Nameless is the land I walk upon,
despite the flags mounted in wind
and the bloodstains on every front door.

This body is borrowed from the stars,
both a million years old and barely new,
despite the gathering of age in my face.

All money is spent in vacant assumption;
as if these inventions of value do anything
but strip all items of their worth.

Dreaded is the will I place in travelling,
knowing intrinsically about arbitrary birth:
that if I was not born on land, I would simply drown.

I have paid for the sounds of my guitar,
but I lose ownership in their effortless travel
through the air - left to sound through the aeons.

This house is nothing but Earth upon Earth.
Watch as the weeds emancipate through the wall;
it is the people who have forgotten their place.

These old friends are not mine, but obsessions.
Memories of idealised time that I cling to,
as toys are swept up and sold in parts.

Passing are these clothes upon my back,
despite the fashion of my walk
and your letters in my old blazer pocket.

Rationed is my life upon this planet.
All that I meet will fall away,
and all that I take, is returned.

Coffee shop of small-screen fame,
playing fields for hunting game,
winter's dominance is sanity's gloom
of life extinguished in this eternal room.

Oh, this world is slain
by capricious men,
but one day soon,
we shall live again

Her skin darkens as she salutes the sun,
staring soft from the yoga mat,
sunbeams cast motes of light
across the surface of the Alzou River.

The neighbours collect skulls of the
rabbits they have killed, turning them
to a fortune whilst honouring the dead.
She had forgotten what it meant

to fall into a silence,
to sit and read in an endless afternoon.

The cyclists roam in the crooked streets
of the cliff-side village, the Buddhists
are smoking **** in their hammocks.
She had faltered to a start,

falling into a corset,
to sit on him and kiss his calloused hands.

She had lost herself to advertisements
promoting freedom in a cinematic drawl;
time-lapse pictures and memories
of a summer spent landlocked in defeat.

She has fallen for her music.
To sit and listen to the drumbeat’s awful sin.

Train track sonnets, the drunk piano,
old trumpets and dreams of West Virginia;
gold tobacco in an antique pipe,
finding a new look in outdated surroundings.
Patients of self-hate stand in bandages,
long sleeves, and in brickwork formation,
all this to the beat of the white man blues,
a country guitar, harsh vocal, the sleepless smoker
on the bedside; new speakers for old tunes.
A new look amongst past disguises, ancient lies,
angry blisters on the road to recovery,
pathetic bottle of emptied red wine.
Tom still sings Hold On through bad hands and lotteries,
he will stay to drink with me, when on a winning streak.

I am not a denominator of original sin,
some remnant or aftermath of fallen grace.
Indeed, I am hardly human at all.

I live in the spaces between breath and mist,
where gravity dares suspend its hold
and all matter slips away until nothing matters.

I pour drinks so I can afford to drink.
It pays my way towards the dead-end
now occluding the avenue that used to stretch

beyond it.

I am not a believer in disorganised action.
Each moment spent in self-destruction
was thoughtfully done to bring about art and demise.

I live in the moment between charm quark and decay,
where gravity falls to weakness
and all that matters slips into temperance.

I eat only to satisfy appetite.
It tastes of nothing but the dead-ends
that now occlude the avenue that used to stretch

far beyond me.

My life is naught but
hollowed laughter;
some canned sound of paltry humour,
calling, calling to ‘amuse us’.

My language is naught but
borrowed idioms;
no thought laid anew, nor words
that twist so unexpectedly.

Some patient of the modern world,
my tongue speaks directly,
some awful diatribe of malformed poetry,
of confessions laid in pixels,
not pressed onto the heart of the page.

I’m calling, calling ‘hold me’,
‘hold me in your palms,
as you read my thought’s patterns,
and I, your lifelines. In print,
I shall discover your fortunes,

run my index over the ball of your thumb,
and massage into you my touch.
My touch upon your cheek,
to catch your tears,
to capture those moments

you have stared in awe upon
the fogged and pastured British fields,
the blink of the crested wave over the shore,
and all memories not locked in time.’

I guess you were once my woman.

But I was just a boy.

And I assumed I was your romance,

Crushed rose petals scattered in joy.



I guess I caught the first taste of tears,

The salt that would line your eyes.

Every time you caught your beauty

And for all those men who lied.



For in you I smelt a mother,

The softness within your skin.

Oh, it was in you I felt a lover,

That clench in my stomach,

That causes men to sing.



And I guess you were once my woman,

And I wish I could return

Into those breezy arms,

And feel the familiar pages turn.

I remember the Canary Islands,
I remember them well.

The patchwork of rock on the roadside,
And the glasses of wine on the balcony.

How I remember the fruit we would carry
Up the mountains and down to the pool.

