My Poetry: This Is Home

This is home,
where memories lie in dark niche
of lampless streets
older than the birch trees
under which we spoke
of our first kiss 
then played video games
into the night until we hit 
last base guided by cheap cider
and sleepovers of our teens
became reserved for girls.

This is home,
Where hedges I saw planted
are now head high,
hiding houses now home
to unfamiliar faces 
lined up in front of a TV 
throwing iridescent shapes 
onto muted midnight street
where silent foxes skulk
and we all pretend Monday
will never come.

This is home
where the big skies of youth
have four more stars 
looking down upon us
since I watched them
glaze over in smoky teenage haze
then later smudge with tears
so I raise the glass
a little higher tonight
in memory of those
who are eternal now.

This is home
where new faces are introduced
as old friends by friends
in pubs where our father's
fathers beat their way 
through weekend pub rounds
till Monday’s bruised knuckles
returned to building sites.
Where we now spend nights
mopping up whiskey to
escape everything the beer fails 
to silence, in company of people
whose roots have not yet took hold
in expanding village. 

This is home,
where we learnt that love 
not obsession rules the heart 
as the metallic summer sun
rose and fell with the leaves,
where green turned to golden brown
as we sat with stoned smiles
trying to outrun ghosts
of our childhood
but we all fell like Icarus,
and as we watched our youth 
race away in the rear view mirror
of old age we learnt
we could never completely leave 
our memories and tears behind.

This is home,
where memories lie in dark niche
of my lampless heart.

NB this is the sister poem to 'Docking' which you can read here if you wish: [url]http://www.thepoetryforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=57460[/url] Both poems are about the Norfolk village I grew up in

My Poetry: Wildflowers

Wildflowers

---

They have dug up the garden
Where now shall those Wildflowers
Of our city bloom
And how will they now grow
Old with us and wilt
Within the arc of the sun
Under rainbow skies.

They stole a solitary corner of beauty
From where beauty hides
In the shadow of sky risers
Where piss snakes from dark corners
Where people hide in niches
Where roses and hyacinths
Only bloom on inked arms of hipsters
And poppies arrive in ten pound
Bouquets, drawing blood red tears
From the skin of the thin pale poets.

Now the Wildflowers are gone
We’ve one less way to find beauty
In tower block cemetary
To know nature's subtle cause
Behind the mourning eyes
Of those haunted empty beds
Which wait for life in silence,
Who know beauty is transient,
And so never chase the sun.

They have taken the garden.
Removed it from our reach,
Now how can we

teach the youth
That a tooth for a tooth is the same
As leaving hickies on a virgins neck
Like laughing at the freaks
Falling sideways down the street
As pretending life will call
After screwing you again.

They have dug up the garden
Where the wild flowers grew
The ancient worm licked soil
Which gave life to society's edge,
And fed them from its breast
Must not stay barren
Must one day return
Resurrected from concrete tome
For when they are in bloom
We are all wildflowers.

My Poetry: Carnival Ducks

Carnival Ducks

---

Lined up like carnival ducks
stalled blank faces
with old rucksacks and plastic bags
on precinct meeting place.

A hundred holy shoes lined up
along a bench,
each corner of each mouth
turned to the floor

listening to the one with
a bottle of cheap blues
and bad news on her breath
recite her lines as if she were
a leading player in a Beckett play.

They all prey for something
to soften the day, her words work
while they wait for time to pass away
like a loved pet.

An acoustic busker jams
another nineties hit;
a child dances, unaware
of everything except the music,
his parents aware of everything,
but the music.

I sit on the bench
eating a pre-packaged cheese sandwich
as i read the poster
on the theatre wall opposite.

Art mirrors life,
tragedy and humour
are married, unfaithful lovers
in this carnival town, i think,

we are either shooting
or are the game,
but never both.