Sparklers and orange bloom
flowers that only shine at night
and wake in the dawn with light and furious colour
like the fourth of July, crackling steak on metal
smoke and seeping juices, screaming meat
rare, just as you like it, on this, our independence day
(everybody cheer) or was it the eleventh?
I forget such things now and then
surely, it's the eleventh for them over there, playing in the sandpit
and the eleventh hour, no less. Tell me
did you see the game?
Apr 5, 2019
Apr 5, 2019 at 6:26 AM UTC
Enfield punches the ground, wheels throw up muddy rainbows
from where they sank with the rain. The rider, some fresh young college thing,
flinches as it ricochets off his goggles, then unsteadily pulls away
wrestling with this strange machine. The old blokes laugh
with their propane cookers and badger-stripe beards, slick
with bacon grease and spit. Outside the beer tent
a kid fingers an old blues tune on a scarred and beaten acoustic.
Coins thrown into an old railway cap, her grandfather’s
smile golden in the sunrise.
Mar 26, 2019
Mar 26, 2019 at 6:07 AM UTC
I saw you, the summer child
lying in a bathtub filled with stars
while clouds spread through water.
Reddish, pinkish lips stood out
on skin the colour of pollen, ash
spreading, staining water.
The stars I learned were razor blades
I cut myself as I pulled you out
and ash slipped through my fingers.
Midday come early on Sunday morning
you should’ve seen the basket that they tossed you in,
covered with roses, perfumed and veiled
you would’ve liked my speech, I hope.
You would’ve liked his eyes.
He’ll worship you, I know.
He’ll make a pilgrimage
every Sunday that would make a novice blush
in envy, but for love
he’d follow you, his angel
all the way down with communion
‘till he’s sick, I hope
you’re proud.
Jan 30, 2019
Jan 30, 2019 at 8:30 AM UTC
Solemn music box
Singing heart of wood and wire
Bought to play for her
Jan 21, 2019
Jan 21, 2019 at 10:43 PM UTC
The sick green lights are off.
The takeaway was eaten
hours ago it seems.
The bottles are half empty.
The hourglass half full.
The clock is reading: TWO AM.
The movie is boring, she paces
across the room, crushing wrapping paper beneath her feet.
Her lover is upstairs, sleeping soundly,
she will leave before the week
is up, and the moments…
Every second a knocking.
Every minute a nail.
There's some baileys on the mantelpiece
it tastes strong and long and sweet.
She turns the fairy lights back on
and basks in Christmas Day.
Jan 15, 2019
Jan 15, 2019 at 8:11 AM UTC
Electric snakeskin
Draped, casting green-grey shadows
Over the pine trees
Jan 6, 2019
Jan 6, 2019 at 10:21 PM UTC
See the flower girls go by
holding petals up to god
holding hands before the lords
and shouting out “come buy”.
they dip their pens and write in pollen
they offer crimson roses
for a fiver, see them
take a knife and form the petal
into the perfect, imperfect shape
of a star.
See the crowds that gather round
and coo and cry in awe
at such beauty and such artistry
see them cheering at the sound
of dripping life from dripping fingers
slick and
wet and
red.
for a fiver see them
the maddened flower girls
holding hands before the lords
and shouting out “come buy”
Jan 1, 2019
Jan 1, 2019 at 1:57 PM UTC
Smell of cordite, soft
resolution, half whispered:
Slow ash on the wind
Jan 1, 2019
Jan 1, 2019 at 1:46 PM UTC
There are those who’d curse the paintings
That held the highest beauty
For being formed from something
Impermanent as oil and paint
Intangible as light.
There are those who’d curse a romeo
Cast in stone relief
For such vanity, and hubris
For how could such a man
Begin to know such beauty and
The truth of open feeling?
There are those who would cut this holy wire
That tethers us across the world
For fear of some lurking evil
Some banging in the dark
That’s bound to take our souls away
Some lack of love or depth
There are those who’d see the flesh on flesh
And cries like angelsong
And **** it for it’s fleetingness
For their father’s love was purer.
For their father’s love was strong
Their poor and lonely fathers
Cursed to loveless love
Oh brave new world that I have seen
That has such people in it!
Who cry for long-forgotten men
Yet **** the ones before them!
Dec 18, 2018
Dec 18, 2018 at 9:51 PM UTC
Do you see me brother?
A feckless skyscraper marching on.
Not deaf but deafened, not blind but blinded,
I watch myself marching past the children,
a million miles away and
all in pretty rows.
We were these children once
before blue academies and flags and books and songs written by long-dead men,
the songs we used to sing, we watched the soldiers,
marching by we marvelled at the colour.
They were so handsome then.
I find you, with graveyard eyes,
brother I feel those eyes on me.
You, who watched me marching by,
you, who turned against
that old familiar stench, drift
into my sleeping focus.
I will not rest-
Tonight
the rivers of blood are sated. Tonight as I listen to the old recording:
“As I look ahead, I am filled with foreboding”
Like the roman I see the Thames is foaming and all is red.
A needle skips,
the hush descends.
The tears flowing from my eyes
are invisible to me, the taste of them is all that’s left. I shout and scream into the bed
but still I find your staring face.
Locked safely far away from me.
Locked safely in my memory.
And I choke on empty air.
Dec 17, 2018
Dec 17, 2018 at 10:55 AM UTC