I remember the permanence of the coastline,
And the fake opulence of the hotels.

They stood arrogantly from the cliffs,
Bleach white and scented with sunscreen.

I remember the movement of your body,
So ******* shadowed from the sun,

As we walked those many miles
To find ourselves a bit of fun.

We dined out by the seaside,
And we watched the tourists meet.

They lay sprawled out on their blankets,
Sunburn on their feet.

I find myself speaking in rhyme,
When I think of the simplicity

Of you and I in the sun,
Away from the din of the city.

I am half-awake in the August rain,
the last strain of summer squeezed
into my glass and cooled with ice.

It is nice. To be up this early with
the morning news, Palestinians and
Jews at war over berries and wheat

in the broken streets of Gaza.
The cats are sleeping on the suite,
ears pinned up for a flash of sound

or stench of meat. My brother is
planning his moves for the future
against the ways I have failed in the past.

I have been half-asleep in debt and
addiction. I have buried myself in a
dream of words; into worlds of

all-talk and no action. I am no longer
a fraction of beer bottles and ashtrays,
fantasies of easy lays, or notebooks left

incomplete and full of cancer fears.
They are in tears; brown-skinned and
forgotten rights, a desolation site

of ground-zeros and a desperate fight
for life. Depleted uranium laces lungs,
as well-versed tongues in heavy suits

kiss the shoes of the corporate brutes.
As empathy trickles down in political
verse, a hypnagogic curse for liberal thought

and consciousness. They are forecasting
sorrow as the sun comes up, to detach
from our Earth, and the late summer rain.

A flash of light in a concrete jungle.
Hands folding in a mesh of loving flesh
to counter the iron-willed Northern wind,
to counter all these days spent so solemnly.

You press your outer crest – your weight on me,
when all is tired, all substance expired;
to counter separation from the heavens,
to counter all life's unwholesome blemishes

that otherwise shall leave me unfulfilled.

Oh, mint leaves on a garnished drink,
a cocktail chained to the kitchen sink.
The wife has come to lose her name,
to a love played out like a guessing game.

She cleans his feet, his footprints too,
before taking to the avenue,
She is off to buy him a richer style,
to empty his pockets, to make him smile.

The wife sweats beneath the ceiling fan,
against the glass and the upward soles of man.
In the dark she dresses, to meet his needs,
she'll plant his crops, and then destroy his weeds.

She'll caress his temples in the night,
tend to her boxer after his big fight.
He'll thank her with a sharp right hook,
he'll lay down the law, he'll throw down the book.

The wife, she bends down to his will,
to his livelihood paying the heating bill.
She'll pay for all the debts that he acquired,
for an autonomy of will, now left expired.

Yet, as she stares at her mortal frame,
in her lonesome bed, she comes to dream again.
Oh, for all of the passion that has come to be tame,
she has finally stood; she remembers her name.

Teach me how to touch you
upon your heart's consent,
throw me back to the gutter
that I'd given up for lent.

Audition all this longing
to measure out its strength,
its lack of sense for fear and time
but that of shadow's length.

Show me how to miss you
without weather turning bleak,
show to me your eternal youth,
bound in memories I seek.

Demonstrate all living joy
as you wake again today,
birthed into the curtained sound
of Atlanteans at play.

Teach me how to hold you
in my sober sight,
allow me to accumulate
all of nature's might,

as I coast on through the avenue,
as I tumble through this plain,
please teach me how to love you
without expecting any pain.

Cracked heel,
Tiger Balm,
Dust of yesterday’s streets;
Sequins from all tomorrow’s parties
In the lining of unwashed clothes.

Cats sleep in the dirt
Beside ashtrays of white monoliths
Stood brave in a bed of stale ash.

Foreign tongue, the lullaby,
Familiar habits, the birth-ground
To finally be new again.

Spheres of ghost-light
Prevent secrets from slipping out
Into the night.
A hundred beautiful women
And still, I sit and stare.

The air is thick here.
Stone-bench vigils
Through evenings that do not end.

Only strays and electrical hums
Threaten to disrupt the peace.
Tears fall. My hands shake.

There is no reason to be sad.

I want to see you stripped
down to bare elements;
a deaf-blind entry
into knowing you,
because I am tired of words,
words, words,
and a lack of warmth
beneath my hands.

I want to see your hair
spread like a river delta
over the pillow;
content and raw
with exhaustion and red wine.
Drunk and torn
from the monotony
of long nights in an empty bed.

