Poems

This is where I publish my poems... I will often use this space as a notepad. I've been published once in Popshots. My main focus is art, but I've always written, I guess its the one thing I never stopped.  I don't write poetry as such, mostly just thoughts. Sometimes if the thought is strong enough i'll try to turn it into a poem.

Poet.

Samuel Beckett laughs quietly

As old gods sit in the attic.

Rimbaud dips biscuits in absinthe

In the front room

Of his poetic mind.

He's trying to forget,

And regrets the days his youth led him astray.

Then he runs guns,

This was the most punk rock thing you could do back then

Without a safety pin.

Aubrey Beardsley is at rest in the orangery, 

Trying to dodge TB.

He sits quietly inventing the 1960s.

Draws huge cocks on the lavatory wall;

And writes "If you want fun, call Oscar on..."

And bitches a little more about Oscar Wilde,

Then tires of this and falls asleep,

Then dies.

World.

World shouts, I try to drown it out.

World has a tantrum;

It throws the baby out with the bathwater...

Then the bath.

World is a second skin, pushes you in;

Folds up your lungs up into tiny parcels.

World runs before it walks,

Puts everything into a box.

Wraps I up, soaks everything in blood.

World tramples through the express way of your heart,

Makes a punchbag of your lungs.

World knows your name,

Sews name tags onto everything you own.

Remembers every important date...

Decides when things happen,

And when they do not.

World is a child, blowing snot bubbles,

Dribbling down its chin

Laughing as it grins.

World is kind, then unkind, then indifferent...

After its reeled you in.

Last stop, meth lab.

"Last stop, meth lab"

Get out before your soul falls out.

No more doors or floors

to wake up on or slam.

All routes are so short,

you get everywhere before your body can;

It's always 3 am 

living in these borderlands.

Finding the quickest way to zero,

it always feels like 3 am

when you're your own hero.

The night is always a duvet,

that you pull under your chin.

You feel like a burglar,

who steals your own dreams.

But still you try to find them

in the ocean of you...

As you try to dive deep, dive deep.

The Waiting World.

As I wait for the waiting world to let me in

I'll be your cliffhanger I'll be your sin.

I'll hang on to your waiting words

Like a rooftop ballerina.

I'll crash into your world

Like a rooftop suicide.

At each switchblade escapade

I'll carve my initials into your wooden heart.

Until branches sprout like veins

And bud to leaf,

Each kiss lets me in inch by inch.

We are our own suns.

It happened on a Sunday;

My life crumpled around my feet,

then...

Later as it hung like a disused coat

you told me I was making a difference,

that I would matter. 

You lied,

and I knew that inside.

You told me that behind all closed doors

my future sat like a overfed child

contentedly dribbling food down its chin.

Again, you lied.

You told me that we were all stars or saints

tangled up in the milky way.

Caught in the orbit of our dreams;

That we are our own suns,

powered by ego.

The future does indeed look great/ bleak

as you described it.

But it seems better when it is

projected through the broken shards

that once held the reflection of 

your face...

The light splinters into a thousand suns, 

And I bask in the heat of every one.

Shed.

Ark, a refuge, ship with no sails;

where everything stays as it was left.

Sawdust covers everything as it falls

Like manna from heaven.

Philosophy happens here.

Here time is fed fat on thought, 

the careful glide of a chisel

cuts wood like waves.

Nails bite wood,

cobwebbed and strange

The shed is mysterious,

Its own universe

Here time is waiting to happen.

BEING ALIVE IN 2055.

The year is 2055, the setting is a old peoples retirement home. It is rave hour; neon day glow sticks are handed out to the inmates. Soon the sounds of The Prodigy will blast out at conversation level, when once the songs of Vera Lynn were sung. Soon the grey raver army will re light their fires. Their blurred and faded tattoos stand out like battle scars from the naughties. Blood pressure tablets will be handed out in lieu of Ecstasy, fifty shades of grey indeed.


Your tattoos have bled
Until they look like maps
Of undiscovered continents
You haven't been to yet.

