What do you see nurses? . . .. . .What do you see?
What are you thinking .. . when you're looking at me?
A cranky old man, . . . . . .not very wise,
Uncertain of habit .. . . . . . . .. with faraway eyes?
Who dribbles his food .. . ... . . and makes no reply.
When you say in a loud voice . .'I do wish you'd try!'
Who seems not to notice . . .the things that you do.
And forever is losing . . . . . .. . . A sock or shoe?
Who, resisting or not . . . ... lets you do as you will,
With bathing and feeding . . . .The long day to fill?
Is that what you're thinking?. .Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurse .you're not looking at me.
I'll tell you who I am . . . . .. As I sit here so still,
As I do at your bidding, .. . . . as I eat at your will.
I'm a small child of Ten . .with a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters .. . . .. . who love one another
A young boy of Sixteen . . . .. with wings on his feet
Dreaming that soon now . . .. . . a lover he'll meet.
A groom soon at Twenty . . . ..my heart gives a leap.
Remembering, the vows .. .. .that I promised to keep.
At Twenty-Five, now . . . . .I have young of my own.
Who need me to guide . . . And a secure happy home.
A man of Thirty . .. . . . . My young now grown fast,
Bound to each other . . .. With ties that should last.
At Forty, my young sons .. .have grown and are gone,
But my woman is beside me . . to see I don't mourn.
At Fifty, once more, .. ...Babies play 'round my knee,
Again, we know children . . . . My loved one and me.
Dark days are upon me . . . . My wife is now dead.
I look at the future ... . . . . I shudder with dread.
For my young are all rearing .. . . young of their own.
And I think of the years . . . And the love that I've known.
I'm now an old man . . . . . . .. and nature is cruel.
It's jest to make old age . . . . . . . look like a fool.
The body, it crumbles .. .. . grace and vigour, depart.
There is now a stone . . . where I once had a heart.
But inside this old carcass . A young man still dwells,
And now and again . . . . . my battered heart swells
I remember the joys . . . . .. . I remember the pain.
And I'm loving and living . . . . . . . life over again.
I think of the years, all too few . . .. gone too fast.
And accept the stark fact . . . that nothing can last.
So open your eyes, people .. . . . .. . . open and see.
Not a cranky old man .
Look closer . . . . see .. .. . .. .... . ME!!

Remember this poem when you next meet an older person who you might brush aside without looking at the young soul within. We will all, one day, be there, too!

I’m blowing the whistle on they, those morally compromised fey
Who prey on the crowd all complaining aloud as collapsed mortgage fritters away.
Whilst the fat bankers dance a jig all the rip offs are ******* the pig
And at the end of the day, these protagonists say, “The Controllers here don’t give a fig!”
It’s the Federal Reserve that’s to blame and old Greenspan is floating in shame
‘Cos the system’s a sham and they don’t give a **** and nobody here’s naming a name.
Now the greed and the arrogance flows, how extensively, nobody knows
They all cover their bums and they snigger to chums as the de-frauded now come to blows.
For today’s finance, Government, sport and the God factory’s… all just a rort
On the verge of collapse or at least in prolapse, leaving truth and integrity…..BOUGHT!

M.
Auckland, 16 January 2016

This night a rich brocade of colour in the sky
Doth overwhelm all misery, so fetching to the eye,
Breathless in the scope of everlasting piling cloud
Embroidered in a golden cloaking, riotously aloud.
Abruptly surrendered to the racing pall of night
Where colour tones extinguish, now, to diamond points of light,
Where chill envelopes warmth with a shiver to the back
And the night consumes the majesty with a shrouding inky black.
Angrily I challenge the abruptness of the change
Where my spectacle of wonder died to darkly rearrange,
It's so typical of nature’s way to give and then to take….

****! …. Wake up fool…this attitude?..just give the world a break!

M.
13 January 2016

Spun on a thread, a gossamer thread
Hung on a dream in a watershed,
Shadows suspended in effortless time
Regretting those words left unsaid.
Regretting omissions, those hesitant thoughts,
Words bitten back by the tongue,
When clear expression could lighten the load
To sing every song left unsung.
So dimly, through deficits' dust laden air
In a shaft of brittle white sun
My confession remiss for omissions amiss
Paint bereft-ness before it’s begun.

M.
11 January 2016

"In peace our nations unite"
...to do exactly what?

Wring our hands in horror?
Write to the Gazette?
Retreat to the safety of our invisibility?
The sanctuary of our silence?
Quiver, hidden in the doubtful safety of the masses?

