the autumn broods,
moody, full of leaf.
the sky sinks like
a silver ghost,
drinks its pools of
frost, its moments
full of dream.

white as a sheet the day’s
ghosts fade like an
old photograph.
the rivers of the day
tremble and drown
with the rain that
falls and falls.
i am a mosaic,
a floor made of
tiles, ashen with
autumn reds.

we dream like
an autumn sky,
shining in the
waters of a
haunting moon.
i put my
hand in yours,
get that rush
of fever, eye
seeking eye,
lip seeking lip,
leg seeking leg.

red leaves,
hollows of water
and sun,
bright reflections,
the day drifts
opens the afternoon
like a love letter
softer for its layers
of bronze.

there is too much rain,
the last leaves
fall, the sky is a wilderness,
full of yellow and bronze.
the day is hung over,
drowns like a sinking tide.
i love you, forever,
tell you my love is yours,
that i love you forever,
forever, every part of me
still in love.

the sky rises up, gathers
her midnight greys, her
ghosts the whiteness
of the moon, her
silhouette the
night fragments
flowing with the tide.
we drift dream-like,
unwind like a blossoming
rose, the sea like a mooning
skull, haunted, silver-rimmed.

built of tarmac road and
lizard king his song was
the end of summer,
the last summer where
the light had to leave but
somehow he left us fused to
it, intoxicated, blown
forever into our
subconscious minds
where it sunk like the
anchor of a ship.

the summer
melts into corners
and doors, unsettles
its ghosts.

the flowers blush
and burgeon, wild
grasses blow in the
wind.

the sun shrinks the
land, blasts the heathers
with their purple blooms.

everything seems to
be blossoming, the clouds,
the sky, even our love.

the summer’s great lizard hides
under a rock,

the summer sings of ending days, of
lonely horizons and crystal seas,

we smoulder in the sunshine
where the clouds flow in their

drifting streams, their ridges like
colossal ledges on the mountains

of the world.

summer has burned up,
blown past, the thermometer
sinks stone-like, its silvers
dulled in metal tombs
no longer spiking red.

the wet leaf hangs lower
on the twig, the bird balances
on the branch, the day
fragments, its grey clouds
flowing under swiftly
closed doors.

the stars tremor in the water,
breathe of sky and silver bird,

the night is a closed eye, a
river of frost
where the dark, born
of root and shaded dream,
stretches like a flower;

the shadows lengthen
dissolve into wooden gate
and hollowed out tree.

the night’s stones weigh
heavy like the cloud.

everything sinks.

the cry of a bird like
the shiver of a stream,
water-thick, eerie as
a ghost.

the heady scents of the night
speak of surrender,
of lost horizons,
of windows flung
open to the stars.

a cat wires his claws to the
dark, drops down from a wall,
lands with his fur full of sky.

sweet night, with
your summer blaze
and shoulder of dusk,

your wings fly up,
crave the sky, flung
into shadows, brooding

like the cattails in the pond,
your breezes are bright
domes, scented by the moon,
your clouds, hidden mirrors.

the night with its sandman
and rivers of dream, hangs
pendulous and remote,
cools like a mist far from
the day with its
sun of fire and withering
heat, its ghosts the shaking
clouds, its flowers the trickle
over rock of a burgeoning
stream.

the sea sings its august notes,
curtsies and prances like
a two year old colt,

believes that the wind
forgives its cold voice,
rises and falls –

its icy engines strong warriors
battling beneath the clouds,

its flowing barrels voices
of gossiping steel.

when we first met, when you
crossed the star-lit skies to

meet me (poetically) and i tried to
hide, (not poetically) knowing

somehow what was going
to happen, you said, “hi, my

name’s michael” and thought
(because i asked you later) “there

is no way she’s ever going to like me”
and i tried to play it cool thinking

“i will die, i will die forever, if he
doesn’t return my love.”

the clouds shake out their
sheets, muse like a poem,

tremble in the hollows
of the dark. the rain

cries on the roof-tops,
cool as a moon beam,

beautiful in its heavy
dew, while the sky wears

its eyeliner like an egyptian
queen, its hieroglyphs a lost
world.

