In a dream I shall feel
The wings of the world unfolding, and
Worlds spinning on the axis of mad journeys;
And the seas breaking turquoise, upon their rippled surface.

In the heart of the ears
I shall hear the shivering willows, dreaming their
Wood-smoke dreams, full of sap and  funneled sunlight;
Pierced by light for a thousand years

And the flowers sleeping nestled in stars;
Gathered in the deep, among the wood-thrushes,
In coagulated violet forests, all shadowed and dark:
And a whispered peace barely rustles this world.

The news never stops, but sometimes it breaks
strange, like when the cops tell us,
Man throws dog at sister.

It didn't fly far, but across town,
the Police did finally catch another stray dog
on the Eisenhower Expressway.

I hear it's driving a '98 Toyota Corolla,
which has nothing to do with
the 3 critically injured
when their vehicle hits a pole
on the Kennedy Expressway.

They could be spooked by the report
that a Suburban girl, 11, threatened
to shoot up her school bus.

She's been told pink bullets
are the latest preteen fad,
and to prove her absurd point,
there's more bad news of
2 children injured in a Far South Side shooting.

Add their names to the piled-up statistics
and the multiple PR reasons
an often divided
State Legislature and Mayor Daley will try again
to crack down on gun violence.

This equation's always out of balance.

I'm perfectly imperfect
That's what they always say
I'm crookedly straight
But I'm far from gay
I forever speak my mind
Always and all day
My heart is on my sleeve
But guarded all the same
I'm devilishly innocent
My mind is not so tame
I'm dishonestly truthful
But never take the blame
I'm completely backwards
We can never be the same

To me upwards is downwards
The sky's my only ground
Your life I can still ruin
It is with in my bounds
I'm depressingly happy
There is no middle ground
My version of earth is flat...
Why should it be round?
My earth is a work of art
With colours everywhere
Your world I broke and ripped apart
Just to prove I don't fit there
I tore it up in little bits
I left the pieces without a care
I'm completely backwards
I'm such a major scare


I'm nationally local
You can see me all the time
I can disappear into thin air
Leaving you without a rhyme
For I'm melodically harmonious
No brighter than the dullest shine
I'm incomprehensibly real
And yet so hard to find
Pure white to me is simple black
Race is gone and can't come back
I can prove all that I am
A thing to which you surely lack
I'm disrespectfully respectful
My words are always fact
I'm completely backwards
I'll drive you past insane
Then I'll never bring you back

I'm illegally legal
Like a drug that you can't sell
I'm contrastingly bendable
In this world of my own hell
I'm resistingly irresistible
My secrets you will never tell
I'm obscenely lovable
In this world in which I fell
I landed in this twisted place
A world of expectations
This world I created on my own
For I'm an undertone of exaggeration
Here I've found my only home
In a backwards world of my creation
And all in all I'm here to say
"I'm completely backwards
In every single way"

Between the cool-quarried kitchen
and paint-faded south facing door
runs a windowless wall
sugar-papered with childhood dreams.

Memories of roughly folded gifts
squirreled in satchels,
crossed creases still intact;
curled corners fixed with shiny pins.

Luminescent paint heartens the darkness of a pitch grotto
anticipating a flicked switch
to illuminate dimmed histories
of abstract symbols, visionless figures and countless fingers.

The small pink fists that captured
Time's most precious pieces,
now live with vaguely painted hope
of sheering unsteady walls
in their uncertain world.

When day closes on late shadows
and small hilltop houses stand as flat silhouettes,
their blinking eyes squinting towards the valley floor
badged with late-grazing grey sheep,
my father stands at ease, hands burrowed in soil-grained dusty pockets,
chin tilted towards moist fields of churned clay,
their blackened furrows converging at a distant curve.

Soon the slim fingers of cypress will softly stroke a rising moon
and at my father's back, the porch light will shed its warm glow
onto the rough path and the stone well,
where an ancient rusting bucket idly hangs
by a tangled chain.
And in the gathering darkness, the clouds will part
to reveal a void in the Heavens.
And he will gaze as always in awe
held in a transient spell counting, like blessings,
the burgeoning stars
as he wrestles with reason, the frailty of life.

And enchanted he will enter the spartan house
to briefly reflect his certain future,
leaving the smothered hills in still air
to share peace with themselves.
And from their safe earth and dense thickets,
small creatures will emerge
to face their own fate without question.

In a little under a hundred years we've had so many wars.
Men, women and children sacrificed for someones cause.

And truly just what has been gained, versus what was lost?
Can we say that it was worth it, can we justify the cost?

In nineteen thirty nine we had the war to end all wars.
Since then there've been so many, like we've hardly even paused

And what is it we fight for? Do we fight for right or wrong?
Or do we fight to get resources that we feel to us belong?

Now sure there are some victims, of persecutions, genocides
but unless there's oil or riches there, the strongest close their eyes.

We forget that we're not perfect, but thanks to Gandhi and Dr King
We changed our stars from where you are, and now know everything.

I cannot help but wonder though, if they were alive today,
would they see us a failure, shake their heads and walk away?

In a little under a hundred years we've learned not much at all,
except in war lies profit, and to some it seems a ball.

Because if you have stuff we want, and wont do as we say,
then we just roll our armies in and blow you all away.

Or if you do things differently, even as we once did,
then we will "liberate" you, then sell you to the highest bid.

See we want you to be like us, cos were so freakin smart,
sure we got people starving but an unmade bed is art.

"My Bed" was bought by Charles Saatchi for £150,000 in 1999.
£150,000 would feed 3200 children in Ghana for a year.
£150,000 would provide over 6800 prosthetics for children who have lost limbs as a result of landmines or unexploded munitions.
In a little under a hundred years, it would seem we have learned nothing.

A poem is grand
that's got summat to say.

But if it says nowt
it still passes
the time o' day.

Never disparage
another mans writing.
He may be twice your size
and good at fighting!!!!!

I am in the river Nyle
In the Ganges water that never defile,
In me there is no guile
Perfect clean is my profile.

In your snow flakes I am
I am the scent of its snow,
I am their soothing grace
With my warmth they glow.

Earth and sky are my home
In love bower I bloom,
I shine in all shades
My brightness never fades.

Just in the blink of an eye
I cover countless miles,
When I sit down to write
What I sketch are your smiles.

C. P. Sharma

We ate eggs
And layed in bed
And ******
Whilst looking
At the view
Nothing to do
Other than stare
And care
Captured
And fulfilled
Within each others eyes.
Oysters
And bomb-diving
Seagulls
And Scissor for hands
Without any sound.

Kodak moments
And dressups
Like cowboy
Dapper dan’s
And pomenade.

Coffee and Belgium beer bars
And pirates with patches for eyes.

Silver trayed room service
And a mat for our feet at the side
Of our bed.
And daddy’s boy
With a cammo ****
Underneath
A Cheshire grin

And for five
Short hours
We walked
And talked
And were kept
Enthralled
By the allure
Of retail
Therapy

We accessorised
As if fashion
Were to cease tomorrow
Silver and tins
And etchings in time.
Then tie pins and scarves
And hats with wide brims.

We were lost
In a city of
Bright lights
And street art
And didgeredo’s
And bag ladies with more
Luggage
Than Sydney international terminal.

Bell boys
And valet
And privacy lights
Respite and
2 nights
of enjoying each day
from the
25th floor