If the world spun a bit faster and we run a bit faster it might get a lot lighter earlier, but if that doesn’t work I can always eat carrots, Dad always said that  eating carrots helps you to see in the dark, Mum contended that eating fish gave you brains, neither one did it for me.

Friday and the jury’s out
probably on the ****
and we have to slave away?

something amiss in the state
of Denmark
( Shakespeare nailed it and I just failed it)

Sepia seeping in
and thinking
I don’t want to go
back to begin again
to go against the grain again
or to feel that crushing pain again
so
I paint the walls in red
the ceiling cyan blue
the doors, I leave as they are,
ajar,

the colours might do the trick
and stop me
from picking at scabs.

Only the windows still rattle
which has nothing to do with
drugs.

Their voice bangin’ on in my head
and believe me when I say that I’m
hangin’ on by the thread that’s
attached to the last of my sanity.

Noisy dreams are the worst
eyes poppin’ out of the bed
blood vessels ready to burst
but now I’m awake,

Today
I’ll take the pink pill
because I’m not ill
the green pill is for when
I am ill
or maybe today will be
special
it could be different
I might even be social and
talk

I’ll see how I feel a bit later.

You
no longer
show up in my history
what happened to
you and me?

,

We lose friends
and the older we get
it never seems to end
and
those friends
are in short supply
I hope that the rest
of my friends
never die,

Instead of taking a crack at it
you wonder as you look back at it
could I have done that?
We all know when the time is ripe
but time escapes you every time,
so have a go
you never know
you
might surprise yourself.

Voice.

I hear many things,
the rustle of silk as she opens her wings,
the sweetness of nectar she brings.
I hear the falling of night,
the slight whisper of winds,
her breathing beside me,
with words she will guide me
I hear all this inside me,
such a cacophony of
sound.

Here's to you all out there
calling to those out there,
you are the one
who will go on.

A question
take your position
sink
or think
the pain will never
leave,

grief
like leaves from a tree
fall
and
I call again
to those out there
you
can bear it
  ·

Yeah
I am the latest thing
in fashion accessories
a necessity
a bit like a dictionary
when you can't find the words.

At present I am,
Sometimes I am past,
what is the future
in the runes, I have cast?

Charlatans everywhere
sharing their lies
and like Simple Simon
I buy their pies.

not sure which chicken crossed what road and don't even care,
but
It ended up in the ***

did you get
what I got?

no, you never
because I got the Wishbone

breaking news,
chicken wishbones do not work
which is like our
Parliament
and when I say our Parliament
I mean, their Parliament
because once that shower get in
we're put on hold
until we become important to them
which is sometimes never.

I wish they'd cross the road.

And what does this have to do with chickens?
well
they're all a load of cluckers
like those in Parliament.

She steals in from the room next door
sits on the nursing chair
tapping her feet on the floor,
it is the music she knows I adore
and I ask her
to tap me some more.

It was on a day like this day far away
when once upon a time began.

I thought they were fireworks
but
they were just police cars
with flashing lights
and sirens,
not the sirens
I'd have chosen
not the ones
in the southern seas

hard to please
that's me.

bedtime
en Angleterre
so glad
that She's there
beside me.

Everything went in the cup
and surely it would have runneth over
if only I'd remembered to put the water in.

Life's a bit similar to a board game,
at times we get bored with it
but play it just the same.

She,
the best half of me
gave me a gift when I got home which is
a place where the sun always shines,

unexpected,
the loveliest things always are
and are better by far for that.

Life's like that too
we never know when or with who
we'll be happy
until we find the one
or the one finds us
until then
we're only living.

In the most unlikely of places
in weather-beaten faces
in old battered leather suitcases
and sometimes we don't have to look
sometimes it's just there,
inside
waiting for us to realise
and to accept it.

Today is the first day of the rest of it
so
I am preparing myself to make the best of it.

Difficult when you're cynical but not impossible.

Let the night be gone
and so it was,
I switched the light on
and there I am
the man I was
and because it's Monday
I'll have some cream in my coffee.

If only the day could be microwaved
and I could do
eight hours of work in seven minutes
at four hundred watts, but
it can't.

see!
technology is not that advanced.

That was us then
using the pen
accusing the world.

Look at us now,
nib less and clawless
and then there's
lNibbles the cat that
can't catch a mouse.

Because we're tired?
yes
put it down to tiredness.

Sunday and I worked like a Trojan
not the registered trademark one
but a man from Troy,
oh
boy do I have to explain everything?

