Negative,
live and live or die and slave to sieve your life through the fine light wire
where the buyer controls the market and the product is factory made.

I was conceived in a small town East of the city of spires,
one of many in the land of Shakespeare and Shires and fired in the kiln with the clay from the pit
hardened and *** red with pebbledash dreams setting suns in my young head,
for a bit it was fine and the wire didn't cut,
but when you're dead you don't know that the way it is so is not the only way to go,
sold out and told off and mixed up I coughed up my penny for the guy toll which rolled into the gutter, a puppet on strings to stutter his way to the factory where scissors are polished by steel wool to finish the job.

The old man, my father knew better than I who gets by on a wing and a gallon of grog and the dog doesn't mind being cussed by the master, just as on the Dansette we go round and round and the stylus is us being stuck in a groove.

I move on in tandem with me and my random collection of thoughts and things I have bought though not factory, there's too much of that stuff and it bungs up the works and clogs all the gubbins.

Here's enough time to live and to live it right here or the engineer may turn us to burn us once more,
the overseer sees everything, hears the 5 o-clock bell ring and me with a wing and a gallon of grog.

The rain is ripping down through the curtains of the dawn

I'm dripping wet and need a place to get dry.

Everyone looks soggy, saturated.

The man in shorts might be a sport
but he's looking awfully angry,

no umbrella and what did mother tell ya?
'look before you leap'

She blows her nose
I hold my breath,
germs are not particular.

Folded arms
lots of those
she
blows her nose
again.

The underground
a breeding ground
why do I bleedin'
use it.

The vintage was old vicarage
the label was old spice
the taste was new, peculiar,
a touch which I thought nice.

But I'm spinning rings
a hoopla stall
the fairground's gone,
what happened to it all?

Everything goes
every one grows
everybody knows why
except me.

Then there are times when love underlines everything.

'I want the one I cannot have'

a line from the 'Giant in the beanie hat'
and there is in that a great truth.

The clock ticks along unaware of its song
and we,
unaware that time will always be there,
but sadly
not always for us.

She makes small talk seem huge
every molehill a mountain to climb
and that's what makes it worthwhile.

Ménage was a clever boy
his
scholarly pursuits
brought us lots
of joy
and
most things being equal
I liked him
e
v
e
n

i
f

h
e

w
a
s

F
r
e
n
c
h

I can see it all quite clearly and how dear to me it is,
the night drawn as a starlit sky, the dreams known
as we pass them by and shown only to the Tarot reader,

the seeds we plant that grow and in the winter go and grow again come spring, the birds that freely sing as they steal the air beneath their wings,

it brings an unchained memory fall
from a small boy to an old man
between the span of two hands on the
grandfather clock.

The pretty girls, the country girls, the city girls,
the girls who sought the cultured pearls,
the girls who bought the stories told them
by some men and lost them in their later life

part and parcel?
at times the living's terrible
but mostly
it's okay.

This ducking and diving is one way I survive in,
one staying alive in unethical times.

you can
keep your kudos for a keepsake,
praise
just makes my ears ache.

But think on
you'll give it all up to get on
and
You'll get on for as long
as you don't think.

It's beyond my ken
as to how
and the why
or the when does not
concern me.

But what burns me
what really turns
my stomach
Is
that it is
the way that it is.

No one leaves here intact
we all
at some time get broken,
battered, cracked, marked,
we try to fix ourselves
though it's a stark reminder
that what you might leave
behind you is a mirror that
others can break,

but we make our roads to
travel on, some to tarry on
before we go on our way,

I live today
if tomorrow comes and I am
still whole
I will play that role, that part
in the cast
until the day is no more.

Perfume,
I was naked
and wore some,
awesome but
not pretty.

Acting the goat.

...and what about the coming of age
when the whole wide world is one huge stage
only to find you're a bit part player,

say!
a fellow I know just got on with the show
what would you do?

I wait for the five thirty eight
which by all accounts should
be here by now

Oh!
and how was I to know
the train crews were on
yet another go slow?

But it's always on Wednesday's
almost as if the day's not
bad enough.


So
I'm sat on the jubilee
no joy here
can't swing a cat
not that
I'd want to hurt
poor kitty
a pity
the train crews don't use
the same
rule of thumb.

..and when you finally wake to find that you're down among the fallout  on the editing room floor
will you wonder why you bothered if this is what your life was for?

