Pre-dawn
No wind blows
Stillness
From the bakery
Nearby
The aroma
Of fresh bread
Light is probing
                       Morning
                       I hear the rumbling
                      Streetcleaners
Some get up
Early
Wear yellow vests
Voices
Morning
Has arrived
The smell of coffee
Wafts
Through the building.

Night frost
  

Last night I wrote a poem in my mind
didn't write it down on paper as it was like a spring flower
coming from the darkness of my awareness.
All I had to do was to get up in the morning and
write my masterpiece down; it didn't happen there
must have been night frost the flower gone?
I have struggled to remember it although I'm aware
That few if any are going to read it and for me it
doesn't matter I'm perfectly able to enjoy what
I write without admiring myself too greatly.

Edith Lived here

Black & white photo
A house where
Edith Piaf lived
Casting a long shadow
On a summer street.
Blank windows
The house is unpainted
As always
Edith has gone
Her voice lives on
She had no regrets.

The Voice of the People

The morning is excellent and calm
I try to write about the feeling I have inside me,
but can only come up with a feeling
of boredom, that comes when looking out of the window
too often and see nothing has changed.
I don't want to live here anymore, but is fearful
of the unknown – being outside my comfort zone-
even if it is tedious, I find the world scary,
a cacophony of a common scream
That comes with unbridled democracy, everyone
                       Has the right to be heard when they should be quiet
                       or speak sotto voice
when they can only produce banalities
Thinking has to be approved by the masses and
those who call themselves liberal

The Enemy among us
The western world has lived in peace for sixty years
mainly because of EU and shared horrid memories.
This has not been the Palestinians case who were
shooed away to give room for a colony called Israel and
those who object – freedom fighters- are called ISIS.
The USA have dropped bombs in the middle -east for
a long time and produced more ISIS fighters which now
is a common name of all who do not like being bombed.
Ex-president Obama sends drones they are intellectual
from the out- set. Trump drop a bomb the biggest in the world
it made a terrible noise, and 36 Taliban were
killed, they too are called ISIS.
(In Trump's case one wonders if he suffers erectile dysfunction)
China and Russia is ISIS in disguise, as are left-wingers
and those who do not believe in the American dream.

Small fry

Fingerlings are playing among seagrass in shallow water
they stop when the big shadow of an adult passes overhead
sometimes they play is so exciting they forget
and end swallowed whole by a fish that knows no mercy.
Alas, the tiny fry has a short memory and soon leave
the seagrass attracted by shiny pebbles shines like nuggets
of gold on a summer day.
The play stops as it just like old school friends drift apart
to other seas and too smart to anyone bearing false bait.
There are no promises for elderly fish when finally caught
a fishmonger awaits them or the supermarket’s frozen
counter displayed in all their faded glory

How did it come to this?
Sitting on a terrace counting how many
Ships are anchored in the bay.
I know most of the ships especially
The coastal runners, the big trawler has left an ugly ship
With a crew of the last chance saloon
No self-respecting seafarer would join a ship
That empties the ocean of life.
How did it come to this?
I am watching ships come and go in the bay of Cascais.
My plans for the future have been overtaken
By the veracity of the day

Do we live too long?

I have been listening to a program on TV BBC about Health service
which in Britain is said to be too costly because we are living longer?
Longevity should be celebrated and not seen as a burden
like the old should be guilty of being aged.
Portugal which a relatively poor country, take the Health service
for granted, but of course, it is a country where the timeworn are respected
When I collapsed at home in Portugal, it took the ambulance
twenty minutes to get here just in time to get my heart started again
I was fitted with a pacemaker, and it didn't cost anything.
In Britain, the ambulance would not have been in haste, and I shudder
to think what it would have cost had I lived in the US.
We should be grateful for the National Health Service in Europe.
It is the young and the rich, who want to privatise the service,
the young because they can't imagine getting old, the rich
because they will not pay more taxes and use private health service
of the posh kind with soft seat and no waiting line.
I'm glad I live in a civilised world where illness and cost do not include compere
where saving lives are the mark of culture.

