You lay by me on the cold shale,
I hear your breath soft and deep
I know that you are not asleep
anymore than I am.
We came here for the peace
We came here for the obscurity
We came here for you to lie me down in a lay-by
For you to lie and watch me die.

Sober thoughts crowd my mind
Happiness I cannot find
Gloomy weather, gloomy mind

Black bile, one of the archaic humours
Rhyming aptly with tumours
Cancerous thoughts within my mind

Pensively I look for salvation
Maybe a cheery salutation
But my melancholic mind keeps me as a brooder

I vent my spleen, searching for the vaccine
Annoyance acting as a screen for the truth
That all I want to do is scream and scream and scream.

Majestic midnight weaves it's spell
requiring us to sit and tell
of stories frightening and beguiling
Of scares and prayers
Of lies and truths
Of pain and happiness
Of fright and nightmares
Of redemption and of damnation.
Midnight feeds on emotion
Drink it's potion and offer devotion.
Silent midnight, stays and listens
Watches your tears as they glisten
running down your drawn face
casting no judgement or illumination
on your midnight tears.

When I walk by, do you feel the tension in the air?
Do you notice that I'm even there?
I'm waiting for you to notice me.
I'm watching whilst you go day by day oblivious of my stare.
I walk so close you must feel my breath
Hear my steps
Smell my scent
Feel my need to be by your side.
And, yet I'm continually denied my presence by you.
Others notice, they look at me, through me.
They ignore me.
The woman in the grey shroud, blending in with the crowd.
Soon, this shroud will lie in tatters, and all who matter will know
How enticed by your paradise I paid the price
Seeds sown, Ploughed and rooted
The child within was muted
Know how you denied me twice and left us to die, sliced.

As we start this solemn slalom towards a day that ends engorged,
with stomachs bloated whilst we gloated and toasted a perfect day,
let us remember that December has more days than the 25th.

Mass consumerism has voided homemade, love made gifts.
Orange? In a stocking? That is shocking,
the kid asked for an X-box bundle.

Now, I'm not from the distant past, just the 1970's/80's
Where Christmas carols played alongside a Wham's 'last Christmas'
as we ate our immense repast and pulled a sad ******* or two.

Now, gifts are tiny (but show immense expense)
Most perplexing is this new time of year that Kris Kringle
Would undoubtedly mingle slamming a tequila or two!

Now, kitted out in new underwear
(Ironically cherubic rhymes with *****!)
it's time to offer salutations to the incoming year
with no backward glance or hindrance
We say "Happy New Year"

T'is that time of year when everybody spends,
pretends to the world that peace is reigning,
winning, lying, buying, crying.

See the mother crying at night deep in the dark,
her heart aching, breaking that love is not enough.
Love cannot be placed under a tree.

Credit wins, common sense loses.
For what? tinsel and a turkey?
Baubles and gifts exchanged in the sales.

Garish lights, plastic trees,
fights in the aisles for the must have items
Belief, understanding all transferred to the neon God.

Advent calendars lie. Instead of chocolate or a gift,
let's open that cardboard door and see the rift
this season brings.

On the 1st day of Christmas a bailiff came to me
repossessed last years gifts and left
the plastic tree.

Little donkey, little donkey
little cheer, little joy,
little donkey can kiss my ***.

Jingle bells, jingle bells
jingle all the way......to depression
oh what fun it is have with discount *****

Poor vs Rich, Belief against Belief
the homeless, the food-banks, suicide
hunger, fear, nothing a man in a beard can save.

We are all dead.
We are born with one goal: to die.
Waiting to cease completely.
Remember to turn off the light.
Try to go peacefully.
Make sure they spell your name right.
We, none of us get out of this try as we might.

Hello my comfort through dark
Episodes,through depression and
Loathing, I've missed your solace, your
Loquacious eloquence.
Opining my misery

Profuse prose poetry attempting to heal
Open wounds,
Emitting sorrow and loneliness
Take me back as an errant lover, the lost and
Raving raven of old and,
Y**ore, tell me repeatedly, that nevermore will we part.

