Not since Marilyn
Was perfection embodied
In so full a form.

The M6 is slow southbound north of Lymm.
Queuing likely Junctions 4 through to 3.
Accident on the slip-road at Strensham
South. Rubberneckers slowing just to see.
Busy clockwise on the M25.
Overturned tanker - now down to one lane.
Rush-hour traffic, best avoid the drive.
M62 heavy westbound again.
Ongoing road works on the A1 (M).
High sided vehicles avoid the Forth
Bridge. Reports of a breakdown just come in
For those leaving the M5 heading north.........
  Felicity comes, I turn off the dial
  The traffic has cleared - if just for a while.

This girl - Felicity
Shimmers *** appeal
Like a plastic pink flamingo

I see her walk
early morning
Along the sands

Watching the tide
roll in and out
High heels in hand

As she waits
for darkness
and the sensuous night.

Love is a crossing
A leap across the river
Will you be my bridge?

Distant light of stars
Reach through the darkness tonight
Show me once more love

With prejudice
You write me off
What right, my friend, have you?
To strike me down so quickly

Cannot you see
That I have fault
Like all my siblings here
Who live on the Earth as one

Do you have fault?
Perhaps you do
Then you are just like me
So imperfect and impure

But I wont ask
About your faults
What right, for that, have I?
I accept you as you are

And I stand tall
Despite your thoughts
And live in disregard
Of the prejudice you serve.

Of all the gifts on Scotland's hills
The primrose is most fair
It stops the hiker in their tracks
And keeps them there to stare

At its kind form and beauty soft
I love it I confide
As deep among the heather blooms
It almost seems to hide

Like a young maid who may not know
That beauty's come her way
While others see her prettiness
And long with her to stay

So if you see that yellow bloom
When summer comes around
You'll know it is a precious thing
On Scotland's hills you've found.

I wished
that you could've seen her
As I did that morning
on Llandudno pier

Working in the arcade
A real '**** and ***'
Yet entirely in accord
with the Victorian elegance

I returned next day
but she was not there
Had the ebb tide
carried her away?

In my mind the memory
remained like the sand
Untouched by the tide
and I gave thanks for that.

As I sit in the sun
surrounded by summers last flowers
in terracotta pots, my mind
fails to share the peace that surrounds it

Restlessness sits like a cloud
immovable in a changing sky
Where lies truth?
Amongst the shadows of this garden

This morning brought the first frost
like a warm blanket it lay
on the grass, on my soul
Is it so stupid to think

That at thirty five years
This chemistry with a teenager
Could indeed be real
and give birth to Felicity

Or does dark delusion
creep over lawn and rockery
To plant its own black seed
in a fertile heart.

In the mornings I would walk

Along the shore-line

Whistling ‘Sous les Ponts de Paris’

It was there that I would see her


To me the skies were blue

To her grey

Lifeless and grey like the ocean

A desert the colour of steel


Often she would stop

Collect a shell

Studying this thing

Thrown up by the surf


Then she would toss it

Into the desert

Returning it back home

Wondering at its existence


Often I longed to run up

To stop her

To ask her if she’d mind

My company for a bit







But I never did do that

I left her

To what? – succumb

Victim to a preying world


I saw her once

Not her

Captured in a self portrait

So beautiful – so young



There her scarf was beige

On the beach – red

Once it streamed in the wind

Like the tail of a young boy’s kite


Now she is gone

I still walk the shore

I read about her passing in the paper

I still whistle ‘Sous les Ponts de Paris’


A child skips down to the sand

He takes her place

His kite soars upwards

Its tail is beige.

Lunchtime - I sit
In my corner
Watching
Tanya

She leans
Against a chair
One knee
Upon the seat

Slowly
I see
Her raise
The coke can

Full fat stuff
She doesn't care
It's that
I admire

A fullish girl
**** and ***
Round of face
Dyed red hair

Her name
Strikes me
Tanya
Sounds like ***

Instant guilt
Consumes
My thoughts
Far from pure

Tanya
Who I imagine
Naked on the floor
Atop my Bowie records

Tanya
Whose name
Has long
Been my favourite

Tanya
Tied - bound
Screaming
In the night

Tanya
Taking my hand
At a funeral
On a wet Tuesday

Tanya
In pink
My colour
Of ***

Tanya
Crying
At the sad part
Of the latenight film

Tanya
Crawling
Across the
Bedroom floor

She places
The red can
On the table
Not caring

Tanya...
Tanya...
Tanya...
Tanya......