All I could think of was to shut you up
Smudge your perfect red lipstick
And forget
For once
About our private hell
And the weight of time
Hanging in the gut of us all

Fireworks scolded in your brilliance
Each one a spec k of observation
Amongst a sea of eyes with no limit
Fragments of no time

Infinity was the glance across the table
After our fourth drink

By the sixth we were bringing in the new year
In a fitful, sleepless night
Of stimulant drinks
And cheap spirits

I have been living as a ghost
For several years now
The ashtray is overflowing
In the wake of one thousand tongues
Spilling their way needlessly into mine

Whatever is left
After a lifetime of travel with no destination
Failed treatments and one thousand breathless
Attempts at barely living
Is yours

Whatever is left
Once you are done tending to the offshoots
And slicing each tendon from the bone
Is mine to keep

For G.C*

I'm on the dole, in therapy, taking meds
and posting statuses. I drink far too much
caffeine and read too little. The cops are bad
and the drug dealers, good. I wear shades
to hide fatigue and spoil pavements with
cigarette ends and receipts. I stay awake
all night meditating, looking for that
deep-sleep pill and peace of mind.

I'm a modern man and an old soul,
stretched out on a beach towel in suburbia.
I punctuate my day with digital smiles
and late night calls to my pillow-talk
sweetheart. All milestones are published,
doctored and time-stamped to ensure
that every moment is lived in memory.
The sky is concrete and the ceiling, made

of glass. I watch tree surgeons clean
the economy's veins, retired carpenters
tending to their miniature Eden, as
the rapists neck their third can by the
fire escape. There are hosepipe bans
and water-gun fights, crowded hospitals
and empty funds. The government are
insane and only the lunatic fringe can

make sense of things. I'm sleeping naked
and checking my prostate in the shower.
There are bowel movements in the
cubicles and Zionism rolls on by through
every other wide-screen joint in town.
I'm chasing jobs and avoiding eye-contact,
throwing coins into the wishing well and
hoping for change. I'm a modern man
and a miserable Old ****.

Distraction! The skirting board is alive.
Last year's grit at the back of a desk;
you have a story to write,
a good friend to deceive, phone calls
to make to indifferent ears.
Dirt accumulates, black algae
in the carpet, and nothing on your mind.

There is an ****** in the sidelines,
it will have to wait – a soap opera,
a bath of salt, a supply of coffee:
catalyst for the morning,
some razor blade, a brand new face.
“A necessity!”she drools, a fragrant potion,
whilst children cry and die in Gaza.

The cigarette falters in its promise,
the fantasist friend, last year's prophet;
you have a life to live
but that can wait another year.
Love sits in your mouth, fat accumulation;
tasteless reprieve from hunger, a motion-
anything to escape stillness, immediacy.

Men in drag lift their skirts to the screen,
the fool is on the hill, the billboard; a dream
of fame litters your focus, your self-hood.
There is a pyramid built for better people,
all these old institutions – indefatigable ladder!
The rings of tea caramelise on the table,
married to the places you have been before.

Elusive enterprise – unfulfilled spark,
you suffocate in oxygen, heat lost to air,
embrace yesterday's comfort, tomorrow's snare.
Take another day inside this indistinguishable prison.
The walls are glass. Eligible, you vote for Hope.
For the drug of the future, a disbursed present
for minimum wage, accepting slave; your eventual grave.

I look into my life.
It’s distorted,
Curved at the peripheries
‘Till I’m required to squint,
Just to make out the features
Beneath the glass.

In the snow lies dead thought.
Water stagnant,
Green-blue and faded paintwork.
How I ache for that great hand
To lift, shake and cascade me
With memories.

Rain on me my life’s memoirs.
Drown me in snow.
I sit and I wait for when
These monotone streets will
Fan and flame, burst to colour,
Burst to flavour.

My romanticised past,
I marvel at.
Recall each day as a dream,
And each night an excursion
Of wanderlust, innocence
And fair fortune.

For now, I’ll remain here.
These arching walls,
My old translucent prison.
Life in stasis, I’m stubborn
As I avoid career-paths
In my dome,

And wonder when this world
Will begin to feel like home.

I remember the old reservoir.

The one we used to take to
walking around in the hedonic
aeon that was our youth.

I’m still young.

I’m young but the years have
aged the path that took us back to there,
grown over in thistle, thicket and thorn.

It’s cracked, with infant pools
of rainwater filling the potholes;
man-made, still habitats.

A mimicry of their mother,
water-filled basin of breadth
and no brine.

Only on those blue-moon occasions,
with cynical tongues and carved faces
do we still cross those few paths
that remain.

I’ve learnt now to accept my loss.

Dear Draycote, pool of life,
circular route and void of time,
I can dream of your return

into my days, but awake
to the sight of my long-gone friends
and all they once were.

I cannot hope to cross your path
in the way that we once did.
For we used to walk in circles,
and now that circle is complete.

So we shall live our separate lives,
pin badges, names, onto our *******,
thin ribbons to bind our fates.

