You are a blank rose doused in wine;
Too thrilling for my pen to hold,
You shed your petals in my mind.

I want to freeze your face in time
But flowers blister in the cold-
You are a blank rose doused in wine.

My morning sunshine makes it fine,
Repaints the waste in liquid gold-
You shed your petals in my mind.

I'm veering off the railway line
Grasp out for hanging vines to hold;
You are a blank rose doused in wine.

The thoughts dissolve in seafoam brine
As if my memory's been sold;
You shed your petals in my mind.

But I still hope to find a sign
A crumpled map into your soul;
You are a blank rose doused in wine,
You shed your petals in my mind.

spin the table knock the room
off its axis children gurgling ***
through juice box straws milk teeth
burst the confines of adult gums
knuckles fly like ****** dice
cards are chewed crackers shuffled

in the corner hear the ******* pray
furious at hosts of gay angels singing
his mother enchanted by female flesh
wobbling like jelly in the grape bowls
she'll be stalking some skirt tonight
he's yanking his hair to stop yanking chains

the political right rests a hand on her shoulder
the girl is happysad at the rain indoors
they slosh around and dance to silence she
is sadhappy and knows how her father thinks
siblings that weren't hers rule family frames
free market capitalism shines like a baby

it is a balmy november spring nobody
is ever hungover aroused or defeated
love takes three spins of a screwdriver to trap
there is something sweet in the council mail
they dangle by the ears from the base of the sofa
the ladies are eating cigars to keep warm

though they don't need to;
it's always sunny in england.

I hate pottering around inside my mind
With no reason or rhyme, like I'm retired-
Poking through cobwebbed corners,
Pulling at age-old tablecloths, considering
A garden party for me and my little lost smile
There in the half-wild,
With the sun like messy oil I'll have to wash
Out of my hair and clothing when I'm done.

I hate playing docile card games alone,
Laying out plans like pictures I'll never colour in-
My doughy brain pokes stimulus off the shelf  
And traps itself in kindergarten daydreams;
I fingerpaint endlessly,
Defining the world through crayon senses,
Crushing, mushing cookies and shaking
Clumsy maraca beats.

If only I could lie down in soft rustic flesh
Snatching handfuls of it to conceal my skin
Finally, finally filling myself in
Buried alive for good
And be expelled, again, into blazing harshness
Choking on the earth that forms my body
Crying, crying for hope and fresh presence
Coming to life for good.

the sky is so blue,
the ******
topsy-turvy vase dribbling sun-spit
crashing around
with its mucus rays
stumbling, heaving on doorsteps
punching drunkenly through windows
giddy and chaotic as it *****
air greedily upwards
windmilling glory
away from us as we exhale-
"what a perfect day
the perfect day to stay
inside
the perfect day to **** away"
the swaying, nauseous people say,
and the sky, the tipsy ******,
giggles as it throws itself
blue, unsubtle, with ripped tights,
glistening thighs, come-hither eyes,
unsteady, with love,
at the trees.

You said I have you
So let me roll your cigarettes clumsily
Over the yellow vase I got from a stranger
Who was heading to the ODEON drunk
And we'll see if I still have you
If I still have you
I'll stroke your veins for an hour in a field
'Cause I love touching arms
If I still have you
We'll fall asleep on trains and wake
At one a.m. in the suburbs
I don't care about finishing poems
I'll buy the best edibles
That my loose change allows me
We'll listen to metal for the rest of our lives.

Warmth drools like a baby
On the grime grey rooftops
Liberalism spawned dystopian blocks
The windows are never washed there
It's the rain that reveals their guts

On your bus stop murders and attacks
Rife on the Piccadilly line, the hum
Of melted Smirnoff bottle angels lays
A drunken lesbian kiss of delight
Party people live for the moment

When you step outside in the morning
To work for callus marks and gas, the trees
That line your route bob thick punk manes
In time to the beat of the rocking trains
They know what The Clash is about

And when you come back from a getaway
Seaside trip with sand in all your cracks
A little salt on your lips, an assault in the paper
You wallow in the polluted city allure
Like you're breathing in god's ****** incense

There it lies, the roll-up skyline
That would make any two-shoed god give in
To railway bridge peer pressure on his chest
At 4 am with deodorant blowtorches spinning
Leaving entrails of delight in the filthy half-blackness

It's a privilege to live in for sure.