We're all someone's stills, pictures on the wall, director's cuts or soundmen's cues,
that's all.

Sold off to the studios or is it in our mind
the next find of the century and then you'll
leave us all behind
but
we've all been there and watched the screen
revolve about the wistful dream
sat silently in the cinema
got ****** at midnight
in the bar,
fell into bed and any bed
heads filled with the promise
of tomorrow
and cut.

if it becomes feasible,
workable,
let's give it a go on
the turntable

spin is the new parable
the story that is leaked to
the press

and we are disciples,
we lock,
load and aim rifles
to
shoot out the
centres and
move it on to
the finals,

they flip the vinyl
now
playing side B
nobody said
this was
easy.

Becoming that part of the mystery,
crossing over the boundary,
leaving behind all the misery,
I wonder if the secret will unfold for me.

I see transparency in the darkness about me
as if there's a bubble of light that
surrounds me,
all hope's never lost and that's
patently
true.

You who have never known what it's like to be
carried to safety by the charity
of the Saints in the service of one
that I'll never be,
don't know what it's like to be me.

It's a bust when
I'm just trying to live
and in the living,
I can't find any give, but
the boundary is clear to me
coming closer
approaching me,
I wonder if the secret will unfold.

A privet hedge..a broken gate the House with a roof tiled with Welsh slate,
a broken half open window from which the light throws shadows on the lawn..G'awn be off with you a Cockney voice shouts out.
The Camera pans.

A street,quite neat and real rare around these parts..two lovers on the corner sharing hearts..as if they could beat as one..
Move on there movie man the cop shouts from the black and tan.
The camera pans.

Traffic light that's stuck on green..a crowd gathers." I've never seen the like "..An old girls cry.."Someone will get hurt or even die,call the police "..as if they would bother their fat *** cans..
The camera pans.

It spins and spins upon its pins and captures you and me..and writes in Avatars of cars and flouting clouds of blues and whites,which balance out the unfilmed nights when cameras close their cyclop eyes and digitals tell no more lies.

I rise early like a bird..I heard a camera crew is coming down to film some scenes in my home town.
An expectant hush
An excited rush and then
The camera pans.

Dull as in drab as in get me a cab
because I want to go where the sun shines.

Somewhere in Stepney Green,
they must have a cloud machine
with its setting on grey.

And its Thursday
not that it matters,
it wasn't Thursday yesterday
but it was still grey.

perhaps it's she that fogs my vision
maybe there is no cloud machine at
Stepney Green,
this could still be the dream where
I'm actually living
but if that's true
where is the sun?

It Can't be Langley?
in the undergrowth
both
of them
men in black
bringing the aliens back
tracking me
it can't be Langley

Detention in the ministry
this school of life will finish me,
**** me or diminish me
and polish me until
I shine like gold
and wealth brought up from underground,
pounded into greedy eyes,where
everybody dies to be, trapped into
the dynasty of chains.
Links forged in the furnaces
life until it finishes,
burnish me until
I shine like gold.

It's early this early
I wish it was later and
soon it will and it'll be
later until
it's early again.

This is like going uphill
passengers dropping like flies
eyes on the floor
'Mind the gap' by the door
still wondering
what I'm doing this for.

On second thoughts
it's like a see saw
up and down
until I get to the town
and then
it's downhill all the way

It must be a mutt of a day
a feeling rough
a Wednesday

going my way?
I used to be
but then I got
sidetracked.

Cold and wet
my bones are set
at angles I don't
recognise,

a spiders web of ice
hangs from my eyes
and I can't feel my toes.

Goodness knows
but I do not.

Anyhow it's Friday now
and beezer,
a teaser for the
weekend rite.

Umbrellas and a
boys night out
the
winning combination.

Still have work to do
before the clock strikes
two
and then it's home
to you and
the fireside,
cold outside
but
warm in here
perhaps I'll give the
beer and boys a miss
stay for cuddles and
a kiss.

Yes
that's what I'll do
when I get home
sometime
after two.

You think that it's make believe
but they make you believe.

In the seeing is believing
unless they're still
deceiving you.

I'm flagged up
flash dried so
what the ****
do I care if you
believe what's
out there?

I believed in a better future
a new tomorrow
but not any more,
I now know that it's
just
make believe.

Like a bedouin in the garden of Eden,
roaming around with Eve and
breeding.

And sin waltzed on in.
'hey
take some of this'

Paddy tells me that the
kiss of a sinner's the same as that of the saint
'cepting one's very good and t'other one
ain't.

