeral in colour make
Instead of iridescent rainbow hues
Speak of life lived
The dawn anew
Put aside talk of dusk
Endings should ever thus be
A beginning not conclusion
As one story concludes
Another story flows
Who are they beside whom you stand
Can this life wrapped be understood
With comprehension given the living
How better could that life be lived
What moments gracious will you carry
And when the shroud in ground lowered
In deep remorse do not tarry
Smell the flowers race the horses
Live your life as if
The tailors are already working
On a shroud to fit you to
Life is far to valuable not to be celebrated
In every shade or colour or shifting hue.

Allowing feelings flow

* allowing feelings flow *
Feeling flow as feelings might
Through words set down in sight
Little wonders thought should show
In the lines which flow
From the musings and confusings
Or the poet often refusing
To dam his thoughts or feelings raw
Leaves wide open heart's door
Even when thinly disguised in metaphor
The feelings felt were felt before
In everyone feelings run
Build up until rationality overcome
Ruled by head or heart they seek
Oh feelings tide no place for meek
The raw abrasion of every moment
Relentless fight against every comment
Up or down or sideways turn
With tornado power feelings burn
And out upon the page I drive
These feeling raw which I strive
To myself some greater understanding commit
For if your feelings you do not admit
What are you and where
For without feelings there is no care.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

more stupidity

* more stupidity *
I am more stupid
Than you could ever believe
My idiocy as much as my love
So completely defines me
I will argue over trivialities
Which moments later I will forget
I will fume and roar and grow upset
Without proportion to ill done
Find war in harmless jests
And say things I don't mean
I am a complete dysfunction
Arguing is just not my thing
I will shout and bang doors
Be frustrated and frustrating
Beyond any measure set
And still be in love
Torn divided and rent in two
Myself is not my utterances
I am not these words I say
I am an impatient irrational sprouter
Emitter of emotions mean
Which I never meant to express
And wish to call back immediately
And the worse (or best)
Is you are exactly the same
Frustrating baiting biting
Our relationship drives you
Two stops past safety of sane
And so we burn together
Our own hell complete
The words we express
A complete rational defeat
Of why we stay together
Of bitterness forever
For I am more stupid
Than you could ever believe
And twice as obstinate in my duty
Even as we senselessly bleed.

Golden Age

* Golden Age *
[Originally written and published on jpwritesi on Wednesday, October 13th,
2010. Slight re-editing, re-writing]

Kings in Italian suits
Arbitrage is their force
A penny difference seen
A penny difference gained
Hedge the buys with sells
Spread the equities deep
As manure applied to the CDO compost heap
Bet on government mistakes
Black Swan events likely
Bring down a government today
Set in place a dictatorship
At least they will get the bananas out
And if you gamble wrong
The government will bail you out
For you are to big to ever fail
So take your golden handshake
And start all over again
Tip the waiters and menial staff
Pat them gently on the head
Send them back to paupercy
And mortgages foreclosed upon
Soon all the jobs will be offshore
And they can't afford your education
Building a permanent underclass
To clean your pools and cut the grass
As high above in Versailles luxury
You live the life of dreams
Now recall how all Golden Ages
Tend to end by guillotine.

Either, or?

++* Either, Or *++
Love or lust
I must choose one?
What foolishness is this
Cannot I not burn with passion
For one whom I do love
Drown myself in lust
Even when this loving accomplished
Even when I know every freckle
And have forgotten every body line
Seen you in a thousand clothes
Charted moods as Atlantic storms
Devoured your kisses
Consumed your heat
Warmed your chill body
Seen you everyday of every week
For a 365 day year
Why should my love
Exclude the lust tugging
At my sinews and my smile
The lingering admiration of my gaze
At your beauty daily
The way you rise each day
A single strand of your hair
The lust inside me intensifies
A fire without compare
Given leverage by Love
Not set aside or worn down
By empathy and respect
Always there a hunger
To love you with lust without regret.

