the song and dance man
drunkenly swings on broken chandeliers
from stage fright to center stage spotlight.
hiding behind dark
sunken eyes
masking
the b r o k e n man
deep inside.
i have seen those eyes
tainted weeping
stained
cracking glass
peering
with piercing glances
past the mashed crowd
in their mosh-pit dance.

drunk show pony
with mescaline poetry
flashing a cold smirk
in a scarlet football shirt
under a zebra striped sweater.
joan of ark dancing in flames
with seizures to lost radio transmission
playing pool in camden town
head cool
deep in the underground.
beehive jazz smoother than velvet
microphone in hand
oozes grace
mascara runs in panda rings
showing face in torn denim
over leather boots

rock n roll gallery centerpiece
paraded on stage
behold the crowned jewel in eyes
of escape artists with mannequin faces
who pay the doorman entrance fees
to see the tormented performance.
stuck record night on loop
sleep is the menu
with a three course
crushed pill
knockout serving -
arriving on a tour bus hearse
                                leaving
for a homecoming final bow
set in the clouds.

My hands sail
with seasoned ****** steering
  precision
slowly southward,
along the waves
  of your hair,
before beaching along
        silky skinned shores.

Navigating marked territory
my fingertips travel,
      tracing
  southwardly patiently
journeying my modern odyssey
along your ribcage paved path
  towards my epicurean mecca
of lush fuzzed meadows
while you cling to me
in our linen pastures
with cosied ivy proximity.

Your spread spent body
      covers the disheveled
    bedspread,
  soaking wet
skin glistening
  bronze,
  from a
first placed finish.

I

a voice in the pocket of the outside crusader
screams in diluted darkness
crawling on blood flooding knees

from prison cell dead end canyons
crossing deep graved cave ravines
curtained by smoke and steamed mirror terrors

light burnt out under collapsing night
bound in the noose of lingering rope
tightly tied to faded flashlight demise

stretched synthetic wet-suit fabric
torn and unraveling into threaded anchors
leak cold salt water into a punctured spirit

torch batteries burnt fatally flat
the leather’d limb matchstick ember
whispers slow fatigued flat line breaths

bed of rock extended beyond
obstacle field crawling lengths
where metres faded into millennia

II

softer than a dandelion cocoon
a breeze sweeps from a hairline crack
roaring life into the cavity tomb

lifted from the empty lung
crushing stranglehold and inflated
floating onto clouds of feathered flight

crippled by fear of fatherless children
a second breath bounced from ropes
into seasoned soldier strength

jaws of death slumbers hopeless
dozed off by the anesthetic bite
fighting to escape the narrowing gates

unscathed and mightier he flees
from the enclosing fallen walls
with strengthening stories of power for all.

the flowers lay torn
with seeds split into thorns
loose ends are dead ends
where the rose bed once slept.

city of sawdust and debris
freezing beer exploding
the roads lead nowhere
in the papier-mâché maze.

milk jugs sit solid at doorsteps
with bubble domes of ice
ribbons hang from bridges
celebrating the new millennium.

crossbars peak out of overgrown grass
where parks hide the dead
under the weeds and leafless trees
a hostage where crows perch on cacti -

my home is a cemetery where i wait to die.

through sixth-sense lenses
built into focused-frames;
the unacknowledged legislator
zooms in on the landscape hidden in plain sight;
to dissect, digest and divulge
an abstract autopsy of societal abnormalities.

disguised in makeup of mythical tales,
the parallel pictures hide in satirical details
dressed in innocent historical fables -
revealing esoteric plot-holes in reality
and magnifying the pore-sized loopholes
onto projections of pundit objections.

in sculpted stanzas
the poet reshapes alphabetical definitions
to portray and illuminate telescopic details
into layman termed translations -
misread by the naked eye in undefined,
unobserved misdiagnosis.

picking up the mantle laid by poets of yesterday's;
the protest songwriter picks, strums and plays
off of the same hymn sheet -
laying lyrical foundations to critical conclusions
on stages set for youth driven revolutions.

Flooded mind in an arid desert existence
my oasis is a
square peg in Maslows hierarchy.
feed me paper plated possibilities
while my lungs burn
for ink stained atmosphere.

Outsider,
silent observer and undesignated critic -
the ticking never stops
without poetic deconstruction
of societal wastleland shaped bombs.

Born into this
I decry my morbid existence,
spent in solitude
spent in hunger,
as amorphous animalistic anger
festers until light rises
out of clear sighted verses.

Torpefied torment only cured
by hospitalized hour handed
time spent,
without relent
in my parabolic chair
of destined emphatic expression.

Born into this,
my perennial poets curse

Cut out of the womb
and lined up,
lying down in the newborn baby
nursery room,
the sobbing infants
sing the sardine tin song
in the sniffling sniveling
cot,
crib
and cradle throngs.

From crawling to walking
to filling jam-packed classrooms
with desks of crisscrossed legs
overflowing with limbs
and too many copies of the same book -
dare not doodle, or cop a look outside.
During eight and five
your time and undivided attention
should abide by the blackboard gospel
pushed from the pulpit by an automatic robotic
preacher teacher -
confined inside while the sun shines.  
On-by-one in single-file
creative,
artistic minds come to die
before the uniform mashed potato brains
are regurgitated, and fertilized
with a dumb dimmed 'no-one home' light.

Mind the gap at the crack-head crammed
bus stops and subways
bursting at the seams
like toothpaste tubes of people
who are rushing on glass pipe smoke
and glass-ceiling pipe dreams.
Low self-esteem herds
brimful with defeat,
sporting weakened-knees
from back-breaking work
in service delivery for minimum wages
who run through endless,
endless mazes
powered by prescribed amphetamines.

From the hamster-wheel buses
the programmed people limp
to their red-brick beehive buildings;
broken
like the cracked, smashed windows
and dangled fire escapes
of their council estate cold water flats,
which spark and zap
from fishy duct-taped
misaligned electric lines -
too blind to see in the stacked
dim-lit,
racked and ruined flatlets;
they tune out to monkey-see,
monkey-do reality TV.

From the manger cages
and through the turnstiles
of military-ready schoolyard security,
into captivity of cubicle confinement -
rapscallion rogue rats with curious thinking;
problematic to jail chain-gang linking -
scratch, gnaw and nibble
with latched paws, so feeble
at the cracks
in the classified class system experiment.
Those stratification cracks cementing
the ratification of immobility,
painted and filled with rat-poison blended pills,
mixed and pushed
by lab-coat fat-cat aristocrats.
Who would stamp insanity
between the twitching, curious ears
of any visionary vermin -
who are shunned by the obedient no-trick pony,
mischief of rodents,
and exiled from the community,
with labels of being possessed,
insane
and crazy.

Is the happiness found
in ignorant-coloured blinding bliss
for better or worse,
in this death-trap mapped
faceless rat-race?
Where individuality and originality is a curse
deemed deserving of a solitary,
outcast castaway alley existence
not worthy of a penny
for any free thoughts.

I pray for the Pied Piper's song
to lead the righteous, rebellious rats
along a new yellow brick road;
to a slavery-free,
cruelty-free
Eden -
built on unshackled foundations
for tomorrow's emancipated generation.