In 1996 when the IRA blew up the Arndale
I was barely able to leave my house
After getting mugged the night before
Which left me with a major limp
For the next 18 months or so
And forced me to ring around friends
That I knew would normally be there
Praying they would be at home.

In 2007 I got led out of my works
Viva an underground tunnel
I hadn’t known about previously
After it was deemed unsafe outside
To walk around the corner as normal
When a hurricane dragged a bollard
Through the Chief Exectuive’s car
And other cars onto the next street.

In 2010 I ended up leading three women
I worked alongside at the Co-operative
To Manchester Piccadilly Train Station
Like James Bond mixed with the Pier Piper
Avoiding all of the bars laced with drunk fans
Just before Ranger’s Europa Cup final
At Manchester City’s Ethiad Stadium
Just before it exploded into chaos.

In 2011, I was getting drove back home
By a kindly Ambulance Crew
Hours after getting registered with Diabetes
When we drove into a gang of youths
And barely reversed out alive
Looting a shop I used to go in for
A sandwich nearly every morning
On the way into my work.

In 2017, I walked past
Manchester Victoria Train Station
About a half a hour before
A terrorist took the lives off
22 people including children
And left me barely able
To sleep for two days afterwards
Laid in complete shock.

Each tragedy or event
Staining emotions
No matter how close
I was to the action

Cherry-picking memories
Into frozen images
Across feelings
Stuck in time

Reprinting each day
Over and over
Into a compressed version
Of Groundhog Day

Shooting grief from my heart
No matter how close to the front I was
Or whispered in braille rain
Tapping in shadow like tears

Brining my eyes
Pushing my grief aside
And carrying on
Like so so many others.


(also blogged at http://onewriterandhispc.blogspot.co.uk/2017/06/from-1996-to-2017-emotional-history-off.html)

Lost in gutter talk,
The history books
Suggest it was his two brothers
Who took him to the fair
At Longford Park
Boasting of dead fireflies
Instead of fish in little bags,

And follicles of lights
In the ghost house
Almost invisible from
The roller coasters
Descending from the sky
Like space rockets
Replacing sledges.  

Crossing the meadows
Blanked in snow
With echoing laughter
The reports stated
Then missing *****
At coconuts stall
Then footballs

Before proclaiming
It was fixed
And gave up wandering
Over to the roller coaster
Leaving Billy stood there
Protesting it wasn’t

******* cheap gobsuckers
Hiding his tears
Turning a perfect illustration
Into a pastoral scene
Of fireworks
Kissing the moon

Tying themselves up
In his mouth
As a attendant said
‘Six shots for two quid, son’
Accompanying over each shot
‘Lower, lower, lower’

Crossing shots over the tins
Like pennies in keyholes
Wrestling with uneven prayers
Chiselling his nerves
Over sweatshop erected fingertips
‘Lower, lower, lower’

Knifing through
His childhood
One shot after
The other
With each target
He shot through.

Catching her tears in the breeze
From one row of headstones to the next
Some days you would see her ghost
Walking up and down
Like a private on patrol.

Entwined with the sun
Just before sunrise
Creeps over the hill
Cascading into a silent film
As the shadows sank away

Repeating his name over
Like a broken tape machine
Caught up in a tangle
Of half forgotten prayers
In at least two different languages

Echoing in the wind
Butterfly shaped with regrets
In a tidal mystery of anger
If things had been
So very different

Over skeletons of feelings
Before they turned
Into scraps of meanings
After the burnt out end of summer
Into a willow shaped autumn

Following him
To the grave
Within weeks
Filled with nothing
But regret.

Sometimes I dream
of the foghorn near the docks
whistling like a forgotten friend
in your letterbox
walking home from work
after I had left for the last time,
  
Remember the ringing of the last tram
freezing  in the air
like a photograph
before breathing too quickly
ain’t you glad you walked away?
  
Sometimes I dream of
the chime of the clock
which freezes at mid-day someday
weeping under spires
and underneath dock boats,
  
Dreaming of my heart
******* in chains
instead of knots  
before I unpicked the lock
and walked away without regret
  
stealing inspiration from the sunset.  


