A bird flies upward
into the sky. Important; the
bird will die one day.

All of the shacks and houses and double
fronted mansions
lie in the vicinity
of a town no-one’s really
heard of which in turn lies
there because of the shacks and houses
and double fronted mansions.
Neither would exist without the other
and nothing would happen without them,
the people are insignificant... there’s no politician
no diplomat or embassy worker here,
there’s no world leading bio-chemist or
any line of royalty behind the slats of wood
or the red brick and bay window fronts.

The bell struck thirteen
and all the mourners cried,
The cats shrunk to the corner
and the dogs howled through the night.
“The poets have run out,”
the young town crier screams,
“they’ve run out of their rhyme,
and they’re bursting at the seams!”
And in the midst of the coffin dropping
and the young children scattering,
The crying girl looks in her mirror,
And drops it to the floor, smashing, clattering.

The bell struck fourteen
and all the town mourned,
The town’s workers ran out
and the meeting was adjourned.
“The Sun, it is falling,”
yells the pretty young girl,
“Get out of your houses now!”
And the mystery begins to unfurl.
In amongst the premature fallen,
A bare boy’s skin blisters,
And all around him she’s not there,
The only crying ones are his sisters.

The bell struck fifteen,
And the town was left deserted,
Save a young girl lying, and her brother
whose gaze was averted.
“All that live must die,”
A sound from a speaker on a van,
“Passing through nature to eternity.”
Live while you must and die whilst you can.
The stars have fallen from the sky,
And they’re crashing to the ground,
Lust the only left emotion,
Lying, waiting to be found.

His first wife died in a fire,
She’d taken her last breath moments
before the blue lights had reached her
and it really hit home how alone he was.
He had loved her more than anything,
Gave her the best he could offer
and still didn’t think it was enough.
She wasn’t really as devoted
but they managed to love to Silver
and he’d made her his trophy
and showed her off to no-one.

His second wife didn’t really like
him very much and
neither did he
and he was still alone amidst the fighting.
His trophy got smashed in one of the bad ones
and they never got past Paper.
And he was glad to be rid of her,
Shed of a cloak in the summer,
Glad of the lonely
like a cloak in the winter.

And he hadn’t had any children
and his family had died
a long time ago.
So all he had to his name was this place,
A quiet
in the
middle of the noise.

His quiet had oak-panelling
all around and little black books
full of people like him
for people like him.
And the smell of *** pourri still lingers
like the smell of his first’s perfume on his bed sheets for ages after she went
and he never washed them.

His quiet was frequented by workers whiling away
their lunch hours.
And he ate a packed lunch
at the desk.

Family, go.
After all, there will remain
a part of you
because in the end, we are all
reduced to tree stumps
the size of broken limbs
and your porcelain collar bones, broken
are now scattered all around
the crying child.

There once was a boy
Who grew up being
The boy who lived down the lane
And he told everyone that he’d been to
The Great Wall of China
When the farthest he’d been was 100 miles up the coast
He told his friends he was allergic to strawberries
When he simply didn’t like the taste
And he was terrified of letting himself down
But deep down
He was petrified of letting anyone down.

There once was a boy
And he knew all too well that
The book was correct
He too was going to die one day
But what he didn’t know was how
And why
And who and where
And those were the questions
He needed the answer to the most
But those were the questions
He knew all too well
That weren’t the questions to be asking.

And now he’s travelled beyond the 100 miles
And seen such beauty.
And now he’s eaten a whole strawberry
And grew rather fond of the taste.

He never did know the question he should
Be asking
But it’s close to him now and he’s growing now
Not up now
But toward, now
Toward it all toward the truth and the question
And he knows all too well
That the world is indeed a deep dark pit
And on every side death does cast forward his net.

And the boy wanted more of it all.

often I miss the day I painted the sky grey
often i long to feel it again
when i drew blood from the clouds
do you remember the civilians?
the civilians wept as i drew blood
they longed for their families
are they okay?