Appreciative
  
Six o'clock
In the morning
Is the best time
To get up when it is summer
Stay on the terrace
Inhale the air
Before it gets hot
Make a coffee
Just being alive
Elderliness is to be grateful
For little things

The Dark Heart

He sits in his cell can't read newspaper or use the internet,
the centre of his mind is the coldest place on earth, and
so much of him is us.
He committed an unspeakable crime killing children,
his mother died for his sins; his father hopes his son will
Will have the sense to commit suicide.
His cell is frosty blue; those who feed him avoid eye contact,
no one reaches out to touch him and former friends,
Even those in sympathy with his fascism have forsaken him.
He cannot hear this he will not hear, he is king of
his mind – a prisoner- and must not stray from his path.
Cosmic Loneliness, if he wakes up from his slumber of
self-delusion and sees how grotesque he is,
there will be no one who will embrace him and give succour

A Life
My life has three stages, I was young once
it didn't last so long, and the downturned came
in my middle thirties, I sank into a gloom which
now is called depression, everything terrible happened
in quick succession divorce, ***** and lose women.
I sought company with people who were my inferiors
and they took advantage of my need to be liked.
It took a long time to get out of this fog I never got the help
I needed all I heard was “pull yourself together.”
But dawn came into my life I went to live in Portugal
I discovered the joy of writing and the pleasure of silence.
I have lived a wonderful life for thirty years and let
go of my ego, to enjoy the day I have the freedom to do nothing
And feel good about it. Today I have been listening to music
on you tube until the strange cat that lives on the terrace
protested; well” the three tenors” sing loudly.
There is much poverty among the old also in Portugal should
I feel guilty because my life is good? No, I will not have slept
on a park bench I have been through the mill, and it was luck
that got me out of it, so I go on living as long as it lasts

To my child

In the morning born
rosy cheeks, caused by a fever
as the autumnal sun arose.

In the cradle a smile
of wisdom old,
never cried, the child

When the first snowflakes
softly covered the soil,
a soul went back home.

Charles Aznavour and I

Once in Southgate, I bumped into him
I apologised, so did he, and we continued on our way.
Further down the street, I said to myself
you touched a famous man, thought of running after
him telling I knew who he was, but since he knew
this already, he would think I was deluded.
I later saw a picture of him on the door of a restaurant
Where he had a “gig”; one is modern.
The ticket price was high, and I didn't care too much
of his singing, his public was for the cognoscenti
who had once been in Paris.
Me, I like Edith Piaf we lived in similar streets.

Haiku
Drunk I was last night
Today my wife doesn't speak to me
I'm sad and lonely

Haiku
I've stopped smoking
Time hangs heavy in the air
In the smoke-filled pub  

Haiku
New Year’s resolutions
Bring out the worst in people
Makes them boring

The ship of ages
It was a hot afternoon when the big bulk carrier left a harbour
at the coast of Bengal bound for Sidney (Australia)
with a cargo of scrap iron from ships that once had ploughed
the many seas, alas too slow in our modern time.
Somewhere in the Indian ocean, the sea separated and
the bulk carrier fell into a timeless zone where life repeated
itself endlessly; the cook is making soup, the captain is
reading a map of the oceans’ great currents.
150 years passed convulsion in the time zone. and the ship
was back on the sea’s surface.
The cook served his soup, and the captain called the harbour
authorities in Sidney, he needed a birth for a ship no one
had heard of, but the manifest stated Sidney.
They let the ship birth on a disused pier far from the city
to the disappointment of the crew.
When the pilot left, he was pale and shaken as he
had navigated the ship through a layer of time.
The customs officials found cigarettes and whisky,
products that had been banned for over sixty years
only marijuana was legal if smoked in moderation.
The crew, the captain and the cook were arrested and sent to
an open camp for interrogation, it was there a nurse noticed
the tribulation was getting old by the day, and the crew could
no longer walk, many were incontinently suffered from senility
and chronic heart failure.
One day they had gone, what was left dust blowing in the wind.