Those Sounds

* Those Sounds *
Oh those familiar sounds
Fill my room and thoughts
Brush away depths of gloom
Voices singing lyrics I ignore
The rhythm and music hook me
Leave me drifting on melody
Pulsebeat becomes the drums
Voices of angels play
Cross numbness of my mind
Opening thoughts blossom
Unheld or driven forward
A liner slipping into the water
Dreams given aural hues
I become a line of a tune
A drop washed into a sea
A wave of surging sound
I am a note lifted
Played and soaring
In the soundtrack of Life
And how my heart rejoices
Soul sings praises
For the music universe
Of which I am part.

Summer heat

* Summer heat *
Light bridges street
Thoroughfare of Summer heat
Ghost shadows pursue our footsteps
Angles consistently industrial blend
As buildings our horizons perch
On edge of street rivers black
We are the current flowing
Flotsam and jetsam of city
Worker bees out of our hives
Seeking luncheon sustenance
Our clocks set to human tides
As Summer sun hammers pavement
Knocks our city anvil flat
We no more than beads of sweat
On the great smithy's back.

Whistlewaterbottom

-+-Whistlewaterbottom-+-
Whistlewaterbottom
A town name so long
An old English village
More history than fame
No one of importance
Or tarred with fame's brush
Has been from Whistlewaterbottom
Since before the war before the last
Yet still clinging to its importance
As where Charles the Second stopped
On his coronation tour of blah-blah
Before the royalists lost the plot
The old town inn has been serving
Watery stew and local ale
Since before America was discovered
By Europeans completely lost
The small river running through
Whistlewaterbottom
Is quite scenic now
The rusting prams have been removed
And the village green annually holds
The village versus manor cricket match
All proceeds to St.Michael's
The rustic white painted church
Which has seen better attendances
And once was interrupted
By an errant German bomb
Which buried itself in the cemetary
But forgot to detonate
Whistlewaterbottom
Seem so much and yet
It dimensions are still human
Fashion a pastiche of
Eras we do well to forget
A collision of styles and statements
Often stolen from some other burb
More stylish and better set
Those aluminium windows ill-set
In a heritage house facade
A door imported from China
On a twelve storey high container ship
A door meant for internal use
Used externally on a dairy shed
Build with bluestone pilfered in 17th century
From remains of a 12th century tower
Knocked down by Henry VIII
As he acquired the local monasteries lands
Reformation and revolt and information
Whistlewaterbottom
Lived through each and seen
Those ages consigned to rubbish bin
Become footnotes to a history
Of a land green productive and free
And little places without compare
Whistlewaterbottom
Unmarked on any map of major byways
Slipped away and forgotten
Except for those who discover it
And find no mobile phone signal
The road sign on rotting posts
Local larrakins have turn thrice around
Enjoy your visit for when you go
No more finding Whistlewaterbottom
Through which the Whistle river flow.

Sleeplessness

* Sleeplessness *
These weary eyes
Disconsolate sighs
Morning of yawning
A plodding day ahead
Is it an uncomfortable bed
Not enough air circulating
The bedroom is too hot
Or too chilly and drafty
Whatever it should be
This sleeping place is not
For on waking no refreshment
Instead tiredness dogs heels
Every move in a haze
Of wishing for more sleep
Limbs are heavy
Thoughts are leaden
These weary eyes
Disconsolate sighs
Morning of yawning
Need escape and relief
A decent night's sleep
For at least a decent week.

Monday, March 7, 2011

Before the mast

* before the mast *
Here before the mast
Time seems to slow
Seagull hanging on the wind
Wind-tipped swells to horizon
The voices have fallen silent
My face rests against hard wood
Rope around wrists bound tight
And hear the drawn out whisper
Of lash descending once more
Taste salt in my mouth
My muscles tense despite
My wish they would relax
And a shock of lightning
Followed ever so sweetly briefly
By collapse into senseless darkness
As pain explodes and drags
Every ounce of breath from me
Real time speed returns
An assault upon my ears
My own groans obscene
A taste of blood from bitten lip
As hear the lash drawn back again
The count is only up to three
Then the whisper loudest to my ears
As lash follows path once more
From air lash's edge draws a shriek
Announcing to my skin
Soon the lash will bite
Soon my nerves will burn
See seagull turn its head away
Know I should relax
An incongruous thought intrudes
A sailor's life for me.