Little miracles are fireflies;
When I catch one, I snap it
To sizzling gloop on my palm

So your god could patch my blisters
With golden thread, instead of the raw
Scraped rubber I spin on

Or tug his dandelion angels from the grave
To levitate me, regal, never to walk another step
Still, I'd deny him.

Little miracles are broken glass;
When the sun drizzles, they could be
Tiny flesh-encrusted jewels

But your god could heal my eyesight
Enhance my Eden to iridescence,
Blooming softly, gleaming,

Or clasp my skull like china forever
Precious, careful as the ****** mother with my brain
I swear I'd deny him.

In a fit of passion, push
Blazing rafts down from heaven
Euphoric streams through my window

Replace my dropped smiles
Like old, shameful sweet wrappers
With hosts of lovers, heather, art,

And me, still scrawling
'Return to sender'

Little miracles are burbling infants
Superseded by the howl of war
They do not revive fossils or friends

Or pelt Australian treetops with fluorocarbon
They are glitter in the carpet
A barbeque for nirvana

A burden
You must deny, deny, deny
(You have my word that so will I).

I can taste it all now,
The sunlight like glazed sugar,
The caramel of silence in the woods.

Blood bleeds away with water
The rapids carry it quickly through
So no sour iron stains the soil.
There is no laughter from her anymore
Just the resigned

Crack

Of a neck supported by thistles
As it rolls like a stone off the shoulder.
All around, the world looks away
Blushes bashfully a few times
So the sky projects the warmest blue
A little compensation for the tragedy.

No soul remains *******
She's bubbles, gone, evaporated
The little thoughts she had left
Trickling in amber down her tongue
While the bees inspect her honey hair.

Later on, she slides further in the water
And they assume she has drowned.
Everyone simply ignores the mermaid fins
That blossom across her back
And claims she couldn't swim.

At least she died looking up.

She is turning in now,
To the syrup grey of the city scape:
Splintering limbs to fit into cracks
And stripping her flesh to line
The potholes; the local council smiles
At the diminished road repair fees.

She is turning in now,
Before the stairs to the sky break:
Spraying her blood on the old brick tiles
And plucking her vocal chords out
To busk with; the local players grin
At the spectacle which reins the coins in.

She is turning in now,
While the skyline is scrubbed senseless:
Shooting her gouged eyes up like marbles
So they are first to taste the morning light;
And this time only the birds laugh
For they recognise her need to escape-
And the circular motion of constant daybreak.

October is chapped lips on burned coffee
Ashes on ashes as fingers entwine-
Ah, October, a familiar tightening of chest
A blue siren sparked by paranoid fire
A dream, a whirlwind
Ending and beginning in horror so thick
You forget life offers cherry blossoms, too.
Bring me a ***, you say,
Your lungs have never tasted as black
And the lack of light ignites the desire
To fill your getaway backpack with flame.
People oblige in October but this scares you too-
Smiles are lullabies for the apathetic and dying
You'd rather be alone.
October is songs by the Smiths and stolen jumpers
Fading scabs under fingertips
Lost compositions and badly held chords.
In short, October is ******* terrifying
And you're so used to it that it almost feels
Like home.

are my lips too thin
so the words cannot flounce
or somersault with flair
they break their pretty necks  
land with a painful yell  
and flounder in your grimace  
helpless

are my teeth too crooked
like a metal fence deformed
the sentences tear and topple off
flattened children in the muck    
mangled by dogs
their sad filthy hands pinch your ears  
hopeless

if i dressed it all up
like a call-girl, ruby lipstick,
fishnet stockings on my thoughts
and i danced out the poetry
on your lap, in the dark,
would you be fine with me
being in love with you?

i don't know

unwashed shrimp; sick pink wishes
putrid puking and hot weather flashes
headaches and nausea for forgetting me
raw plates of karmic misery, i drank too much

I'll weather it with you through the phone
congealed seafood skies when i was alone
bred the bacteria that made you so ill
petri dish summer, i never wanted
to **** you, i drank too much

forty degrees like a tenerife beach
maybe from now you'll remain within reach
below the surface marine life bubbles
the fish of my thoughts will swim out of trouble
from now on
maybe I won't drink too much

Just when I think I've finished fading,
Something makes me leave even more.

