My Poetry: your Hands

Your Hands

---

Your fingers,
trace my cheek
where tears had been,
as your body
envelopes mine,
I am vulnerable, again.

Your hands,
like water and sun
to wilting daisy
in parched savannah,
has awakened life
inside of me.

Before you came:
before warm
touch of palm
refreshed diluted body,
I was just another
museless poet.

But your fingers,
oh, how your fingers enthrone
this pauper's heart
to mighty king;
turn abstract being
to flesh and blood, again.

 

My Poetry: Portrait of a Mum, aged 16.

Portrait of a Mum, aged 16.

---

She stares up from old sweet tin
like a silent movie star
or waning moon in night sky;
a disjointed image,
from a pixelated past

in plain, navy dress
blonde hair worn long
across the shoulder,
strong and defiant and naïve
she leans against a fountain,
in old sea-side town.

A shy girl thrust into adulthood
while still a child,
a belly full of her future
just showing,
like a far off uncharted mountain
she'd conquer alone.

That old familiar smile
captured in frameless photo,
seen since on nights drawn out
in reds, black and blues,
nights a shoulder became
a pillow for her greying locks.

A smile painted across
flawless pale canvas;
she is still flawless,
but the canvas is now full
of lines, like a crumpled pad
of discarded half sentences.

If only she could've known
the last half would be, it'll be okay
when dust finally settles on day.

My Poetry: The Horizon (The myth of Salvation Island)

The Horizon (The Myth of Salvation Island)

---

On bleak shore I stand
imagine swimming to horizon
to see if cold sea can dilute
salt water crusting on crimson cheek.
Maybe make friends with the lost
cast away, ugly ducklings, on the way;
swap stories and jokes
till punch-lines run dry
and sirens beckon us back
with swan song melodies
full of promises of melancholy wishes
played on pipes of indifference.

But those exotic songs, do not beckon I,
so to horizon I’ll keep a heading,
to where sun setting
turns brine to ink so I can pen
a verse or two titled ‘Sea of Tears’
and/or ‘When salt waters collide’
and sing it to my new duck friend
who asks why
I want to reach the horizon.
I answer only: ‘Because it’s not shore.’
and he pretends
to know, but he does not
as he leaves me for sand sanctuary.

Then as day gets older
setting sun sits lower, glowing orange,
like it’s set fire to the horizon,
a ceremonial cremation
for the death rattle of dying day.
but no elegy or pyre
could entice me more
than hearing its crackling promises
to dry the salt waters, which punish I,
like sea-sick sailor
craving home and the bosom
that awaits he
with ember hearth and warm rum.

But shore is neither home
nor happiness to I, now I know
the burning kingdom of eternal rest
lays just beyond the distance;
the esoteric myths of poetic fools
and holy men, enough for me
to continue to believe
in the rumoured uncharted island
nicknamed salvation.

When alongside I, a whale,
the size of France, appears
with a sickle shaped smile
and bloated promises
claiming: “I know a place that is neither
‘shore nor horizon,
‘where poetic verse is pointless
‘because pain and happiness
‘is but the same within its ephemeral walls.”
I sighed, and started to backstroke
so to better view, that big blue
promiser of heaven, or hell.
‘But what care I for such a place
‘where the sun is the same as the moon
‘and folk like my friend the duck
‘have no shore to call a home?’ said I.
‘But its beauty is unsurpassed:
‘rolling hills and poppy fields
‘sit like lakes of blood in mint green sea,”
Said she, as if my history was writ
on jetsam floating by.

‘Alas, madam,’ said I.
‘I cannot contend its beauty,
‘and if it’s as great as yours
‘I would surely be happy there,
‘but I must reach the horizon,
‘so I can write the duck
‘to confirm the ugly and unwanted
‘are at least, welcome there.
‘So, Fair thee well, my tres belle femme,
fair thee well.’
I said, with practiced apathy.

But days, turned to months,
and years snuck up
till thoughts of horizon promises
began to fade, and I forgot
what crimson cheek was like
without salt water.
I begun to think holy horizon
was beyond this swimmers reach,
I sighed to raging sky and confessed
my love for it and for thee,
before solemnly taking grave
on ocean floor
beside starfish and octopi.

 

 

Edvard Munch (1863-1944), The Scream Signed E. Munch and dated 1895

 

This is a poem about depression and the overwelming need to escape which can take over the day.
I used the horizon as a metaphor of never reaching your goal of happiness (because the horizon is always in sight but never reachable by definition).
For some reason I liked the surrel charactors in there - the duck, someone who is also depressed but finds happiness; the whale, a drug dealer offering a respite from the sadness.
The final stanza, is the protaganist giving up after too many years of swimming for happiness ('I forgot, what crimson cheek was like, without salt water.' i.e tears).

My Poetry: We Used to Pretend

We Used to Pretend

---

We used to pretend
Eros scattered the stars,
like diamond confetti
to mark the marriage of our hearts.
But they seem dimmer,
now pretending is of no use.

I used to recite you verse
under observant moon,
soft words conjured up
to honour your magical beauty.
But all nouns are useless,
now words are of no use.

Now all I see is light
reflected from rocks,
when my heart softens
to words aimed at heavens above.
Your gentle headstone
in the graveyard of my soul.

