The night is old
And my eyes are heavy
Heavy, a puppy held too long.
You’d think I’d sleep. But the door lies open
Staring at me,
The threshold slathered in anxious thoughts
Responsibility, a feather, a mountain
The reminder is onerous and incessant
Inescapable, tied to the wall
Must sleep. Please!

Nassau
Warm smiles under rusted hulls,
mailboats smoking,
lobster red cruise ship tourists,
back to the islands they go

Highborn Cay
White cloth walled gazebos,
bikinis and tan.
Loungers on pearl beaches,
lovers, the sea and sand

Compass Cay
A pirates place.
Rustic docks in crystal blue.
A meeting place, restless souls
Pathways and secrets on a tropical island.
Oh, frolicking sharks? In cuddle piles.

Staniel Cay
Rural and lovely,
Pink and blue shops, take your pick.
Haggling fishermen in front of a quaint little pub.  
far from home, further from troubles.
Locals tell me god blesses me a lot.
The church has the best plot of land.

Conspiracy nuts
Say lizards rule the whole world
I'm going with no

A cackle of hens
A parliament of baboons
They giggle and guffaw
Ladylike buffoons

The alcohol flows
The snow falls deep
The dads watch through squinted eye
The Bahamas vibe, new age sheep

They waltz to their yachts
New dresses flowing
Their saunter falters
Their confidence still growing

It’s been two days since I saw your name
My heart falls into my stomach whenever I do.
I turn to my crutches and hope they fill the hole inside me.
They don’t though
Very few things do anymore.
Writing helps, though I shouldn’t indulge this emotion. Not like this.
It’s been two days since my soul rebelled.
I hope it comes home soon.
My body can’t sustain

I heard a man once say.
“A good soldier can go from having a cup of tea to mind bending violence in the blink of an eye”
As action movie cool as this sounds
I found it weirdly troubling.

Peppered walls, pocked and pink
Stand proud.
Little thing, shutters agape and haggard
Stand proud.
Someone calls you a home, a house, mine
Stand proud.
You’re a shelter, a solace, a sanctuary
Stand proud.
Though beside you rise glass and steel
Stand proud.
You dominate, unique, one
Stand proud.
You’re loved, you leak, you’re you
Stand proud.

The Silhouetted buildings peak
through the clouds, obscured
across the river, a city shivers
on a cold New York morning.

She’s adventure,
She’s Spirit,
A fighter  
No limit

Her Smile, a sunset.
Her laugh, a chorus.
Like a Rose of Noisette.
She blooms right before us.

Hair, country morning gold
Eyes, cotton candy blue.
A fighter, courage extolled
A warrior, her struggle is through

It is, I tell you, I promise.
It sits on my right, open and barely touched.
Pure condensation glittering on the outside
Chemical intoxication squatting on the in.

Charmingly Silver and a splash of red
the colour of an impulsive clown.
"Diet" it says, Im not on one.
"Coke" it says, Im not on that either.

why are you even here?

I have a set of words,
I don’t know how to say.
They’ve been lost and jumbled,
Scattered to the tides, stolen by ginger mermaids
I have to catch them, before the elements.
Should even one of those fragile blades
Wash upon your shore.
Then the wall would be thickest,
A Medieval palisade.

A spherical furnace lights the world
His great love mimics his efforts at night
Orbs daytime warmth doth flowers unfurl
Her pale lunar grace cradles lovers in flight

An embrace that is mythed in the ages of men
Portents of great things from dessert to fen
Their coupling is spied with shielded eye
Until she leaves his bright daytime sky

A shiny loose tooth
Is something people can lose
Vice Versa? NO!

I don’t write about you.
I daren’t, for my anger and resent
Could only portray you in the worst
Possible manner.
So I’d rather not.
I’d rather not indulge the bitter acid inside
I’d rather remember you before the
Heartache and pain, a flashing smile
And a twinkling eye. A glow and presence.

I do not miss you, not anymore.
I count our parting as one of the great blessings
One of the bullets dodged.
And rightfully so.
Duality in destruction
Can never come to any good

I do not hate you. I Never did
Surprising, I know.
Such feeling is reserved for enemies
And even then sparsely.
I hate things because of you.
But not you. I pity you.

Nonetheless I write this that one day
Whether it’s read or not
You will know. That I hope you are ok
That your zebra comes home
That your lion doesn’t eat you
I’d wish you happiness

Au revoir, bon voyage, goodbye

Sincerely your “no longer a friend”
Me

I haven't penned a thing
I've been as busy as hell
The sun is rising

The tree that never had to fight
For sun and sky and air and light,
But stood out in the open plain
And always got its share of rain,
Never became a forest king
But lived and died a scrubby thing.

