BECOMING THE MAN MY FATHER ALWAYS WAS
( For brother Brian

Each night
I would follow you

through the rituals
of what you had to do

being Daddy.

I wanted to be Daddy too.

Mimicking your gait
becoming an exact

copy
of you

trailing along
in your footsteps

like a lone seagull
following in the wake

of some great ship
of state

watching the water
burn

'til it was all bubbles

then letting it
calm down

before filling my mother's
hot water bottle

carrying it to her side
like a lover's gift.

I was
your little shadow.  

She'd always smile:
"Thank you Danny! "

"That's alright love"
was always the answer.

These the ritualistic words
in the hot water bottle ceremony.

Then he'd teach the clock
to ****

adjusting it with his hands
and wind up Time

so that it spit tick & tocks
all through the night

then go lock doors
turn keys
draw bolts.

"That's it, son!"

I used to imagine
being you

and now I am
my own man

winding up Time

bringing my missus
the gift of a hot water bottle

(the gift of me)  

both equally
heart warming.

'Thank you Donall! '
she always smiles.

'That's all right love! '
I always answer.

Me the man
I am

because of you.

A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT

the river stood up
its head in the clouds
marched off to find the sea

it took the river time
to find its feet but when it did
it ran & ran & ran

tired now the river
took the bus
spilling some of itself goin' 'round a bend

the river
kicked off the bus
for not having a proper ticket

the river
trying to hitch a ride
no luck

mini skirted blonde
tells the trucker
"This here river's with me!"

river weary now
just wants to lay it self down
and meander

at last the sea dawned
the river plunged in
losing itself in its joy

OMBRES
de nous-mêmes
ANCIENS

April in Paris
John Donne has indigestion
pines for words from the Isle of Wight

"...whether I be
increased by a child or
diminished by the loss of a wife..."

his baby is born
dead
his wife lives

words...words
these creatures
made of ink

he begins his Anniversaries
Elizabeth Drury becomes a symbol
for the death of youth and beauty

Ben Johnson scorns
such
extreme lamentation

"If it had been written of
the ****** Mary
...it had been something!"

"...she, she is dead; she's dead:
how wan a ghost
this our world is..."

"the imputation of having said
so much
...to say as well as I could...

an Emperor is
about to be
elected

the busy old sun
rests for a moment in
an empty room

*

Being in Paris and like Mr. Donne suffering from a cold....only hundreds of years apart...so that he( and his life )entered my thoughts as I flâneur'd about the Paris of now and then so that the now and then and the then and now came together in my slightly out-of-kiltered mind.

INVISIBLE BLUE PLAQUES
(for Janice)

Someone or other
lived & died here.

Some other someone
wrote their most

famous work
there.

Every so often
a blue plaque informs us

as we journey
through town

(rain falling down)    

of Blah Blah
who blah’d & blah’d here

or was
blah’d there

... who cares?

In my mind
I ***** invisible
blue plaques

to commemorate
us.

Here: we kissed
(did we not?)    
...a mere minute ago.

Here: we turned
& laughed

on the corner of this everyday
road.

Here: we laughed
& hugged

on a pedestrian crossing

(a pedestrian
crossing)    

whistling at our
ardour

a taxi honking
at our armour.

All over London
our invisible
blue plaques

commemorate
us

&
that

we once
passed this way

so deeply
in love.

AND SO

a latch
shuts the night
out

a turn of key
puts the town
to rest whilst

outside a cat
and a milk bottle
gaze at the moon

yellow and overblown
and now Mr. Cat
with swish of tail

vanishes into the shadows
as the milk bottle
falls and rolls away

its note left
on the pavement.
Inside a clock has run out

of tick-tocks
until it is wound up
by a sleepy eyed man

so that
it speaks of
time again

the house dozes
the lawn yawns
everything is

just so
and so
....goodnight

MR. DADDY SOFT SOFT

Always her fascination with me
shaving.

This her early morning ritual
observing each action

as if it were holy.

I hide my face in foam.

“Santa Claus! Santa Claus!”
she chants

winces with delight as the razor
(she gulps)          

goes over my bump without
(gasp)slicing it off.

The shaving uncovers the me she knows.

“Soft…soft. . .Mr. Daddy Soft Soft!”
she gurgles in a lather of laughter.

“Me now…now me!” she pleads with me.


I take the brush…coat her reflection with foam.
I shave her…with the tip of my little finger.

Her reflection sniggers & she sniggers too.

Later, in the early evening
she appears  

bearded in fresh  cream.

She shaves herself with a lollipop stick.
“Me... Daddy now...see!”

I cha cha cha her on the tips of my toes
as she clings to my fingertips

the living room dances around us

One delighted half shaved little girl.

One delighted soft soft Mr. Daddy.

THE WIND WALKS AMONGST THE CHANDELIER

a chandelier
hung from a tree
the sunlight in love with it

"No room for it
in my little house
I thought I'd give it to the tree!"

"Well, have you ever
seen a chandelier hung from a tree?
No, well...there ya go!"

the tree looked happy
wearing its chandelier
as if it had grown it itself

a bird alights
on the tree's chandelier
a sunset caught up in it

*

It was strictly for the birds and the bees( and the tree)who seemed to love it...it was only a broken plastic thingy but the idea of hanging it on the tree was what made it work...it was very surreal like coming across a Dali painting but after a while you just accepted that...well...there it was...the wind liked playing with it too. All it takes is one man with one novel idea and there...ya go!

A friend has sent me a picture of a chandelier in a tree! Ha ha I thought this only existed in my memory of Ted in Cornwall! I hadn't a camera then and didn't write poetry so it just sort of languished there in my mind until it got jogged into recollection! We used to drink Mint Juleps under it and talk into the sunset. He used to have bottle trees as well so I thought the chandelier tree was just an extension of this. At night he would run an extension to it and it would just exist in the sky like a rather large firefly. I liked its daylight incarnation best as then it was strictly the tree's. Once electricity was added it became more ours...albeit a rather strange "ours' but still ours to drink mint juleps under until dawn lit a fire under it and it was time to go to bed.