I see no ships as She slips into the bath.

on the perimeter I shall swim with her
we shall laugh and dive into where
it all began.

Once again I woke
though
not sure if I'm awake,
my head aches
my legs ache
She says
take a cure-all
by that
She means
Panadol,

I take a minute to think
did I drink last night?
no!
that's right,
I was working til ten
got home,
bellyflopped onto the bed
dead to the world.

..and more of the same today.

..but not all doom and gloom
I left some room to swing the cat
( not a euphemism )

They opened me up to take a look and to understand what made me tick, I saw it all on the cameras and boy did it make me feel sick, they prodded and poked and one of them joked, he looks like a slab of pork, I looked at him with his triple chin and thought, Mister, you should talk, you look like a field full of pork.

But they got me fixed and sent me on my way
back to the battle and into the fray.

Woke up feeling drunk
bouncing around
thinking Kerplunk,
it's a game,

but I never touched a drop
work wouldn't stop
so
I had to keep going
knowing that eventually
the chefs would see sense
and be still and
we all could leave.

jeez us and please let us rest,

Sold down the Suwannee
prepackaged if only
we'd listened
to prophets and seers
but we were deaf in
both ears and blind to the
signs that were shown

ah,
that wild blackwater
we rode it to Mexico
and
passed out on Mezcal.

We had to try
if not to live
then to die
as men.

Down in Harlem, no one dares to question
hands up? no problem,
something going on and definitely wrong
down there.

Durango!
eureka, I got it, not Fandango but Durango
and not Eureka that's East of the Pecos
or it might be one of the other three directions.

so where's Fandango then?

Perhaps some of us
should be put in cabinets
and
labelled as curios,
who knows maybe then
we'd get some attention.

Twisting round and bending in
but where or when
does the seven-coiled serpent
begin or end?

I have been constantly turning
in the winds of change
and chance,
the serpent, always with me
and
though thy rod and staff protect me
I am fighting all alone.

I found the end of the rainbow
at the start of the rainbow's end
and the end of the start is where
we take our leave and depart
only
to begin again.

It doesn't matter that the pitter-patter of rain woke me, I was awake and that's what counts, not the sheep I counted before sleep overtook me, not the dreams you starred in which I admit shook me, but I should be so lucky.

Winter,
and we're approaching
I'm sitting in coach
She,
is in first class.

The stars align
yours and mine,
and not before time
I might add.

In her eyes I see sunshine
there is warmth in her smile.

Another one steps to the left of what's left of me,
but
there's always the third man, the one I never see,
the one who's coming after me, the one who went
before me.

Have you been disappointed by the ruling political party?
if so, you may be entitled to condensation,
ha Compensation would fit but you're getting *** all from this party.

If there's no picture then how is it real?
feel like you know the answer?
Sudan
Ukraine
Gaza,
pick any three from three,
and three more will pop up
but what's a war between friends?

it has always been obscene
******* for the masses
the working classes
the uneducated,
and this is what we waited for
another fukin ***** war?

I'm going to sleep,
and aren't we all?

Then and now and we all fukin know
how
that turned out,

we should have jumped
and gone over the edge.

here we sit, bit between our teeth
ground
and around about now
they'll smile and tell us how
it's for our own good.

None the wiser than I was
when I was wise beyond my years,
but now I'm older and I'm greyer
and the days are so much shorter,
my shadow seems to linger
I admit, I linger too.

Liver spots and little dots to match
I have to catch my breath at times
can't do what I used to do

and that's okay
I'm here today
you
can thank me later.

The lid's hanging off
the door is askew,
we're all a bit loopy
and that includes you

whatever pills you take
be they blue, white or red
you know you only take them
because you're going off
your head,

and I'm sitting here quite sane in the rain
waiting for the sun.

We could have been
more transparent in our conversations
if only we were more aware of our own conditions.

We could have drawn aside the curtain.

But here we are
still
so far away

and it's raining
not surprising
but
welcomed
like we'd welcome
an old friend.

I rock
in a rocking chair,
but
I really want to rock
on a rocking horse.

The older we get the more we get set in our ways,
yeah right,
I'm getting set to get ready and go
to go and throw snowballs
write graffiti on church walls
and then She calls to ask
if I'm making the tea.

Sure as **** you're feeling the pinch
this lot is tightening the cinch
well
they work us like horses
don't they?

Here we are again,
a new pain in the ****
but aren't they all?
and
for the sake of argument
let's call them
politicians

robbing *******
in the olden days
they'd have been branded
as malefactors,

as I get older
anarchy attracts me
even as the odds are
stacked against me
anarchy
attracts me,

She tells me to behave.