A waterfall of colour
Is she
Pouring on my mind
Both night and day

A moonlit bay
Is she
Glittering like stars
Between anchored yachts

Virtual L.S.D
Is she
Brasil '66
Psychedelic cacophony

Soft skin and lace
Is she
Felicity
My 60's girl.

It is the ordinary
For me
That so often
Fills the memory

This is how I tell it ……

She didn’t give a ****
The ice cream seller
19 years – quite pretty
Sunday, New Brighton Parade

: )
Hey!
Wot U @
**** all

Through the hatch I saw her
Mobile in hand
Sitting on a *** that would
Get bigger – and better – with time

U?
At work
Its crap
Lol

She barely bothered
To look up from the phone
Casual disregard, I found appealing
To my ****** side

U out last nite?
Yeah ******* smashed
Went home with that guy
U know the one

Two strawberry cones please
And a vanilla
Don’t do strawberry
Just vanilla

***** mare !!
PMSL
I need to stop
He’s using U

Is there anywhere else?
Yeah, try up Vale Park
Just up there, round the corner
It’s cheaper too

U still there?
Yeah, sorry, a customer
Can’t be arsed today
Haha, don’t blame U

I left her there
Back on her ***
Leaning over the phone
Hoping for no customers

****
He just txt
Wot do I do?
Tell him to *******

We found Vale Park
Saved three quid
As with jealousy she cursed
Her mate and the ice cream.

By the door
Of the social club
We take in the evening
Together - Alone

Yellow
The light
That colours
The vision

My confidence flows
Drowning my shyness
I smile, make jokes
Basically - flirt

Orange
The hue
That colours
The scene

If I make you smile
Hold your eye
I taste the moment
Sense - Completion

Green
The life
That colours
The picture

Stunning and beautiful
Flicking your hair
A roman candle
Burning - Alive

Pink
The desire
That colours
The mind

Deeply I breathe
Imagining the moment
I kiss your lips
Together - One

Red
The danger
That colours
This poem.

Dark towering forms
With strength of millennia
Weak against our love

I am nothing but
a pebble.
Cast up upon the beach
that is your life

My hard edges rounded
by storms long past
Whose fury was lost
upon this shore

Now still wet - I glisten
in the early morning sun
As the tide ebbs away
revealing your truth

When the sea returns
racing in across the sand
We two will lie together
Safe in Neptune's bed.

Where in fact could you tell me
lies this girl Felicity
The name I myself did give
to a perfect model of love

Is she the teenage girl at work
who flirts and shakes her ****
Asks me to touch her fleshy stomach
Everyone thinks we're having an affair

Is she the twenty something student
who texts me now and then
So we meet for illicit dates
and never anything else

Or is she the woman now past thirty
who feeds me every night
Wears high heels in bed
while loving me with all her heart

Which of these can you tell me
Is Felicity among the Felicities
Surely it is not you
I couldn't deal with anymore.

An English rose
found within
the Caithness landscape.

Beauty and fragrance
in a land
both harsh and true

Raised in the green
of Hampshire's England
then blown north.

Like petals on
a summer zephyr
to land upon my heart.

With your finger
You twirl your hair
Smile across the table
And in shyness look away

I just look down
Smile to myself
Think how lucky I am
That you are here with me

This room is full
Of other folk
But they are merely given
Supporting roles in this play

My misplaced foot
Touches your leg
Quickly I say 'sorry'
But we both know that I'm not

I'd take you now
Up close to me
I'd hold you here so tight
And I'd never let you go

But this cafe
Is not the place
For two to boldly love
Each other for all to see

Except like this
Quiet and subtle
Yet ever more sincere
Over both our coffee cups

The world goes by
But not for us
We're wrapped in this our game
For we're only starting out

But we both know
We've reached the point
The point of no return
Darling we've begun to Love.


An early piece from some years back!

In shimmering still
It rose among the chimneys
Face to face we sat

I beholding this vast sphere
It mocking my existence.

This morning
the blackbird sang
Her low guttural notes
made me long to stay in bed

But I rose for work
and thought of you
Doing the same
as daylight slowly seeped in

And I knew
behind yesterdays harsh indifference
That your heart was human
as the blackbird sang.

River searching for
The sea its close companion
Two becoming one

Like hearts as love develops
They reach their perfect order.

