Things coming in from the sea,
yes
it's that mist out there that frightens me,

something or some thing could be hiding

She says
but we're miles from the sea
and that worries me even more,
things are advancing.

Well,
this isn't getting the grass cut.

But times like these are few and far between the Devil and the deep sleep of the just,

one could bust a gut doing too much by waking up,
a bit late to realise that
when I opened my eyes to find the beer in the glass from last night had gone flat.

The coffee was hot but it's not now
somehow time passes and things cool.

This is still not getting the grass cut and my stomach feels like my throat's been cut so it must be time for breakfast,

at last the point of no return
got to go now and watch the
toast burn,

have a good day
even if it is Monday.

Sunday
and the sun is rising
put your eyes in
and take a look.

another hot one
so
get your shorts on.

I love the way
light covers me
in different shades,
the way it sparkles
and in sunlit glades
the way it fades
in and out between
the leaves,
leaves me breathless.

Green grapes.

What a palaver
here we both are
sat in the parlour
drinking a sherry
and who do we
thank for that
yep
Francis flamin' Drake.

If you have been affected
by the Eurovision Song Contest,
you may be eligible for absolution.

I am certain
that behind the curtain
there's a wizard waiting

nil points for imagination
but
I still feel full of nul points
and
that's the situation,

I have to do
something new
to
revitalise
to
re-energise
but then I compromise
and have another coffee.

She rode in a surrey
which was not made in Surrey
it was the Studebaker of its day
and now it has had its day
because of the Motorway
and
automobiles
and
tyres
and wheels
and
speed

suddenly I need
an automobile.

You have to face it
time has the edge,

there have been lots of edges
some we've gone over
thinking that was the finishing line,

time has the final say,
but look at today
we've had all the time in the world
and yet, done nothing with it

that's the beauty of it
and
the cruelty within it.

Summer and some aren't
that's the way I look at it.

Today looks like one of those days
and by one of those days, I mean a great day,
the sky a
sky blue that flits through my eyelashes

opening the sash window
I shout out loud to let everyone know
what a great day this will be
and
some sad sack of something
reported me to the
noise abatement society,

I'd say
it's still a great day
but for the gagging order.

When you understand it
you can turn your hand to almost anything,
oh yeah!
that's right
put the lathe operators out of business,
said the lathe operator.

Good luck with leaving no carbon footprint to save the environment.

Trash and more trash making more trash
and good luck cashing in on that.

What happens when they fill all the landfills and there are no more landfills to fill?

we'll probably find that out in about ten years according to Google which is sat on my lap thinking it's a cat and making a whirring sound.

If this is the best of it
and we have been blessed by it
why is the baby crying?

The Midwife was halfway to being married
but she carried herself very well
the priest on the day didn't see it that way
and knew we were all going to hell.

Then at my beck and call,
the bill said it all
surprise me said Cilla
who drank sarsaparilla
and looked like a killer
dressed all in black.
but
back to the best of it
and
if this is me being blessed by it
you're welcome to the rest of it

I'm going fishin'
again.

..and if you've ever wanted to get back to where you were
I am here to tell you
that it wouldn't be you there
it would be
someone
a billion thoughts away
and
that's my thought
for the day.

now
a billion and one.

I know that they make up new words for old things to make us think that old things are new things and things are not getting better but worse,
do you sleep at night wondering if one day they might change the night and make up a new name for it and if they do would it be the same for you?
so many worries and worries about worries
it's no wonder I worry.

I will take some time
open a bottle of wine
and then take some more time
to take time to drink it
and by that time I'll be drunk enough
to not worry about worry and stuff
and nonsense.

Jason
Jeremy
Bethsheba
Bellamy
Frank
Hank

we went through a lot and
then settled on
Gaston

so the bear has a new name
we had a good game
and now
we can have a picnic.

It was all that moaning and groaning which presented me with the idea and thus after much deliberation, self-medication and things we don't mention I have come to the conclusion that,

there are ghosts that live inside bedposts!

well,
I suppose it's to do
with the
housing crisis
and
rising prices,

but
it's disturbing
and
it disturbs me.

Hilda was walking the dog
and even though it was a firedog
no one corrected her.

One pint of milk in a plastic bottle for ninety pence!
have we lost all sense of what basic means?
frikin beans one pound and forty
well
fork me a frankfurter
let's go the whole hog.

Give a dog a bone
and your broth's gone,
you scoff,
but half of you don't even
know about bone broth.