Most people will do this,
lament the tragedy and let it slide with a shake of the head and a frightened, pious silence...

When in actual fact.....
what we all should do is take up the drum and beat it deafeningly, furiously...and together, roar our fury to the powers that be....

That they take up the sickle and pursue these creatures to the end of the earth and deal to them once and for all!

Amen
M.

Ordinary people
Doing ordinary things
On an ordinary day
Slaughtered,
Suddenly.
Violently.
Causlessly.
Irrationally.
B­rutally.
So that
Jihadists
May salve their lust
For Power
And
Caste havoc
In their own
Misguided image,
...In the name
of their own
Perverted cause.

Allah the Almighty
Surely quails in horror
That they do thus
To the innocent,
In His name?*

M.
15 Nov 2015

Sparse grass adorns the hillside
Thinly green against the grey,
Where lurking bull ant wolf packs
Hunt where chirping crickets play.
Way too thin to waft in breezes
Way too thin to really count
Like bad dealerships in Chevrolet
Mostly struggle to surmount.
Like thin pacifists in fist fights
Race, back peddaling for the door,
When, in fact, the convenience
Is a bullet through the floor.
And hot starlets jiggle **** jobs
Strutting carpet, red as rose,
Imitating, superficially here,
Whoredom wishing to impose.
Those roaring Russians, in denial
As their cheating athlete’s pale,
All denied their right of entry
To Olympia’s Holy Grail.
And insipidly they all collapse
In fracking’s blatant wake,
Leaving gloating, fat Americans
Gorging merrily on steak.
Whilst the oceans are advancing
As the ice floes dissipate,
And the clamour is ignored
Though Island nations inundate.
Fractious currencies do vacillate
In global bouts of greed,
Where the rich are fatly richer
And the rest in desperate need.
Where all truth is but a fantasy
Which everyone ignores,
Where expediency is the answer
And future proofing snores.
Black distrusts the whiteness
Islam hates the Jew,
East and West at loggerheads
What hope now…. for you?
Oh sparse grass adorns the hillside
Thin green against the grey,
Where the morrow is a vaugary
And worrisome it’s way.

M.
Friday 13th November 2015

Tangents fly
As serpents die
Life ends as it begins,
The ups and downs
Terrain of clowns
Commits it all to sins,
So, go for broke
It's just a joke.....
'Cos he who loses...Wins!
M.

But....Wouldst thou see
Thy perjury
In pondering my
Soliloquy?
And should thou wear
Thy penury
If truth should prize
Thy concience free?

Then, writhing thus
For all to see....
Wouldst thou blush
A smile to me?
M.

The little towns near Egmont
That nestle on the plains
To gather close the winding roads
The homing trails and lanes,
The little towns near Egmont
That sleep the whole night long
Cooled by the scent of mountain breeze
Lulled by the sea wind’s song.

The little towns near Egmont
Will ever seem to me
Like stars that deck the evening sky
Or isles that dot the sea,
Like beads that sprinkle here and there
On Taranaki’s gown
Like figures in a rich brocade
Of yellow, green and brown.

The little towns near Egmont
Seen through a summer haze
How fair and fresh and free they lie
Beneath the golden days,
Not crowded in deep valley’s,
Not buried in tall trees
But open to the sun, the rain
The starlight and the breeze.

The little towns near Egmont
What busy lives they hold
With happiness and health to keep
Secure from heat and cold,
The comfortable homesteads,
The park like lands so fair
God keep them restful, clean and pure
As Egmont’s snow peak there.

Hanna Hair
Dawson Falls Lodge
Mount Egmont, Taranaki.
January 1926

This poem, hand written and forgotten, was written by a guest of the house, in a thick, ancient tome of comments and articles, secreted in a dusty corner of the beautiful and quaint Dawson Falls Alpine Lodge, nestled comfortably in the dense, high podocarp forest, far up the snow clad slopes of volcanic Mt. Egmont in Taranaki, New Zealand.

From its high vantage point on the mountain looking out toward the curving coastline of the vast Tasman sea, the lodge affords magnificent views of the sparse settlements and farmlands spread widely on the lowland plains before it. By day the smoke rises from farm house chimneys, by night the warm honeyed glow from scattered windows dot like an expanse of fire-flies amidst the velvet blackness extending out to the luminosity of the line of breakers pounding the distant coast.

