Champagne corks pop
a cow parsley flourish
on your life’s roadside
after driving alone a while
someone to fiddle with the A/C
and monopolise the aux
with unrepentant cheese
is a welcome change
as the prevailing breeze
shifts

Shush brain,
let the regular, looped refrains drop,
seek a safe, blank space,
a place for quietude
and maize based snacks:
for the love of Pete
relax

A bold density of memory anchors,
scattered across a past
where colour saturates
like someone sat on the remote control,
holy hand grenades on loose afternoons
with the slap and bicker of passing the joypad
in blithe ignorance of washing piles
deadlines and empty pockets

Drifting in the now, helium light,
well-heeled but drab,
absent fingers trace the slight links
on the line around arthritic ankles
as they gently, surely give

On the whole kindness equals weakness thing,
I question any ****-nettle licking bulldog
who with merry abandon will slobber, chase and
bark bark bark at tired rabbits
to hide the bare patch where real ***** should be

Glorious, true strength comes from settling into
another’s shoes and sadness
and making both a little lighter
while still achieving arbitrary, stunted targets
set by dim witted stumps getting paid way too much

Hawthorn breaks a smile in the hedgerow,
whispers a truth
that, easily forgotten, delights again
and the indoor pain is lifted a little

The green is almost angry
demanding attention like a fat toddler
or peacocking buffoon
that somehow still wins hearts

I cried yesterday
despite spring’s giving relief as backdrop
anticipating a warmth
that still evades my fingertips

Friday night fleeing from the scrum
like the last thing on our minds
are other people’s kids:
the outrageous, hysterical bashing we take
hour by hour as
we
just
try
while each successive boss quickly forgets front lines
and asks for ‘evidence’
of piling into the meat grinder

Then something tiny reminds
why we’re even here:
a flood of tears perhaps as dogs have died
or that kid who says “I’m a microwave
bzzzzzzzzz”
and despite our glowering frowns
we smile so hard we cry

I forget myself sometimes
in nettles and dead wood
as feet step on, envious of small things
that skip through barbed brambles
like ladder rungs to new space

I’ll content myself with lungs of open air
and try to care less about slings and arrows
and my Brobdingnagian clump

to be allowed here is enough

Most of us wrestle our ball of twine:
the more we struggle to catch an end and untangle,
the deeper our fumbling takes us

for some the fight twists dark,
the yarn becomes barbed wire
and they bleed loose in many small ways

for others the yarn dwindles
microfilament caught
eternally wriggling on the end hook

I call to you now and give quicksand advice:
stop still and calm and rest,
look about you and a hand will come

This ground was thirsty
by god thirsty
been cracking and cursing for months
with only the vaguest hunch of a possible deluge

so these rains were drunk in abandonment
and the angry soil has yielded
soft underfoot, a sole cwtch
to be savoured, felt

the stream, so feeble last week
has remembered its fatness,
wetness, strength
recalling a bearing
thoughts are borne once again
with vigour to the constant sea

Green shoots,
little shocks of brilliance
from mouths so oft distracted
tis a wonder they’re not more malnourished

the courage to give an opinion
on long dead white kings of literature
who speak Christ knows what but it ain’t English
is, as they themselves may say, lit

my tired soul has read the lines so oft
I feel peppered for all this,
so finding out Romeo is now a simp,
has the hot blood stirring again

GCTA shouldn’t spell your name
but I’m pretty sure you’ve hacked my DNA
so that a well-meaning scientist
seeking to cure my horrendous malady
with cutting edge gene therapy
would scratch their head
in finding your name writ so deep

A restrained ahem
echoes into the night
without even the edge of an eyebrow raised

the tentative gesture
fails to interrupt business
as usual
no mass exposed
to the fat con and filial misdirection

while on the stage
the hamfisted prestidigitator
sweats so profusely
that the greasepaint nearly shifts

We grew in this yard
in between the broken glass and dog ****
vine inches
minutes by hours by days
roots crept in an inconsistent soil
and growing despite