(From the End of Summer - https://www.amazon.co.uk/End-Summer-N-Andy-ebook/dp/B01LY7YR9K/ref=sr12?s=books&ie;=UTF8&qid;=1475915722&sr;=1-2)

18 Herding screams like crocheted baubles
He plucked each target from the rooftops
With the grace of a fishermen

Slicing hairs off heads
And coke cans from hands
With a skill most of his ex army mates
Would have been proud off,

Piercing dreams with hard earned sweat
Flicking art with each bullet

Ripping policemen in half
And people running to his rescue
Into splots of paint,

Slowly drowning in his own happiness
With each ****
Unaware you can’t **** ghosts
With bullets

Until it was too late.

*

19

Swollen with nerves
Scaled around the outskirts
Of what he had just reported
The police inspector
Spent the next 10 minutes
After his interview with the press
Panting with breath,

Fathomless in his guilt
Covered in a paused sweat
Lighting cigarette after cigarette
Like a stale perfume

Fragile in increasing nerves
Out wearied across the stars
Until a colleague joined him saying
‘Did they buy it, sir?

To which he answered
'I know I wouldn't.'

Drumming across windows
In both of the toilets
Banging could frequently be heard
Dragging chairs under the stairs
In the entrance hall

Thawed in the cheesy music
Leading to the main bar
Twitching across your back
Like a whistle blower
Drowned out by the noise

Over the sticky floors
And watered down lager
Curving into a maze of bodies
Aglow in a series of frantic lights
Sweeping diamonds in their dreams

Caged with the TV Screen
Dangling half drunk from the ceiling
Scrunched with a frightening rage
Held back by invisible hands
Wishing for the carnage to end

Over the top of a sign that always said
Drinking, dancing, cavorting
While the revernd sits there unseen
Constantly spitting feathers
Throwing toilet paper in the air

And attempting to push staff
Down the stairs as if to say
They weren’t getting out of there
Anywhere near quick enough
For his liking.


(Brannigans  is a now closed Bar in the centre of Manchester which was reportingly haunted by Reverend Collier, a fierce anti alcohol revernald at the start of the 20th Century of which his church, Albert Halls became Brannigans at one point).

Shrink wrapped in a breath-riled panic,
The violence was over
Before a word could be splattered

Blood covered like a trail of chalk
Unbranded up and down the waiting area
With broken glass slumped on seats

Drenched in split skin and broken nails
All the way down the escalators
And back onto the main concourse

Lining the ceiling in screams
As the rifle opened fire over and over

Concealed in warnings

You had warned me about
Half an hour before

Which I had stupidly ignored
Dismissing it as a gust of wind
Instead of a warning that
History was going to repeat itself.



(A Short Prologue of a epic Poem to start as part of NapWrimo in April.
There will be a second Prologue in March. Get in touch if interested in getting involved)

Abandoned like an unloved pet
just outside the outskirts of Rio
underneath some of the white
washed slums
you told me to wait there
while you went for help,

But of course you never returned
discarding all responsibility
glistening in the moonlight
returning to your car
and driving off like a panic led sprinter
before I realised,

Flying through the night
across Copacabana beach
pressing your hands
on the wheels like Excalibur
rising from the ground
before freezing halfway,

Cut and pasting your fear
with each mile
unsure which way next
across the sea front
towards the edge of the
Sugarloaf Mountain,

Then hiding in the shadows
of the Art Museum
in Sao Paulo,
before then running  
to the booths of
the Se Church in Sao Luis,

Among the Market sellers of
the Porto Allegra Public Market
in Rio Grande do Sol
trading monies for
blankets and hats,
in a vein attempt to disguise yourself

To smaller, less known places
Like all the way down
To Boa Vista
Where your car finally died,
And the Wreck of the Santa Maria
Where you was tempted to hide in

Or hide in the now
dis-used lighthouse
on Morro *****,
and watch the sunrise go up and down
each morning
until you went stir crazy,

Full well knowing
I would caught up with you
sooner or later
no matter
which way you ran

Eventually.