This delicate work captures the sparse beauty of this magnificent rural place, it further affords a snapshot of that particular era and of the pioneer spirit and rugged endurance of the settlers who made this isolated land home.

Marshalg
Dawson Falls Lodge
26 October 2015

Loneliness walks hand in hand
With he who strides the long way forth,
With he who walks the path alone
Through solitary’s East and North.
Firm his sinewed hand so strong
That steers the compassed vessel back
Bridging pitfall’s chasm wrong
Through deft manipulation’s track.
Guiding they who pledge good faith
To fall then, by the wayside, weak,
Then in bridging disappointment’s song
Instead, he helps them to their feet.
So long that night of solitude
With stark decision’s crucial stack
When none would share that brutal loading
Weighing solely on his back.
Lonely is my leader’s song
Lonely as his dying day,
Would that he could share a word
Who would understand his way?

M.
17 October 2015

Touching the moment, this delicate moment
Touching the face with its’ sad falling tear,
Softly aware that strange feelings surround us
Cloyingly close with their aura of fear.
Fear of a mantle of misunderstanding
Fear of uncertainty choked in forlorn,
Cloaked in thick prejudice clad by constriction
All drowned in a sea of wet ignorance borne.

Where stand the rational reaching for reason?
How seek the humble in searching for more?
****** not the javelin of angers’ contrition
In weighing this moment, I humbly implore.

For thus sits the fabric of deep understanding
Thus lies the tantric of feelings unspoke,
Thus the true substance of one to another
Uttered in wisdom through words best unwrote.

M.
30 September 2015

Arbitrarily flung to instants of moment
Scattered free in the gleam of the eye,
Cast with abandon to scattergun’s chances
The wondrous pearls, I’ve occasioned to fly.
Together with detritus maudlin to moribund,
Together robustness’s wrongness in rouge,
This crimson lusting with anger’s green jealousy
In scattered intemperance now fawning to rude.
Spindrifts of coarse-ness in calico fabric
Flooding of richness and redness in heat,
Shadings of blue in palaegic intemperance
Now flung to eruptions of laughter complete.

Marshalg
28th September 2015

Jasmine flows in lemon scented tendrils
Wafting on breeze in honeysuckle air,
Drifting in promise of delicacy hovering
Caressing pubescent delights from despair.
Delicate flavours of spearmint and juniper
Tilt in a torment of honeyed delight,
Garlanded avenues sweet and deliciously
Titivate nostrils till sensuous night.

Amorous airs in the warm summer evening
Poignantly poised in the lingering scent,
Romantically touching the tremble of senses
Released in a sigh of exquisite content.

M.
22 August 2015

Shadowed in the deepest trench
Four good men stand and stare
At my white face now reflected,
As if I wasn’t there.
Through a barrier of ethnicity,
Down walls of wooden eyes,
To pass through halls of prejudice
That none of us disguise.
They see me through a spectre,
Depicted by a ruse,
Of elemental difference
Which neither party choose.
A product of upbringing
Incumbent in each race,
Between us lies discomfort
When we search each other’s face.

They are black and I am white
Our blood shares crimson red
We all love our wives and family
And we struggle till we’re dead.
Why we amplify this difference
Why we bear this manic cost….
Where a hue of pigmentation
Means all reasoned thought is lost?

There’s a sadness in the offing
There’s an air of quiet remorse,
For mankind to come to terms with this….
The beast must run its’ course.

Marshalg
In the deep northern trench
27 July 2015

“Whilst smiling to my face thou
Hast plucked the ****** from thy boneless gums”
Thus spake the venomous she,
When querying the quandary
Of “The Milk of Human Kindness.”

That altruism,
Proffered by many as sincerity
In a charity bequeathed
To the disposessed and less fortunate.
Is an act which may be, in fact,
Obliquely or brazenly,
A lure to enhancement
Of personal nobility sought.

“But the quality of mercy is not strained
It droppeth as the gentle rain from Heaven.
Twice blest… It blesses he that gives and he that takes.”

Thus so, is ****** upon the truly altruistic…
An interminable questioning
Of the Impetus Behind the Act ??
In order to mitigate
THE JUSTICE OF THE PLEA.

How stands Thee?

Marshalg
25 July 2015

Bent beneath this candle’s flame in shadowed cavern lost to light
I wrestle with my rationale to question what I seek is right.
To bend my beetled, battered brow, bent fist beneath my whiskered chin,
To worry, nay to question why…my daughter’s hand is right for him.