Summer had long since betrayed the sand
When alone we both walked hand in hand
With others whose love we tried to hold
On the hail swept beach of bitter cold

Your memory seemed within my reach
As the angry waves punched the beach
Cross ebb tide that made it depart
I scanned the horizon for your heart

Finding instead that still your grace
Lived in this bleak, lonely place
When long days stood in long nights stead
Here you were - Victoria Silvstedt

On the sunny sands of Saint-Tropez
Too much for feeble words to say
Then after we had tread a mile
My 'other' gave an uncertain smile

As if somehow she already knew
That here those nights I came for you
But as she urged us both to go
You appeared once more - spindrift rainbow.

Light burning brightly
Protecting wandering loves
Shining through the night

Lamp for a northern landscape
Expel darkness from my heart.

At Warehouse I wander
As light seeps from the sky
Among the cold, grey tombs
Of the ancient dead

In this timeless landscape
So remote and lonely
Forgotten tongues whisper
With the wind through the heather

A harvest moon
Not yet quite full
Is the only witness
To the truth of these stones

My spine tingles
The mind races
I smell the smoke
Of my forebears cremations

And as I leave
The moon a guardian
Over these distant graves
I sense communion


Written after visiting the Warehouse Chambered Cairns on 26th August 2015.

I stood in view of Helvellyn
on a summer afternoon
Marvelling at the majesty
of this English landscape

As young hikers lay
amongst the ancient stones
Performing ancient rites
they thought they'd invented

I thought of the poets
of life and the world
Remembered Lovehearts words
and drank in the air.

If a snowflake does not fall
Here on Christmas Day
Then a Christmas card from you
Will come, I hope, my way

And even if it snows
I'll hold your card - still dear
So send your Christmas card
With all your Christmas cheer.

Smoke rings float
In the air
Before entering the mind
Through the nostrils of the soul

Love hangs like a pair
Of pink knickers from a lampshade
A bad cliche
From a good *****

My mind exits
Floating in the air
Like an 'Operating Thetan'
If you believe in that

While Felicity
The stiletto heeled epitome
Of abstract desire
Dances in a concrete world


If this poem is derogatory then it - and I- have failed.

Like fresh spring daffodil
Bursting through frozen ground
You appeared by my side
In the summer of '11

On a rainy afternoon
As we listened to the Marxists
And those who merely warned
The end was near at hand

You asked me for the shelter
Of my newly bought umbrella
I absorbed your pale blonde hair
And eyes of powder blue

An Imam raved and ranted
You must have been nineteen
I struggled with my conscience
Every time you smiled

If the end then truly came
As the speakers said it would
I'd have kissed you on the spot
My luck was not that strong

So I watched you walk away
Despite an implied offer
Turned to face the Marxists
Left my heart with you.

Searching here once more
For what may or may not be
Love seems lost tonight.

Little black mini
Six inch high heels
Pink lipstick, perfume
Spray-on fake tan

Yet behind the lovely vision
The person I plainly see
Made in God's image
To love and be loved by me.

They've been good to me the council, I mean
they put me here
and when all's said it's not that bad a scheme.
With my penthouse flat I'm the overseer
of the world below me its rights and wrongs
and from my sitting room, well man the views!
Of the far green hills and the rising sun
in the early hours gives my heart a song
that only fades when I switch on the news.
But it's the roundabout that yields me fun.

It lives below me and I must give thanks
to whoever
placed it here, a planners' pen, paper blank,
if it were like that no planner better.
For he drew into my life such real joy
I've known too much sadness - I lost a son
but don't dwell on that watch the roundabout!
Enter, exit, quick and slow, bold and coy
I see it all each day, what have I done?
They all pass through it but I have no doubt

That they love its lanes and its scrubbed white paint
guiding them on
some too confident, others like to faint.
Their parents drove here 'neath the self-same sun.
Indeed a time or two I must recount
an accident, mans lust for the violent.
Up here, I will confess, within my heart
I saw all the signs but I did not shout
the warning words I could have sent
but looked on in horror as per my part.

And so, I suppose, until near the end -
I'm not quite sure
when I'll make that choice - I will have to spend
my time in this flat the unnoticed viewer.
Watching you drive the roundabout, your car
spluttering, stalling, even breaking down.
A journey joyful and sometimes sad
taking you nowhere or taking you far
through congested traffic enough to drown
out all my loneliness, leaving me glad.