Body obsession

Naked, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror
and asked are you sure this is you?
I’m a fat man with ******* and a big stomach but legs
thin as twigs on the almond tree.
I have diabetes, but that is no excuse, somehow
I eat too much
90% of my food intake is vegetables, not potatoes
no rice or bread, no beer most of the time, so how
could it come to this when what I like is banned?
I like whisky mixed with cold water before bedtime
and now I wait for the health brigade to tell me
Whisky is fattening, bad for the liver and the heart
I will not believe you; too many lies have been told.
I’m body shaming myself. Pathetic!!!

The first voyage

My mind goes back
To a faraway place when I joined
My first ship as a mess-boy.
How sick I was, throwing up
My supper.
There was no reprieve
get on with your job, boy.
I did, but remember the ghastly
the smell of soap suds.
The ship was going to Baku
Then a part of the Soviet Union
And the black sea wasn’t black
But full of ice.
The town of Baku was sparse
On streetlight but safe
A kind solder followed us around
We drank white wine, and I threw up again.
Memories last long I never drink
White or sweet wines.

Seen from the Terrace

The misty weather over Cascais persists
there is no wind and silky rain falls.
Three old freighters must be 34-40 years old,
anchored in the smooth water in the bay.
There is a third wave lurking in the streets
we, the old sit indoors except when going to
the bank to pay bills or to the grocery shop,
that is open during the day.
I notice the ships are Panama registered
old ships usually are, cheap wages and standard,
Sometimes the old ships are abandoned
by the owners, the crew left both penniless
and hungry.
The last journey will be in a town in
the Bay of Bengal, and slowly turned Into nails and
other undignified objects.

Yesterday is tomorrow

Ay the first meeting he loved her, and she loved him,
he was jealous of her flirtatious ways, and harsh words
were spoken. She left.
They met again a few years later he was more rounded
and accepted her little affairs, as she always came back
to him. For many years they were happy to the day
she contracted gonorrhoea which took a few weeks
to clear up and they continue their love life.
But it was a pretence they struggled to believe, it was
like a shadow of doom had cast an evil spell over them.
She took to drink and often smelt of gin in the morning
she couldn't sleep and drink late in the night.
One day she said she didn't love her anymore, she had
met a man who was like he liked to drink and dance.
Again she moved out, this time for good.
Because of their lifestyle, both fell on a hard time
and moved away to a town where no one knew them.
What he often remembers is when they were young
and he tried to jump from a wall to a flat roof and
she held out her arm to save him from falling.

Food Revolution in England

That was what a middle-class paper wrote
and it could not be more wrong.
To eat this esoteric food, you need a thick wallet.
most people in England are poor and since
the food industry has taken over
People, eat pizza, fish and chips and occasionally a Chines meal of chicken and rice.
They have unlearned how to cook a nourishing simple meal.
Yes, we need a deep social revolution.
The paper in question “the Guardian” appear not to notice
the rampant poverty we live in,
Instead, they talk about luxury restaurants where you need a workman´s wage to enter.
To write this article is fraudulent, pandering to the haves
and poking their noses at the hungry in the street.

The Obama presidency

He started out promising but fell at the first hurdle
When he tried to give America a health system
That covered the working classes, what’s left is
An insurance system they can ill afford.
He sent back thousands of illegals back, but since
he was the darling of the liberal press little was said.
Once when he had the chance to become great
By declaring Palestine, a free state, he didn’t quite
Make it, and his speech ended in platitude.
He will be remembered as a suave but weak man
Who baulked at the pressure from Israel?
He was not a great statesman but buckled under
The burden and there are little to remember him
By other than what he could have been.