Funnily enough
my conclusion is that
buying fast foods
don't make you
any faster
and buying good food
only makes you poorer.

it's either innuendo or out the window,
si
magnifico said Alberto the Spaniard who was hard of hearing even on a clear day,

of course, it's always your Mother or Manana down at the Copacabana,
didn't Freud say that?

I practised it for years
and got so good at it
that no one noticed.

We will get there because there has always been where it was and we knew but never acted upon the information, so "you are here" according to the map and you cannot argue with that.

Another memory to keep
and one more notch
on the brainstem

which is where my memories
are dredged up from.

unusual?
it's downright incredible.

The woman with pearls for eyes,
the world is her oyster
the guys all adore her
but
she sat down beside me
and proceeded to ignore me,

in a leisurely fashion
or so I imagine.

A long time takes a long time
I expect it'll be worth the wait.

aw ****
it
becomes the bedtime
can I rhyme it?
no
you fukin *****
tomorrow
be a long time
to rhyme,

go to sleep.

I do wonder what was the choice
when I had no choice
only the voice that richochets

and in the voice the echo that says
take the sick you need me
and I
who could not feed the need in me
would not listen
to this one who was forgotten,

I remember then
and
I guess you do
who I was
but
I'm still me
in
a different century.

I heard that Sadiq Khan was on the streets of Newham
and I thought surely he couldn't be begging
because that's the only time that we'd see him,
but it was probably votes he was looking for

well
look no more,
someone else got the keys to the..
..oh wait..

News
Breaking Now,

somehow
it looks like it looked like in 1388
and here we are
waiting for the
Workhouse to open.

We take these little diversions
and call them conversations
and we're designed that way

the alternative
a
blank canvas
and
no paint.

I never felt that seven-year itch
maybe it was a glitch in the system
perhaps I was standing in the kitchen
thinking of how she has chained  oops
I mean changed me

definitely for the better.

I know very little
but even that knowledge
in the wrong hands is dangerous.

Fire and storm
only one keeps us warm
but we cannot discard the
other.

Whatever wills us to live
also wills us to die.

Erring on the chilly side
the wind's a bit on the wild side
I think that I may stay inside,
and read myself a book.
I took a look through the bookcase
in case I saw something that I'd fancy

well
Nancy Drew's a mystery,
a cup of tea and a biscuit
and I'll bury my face in it.

I see that those bleeders have still got their beaks in
******* up the last of the wine,
about bleedin' time we got shot of them
put the flamin' lot of them
in the chokey
and
that'll do for me,

cast them all out into ***** and sod 'em
and
for good measure you can sod 'em again.

yeah
we'll have new Mayors yoked to the same old chain
telling us it'll be different but you know and I know
that it'll be more of the same,

I'd go fishin' but it's raining and I blame him
in Downing Street for that.

There's always a catch but it's not always a
'Catch 22'

on the shore of the biblical Galilee
Jesus
gave catches for free,
it's true and if you don't believe me
ask him or her or ask any one of them
who were there.

It has to be virtual because the reality is too painful.

They're making a program
where even blind men can see the truth.

Meanwhile
those of us stuck in the pre-decimal are still dinosaurs dreaming of
the digital.

And
does it or will it make any difference when the lights go out and we all power down?

If I wanted more Facebook friends I'd add all those young ladies who said that they found my profile interesting,

I do wonder about them and their taste in ( interesting ) men.

Thinking
it was armageddon
then finding
it was only lightening
and the thunder was just thunder
not the World being split asunder

what a way to start a Thursday.

disappointment one
but
She says,
what the hell are you on?
well
it ain't a slow boat to China.

May is that time of the month compressed into a day and the day lasts a month and there's nothing one can say except perhaps it was rain stopped the play.

I'm glad it wasn't armageddon because I slept the night with no pyjamas on,
that would have been embarrassing.

We came this far
to find that we're still in the same place,
how bizarre.

treading water ain't no trick
walking on it,
now, that's slick.

But how far have we come?
same shadows, same sun!

We're running but the sand in the hourglass
runs faster.

What's cooking?
probably the books
is what I'm thinking.

It must be double entry
because they're all bent
or so he tells me.

There's a smell of peculiar
emanating from Westminster
it must be their subsidy
or maybe more double entry

the bean counters are busy
making sauce for the goose
the tax men are rabid and
they're being set loose


so
that's what's cooking and it
looks like a storm.

we could be rambling along a country lane  or better still we could be sitting up by the old mill among the buttercups and lilacs and having a picnic of peanut butter sandwiches and freshly pressed lemonade and then lying back and watching the movie show of clouds that pass,

we could be
if you were with me
but you're not
because you married that little snot, Timothy Gregson
and I am on my lonesome

so it'll be lunch for one at the chippie
again.

they tell you that it's a giveaway and then they'll ask you to pay,

what a waste of space when I could be seeing what you had for dinner last night or
how your cat can bark like a dog

we're bogged down in the minutiae of what goes on in someone's mind's eye.

the news isn't the news breaking or not
and the ads are just as bad
they're just taking the proverbial.