And always the silent smell
Of music follows
Each time his name is mentioned
Never justice,

Covered in ignored pleadings
With pinpointed accuracy
Constantly kicking
The ladder away
From his freedom

Evidence suppressed and misplaced
For 16 years
In cross currents
Of ignored medical reports

Miscarrying justice
And innocence
Constantly brushed
Under the carpets

Drawn back on curtains
Across hospitals
And your bedroom upon release
Which eventually killed you

A terrible crime
With two victims.

After the blast of lightning from the east
A dismal fog hoarse siren howled at dawn
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks
Whispering in my hearth
Sojourning through a southern realm
Halted against the shade of a lost hill
Charged with beauty as a cloud
With bright darkling glows.





(A Poem made up of lines from various Wilfred Own
poems, mostly just first lines and published just
a day or two before Britain declared war on Germany
on 4 August 1914 in tribute to Wilfred Owen,
one of the greatest First World War Poets)

Draining each drop
Her mood didn’t improve
******* up the air
Each time she looked up

Spiralling inside out
Across the wind
At all that
Passed by,

Severed with a
Thread crawling
Slightly behind it
In a deep frustration

Merging with anger
That he’d smiled
At somebody else
That morning.

Due out over weekend - mystery story viva orgami press. anybody who would fancy a advance copy for review purposes let me know.

Hi all;


Had a busy morning today and ended up writing two poems today instead of one and instead of posting just one and dumping the other / cheating tommorrow with it decided to post them both I thought I would share with you.

Also had another excellent guest poem arrive yesterday from Scott Devon, a writer who is partly responsible for me launching a mini collection with Orgami Press probably next month. (More details to follow on that).

http://napowrimo2014.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/part-xxvii-and-xxviii.html


http://napowrimo2014.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/guest-poet-14-scott-devon-out-of-earth.html

On the third day
She clung to the handrails
Near the door
All the way back

Zigzagging in knots
Shining incandescent
With the sun

Chained to a swing
Piled in drifts
Of faces
Marching on and off
Almost invisible
To the way she
Clung herself

Constantly trying
To get my attention
Like tapping on
A ***** window

And only successing
On the way out
Like a feather on the wind
Breathless in an unfinished flight.

(From the ongoing series of 30 ghost poems. Get in contact if you want to read the rest online)

As several samples previously blogged..  
(http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=41231) Counting to Ten,

(http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=41341) Prisoners of War and

(http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=41505 - Prisoners of War II)

my new collection ‘Europa - In The Dark Valley Between The World Wars (co wrote with Nick Armbrister) has now been published viva Lulu.com on (http://www.lulu.com/shop/andy-n-and-nick-armbrister/europa-in-the-dark-valley-between-the-world-wars/paperback/product-21540773.html)
With amazon status and ebay status etc to follow or directly through myself viva my email address – aen1mpo@yahoo.co.uk
For £5.

Next up, as part of NaPoWriMo  (National Poetry Writing Month - http://www.napowrimo.net/) I have created a  NaPoWriMo blog for this year which can be read at http://napowrimo2014.blogspot.co.uk/ with a difference where the blog will contain (hopefully) 30 poems connected into the same story called ‘Ghost Story’ which will be about a meet up with a man called Andy and a young lady called Michelle who is not quite what she seems.

The difference with this story, as each poem is released on a daily basis is I am encountering people to send in poems linked in within the world of the story or other ghost stories / poems.

Email me on aen1mpo@yahoo.co.uk for more details.

Dispatched to our recycle bins
the memory of their suffering
comes across as a
thawing out window
lost across the decades
rather than perpetual
constant moaning,

An epitaph in the wind,

sleeping in the distance
with shell like heads
and shaved eyes
staring at the camera,

counting to ten

engulfed in silence

in front of a candle
between emotions
that lie between
the pair of them,
praying silently their son
wasn’t on the next train.  

(For Paul Cealan Who lost his parents
during the Second World War)

(A poem from the soon to be released split book 'Europa'  with Nick Armbrister which explores real life stories set in the cruelty of War)

Steeped in silence
At six in the morning
Across bright lights
From a nearby field,

Seagulls land on the ground
Before leaping into the air
In a circular pattern
Leaving nothing
But feathers in the mist,

And the tapping of my paw
On the window.