But what, my life, do I call my friends
that now only frequent my mind?
Oh how do I catch up with them,
after falling so far behind?

Left her crying in the driveway
after forcing her way through the window,
feigned a car crash, a sudden death,
so I could sleep alone and warm
without discussion across the pillow.

Drank whiskey and coke,
distant and remote-
noted her painted nails,
her short skirt, her knotted shirt,
shaved legs
in anticipation
for something I could not give her.

Made an excuse to sing the blues
until the pills took their hold
and muffled my strings
in a tranquilised series
of half-toned grins
and yawns that sing
the death of another evening.

Would rather take to art
than any flesh, bone, or heart
that bleeds upon my feeling,
would rather cling to a verse,
a muddied crime, suit, or hearse,
that leaves me high and dry
and staring up at the ceiling.

Left her nursing her wounds
whilst I search for an excuse
why I cannot love without leaving.
Left her alone in her bed
a feast of wine and bread
that has no taste,

that has no rhyme or reason,
for why I keep ploughing the field,
for why I keep moving through the seasons.

There is no meaning to my motion,
no depth to my frantic gathering of breath,
no distilled calm, nor consequence to each brief,
suffering emotion.

I am just a ladder to climb.
I am no stairway to heaven.

The teenagers smile through their misery
as they learn to love the taste of beer.
I learned from then on that no actions of ease
are ever sincere; that we all struggle to keep pace
with all that is expected - a grade-mark percentage,
an overtime enthusiast; a steady-state consumer
who is always bright, bright, bright and on time;
who is never bleak and twisted, or overcast and out of mind.

I see the couple's silent feud
as they hold hands across the road;
I see the womanizer pop a zit in a wing mirror
on his way to the latest *******.

The sales assistant yawns through the breathing spaces
of professional enthusiasm, scouring the pages
of the company magazine, whilst the radio sweats
in the corner of the room. Last night's words
are on her mind as she signs the papers
with today's date; today's place in time
amongst all of the others that dominate her life,
whilst leaving scars and no memories,
punching the clock and throwing the fight.

I see the hang-man wince in empathy
after his dog had died last week;
I see the expert in the hotel mirror,
feeling sorry about his ****.

The Beautiful People are walking the ugly track
back home, amongst the rubble of Snapchats
and bad scratch-cards; the cardiac nurse
meditates in the restaurant corridor
before going to meet a woman.
I learned from my lofted position
on top of all the walls I have built,
that no matter how vivid the flower in sunlight,
in the darkness, it will always come to wilt.

Lest we fashion ourselves
in artificial joy,
we must sing to this world;
the poet’s envoy.

In these days so heavy,
In these days without cure,
we forget the homeless
asleep on the moor.

They’re asleep in our wake,
they’re asleep to the hiss
of advertised pleasure,
manufactured bliss

And forget not the old,
with those faces of fault lines,
so haplessly devoid,
like the old coal mines.

They live in their shadow,
they live within their past,
this world on which they’ve learnt
that nothing’s built to last.

No notebooks in the drawer,
Nor diaries of old,
The story’s in the sale,
Not from what is told.

So, before we get lost
In day-to-day routines,
Let us piece together
What life really means:

The faded word of print,
A sugared ring of wine,
Favourable melody,
Endless stretch of brine.

The winter’s passing rain,
And August’s fatal heat,
The swaying of the tyre swing
Where lovers care to meet.

And we will return to
Our places in the skies,
Where life is lived in centuries
Devoid of all goodbyes.

We’ll weep not in longing,
We’ll weep not in our haste,
For losses felt yesterday,
For all that’s laid to waste.

Upon the explosion
Of all these dying stars,
We’ll rejoice in the so-near’s
So much as the so-far’s.

We will live out our dreams
upon that foreign shore,
and sing out to our lives,
‘till we breathe no more

I cannot write an honest poem
in the fear of losing you.
That the shutters of concern
will be lowered, as everyone
turns to face the screen instead.

I cannot deal with blind windows,
I cannot suffer in privation.
But the thought of eyes on me
and sustained conversation
leads me to blackout again.

The story rolls on
and days keep coming by.
The seasons change
despite my lack of animation,
and they cause me
to see the world as it is.

The Agentic State
has stolen our land
and human nature.
We swallow stillness with panic
and over-stimulation;
no chance for peaceful completion.

I cannot give you any truth,
when my truths got me here
in the first place. I cannot
write to you about the coastline
as I never get to hold it.

All I can do is remain in my place,
tarry within the comfort of lies.
If you allow me more time
in poverty, I will repay you
in thoughts turned to rhyme.

*Though I know you'd prefer cash.

Water skids the ephemeral valley.
Tight turns, night gowns and cigarette ash beds,
with countless souls lost in ruby red wine.