Happy birthday

the morning started with a bang
four people breakfasted together on his birthday
it didn't bode well.
The breakfast table was loaded with sweet things
He, a diabetic, could not eat, he had an apple.
Switched on the telly as mother and daughter
began fighting about forgotten things, he intertwined
when the mother cried, got her into bed for a rest
The flat fell broodingly silent.
When the fog lifted the protagonists made up and
sat talking about the restaurant they, with the man
who was eighty years old, should go.
The elderly man didn't want to go but had no say
in the matter, they were going to take pictures
for the facebook.
The birthday boy drank coca cola zero and hoped
The party would be over soon he needed his afternoon nap.

Tanka

“Straws bends with the wind
That will uproot you, old oak,”
A yellow stalk said  
“Look behind you, the tree said
The farmer carries a scythe”

Cold is the wind in Europe
It is a stormy evening brown leaves flying in the storm, they a
re dank and slimy tore from the tree with no home to call
their own. I'm thinking of Macron, the president of France
He is extolling globalisation, I'm a nationalist I come from
a country that has naturally evolved has its own culture and
an unspoken agreement on how people should perform.
We don't want a global nation with one culture one language,
one thought as dictated by a newspaper owned by the globalists.
It has been tried before under the dictatorship of Stalin.
Macron is, in the words of Oscar Wilde:” Deep down he is
a shallow thinker.”
Migrants are welcomed in my country if the can blend be as us
and not a confused mob demanding changes in the way
we have accepted the system as it is.
Mass migration is a manufactured phenomenon it could
be avoided by investing in the countries they hail from and
is political to sow discord in Europe.
We see how the USA a beacon democracy, has been turned
into a semi- tyranny helped by the opaque forces of Zionism
they want globalisation to serve their end that is  to enslave
and bend us to their will.
The working class in Britain get it and the ditto Germans
to see the way their countries are going and protests
because of the know if this is not stopped a new war will
begin a war that can only benefit the Zionists.

The boy on the bridge.

At the hospital, I woke up in the night
got up, walked into a hall I didn’t recognize
A nurse came and told me to go back to bed
“My father told me to stay here,” I said
I knew it was in a dream, a poem I had read
many years ago, when I could remember
with clarity what I read.
In the morning, waiting for breakfast,
coffee and a scone, a nurse was busy
sticking needles into me.
I tried to remember the title of the poem
“The boy on the burning bridge?.”

Meghan and Harry

So, Meghan and Harry appeared on the unelected
queen of America´s Oprah, last night.
Banality swam in a sea of phoney weeping.
Harry, the prince, when not feeding, the chickens
had to listen to them and nodding his head.
He cut a pathetic figure.
The gutter press goes after all young royals coloured
or not, Harry´s mother was white as the driven snow
yet she was hounded, one can say, to death.
There is one winner here that is hard-as-nails
Meghan got her prince, and she has been
elevated to schmaltz, the upper class of triviality.

The outdoors

Once, I walked on newly fallen snow
It was sobering,
but then it got cold, and feet froze
enough of sobering.
Thick, woollen socks and boots
I’m not an outdoor man
Traversing the North Pole is not
For me, I’m not a penguin.
I like to stay by the window when
it snows look romantic, festive too
thinking of yuletide of yore.

Epigram 3

If the universe has a limit, will the limitation
Be a wall, made of elastic a rubber band that
Can be overextended to the breaking point
A balloon that can be pierced at will, or like
The horizon, you see it, but it can't be reached.
And what is beyond the boundary?

Cats
  
This morning I went into the outhouse to retrieve something
there was movement between my sacks of stuff, fearing it was a rat
I took flight but out came a cat, and it wasn't frightened by me
apparently, the cat had taking abode there.
“Little cat you can't stay here I will be moving soon.”
The pus took no notice.
I thought of being tough finding a broom and scare it stiff,
but I don't know where my wife keeps her mean of transportation
so I opened up a tin of tuna fish instead, but sternly told it
there will be no more food.
Cats are opportunists they take a look at me and think
“He is a soft touch.” And before I know it they
sleep on top of my bookshelf or interfere with my keyboard.
Once my neighbour a nurse went to Africa for a year she placed
The cat with a friend of hers, but the cat didn't like it moved in with me
for the duration, and when the nurse she came back the pus left me without
as much as a thank you.