To be sure the pure took a dive
kicked out of paradise, but
they learnt to survive on
the streets of anger where hunger
was the snake in the grass.

Abel and Cain and paddy says,
'two peas from the same pod
'cepting one was a good guy and
t'other made god sigh'
aye, a
biblical time
dinner at eight
apples at nine
homeless at twenty in a world full
of plenty.

Thanks for the rations, the
fig leaf and fashions
the snake in the grass and
I pass on the rest.

These are the test of times,
the beginning of days and of
Eve and
her ways.

The bible unread
the sea of the dead
the holy land and
Netflix.

The difference is,
she
phones me and talks like she owns me
because she's known me in that biblical sense.

Sniff
*****
noses and stuff
the tube is full of 'flu

cover my face
hide my tracks
that's what I'll have to do.

Sick people should be seen
and not heard
or could that be children?


Monday and all is well
( sniffers not included)
but it's hard to tell
even harder to sell
to the public.

Graduation day
already?
you say,
yes,
time waits for no one

and getting off is like getting on
but in reverse.

We try to strip away a bit each day
to find what lies behind the mask,
are we defined by man made things that
such delving brings us some relief?
This quibbling over what is right
this nibbling below the skin,
this wanting,needing
seeds of light.

Unleash the night in me
if I cannot see
I cannot feel the pain again
will not tax my brain with thoughts
of excellence,
take my blue eyes turn them grey,
strip me,rip me from the day
I do not see
nor care to see
the mask
the mask
unmasks in me the ask I ask myself to be.

I strip a little more,
nearer
coming to the core,
the pip
the seed
the overwhelming need to know,
the mask drops
time stops
end.

Through to the Bank then Northern line to get to Archway and some time for tea, a bite to eat, that special someone that I'll meet.

A walk down to the resting place of Karl Marx, can't forget his face and other notables at peace in Highgate cemetery.

Then to see the ballet, really?
Yes indeed,
a rare treat for these eyes to watch the 'sleeping beauty' rise and grace the stage.

And home again to supper, crumpets on the open fire or grill
A thrill a minute and I just grin and bear it.

Sunday.
you either wear it or it wears you down and London Town's a fashion shoot that shoots to **** you, thrill you, will you sit at peace with me in Highgate by the cemetery?

Are you on the A list?
or like me and
somewhere up near
the T list

and have you ever wondered
what you've missed?

As the end puts the icing on the day
it doesn't really matter anyway

A list
B list

I wouldn't mind a tryst
being one with the *******
my list  
I guess
we all missed
that one.

I know I know and I know that you know that I know and you know that I know what I know that you know.

Knowing isn't everything.

Blessings in disguise
begin with the firelight
flaming in your eyes,
the Suns that rise and
although only one
they seem to go on and on.

The Pharaohs become the scarecrows
and the deities are defunct.

History bemuses me
but
we make our own
most assuredly.

one hundred to one and the
gamble is on,
a rank outsider to tide ya over.

It's a jungle I fear
and the fear's in here
locked in my head.

Bed,
boring,
can you see the walls shake as
I hear myself snoring?

We want somewhere over the rainbow
but
no one wants to go there
all we want to do
is share
on Facebook
what the **** is that about?
like
like
wow
like
smiley
while we
still want somewhere over the rainbow

They say,
that to write a powerful piece
you have to use powerful language.
Is that true
is that what you have to do
Well
Is it?

They say,
that the **** you will find through the day
should be written in ink.
Make your writing stink with the stench of it.
I think
that's absolute *****.
I don't feel the need to write in the way that they say that I should
Would that I did
do as they bid
but I don't.

I shall gently caress those words I undress on the page
this is my stage
and my rules apply.

Life's demanding enough
without understanding that stuff
it demands of you.

Give me a 'lonesome pine'
and something to rhyme
with.

In those olden days when we
were younger and hungered for
the future,
who knew then that we'd get fed up
with it?

With a Beano or a Dandy and an
American cream soda to hand we
were living the dream,
only we didn't know it.

We're not supposed to say that
you can't do a thing today
because they say, that it's not
politically correct

I do it anyway and every which or other way just to stick two
fingers to the man who thinks that he can
tell me how
to go about the business of my life.