"where love is a ghost and a star"

play with me,
loosen my hair,
let me sing to
you a sea song
where the waves
somersault and
crash to the shore,
where the wind, wild
as wild, faints to breathe
in the darkening sky.

"where the night clouds ebb and flow like a tide"

the clouds roar their
thunder, balance
against the sky like a
set of scales
while the rain,
heavy and dreadful,
soaks the hot ground turning
the trickling stream back into
a buoyant wave chattering
to rock and silver leaf
of summer’s blossoming
dream.

love poem
"where love is a wave that splashes on the sand"

when a heart
loves
the stars surrender
to the heavens,
the moon catches her breath
and the avenues
of silence become
voice. i follow the
path to my love,
i die for him,
i live for him,
like a spartan
in the heat of battle,
like a flower in the
mist.

the bright sky is wrapped in
summer, we no longer wait
for flower or ghost,

a miracle of light, the tongue
of the sun flicks like a snake,

the world is gaudy, hung in
petal chambers, where the sky
ripples like a blue pool,

the heat is deafening and blinding
its love a turquoise bird
blasting the earth with
its wings of fire.

Surrounded by peals of
thunder,
Little Cat rides the tree,
Gripping with talons
****** deep in the wood
Lashed by the wind that
blows no good,
Soaked by the rain,
So misunderstood,
Then lightning strikes,
Oh!
Poor Kit-e
'spose she'll make a
change,
From KFC.

the iron gate sings of roses,
water and moon tremble and sigh,

the night breathes in its water colours,
shadowy and whimsical like a bird of
dark air,

its eye-sockets the moon-world
of dream,

its clouds the stream-golds of
the glistening, eventide moon.

i see your stars, glazed
and fearless, glistening
like a spectrum

and i understand wonder,
that life is that sharp intake
of air.

there are no ghosts
in the sky,

my tabby cat wears the moon,
curled into the corner
like a sleepy fog,

the dreamscape is made
of silver and gold,

you (like always)try to get my
attention and i (like always) ignore
you, trying to write
my poem…

bird of wood and grass
built of darkness and
yellow beak, incredible

sentry of lawn,
poseur of dawn,

stone-shod mover,
hopscotch lover,
ellipse of heaven,

shadow of the
witching hour,

carrying the wings
of evening like
a worm in his
sultry mouth.

luminous, like an incandescent
star, you fell into my life,

unwrapping me like gift paper,
wearing my fabrics like those

boyfriend jeans you liked
me to put on.

i melted like ice in
the liquids of your voice,

tore open the love letter
you wrote on my heart

and collapsed, an exquisite
and beautiful rose, with the

longing in your eyes, tender
and delicious, every sense

awakened, every joy believed.

tonight i can't write poetry,
a star is just a star.

summer’s petals
sink perfect, fall into dream

on their night-bed, soothed
by a purple dew,

honey-sweet, like the
drift of a cloud,

the night is a bird with
gorgeous wings while the

moon paces the world
like a garish cat.

the summer sings its
orisons, prays like a
priest,

star petals melt,
flowers blossom
and die,

i’m all at sea,
glazed by the sun -
a high note of yellow
in an angelic and
gorgeous sky.

sea, soft harbour of summer,
where the breezes drift
and the dawn tide pales like cloud.

summer’s roses bloom
while the dawn tide pales like cloud
and sweet breezes drift.

where sweet breezes drift
the dawn tide pales like cloud, the
rose of summer blooms.

i’m crazy in love,
your lips eternal greys,
your eyes lost birds
fluttering into dark skies,

we cry and crash, mould
our dreams into new worlds,
uncover lost cities and lonely
isles,

reinvent stars and moon,
lie close, dance into
the night,

our flowers, our gleaming eyes,
our ghosts, the drifting clouds.

the stream is a breeze of
blue stars, layered in sweet
melancholy, layered in
sadness and love.

the world revolves like
a wheel, burgeons like
a flower, weeps like a
sorrowful cloud.

i yearn for you, down
misty lanes and dreams of
dark seas, fall until
i can no longer fall,

fall until our love blossoms
and our hearts cry out.