To arrive now with weekend garden centre eyes
you may see weakness in some leaves
that belies the truth of a fragile fruit
long nurtured from blood
and uncompromising viticulture

And if you try to claim the bouquet
or the legs on that glass
or the complexity of hard fought tannins
and subtle warmth
and lasting aftertaste

Then you will see us spit

Today I thought “*******.”
You’re rude to those I love
through ignorance,
yours of course, as mine is finer tuned
though I abhor you
for your corporate judgment
in kind I’m classifying you
to post in **** encrusted pigeonholes
so future proles
will know to write you off
and your specious waffle
will forever be followed
by polite cough,
Yours Faithfully

The garden cats aren’t mine
with my pss-pss-pss
and shuffle finger
I try to entice them
but mainly, warily
they ignore in the truest
feline tradition
to leave me and my allergies
wishing

The brief needle in my arm
and onwards
the dog with the slobbered tennis ball
the boys braving bare feet in the stream
and onwards
soft wind still with a sharp edge
the brief needle in my arm
the tumble song of the ice cream van
and onwards

Skimming and scanning
the grammar of the riverbank’s
brown leaf, new shoot syntax
a bold type wren,
like the old bouncing ball of singalongs,
led my eye to read the waterline
and yet I still couldn’t discern
if smiles or tears were written
while the branch tips still scribed

Look at us perched again,
anxious dreams set in long gone buildings
where the kids won’t do a thing we ask
and for some reason we’re naked
(except for a mask)

And as my old man says,
the conveyor belt hasn’t so much as slowed
so our wish for a cautious toe to get set
will be whipped from starter to panicked plenary
before we hear the gun crack

Know this, comrades:
the holes in our practice we think show clear
are lost to the fizz and bubble of our charges.
When Monday comes they’ll listen (mostly)
as we carry on regardless.

When the tiredness came
sad eyes regarded it as nothing new
in hindsight she’d always made space for it,
an unconscious pet bed

the lack of shock
as it crept to her was almost nice
fingers on imagined fur
she felt her edges numb
retract from the screech of daily headlines
and dumb fingered scrolling
that sparked electrocutions

pacing in slow circles
around the blue pulse of her core
it settled unrequested
and pretended a defence
while forever she reached for rest

On the news
the language on the vehicles changed
from the ignored alphabets
to those we sort of got:
to ambulanza
then l’ambulance
to ambulance
to ambiwlans
to carbad-eiridinn
to otharcharr
to ours

We were once well acquainted
with the wee small hours
adept at navigating neon jungles
and the deeps of kitchen philosophies
entwined with kebabs and illicit frissons,  
in vino veritas conspiracies
that took weeks to unpick and apologise for
but passed

Now, if seen, those hours hold different snags,
surrounding plants are far less exotic
but familiar brambles cut deep,
immutable truths roar
when the ***** doesn’t do the talking
and morning burrs not so easily dislodged
by a full English and a million teas

Your sick incarceration
held against a shining will
‘til unmoored you walked

a light you couldn’t see,
that lifted others,
dimmed

each step seeming free
with inexorable gravity
drew to the woods

your last embrace
brought cold release
and all our griefs became

A great deal of weakness
goes into the man I am now
indecision and a flurry of doubts
that make ways cloudy

But it’s fertile ground below,
this lack of surety
this endeavour to truly know

and if more would live here
how much better we would be

I came down with an absent mind
not fully fixed on seeing you
knowing that the paused world
has changed much
and the art of letting go is survival,
to avoid the pockets of hurt

So with loose hope, I stepped clumsy
to where you’d always been
when with azure shock, there you were,
half-memory, caught
in the high speed shutter of my eye
a teal and orange thrill

Gone as soon as seen
I could lean into the loss,
but I knew you’d been here
to prove this dull distemper will quit
scars that remain will fade
and I’ll see you again

They can sadly twist naturally
even though trellis and secateurs
should train properly
a root bitterness can still linger

Most of the time a healthy growth,
both verdant and upward holds
but on dark days
or at dusk, the shoots can bolt

More so if left dense in clusters
so a monoculture prevails
when no amount of cutting back
will yield fruit