Its cost

* * its cost * *
Soft butter leather
Well used and carefully kept
Your satchel is reminiscent
Of one less expensive you carried
When you were young and carefree
A youth with ideals intact
A naivety almost offensive
To how world was and is
You carry the satchel to try
And recapture essence of that time
The bubbling creativity
The winning without loss
The feeling all can be conquered
Such wells of strength from which to draw
Not realising not only the world
But smallest of their minds
Against which you had to war
Their thoughts were placed differently
Their pace was set so much slower
Could not understand your urgency
Indeed you cannot understand it now yourself
As if to drive the coach of your ideas all the faster
Would make it achieve where all others had blundered
When in fact the end was already preordained
A job slightly comfortable
Ambition without insight
A gradual move across
To the slowly plodding tracks
Of the carthorse not the race
A little grey in your hair
A satchel in your lap
Reminding you of other days
Hinting at the once was brilliant
The person who you was
Not needing symbols to demonstrate
Who you wanted to be
No need for satchel or pen
Your heart and voice proclaimed
The thunder in your passion
Drive in your life
And now there is just your smile
Amused and wiser and wired
To a greater understanding
All poets cannot write poetry
All philosophers are not heard
And a mortgage needs paying
A comfortable life has its cost.

Self analysis

* self analysis *
These days of subterfuge are over
Who I was can raise up
The fearful warrior quavering
Before first battle of a war
The braggard full of bravado
To disguise cowardice at his core
Too many extra battles have been fought
Because refuse to acknowledge
Who I am is permanently broken
Who I was never was quite right
I laugh too eagerly and loudly
A dancing dog performing tricks
For scraps from the table
Or coins tossed upon the floor
I trust no one at all
Think my hypocrisy they will breach
See the coward cowering here
The brave man ashamed by fear
All the efforts I have exhausted
To conceal my lying mask
The decay set deep inside
The heart as cold as ice
The philosopher ignoring
Every true guide or principle
Not interested in growing up
A bonsai stunted character
Aiming to destory
This twisted malignant illness
This abomination in my sight
Staring in the mirror
I sense thise ceaseless fight
To grow or die or dissolve
No more absolving of my flaws
The hurts were all yesterday
Tomorrow beckons free
I need only embrace it
With a renewed reinvigorated accepting version
Of the person who could be me.

Taught to speak

* taught to speak *
You say my words are wicked
Barbed darts which fly
I think not to hurt
No venom do I spray
It is just the way
I was taught to speak
By those b*st*rds of my youth
Who beat up on the meek
Their beliefs were like flooding waters
Probe every single point
Constant pressure bring to bear
Until you find a weakness
Until you find a flaw
And then set more pressure at that point
Be unrelenting in your torment
Keep on flooding forward
Drown the good inside the youth
Till all is overcome
Every barrier broken down
To flooding water meek has succumbed
Drowning in their hatred
Their barbs so rich and many toxic
Destroying what was
Replacing with nothing at all
Leaving a hollow empty shell
Echo chamber for their raucous calls
Seems I now reply
Before any slight has been delivered
My words are razor edged and toxin coated
A viper I have become
Moved from nest in which I grew
Unable to renounce
The poison in my glands
Fury of my words
The meek who was within is gone
Just the fortress walls remain
Never to be conquered
No drawbridge to be let down
An angry cruelled parody
Of who once spoke soft words.

