Tempus fugit!
I say **** it.
Carpe momentum.
Carpe diem.
Carpe sabbati.
Carpe vita.

I just want him to reach within my soul
and try to grasp all the pieces that make me whole.

escape with me, starry-eyed
a smoky shadowland
where sin is infinite
hell warmly embraced
and lust a syrupy *****.

desire is so crookedly pristine
when untouched by
the ugly delusion you call love

luring, seducing
the inky ebony of eve
coaxes us sweetly, chillingly
to join its empty prisoners --

passion aches
inject me with your raven smoke;
crave me,
consume me

come and dip with me in the night
where our veiled vices can find relief;
its venom will feed my impure nocturne
and your wicked clutches can snake into
the perverse piths of my phantasm and person.

You started to leave as the cold nose of Winter
bulldozed through Guy Fawks skies
and Christmas silent nights.

Your nearness was a far plane
of slumped reflection, deliberation,
contemplation of your plight, so mine.

Suspicion stirred in morning tea
and pre-work niceties.
You watched me when I turned my back,
your head buried in the ‘Daily Mail’,
too close to the print.

Denial hugged me a long while, dismissing
the cosseted phone and obsessive hygiene.

Giggling-head days, home-fire Wednesdays,
pledges in sweat daze
all rolling around
on a distant carousel.
I hoped you could see,
but hope could not override
your turning tide.

Your eyes begged for the ‘talk’,
so you could bring it up
like rancid *****.

Coward

You left in a yellow haze with the daffodils,
and I hated you

with all the love anyone could imagine.

curious child
peering from the bedroom door
half open
standing in the shadows
i watched him
he sat in his easy chair
right elbow propped
cigarette placed between index and *******
light from the tv flickering off the walls
smoke snaking its way to the ceiling

my Father
in his sixties then
lost in the vapid juvenility of Hee Haw
my Father
whose poetry i had discovered
tucked away
out of sight
out of mind
this little black book where he kept his soul
waiting
if he ever decided to find himself again
or perhaps to just remind himself

in the early stages of alzheimers
i saw him cry for the first time
wondering aloud
why after struggling for so many years
he was rewarded with a failing mind
and the loss of a friend
a friend left behind in a black book
a friend i never knew

my best songs were about you
full of pure honesty and hopeless desperation
they were written in minor keys
on lonesome days when I needed you most