Oscillating timekeeper ticks and tocs.
Pendulous seconds bumping time forward on the face of a clock.
Father Time, that Patriarchal chronometer
that martyr, master, commander and observer.
Watch the clock, it's moved forward, did you notice time moving?
Father Time so old, and bearded, a scythe by his side waiting to cull.
Waiting is dull.
Time is a lull, a lullaby before you die.
Cronus never steps back, always marches forwards
and we the human race, suspended in time, and space
watch the clock, wishing more time away with regret,
whilst watching the clocks face.

Today is grey.
Today is cold.
Today is getting old,
soon it will be tomorrow,
but tomorrow never comes.

Tomorrow will be the same.
Tomorrow will be today.
Tomorrow the date only will change,
I'll charge my glass to the coming morrow
Same day same sorrow

Staring through the bottom of a glass
tomorrow is far away.
Tomorrow is not grey, but a whiskey gold
staring at tomorrow through the bottom of a glass
tomorrow is not old, just another day.

No host of golden daffodils do I see when I look around me.
Just the debris of a life, cut short by a knife.
I wandered lonely not over vale, but over my body
Lying prone on the floor, no breath does it host anymore.
My eyes gaze sightless into the distance,
a sphinx upon the waste land of the laminated floor.
My hair limp, not fluttering in the breeze, my blood cooling into a pool
my death scene, gives such chills, that renders even golden daffodils pale
Death does indeed ride a pale horse.
He shows no remorse.
Wilted in a vase, wasted on the floor, I await my light, my open door.

Haunted, I see you in my dreams
Haunted I see you in the street
Haunted I see you all around me

How can that be?
Since I've left your corpse in the cellar
And I have the key.

"Trick or Treat"
Clamorous voices demand at the door.
A cry that you've heard so many times before.
You open the door face plastered with a grin.
Wishing you could cull this rabble and stop
their screeching babble.
Sweets doled out,  "be safe" you shout at their backs,
after all you wouldn't want to be hacked by a ******!

Knock-Knock**
Its sound echoes all around.
You hate these midgets at your door
looking cute and asking "give us more"
You'd love to keep the door closed,
but well then you're known as the weird house.
So adjusting face and keeping pace you open the door,
only to be heard of no more.

Bacon sizzles
*** fizzles out
Bacon comforts
Relationships cause discomfort.

Deathlike is our love.
Tired, expired, stagnant and numb.
I'm through playing dumb, treated like hired help.
When we met my pulse it fired, now like death it has expired.
We lie in bed side by side like corpses in a morgue,
inanimate, undesired, tired.

I'm sorry if this hurts but love it can expire, lose its fire and it's flame.
I wish that I could say we're both to blame, but you my love you sired elsewhere, and expected me to understand that you were desired by another and now I'm expected to play the role of second mother to a child,
innocent though he is of his father's shared night of tireless passion with another!

And so it fell to me to prepare this fine repast, forget about the past,
look toward the food cupboard and make a dinner of herbs.
A pinch of hemlock, a touch of aconite, a soupçon of strychnine and a
drop of arsenic. All prepared by mine own fair hand, it's bitterness shone in my tears, as you praised my cooking and my fidelity to you, begged my forgiveness and took me to bed.

Now, cold you lie.
Forgiveness I could give, it was the forgetting that did both you and me in. Like Romeo to his Juliet, a moth to a flame, a drop of wolfs bane,
your Belladonna has had her final fling

Opposites attract.
Sameness detracts.
Love fades.
Life wanes.
Darkness can warm.
Light can freeze.
Caught in life's cycles,
Spinning outward to the end.
Caught within a breeze.

Why is darkness treated with fear?
As much is done in the light as in the dark.
Much maligned our primal senses heightened we see no light in the dark.
Yet, in the dark we are rested, in the dark we test our senses, in the dark we are even, in the dark we are one.