Friday, March 4, 2011

too often think

~¤ too often think ¤~
These days I too often think
Of those who will not be here
Who in a phone-call I fear
Be stated as having passed away
Be dead not alive
And my world collapse a little
A support having given way
A parent or close relative
On whom I might depend
Will have come to an end
Change my world forever more
My world become a hollowed out core
And am I so to others I know
An expected constant pillar
A mark on flood pole of life
Something familiar without which
Their world would be off kilter
Stagger and no longer a round figure
In their calculations of life present
As I think of those who may
Soon be gone away
How I resent life for such cruel tricks
Could I not have grown up
With my parents when they did
Learned to understand them better
Not take for granted their existence
As my thoughts too often turn
To those who may soon not be here.

Media myth places

* media myth places *
Here mythmakers and mythbreakers dwell
The studios of network television
Ponderous landlocked landholding offices
Marked by a single number
Demonstrate their allegiance
Tell viewers to whom to switch to
To learn what is happening where
Or be distracted by sweet dramatic pulp
From the chores of the day
Though in truth they are eroded
Labour saving devices have done as
They did commit to do
Our chores now are superficial
A little pick and carry
Before television once more tarry
Unhurried by day's passing hours
Ensnared in narrative web
Of those fictional characters presented
Who seem more real than we
Bleed and live more life
Than we could ever dream to do
Whose challenges and opportunities
Seem so much more interesting
Than our very own.

COMMENT!!!

~~ COMMENT!!! ~~
Who are you

Dropping in and glancing

Or a ponderer who pauses
To consider mental health
Or intellectual gymnastics
Of the writer's word written

Or a disconsolate soul
Lead astray by Google search
To this barren commentless blog
When you were searching Amazonian Frog

Either way please feel inclined
To leave a comment as you past
For I have set the blog to allow all
No more requirements to be a member
To leave a comment when
Upon this blog you fall.

Really don't cares

* really don't cares *
The what's and where's
The really don't cares
The incessant babble
From the elected rabble
We just want our cake
Our power and water
We just need the thoughts
That we live free
We don't want high taxes
Or obvious injustices
The rich should pay something
Poor given a hand
We should have time
For holidays and fairs
Summers should be warm
And Winter's chill
Spring should be green
And Autumn be rich
With decomposing mat of fallen leaves
All time is the same time
All urgency doomed
Leave us alone
Sterile in thought
Snug in our homes
We have no consideration
Of your what's and your where's
We are the who really don't care.

Everyday goddesses

* everyday goddesses *
How pleasant you sound
All legs and round vowels
A scent of exotic
Your perfume is tantalising
And you are surprising
The places you have been
Things you have seen
Views which you hold
A merging of cultures in your blood
And thoughts in your head
The old you retain
Without a worry how
It may not agree
With the modern philosophies
You espouse so enthusiastically
Your dress is short hemmed
And open to show
Your pride in your bosom
The perfection of snow
And skin rolled in butter
Smoothed and lathered over
A meal to be savoured
Such an appetite you engender
A proud statement of your gender
All of your wit intelligence and grit
All of your modern ancientness resplendent
And I place my order
Go back to the conversation
As you go to get me
My coffee and toast.

In the interrgation rooms

* in the interrogation rooms *
Too many walkers
Too many loose talkers
All of these plans will fall
The secrets in perfection
Plans are still in conception
Please stop torturing me long
Give me a pen
Give me some paper
I will list them all
The baker the butcher
Journalist and student agitator
I detail them before long
Every person I ever met
For a glass of water or cigarette
I will turn over to you
Just turn off the lights
Let me have sleep
My body is aching
I can't stop this shaking
There is nothing more I can do
All the names written
Places where they are hidden
Explained in as much detail
As my traitorous mind can do
Release me and forget me
I am insignificant to you
You hold all my secrets
And if you come calling
When I am again living
Far from these walls
And the lights always bright
I will inform on all others
Do whatever you ask
Just set me down lightly
Ignore me and set me free
It seems the least you could do
After all of my talking
My name writing and betraying
The giving up of my soul and my self
My offer to serve only you.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

From canvas raised

* From canvas raised *
Looking at faces
Graceful and ageless
Madonna child to her bosom
Picnickers in indolence sprawled
Mona constantly appraising
From canvas they are raising
Sparkle in the paint
As if could give birth anew
To the moment artist viewed
Life not crushed beneath brush
Instead feathered and captured
Revitalised in colours lush
The Masters it seems
Tied reality with dreams
Held there in stasis
Life moments precious
Inside those frames
The participants escape Time's tyranny
Forever beheld timeless and still
Graceful and ageless
Still looking at faces.

