I do not wish to suffer but suffer I
   must
Cursing my ill luck and the mad
   excesses
Of a selfish insensitive owner
Obsessed with destruction, both mine
   and his;
Occupying a spot here in the High
   Street
Opposite the Courthouse and its
   official Clock
An eyesore, a common talking point
Squeezed between more fashionable
   premises
Which seem always to frown and
   grimace
Expressing major reservations,
   unambiguous opposition.

Housing curios, oddments and
   selected modern junk
We sell little, our few customers
   dribbling in
Only to supplement their journeys
   while waiting on the bus
Or to eye with a morbid curiosity
That sickly creature seated behind the
   counter
My luckless tyrant of an owner
Against whom all conspire
Who seriously in debt, is helpless,
   cannot pay up
Hounded interminably by mysterious
   moneylenders
Who after giving a little now expect a
   whole lot in return.

With fuel running low for my boiler
My heating system, it is unreliable
Volatile, treacherous in Winter
My ventilator rusted through
Erratic at best, chronic in Summer
The damp in the walls and ceiling
The dry rot, the wallpaper peeling
Encouraged by years of neglect
Of being used, unscrupulously
   tampered with,
In need now of meticulous care and
   attention.

My owner truly a derelict, a dissipated
   soul
Spending more time in the cellar with
   a bottle
Than on any other shop floor level
(Among his friends, the mice, the
   cockroaches and spiders)
Who trying to stay awake, eventually
   must capitulate
Caught by that Ghost Ship that drifts
   slowly North
To where the icebergs loom large and
   ominous out of a damning fog
It's compass frozen, it's wheel
   unmanned
Nothing but shadows and wind in the
   rigging
As he floats off into oblivion, off the
   edge of the earth
Where exist such shapes that can
   never be said.

                               II

Is peculiar though, my owner
At times displays a certain poise and
   grace
Hinting at a time in the not too distant
   past
Which was not altogether bad or
   harmful
But unusual as it might seem
Was quite on the contrary, fruitful !!
Him featuring as being both proud
   and distinguished
Far removed from today's pitiful
   wretch
Whose solitary doubts and fears have
   all but taken over.

And maybe I do find it hard to
   sympathize
I after all being the one offered up
   now in sacrifice
Him there with little joy, love or hope
With only complaints and grievances
   mounting up
Filed away in offices at City Hall.

                                 III

Whereupon the hour, every  hour, the
   Courthouse Clock it chines
Ever vigilant, ready to track it's quarry
   down
Where in the corridors of power this
   very moment
City fathers, town planners and
   architects have gathered
To discuss whether our future lies in
   this town
To argue out the case, the for and the
   against;
While below the vile demolition man
   he stalks my borders
With his heart of ice and ghastly  
   drunken laugh,
No! I do not wish to suffer
Indeed, I wish I could be like any other.

The tune you played it ran so sweetly
I was sure Time himself had stopped
    dead in his tracks to greet me
And let believe all the while my soul
    had been enslaved
Such was the relief to my heart that it
    gave;
Holier than the sight of monasteries
    crouched in secluded valleys
Sweeter than the song of the bird in
    the green Summer's tree
So sweet was it that it opened a
    thousand as yet unsavoured dreams
And had my mind rest easy on the
    cool wind
Which swept over their prosperous
    seas.

                              II

The tune you played brought calm
    upon a boisterous evening
Though Sorrow came to me
When I saw you finish and leave the
    centre stage
For I had thought I might live forever
    under your enchanting spell
Far from the world in peace and
    harmony
With Love kept, not left weeping
Far from the wakening hour
From that chore of modern empty
    living;
It was by far the sweetest tune
It released this fellow songbird from
    his cage
And it all seemed like glorious Heaven
    these brief moments spent
For he who had longed always to be
    free.

                                Translated from the
                                original Latin of
                                Emperor Nero circa
                                40 AD (his later
                                period).

Across the room I watch you from afar
So much to see, so much to admire
I can only gawk in awe:
Shimmering softly beneath the party
   lights
Delicate as fine porcelain, elegant just
   like a China doll
Little Perky !  diminutive little button
   of a nose
A sublime protuberance, with a
   wonderful angular symmetry;
Like a beautiful ballerina in the centre
   of the face
One lonely Cinderella, forever
   overlooked and unsung
Neglected, passed over, the great
   unmentioned one;
So still and so quiet, mysterious like a
   question mark -
"Little Perky, don't you fret, I! Me!
I'll be your poet though a poor poet I
   be
I'll hold up your charms for the whole
   wide world to see,
I'll be your dashing Prince too, if you
   let me".