Fingers indiscernible, scaled hardbacks
lay upon the shelves in deadened beauty,
whilst creation is born in digital sound.

The weekend revellers
hand over a half-hour of toil,
of eros, of prayers in cash,
of dizzy heights, life lived
and to be lived again
as I hand over their bottled beer,
their ice and *****,
their poster boy of good times
and the erasure of all day
spent watching the wheels.
Spent watching the clock
wind its endless route
to freedom.

Legs cramp,
eyes blur to focus,
and cash moves dirtied hands,
one to the other, to the other
and back again.
Back again to the dancefloor,
to the gape of sweaty arms
flailing in catharsis,
in sweet memories
of playground kisses and
lunchtime riots.
We play sweet imitation
of black-man-blues
and toast the new day
as it comes 'round the corner,
steamrollers through
into Sundays spent
with cigarette ends and
heads in buckets.

This, my origin of misery,
their open-doored appearance
to substantial existence,
to footprints of two-time
than carbon.
To commutes of whiskey sour
and wine dry,
car left in park at home,
whilst the taxis
pick up the slack.

Poisoned in the promise
of forever-youth,
the cougars cover
the same old ground,
the same old ground
every week.
I spot them in the corners,
by the doors,
in the cloakroom
and in the fire of backway passages;
the closest hope to
human touch
they'd ever dare to dream.

And the shot girls.
The shot girls kick water
in a sea of salted men,
football hooligan,
semi-political lyncher
and the neck-tattooed reality hero
who crawled in from
some bar or other,
to condemn losses with shouts
of *****, of *****, of please.
“Please, just once,
afford me a want in life”,
comes the mating call
of lads and businessmen alike,
as young female flesh passes by
their lives,
like some unfulfilled match,
kicking up sparks
but refusing to flame.

Each day I wonder
why dread exists. Why I
cling to the bedsheets,
why stories are poured
and glasses written,
why I settle for anti-living
and artificial light,
why woman is singular
and drinks are solo;
whilst all life passes by
in the excruciating hours
spent stood behind
the beer taps,
behind the barrier
that separates me
from them.

These days the habitual ache
Is far worse.
Far worse because
I know it cannot abate.
The storm is forever,
Shelter reserved to hurried moments
Scrambling beneath the eaves
Of a thousand trees;
Bearing no fruit
In the stone-cold furnace
Of my self-regard.
Things got too hard.
Things got too heavy.
Things accumulated like unread books
On weak shelving.

Eventually
It only took one word
To bring the whole thing down.

Eventually
It only took a whisper
To be drowned in sound.

You are art manifested in my eyes.
The glow of the camera
tells of soft skin and heart.

Oh, you are a papery beauty,
mystic and fair
as the childish storybooks
and all of their impossible colour.

Long hours I spend,
planning what is to be said
between us.

I imagine my confessions
spilling out in perfect eloquence.
I imagine a connection beyond
the regions of my past experience

and all of the poverty of the present.

You are the unknowing and benign
conquest in my life. Oh,
how I place in you
the catalyst for my escape.

There is a war on the screen
Full of filth that goes unseen.
Yet all I can do is sip peppermint tea
And regurgitate conceited poetry.

Of days too long where I long to hold
Purpose in me, a spirit bold.
To go forth and spread a message of love
And pray to the science of the stars above.

But it’s a caterwaul of profiteering
And adverts for the hard of hearing.
It’s to my heart, this world’s poison is seeding,
My once hopeful head is now receding.

So it is with compromise that I do age,
A prostituted soul on minimum wage.
I’ll escape out into my fictitious streets,
Where fairytale lovers still care to meet.

Where words are read and held to *******,
To imprint the words upon the tremor of chests.
Where misfortune is fickle and lasts not long,
To where the dandelions may sing their song.

The vintage shops are closing,
The sweepers are cleaning the streets.
Our modern minds are locked in change,
As poetry suffers to defeat.

Oh, the Christmas bells are chiming,
To greet the start of June.
They’re calling, calling, that love’s tokens
Can never be bought too soon.

And, the infant yell of binge drinkers
Sounds over their bosses’ tones.
They’re drink-driving to the liquor store,
And weaving through traffic cones.

Now the engineers are catcalling
In their neon-breasted suits,
Hard hats to hide their flaccid love;
Oh, purple-hearted brutes!

This hometown is full of characters
In the brief demise of day,
And all I can think in this lonesome state is:
Darling, please don’t go away.

This photograph of childhood
Stains my eyes with smiles.
Such a full and healthy appetite,
Now gone over so many miles.

Still, I search on for a reason
To live within this hive.
I’ll give my all to find this sanity;
I’ll give everything just to survive.

