Above which flower
Do you sleep
With vibrant color
Flavoring your dreams

Beneath what fibrous
Root do you rot
Dank earth mouthing
Funereal dirge

Within which flower
Do you reside
Aroma calls me
To your side?

Sturdy yellow petal
Or blushing wilted pink

Beside you would
I stay with buttercupp'd kiss

Don't be afraid of love,
that fear will never let you find it.

Cherie Nolan© 2016

Through insomniac nights
a fuzzy grey mouse and I
coexist under lamplight.

My sleeping routine,
it's far from a dream
but my buddy and me,
we feel free.

He stays in the shadows
Collecting little bites
of leftover dinner to eat.

He comes out at night
and scuttles in this light;
he's put his trust in me.

I honour my promises,
and mice have their rights
so I vow to tell nobody.

So when I can't sleep-
in secret we meet,
my fuzzy grey friend
and me.

In the old part of town
There are still cobbled streets
And at one time
These streets were surrounded
By living working mills
Marking the towns heartbeat
Twenty-four hours a day
Seven days a week
The machines hammered the air
As the flying shuttles were cracked
From side to side of the weft
On more than a hundred looms
It sounded like a battlefield
And some would say it was

But that was long ago
And now the mills are dead
The buildings still stand
But inside they are broken
Housing many more
Modern endeavours
And in one of these old buildings
Within the same crusty bricks
There's another world that lives
In the dark hours at least
There's a night club that throbs
To the sound of bands playing
Different rhythms for the town
And the neon lights outside
Shine on the same old cobble stones

                                        By Phil Roberts

Congratulations , you are among the living* !

there is
that one ambitious destination
that one castle in the air
that one taste of exctasy
that beams a flicker of light within us.

let that candle flame spread like wildfire
and spew out of you.
let your passion light this grey world with unclouded - and much needed - colour.

- t.m

There were sharp, dark nights
When I was sent to the store;
The alleys and empty lots
Were void of comfort light.

There were night sweats
When figures approached;
I would pause on the sidewalk
To hear the retreating steps.

I'd turn to watch a dark outline
Cross under a canopy of branches;
His procession out of the light
And into the long sharp night.

Abandoned houses had draped windows
In the dark of morning deliveries;
Black, steel steps lead to balconies,
Beneath them darker yet.

My window displayed the silhouettes
Of cold thin twig fingers;
And the darkened stairs had a balanced creak,
Or a shoulder bumped into the landing.

I pulled the blanket over my head,
Darker still, I let the night roll on.
That was night.
Tomorrow has dawn.
What's night is night.
What's dark lives on.

Beach Glass

Wrap your hand around
beach glass in your pocket
seafaring meteorite washed
up from another galaxy
cool lozenge squeezed
by degrees from deep
within the shoulder of a wave
eased glistening onto sand
glint of sunlight driving
a splinter through your eye  
the hollow of your palm
exquisitely matched
sculpted seed ordained
sea vast on your tongue
in holy communion
body and the blood bottled
in blown green glass
a sign cast up
from the belly of a whale
or nothing more
than a world weary
vagabond drawn
to this lightning kissed beach
fused skeletons of sand
writhe in recognition.

People don't change
Their masks do

This is a tale of a bird and a tree,
All revealed to a poet like me,
Once there stood a broad tall tree,
A bird flew, perched, and looked for tea,
Flew down and foraged in the grass,
A cat appeared, would the bird last?
"Quick, fly back to me..."
whispered the branches of the tree,
Safely landed, high in tree,
Munching little worms for tea,
Friends forever now, you see,
A little tale of a bird and tree........

I crawl the floor

Collecting broken glass

To protect feet of those who do not know

Do not care

Whilst rejecting offers of company

As music moves the floor.

Later

When all is quiet

I enter the night

To walk along roads alone.

A bogeyman of myth

Stalks these streets

It's ok

For I am not the prey he seeks

I am not the prey he seeks.