I wanted to write
something to unravel what is going on in my head.
Lyrical sentences to explain madness.

But then I  realised,
FINALLY realised
that you are an *******
of the cruelest kind

and you don't deserve
the time I'll waste
forming my disgust at your immaturity
into beauty.

You stood awkwardly in my doorway to say Hello,
hiding in shadows
and my mouth formed shapes made from the stunted conversation
of strangers,
while my fingers fumbled with the light switch.

I've loved you since we were children
and now a rift the size of oceans separates us,
filled with small talk and broken ships,
and it makes me seasick.

Cold feet hold up the weariest of skeletons.
I am sick of this limbo.

Flinging myself between two hearts in the hope one will sear an imprint
on non-existent flesh.

Nobody can love cold bones
and cold bones can love nobody
when they have no body to love.

What good and what tragedy will come of it?
To reach back through murky time
to air out our togetherness like winter sheets,
in hope the mustiness and dust will disappear.

To wrap you back around my skin,
a blanket of familiarity
so patched, so frayed.
Will the cold shiver through old comfort?

I woke up this morning
to see how your hangover wraps your face
in the creases of a sleeping headache,
last night's cigarettes still traces on your fingertips
curled around my waist.

You fell asleep last night
pressing a smile against my skin
that left me feeling tipsy,
like the beers you drank
before you called me,
to ask to bring you home.

Darling,
I have grand adventures planned.
worlds away, lives away
from what we had in mind.
you and I, now there is a thought.

Darling,
So do I, you say.
and your first grand adventure breaks my heart
through the computer screen
more casually than I could’ve thought.

scrub it off
cut it out
**** it up
make it count
let it go

scrub you off
cut you out
******* up
make you count
let you go

scrub me off
cut me out
**** me up
make me count.
Let me go.

There will always be
flour on the bench and
today I've got banana everywhere along
with the chocolate chips
which tumbled from the sides of the measuring spoon
and bounced along the floor.

But once I've sat down covered in
butter and floury hair
and the smell of the cake
is tangible,
its worth the mess
i make to see
friends jostling for
a piece.

just to sit in scalding water is not enough
to wash
  human days  off your skin

scrub through the dirt, the worry, the love
scrub until blood reminds you
we are more than organised paper and ink blots.

My friends and I got drunk tonight
it feels like there are fire alarms going off in my head
but it doesn't matter because tomorrow there are bacon sandwiches
******* bacon.

Taking a seat near the door,
Curiosity sits politely through a church service
not to scoff or sneer, but to observe
Faith.

With a nod, a smile and a reassuring touch,
Faith walks quietly through the congregation,
but never quite reaches
those sitting politely,
in the last pew.

To an astronaut, it's full of planets
To a keyboard warrior, it's a weapon
To a stoner, it's a state of mind packed in a cone
In a race, it's a split second of opportunity

But to me, it's just where you're missing.

Time no longer falls quietly into order
the minutes and days have unravelled
digging their boots in the dust.

The hours and weeks stacked like rocks on your shoulders
as you drag time wearily along to nowhere.

Oh but to escape this ache.
Pain permeates the rocks and dust
soaking up through your soles
to lie like pebbles in a river
on your heart and mind.

But how do you run?
How to battle Time back into submission?
A solitary figure bruised and abandoned
alone in the wasteland .

Time weighs on you with the strength of ages
while the past snaps and slithers at your ankles.

Fight the claw and crushing restraints!
Emerge ****** and torn, yet victorious.
Tame the fickle measure of life
and send the past yowling back to its murky world.

Square your shoulders and lick your parched lips.
March on, you will conquer the wasteland yet.

"Hey Critter,"
is how Jake greets me.
About that  dude-
he said-
he's a child.
You deserve a world better.

I was telling my
Mate Jake
that you're coming over
and he said
"good."


You don't even know him yet
I said.
Yes but from what I've heard
he said,
he's "good."

So today I was drinking whiskey and juice
and playing pool.
Then we went to a friends house and
watched the boxing.

I don't think
watching people hit each other
is exciting so I
smoked a lot
of cigarettes.

Hey Critter
Jake said,
and I know he's got my back.

I'm building myself a fortress
a tangle of bricks and mortar,
deep in the forest where you can't find me.

There are spikes on every window ledge
and a deep dark moat full of monsters,
and I'm inside the darkest room,
visor down and armour shining.

But all this doesn't matter, you wont attack with force.
The armour is useless and the walls will crumble down around me
without the help of a siege.

Because you don't need to find me,
you've already kidnapped my mind,
I can put up no fight
and so
memories well up and spill over.

All I can feel are wounds made by no swords,
empty places that ache to the bone,
armed for a fight I've already lost.

You disarm me so completely,
all I can do is surrender.

The first time I kissed you (again),
we were sitting in your car,
under shadows and street-light orange,
and the impression I was going inside.

But then I found your NERF gun,
which you said was for robbers and slow drivers,
but proved more entertaining for girls
who like to sit in your passenger seat.