Only imitation of daylight touches me.
New air finds yellow skin through vents in the window,
or else in the brief presentation of my bowed head
each time I succumb to nicotine and black lung.

It is a depression of inactivity,
not worth the document. These daydream catacombs
afford me translucent substance of consciousness,
and untraceable, numinous identity,

so that with each day I can be spun-out again.
The only reality in which I engage
is that of words, words, words – meandering delights
of categorising all fear into known terms.

Lo, how the quantum world beholds this emptiness.
Great depths of solidity, Mother Earth's mantle -
tectonic collisions of Biblical tirade,
of all shield, political firewall and bloodshed;

discarded in the nothingness of the atom.
These ****** words too, will offer no quantum relief.
Each thought lives brilliantly, but in a moment,
and words, words, words, are but the thunder that follows.

Brexit and Trump
mass shootings
and bombs in
schools
mosques
churches
streets

These are things that happen
when people forget
how to
talk
to
each
other.

Sensory awareness;
fold of translucent light through thin blue sheets.
Faint scent of tobacco smoke -
morning reveals the desolation of yesterday.
Coping mechanisms galore!
Scene of poetry without a purpose,
scene of black holes in red carpet,
scene of high moons by the windowsill
and always feeling low, half-****** on Zopiclone,
how I once slept full, breathed from the diaphragm,
dreamed with ease - but that was so long ago.

Slept-in sheets, weeks of cold sweats
and takeaway pizza eaten in bed.
12 hour days on minimum wage,
I feel like a gardener on his last legs-
a garden to be tended to,
a garden that grows all around me.
The incense tray is full, synthetic Jasmine,
putrid Lemon-grass bought from the Pound Saver
solely to talk to the attractive Hungarian woman
behind the counter.
It's a working day and my mind is in disarray;
the sheets are too heavy, I'm a little hungover
and I've been going insane.

Half-an-hour to be showered, bowels emptied;
eyeballs removed - or whatever it is people do
to get themselves ready for the day.
It's a scene of kicking out in dead-water,
it's a scene of black holes and being human,
it's a scene of fear for the present day,
so much so you cannot build for a future.
Half-an-hour to be showered and out of the door,
half-an-hour to be someone I'm not-
well... I've had to fake it all before.

After a long stay of depression,
he awoke on his motorbike
beneath a searing rainbow sunset.

The mountains arched silhouettes
as he tore through the highway
in the still-image of youth.

Slow evenings spent unwinding,
numbing himself with changes
and the crudeness of a new tongue.

On the shoulder of Kalasin,
in a nowhere-town province,
he had tasted everything.

Ate with his hands
on decorated tables,
trekked the petrified forest

on Christmas Eve;
somewhere between all of this,
he finally learned to live.

After a long stay of depression,
he rolled away the stone.
Found himself six thousand miles

from anyone he had known.
No one can speak English here.
Today, he learned the word for ‘home’.

Another fated Saturday,
where shadows often lurk,
please let me settle in my place,
please, don't make me go to work.

Another night of ungrateful drinks,
and hooligans gone berserk,
please save me from this dull disgrace
and don't make me go to work.

Winter passes with little consequence,
ourselves barricaded in these four walls;
heat folded in, embraced from daylight’s woes,
an entire generation is numb.

The universities are flooded, rinsed,
it’s a uniformal fashion parade;
homogenous clones, vacant discussions,
future fears, present greed, our apathy.

These are the faces of tomorrow’s world,
they are clothed in dime-a-dozen sweatshirts;
“choose your pigeon-hole, circle your answer,
tick appropriate box, sign and print name.”

The bars are overloaded, fluorescent
with lack of change, cheap *****, social decay;
stories are ornaments now, not lived in,
but tried on for size, disposable quest.

Memories born in pixels, never felt,
the out-of-focus lens of our daydreams
is no match for high-definition;
screens play out all eventualities.

The youth on borrowed time, defaulted loans
of goodwill. We drink only to stand our ground;
we will toast our tomorrows, welcome them
with cynical tongues and steeled spirits.

I hear the subtle sound of heartache
calling across the quay,
young lovers spell Joni's words
with the catkins of the tree.

I feel the heavy weight of lover's wake
as we dream on through the day,
old demons used to poison me,
before you took them all away.

I taste the blood in chocolate wine
and it's sweetening my mind,
it's telling me of fortune's treat,
when good intention is combined.

I smell the human in our longing sweat
as I press into your skin,
steady as my doubts are perished,
all happiness, lived again

I see the poetry in street-lights
imitating the moon,
telling  me when darkness falls,
light will follow soon.

I know there's more out there
than ever I've seen,
more than whatever I am
and whatever I've been.