Plants get stunted, malformed
and left unchecked will stifle others.
So give time to your horticulture
for all our sakes

Hey! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!
We’ve all earned our time in the sun
to let tense necks and foreheads unfurl
and remember that even though it’s a bit busted
there is a world

For the love of heck, turn off the laptop
stretch legs and do you
even if it’s tricky to remember
there are plans outside of planning

Your role is essential, even while
fat white men who went to abusive schools
will tell you otherwise

You need your energy to lift the eyes
of those who feel low, forgotten and rotten
so please
recharge

Ladies and gentlemen!
To you, this seems a simple set of stairs
mildly vertiginous perhaps,
but no real challenge
with careful steps
and grip upon the bannister
even granny still manages

But I, The Great Fearlesso,
for one day only will attempt the impossible:
down the stairs in a sleeping bag!

Yes, your frightened gasps are suitable
(at least I assume that’s what the sound was
as it was a bit like tutting)
but I will not be dissuaded

I ask my glamorous assistant/mum
to help me into the bag of doom
with as much grace as a baby elephant
on roller skates

And here upon this precipice I pause,
my life flashing before my eyes
Look! There’s last week!

I peek through my fingers at the drop
and though my bottle is challenged
I, glorious I, commit!

I go, and the bumbled blur
of carpeted steps is lost
in the howling hiss of synthetic materials
I am tumble dried to an almighty
thump...

And dazed, I rise
to the thunderous applause of the cat
I stand and take my bow

Then do it twenty more times

The clarity of that light
apologises for the fact the cold
will still shrivel your extremities

Once again
we sit in wait of the first hot pulse
to wake our state

They say it’s coming
but we’ve been (not) burned before
so cautious underwear is worn

But be sure
that ****** foil barbecues will sell
in panicked droves come Monday

Do you know what’s good in this world?

You, you ****** idiot,
expending all your energy
whirling and worrying
about what others think
while your very industry stops them sinking,
you almighty dingus

You bally fool!
Your absence injures
in increments felt by each person
you vex for, who miss you
which add in mounds and scores
and you shaped piles
while they would run for miles
to keep you in their orbit

So,
you massive plum,
let yourself feel it

Put your ear against the day
lub-dub beat slows
throttle hand gives
deep breaths release
kinked shoulders
and the tears that come could be
for anything

Mens sana in copore sano
so they say
which these days is a worry
as the sedentary blur
sees a time-lapse
of my fattening *** shift
marginally on the sofa
while the pallor of my skin
makes corpses wince
and message u ok ***?

Given my increasingly potato shape
what state will my cabbage brain be
when they finally give the all clear?

When we are once again allowed near
I envision sitting with my primates
grunting fear as the brave one
reaches for the monolith

Six assorted buzzards and kites
claimed this sky today,
their joyed metallic calls proclaimed above me
while I pottered slightly mournfully below
in a fecund but disappointing garden

From their strident majesty
I should take inspiration
and bend the land to match their empire

I got as far as picking some crisp packets
out of a hedge

A day will soon come when you will wake
after a full, unbroken night
with no asides other than kooky dreams,
and materials for breakfast
will be at hand and in date

and your plans will be loose
and peopled with easy love
and activities that boost your soul

the weather will be just the way you like it:
that crisp, bright, balmy, bracing, intoxicating kiss
you’re perfectly dressed for

the memories you carve will remain
to glow in the dark
like the stars on your bedroom ceiling

a day like this will come again
so hold on my loves,
hold on

I grew on after she was gone
unaware that routines of love
high days and Sundays
had woven spells

Bay leaf smell
kindnaps back
to a kitchen where windows,
steamed with riches baked and boiled,
wombed us from the outside world

Born to patience and a place at the table
each chair full, with more squeezed if needed
while more than food sustained us

Walking with the sun behind
eyes fixed on my worn boots
as they try to find the old stride
each time they lift, this still winter light
flicks ahead under them, easy as,
like nothing’s changed
but when they fall, this light cuts,
mud grips and boots go blind