My Poetry: The Seagull

The Seagull

---

Cries from solitary seagull
break the still Autumn air,

maybe it calls to the lovers,
the losers, the ghosts
who speckle the seafront,
maybe to no-one,
as nobody echoes its call.

Drifting creature - falling
in circles ever-decreasing,
white wings silhouetted
against a mackerel sky -
lost to instinct in need
of any warm nest
on this cold November 'noon.

It drifts inside greying shroud
of the pier's half-light,
as day trades blows with night ,
desperate flicker of lights,
flash and urge fractured souls
from slate sea to safe shore.

Lovers, losers and ghosts now hidden
in street lamp shadows ,
which grow taller,as night creeps.
Some days the sun ignores
this corner of England,
where no-one hears the silence
when the bells of loneliness peel. 

Brighton Pier 18-11-2013

A clip of me reading the poem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1oAfcZqqv0

My Poetry: Emotional Sand Castles

Emotional Sand Castles

---

**NB, for those not in the UK - 'the dole' is the welfare system for those out of work and Primark is a chain of cheap clothing stores. 'shrapnel' is a slang term for coins**

I hit the street
a handful of shrapnel
in a old leather wallet
tucked inside the pocket
of a second hand jacket.
Today the rain feels colder,
my bones heavier, the lines on my face deeper;
and as the metalic sky starts to pour
flushing hope down the drain
I stop to sign on the dole, again.


Inside officers guard the office
in case poverty frustrations boil over;
a thinning man in cheap red jumper
sits in a booth, head hung
to hide the tears he dries,
as if the rug of self-esteem
was pulled beneath him when
a man the same age as his son
ended his career with a faked smile
and an attempt at empathy.
I know this man,
from my midnight fears
when the ghost of sleep haunts
me from the end of my bed.


I take instruction from logoed suit
and step inside the drizzle.
50 yards down the road,
outside the law courts,
jobseekers in their newest hoodies
and Primark slacks blow smoke
into the air like chimney stacks,
but no one notices the irony
and it’s too depressing
for me to point out or write
in an email to the town's planners
sat in their ivory towers
sipping at cups of instant coffee.


I stop for a brew,
sit in window seat, watch the world
walking by: the umbrellas, prams and wool coats
of shoppers and office workers.
Suddenly I realise all this movement
is about money - make, covet, spend -
as if the paper chase will buy back a smile.
I want to tell them they are free
to those who know where to look,
I knew a place once, but know if they ask
I wouldn’t remember the way
because the map was lost
in the modern day divorce,
the only souvenir from two years
was the one stolen from a Marrakech hotel
the last morning of our first holiday togther
when rain flooded our bedroom.
This makes me think of you,
but I kill the memories,
because these streets are no a place
to build emotional sandcastles,
'cus no one would care
If they kicked them over.

                                 
My recital of this poem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W-C2NpFQHY&feature=youtu.be

My POetry: Getting Older

Getting Older

---

Getting older,
Is knowing for sure
Which brand of jam
You prefer.

Or having to google
Twerking AND the celeb
Splashed across the Sunday papers
As you relax
With camomile tea and toast.

Then after turning on the lap-top
Ignoring porn
As the hunt for the perfect
Moccasin moves
onto day four.

It's celebrating birthdays
With grub rather than pubs
and exotic other stuff,
'Cus you're worried
about the morning after.

But best of all
Getting older
Is knowing the difference
Between what matters
and those little silly things
That really don't.

My Poetry: St James' Street

St James' Street

---

**For reference, St James' St is the main street from Brighton to Kemp Town and is renown as the gay area of the town**

Before first coffee remedy
refreshes hungover head
sirens pierce the silence
of humming Autumn streets,
another city dweller
fighting
for the chance
to see another day.
Armed with muddy lexicon,
the complexion
of rural england
still on his boots,
the country boy hits St James' Street,
senses pricked
by prevailing street life echoes
from Tranny-oke bars,
or, gay dads strung outside
dinner time Bulldog bars,
or, students blowing grants
on a black hooker
opening her knees
to close a coke deal,
or, colour blind hobos begging
for pink pounds
from degree level
call centre employees,
learning to cope
with careers
of between job jobs
stuck on two rung stairways
to petit-bourgeois heaven,
optimistic the storms
will stay at sea
and not rock
an urban ideal
in which the fight
or flee instinct
is nullified with beer and preening.
The north-Norfolk lad pulls into a pub
furnished with quiffs
and hipsters,
five quid jean shirts
bought from curbside racks
line the bar;
one becomes two
before midnight leaving
with a quick-witted Irish girl
he shares lines and kisses,
but not numbers, with.
Then before he knows
the orange street lamp
light thrown through
the bedroom window,
which cast shadows
on the off-white walls,
dissapates,
as a new day dawns,
with all its promises.

My Poetry: Love as a Rainbow

Love as a Rainbow

---

One more birthday
further from the need
to chase rainbows
and all those pretty things,
like pots of gold
and tails,
which promise happiness
and distraction
from the formless
monotonous days,
but it's a fools gold,
if ever found at all,
that drove many a man mad
in their hunt
for love's Eldorado.