I am moderate in my views but speak some language
that you might not choose to hear,
get over it,

we're not all 'peter perfect' and inclined to be
correct,
there are times you have to colour in
by going outside the lines.

but we love
we love
we love and they can't
take that thing away
can't tell me
who I must love
in whatever way
I choose.

A foreverness,
a looking glass that looks into endlessness
full of emptiness,
unhappiness
and a corner, chipped, that spreads the
image resigned to
hopelessness.

I have an empathy with these things that
look but do not see, these minutes fixed to
an eternity,
if I am free, If I unwind,
if I ever find the unknown or
am shown the question,
the answer will follow.

But......

what if they took the wrong man down, it was dark, they were scared.
what if,
it wasn't the son of Man but some thieving alley rat that they wrapped in white in the deadness of night,
what if,
we've been praying for lifetimes to the thief ridden bloodline of a merchant or sailor,
call the jailer now
put me in Bethlem
send me to Bedlam.

But
what if it was true.

There was a talent pool,
the clever school but
like a fool
I did not go.

And there's a match com
a catch com
a get them in a batch com but
I don't go along
with none of that.

In the night club,the
find me in a fight club,I
flick my cigarette stub and
rub my hands with glee.

The word out on the street is
one day we all will meet this,the
realisation that we'll all miss the
last train going home and
if that day should ever break
I think that I am going to take a
long hard look at myself.

To give the Devil his due,
that old demon lets everyone through.

God's got the ticket or rather he has a ticket machine,
you pull out a number and wait in the dream for your turn,
'have you been saintly? if not you'll burn'

and you can't tell a lie because your life's been
recorded
on the celestial circuit TV (cctv for short)

and if you have been without blemish or sin
it's an odds on chance that you will get in.

but it must be deserted up there
they're all at the party and the devil
don't care.

The son of Man
and that was God's plan?

Give me that old testament time
smite all the sinners and that would include me.
but
my talents are buried beneath the oak tree.
which never works as an excuse

I have me a vague hunch that
there will be a plague and
at a crunch
I'd say it will arrive
after lunch,

locusts on a full stomach?

and what nationality are you sir?
he answers,
'universal'
which is really the rehearsal for
what is to come.

Remembering the time
you sent shivers
down my spine.

Do it again.

Some walk with wolves
others with sheep.
I keep
my options
open.

Last night she came into my bed
in the dead hours before the light snook into my eyes and through the shadows lined up like labourers on the walls in my head.
She woke me into another dream I'd had some years before and as I stuttered to form the words to speak to her,
she shared with me,
a picture,some melody I remembered vaguely
which though nice was rather sad.

Quite glad that being well prepared for these invasions of the night, I had snared a little spot,not too cold,not too hot and we could tot up what we got up too, as morning grew into the day it would become.

It's like I won some inter-universal game of chance,first prize,last chance of romance and I have glanced quickly through the rules,
as fool as I am,not sure how to be a man and anyway I never knew what the plan would be
or if entering this game of chance was free or would there be a fee to pay.
She took my mind away from thoughts like this and in that first kiss when my body being in overdrive felt like I'd arrive before I'd even left
she put me back to idle speed
and now in idling how I need her more to stamp the accelerator to the floor and race me on to that place where all doubts have gone and we will get there
in time to share cakes and teas and
indulge ourself in pleasantries.

Tonight I need her to come again
to come with me upon the dead hour train that speeds through lifetimes,through those windowed pains that although washed and cleaned have dreamed of sordid sights in more sordid nights and now
and now
the train of thought has stopped
this malady crops up from time to time
and I say that 'my memory's fine'
but then I would.
I want my caller in the night to think that I'm so good and not affected by that infection,age
she might
not notice line and wrinkles that twinkle in the star or moonlight
or she might.
I make light of this and wait for more,just one kiss more
one kiss I guess is more than less
one kiss
and then I sleep.

I wonder where the time went,
did I spend my sixpence for three minutes of idleness,was the less of me all I could see or be?
From Another Time by John Edward Smallshaw
it never came free
never lent itself to me
I had to fight for it
put up with,
oh
let's call it ****,
but where did the time disappear,year upon year and now,
now
comes the winter of bitter regret.
I bet you have them,
the me in the men do
amen
is all we do
when we think this short life is through,
yeah?
fuckyou
I have no regrets
all bets are null,
pull up and put that in your pipe and smoke it out,my life's not about what might have beens,it means so much more to me than what I think time might see.

'From another time' is from another time and yet another rhyme and did you read that?