Blackout blinds and ditzy drunk, I lost
My breath it tangled with your fairy lights
Words like ripped petals collapsed, sad,
On your sheets and we are such teenage cliches
I cried about him one more time when I got home

It felt like the moon, fuzzy and good, you said
I was telling the truth but the vermouth
Hinted I was lying just a little and I was
Undressed to my bra watching fake plastic stars
Swimming in positive vibrations from your speaker
Thanking you for caring

We weren't ****** but we acted like crackheads and still
I cried about him one more time when I got home
The solar system came full circle, it wasn't
Solipsisim anymore, I'm not alone
It's not a simulation I really am hungover
And very glad to be a part of your universe.

write for me
you insist, forcing sparking needles
between the folds of my grey gum brain
and i try because i’ve seen sunlight
and shocking green trees in a paradise city
so writing should come easily
write for me
because we’re caught in an infinity
of ill health and lead heads
and everyone praises the power
of the written word
before they’ve even read it
write for me
like you have ideas balled up in your fists
but refuse to let them out
like it’s your fault we’re stuck like this
on the outside of a drowning horizon
like with one more word
i’ll finally break free
write for me
so i try again.

A little girl splashing in the rain
Among cesspools and fantasy green
Kicking up the moss, ferns, dogshit
Soiling her unspoiled baby shoes
Mummy can't grab hold of her
Her arms are tiny ***** of light
She thrives on carrot mush and mischief

Fox **** can't throw her off
It's a fresh scent, her button nose
Doesn't yet crinkle; sour is captivating
She doesn't know there are homeless men
She's stamping on the mulch
The fairies nip at her ankles, they'll sew
Her a twiggy crown for her damp curls

Later, a pebble, chiselled, bitter,
Thrown vindictively from a high-rise window
Will try to knock it down
She'll learn about money and hate
And scream at the rain
Like she's trying to lacerate it
Maybe she'll watch it bleed

Someone will break her heart and nobody
Will be there to make it right
Apart from maybe a smelly poet
Eating a takeaway dinner
A few decades away in a stinking room
Probably boozed up

A little girl splashing in the dogshit
Unaware of gypsies, robbers, death
And me just stood there trembling
Thinking lucky,
Lucky her.

Scratching itches with bottle caps, grooves
In my brain cut from diamonds and blood
Flinging my shadow like darts at a wall
Frustration, when dizzied, transforms into love

Scabs and guitar riffs I'd shred with my teeth
Gnawing her lips to bake blackberry flesh
Stamping on baubles, an aureate hail
In a winter that reeks of sweet summer death

This circus of wildfire charcoals my hair
I'm yearning to stay but it blazes me out
Cold air and bored stares, a knock on the jaw
I thought I had finished bedazzling myself

I've underwhelmed the brightness I chase
Adrenaline fawns over prettier girls
Cold and alone in a fitful night's sleep
When you're fevered and worn, the splinters stick deep.

all of this
the world like a piece of meat
humor hatred saturday jogs
leaking balanced unbalancing

all of this
fleshy tender company
herbs conflict flooded staircases
dribbling sun on bus journeys  

kisses on benches
playful slaps pushes shoves
hugs

and us just sat here
tapping out words
listening to muffled guitars
the hum of the pipes
the flicking of pages

and us just sat here
opening curtains
remembering red hair
snippets of conversation

and us just sat here
the world on a plate
steaming bleeding sizzling
a slab of death of love of something

and us just sat here
nauseated and longing
the flies will come soon
they aren’t vegetarian.