Men drunk

on the ephemeral promise
fostered by myth
and hope
that when its mirage appears
it will draw

smiles on the faces
of the most violent of heart,
before....
the dark clouds gallop,
once again,
to fill the horizon
like apocalypse Horsemen
of Winter long, waking nightmares
arms bared, ready
to kill such rainbow thoughts
of love's distraction.

My Poetry: Too Late

Too late

---

As the needle hits
old worn tracks
I feel it in my bones,
I was born
a disciple of a decade
I cannot understand
so with practiced patience
the needle drops one more time
onto charity shop vinyl
from three decades past.
The opening chords
from a whiskey soaked
bar-room performer
warms the blood,
envy of those heady days
when powdered exotic bodies
elegantly wasted
in seedy hotels
created folk lore
stories to inspire
future guitar generations.
It nullifies this week's
radio 1 playlist
'hits’ no better than bum notes
begging to be forgot
digital dial moving
from bland to pointless
promoting pop stars
who don't fizz
while DJs younger
than my favourite shirt
jostle for prime time TV slots
and photo shoots
in Heat
next to a grinding Miley
proving it’s porn
before consciousness
no place for a modern day
Janis or Joni
just R+B singers
with no sex appeal,
chart toppers devoid of substance
but oh so stylish
in the lifestyle mags
full of so so celebs
preoccupied with themselves
but oh so in tune
with the national trend
for an adolescent culture
Champagne updates and followers
on social media,
idolising Twerk teens
and pricks acting like role models
only proving school
doesn't necessarily pay.
When the needle hits
I know I was born
three decades too late.

My Poetry: I Read the News Today

I Read the News Today

---

I read the news today,
oh boy...
pages plump
with sex crime soap stars
and the nightlives
of designer idols
from football estates,
column inches aimed
at doping wage slaves
with tits and tattle
businessmen disguised
as politicians engage
in press manipulation,
planning conflicts
propagating fear
to justify death
to line their pockets,
while the brainwashed masses
skip sanitised snippets
of foreign babies dying
in the arms of siblings;
bleached words
for prole consumption
so they don't choke on reality
while munching bacon n egg
weekend breakfasts
cus they prefer to escape
bank statements
client facing nowhere careers
zero hour contracts
multi-coloured foes
with TV set gossip
of false characters
and all the while
Cameron's Blairite smile
looks down on his puppets
as he continues his mission
to break a broken Britain
under the guise
of a united Queendom
while removing everything
that made it great.

My Poetry: When the Show's Over

When the Show's Over

---

Come, sit beside me
you look lonely,
we can share a table
split a bottle,
no need to talk
just act as if
we do this all the time,
pretend we know
each others name,
tap our fingers
on the glass
ignore the silence
watch the band
flirt
with the boy/girl paradigm,
then part
without the need
to swap numbers
or saliva,
just a neat goodbye
to acknowledge
the show's over.

Pic: Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson from a still of Lost in Translation. buy it here: http://amzn.to/HxFIJs

My Poetry: A Monochrome Rainbow

A Monochrome Rainbow

---

Alone but for a beer,
the static glow
from a dull TV show
casts the couch’s shadow
across the room,
but the only
thing worth watching
is the rain
clouding my window.
Where are you tonight?
Why did you take the sun?
Was it so I could
use the grieving sky
as a canvass
to project your image
across the horizon
so loneliness
would not fill my evening
like a monochrome rainbow.

My Poetry: These Voices Know YOUR Name

These Voices Know YOUR Name

---

The lords prayer

muttered under
shallow breath
stops the pain
digging within

the anger thickening

my veins
but it's in vain

hope ''cus He cannot halt

the Voice

from tellling me
to rip that forked flesh
from between your lips
to silence the screech
once and for all.

I walk to your home
lungs filled with screams

the Voice tells me

to let go the frustration
in the faces of strangers
so they know the pain
which is  forcing

my hand to slice

your windpipe
slow,

to watch the vileness

seep down your neck
like honey
on bleached bones.

You should know the Voice
knows YOUR name
in the whispered evening
as the clock ticks
down your demise
It wonders if

you're sitting pretty
in your malicious throne
unaware that justice
will bleed

your rotten veins dry
and your last words
will be my own
screamed
into your fading conciousness.

My Poetry: Nothing Is Enough for Me

---

I loved you, secretly,
tho I could never
confess with words
those rose thoughts
you despised,
so I held you, instead,
arm’s softened
with false hope,
as we got close
enough to touch,
but not fully embrace

the boy girl paradigm,
while I tried in vain
to paint a primitive
sketch of a heart
on the palm of your hands
with false hope to heal
your imperfect body and mind
so you might fly again,
but like a fool I forgot
what decades of laboured

unrequited love
had proven,
that when someone so wild
and beautiful
enters your life
they are not yours

to hide from the world,
so you paid for my kisses
with the golden pieces

of your broken body and mind
you had left,
which in the end
was nothing,
but it was enough for me
because you see
I was poor
before you came
and I'll be poorer still
before I pay my final bill.

My Poetry: Your beauty was your down fall

Your beauty was your down fall

---

Your beauty, was your down fall.
The dark clouds I hung to, mine.
You were Saturday night
To my Sunday morning,
But the songs we played each other
On drunken Tuesday afternoons
Were for no one
Except us two.