Complex are the reasons why he strives to seek her hand,
His dubious inflexion in the way he likes to stand…
Looming and superior he condescends to give
Long lectures of complicity in how wrong, mere mortals live.

There are fractures in the porcelain, thin cracking of the glass
And a chill wind blows within me should I let these questions pass.
For I doubt the man’s sincerity, distrust his very stance
And I’m loath to giving daylight to exposing this to chance.

I’ve come to a decision, hard, to snare his spiders web
With deceptions of complexity with potions, black and red.
Tomorrow as the daylight dawns I’ll paint the mountain's frown
In sowing seeds of conflict to bring this union down….
Endureth she of curve and grace, repaireth she who cries…
I’d rather this, than see her bleed, a lifetime wed to lies.

Marshalg
24 July 2015

All nations beat their own drum.

The US, China, Britain, Russia, Europe, Israel, India, Turkey, Pakistan, Syria, France, Germany and a whole host of others, have been beating their own drum in deafening cacophony since realisation dawned of their individual sovereign potentiality.

Every nation is manouvering for their own best self interest…and in this volatile environment of the Middle east plus the factor of the complete savagery and unpredictability of the rampaging ISIS Calithate….any outcome, anything is now possible.

Iran is the meat in the sandwich.

She squirms this way and that, buying favour here sacrificing loyalties there, switching, adjusting. Friends become enemies, enemies become friends at the drop of a hat. Writhing within herself attempting to find the path to the future in an incredibly difficult minefield of pressure from the onslaught from the East and the West….A crushing miasma of pressure from friend and foe alike.

Who can say which way she will jump? The only sane predictability is that Iran will leap to her own salvation, her own survival….and to Hell with the rest of the barging, braying self-obsessed world.

Marshalg 23 July 2015

Pandering to platitudes am I….
Running riotously adrift
To spice my day with pleasures.
Pleasures caste in portraiture so stark
Of thee my love, of thee.

In curvature of smooth refrain
And delving vortex of unimaginably fine dark fur.
Reclined in attitude of ease…
With mischief dancing about thy porcelain, painted lips.

Oh that I could die with this indelible art?
Slip away to this shrill cacophony of sweet,sensate spree?

M.

Recep Tayip Erdogan though Turkish to the core
Has loathing in his Turkish heart, ferocity and more
For the secular insanity’s of Bashar Al Assad
Determines chaos at his border with warring Syria is bad.
With incursions by the Kurdish to the ISIS foe at hand
And the umbrage taken by the Kurds at Turkey’s open border stand,
Where ISIS can permeate both back and forth at will
Allowing freedom for Jihadists, now, to raid, behead and ****.
Europe visualize this menace at their doorstep as a threat
But Turkey, playing both sides, leaves NATO, now side stepped.
Where our friends become our enemies and enemies our friends.
In this Middle East miasma ..... confusion never ends.

M.
27 June 2015

An ode to hospitality and the magnificence
of New Zealand’s majestic South Island.*


Pale Granite massif plummets down from snowline to Kaikoura coast
Where white waves seeth in ocean rage atop the green of dark abyss,
Below subducts Pacific plate to buckle mountain mantle’s boast
Titanic forces ****** beneath the wheeling flock of sea-tern’s hiss.

Cold winds blow from seaward swell of glaciation far to south
Where blue whales hunt the clouds of krill and ply this ocean’s constant roar
Through icy currents rich and deep resourced from white Antarctic mouth
Whence icebergs blue shall calve and drift, where seeking albatross do soar.

Frosty on this Winter morn, green rolling hills caress my eye
Deep shadows creasing valley clefts, round sunlit pastures highlit, mound.
From coastal dune transitioning to snowy mountain crags on high
The splendour of it all, my friend, entrancing me in sense-surround.

Blown red tussock streams to windward, ripples in concentric waves
Ripples in the mountain’s flank surmounting to the alpine pass.
Bastion of high country shepherd, striding forth with dog he braves,
The loneliness of isolate in isolation’s clawing grasp.

Tempest in the black beech forest thrashing leafage falls like rain
Rain in sheets cascades from clifftops, waterfalls in grand parade.
Hellish clouds embrace the fiords in hellish lightening flash refrain
Fiordland in majestic style in vaulting might of storm’s charade.

Grey light in the estuary, reflections in still water stand
Of fishing boats at wharfage in a timeless moment’s instant gaze,
Riverton in midday mode as fisherman’s coarse calloused hand
Prepares to launch beyond the spit to brave the sea, to snare the crays.