Nothing out of the ordinary
it was just another day at the seminary
and later we did magic tricks for the peasantry
eliciting oohing and aahing from those who had
bought into the plan,

this seems like a dream and might well have been because I think attending a seminary for someone like me is definitely out of the ordinary.

It rained cats and dogs through the night here although in Springfield I'm guessing it didn't.

still raining now and how you may ask am I supposed to go out in it,

well I'll dress up in oilskins ( asif)
put on me pith helmet,
apparently
they're trending in
Merthyr Tydfil,

him at the back
who's a clever ****
shouts
don't you mean a pit helmet
I tell him to pith off.

Tear stains on the pillows
other stains on
the sheets
the maker greets us
notwithstanding
who or what
we've had a hand in

Pretty gruesome then
but then we grew some
now
we
don't know what to do.

Tracy Emin
feminine

and made us
more aware.

Today was really trying,
trying to **** me
with boredom
I
should have kept my
pyjamas on
and stayed in bed.

but I did my best to stay abreast of the tidal if you know what I mean.
everyone looked sullen, almost inevitable in this climate.
and
it almost finished me but see me
I'm not that easy to finish.

She just told me to finish what I'm doing and I had better do that or I sense there'll be trouble brewing,

life is tough
we
just have to be tougher.

It looks like I'll be canoeing to work today,
I had a kayak but ate it ( old joke but so what )

In my mind I've already finished and am back at home, that's in my mind, but it doesn't make it so and so which is not a needle pulling thread although that too is in my head it'll be off to work I go.

Rambles on and on as if the record's stuck.

There is more to do than can be done
so little time and what there is revolves around me,
the earth around the sun, the bullets in the chamber
lining up within a gun.

Do I know?
I don't know but the answers are there
everywhere you look,
obvious to me that
I don't look in the right places.

Sunday not sundae
sweet or sickly
both are crying out
please pick me,

I pray for guidance
to the satnav
she tells me to
go straight
for four miles.

I wonder what she means
by
go straight.

Remember the interview
no
and neither did you
because
they wouldn't allow it

and yet
I sat with you
told you secrets
let
you know
things

You
told me more
in the light that
shone
from your words.

We see her
pretend
not to know her,
but
she is the shadow
in the valley,
far below us.

I look nothing like the old me
or so She told me,
but I think her prescription
needs looking at.

this is from the last will and won't it be Sunday tomorrow.

Interesting
when you realise that you're the only one who can do anything and do nothing.

sting in the tail?
and
that's the reason we fail when we try to try because we don't try at all.

I wanted chips but didn't want to peel the potatoes
who knows
I could have had chips if I did

and that is the want in you
you don't want to
and wonder
what would happen
if you did.

when you're near enough and fear enough I shall tell you stuff that'll make you quake and then you'll know what fear really is.
but maybe not
maybe
the black spot
will remain
in Blind Pew's
hand.

Would you sail off with me across the sea for hidden gold
and forget everything you've ever been told about the skull and
crossed bones?

would you head inland on an island or would you stay within reach of the beach listening to the waves?

does serenity suit you?

when the only way out is to get right back in and make a splash
wait for the dark and wait for the sharks

nothing ever leaves you it just goes away for a while.

I wanted to go to Butlins
but ended up here at
Pontins
and not even the
contipontinental
one,
no,
it was
the one at
Camber Sands,

the camber was obvious to me
the beach sloped down to the sea
the sands were sandy which was handy
for building castles,

that is it
glad I got that off my chest.

It's long john weather said Long John as he put on his long johns and his pirate crew who were shivering their timbers as crews do when the weather turns your fingers blue agreed.

My wife shakes her head
and tells me to come back
to bed,

I reply
aye aye, Captain.

writing alone is a
dangerous way to pass the time
much better to pass go and
collect two hundred.

But I'm just a seam in
this place,
are you
dreamin' of me?

She,
says maybe
come be my baby,
tonight

looks alright
to me.

Who thought a Caledonian sleeper was a lump of wood under a Scottish train track?

come on, don't hold back

oh
just me then?

listening as the cracks appear and another notch gouged in my ear to remind me that nothing is now as it was
but I'm still here,
still me in the mirror,
or rather
an older version,

the original was lost,
it was
a bit like me but not me

Things we
outgrow and sometimes we don't know we outgrow
because we don't miss them,

how can I be the only one
tell me I am not
because the Caledonian sleeper
has got me worried.