Foul deeds may require the blanket of dark.
But the reaper calls at any time, ready or not he will come, his scythe sweeps and you are gone.
Light or dark, love or hate in each opposite you make a whole you.
In the light we see the dark.
In the dark we see the light*.

Let me clarify, I'm not here to prettify life.
Amplify your ego or nullify your beliefs.
I'm here for me.
Dignify for me your response without a lie.
Can you? No?
Then in my best of Anglo Saxon do me the favour of
"******* the *******".

Come take a walk with me.
What do you see?
It's not a trick question, I'll answer first.
I see a world that is cursed.
Cursed, by greed, by wannabe fame,
and the human race playing a game.

What do you see?
Do you see the sea choking?
The forests de-cloaking?
Their limbs torn and cut for adornment?
Do you see children hungry?
Being used for money?
Do you see the rain as just water or tears?

What do you see?
I see people not caring, not sharing.
I see pain and sorrow for the coming tomorrow.
I see destruction and ruin of a planet that ironically rhymes with birth.
I see darkness where light should shine,
in your soul and mine.

Let's take a walk, a wander, a gander,
let's take time to see the truth, to soothe, to return kindness,
to ourselves, friend and foe.
With nothing to gain but a smile and hello, from a neighbour,
from a world in pain.

"Are you lost?" Said no one to the ******* the bus.
"Are you cold?" Said no one to the figure huddled in the doorway.
"Are you hungry?" Said no one to the hollow eyed man.
"Are you scared?" Said no one to the child with the bruised face.
"Are you safe?" Said no one to the family in a squalid room.

"Please send a donation to the human race. We've lost our humanity"

Nothing rhymes with Orange

Therefore I am an Orange

Nothing is what I feel

Nothing is what I want

Nothing is all I am
(apart from Orange!)

You were my rock
But time and feelings have eroded that rock into a pebble -
soon nothing but sand will remain.

I am a nymphomaniac.
I'm not really but it got your attention.
I bet I nearly gave all reading a cardiac.
I have to make bold statements now, as I have a condition called,
"Black Glasses" and no one makes passes at ladies in glasses.

Like an albatross around my neck it sits in the room.
Devoid of warmth, lacking a purpose.
It defeats me every time I enter.
The clean white sheets greet me with a mocking crispness.
Clean, virginal, untouched, unused sheets.
My energy and resolve are depleting,
what I nearly was is fleeting.
Time to concede these empty sheets are never to be filled.
Time to retreat, concede defeat and take the cradle apart.

Trends come and go,
friends remain forever.
Friendship transcends love.
Family, are genetically bonded.
Friends, are experience bonded.
Both are needed, both are loved.
Family and friends both pay dividends.
Richer to be loved by friends that become family,
than hated by family that pretend to love.

As I lay me down to sleep I pray the demons from my door will keep.
As I drift into unconscious, I pray the monsters aren't adventurous.
As I remember all I love, I pray a hand to guide from above.
As oblivion takes its hold I hope a beacon takes to light and gives the demon its own fright.
As I softly slumber, I pray the demon he doth lumber back to whence he came.
I've fought this day long and hard, today I stay, and that demon he will weaken and allow me and others to fight on, and see dawn's light as confirmation that we did all flee the monster's mausoleum.

Life is a maze.
Life is a phase
Life is a craze.
Life decays
Life can amaze
Life can be full of clichés
Life filled with schooldays, holidays, long delays.
Life is a labyrinth, with a Minotaur in the shades
Life is full of constraints
So leave the maze, untangle your hair and meet me in a different cabaret, I'll be there
I'll show you how life is just one big malaise, we need to fill the maze with a blaze of glory.
After all life is a story. The ending the same, we all die, but in between, we runaways from the maze can drop the chains and create our own tales of the maze.
*And those tales can be quite amazing!