I loved you
I guess I still do,
Though we’ve not swapped words
Since that winter Wednesday
When I moved my notebooks
And old records
Out the cottege,

Hours before your new boy moved  in.

I spoke your best friend,
Last Friday night,
Who warned me not to write
Like she could sense
My cracked heart
Wasn’t quite mended.
I lied it was okay
Your charm forgotten
The rum helping
A simple white lie.

My Poetry: Angels with Dirty Laughs

Angels with Dirty Laughs

---

I watch angels
with dirty laughs,
wings clipped by sin
flirt around the bar
in cheap country
mini-skirts
and Empusa t-shirts,
like paper on the wind,
and the longer I watch
the more I'm convinced
they only dance
to show the white haired drunks
their fate
is incomplete...

But the brunette and me
stay seated
spilling gin and laughing
as I nurse her
from a sadness sickness
consuming her,
coaxing the light
back into her eyes
till we leave the pub
joined at the lip
and with drunk tongues
we vow
that when tomorrow
parts us
the three months
when the future was lost
and we danced
to our own fateful tune
will be ours.

My Poetry: Driftwood

Driftwood

---

Mist falls like bricks
over the rotten city rooftops.
I follow my feet
through the new scenes
thinking of a nameless girl,
her features obscured
as if in a dream;
for a while I called her princess
she was pretty,
full of light and shade,
holding onto my arm
like a sailor
falling overboard.
But tonight, I drift
where the warm summer
breeze pushes me
like a splintered piece
of an old wreck
waiting for shore.

I’m the same
as when we met,
I took nothing
but her body
and time,
I don’t blame her,
it's all she had,
her sail set
against my tide
leaving me with just a
phone snap shot
leaving me a little a sadder
a little older
but just the same.
So I wander, rudderless
through the sea mist
which hangs low
smothering the desolate
city streets
which hangs low,
over the shoulders
of the lost and hunted souls.
But I am neither
tonight,
so I wander.

My Poetry: This Time Last Year

As I laid down beside you,
this time last year,
I dared to believe the war
was over;
The final trumpet
for the casualties of love's doomed youth
played long and low
as i laid to eternal rest
in your hands

But today,
as I pass our old cottage
memories both yours and not yours
exhume the ghosts which cursed our dreams
even though we knew
the lull of war was temporary
just like each time before.

And so this buried man
in heart shaped box
stands tall again
and vows henceforth
to fight the gravity
which dulls my heart.

This time last year
I thought the war was over.
Today, it's a little closer.

My Poetry: Important, If True

Important, If True

---

True love is
important if it's true
or by weight of feeling
you know it's truth.

Or....

By bitter search
via moon or star
you life's bitter journey
is indelibly marked.

Or.....

When in doubt
with no wish to escape
your open heart
accepts its fate.

Or....

By first head then heel
from grace you fall
but unto the One's arms
you're caught.

Or...

By blind faith,
death of reason,
you, at last can see
Love is important...

My Poetry: I Took My Heart Out

I Took My Heart Out

---

I took my heart out for a walk
We wandered through the pines
Along the river banks lined
With weeping willow
And all the time
We confessed to each other
Without confessing anything at all.

I took my heart out for a dance
We dressed in matching shades
Of dark and painted
the town red to match her lips
and all the time
we held each other
without promising anything at all.

I took my heart out for a drink
We chased pints and shots
ran around like hail on plant pots
I spilt my secrets on the bar
She laughed and ordered more
And all the while
We held on to each other
Without holding on to anything at all.

My Poetry: It's My Fault

It's My Fault

---

It’s my own fault
for thinking,
then as I grew weak
believing.
I cannot blame you,
from the start
you told me
the way it would end

But I begun to believe
when we kissed
and held hands on a date
when your pyjamas
got sexier
and you’d texted me
for no reason.

I began to believe
when you made me
forget
the red head
and all the other beds
as we shared in jokes
like best friends.

I began to believe
when you brought
back the smile
missing from my lips
for so long
it felt forever…

It’s my fault,
I fell for you,
I cannot blame you.

My Poetry: What Future Outside Your Arms

What Future Outside Your Arms

---

What future this man
with no desire
outside your arms;
as the summer
of our courtship
turns to autumn
the fresh crimson shoots
of passion
fade
to ruddy orange browns
and the songs
the morning lark
sung for us
disappear under
the cuckoos call.

What future this man
with no clear skies
outside your blue eyed gaze;
the last fractals
of our summer daze -
where we shed
our cocooned selves
and flew
through the scarlet dawn -
now fade to grey
with the clouds,
and my heart
and old pictures
become the only reminder
of your smile and grace.

What future this man,
with no desire
outside your arms…

My Poetry: Even Now (at arms length)

Even Now (at arms length)

---

Your words cursed
as you held on to
fragmented freedom
and now,
even now,
as your head
rests on my chest
I hold you at arms length.

City street lights
cast orange shadows
your fingers twitch
but now,
even now,
with sleep’s breath
on my neck
I hold you at arms length.

Love’s irony
warns me your touch is not
a place to grow
comfortable
and now,
even now
as we spoon
I hold you at arms length

As you wake
kisses lead to bruises

as sin grows darker
and now,
even now
while I'm inside you
I keep you at arms length.