To suddenly be old
It came so suddenly one day I woke and was old
I thought it was never going to happen.
To be old is ok up to a point, but the body is falling apart
I walk with a cane now, constant pain when walking unaided.
I have lost my sense of humour nothing is funny,
What made me laugh has turned into shrug about the idiocy
Of humans. We see this clearly when a British troops board
An Iranian vessel, after request, by the USA it is laughable
How they want a war that has no reason other
Then revenge when Iranian students took over the American
Embassy in 1976, it is sniggering funny, I am not laughing as
the world faces another calamity, a war that will hit us all.
Brexit is a hoot the British elite at its worst; it lacks dignity
When incompetent politicians fight for power, do anything
To avoid Corburn getting to control and destroy
The elite’s little earners, I shrug we have been here before
And it is not funny.

Sunlit Cascais

Today the sun shines
Over the bay, a pilot boat
Is going out
To take a small coast ship
into Lisbon.
In the night
the couple upstairs
made robust love
Plaster fell as snow
on our bed.
And that was ok
******* is better than war
I know the woman
often see her in the foyer
she looks haughty and chaste
and unsmiling.
Not that I would tell
about her nightly desire
but the falling plaster
it is a worry.

The story of the young Jesus

Jesus was sceptical of his tribe as a trainee carpenter
he was lousy, could even make a bookshelf, he was bullied for this.
Jesus took umbrage and criticized the establishment of bootlicking priests
whom the Roman occupiers had given them power?
He took to hanging out with a group of radicals of the day
and since he was good with words soon became their leaders.
The groupies, one of the Magdalene, were for the pleasure of the flesh,
although Jesus was fond of this woman, he didn´t show it openly.
Jesus got big-headed thought he could take on the establishment
like when he chased money lenders out of the church.
He was wrong!
He was arrested mocked, and given a thorn crown, but he insisted
he was the proper leader of the people.
they crucified him, but women come to the rescue, healed his wounds
and sent him and Magdalen, the despised ****, to France.
He had seven children and ended his days as a valued goldsmith.

A small collection

Working on a small poetry connection
There is no haste a poem a day keeps the mind focused
And not drown in self-pity.
It is needed good laughter, the fun of a joke
That can have a stream of seriousness underneath.
Excellent fun docent appears by itself it stirs up
The tired mind, something remembered, because
Life is – despite dire predictions- bitterly funny.
Old men departing wisdom is an uproar of pompous
Idiocy you can’t help but laugh out loud.

An Odd Bird
  
   The seagull and I were flying over the Andes.
   the mountain was brown, and we saw a lake green
   as an emerald ring on an Irish girl's finger.
   Let’s fly down and have a bath I said, the gull said
   the lake was poisonous, so we continued on our way
   to the pampas of Argentine.
  Landed on a jade green patch of the land
  it was then the seagull confessed it suffered
  from hydrophobia, it was, therefore, it had left
the Pacific Ocean and avoid derision from birds
that loved the sea and diving for fish.
But a seabird is supposed to like fish.
Who says, the gull angrily uttered I like cooked
meat with boiled potatoes, anything wrong with that!
we walked to an inn, that is the bird sat on my
shoulder, had lamb chops with mint sauce, are you not
surprised to see a bird in here, I asked the landlord,
no not at all it often comes in here it is
the first time I have seen it with a human.