From quiet homes and first beginning, Out to the undiscovered ends, There's nothing worth the wear of winning, But laughter and the love of friends.
Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953), British author. "Dedicatory Ode," Verses (1910).

Dear Parents

Thank you for deciding after two years of marriage to have a child, me.
Sorry I wasn't the boy that so many of my family desired, sorry I was late, sorry that you missed the "Rumble in the Jungle", if it's any consolation I know who won.
How I came to be is quite beyond me. Father's family disliked mothers and vice versa. Dad a steelworker, Mam a trainee chef, dad flipped a coin with a mate, my mother was the stake.
Four years later sister came along, then another four years the son, that so many yearned for made an appearance.
I saved my sister's life from my grandparent's dog, lost an ear in that battle, a bit like Van Gogh. Plastic surgery at seven, still hate Cocker Spaniels to this day. I tell everyone I saved her from a rabid Doberman (I know parents, there's no Rabies in Great Britain) what did I get for my trouble? A stuffed white cat and a sister that I made sit in a cow pat.
Thank you parents for sending me to a school that made other kids suspicious of me. A welsh medium school, might as well have been Hogwarts, but they taught me well, (I can swear in five languages) and read and spell.
Dad taught me how to head ****, mam you taught me how to make cake.
My sister taught me how to share, my brother taught me how really not to care. Live each day as if it may be your last, I told my brother that often.
Dad, one of 13 kids, mam one of 3, like me. Dad, I hate your sisters that are alive they remind me of the Moirai, or the three witches from Macbeth, I've tried to like them but I'm terrible at lying, and to be honest they are in their late 70's so they must be close to dying.
Mam, your sister is a lesbian, I think her army days gave that away. Your brother like mine a source of consternation a Navy man that never went to sea????
Now, my grandparents are all dead. Apparently, I have inherited my father's mother's temper. She disappeared for 3 days when she thought she'd killed my grandad!
I'm married now, no rug rats thank God, I'm aunty material, selfish and wicked.
Now, this sounds I know a little quaint and odd, but I know we've had our share of bad luck, but, 42 years wed, still in the family home, surrounded by trees, neighbours we've known for years and people we'd like to poison. But,we've laughed so hard mam you have a hernia, dad you are the male equivalent of a ****, you'll be flirting in the OAP home **** yes, sorry parents as one of your three I get to pick the residential home! And, as they say,that is a good life.
Jo **
P.s I didn't mention our family mental illnesses, early 20th century communism, possible adultery, coveting the neighbours Ford Capri, or pet cemetery in the garden. I'll wait til all are dead then spill about the good secrets.

Take my hand, as we walk this terrain.
To the place where upon a branch a woman was hanged.
For stealing grain to make bread, ensuring that her children fed.
Look upwards, crane your head, a woman killed for baking bread.
Now, take my hand and look overland, where grains of sand make up this barren land. From barren life hanging in a tree, to barren sand eroded by sea, come to me. Come away child.
Let's build a sand castle and forget the fear in grains and sand.

Yes I laugh. Yes I smile.
But deep down I cry all the while.
Yes people like me. Yes, some love me.
But deep inside I want to shout go away.
Yes, I look sane (whatever that may be)
Yes, I look happy, not in pain.
But, happiness and pain share one thing, tears.
Tears of joy, tears of sadness. One and the same.
I cannot differentiate anymore.
Do you think some people are just born Eeyores? I do. I'm one.
If you always start low there's nowhere to fall.
So, who am I?
I'm a lie.

Within the cloistered silence, a whisper is heard.
~
I love you.
~
Who spoke those words?
Why did I hear them?
Were they meant for me?
~
I love you.
~
Deep in the silence they ring as loud as a bell.
Calling to those who need to know that they are loved.
~
I whispered those words.
I whispered to my heart.
I whispered and it became a shout.
~
Three words that take a lifetime of forever to understand,and believe.
~
Pious thunderous silence follow those words,when you believe your whisper.