 

Pic: Stella Murray Whatley 

My Poetry: Suburban Dusk Falls

Suburban Dusk Falls

---

Suburban dusk falls,
illuminating the sitting room
sanctuaries of the Saturday night
stay-ins;
I watch the tv
through the couples window
wonder why they sit
on opposite sides
of the couch,
if they still kiss
an electric glow thrown
from brushed cotton lap top
highlights the lines
on her sallow face,
her partner starts
to channel hop
so bored
I turn my feet
head to the end
of the street,
past pairs of friends
past half empty pubs
past orange lamps
to an empty couch
and ask myself
if given the choice
would I swap my lifestyle
with those strangers
and I know...
half of me would.

My poetry: As Rusting Cogs Turn

As Rusting Cogs Turn

---

The streets are littered
With broken hearts and glass
And the shattered dreams
Of the many,
Repressed and depressed by the few
Who demand more numbers for their time
So they down tools
And watch with glee
As the pavement’s become scattered with
The flotsam and jettisoned
Ideology from a supermarket nation –
Streets stacked high, getting higher
With old trikes, knotted condoms and
Premium brand packaging from bourgeois kitchens
Litter blows on the easterly
Through the overcast streets
Because some men believe in bank statements
And virtual money
Hoarded for higher purchase big screen TVs
And cars they’ll never own out right.

Kept fat with desire
By a consumer fed mentality
For the things the adverts
And celeb shows tell them they need.
More, always more
Numbers to feed the machine
To pay the desk bondaged
So fatter cats can take their kittens to Disneyland
In lieu of love, cuddles and bedtime stories
From a cartoon character
Falsified land, where dreams come true
But only for the suited monsters
With Mickey Mouse morals
Who mock the celeb drunk prolatariate
Brainwashed by their 52 inch screens
While their kids play in the streets
Littered with refuse they refuse to pick up
Because the union big wigs
Say down tools till city bosses
Pay,pay, pay
More,more,more…

But the black girls
And eastern Europeans -
Who take care of parents
Whose kids don’t care -
Don’t care for numbers
When they pull on trainers
And crusty smiles to walk to work
Over broken glass
As the funk of shit sits over the city
Like acid rain clouds or a drunk uncle
At the Christmas table
Meanwhile…
The cogs on a rusting machine turn
And ten days later protest strikers
Return to work and overtime
Florescent jackets
Sweep, sweep, sweep
And the machine is oiled with numbers
And everyone is happy, again
Pretending the rubbish
Has disappeared or been gobbled
By a Disney monster
Which it has – eventually…

check this for context: The Fresh Stink of Sea Air - M.C. Freshness

My Poetry: Goodbye

Goodbye

---

I saw stars,
when the news arrived,
a sucker punch

disguised in
bitter words

rained down

like glass.

Tossed aside
like yesterday’s news

fish wrap,

hooked then left gasping

for air.
Years of toil and loyalty
lost to this

last fairly well
but girl please leave

knowing the bad
outnumbered the good
in so many ways.

And know
the sadness
which leaves
stains on my shirt
is not rejection
nor humiliation
or the hypocrisy,
of they way you acted
but for me
and those wasted years.

My Poetry: I'm Free

I'm Free

---

I cried
I slept
alone,
I ate
I slept
I woke
alone.

Goodbyes
were said
I cried
and cried,
but then
one day                                                                 

tears dried.                                                    

Sun shone
I smiled
I'm free
of pain
and hurt
and you
at last.
I'm free
I smile
and joke
again
I'm free.

 

image: Banksy's Brooklyn Heart

My Poetry: One Day My Death...

One Day My Death...

---

One day my death,
Will mean nothing to you,
Just as the death
Of shared dreams
Means nothing to you now.

Cursed from the third date,
pretending it meant nothing,
We lied to ourselves
And to each other
Thinking it meant nothing then.

Dehisced heart in pocket,
means nothing to you,
You threw back the pieces
Like you hated me
And it meant nothing to you then.

You’ve found another hand to hold,
It means nothing to you
When I offer mine
To acknowledge our past,
Which means nothing to you now.

My Poetry: Since There Wasn't You

Since There Wasn't You

---

It's been a month or more
since you were here;

since the face in the mirror
was recognisable as mine 
as it walked out the door.

It's been a month or more
since you were here;

since the sun rose on the day
and the flowers bought for you
stopped showing their beauty.

It's been a month or more
since you were here;

since the old time records 

my loneliness used in lieu of a lover

lost their charm.

It's been a month or more
since you were here;

since each meal became a chore
and the fork in our roads
left me starved of your kiss.

It's been a month or more
since you were here;

now the man you left to rot

 hums a new tune
as a new you beckons him forth.

It's been a month or more
and I'm forgetting you were here.

My Poetry: I think of all the words

I think of all the words

---

I think of all the words,
both those I wished I had
and had not said.
Remember the times
when words were useless
kicking through Autumn leaves,
watching you smile
realising I loved you.
The naivety of asking you
never to leave,
how with a curve of balmed lips
you said, you never would
but you broke
so many things
along with your promise.