Circular girl, I search
For your presence
In the stars and moon
Of mental distortion

It's 'Ashes to Ashes'
With you and I
Drink drives my mind
Expanding to fill your void

Circular Girl explore
With me 1965
The Responsive Eye
In tonights darkness

The right leg crosses the left
the left leg crosses the right
Not bad for forty two
I watch across the room

This seductive sequence
to think I used to **** that
Not now though - no chance
she really hates my guts

Yet every few weeks  I sit
across the silent living room
She streches over, presenting her ***
In **** tight pink trousers

She knows what she's doing
understands my mind
Pink is my colour of ***
I cannot ignore her

And so the show goes on
and then for days to come
I dwell on the pink trousers
skin of forbidden fruit

The Fox River flows
like a river of nothingness
Through my mind in the light
and my life in the dark

So many places like this
where I never have been
Exist in the world
outwith my experience

A bridge crosses over
the flowing waters
As endless as time
that I cannot tie down

On the library steps
beneath an Illinois sky
A woman gazes out
absorbing the scene

Where I do not feature
except in the mind
Testing conciousness
and the meaning of life.

The tide abates
As the storm rages on
Slowly the shore reveals itself
Assaulted by the waves

Twenty years ago
Here I would sit
Upon this rocky outcrop
Watching the ancestors of these waves

The rocks and shingle roar
Growl to me from below
Why don't I jump in and save them
From their steady,slow erosion

A long, piece of driftwood
Is flung airborn by a wave
Part of a long-lost craft
Only now finding landfall

The light begins to touch me
Through the tangy, salt-sea air
I retrace my steps once more
Leaving home behind me.

A seaside girl
I met her
Down on the Prom
It was out of season

Her hair was the colour
Of miles of sand
That lay like a blanket
Along the coast

Behind us the arcades
Pumped out their noise
As she looked in my eyes
I heard her beauty

A woman now
By no means a girl
I couldn't but help
Picture her - nineteen

Then as if
She'd read my mind
She told me of summers
When the crowds had come

Behind us the Sky Tower
Stood like a parent
Proudly watching her children
Paddle in the surf

She pointed to where
The Pavilion had stood
In the distance wind turbines
Stood strangely still

I used to watch
Your children play
Down on the sands
Such beautiful kids

I smiled and nodded
Her eyes were blue
Like the distant mountains
Out to the west

And then a sadness
Crossed her face
On the horizons the turbines
Began to turn

I long for my youth
I wore a bikini
I took her hands
The rain began to cry

Then as quick
She disappeared
Into the air
That now seemed colder

Who she was
I still can't tell
My mind has named her
Sunny Rhyl

Through dark rainy streets
I run
Searching for a man whose face
Seems carved from flint

Years of knowledge
Have etched his face
A Scottish face
Of rugged landscape

I feel the cold
Seep in to my bones
Tonight I need
Someone who understands

He enters the room
Where he is well received
Orders a pint
Stands by the fire

By the overpass I stop
It’s raining hard now
Below me the motorway
Pounds with traffic

Soon he has company
A genial man
Just in time
For the second half

The motorway calls me
I climb onto the parapet
One last leap
And the rain would stop

The warm flames glow
Casting shadows in his features
His wit flows freely
Girls notice his eyes

The wind picks up
My blood runs cold
A cowardly end
To a miserable life

Another dram
Before you go
He’s been here two hours
The life and soul

For a second on the wind
I hear my mother
I climb down from the bridge
Wet to the bone

Gordie smiles
As I enter the bar
He hands me a drink
‘Your dry now son’

Like teenagers in a bedroom
We giggle
As the record player
Spins

Ashes to ashes

Felicity lies sprawled
On the couch
In her pinkest bra
And *******

Funk to funky

One black stiletto
Is on the floor
The other freely
Swings from her toes

We know Major Tom’s..

She exhales the smoke
I drain the bottle
In my head, once more
The colours explode

A ******

The room holds
The unmistakeable sweet smell
Of ***
Two days of ***

Strung out in heaven’s…

Her eyes glaze over
I hate pink and yellow
She spits
Oh, and light blue

..High

I hate you, I lie
Then we ****
With anger, savage
As she has mocked the colours

Hitting an all-time..

The record player sticks
Stilettos and bottles
Litter the floor
Slowly I withdraw

..Low

Stepping out the back door
in the quiet of the evening
To that place in summer where
the wild rose and honeysuckle would grow

I caught the blackbirds song
carried 'cross the gardens
As daylight seeped away
ending this individual day

That had been spent with you
and now...ever would be
Left to dilute itself within
the long tapestry of life

And then later when
my head married the pillow
I remembered the blackbirds song
and in dream spoke to you.

