frying plantains in Tanzania
with rice - so much rice
ageing postmen with bus passes and metal knees
carrying keisters of it
a thousand different ways

slow walkers
married, always
frittering away chances or just
connected,
with the mortal coils of the market?

big coat on in the Kalahari

your scorpions absent from the guest list,
exiled.
the brown bears caged, but should things have
really.
come to this?

fierce heat.
fizzing geysers rumpled by grey fluorescent lights and
plagued,
by the speeding steam trains of their past that took them to
SO MANY GREAT PLACES but they only recall the
endings.
the crashing off the tracks,
the unexpected landslides

revolve
navigate the ridge and don’t funk from looking down.
it is better this way.

stamp the scorpions in.
£5 on the door.

take the free round and dance around their nimbus because even though you WILL NEVER
know them,
you would NOT
BE HERE.
without them.

your corner patch
a feral patch given over to woodworms and weeds
but a patch without chains,
shaded by roses suffering a kind of pressure you will never understand.

the naan breads arrived 40 minutes early and ruined your bath but
WHAT
A
PRIZE.

to exist in a rainforest where naan breads are possible.
and ferns unfurl,
then hang,
and rise again.

frying plantains in Tanzania
slow married women bearing grain

carry your cactuses out into the sun.
feed them.
watch them.

be naked with your scorpions and really feel the
football finals
the canal gates
the shooting stars, zooming by
through the windows of the train.

a two tonne viking frying taco shells thinking he’s Louis Zamperini

a cracked slate roof leaking acid rain onto photo books of artists who have
dark minds and
black eyes and
lips made of pewter and are
brilliant,
because they are
troubled.

tiny Mexican rabbits
******* on fresh bedding and
snowboarding with packs of salted butter on the new
screed
floor.

The Spider.
mushrooming her web around every crack on your hands
spitting marmite
drinking bitter bitter tea and ******* on The Vikings’ **** like it were a
Tarocco
orange.

bank loans
RSJ’s
a plague of aphids and
diesel, so much diesel but
jellied.
no glow.

the lime between the bricks bearing this system are
oppressed,
and mouldering.

the foundations are screaming, yet RIGHT THERE
at ground zero
The Bonsai Tomato.
tunnelling.

a green Yuri Gagarin set out before the final frost and
robbed,
of his wings.
stripped and proffered scuzz by a society run on
injustice and
pelf.

yet, somehow. still sure.
surrounded by the web but not tangled in it
haunted at night by the blood orange but not jaundiced by it

sea salt from a yellow grit bin.

another Oxfam jacket for a funeral.

six million blackouts painted by builders but The Bonsai Tomato is
STILL.
THERE.

eyes set on the next bend.
unshakeable.
holding his own.

6 sirens snoozed to the wind and a petrified banana
burrowing down in the slow lane
billowing blue smoke
like white horses over a bombora

accelerator airflow regulator out on his own
zonked
lopping around like a white flag stuck at half mast
3 weeks after the funeral

smug green peppers and salt hung rabbits that have travelled and
have seen things and
know exactly,
what you have done

spray painted bees, howling
window cleaner 10 jobs in and still using the same water
Bill Clinton,
£4 a week

Yamata Yamata, no jacket
Spanish ceramic pots that I told you are sensitive and
**** THEMSELVES
in the dishwasher

ritual
like sunday prayers or Chinese mushroom powder in the morning
4 of your 5 a day sounds impressive but when you start the day on
MINUS 10
you spend the rest of it buying back lives

duck soup Danish

milkman’s left the bottle behind the bin where you will NEVER FIND IT

tonight — blue moon
last night — no moon
wednesday — moon doing bad things in a capsized kayak at a
full moon party on Zanzibar

coat hanger for an aerial
rocket launch to the ursa minor

£3.49
bottom shelf
all the answers you need for less than the price of a day-rider

and then tomorrow
bombay lentils
bombay lentils
bombay lentils, everywhere.