A émigré's Dilemma


I have lived in this foreign country long, longer than I should
Many seasons I have seen, my hair is grey and brow wrinkled
seeking an understanding of a life that makes no sense.
I know their culture, have read Fernando Pessoa, sing their
songs, but I came here as an adult, but my heart is not there.
I wanted to be a part of this Iberian country, but when
remembering a lullaby, my mother used to sing, when the party
is over, I know I’m a pretender.
I have lived here too long, but if I go back to my old country
I will be a stranger, in a town where no one knows my name,
and I will dream of a mythical Portugal.

Deserted by Alfred


It was not my fault I had no shoes
And the police stopped and asked and since it was none of their business
I naturally told them to *******.
was handcuffed and put in a police car,- which was more cooling than
the asphalt, after all, it was October in Albufeira.
I thought this is a perfect movement when a father defends his son
but Alfred who refuses to be my father had gone home
I was left to explain this ridiculous case, but luckily the Portuguese
police force felt sorry for me and let me go.
Next day I bought a pair of sneakers in a Chinse shop and my father
who refuses to be my father was wearing my leather uppers.

The problem of a misfit

The problem with being a ******
is when you come home you have fewer friends,
and those friends you meet are often who were
lost within themselves.
One day I found myself on a park bench drinking
brandy from a bottle that was passed from man to man,
this struck me as a shame to have sunk so low
I got up left them with the bottle had paid for and
walked away, my life was not here.
I left the town for England for a while it was interesting
but couldn't understand the class divide, I had to
find a place of peace, and I saw it in the interior
of Portugal and have lived here ever since.

The occupiers

Faro is a beautiful coastal town with a marina
and wonderful blue waters, it is an old city with
historic buildings and an inner wall where
the army and rich merchants lived, but there is a problem
you can hear it like swarm bees long before you
see them; rats are building a city in the ancient
the sewer system and get sunlight through
the storm drains, not to forget they a have an army to,
vermin come ashore from long boats, established
a colony thrived and married into the local rats.
At night thousands of them come over ground
and clean the city of waste, the sanitation dep,
has little to do in a town with no litter, but how
long will it takes before the vermin are strong
and ready to expel the humans?

PS. This scribbling was never meant to have political
Connotation.

The very rich woman

Once at a meeting, I met a lady
Dripping of riches belonging to a posh family in Ireland.
She didn’t have her Bently it was being repaired
I drove her home in my Fiat.
We sat on her sofa kissing and cuddling and ended
Up in bed, she wanted ******* with her on top
And I found myself
With my head in her crotch, when she had an ******
It was like being hit by a bucket of warm water.
There were other positions with her on top too and in
In the end, she fell asleep.
In the morning she asked me to make her breakfast
Which I did, and then she planned my day
Apparently, I should mow the lawn and trim the roses
She spoke to me like I was her servant.
I said I had no time, but stay away tomorrow I have
Guests, that was ok, I had no intention returning.
She rang a few times but I always found an excuse
She lost her temper said I didn’t belong to her class
And she could have made me wealthy, me, I rather
Be poor and free.

Truck driver
I heard crackling under the floorboard
could it be my cottage is falling into a deep
the underground lake where fishes are blind
since they never see daylight.
A lake that has pure crystal water and is free
of sharks and crocodiles.
You are right I have been watching a program
about truck drivers in Alaska who risk their lives driving over a frozen winter lake.
Real heroes who win no medals driving supply
to obscure places dicing with death every day,
their destination is a little pay packet to keep
their families fed.
The crackling has stopped I have to tread lightly
and not eat a full English breakfast.

Haiku  
Ripples in the cove
Had a dreamy quality
A Memory

The lake a mirror
The heaven admired itself
Rain erased mirror

Irrational rollers
Committed suicide on cliffs
White foam on emerald

Obituary of a cook
A famous French cook has passed away
this is sad of course, but it shows how the world of catering
has changed character.
From an unshaven backroom man to a leader but only
a leader in his restaurant for cooks holds no other power.
I enjoyed that he once threw a plate of spaghetti
after Chef Ramsey for not making ravioli right, mind
with a master like that no wonder George Ramsey swears a lot.
But hang on a bit, if we elevate cooks to the status
of world leaders of great importance then we should stop
and think of the millions of women who cook for their
family and do so by being economical with their food so
it can be used the next day.
Of course, there are millions of women in our modern
society for whom the sight of a carrot or a potato leaves them flabbergasted,
but as the fairy tale says
need makes a naked woman knit a blouse.

