Ten years!
a decade,
did I fade?

Do you think I still look good?
would you tell me or
would you
let me go on imagining that
I'm still in the spring of my life.

What then in another ten
will I know you
will you remember me
will we even be?

I know that I'm no longer him who goes to the gym to build up his pecs,
I'm the man inside wearing slippers and specs who pets the dog and goes out at night to look at the stars,
but somehow the same.

Life only gets livelier when you live it.

Today does not know that it is Monday
the light has not penetrated yet,
but not knowing it won't make it
go away,
today
will still be Monday.

Who would buy my dreams,
sight unseen and take them on trust?

Looking back at it
wasn't the filofax
the biggest load of ****
and
those
toffee noses with
pencils
coming out of their arses
scribbling away
as if their day was more important
than mine,

but what was mine?

scratching a living
and
not giving a toss,

the filofax fad when it passed
was no great loss
and now
there are more homes in mobile phones
than people in houses
nothing changes when nothing changes

it all looks like the same old ****.

I make believe it's Excalibur
but
it's actually a spanner
and
I'm tightening a nut.

where would we be
without fantasy?

in the big deal
real world
where everything is a sideshow
where everything is out on show?

I know
what
and he's on second base.

Bud and Lou
know what's what and who's who.

That was last night
when the Generals told us
everything was going to be alright

one hundred plus years
and the tears still drop
the wars don't stop

I think the Generals were fibbing.

She's called time,
bedtime
am I in for a
treat?

The evening came in
like Gunga Din,
British India
without the Sun.

I loved it so
and wanted to be there
but it wasn't to be

She,
keeps a tight rein on me.

Enjoying a meal in
getting the feeling
that tonight might be

and we're all a bit might be
aren't we?

Machiavelli,
well he
would be
wouldn't he?

poet and philosopher
in the age of Medici,
he
would be
wouldn't he?

and here in this year
where anything and everything,
is scrutinised
the politicians
still get away with their lies.

I'm not going fishing
because the fish are full of
plastic,
the rivers are caustic,

I am having a ***
the only fun I get.

Winter is coming
and I know this
because the birds
are going South,
flowing
as fast as any river.

They are an omen
much better than the
weather men.

Spring will come along
with a blooming lovely song
and we'll all feel warmed by this.

..and so.
daylight on its wooden crutch
shambles slowly through the night
arriving with a look
of Autumn on its face.

Men look like that because men look like that and I'm not saying it's right, it might be wrong, but men look like that and some like that when men look like that,

confused?
I am
a man among men
not sure when that happened
but happened it did.

Hoovering
cleaning
washing up
hoovering, oh
already done it
now done it twice,
making the bed
scratching my head
changing the sheets
making the bed
again with the
scratching my head,
have I forgotten
anything?

food in the fridge
fruit in the dish,
wish my memory was better,

have I forgotten anything?
nothing but
a shower and shave
a touch of cologne
and I will wait patiently
for her to come home.

Bet I forgot something though.

As far as it goes and I think it's going to go far this car crash of a government has definitely raised the bar,

we're going to be poorer
and they say,
because of the Tories,
****** and corruption
are just two of the stories.

I should try jumping off this tower block and make believe that I can fly, we're all living in this scary tale and we're all going to die.

We can't Elastoplast or bandage
the damage is too great,
there's nothing else that we can do
we'll have to amputate.

Next time I'm voting with my feet
walking away from all of this
I know when I am beat.

Does it seem that way when you've been awake for an hour and its already been a ****** long day, does it ever seem that way to you?

Doing my best because a change is as good as a rest.

I'd like to think but then again I'd like to do lots of things that are beyond me, but beyond me is where I find lots of like-minded company,

am I rambling?

I looked and thought he looks like me

amazing what you see in the mirror.

But that's only a reflection of what goes on in the mind of John, it's like a windmill up here, sails going around, corn being ground into the flower of my youth.

it doesn't do to be namby-pamby about the nitty gritty when you live in this city, you have to take the rough with the rougher get tough and be tougher or drown and suffer the fate that would await you if you were honest and decent, from the back row   (again) he shouts, like a good Catholic or Protestant?

Good God I reply, I'd rather dye my hair green than to be seen as one of them or perhaps it's one of those who knows

and in the mirror, I look again and see the rain pouring down because it wasn't the mirror it was the window and do you know I wasn't surprised at all.

If forever is the distance between now and never how long will it take to get there?

some things are intolerable
some are unsolvable
most are not.