Concertinaing again
compressed on a runaway train
and Casey Jones, that bag of bones
is nowhere in sight.

But there's only so many times i can fold
so i put the concertina on hold
and try to stretch.

Haha fascinating what the mind feels
when the seals break

and that's when the antipsychotics
come into their own.

They are out there
thinking they're
the Jetsons
but
looking more like
the Simpsons.

yep you know them
the peculiar ones
the out of the
ordinary ones
the ones that are
your grandchildren.

and they're getting degrees
the
Bachelor
the Master
am I going to fast for ya?

there are
'ologies for everything
today

in my day
you went down the pit
or off to war
to do your bit
God save the King
had a certain ring to it

and now
it's
Futurama
which is
Fukushima
on acid.

Sing to the Bazouki
dance the Zorba
eat Tsatziki

he dreams of Knossos
whilst snoring like a colossus
sleeping like a statue
on the island of
Corfu.

It's getting lighter in the mornings
which is a weight off my shoulders,
darkness is heavier by far
and by far
I mean about fourteen pounds an inch
at sea level
yeah,
it's all Greek to me too,
but the way is the way out of the
night where in limbo the ghosts
hold onto you tight.

Monday and the record is stuck
I've been here before
just my luck
another repeat

and then you become superfluous
which to me sounds quite
ridiculous.

When books are kept in a museum
it'll be us
the redundant
who'll be out there to free 'em.

We are the pensioneers
like mountaineers
but
without the climbing.

and we're
also good at listening
when the hearing aid's
working.

They may want blood from you but do what's good for you and deny them the opportunity.

I remember the Lockdowns when them friggin' clowns down in Whitehall were laughing at us and having a ball.

Vote?
yep I'd vote that lot into Judge Jeffreys's courtroom and hang the whole shebang.

But for that, I'd do penance
while they pay me a pittance
and call it my deliverance

we're still in lockdown.

Rolling your joints is not exercise
and
the medicine ball is not medicine at all
it's all lies.

You fooled me again
walking in out of the blue
and I,
what did I do
but stand here and welcome you

I
know in my heart
that you will go again
and fool
that I am
I'll welcome you back again.

it goes on
and
it goes over me,
just
like the tide
rushing back in
you
will drown me again.

That is life
it may be love
it could be ecstasy

stop fooling me.

No one in their right mind would walk through the wilderness, no, they'd avoid it,

imagine the snakes snaking and the wolves taking you in, even thinking you were a little bit thin, but you'd do for a snack, oh yes, everything out there will attack you and them bears, yes, them bears will track you and I don't mean GPS.

Jeeez it's downright scary
birds of prey waiting to devour me
and those things with stripes
thinking I'm ripe for the ****.

But I will not give way to my fears
nor fall prey to the laughter of my peers
I shall instead stay indoors watching
Attenborough
with a couple of beers.

Well?
I woke up
was there anything else?

Getting to the doing will most definitely be the undoing of me

there comes a time in every man's life when if he is wedded
his wife will say,
what are you planning on doing today?

no mention of getting to the doing or how long it will take you to do.

so
I woke up
and gave up
and I'm doing it now.

Waiting for the gas man, he's probably walking as he doesn't seem to have a gas van, but that's just a guess.

Meters and metres and metric electrics everything's charged by the foot, I'd give 'em all a boot right up the jacksie for charging me over the odds.

Cooking bacon over a candle light and to be fair the bacon is crisp but it doesn't taste right, a bit waxy if you ask me.

It's Friday and I no longer care and again to be fair I don't really care when it's Monday.

There's plenty of room and more on top,
the bus stop stops the bus and we get on.

Let us all have a sing-song said the conductor.

yeah yeah
the wheels on the..
..what a fuss
just to ride on a London bus
where every fare is the stage that we bear.

The driver on the 243
looks a proper misery,
I believe that
the 141 is the best one to be on
but
whatever floats your boat.

Superstars
we should all have cars
bright and big and shiny
when everything else is tiny
one has to compensate.

Friday yay and yay once more
in Regents Park the lions roar
I close the bedroom door and
am as quiet as a mouse.