People Uprising

--- People Uprising ---
Is your blood rising
Call in your heart exciting
Hearing they are coming
Those tyrant's men gunning
Take away your lives
No more you are running
AK-47 lightly slung
Over your shoulder easily won
Winning your freedom
Sweet taste of free breathing
To hand down to generations following
By less easily gained
Off now to war
To settle this score
For the corruption and torture
The shooting of innocents
Pillaging of government coffers
Emptying of your banks
For the poverty and hate
Take these dreams and build them
Out on the frontline
With bullet and shell
Bury the tyrant
Send him to hell.

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Inviting

+-_ -Inviting-_-+
The pale white depth
Of the screen is inviting
Me to be writing
Scribbing my thoughts
A key at a time
Trying catch feeling and rhythm
The soft gentle plinking
Against keys as I thinking
Of topics vivid to consume
All of that white room
Fluorescent pale and exciting
As words begin fighting
For space on the screen
Thoughts begin to overrun
As if driven ny a gun
The nimbleness in fingers
And a tingling lingers
Flushed as a kiss
These fingers red miss
A key here or there
Depending I repair
A sentence or word broken
Never be so if I had spoken
But poetry needs
A place to be laid
A sheet of paper or screen
With pen or with digits
Before poet forgets
These thoughts and these dealings
The raw sentient feelings
The rhyme and the rhythm
The always there something
Driving the poet along
To fill space needs filling
With poet's thoughts sweet or chilling
All of the words conjured
As if mugged in a junkyard
Repaired and refitted
Set now in new purpose
Get them down is the chanting
Not idealistic or romancing
Get down all those words
In their ordered herds
Of ideas for the milking
Cheap words for silking
Fill the deep white
The screen electronic bright
With words from your thoughts
As the words of the others
Who lived before screens
Before paper and inks
Swishing the verses
On walls in the caves
Of antelope chases
Of buffalo hunts
Of the chaste and the brave.

Tales Past and Future

* tales past and future *
Mysteries deepen
Hopes are misshapen
Treasure remains hid away
The tales of past days
Curtsies and true ways
Fairy tales imbued by time
With wonder and truth
As if we keep saying often
History fades
With the remnants real we are left
Even our own past just past
Romanticised and made unreal
I don't recall the world
Of which they are speaking
The simpler cleaner place
When all life is easier
And the streets were layered with gold
Jobs for the picking
The cars nearly perfect
Houses and land inexpensive
And phones stayed where they were told
Now there's this new world
Seems like the old one
Wars are still bought and sold
Good men do things which worry them
Bad men get away with hell
We hope for our children
That the world we are building
Will be worth something when they are old
But whatever we do
However we make it
It will theirs to behold
The way that they view it
Reflect what they're knowing
Not all the luggage
Of the years we are towing
The chasm between us
The difference as if
We were on one tide
And they are rising on another
Searching the beaches
For the mysteries to unfold
And the treasures they know is lying
They hope to be holding
Now reached their time to be bold.

Inner city guilt

* Inner city guilt *
I cannot find it in me
To reach deep into my pocket
to bring forth charity you seek
My own family need my alms
And my selfishness annoys me
Seems I constantly grow smaller
As larger riches I seek
An act of dimunation
Centred in my heart
Draws my vision ever inward
Disrupts me in my sleep
A man of caring made immune
To your calls for support
As if you chose to starve
Or earth to quake
Or land to burn
Or waters to wash you from your feet
And I keep on walking
Heart turned away
Eyes fixed upon the grail
Of no more debts to pay.