I was looking out of the corner of my eye to see if I could see around it and catch my ear blushing but I couldn't,
but one has to try
even if it sounds crazy.

She was right,
I'm still awake and it's still night,

years ago my Dad said that if I swallowed apple pips trees would grow in my stomach, I swallowed them anyway and no trees ever grew, I think Dad knew that and was kidding me.

When eventually came,
we eventually gave it another name
for convenience, they told me,
but I finally understood
that nothing good comes from eventually
when it becomes known as the certainty.

So
now I'm waiting for the Mayan calendar to kick in.

She in her wisdom tells me
it's a certainty
that if I don't go back to sleep
I'll be tired later on.

eventually, I will.

The Salvation Army came storming in
the Major ordered a pint of gin,
that was his personal
War Cry.

Many pretended not to hear,
drowning the noise out
while drinking the beer,

I was looking at a good-looking
majorette
who got me to put a penny in
her tin ( not a euphemism )

the Major ordered another pint of gin
I think
I like him,
but I like her more.

There is a website builder
called Spider
who is probably not kosher
which just goes to show you
that you can't trust
anything.

That could be poetry,
I refer to it
as the onset of senility.

Christmas wouldn't seem like Christmas if it was Christmas every day.

I think christ on the cross that would be a loss if we lost out on how special it was.

Okay
Okay
I'm barely awake
the universe needs to give me a shake
and up now, ready to go

someone wants to know
why didn't I go years ago?

all in good time,
time and a quarter
time and a half
double time on Bank Holidays,
which include Christmas days

why isn't it Christmas every day?

When the sun shines and your eyes beam and the world seems like a rollercoaster that's the most I could wish for,

I do not want diamonds or gold my riches shall come as we grow old together.

Haven't we all had that
the pit-a-pat before the boom
before the room starts spinning
when your heart starts beating harder

and the sweating
thinking you might be getting somewhere
then suddenly
you're awake,
screaming for god's sake,
these dreams will be the death of me.

you might deny it
and that won't affect me,
but honestly
haven't we all had that?

Would you trade them in
to begin again,
empty the memory store
get rid of all the pain
and the joy?

sepia seeping out of you
and the brightness of a future
flowing in,

would you
trade them in?

She stretches
as if there are only twenty four hours in a..
..may I tell you
that is not the case.

there is more to come.

I remember crying
when he died in
unfortunate circumstances.
and
you thought this was poetry,
but there's not enough left of me
to do that.

I have a day free
unusually
and what will I do?

sleep
or
keep waking
taking some time
to make some of it mine,

half past six and I'm fuked
I should be tucked up in bed
head on the pillow
but I know
that's not me.

a free day
wow
wonder how much
I'll pay for
that.

Lets put it all out on social hysteria,
she left you and you wonder who's seeing her and what did they have for dinner last night?

search the name, find the name, scroll down the page and feel the rage boiling,
but it's too late mate you had your chances
she upped and left you

lives in Crewe and the man who got her is a train spotter
oh jeez
the rage
scrolls madly up and down the page,

ooh
dinner was tripe and chips,
he rips his hair out

that is what social hysteria is all about,
who gets who and when and where
and do I care?


wonder what they have for breakfast.

Be.
She,
tells me,
but
be what?

that is the question.

Another,
can you catch the wind in a butterfly net?

I'm studying
nothing in particular
not art
nor
architecture
basically
I'm just looking
and being
interested.

The problem is that thing which gives and out it goes again.

Internet in case you wondered what, that thing that I ain't got,

But the phone's connected even if the computer is not,
I can't understand this technology that appears to be telling me that I'm not plugged in or switched on,

oh where have the simpler things in life gone?

Get the band back in
'I'm still standing
yeah, yeah, yeah.'

Never thought it would come to this
the loving kiss,
the hand on my shoulder
and me
being slightly older,
but She,
makes me come alive.

Off for a sprint
in the Olympic Park
or rather
a stint at the coal face
in the place where I work.

I pretend it'll end
soon,
but
it seems to me
that the Moon and I
have been old friends
for an eternity.

She tells me again to be brave
to save some of myself for
myself.

I saw September in a dream or it may have been my reflection looking out at me from the mirror of a stream,
either way it was September I saw
and here it is again
promising rain,

seeing September again
someone singing that September again
and
it feels like this September's the same
as the ones that gone before it.

In a folder on my computer
the line reads
you're getting older

I shall reboot her.
there's obviously a bug.