The Bear's Paw
standing at the bottom of the hill
guarded by psychedelic sandbags
filling in the cracks opened by the daily pilgrimages of sheepdogs 

King Kong cries
his battery acid caught with it's guard down on the wrong side of town
bearded vultures, pecking his ears in the rain
and his chin setting down a towel on a **** beach while people touch each other,
everywhere

Pol ***
reeeeeeeeeeling.

hundreds of millions of tiny microscopic parasites
dancing in gaggles while a 140 year old dog lies dying,
slowly steering his magic carpet through a stratus
of lightly spiced sausages

The Popo,
all the gear but beached like blue whales on the wrong end of a tsunami 
lions have played backgammon for a thousand years around this watering hole so tell me why
after so many famous moves
would they get bored now?

old man, with tobacco eyes and a homemade pool cue
his dancing demons his own and his chin working from home
you can't win them all but if you hit the ball with conviction 
you might just catch onto the coat tails of an incredible journey

King Kong has been divorced 3 times and has never met his kids
Daddy Kong packed a swimming pool with watermelon's when King Kong was merely a glint in the milkman's eye and told him that he would DANCE
WITH PINK DOLPHINS
because he was the fruit of the pangolins 
and that's what pangolins were born with the right to do

tobacco eyes eyes the black
the parasites swipe right, go on dinner dates, then give birth to 10 baby parasites in under a minute.
the baby parasites grow hair,
learn to ride bikes,
travel the world,
then settle down.
sand-pit. wax roots. cheat.

before you've even squinted to see the next train,
thousands of great great grand-baby parasites are getting dressed up for their first day of school
all in the time it takes
for a pint of Guinness,
to finish ******* ITSELF.

LOVE, in every stain on the carpet
a lifetime of 10/10 potatoes
shirts, tucked in - just like it says on the rota
stories of adventure and death traded in phone boxes with infinite shelves and shipping containers loaded with questions

answers always the same - 
same ****, mate
different day, mate.

The Bear's Paw
standing at the bottom of the hill
old wooden door wide open
love stained carpets buttered to the edge with the marmalade of the free

no King Kong's, 
no pangolins,
no PINK DOLPHINS.

just microscopic parasites
and loyal sheepdogs
who have travelled across a thousand fields 
sat waiting to bewitch you with their tales

a two tonne viking frying taco shells thinking he's Louis Zamperini

a cracked slate roof leaking acid rain onto photo books of artists who have
dark minds and
black eyes and
lips made of pewter and are
brilliant,
because they are
troubled.

tiny Mexican rabbits
******* on fresh bedding and
snowboarding with packs of salted butter on the new
screed
floor.

The Spider.
mushrooming her web around every crack on your hands
spitting marmite
drinking bitter bitter tea and ******* on The Vikings' **** like it were a
Tarocco
orange.

bank loans
RSJ's
a plague of aphids and 
diesel, so much diesel but
jellied.
no glow.

the lime between the bricks bearing this system are 
oppressed,
and mouldering.

the foundations are screaming, yet RIGHT THERE
at ground zero
The Bonsai Tomato.
tunnelling.

a green Yuri Gargarin set out before the final frost and
robbed,
of his wings.
stripped and proffered scuzz by a society run on 
injustice and 
pelf.

yet, somehow. still sure.

surrounded by the web but not tangled in it
haunted at night by the blood orange but not jaundiced by it

sea salt from a yellow grit bin.

another Oxfam jacket for a funeral.

six million blackouts painted by builders but The Bonsai Tomato is
STILL.
THERE.

eyes set on the next bend.
unshakeable.
holding his own.

before the beginning
a rogue preface

an unwanted introduction throwing voodoo pins at a line drawing of your nervous system

Yellowstone
Etna
Maybe a cargo train with square wheels

but after,
deliverance in presence…

through the chess game of rocks
the ambition of ferns
the patience of streams

Ghandi
Brett from the allotment
a stone wall leaning on the ropes of the ring

open you're eyes, and you will see

there
through the mist
beyond the pine trees
over the sea

casting for mackerel off the ken

a thousand miles away but alive and growing in confidence

starships. chances.

a kind of light that you are content to not understand.

Tunguska smacks cold shoulders in the shower
a turbine bunged with ducks
clogged, docked

a shaved chicken smashing through ice and his
armbands
at home, in the cabin

labour without fruit is no labour at all and at the end
an invader
a hot sock by the fire dressed up as The Gestapo
teasing along the trapeze with wild eyes on your
flies

a web within a web
or Home, as you once called it.
Dancing.

at the heart of your engine management system Krakatoa is exploding
but you don't have to understand it
to survive it

rise and fall
rise and fall
control.

Wim Hof climed Mount Everest in shorts.

the web glistens with the light of the dawn
exist for the labour for the rights of the fruits we shall
never.
own.

live for sea tornadoes
for water buffalo
for great white thunderstorms

be open, always
and know that no shaved chicken will ever be alone.