Well the dogs begin to bark, disembodied
on the cemetery hill. Gravestones are silhouettes,
furniture in the night. From here you can see the housing estate,
constellations of halogen bulbs and bicycle reflectors.
All is still but my mind and the sound of the dogs in the distance.

A lofted branch, a hanging thread:
when did the rope-swing become a noose?
We came down from the trees
to burn them to the ground.
A thousand signals pass overhead. Unintelligible.
Unseen. The homeless leave ****-bottles of cheap cider
and backwater in the flower bins

but no one has seen them do it.
A chapel reflects the distant street-lights, unmoving,
so that only the trees share my discourse with living.
The dogs have shut up. The signals continue.
I lost my way again on the cemetery hill.
Scars have become medals.
My heart refuses to still.

He collects copies of The Watchtower
to get a feel of true America,
to spike a lonesome fever, a voice of
desperation now in the hands of fate.

And in the black tapestries of starlight,
upon smoke and abandoned birthright,
he will stumble into a walking pace,
whenever the moment has come too soon.

He writes about writing more than he writes,
delusions of tyre-swings and fallen kites,
dreams of solitaire and those black-out fields
where you started the fire, then danced within.

And in the grey misery of hindsight,
in lack of sleep and forsaken sunlight,
he will stumble upon an inner peace
for the moments that are still yet to come.

He thinks of naked women all the time,
opened boxes of wine, slave to the mind
of divided poetry, words that rhyme,
a missing person, hidden in plain sight.

I have never met someone as beautiful as you.
I can’t believe you are going back to China.
I can’t believe that I will never see that face again.
I can’t believe I didn’t at least try, at some point.
You are leaving forever.
Every day I stared at you in awe.
But that was the problem - I just stared.

She used to sell
Counterfeit t-shirts
By the roadside
To all the tourists
Pulling up in Tuk Tuks
And motorbike taxis

In the evening
She would cook
Pork rib soup
With a side of
Fresh vegetables
And fried rice

We would take it in turns
To pick songs
And fill each other's drinks
As I washed the dishes
She would close the curtains
And turn the lights off

She always found me
In the dark
She felt new everyday
She could make me hard
Or break me into pieces
Just as easy

She was a nightmare
To live with
And so was I
Countless nights
Staring at opposite walls
In a violent silence

Only to wake
In a bed of hot ***
And no regret
She taught me how to live
She never said
What I should do

Once she's gone

Walked away from the world, save for luscious green
and cigarette smoke, I wonder what makes her ***;
what makes him stare mockingly over his glass
when I tell him that the system is broke.

Walked away from the world with an acoustic guitar
and notes like foundation, pressed to the corners of the walls;
the inside of my skull.

I cannot find my way out.

Walked away from the world, save for stubborn breath
and stubborn weeds poking out of the concrete in the streets;
what makes them break out for the sunlight,
what makes me crave for retreat?

Walked away from the world without a direction,
notebooks of freedom, seasonal depression;
the fork in my tongue.

I cannot find my way out.

They smoke a lot of cones by the east-side lobby,
watch the sun come up in a habit-***-hobby.
Sweatshirts line the edge of the high-rise feature,
they pass their smoke through kisses, creature-to-creature.

The weeds hang over their heads in a brick-work reminder,
search-parties comb the woods, but they couldn't find her.
In the murmur of the city, with the street-kids drinking,
cooking up their schemes for a new-wave thinking.

The papers plaster words of in-group fear,
view the class-war that is coming near.
They don't vote for the parties that bring come-downs and blood;
they'd write a sing-song for freedom, if only they could.

They exchange love like high-fives, in teenage abandon,
now in their mid-twenties, still dreaming of Camden.
In the centrifuge of their small-town dissonance,
they toast to their cancer; to their short-lived innocence.

The sound of silence
So frequently documented
Resides in my bones.

My restless brain sleeps.
Saved from the wretchedness
Of one million sounds.

And I let myself write.

The din of a stadium
Full of klaxons and canned laughter
Is now but an echo
And it is just Nina and I.

I can stare endlessly out of the window
And not be asked why.
I can sit stubbornly with my mouth taped shut
And not be asked why.
I can sit and strum
Out of time and out of key
And not be asked why.

And I let myself write.

A scattering a books and a half-made bed.
A cooling mug of tea.
I am laid bare afore the eyes of nobody
The fool of the romantics, and the jester of the ghosts.

And I sit here and just sit.
Twitching my lips along the grooves of these words
Stumbling over them in a soundless whisper.

And I let myself write.

This sound of silence,
So fleetingly fair
Will last just moments.

The chimes will soon sound
And one million yawns
Will tremble in the throats of others.

So for now,
I let myself write.

I

We lost the art of brand new sight,
of sleep unaided in dreams of flight,
when tendons grew
our hopes diminished,
we set to flame
all the books we had finished.