(Wrote for our younger cat, Roxy.
The prompt for this poem came from Jo Bell's excellent
52 poems blog which you are given a prompt weekly
to write a poem on. It's a excellent idea and recommended.
http://fiftytwopoetry.wordpress.com/)

I ring you in the usual way
During a early lunch
But you drop the phone
When you hear my voice
Leaving me with nothing
But the droning ambience
Of a lost call.

Perhaps you are still in bed
In the middle of a deep sleep
After a late

Late

Late night

Talking

I had forgotten you mentioning
With a few bottles of wine
At your friend Jane’s
And couldn’t be bothered
Staggering out of bed
To answer the phone,

Or maybe your Cat
Has instead of missing
The dressing table
After jumping from your bed
Has leaped over the suite
Onto the window
And knocked the phone flying
Cutting me off into oblivion.

Perhaps it was a BT error
Or you are on the phone
To your mate, Steve
For one of your epic
Three or four hour calls
Which frequently has me thinking
What the hell
You could talk about
For so long
And is meant to feel minor
When Steve says he sometimes
Talk to one of your ex’s
All night long
Sometimes,

Or maybe you are rushing off
To the shop
Across the road
To pay your lottery ticket
Before rushing off
To your doctors
Then asda up the road
Before it closes
And really
Really
Could not be bothered
Answering my call
At least then.

Whatever reason
It still hasn’t clouded
Over my love
For you.

After Summer
Autumn is always brushed
Under the carpet
Like a half-baked afterthought
Before the Winter arrives
With its blanket
Of snow-rolled blues.

At the beginning of Autumn
There is a hesitation
In the breeze
Before the clouds
Darken the sky
And poison us slowly
With mustard gas.

There is a sadness
In the half-cut sun
Flickering once more
Before the clouds
Carry the sun away
Like a funeral director
As an ornament
Of a mystery
Dying with a silent scream,

Before setting their
Compasses north
Never to be seen again.

(Previously published on http://static.inexsilio.com/pdf/2013_spring.pdf)

For only a few seconds
He was stood outside
Next to where she waited
In the heart of the moonlight,
Peeling back her unknown promises
Behind the hiss
Of a stuttering train
In a mystery of bleached hair,

And bright red lipstick
Tangled up in each others footsteps
On a uneven texture
In the mist
Before tossing her cigarette
Back into the
Middle of the river,

And with it
The last remaining evidence
Of the crime
They’d just committed
In black and white.

(Previously published at http://www.staxtes.com/2013/10/andy-n-of-stuttering-train-poetry.html)

Random moments
bring portals of memories.

Random moments
bring fragments of peace.

On dust covered dunes
lost in the drones of the sea,

or looking at you
looking aimslessly out of the window.

Watching Candy Floss
dance across the sea.

Listening to bus wheels
stutter like stray thoughts.

Looking for seagulls
like clues to a great mystery.

Clues across the closed pier,
and the chaos of the severed sun
looking for a ticket to ride
as it chases the bus
past an aloof Arcade
before you find the answer
in my arms.

(FROM 'A MEANS TO AN END')

There is a calmness
Like a Buddhist prayer
On the road
When it snows
And cars are afraid
To come down it.

There is softness
In the trees rustling
When the wind
Shakes it off
Which reminded me
Of my father
When he used
To shake off his boots
Before he stepped back inside
After gritting
The front path.

And as it gets softer
Like Andrex paper
Before getting crushed
Into ice
Leaving a hush in the sky
Of slight fog
The moment is mesmerising.

But I am still glad
When it is all gone.

(FROM 'RETURN TO KEMPTOWN')

Put your head against mine
On Christmas morning
Just before the Alarm goes off
And your cats start marching
Up and down in your kitchen
And remember what it was like,

Of the way Snow used to come down
Outside where you used to live
Leaving that taxi taking us to my parents
Going up and down that hill
Like it was trying to tackle
A ski ***** rather than a ride out,

In particular when I knocked off
All of the labels skidding down the road
Leaving us guessing all the way down
Whose present was who’s
Much to the amusement
Of both my father and brother,

And on the way back
When the taxi driver
Couldn’t get his taxi going again
And I had to help him
Push it back up the hill
In a attempt to get kickstart it,

Totally defying gravity

A lot like what your cats do
Every morning.