My Poetry: The Pianist

The Pianist

---

The wizened pianist plays
old blues standards
beneath a peeling sign
that reads
‘Wonderland Inn’ -
but nobody believes it.
He plays each night
till dawn
for money and company
matching each regret
with whiskey and beer.
He plays soft,
almost silent,
for himself,
and fast

for the hearts
on the dance floor as they
gamble for a kiss,
like broke poker players
who would rather

cheat the dealer
than acknowledge their luck.

A still from Casablanca

My Poetry: Her Hands were Warm

Her Hands were Warm

---

Her hands were warm
where yours were cold.

Love disappeared,
 a stranger to us both.

 

I never meant to let you know
that way, but it happened,

when I wasn’t sure
if purity existed,

so when she pointed to salvation
I took that lethal dose

and now the high is wearing thin
I realise that love is starting again

without prejudice or past
and without believing it will last.

So babs I don’t mind who you wake with tomorrow
just know you’re on my mind right now.

My Poems: I'm An Achiever...

I'm An Achiever...

---

I’m an achiever,
but my achievements
mean nothing to those
who have always achieved.

I’m an achiever,
because I’ve broken
from the chains
that kill dreams.

I’m an achiever,
because now my dreams
are more than hopes
no matter how much I regress.
 

I'm an acheiver

because no matter my regressions

I know the path

needed to to grow.

 

I’m an achiever,
because I grow
with each heart I touch
and each one I lose.

 

I’m an achiever,
but my true achievements
mean nothing to those
who prefer power and money.

My Poetry: A Winter's Kiss

A Winter's Kiss

---

The sun set slow
over slate sea
the wind howled
cold across the beach
you tied a red scarf
tight
round your throat
and buttoned the buttons
on your grey duffle coat
against the winter.
We held hands,
for the first time

that night,
as from a wet bench
we watched
the Christmas lights dance
off the pavement puddles,
like fairies.
We laughed about
our life, our friends 

the drizzle
until our shy hands met
for a second time,
then,

without knowing,
we shared our first kiss.

Still taken from Breakfast at Tiffany's

My Poetry: Waiting for a Train at 7.35

Waiting for a Train at 7.35

---

The dark cold
hugs the strangers
standing around,
motionless,
staring at the tracks
waiting for a thought
waiting for a lover
waiting, just waiting.

I look across
the fading station
at the ugly tranny
holding court
with freeks and geeks
who are all discussing
Shakespeare's poems
that he's translated into German
for the Dada scholars.

When the tannoy lady
says something
about the 7.39
from platform four
to Brighton town.

The train arrives,
and I take a seat
opposite an expensive suit
with shades of grey
in his eyes
and yesterday's paper
on his knee.
And I'm jealous...of his shoes
and he's jealous...of my freedom
and I want to ask him to swap
but he gets off
in Moulscoomb
before I can be bothered.

The train doors slide
and metal rattles
on metal beneath me
lights shimmer across the city
as we glide over the rooftops
I can see through the windows
of homes:
people making tea.

Then that tannoy lady says:
'This station is Brighton,
please leave
for other connections.'

My Poetry: The Light Is Not Tender

The light is not tender:
the secrets
it illuminates
are not true -
least to me -
on a day like this
when sun clones,
tanned flesh bared,
wander like zombies
through the streets.
No,
the light is not tender:
block the doorways
with wood,
for my only comfort
is the storm clouds
which gather
inside my skull;
tearing at my polar opposites
rendering the night -
my favoured companion -
bringing with it
the dark
charactors which visit
as I huddle
in my shadowed corner
awaiting the necromancer
and her trusted spider
which spits truth
like venom
into my inner ear
poisoning my ego,
untill no faith
song or prayer
can keep it from death.
No,
there is no light
in a day
devoid of tenderness.

My Poetry: I Once Held Your Heart

I Once Held Your Heart

---

I once held your heart
in my hands,
now all I hold is dust,
and the rusted arrow
from cupids bow.

I once knew my future
in your touch,
now it's apaque,
with broken wails
of visceral woe.

 

                                                                                 I once believed
                                                                                   in our love,
                                                                                   now my eyes well,
                                                                                   and stomach churns
                                                                                   to think of you.

                                                                               I once promised

                                                                                with immortal words

                                                                                 what I thought I knew
                                                                                 but they now lay buried

                                                                                alongside hope.

                                                                               I once held your heart
                                                                               in mine,
                                                                                but its turned to dust,
                                                                                and cupid's rusted arrow
                                                                                  twists my sorrow.

My Poetry: Take Flight Little Bird

Take Flight Little Bird (let love leave so that one day it may return)

---

When you call I come;
When you push I go;
When you question
what’s happening between
the moon and the sea
and the rose and the bee
I have no answer,
just this key,
to a cage never locked.
Take it,
escape the emotional prison
you’ve built,
curiosity’s winds call,
take flight,
Little Bird,
on blackened wings
I didn’t mean to clip.

Take flight
Little bird;
to remain caged
is to deny your beauty
so I set you free
to hold
freedom’s magnifying glass
to your days
to better see your morrows…
I cast thee free
because I want you to return,
don’t you see,
to your cage
where your heart
once was,
where thine is now,

But I know
you’re only trapped
when in a place
you don’t want to be
so take flight,
I’ll wait,
drained and stoic,
hushed eyes
trained on the horizon
awaiting your heart’s return
to this cage.
But if you never
return
remember
me
as you soar.