A pin
asking just enough of the taught surface
to make it give

bang-burst a gust
of shameful, baleful disappointment
snuffing embarrassed cake candles

or gush a splat of misery
to spatter snot and tears
halting high squeals on a summer lawn
as eyes look for answers

With mixed and barbed emotions
these thick and heavy days defy physics
individually grinding
yet weekly whipping by

But in this treacled maelstrom
Friday’s unique frisson
still brings a cheeky tickle

We drive through the dark
to her home,
radio lulling small back seat bodies,
so late that our DJs have hushed
and only the rustling burr
of an AM station remains,
in and out like consciousness
with songs of eternal love,
bread of heaven
ar hyd y nos

Friends cause ructions,
paroxysms,
liminal and otherwise

but the constancy of those
who count neither shaven off
nor with fingers on the scale
are the whole of my heart

Stuck on the actual prime meridian
where gambling and grown up shenanigans
are viewed all *****
hurting society, though I could legally go to the drain on my street
and drop a thousand twenty pees in it
nae bother
our equivalent bet
as high rollers we are surely not

I miss you Vegas
with your daft anti-reality cushions,
the strip with no history or heritage
necessarily
but with goofy drunken dreams brimming alive

and I know vice, bad, horror, addiction yadda yadda

I miss you Vegas

Bone tired, petal and stem
still crave the light.

The fug has muted us
putting aches where shines were
but the yearning for the thorn and burr
of every normal day persists

My skin is ready to be kissed
with burn and nettled rash again
to give me pause for actual thought

Buckle-eared, sitting,
the ditch giving shelter
against a trying spring,
a hare with no immediate worry

just the usual stuff:
fox, buzzard, kestrel even,
the background mix of dread,
while to the left
snowdrops shine

and behind, carefree daffodils
begin a brief, incandescent grin
to draw life from

leverets will appear,
new-normally
on sugar paper cards,
if through our hurt grip
the ditch will hold

Breathe:
another week
has passed without
disaster catching
you

Funny
how that
seems to be
the common
pattern

I daily commit to being negatively capable
one might even say it’s the defining spark
of a life spent loving and hating
the art and accountancy
of the modern teacher’s grins and grind

So here’s a mellowly fruitful glass raised
to comrades and fellow sufferers
who dwell in uncertainty and decreasing circles
while those, as sure as idiots
forge ahead

A moment catches:
scent thrills a heart,
grabs memory in a vice
that denies gut overhang
and aching bones,
never a thing before

are is good
were is heaven

Get that window open!
Go on, do it!

Feel the fat rotation of the planet
throwing a little spring our way
to poke our amygdala
and rattle our dormancy

and sure, we know at the back of minds
a bare faced bait and switch is in play
which means our twitching fingers
will seek to put the big coats in the loft
only with dismay to find the grey frost
return to bite our ***** mid-March

but we can dream and show some ankle
can’t we?

We hold out for this spring
harder than a man who’s lost nine digits
to frostbite
so we can point to where it hurts,
be heard,
aware that we’re linked,
a swarm of warmer hands
that need to hold, to cling, to brace
against this lingering, malingering pain

We’re ready to emerge,
but only together
and while inclement, duplicitous weather
still rages
we’re better, sadly,
caved

Night
a nugget of slide virtuosity
sings clear in the dark
that from the usual velvet hand
somehow has been forgotten

Your brass-burnished touch
has been nothing but felt

Sleep on, whole rest

Cold white numerals
from the Teutonic-honest dash:
9.5°C

Not so cold, I guess
but not the weather to press the button
for the windows to drop

I do while accelerating
too fast for the road,
the fresh air has volume
that angry-loves my tired,
house-cat skin

The wub-wub-wub pulse in my ears
has a cause I control
for once
as the next curve beckons

Sharing a lost freedom
you gave us a fleeting,
distanced touch of colleagues,
friends, your girls

free laughs flowed in honour
til you passed us for the last time
in this grey world
and we choked a little

but even then, the technicolour
of next time rained,
irrepressible as red laughter
and leopard print