You are like:

Cherry Blossom petals
in spring
The long days
of summer
The rich colours given
by autumn
And Christmas
in winter.

Here in my mind
I see the world
Coloured in shades of red
The colour that paints my love

I see the sky
Crimson and clear
With brightly burning sun
That warms the air around us

The sea is pink
A pool of love
Bottomless in its depth
Made for lovers to drown in

Ruby mountains
Valleys of jewels
Yet none will ever hold
The value of your love

The trees are red
Yet still they grow
Just like a fertile heart
They reach as high as they can

This is my dream
My scene for us
For red is the colour
Of passion and desire

And that - with love
Is how I feel
About you - only one
Please feel the colours I see.


An early poem of mine when I wrote 4,4,6,7.

He boarded the train
A human wreck
Bleak Sunday morning
At Chester station

The morning after
The night before
Self inflicted terror
Of the most reckless kind

Barely functioning
She offered him kindness
His perfect dream
A bubblegum blonde

'Your dead proper gorgeous'
He sure didn't feel it
Where was she
Twelve hours ago

A cocktail of sickness
Headache and hell
Meets panacea of perfume
Hoop earrings and paint

Now years have long past
The pain well forgotten
Yet still I remember
My Manchester girl.

A ball of the softest gold
Fills up an evening sky
A time when man and woman
Can ask each other why

Emotions are unfettered
There is such scant control
When the heart does yield them
They soon begin to roll

In a way that can't be stopped
By either one involved
If you know why this happens
The puzzle can be solved.

In the rain we met
On a Sunday too
A day for promenading
With a girl round Hyde Park

From nowhere you sprang
You appeared before me
Fresh faced - like the sun
Peeping through the rain clouds

Your pretty features - blonde hair
What - nineteen?
Too good for me
Yet you chose to stay

And you smiled as we walked
Laughing through the rain
As we shared my umbrella
And listened to the racists

And the Marxists,the athiests
Even the preachers too
And those who did announce
'That the end is nigh'

Your eyes sparkled
With the mirth and joy of it
To the world did we appear
Like another couple in love?

Perhaps - but then
I let you slip - I had to
And you joined the crowds on Oxford Street
And I chose to stay

With the Marxists in Hyde Park
In the rain
My love owned by another
On that Sunday afternoon.

How could it be
I now wondered
That here in winters depth
My thoughts could turn to spring-time

I'll tell you, love
How it could be
For it were thoughts of you
Alone among the flowers

There in the warmth
Gift of the sun
That gives the flowers life
As your love gives life to me

Which is fairer?
I dared to guess
Well lover, it is you
More fragrant than those flowers

That fill my mind
As if I see
Them floating on the breeze
Like dancing Red Admirals

So as you work
In the meadow
When spring-time comes again
I pray that your thoughts will turn

To what will be
With you and I
In the spring-time of love
Now sown within the meadow.

Sky of deepest blue
Free from rain cloud blemishes
Flawless as your face.

A war memorial stands
Keeping guard at the end
Of an ancient High Street
Alone on a roundabout

From this historic spine
Of Flooring Centre and Bugdens
Run ribs of semis
With their suburban wives

I watch as my feet
Stamp down cracked pavements
Teenage schoolgirls
Giggle at a phone

At the village hall noticeboard
I read Parish Council minutes
Wondering at the secrets
Of the good who serve

Whilst against it all
The background hum
Of M3 traffic
Racing towards death.

In a flight of fancy
Felicity pronunces
Her admiration for Henry Moore
As we stroll in the sunshine

For my part however
I'm preoccupied
For I have a date tonight
With the 'Green Fairy'

She waxes lyrical
As together we admire
'Reclining Figure - 1951'
In the Tuileries Garden

And I have to say
It breaks my reverie
Returning my main vice
The female form.

In the shade of the sails
We heard a bird's song
Bring joy to a morning
With notes short and long

Perched high on the branches
Quite close to the path
Felicity saw him
And started to laugh

At red-breasted mischief
In England's fair land
As I began cupping
Her *** in my hand

So as robin sang out
We started to kiss
I groping the **** of
This prim English miss

'Cross the straw-stubble fields
My mind saw her run
I chasing, then throwing
Her down in the sun

Behind us the windmill
Above her, her frock
Bare thighs and hard *******
Poor robin in shock!