My Poetry: Watching Stars Explode

Watching Stars Explode

---

Do you remember,
that night,
perched
on an old broken bench
above the town
watching stars explode
across the velvet shroud
cast over our heads
as we held hands,
you moved closer,
for warmth,
do you remember?
as I showed you
Orion's belt
and the Plough
and you showed me
how to kiss
with tongues
until all I knew were cliches;
but your eyes DID
glisten
like a million snow flakes
and your mouth DID
make the world
seem small
and they still do,
they still DO.
                                  

This is the sister poem of "The Cliches I Wrote You" : http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=9205864325932667553#editor/target=post;postID=4287483254283183708;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=3;src=postname

My Poetry: Glass Hearts Filled with Christmas Cheer

Glass Hearts Filled with Christmas Cheer

---

Lights shimmer, along
old cobbled streets,
cold noses, bit with frost,
poke out from bobbled hats
like wild red berries on a holly branch.

Gloved lovers, holding woollen hands,
recite Christmas hits,
like they’re stuck on repeat,
from shop to shop,
buying gifts
to stack, like iridescent bricks,
beneath the festive tree.

For Christmas Day, will soon be here
when bickering and woe
is swapped – sporadically -
for mistletoe kisses and all the trimmings,
while glass hearts filled
with mulled wine cheer,
toast fresh dreams of new year
free of the last.

My Poetry: Our Riches Can't be Counted

Our Riches Can't be Counted

---

I've heard
rich men moaning
money is nothing,
but the root
of their evil.

I've seen the skint,
debt crippled,
scraping
together change,
to revel in its sin.

I've witnessed,
paper and gold
and a rainbow rock,
placed over a finger,
return a grin.

But tonight,
cast your Armani
clothes to the curb,
ignore your Rolex
and just listen
to this promise,
cast from three
free words,
'cus our riches,
can’t be counted
in gold tonight.

My Poetry: The Cliches I Wrote You

The Cliches I Wrote You

---

The cliches
I wrote you
as a bleak
and love-torn teen
when I compared the night sky
to your eyes
and the moon to your smile
are still true,
they're still true.

The cliches
I whisper you
as a beat
and love-worn man:
'the ephemeral velvet night
won't outlast us,
and the blue moon is just jealous
of the Citrine stars and our love'
are all true,
its all true.

My Poetry: Coffee house Blues

Coffee House Blues

---

You cup the coffee
like a soldier
would holy water
ahead of war.
I see you take
it without milk
now,
but you’ve not really changed
that much.
Your smile is just the same,
but your once blue eyes
now match the grey
in your hair.

I notice the white mark
on your ring finger
and wonder why you called
again.
I gave you everything
I could,
placed my bruised heart
in the palm of your hands
all those years ago,
gave you everything
but my soul
yet it could not sate
the appetite
for what you felt
you really deserved.

I watch the couple
to our left
eye each other
like we used to
when our hands
were warm with desire
before a younger lover
stole your faith in love.
You tell me his name,
and how he taught you
to ride horses
and how you bought an ivory dress
to fulfil your dreams
and how he left
to chase his.

The words fall
like bitter brine
on hope’s parched crops
as you raise the red cup
to your rose lips.
But I cannot explain
or comprehend,
the ways I missed you,
then,
sat with those thoughts
through five lonely winters
and how each one
remains incomplete
and complex, still;
each one merging into the other
till all I understand
is the rain clouding the window
and the solitary sound
as you clink down the cup.
So when you called again,
yesterday,
I couldn’t allow the salves
and ointment
that once were your hands
to aleve the years
lost to someone else.

You cup the coffee
like a baby
as I say we could never
do it again
and this time
I leave you.

My Poetry: Shadows Growing

Shadows Growing

---

I don’t feel myself;
Like a ghost lost
in the midst of the days.
Nights waiting
watching,
shadows growing
knowing that soon
they’ll have to
surrender themselves
to the slate sun rays,
just as a wild red rose
to the bee….
silence
buzzes in my ear
as the world sleeps with you…
I don’t feel myself;
adrift, rudderless.
I gave you my years
                                                                               now accept this most
                                                                               beautiful, brutal poetry
                                                                               written in tears
                                                                               which fill the ink well
                                                                               with invisible letters
                                                                               now soaked into this page:
                                                                               they are yours
                                                                               you summoned them
                                                                               they are yours
                                                                               you deserve them.

My Poetry: Who Am I

Who Am I?

---

Who am I?
suffocated
by life and love and money.
Who am I?
that craved
these three things
when they were just
abstract thoughts,
like water and poetry
in my parched throat and soul,
as I wandered the Savannah's
of my youth.
Who am I?
that dare bemoan
these things
that now suffocate.
Who am I?
I used to have cheekbones
and dreams
and an appetite
for those unquenchable things.
Who am I?
that now counts the stars
among my friends.
Who am I?
this stranger in your bed.

