It was great for a time
*** and wine
Wine and ***
Then commitment and open and shut curtains.
Special delivery of child made the bond complete
Six months down the line
Breast feeding was action watched from a distance
Intimacy was a tired look
The neighbours cat looked hot
Killed the lonely nights
Killed the commitment outright
Got to know the lawyer through rapid bank withdrawals
Weekly child visit watched over by Brutus
Bar visits watched over by the world's condemned
Special occasion became a twice yearly treat
Birthday and Christmas, bit of hate thrown sideways.
Then the new man.
Felt good for her.
Maybe some pressure off.
Maybe missed that lobotomy bar lecture.
Years dragged the hate forward.
Time moved on.
One day I wrote her a letter expressing my anger.
She wrote back in triplicate.
I wrote back in double triplicate.
She sent a thesis on men and *****.
Suddenly without thinking, we had dialogue.
After a while, we moved on from the anger.
We became human again.
I actually liked writing her letters and receiving them.
We never got back together.
But the letters kept us close.
Sometimes there would be a kiss at the end.
The little bit of love I probably never deserved.
I would mention it to her in my next letter.
Even an *** deserves a solitary kiss now and again.
The bar room lawyers would probably agree.

On the straight
just like an arrow
to find
the straight
is very narrow.

lots of jumping off points.

I felt for the first time
when she left
by then way too late
alone in a motel room  at twelve  midnight
with the neon bar sign outside glowing
the traffic of the bypass
almost singing  a woeful tune a full
ashtray an ember burning my careless
fingertips
tomorrow
and hope so *******  long past
my beard growing  every second grayer
an inch
itching it's way through
like despair
on an express train
to nowhere
again

I waited for my son
In the airport today.
It was fun.
It was fun crafting
A poem on the run
As I checked faces and
Metaphors - one by one,
Asking them all: “Is a
Poem a loved one -
Like a son -
Or is it just a pun
'On that which is done'*?”

©LazharBouazzi, Carthage, TUN, March 19, 2017

All of the shining mad ones
With their heresies of reality
And other visions and other voices
Are not diminished
By the multitude of choices
That is their truth
Upon each waking day

They are woken by the howl
From beyond the first ear
And into the deeper mind
Where there is other language
And blinding colours of emotion
For madness has the purity of pain
That martyrs can only long for

                                           By Phil Roberts

Did you take your soul to a land
Where those with hope do not linger
And apprenticeships have been served
With cuts and broken fingers

Oh these days of hardships swell
Cries the mother with howling baby
Who would care and who would dare
To risk their spare change lately

And now you walk on broken stones
With your feet wrapped in newspapers
But they say it's alternative news
Perhaps you'll learn the truth later

So is this the place your soul should be
In this land of hate and anger
Where you would place your fragile fate
In the hands of a stranger

He may be God he may be not
He could be a fallen angel
In this land of decay and rot
Who would trust a stranger

                                           By Phil Roberts

what closes my eyes
opens them too
thoughts which bare their souls
in my brain
of you, the curling kitten
in the window
moist petals discovered at daybreak
of a clover just emerged,
the ten millions of suns
over the hill
I have strained to view
daily,
her lovely
whatever I fall asleep to
dreaming
I awake to a new thing
to fascinate the
corneas
make a  new plight of
a new discovery
eyes open or
closed
makes
no difference

I know that there have been times,
down the bruised and misread years,
when I have been hard and cold,
perhaps even seeming to be cruel.
But, please remember who I am
and where it is I've come from.
Born to gossip and scandal
and raised in the family war zone,
where the language was rage
and words were often lies.
Trust and tenderness, at times,
seem illusory to me.
Unknowable.
Like smoke in my hands.
But I still try.

                                  By Phil Roberts

When you're alone and tired
And your mind aches too much
To find hope or peace
Close your eyes and think of me
Feel my arms around you
Feel my warmth against you
For you know I'm always there

We will leave the pain behind us
And we'll gently fly so high
Through the soft and blue
Warmly cradling sky
Where every breath we take
Becomes a lover's sigh
Just close your eyes and feel it
For I'm here by your side

                                                By Phil Roberts