So we broke into a scuffle
in pools of orange light
abandoning  seat-belts and any pretence that I was leaving
to wage an epic war
inside a parked car
over ownership of the polystyrene darts.

The end came when a missile was lost to your backseat,
and we both reached for the NERF gun,
and that kiss I'd been waiting for since I'd first put on my seat-belt
materialised between the space above your handbrake
and a little plastic gun.

On soft paws she
comes dancing like a
slip of
silken air
to pad about the room
feigning innocence.

Then,
quick as the wisp she blew in on,
drops her guileless  disguise
in haste
to do battle with the socks
and commandeer
the newspaper fleet scattered
on the floor.

But,
in a flash
the crusade
she won
is forgotten.
because she's found a hoard
of spoils and treasure.

Among the
warm golden spills the battle claimed
on the windowsill,
she lounges,
and rumbles her tiny
lion voice,
surveying her conquered Kingdom.

Hello you say as
you saunter through my door  to
flop onto the couch and
fluster me with a lazy grin.
got any food?

I am elbow deep in a bag of nachos
why?I ask suspiciously
and you smile wider.
Because I'm hungry, you say
and
kind of fried.

Of course you are
and you
laugh and grab the bag
your fingers brush mine amongst the
crinkly chips and
the artificial cheese dusting.

Who, you ask later between
crunches, is hotter. Gerard Butler or
Johnny Depp?
I nibble a chip in
consideration distracted
by your arm sneaking
around my waist.

It is obviously
Gerard I say because of
reasons I forget when you
start to kiss me.

The nachos suddenly lose
importance because
you taste like
smoke, cheese
and a friday afternoon.

I am too hung over for dairy
you said
our ice cream dripped and
dribbled onto the hot chrome
and the sun was blinding me
and i was listening
to the little boy telling
his Dad about rugby
and looking at your freckles
and thinking you have nice hands.

We walked back to my house
and sat on the jesus rug
under the stolen shade of
my neighbours tree
talking about nothing and
squinting at each other because
the sun was bright until
you fell asleep sprawled on my grass.

Then mum came home and
you woke up to say hello and
she asked you about work
and you told her about how
you are a little sick of the timber yard
but it's alright.

Mum went to make a
cup of tea so you
and i walked out the front
my feet were bare on
the hot concrete and
we said good bye and
i could see that twist
in your grin
and i hugged you
so i wouldn't see it anymore.

Sometimes when i dont sleep
i imagine the day
in the yard and your
hands and that grin
and where it would have lead
if i hadn't looked away.

I remember what it was like
to use you as a wind break
standing on the pier at Brighton.

But I don't need you anymore
because I bought myself
a really good raincoat.

Hiya what can i get you?
fingers tap on the polished wood
of the bar they sit in front of
Their faces sag
like the coats they shrug off
lowering their old bones into chairs

two jamesons please
gentlemen hands fumble for wallets
for money
for the sweetheart
easing an old mans' troubles
with ice and a measure of whiskey
behind the bar

that's nine dollars twenty
thankyou my darling
a crisp new note in a weathered old hand
thats an old hand at weathering life
you're welcome

into the whiskey they sigh
away an old man's aches
I polish the glasses
while they polish
their glasses
and polish off
glasses
of whiskey.

Through the house
smoke is drifting
You're a ****!
No you're a ****!
cheerful exclamations mingling with the smell of salsa and the clink of beers.

Schizophrenic,
the way we love.
your love and my love bind my hands,
a straightjacket ,inside rage is trapped,
a pent up swirling vortex futile against tender restraints.

Yours is the voice in my ear,
at war with the angry noise in my head.
‘Love’ you whisper across the space and dark between us,
reassuring the buzz and hum of desperate uncertainty.

Your hand slips into mine, rescue in torrid waters
Anger surrenders, too tired to howl and rage.
‘Love’ I breathe back, and the noise becomes distant

You set me alight from the inside
the fire warmed my bones.
and you eased yourself under my skin
you and happiness,
to hold me closer.

Oh the fragility of happiness.
Tall we stood arm in arm
I was impervious,unbreakable
fire burning under my paper thin skin.
you choked the flames, lost sight in black smoke.

happiness and I crumpled together like paper,
little dolls in the wind.

I could sit here
at right angles
with a computer
a clear head and course work

or

I could lounge here
at whatever
with a computer
a smoky head
and a chocolate bar

First sound before first sight
is the spit and howl of windy sleet.

first sight the pearly water
dribbles down the hopeless window
and Cold sneaks in to hug your bones.

up into the shivering morning
two bodies leap
one earthy flesh one gossamer wisp

the faintest touch of silk
up a backbone  a thousand small soldiers
stand to attention
of the coldest kiss

next and suddenly
brisk warmth over rubbed skin
static woollen heat

the whisper of a touch
up a backbone a thousand small soldiers
slump from duty
and Cold slips and idles away