Finely chiselled, exquisitely sculpted
Better than any Michaelangelo
And I love the little wiggle;
How silently you sit there and how
   patient, enduring all
Stuck between the two drama Queens
Eyes all painted up, that flit and dart
Twinkling and fluttering outrageously
   like their a class apart,
And a rouged up Mouth's sulky lips,
   burning rubber
Busy gabbing away, running off like a
   wild piano;
But then there's you Little Perky,
   simplicity itself
Shy bulbous beauty, a throwback to
   childhoods innocent days:
Like the others, you play the game
You go along but it's not the same,
See you sniff into your little hankie
And know that beneath, you're
   probably not all that happy,
You seem to say (to me at least)
" I hoped for more, I dreamt - I dreamt
    of other things
And other nights than these".
I see you Little Perky, I see you all
   alone in your lonely prison cell
I hear your sniffles, your silent sobs
   and sighs.

When pinned in the corner and
   assailed from all sides
My eyes, they secretly run to your
   quiet hill, that lonely mountain,
Like Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights
I'll wait for you Little One
I'll wait for you there..... my Cathy
(O! lovely wild and spirited Cathy)
I'll wait for you through the wind, the
   rain and the snow
I'll wait for you to come
I'll wait for the real 'You' to show,
Beyond all the bravado and the big
   bluster notes
Beyond the crowds constraining looks
I'll wait for you, my Love,
We'll laugh again, and dance beneath
   the stars
We'll live the dreams that once we had.

Little Perky, sweet alarm bell of the
   soul, shiny little bugle that gleams
Go on now, give it one more blow
One huge giant elephantine blast
That'll sweep them all away
And leave only you and me here,
   alone at last
Facing each other across this floor
O! Little Perky, my Cinderella, my
   Cathy.......my Heart!

Once above my face the Sun did
  weave a joyous spell
And rested calmly upon the backs of
  the great stone Giants
Whose stance used bring early night
  to bear on these tired eyes of mine.
And the dutiful Moon too, did smile
  down
Reassuring me with her presence
Patrolling the dark heavens till the
  Dawn would order her away.
Down the wild slopes rode my
  children, brimming with life
Their blood ensuring my Youth
  forever, or so I thought.
Watching over their shadowy green
lanes, noble cedars and majestic pines
Vigilant watchtowers upholding our
  green faith:
Caressed the Bloom's feet I did and
  raced the drinker's pace
Precious memories slowly eroded as
  now in lonely exile I dwell.

First warning I got, carnage floating
  downstream
Severed trunks of trees and their
  stricken branches
Finally laid to rest upon the worm
  eaten lock gate -
Saw a mass exodus taking place,
  whole tribes on the move
Telling of trouble coming and of a
  world soon to disappear;
Pagan storms they brewed ominously
  overhead, their seed
Did burn my skin and burnt through
  the silver scales
Crippling the little fishes who'd bury themselves prematurely in that cold
  graveyard depth;
Those blissful birds too, that used eat
  out of my hand,
As my countenance grew steadily
  more gaunt and pale
They too, did decide to leave, seek
  food elsewhere.

And the ailing flower wishing the old
  days would return
As my ears they began to pick up a  new sound growing louder all the time
Gnawing away like a worm in my
  brain, the razor-toothed saw
Singing in the woods his eerie Death
  song
Leaving in his wake a grisly trail of
  ****** and mayhem.
My own days numbered then; I saw
  the savage leaders come
With their strange ideals and talk, of
  quotas profits and costs:
Who beside me built a Fortress, a
  sinister smoking structure -
O! those Dark forces it sent forth to
  finish me off
Looting and burning, laying waste my
  beautiful Kingdom
My exiled Spirit indeed, all there is now to tell of that terrible cost.

When the yellow day coppers to dusk
I paint my weary eyes dreams.

They nudely wade the crabhole muds
for marks of the great marksman
climb up the chunks going into tides
tiptoe through the needle roots
sniff a wind that smells of stripes
thrilled
death if comes
would be a momentary stir
a dangling cloth
resting on the trail of blood, marking,
someone ventured.

Every time she
kicks me out,
she throws my stuff
away:
my clothes
my books
my poetry.
I'm broke like
a toad.
I can't afford it.
No bother--she just
throws it all away.
No apologies.
I come back, and
ask, "Where's my stuff?"
Away...
Far away.

I've drank the finest of wine
Down to the bottom of the bottle
Only to witness an ocean alone
Barely surviving my own hands

A fire burned through my viens
That was blew out by the wind
Breezing through the leaves
A calmness that sits with me
Before calmness dismisses me

I walked across the tallest blue sky
Where wide winged birds soar high
Til promises of white clouds turn grey
And so there I fell with the rain
Dripping through the lowest gutter

Many times I was buried, lying in dirt
Like a grave, needing no help
Finding the dark inside of myself
But I always rise with the blades
Of the greenest fresh spring grass

No matter what feeling I catch
None of them seem to everlast