Comfort in a welcome smile, welcome in a warming fire
Luxury in the steaming sting of shower water piping hot.
Blue cod baked so perfectly with pinot noir to my desire
The sanctuary of “Land’s End”, quaintly, the very best New Zealand’s got.

Marshalg
“Foxglove”, Taranaki
25 June 2015

*“Land’s End”… An exquisite find, a very English bed and breakfast hotel located, remotely, at the very tip of southern lands end at Bluff.
A delightful discovery to complement, perfectly, the utter charm and grandeur of New Zealand’s wonderland....
The magnificent South Island.

M.

Oh ye student of Gothic complication
How dost thou writhe in a sea of nightly scented jasmine?
How dost thou cast off the shackles of thy piteous life lost?
To effortlessly shed the ruckfall of protagonists
...in a double narrative of well travelled refinement?

Linguistically intriguing it be. the richness therein enthralls.
A depiction of contemporary expression from a student of sleight of hand, wed in a rapture to the knowledge that whatever thou has written, shall flow through the fingers like a waterfall of soft white sand.
M.

Little is known and less is appreciated about the geographic, strategic and political significance of the Spratley and Paracel Islands situated midway across the South China Sea.

Disputed historically for ownership by Malaysia, Vietnam the Phillipines and China, amongst others, the islands are situated strategically across the major commercial sea lanes of the region and atop an ocean of vast, submarine deposits of untapped fossil oil.

China has used her muscle to occupy and claim these islands, together with unspecified, adjacent sea way area. She has claimed them as sovereign territory of the People’s Republic of China. Until this occupation the islands have been largely unpopulated and have had little or no military significance. Recently, however, Chinese constructors have been ruthlessly dredging the surrounding coral reef and building a 3000m long concrete runway for military purposes on the hugely expanded artificial island area created.
Chinese troops, in divisional strength, occupy and defend the new territory.

It is significant that all parties in the region are watching China and gauging her intentions. None less so than the United States Navy who have an aircraft carrier and supporting military vessels, stationed permanently nearby and conduct over flights of the island airspace testing sovereignty and Chinese reaction.
To date reaction has been muted….but this will definitely change.

China is frantically building to be the world’s next superpower, economically, industrially, politically and militarily.
...And, as this development comes to fruition in the very near future, it is inevitable that this distant, remote set of  South China Sea islands shall become the next global hot point of international confrontation.

China and the United States of America will go eyeball to eyeball, bristling with hostility, resolute and immovable, each waiting for the other to blink!

…..and we, the rest of the world, shall, again, tremble in our boots, breathlessly awaiting the outcome.

Marshalg
22 May 2015
AUCKLAND.

Dissatisfaction curls the lip, so felt,
Alas we deal with what we’re dealt,
Contradiction screams her song
Alas that she could be so wrong.
Potential oozes from my pores,
(Of course my dear, what’s mine is yours)
Surely there must be a way
To reach beyond my limit’s day?
Limitations frazzled paw
Allows me much… but then no more,
Restricting me to what I’ve got
Within this irritating plot.
Dissatisfaction curls my lip, so felt,
Damnation deals with what I’m dealt!
M.

But to pass from beige to puce to rose
bequeathes a choice, I do suppose,
A choice of whence thy shall or shan't
corral thy name or curse thy can't.
Hold it high or cast it out
Regardless, LET-THY-LOUD-VOICE-SHOUT !
....For he who wears his mantle thin
Forever then, be clad in sin.
M.

Birth is  a beginning
and death a destination
And life is a journey:
from childhood to maturity
and youth to age;
from innocence to awareness
and ignorance to knowing;
from foolishness to discretion and then, perhaps to wisdom;
from weakness to strength
or strength to weakness -
and often back again.
From health to sickness and back we pray to health again;
from loneliness to love,
from joy to gratitude, from pain to compassion,
and grief to understanding -
from fear to faith until,
looking backward or ahead,
we see that victory lies
not at some high place along the way,
but in having made the journey, a sacred pilgrimage.
Birth is a beginning and death a destination.
But life is a journey,
from birth to death......to life everlasting.!

Sammy

Intangibly, it cometh and goeth.
Substanceless it slips in transition from one immeasurable instant to the next. Equitable to infinite space, in terms of distance, infinite time is a concept quite alien to the finite human mind. There is no proof of existence, it is a human conception with no sensory component, an illusion and utterly immeasurable in real terms with only a human contrivance to calibrate it....(and poorly at that).
Time is the silken zephyr on which we lay our dreams and aspirations. It is the currency of deep religion and is regarded as the ultimate sword hand of God. Incorruptible and absolute it brooks no favour, seeks no fame. Irreversible in it's cold implacable, unquenchability it merely, unfeelingly.... proceeds.
M.