My Poetry: To No-one at 7.30am - part 2

To No-one at 7.30am - part 2

---

I have to be honest,
in poetry
and the way I say yes and no;
so I read Corso and Ginsberg
and a copy of the paper news
while you sleep
back and bum
facing me.
I touch the mole
on your thigh
to remind me
where I am and are:
I’m your boy
fighting to stay warm
in cold bourgeois dream
listenin’ to the dustmen
earn a crust
beneath our window
while I wait
to bully a mouse
to make mine.
So forgive me father
if my art declines
cus the bread I make
can’t be breaked
and its crumbs disseminated

My Poetry: To no-one at 7.20am - Part 1

To no-one at 7.20am - Part 1

---

I woke weepin’
cryin’ out for
my imagined loss
crystal beads
of salted woe
decorate my rose
flushed flesh
which droops
like apologetic
fruit, bruised
by caustic
playground words.
The weepin stops
an' a salt crystal necklace
glimmers in the new sun’s light
like a sailors code
no-one understands.
So I lift myself
out of active sleep
and leave

the bed.

My Poetry: Hold of the Dawn

Hold Off The Dawn

---

In the humble
drifting
moments
between dreams and morn
syllables slip
from your wine lips
thick and sweet
like honey from a butter knife.
I reach beneath the covers
my lips taste silk flesh
in the moments
before the curtain’s drawn
before the Robin’s morning call
before a world wakes
beneath slate skies
and winter winds that bite
hard at the heart and hope.
These moments
between the death of night
and birth of day
are no time for speech
just gutteral sounds
and touch and belief
we can hold off the dawn.

My Poetry: Love's Mist Retreats, Again

Love’s Mist Retreats, Again

---

The solemn deathly mist
clings to the shoulders
of the harried man
who hurries
like a doped lab mouse
through the shadows
of his solitary bliss.

His tombstone soul
runs from the hand
that conjured forth
that deathly mist,
 ten thousand years

of minstrel and poet
verse and song

could not explain.

It just is, they would hiss,
that solemn deathly mist
which lightens
the blackest heart
like hope’s blanket cast
across the barren banks
of despair and pain,
both cursed, as they are,
by light and shade's shadow.

Now, as he runs,

the maid sits staid and sad
with just the thoughts
that fill her head,
words of minstrel

and broken poet
leaves her blind
as the mist of love

retreats again.

 pic: jameswoodward.wordpress.com

My Poetry: Your Death on my Birthday

Your Death on my Birthday.

---

I read the last lines
of a book so big
it took two hours
for me to realise
I’d finished it.
Laying, naked
but for the cover of a bare bulb
solitary tears snake
down my face and neck,
soaking
into the crumpled sheets
that wrap around me
like a coffin cover
as I sink into the mattress.
My thoughts slow down and return
to her funeral,
the tears I restrained
now strain my guts
as I remember how
I felt your life’s energy
move from wooden box
to solemn ash tree
which harbours
the mined souls
from two hundred years of death.
Each fading, yellowing leaf
a post-it note
from wherever they lay now…
I read the last lines of a book,
and I remembered your death
on my birthday.

 

This poem was inspired by the Patti Smith book 'Just Kids' click here to buy it or have  mozy: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Just-Kids-Patti-Smith/dp/0747548404

My Poetry: The Old Fisherman

The Old Fisherman

---

*The old fisherman,
hunched, stoic,
sits watching
the ripples dissipate
on a corrugated iron sea.
Mist hugs his gentle frame;
He waits.
The clocks have stopped,
his copper face and knotted brow,
lined with years
of drink and heartache,
smooth out.
He cares not for sun-rays,
or pointless words
from human mouths.
He has no need for smiles
that sink his heart
and sea-sicks his head,
out here.
The rattle of pebbles
- shore clashing with sea -
the cry of gulls
is all he needs.
He waits,
like a snarled old Buddha
watching the sea and sky unite,
his un-baited line
trying to hook the horizon.
Out here, alone,
The old fisherman forgets his life.

My Poetry: Unknown Man

Unknown Man

---

I walk,
the lush hour
upon me,
past corpses
half empty with souls
moving like atoms
along paths
carpeted with gold
leaves, ruddy
and decaying,
in the cold
of autumn’s breath.
I look down -
I see shoes
scuffed at the toe,
cheap Asian cloth
woven to suit my job.
My tired eyes recognise
what the adolescent me
would not
this future man.

My Poetry: Still Here

Still Here

---

You stare back

from a cheap

photo frame.

Tom Waits plays

old blue tunes,

moonlight hues

fade fast from

my cold room.

The fifteenth

shot of rum

warms my throat

your image swirls

thoughts flow

out-loud

to your ghost,

and while your

truth, smile and art

remain

you'll alway be here...

My Poetry: A Darkness Descends

A Darkness Descends

---

A darkness descends
on the day.
A solitary lamp
casts shadows
across the night;
the blank canvass of my life
waits for a painter
or at least
an idle doodler
to turn nothing to something.
The sting of loneliness
no longer nettles,
we embrace
like old friends -
I raise a glass
to our past
and tomorrows.
But I forget the last time
I felt the sun rise -
in another life when dreams
were tangible,
before tears
diluted their reality,
before scores of autumns and winters
took their toll
on my empty pockets.
I sigh
and my shadow sighs with me
it knows too
the sun’s rise
is as inevitable
as the night’s revival
so we wait,
together,
with only the clock for company.