Weary

* weary *
This blade is dulled
This genius worn
Spark snuffed out
Lethargy surrounding
Sargasso Sea of fact
I move neither
Forward nor back
Motionless and energyless
Dissipated and collapsed
A shadow's shadow
Of what once was
A tired nothing
Turning homeward
Beaten and curled
By a daily day too long.

During the breaches

*+- during the breaches -+*
Tribulations tend to breach
Civilized social veneer
Make us reach out
In comradeship acknowledge
All of us are
The same in our grief
In our unhappiness deep
This desperation complete
To live and not die
Reject strength of elements fierce
Fire or flood or earth shaking through
These moments of life when you knew
Life is a fight
Each breath a deep pleasure
Life can be turbulent
Never expect always leisure
For all torment set
Another lesson obscene
Of how fragile life
How much life really means.

Breaking away or down

* breaking away or down *
Breaking away always seemed
More like breaking down
The tears and vale of death
Heart shrinking hurt
Feelings of being in debt
When merely sharing
Life's events to the now
Trying not to be crying
In public places raw
Fear you will howl
A Ginsberg frustrated howl
Sure you are the loser
Battered and worn
From best things in life being torn
Deluded more than just once
Unsure what is delusions
What is the truth you can touch
Were you too sheltered
Too exposed loved too much
A pawn for others feeling
Never owned your time enough
Or were you a stickler
for what you did want
Accused of not giving
Being cold to the touch
Who ever declared you should be
Whatever they want you to be
The wheat in the field
May bend at the breeze
Yet it is still wheat
And always will be
How come it seems
Growing up is being harvested
Ripped from the ground
Thrashed and threshed till you are raw
Evey emotion quivering
A seed so alone
Surrounded by so many
In same place as you
Wondering if tomorrow
Dawn will capture them
Sharing and caring
The hollywood sweet sap
Of the perfect lived life
For now wondering why
Breaking away feels like failure
And all of your living
Seems to be a case of breakdown.

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

* when you were three *

*** when you were three ***
You often wonder who you are
Where your world might be
If this was the life that was intended
Marked out when you were three
Should you expect more
There seems no peace
And yet there is no war
Your smiles often fall it seems
On ground so hard and barren
As if all your efforts make you more
An outsider an always one of them
The backs of those you know
Too often turned from your needs
Seems your voice does not reach their ears
Deaf and heedless to your pleads
You do not seek that much
One to love who would in return
Love you as you would love them
With trust and joy and loyalty
A smidgen of commonsense
Intelligence and humour
Yet all you meet seem so far removed
From the love you pursue
Those upon whom your time consume
Fail you when they should stand true
Leave you wandering alone
Wondering if this was the life intended
Marked out when you were three.

Smallest dreams

* smallest dreams *
These smallest dreams and hopes
Sheltered in my soul
Kept warm by beating heart
Pushed gently forward by thoughts
Of other days and other things
Which I might seek to do

Dreams as fragile as blackbird eggs
Not heavily wrought or crude
Of having sufficient to eat
A comfortable chair
Cosy abode
The ability to if I wish
Purchase a luxury or two
A new fresh purchased book
Linen white and virgin pure
A cup of coffee in a cafe
As world slips

These dreams of mine are small
I tread around them soft
I fear the world in which I live
May treat such dreams rough
My money saved evaporate
A war break out and crush
Every little dream I have
Of living cosy warm and safe.

In Tuscany or Normandy

* In Tuscany or Normandy *
In the shadows of the villa
Autumn shadows loger grow
Summer past and ground grows cold
Leaves plastered on the ground
Trees bare beside the parking area
Empty of cars or life
Night wind has an icy edge
All which was has moved on
The swimming pool closed over
Shutters on windows latched till Spring
A state of hibernation found
The caretaker from the village
Will trek up the road
Not daily as was his chore before
With milk and eggs and butter
Instead clean out the gutters once a month
Cut the lawns and ensure
No door is open or shutter banging
Till the Spring sunshine comes again
And holidaymakers in colours gay
Once more visit and contemplate
How to do as close to nothing
As the holiday spirit will allow.