We faced childhood's end upon the start
of routine pain and a world-weary heart.
When sadness grew
without a good reason,
we viewed happiness
as just a passing season.

We felt parents weep upon our shoulder,
experienced loss but never grew older.
The passing of time
has kept you away,
but upon my first kiss,
I shall ask you to stay.

II

Our father was a lion buried under the mound
in the jungle grass of our garden. When trains
passed by at night, we roared our father's calls
back to him. We always felt we would meet him.

In boundless energy, we would climb the tree,
scale the back-alley car-park, parading maladies
as a badge of honour. We were going to be
astronauts, playing football on the moon.

There was no time for debts or tomorrows,
only the taste of sugar and plastic mints.
A long soak in the bath was a punishment,
with nothing but dirt to wash away.

III

I think of you in comfort
as I open unfamiliar doors,
as I fall in love with a photograph,
as I find myself sleeping on floors.

I think of you in solace
when waking up is hard,
when love has been reduced
to the print of a greeting card.

I think of you too often
as I dodge another bill,
as I waste a field to play within
and settle for the windowsill.

It’s four in the morning
half-******, alone
slouching towards brilliance
on the back of a half pack
of cigarettes and a lifetime
spent staring out the faces
in the ceiling.

Been this way since evening
unshaven, undressed
striving to be beautiful
amongst flashbulb memories
of my fingers between her legs
and her phantom song
that cut through the smoke

and tore the heart of every man
left standing
in the room.

Don't give yourself to points of misery
every time the die doesn't fall your way,
for tomorrow could be the day you wake
to all of the outcomes in the right place.

I have seen it for myself, my dear friend,
the way days drag on but you have no time
to find a conclusion, to find a reason
as to why you even woke up at all.

But the day will come when fear has no hold,
only loose ties to old loves and old selves.
You can learn to count your blessings amongst
all of the wreckage of your misfortune.

You will find yourself amongst lost pieces.
You will finally see all that you've done.
You are noticed my friend, and always loved.
The day will come when you see it for yourself.

The Mother's pull is stronger today.
She persists me into the ground,
Sun milk over the weak grassy mound,
and it teaches me of my astral self,
the only means to my escape.

The Mother's delight is lessened today.
It persists to pull me to the machine,
of concrete rule and Corporate Queen,
and it teaches me of my ****** self,
the very lock unto my prison.

****** in the afternoon,
Orphans brawling in stereo,
hometown ballads of unseen terraces,
bar stool swallowing peanuts, pretzels,
salted anti-depressant,
the foul smell of life amongst
folded towels, synthetic apple,
the Magna Carta of Suburbia.

The allotments buckle and spread,
fragile sexuality, the April sun;
quick to heat, quick to tears
after a long winter of recovery.
Grit in the carpet, art in the air,
it comes too thick to catch a breath,
too thin on the lungs
to turn it to a song, or prayer.

This G-dless drug,
hippie theories, old self-harm habits,
slanted handwriting to prove a point;
intelligible fears for acceptance
as words form like train tracks
in my disappearance from this:
the peak of the day,
at the bottom of the world.

Spring-loaded,
Nervous energy;

Often wondering
In an archer, a yogi-
Gathering static strength,
A tension
With the potential
Of absolution;

Else a stopwatch wound
Too tight. A pointless climb,
An effortless demise-
Out of time,
Out of mind.

Cannot walk slow.
Baulk beneath
The cathedral,
Lengthening of the shadow;
Another wasted day.

Often wondering
if idle or incomplete,
Whether the chip
On my shoulder
Is a flute
Or a fatal malady.

Managed the cap and gown
With a professional smile.

Found my audience
When I gave it up.

Often wondering
What I am doing,
Sat drunk at the typewriter
Alone;

Often wondering
Which is more fearful;
the void
Or the comfort of home.

A speck on a tile,
the cabinet floor,
my patchwork wooden table
left to disrepute.

That red speck of being,
crack open another,
the sharp side of glass or else
the fluid within.

It laces my blood,
or else is blood itself,
staining my innards
and shaping my mask.

My martyred heart
and its tireless pound,
marching the red-coated soldiers
to their eventual demise.

Incorrigible workhorse,
sustain my progress
when all else has turned to ash and rain,
when all else has been slain.

My Boxer, he pleads
to keep on up the hill,
to allow him his efforts and fluid,
when we’ve all but given up.

And so I shave in the light
of the late-morning glow.
My hair collects in your old shaving mug,
remnants of yesterday.

So for now I’ll ignore
the speck on the tile,
and all of its false promises
in the time of my storm.

For now I’ll awake
with taut skin and white scars,
with broken-sleep eyes, pastured bone
and some far-off notion

of forlorn hope.