talk to me directly, **** you
look me in the face and see me
see me smile an authentic smile
talk to me directly,**** you
you have a silent wall around you
your gripping app has you enthralled
everything you do is choreographed
and you get your kicks from the selfies
you're at sea when it comes to real humans
warm, tender and wanting your attention
real people with brittle hearts that break
real people that you cannot programme
for there are no icons for such phenomena
so look at me and talk to me, **** you
lest we get lost in a world gone mechanical

in and out of my waking moments
drifts this flirtatious apparition
the ghost of a smile on a broken face
i feel the sanctity of my shores breached
by this stranger on my bewildered shore
the sometimes leering face is like a cloud
hovering above me only in a thick crowd
this stranger on my mystified sandy shore
forever tempting my imagination with glee

perfect poise
between diction
imagery and tone
measured rhythms
and true fine feelings
that fall like soft rain
to mirror humans
in tender moments
and coarse grim cameos
of things best forgotten
things nuanced and bitter
this vast field of experience
is the business of poetry
the art of aptness
the art of compactness
and incredible depths
leading to damp squibs
we search nevertheless
for unique form and content
that exercise in futility
till at last we rest from our labours
and we understand at last
poetry like life is a bitter-sweet  illusion

this is where you find us
with our bits of paraphernalia
and our shredded hopes
reclining upon our mad fantasies
this is where you find us
on our windswept bits of  concrete floor
hoping against hope to one day be loud and rich
our affluent mouths enriched with aromatic cigars
this is where you find us,
our women ravaged by the wind
and our children taking whatever we give them
from heaps of misfortune
festering like putrid wounds
on forgotten bits of terrain
along cursed routes that lead to where it all stops
this is where you find us
with our broken teeth and our losses
with our jaded dreams and our hallucinations
this is where you find us, we the deluded many
who were foolish enough to imagine a community
glued by common bonds of former oppression

hush little brother mine
huff and puff no more
mother is at the open fire
little brother of mine
she's cooking your dish
the one that makes you drool
and the dogs keep watch outside
so eat dear little brother of mine
eat your fill and fill in those hollows
eat little brother of mine, eat
till your tiny plate is shining clean
and mother thinks it is all right
getting smoke in her eyes for you

Child of my child, you for whom I lived this long ...
I shall be gone, yet be with you still, especially when times are rough
I shall be your mentor and your prompt under the eaves
As you whisper husky sweet-nothings into her waiting ear
Child of my child, remember these things when they lay me down
In that soft coffin so inviting one could die over and over again
Just to lie in state in it and be the star attraction one more time
I shall  lie there with a still gaze into distances you can't see
And I shall look prettier than a picture in an old storybook
Those given to weeping shall weep themselves sick but in vain
For I will neither move nor be moved on this my special day
And only you will feel my fleeting smile in that enigmatic moment
When you get to know that life is always nigh and never really gone
I shall be relaxed and pretty though dead and you will know then
Why your grandfather brought me into his home to create happiness
So, child of my child, walk softly into the future that must come
The present bears you aloft on wings fuelled by receding past times
And as blinking stars beckon to ocean waves lapping the shores
Live your life as you'd wish to and as I might recommend
Let life's cloistered mysteries softly unravel before your eyes
And carry the pictures that you see in the shelves of your memory
Sometimes to peruse and smile when a memory comes floating in

We go one way
Time goes the other
Patience is a myth
In your merry youth
We rush to the zenith of our folly
and so quicken our demise
Time goes its way and cares not what you do
And try as you might
You never can catch up
And you never can evade its ravages
These spindly legs
Once carried a proud athlete
These tired old legs
Were the pride of a queen of the ramp
But now alas, time has played an ace
and won the race
Time goes its way
And we go where we are bound