The semblance of a smile
Hangs about your lips,
Nothing of you is left
From your hair, to your teeth to your hips.

By the time our brains
Have been blasted with rays
From cradle to grave,
There will be nothing left to save.

But really it's great being alive in 2055.
You can cut up Fray Bentos pies with laser vision eyes,
You can levitate scones with your telekinetic mind,
Yes, it's great being alive in 2055.




BOXSET.

I have watched box sets until my eyes bleed,

Until I have lost the need to sleep.

I have watched a life born and die 

Between the blink of an eye.

Between the time it takes

To make the tea,

And going to the loo for a wee,

Whole empires have collapsed.

My dreams are set in Gotham,

Real life can not top them.

When I watched Breaking Bad,

I wished Walter White was my dad.

I thought I knew it all,

Until I watched Better Call Saul.

Yes Netflix,

You have played cruel tricks.

Now my days decay

In a post box set haze,
I wonder what to watch next
As I count down the days.

Yes, I count down the days
Until I can mainline other lives.
I'll admit I even cried
When Heisenberg died.

YOU COULD BE A OLD SOUL TOO.

I thought you called me a old soul,
But you actually called me a arsehole,

I misheard I guess.

The cold blade of truth put me to the test,

So lets go on a word ride you and I.

The truth is hard to know

The truth is hard to find.

We have tied up parcels of ambition

We have tied up parcels of lies,

And have handed them to our children

For them to unwrap in their own time.

While we look on and act surprised

The tears run from our eyes,

They run from the scene of the crime.

While the wide eyed eye of expectancy blinks.

Blink and you'll miss it.

Don't try to hug it or kiss it too tight.

Or the life will bleed right on out.

So let them sail on in their own way.

Just remember, don't be a old soul,

Or your children will be old souls too.

SMARTPHONE.

The far away cries of digital lives
Digital husbands and digital wives,
I swipe therefore I am.
Digital zombie, digital maze,
I am not fazed 
By human emotion.
The constant flow of information
Ticks my boxes,
In the flow in the know.

I swipe away boredom,
I swipe away truth
I swipe away lies,
I swipe away my life.

Why can't you realize you could be:

Feeling the weight of time,
Feeling the weight of silence.

Stop this binary purgatory,
Embrace the waiting world.
Step back.

I HAVE DECIDED ON THE TWIST OF A SYLLABLE.

As true as sand shifts to stone
As true as flesh shifts to bone,
I have cut my tongue on sharp words,
I have let my words fly free as birds.

I have decided on the twist of a syllable
Whether my battles are lost or are winnable,
Whether to put myself on the shelf
Or let my words fly like arrows towards someone else.

Sometimes I have slurred my intentions,
Sometimes I have fogged my notions.
I have let words fall from my mouth
Like drunks out of cabs.

I have soaked my words in wine,
I have made them as bright as the sun.
I have measured my words,
And I have stretched them to fill time.

Time has wound down my days
My mouth is hollow as a cave.
Then sometimes something springs to shape,
Like a fresh green stalk of grass
Whose edge is as sharp as a blade.

WORD JOURNEY.

I know.
In secret caves i'll find you,
A cold shivering thing
Living like sin,
Collecting stones.

I know this tree.

On which you hang your thoughts on, 
It's branches spread like veins.
They cut the wind and say
We understand the rain.

I know this hill.
On which you climb on,
To the horizon that divides the day.
It tells us we have time to set aside
To mend the error of our ways.

You say:
"The way of all things is mindless"
And "I understand the reason why".
You understand each thing seeks its own kind,
That's why the earth keeps its secret from the sky.

You say:
I know, 
This tree,
This hill,
This journey
We take.

NIGHT CATS.

The night cats whisper
tales of tomorrow.
They tell of ancient longings 
for moonlit spaces.
The test of time has taught them
that sorrow is the best medicine.
Cold grey slated roofs
are bandages for feline eyes.
Shafts of light that slant through keyholes
tell tales of escape,
A whiskers twinge away.