The man who never had to toil
To gain and farm his patch of soil,
Who never had to win his share
Of sun and sky and light and air,
Never became a manly man
But lived and died as he began.

Good timber does not grow with ease,
The stronger wind, the stronger trees,
The further sky, the greater length,
The more the storm, the more the strength.
By sun and cold, by rain and snow,
In trees and men good timbers grow.

Where thickest lies the forest growth
We find the patriarchs of both.
And they hold counsel with the stars
Whose broken branches show the scars
Of many winds and much of strife.
This is the common law of life.

Cotton filled mouth
Cotton filled head
Lids drooping South
Eyes filled with lead

Coffee’s too sweet
Lights are too bright
My sleeps incomplete
My head’s dynamite

I’ll sip and I’ll stare
Between here and there.
And pull on my smoke
Coz it’s just one big joke

The questions don’t stop.
The incessant babbling of a panicked boss
The bone churning boredom of paint drying with the sympathetic tears that accompany a slowly dying animal.
I need a drink, rather several, rather all!
Maybe, for bonus points, we can throw in a crippling drug addiction that could, maybe, allow for a grasp on the slick walls of the pit. But we both know it won’t.

I need to escape, to get away from this horrid existence. But I don’t dare. Yellow bellied sluggard.
Thank god for cowardice, or I’d be the main course at the feast of the maggot king.

The skies were grey
The rain fell fat
Her smile was wide
Sheets, covered that.

Spoilt little *****
Demanding this and demanding that.
Take advantage of a situation.
Make the unexpected the norm.
Care the alms, care the hand,
for arms and hands are what you'll lose.
Benevolence and generosity
are treated as weaknesses, flawed characters being nice.
Smiles are kind, faces glowing, eyes, testing.
Be clear of your intent of kindness.
Once off, no expectations.
I'm ******* angry at this horse ****!

here I sit
Under thatched gazebo.
Gin, Tonic and Marlboro to keep me company.
The warm air broken by cool breezes blowing off the Bahamian sea.
The sweet smell of bug spray permeating the otherwise pristine natural beauty.
It adds to the charm, like sun cream stinks of beach days.
Gently the sea makes out with the shore below me. I’d feel like I was intruding had it been any other.
Peace pervades.
All woes and doubt settle into my feet.
A far cry from where they stir unwanted feelings in my belly and heart.
I could sit here all night.
I think I will.

I walk by a garden that’s not mine.
Not everyday, but less than I’d want.
It has a flower blossoming right by the gate.

It’s petals are green.  They sparkle with dew.
Bright and glowing at all times of the night and day.

It’s face is fire. Crackling and warm, a beacon to lost souls and small animals. Warming pieces of people that were unknowingly frozen.

It’s stem is lithe. Twisting, gently curving its way up to the sun. Strong enough to hold its head up and not bow to the wind.

It’s roots, enigma. I do not know how deep they go. But I’d be willing to try find find a *** big enough to hold them all stretched out.

I’d wish to have such perfection in my garden.
I’ve tried placing beauty in it, to no avail.
I once even planted a pretty **** with thorns and spikes. It didn’t last either.
Perhaps my land is salted.

I’d like to say thank you
For showing me how
To pick out the Big Dipper
In a strangely starred sky.

This old fashioned simpers in my hand
Sweet and sharp, Bitter and Blight
it calms my everything
to a point
where I cannot
Deal

We find it in the bottom of a cup
In a wine glass or beer mug
Imbibing all manner of spirits
Until the blackness takes hold.

Or in a person who eases our spirit
A phone call, a message.
Acknowledging our existence
And letting us know we’re loved

Some people find it in lines on a mirror
Or in a needle that leaves scars
It’s smoked off of a spoon
Or rolled in some paper

Other people cut, pain to ease pain
Slicing away bits of anxiety and flesh
Leaving thin long reminders of
Feelings best forgotten

Some find it in poetry, vomiting feelings
Onto a pristine white page until
It’s full and stained in emotion  
An artwork of agony

A few seek moments alone to
Close their eyes and meditate.
Counting breaths and clearing imagination
Getting lost in the maze of their minds

Some brave individuals
Listen to blues and sorrow
Their anxieties leaking from their eyes
And out of their noses.

Me. Maybe I do them all
Maybe I don’t.

Everytime I hit the front page
I am saddened by the tortured souls
Who populate its halls

I will not write sad poetry
I will endeavor to brighten these corridors
Feel free to join me.

At one point in time
When all is said and done
The only things that remain
Are the ashes of good intentions

It is a general rule that
People maintain an underlying
Need for gratification
A facade of “I don’t”

No ***** given

This is false
We’re all liars inside
To your friends, families
Selves.

To look in the mirror
Whether model or mould
Is a painful reminder
Of this stark reality.