will you come up though?
will i ****
love the bones of you
bones is right

we were circumstance
and christ did we **** the fat
out of that
ripped through the tendons
pummelled the muscle  
gnawed through the marrow
even the cat wouldn't touch us
way we are now and she'll
eat about anything

well.. there's still my thigh
to pummel i mean
in biology until end of term
then summer  
you can watch me puke in bushes
yes summer
blind drunk i won't know you
that ways better
we kiss and act like strangers
so sweet then to each other

all this hatred at the end
they say that that's familiar
it's funny, that resentment
it's just love in a wig
pig, ex PM
that's us
that's us
we are far too similar
for our own good.

two things I will never feature in.

i endeavour to burst
my glum queasy organs
by binging on the sun;
like a fattened sow
that wobbles to slop
against the mist of *****

i'll **** the lemon hard
mouth spasming with beams  
till the rinds soak up my gums
where the nihilism clots
like plaque around a tooth  
fouling up my lunch

maybe i'll explode
across a hopscotch grid
they can twist my guts for rope  
and the sticky sun will mop me up
sour blood to goddess rust
now that's what hope feels like,
i'm sure.

Oh, Gabriel.

love will not because it cannot

heal it has no cough drops
chug it like syrup and you will retch

dance it neglects its limbs
tangled bruised an epoch of breakage

smile its teeth are blackened sugar
liquorice diabetes thick as sharpie night

be because it isn't
anything more than a mask
for lustful, ill-born fright.

What's in a human
A scattering of bones
With puppet strings worn thin
Spellbound to earth alone
And miles and miles of skin

What's on that skin
An architect's drunk paths
Bombs exploding by touch
And clumsy human marks
From broken hearts and such

What's in those hearts
A cracked kaleidoscope
Search parties for the blind
Through knots of living rope
The core of humankind

But what makes a human
Beyond sunlit plasma,
Mind hatchlings that enthrall?
If the deities scoop darker
Would they find anything at all?

saturated with ***** don't watch the news
be it
throw your head back so the oil of the sun can
slip a ***** leer down your open trachea
brave and the knives can't inspire the fear
glad you're here?

great

empty just pools only watering holes
don't move
not an ant in your plasma gold cold and clear
out of ideas even mucus stains disappear
are you still here?

no

so

saturated with *****, don't watch the news
feel it
and the sun is extinguished
and your throat peeling, yelling and stripped
and you're not really present
for any of it.

Dehydration will
Crimp and squeeze you
Wrinkle your bones like paper fans
Lacerate your doily throats
Won't you package water for it?

Starvation yearns to
Yank and stretch you
Flesh out the pitfalls in your face
Coax out your cabernet ribs
Won't you import produce for it?

Exhaustion could
Squander your crystalline minds
Flay you right down to the core
Burn you out like your kings of Denmark
Don't think, build homes for it.

Apathy will tenderly itch at your lips
Plaster your eyes, emblazon your ribs
Pepper regrets in your Vogue cigarettes

But let you live, collect your pay
Be a friendly face, at the end of the day.

it's been fun, still
there will always be the past
maybe i can crawl inside it
like those muddled in the freezing wood
slit open a horse carcass to survive
late at night maybe i'll lie there
tasting the drip of equine blood
listening to you laugh
it's as sweet a future as any
we might have shared, at least
there is no longer anything
you could do to stop
the way i love you matting my hair
and i'll reek of entrails forever

slipping drinks into cups
for scientific mirth only
a few OH groups and she totters
wobbling on cherry jelly knees

glass ****** dry like mango
back on your feet with lightning
shocking your hair into witchy frizz
clamping fairy dust in bottle necks

third fourth fifth keep on
consensual poisoning can't be
morally rotting perverted frissons
of thrill you feel as they sway
have something to do with the hour

incapacitation by grace
soft peach smile as you pour
generous purge juice on filthy ice-

if her blood orange brain clumps on concrete
will the fruit of control taste too nice?