It’s big
and it chews on your thoughts
termite toothed
til you feel your
brain pan is honeycombed
with broken links

To think around it
seems impossible
when from current vantage
you can’t even see its shape

Perspective seems
as hard to find
as eggs and flour

but minutes will hour
hours will day
as always

and time will do it’s thing
turning tragedy
comic

To the average working stiff
the mouth feel of Saturday
always popped and fizzed

a day to get on with the business
of being
without being defined by your business
(shout out to all in retail and shift work
your heartache is saved for other verse)

This Saturday has come
with revised terms and conditions
that seem to have rather stunted
the former purpose
like a PC revision
gutting all the cheeky dirt
for contemporary sensibilities

Fine, but understand
that from behind closed doors
a million folk are figuring
how to **** about in a myriad
of new ways

Ye can take our pubs,
but ye cannae take
our shenanigans!

I began a thought
followed it really closely
until dazzled by a mote of dust
that drifted by me

momentarily dumbfounded
I grasped to catch
where I had been heading
when a cat crossed the garden
and intent on its actions
I stalled once more

I shook my head
and pinned my fingers
to the keyboard
to rattle out important words
but then I wondered
how the Easter Islanders
celebrated Easter
and went down that rabbit hole
for an hour

Resurfacing I finally began
and sentences flowed
for a good five minutes

until I saw
that it was time
for dinner

No one on this wet rock is self-made
they all got fat with a safety net,
foundations laid
by mothers and fathers who gave
time, lives, thought, truths
so we can do what we do

It’s this we should continue

Let those who can
burn bright and earn,
that’s fine, they’ll cope
but your concern should be
the bedrock beneath us

Your every task should be to
feed, clothe, educate and make safe.

If you want Great,
supposed lost,
fulfil your role as public servants,
right and honourable,
that’s the only real cost

Our feet scuffed drying ruts
along the riverbank
and we gave the land
our thanks for holding up

Alongside us, green bright head
curious,
a duck and drake kept pace

I know the quizzical eye
was a bread request
but you’re as lucky as the rest of us

Above us, swimming languid
in unbounded blue
two buzzards circled

My mind got to thinking:
what fate are they
hoping for?

There were these moments when you’d remember something I’d forgotten
Or blotted from my memory
Often highly embarrassing episodes where I’d exposed my clear ineptitude
And you’d lead me back through them, laughing,
Walking in the gardens of my shame and naming all my
Clear inadequacies until you creased with tears in your eyes

And you’d think I’d hide
But it was love
and I miss you

You’d quite often leave a small amount of liquid
In every glass you drank from
So that every time I picked it up in a hurry I’d hurl it
Onto my trousers, or sofa
Or the pile of letters you’d refused to open and I’d curse and rankle
Wishing you would just tip things down the drain

And you’d think I would go insane
But it was love
and I miss you

And when you pulled the duvet round yourself to make the perfect
Bed based sausage roll and I shivered through
The night because despite the fact I’m twice your size
You had a vicelike grip that would never
Once
Slip

I’m ill-equipped to deal with the real of you being gone

I pace the places that you were and get lost a lot

But not lost like we used to when you’d tell me it was just around the corner
And I’d point to the fact that the century had provided me
With an infinite map in my pocket
And you told me “**** it, let’s just go this way and see what we see.”
And we’d end up in some seedy part of town with some ****** staring me down and you’d hide behind me laughing
And we’d have to run for it, me with these knees

And you think that I’d go mad at you
And tell you that you wind me up
And tell you that I’ve had enough and you can figure you own **** out from now on

And now you’re gone
And it was love
and I miss you

Remember a time you weren’t here
and your day rolled free

honey warm joy
holding your soul
in a cwtch

catching their eyes
and shine of smiles,
lining your insides
for days and times like these

we build these pots
and stocks to tide us by
with the benefit
of no selfish deficit

allow yourself a sip
to reminisce
and ease the days
until we can replenish
togetherness