“I do not weep, do you”
I almost did today.
Hearing a voice I hadn’t in a while

I have four

One wrapped in guilt and shame
Though it should not be.
It’s a free voice now, one that speaks with delight
Where there once was pain.

One that is shrouded in the depths
Buried and hopefully never to be heard again
A voice that changed mine
For better or worse I do not know

One that is logic and tempered steel
A firm and conscientious whisper
Where fire and chaos fight to control
My eager and reckless heart

One that is beauty and love.
It makes me burst and fills me
To the point of tears for
Not having heard it in months

These are my angels and demons.
My queens and tyrants.
My sins and sanctuaries

The first odyssey is a difficult one
To step out into the blue and hope not to fall
But fall you will. Usually fast and quite hard
The next time you walk out yonder
It’s with more care, but the result is inevitable

Sometimes you leap off the cliff.
Sometime you inch off of it
Sometimes you don’t even see the edge

Eventually the landings become easier.
Your knees cushion you.
Your arms splayed for balance.
Is it getting easier?
No!

Sometimes you hit every outcrop on the way down
And land in a broken heap on the shore
But you know what
You’ll do it again, we all do.

Get on up
It's spring time in the city
Count your eggs

I knew a old dude from Du Preez
Who tried to **** over a tree
The tree was so high he ****** in his eye
And now the poor ******* can’t see.

A lock, enthralled by a fist.
A mouth, enamoured by a neck.  
A picture, on this Friday wall.

My favourite place is in the breeze
Or in between the sea and sand.
My cup of coffee close at hand
The cooing doves a gentle tease

Another place I like to go
Is up amidst the mountain snow.
A cup of schnapps to warm my heart
And make a man feel mighty smart

Where’s your place?
where do you hide?
A quite space?
Or a love that died?

Choose to write a beautiful thing
Something sweet, sweet as sin!

It’s a fickle thing that moves us to this
A miss said word here and a cut there
It’s barbs and fangs and sharp things that stab
It’s an unpleasant time for all.
A crucible to temper the soul and harden the heart
When it’s done is it impenetrable?
Is there an alloy that does not become brittle in its strength.
Too many times in the fire and everything breaks
Too much fire and we all are changed
I cannot be soft. It doesn’t suit me

I don’t like writing this.

I have no desire to recant the red dress
The storm, the torrid blend of passion, anger and shame
Yet it haunts me at ungodly hours.

Let me sleep *****.
I can tick the bucket list.
Check the Facebook quiz
“One point for if you’ve ever loved”

Have you tasted ashes?
It’s ******* awful.

it’s the famed drink of pirates.
It’s a poor substitute for sedatives
Once again my trusty friend has failed in his task
Is the pain stronger?
Can the mind no longer be deadened by such
Does it take a narcotic of higher potency?
Is there such a substance?

3am. It’s alive.
a faster beating heart
It’s the whir of the air conditioning
Removing the heat and leaving the sticky sludge over the soul
deep breaths to calm
blades to sever thick ship lines to the past.
It’s the drip of the cat fountain.
3am it’s a brutal hour, it’s a painful hour,
It’s a dead hour.

Sickeningly empty. Surrounded by silence
Its unerring and it aches. A single fruit on a monstrous tree
A car without gears a pilot without a stick
Biologically nonsensical, emotionally dead
And I slept

I won’t. I’ll try.
But ultimately it won’t happen.
I’ll sit here with good intentions
I’ll feel optimistic and chipper.
And then I’ll forget

In the end my goal is to improve
But just like many other projects
It’ll end up on the curb.

But I’ll certainly try.
So let’s make this day one.
Perhaps we’ll get to a “good enough” number.

It’s suffocating.
I used to read you through rose tinted sunnies.
Now all I see are black and white scratchings
It’s you for sure, my heart can tell
But your colour is gone.
Yawn.

Who welcomed you into dreams
Of church fairs and rugby games?
Who asked you to sit there
At the table like we were still friends?
Who asked you to toast with us
to the future and couples and tequila shots?
Who? I’ll cut them out too

It’s not Settled
It’s not there
The heart isn’t a willing disciple.
Judas turning his head
Every which way but that way
comforting love is a strange Companion
Is it real if it isn’t painful?
Or wrong?
Probably. But I can’t see.
my prescription Expired last year
so who knows.

I don’t like this sit.
It sits in strange ways.
Left cheek tingles, right cheeks numb
foots gone drowsy, other ones fast asleep
The stand brings a stumble, a drunken lurch
My feet rouse quickly, but not my ***.

They're gathering
Theses shadowed dwellers
from places that hurt the eye, to peer into

They twist and writhe in my throat,
stabbing their sharpness into my brain
merciless, unfeeling.

What banishes such indomitable spirits?
sleep? postpones their march