the sun, bold as an eagle,
stretches its wings,

the summer is like a
lizard basking in the
brightening light,

it is like a mid-day dancer
drowsy with the
flowers of day,

the pools of shadow
purr like a cat, yearn for
a cooling saucer of milk.

hot as a roman spa,
the day fragments
hits its searing top note,

the blissful breeze
waves a flag,

the sky, the sun’s captive,
is all slumber and mouth,

i swallow the dust,
watch a butterfly
land with the wings of a god.

i’m carved out of stone,
my heart windswept
and wild.

i wind and unwind the stars,
hide in sweet caves.

summer unlocks her doors
opens shutters far-flung
in a distant sky.

your love draws me nearer,
scatters me like rose-dust,
attracts like the dreams of the night.

hot, hot sun, golds and yellows,
sky like a tranquil lake,

in the cave-like hollows of the wood,
the smooth leaves glide,

shadows, falling like dark water,
cooled by a wanton breeze,

sink like a gentle flow of air
woven out of breathing silk and the

dim space that catches its breath -
collides with the sun –

hangs dampened branches out to dry.

the stars lie on the water,
shimmer as night bleeds
all its blacks like a dark root,

summer’s yellows are now
forgotten, darkness chisels
water and sky,

blossoms stony and grey
like a colossal and
beautiful flower.

the summer roses
flower then unsettle,
crumple in the storm,
blow red to brown.

where the night carries her silence,
her greys the bridging dome of sky,
her stones their blossomed ridge-

the moon’s half-circle bends
amid cloud, steps in
staccato, where the
stars can’t be seen;

i am less than the cloud
and the sky,
hardly breathing,
moon-ghosts in my hair,
moon-opals in my belly.

the leaves gather ghosts
in the shade,
boy of the dark,

where the breezes wait
for the overgrown rose to
flower, immersed in
love and sky,

and the summer night
breathes in petals of gauze,

you sweep me away on a
blue-glazed tide, draw me
into your arms,

drown me in an impossible
sea.

the roses bud and flower,
then darken like the dusk,

you fill me with the
sweetest love,
resonating like a bell,

i die crazy in your arms,
cry out for you,

unweave the stars.

summer buries her
golds and yellows,
opens her soulful eyes;

the running clouds
whisper to the day,
write love notes on the
parchment sky,

you remember our love,
brush my lips with
a kiss of rose.

i’m drifting like
the sea,

your voice the colours
of the sun,
unwrapping my core,

the ink dries on the
paper,

our love glows in the
gentle rain.

moon, bright lamp
of grey,

sky, open and brave,
colossal dream of
drifting love,

sweet journey of
the night, lifting
her pretty head,
worn and unholy

like the falling petals of
the stars.

boy of dream,
the colours melt,

your lips finding mine,

beneath an ashy sky,
where the shadows lean,

your fire finds mine,
your kiss as beautiful
as a summer rose.

it was near the cricket field,
stitched into the ground -

amid clover and tufts of grass -
a little ring of white mushroom,

longing for the night sky,
for the journeying cloud,

sweetened by flower and dust,
where the little fairies danced,

balancing on the air -
weaving the moonlight like cloth -

with their drowsy feet
and wings of blue stalk.

in the dream he asked me if
i would like him to read me some of his poetry -

i said i would love him to and we
set off for his house -

but we seemed to keep travelling
left, although i knew his house was on the right,

and suddenly i was in the basket of a
huge crane, lifted higher and higher

600 ft, 700 ft, i couldn’t find jim
and i crouched down in the basket-

with my hands over my head -
and everything was like

edvard munch's  ‘the scream’
and then i awoke and all i could

think about was seeing jim morrison
and how i’d have liked him to read me his poems.

you are star, you are moon,
a blur of white in the rounded night,

tranquil as the narrow streets at nocturne,
where the tall streetlight breathes

its half-moon yellows, love flowers
behind frosty windows; behind

avenues of dark stone and gothic
eaves the dust of the moon

starts to settle, weaves a golden web.

sweet as our lips,
summer boy,

dream of blue stone,
as the night flows like a tide,

burgeoning like a drifting
cloud,

you are my boy of dream,
blossomed from water
and moon,  from crystal light -

i long for you
summer boy,

as the last stars vanish,
blunted like the hills.