First
they came for the elderly
which didn't bother me
because I'm not old
then
they told me to pack up
I was in the next take up
but
middle class guy
wondering
middle classly why
me?

they'll come for you too
and raid your pensions
when you're asleep,
those ***** rotten bounders
want to bury you deep.

What's new is nothing new,
a different government
same old crew
and
they're ******* you.

If lying was an Olympic event
they'd win the gold

twin tubs.

help the elderly
but *** the old.

I'm already tired of this.

I needed
but never wanted
and then I wanted
but never needed,
a turnabout,
what's that about?
I'm only trying to survive.
She says,
you'll live forever
and
I never doubt her word.

So
I didn't get a ticket
frick it,
the only oasis
I'll be likely to see
will be in the Gobi.

Follow your dreams
they told me,

of all the bad ideas in all the world
they had to sell me on that,

play it again Sam,
but this ain't
Casablanca
and my life is not
a movie,

get me?

I'm really good at waking up
I can do it twenty times a night.

He cries
no gold medal for me though
just bags underneath my eyes.

Plodding on and nodding off and waking up is not enough to keep me on the straight when everything I go to
I always get there late,

he begs
operate and get that lead out of my legs and make me mercury,
I want to see how easily that I could flow, go underneath the infrastructure, but you know and I do that they ****** you, put you in the system grinder,

do I remind you of a holiday you took?

well do I?

look,
it's only seaside blue when you open up your eyes to look inside of you and see that life's not mystery, not a book you read or blood you bleed

just
something that you do to keep the story going and when you're gone?

waking up is easy and I get better every day

Banjaxed seems like  the right word to use after a day of grafting,
I must be going soft in the head to labour as I do.

knackered, dog tired and not wanting to be wired to the grid
I rid myself of id, ego, ergo I am free,
well, hopefully,
but
we shall see.

This is where I should be
in twenty twenty-four
thinking nineteen sixty-three.

Seven years old when old was last weeks Beano,
how dandy I looked in a bow tie and shorts.

But time as we all know
is put upon this Earth
to show us
the error of our ways.

By nineteen seventy-one I was gone,
a stevedore
boldly going into the hold and knowing
that this wouldn't end well.

We get things right and we get things wrong
and going on we learn to tell the difference.

Tie yourself up in knots
and
what for?

stress
kills
slowly
but
kills
anyway,

chill out
get out
untie your soul.

Easy to say
sometimes
not so easy
to do
but you
are your own
hero
heroine,
so get going
now.

It's not Christmas but it's Saturday
which goes some way toward lifting my spirits,

At the moment which is now at that moment, I was trying to lift my legs out of bed and onto the floor, Coffee in case you were wondering is percolating or will be as soon as I can see through these tired eyes.

This is my morning ritual which doesn't involve a blood sacrifice,
open eyes,
look around
check that I'm all there
and
energise.

Postcards on the sideboard and all wishing that I was here,
then here I shall be.

She tells me
you're not and never have been here,

but I've been there
running my fingers through her hair
wondering where She'll lead me.

It always rains here
that's why
even when it was baking hot in London yesterday I went to work in an overcoat knowing full well that the downpour would come the moment I passed Warrington and I wasn't wrong.

If home is where the heart is and where the umbrellas are lined up like the elderly on pension day then I arrived late last night, but they don't notice things like that up North, if it doesn't have curry sauce on it or mushy peas on the side it doesn't exist,

through the mist which is actually cigarette smoke I can see today coughing its way through the early morning streets,

Ah
so good to be back in the clickety-clack of the mill town.

I think I shall be
someone other
than me,

I shall move differently
almost reverentially
and I will
have a tic in my left eye,
a flicker to remind me
of why
I came back.

I might also have a walking cane
reminding me that I am not the same
as I was.

The sky blushes pink
do I think it saw me
in the ****?

not sure about that
but now the sky
is almost cherry-red

I must remember to
close the curtains
before
I go to bed.

They will **** me
and they'll tell you
that it wasn't me
it was John Doe,
and
just so you know
they're fukin lying.

they off everyone
who disagrees with them
politically
and
they do it publically,
so
when you find me
on the street,
dead meat,
you'll know
that they killed me.

Well
if I could scamper the *** out of going to work I would, Monday should be declared a National Emergency, bring in the army to defend the weekend.

I haven't scampered in years but I'm getting really good at tottering,
next, I'm going to learn how to teeter,
( Grammarly suggests wobble, but I already do that )
and
I think when I teeter it is then that I'll meet her
halfway to wherever it is.

Passion,
like the fruit
if not tended
and cared for
will drop
from the tree,

we are the custodians
look after your lover.