The fly

Mother had gone to work
I, a precautious child, was ill and at home.
By the window I caught a fly
pulled its wings off to see how long it would survive.
It didn´t.
Overcome by guilt I burrowed it in a *** plant.
When mother came home, I told her,
I think I wanted to be punished for my sin
she said nothing.
It is easy to love a new-born lamb or a cute kitten
but all life is here for a reason.
It is unsightly life that tests us as human beings.

A few thoughts

Morning mist
I Can’t see the bay

We are silent
You and I

Your brave silence
Calms my nerve

When the sun arises
We will be erased

You and I

The fog will reappear
Will we?

The kiss

her lips had kissed many a man a butterfly
Fragrant and vivid like a spring day in May
Yet not to the point of pollination.
She waited for a kiss that tasted of wealth
She dreamed of a castle and ballgown if silk
Sailing down the river on a boat made
Of a swans’ feather sewn by silky threads.
She met him and when they embraced,
It was as wonderous as when earth and
Heaven became one and nothing counted
At last fertilisation and deep was their love.
At dawn she awoke he had gone, Nine
a month later she gave birth to a golden son,
Her lover is a poet living inside his dream.

The paedophiliac?

I sat on a park bench beside another old man
we saw a beautiful 17 years old girl walking past
and I said: we can’t get any of them.
The old my smile and said she is my granddaughter
and I sleep with her every night
My God! Another ****, Got out of my seat and hasted away
in my case slowly.
The old man died, they tend to do so. At the funeral
his granddaughter said to me never liked him much
but he made me do it.
She looked at me with eyes as glacial as the Arctic before it began
to thaw and asked: will you be my Valentine?

The Heat elsewhere
  
It is hot think of switching the air-condition on
but I think of the refugees from Syria waiting for a gate to open
Israel will not want to become a nation of ******.
Jordan like ways has a million refuge and political problems
but if Europe pays them enough can take in some more.
The refugees are sweltering in the hot sun many have not
tents and there is no shade in this no man’s land hell,
I hope the Red Crescent and Doctors without Borders have
the courage to help, all I can do is send money and
not switch on the air-conditioning.

Greek Summer

This dawn I was an Adam without a fig leaf seeing the sunrise, the sun looked a bit pale
like it has lost power, put on a shirt
one has to be careful about not catching a cold.
Now at nine in the more, it is getting warmer
if not as warm as yesterday.
I do like the sunlight, but lately, it has been
too intrusive and a bit of rain would be welcome
it freshens up the street and scents wonderfully
clean trees and fresh minds are a lovely combination.
But we humans are never satisfied when it is
******* down in October we look for the next summer.
But that how it is natural does what nature must?

The division

Here in this landscape of bushes and crippled trees
the grotesque peace of daylight ghosts, grey boughs
stretching upward appealing to a soundless god.
“Give us today a new life.” There is only one deity
the almighty one goes under the name of Silvanus.
Those who do not understand this are doomed to
a life of empty pursuit of pleasures.
Crowded nightclubs and casinos, people trying
not to be alone in the night and face the truth
we are mortals and infrequently remembered.
Faces in a black frame, seeing you seeing through
you and into an ever-expanding void.

Peculiar things

It has been raining so much that the lemon tree
is taller than a building of flats where we live.
A neighbour who was hit by one of its fruits
is still uncommunicative.

A flat battery in a jaguar is a sight to behold
when sitting in a bough of a tree.

The aroma of lemon juice wafts through the building
the restaurant in the basement sells fried fish
Quite fitting since it is Friday,
I like eating pork chops while driving a porch.