But what would life be like without these encounters?
The spark of passion ignites that which is supreme in the patina of our days, of our years, of our very being.
It comes and it goes...but in going it hovers in a spangled irridescence just beyond the now and endures in this special place, until the day we die.
M.

While reading an article last night about fathers and sons, memories came flooding back to

the time I took me son out for his first pint.

Off we went to our local pub only two blocks from the cottage.

I got him a Guinness.  He didn't like it, so I drank it.

Then I got him a Kilkenny's, he didn't like that either, so I drank it.

Finally, I thought he might like some Harp Lager?   He didn't.   I drank it.

I thought maybe he'd like whiskey better than beer so we tried a Jameson's, nope!

In desperation, I had him try that rare Redbreast,Ireland's finest.   He wouldn't even smell it.

What could I do but drink it!

By the time I realized he just didn't like to drink, I was so feckin ****-faced I could hardly

push his pram back Home.

That giant wheel of life grinds around us
Sometimes it's sweet or so sour.
A meld of habitual habits
A mixture of ash amidst flour.
Concoction of humour in sadness
Of chuckles in midst of the tears,
Of ingratitudes greatest propensity
In stealing those yesterday years.
I guess there's good in the badness,
I suppose there's light in the dark
But the factor that burns
In the hope my mind yearns
Is that bitterness drowns the remark.

M.

But...Tantric mumbo-jumbo Joe
Issued from a dribbled lip.
Issued from a tortured mind
Which writhes in phraseology to slip.
....slip between the now and then
Slip between the right and wrong,
confused about reaction to
Our capacity to sing your song.
....that eerie tune of deep lament
Lament for what should be, but won't,
For we is but a subterfuge...
Who says it did but knows it don't.

M.

Coronation of a Princess
To elevate a Queen,
To raise aloft a Monarch
Who shall rule to seem as seen,
Who shall treat with due decorum
Her loyal subjects and her Crown
And adjudicate all personal preference,
Severely, not to let them down.
She shall marry into Royalty
Thence to breed a stately brood
Who shall tread the path of unctuousness
Avoiding steps into the rude.
Her decisions shall be just and fair
Her politics unseen
And whilst riding with nobility
Her associations shall be clean.
For she is known now as “Her Majesty”
And as such, she shall remain
Aloof from all conjecture,
And removed from callow fame.
Forever worshipped as our Monarch
And though imprisoned by her scene,
Imperially shall her smile shine bright
When sung….”God Save the Queen”.

God Save the Queen!
M.
27 April 2015

In the shadow of Everest people are dying
Crushed in a chaos embirthed from beneath,
Emerged as destructor of temple and Taos,
Emerged as an innocent killer... bequeathed.
History crumbles as heavens roar mightily
Ghorka is dead in an avalanche of rock,
Beggars and potentates crushed  in the brickfall
Dharahara’s fall leaves men gaping in shock.
Shuddering mountains in avalanche of free fall
Wails of the stricken as quaking defiles,
Gold topped pagodas and statue of ancients,
Sculpture of lions now a rubble in piles.
Khathmandu in the clasp of calamity
Nightmarish forces arisen from deep,
Grasping the earth in their grip of profanity
Monstrously tearing the bedrock from sleep.
A techtonic ****** of Asia by India
Nepal’s Himalayas ****** to the sky,
Inconsequential, this plight of humanity
Nature proceeds as poor Nepalese die.**

M.
ANZAC Day 25 April 2015

I’m phased out to sepia, Pet,
The last cab on the rank,
My good looks and *** a memory, Sweet,
For which, I’ve you to thank.
One day blending through to next
Increasingly a blur,
Dissatisfaction total now
For things ain’t what they were.
Ignored by all and sundry
Quite invisible to they
Who converse in hieroglyphics,
Incomprehensible, I say.
Overtaken by technology
Can’t figure out the phone
Facebook, watch and wallet mishmash
Won’t leave us alone.
Confusion at the pace of things,
It’s all moving far too fast
Queuing up for life
Leaves us, inevitably, last.
But bitterness ain’t with me
For I’ve loved your churlish ways,
Tho we’ve sailed through life on cobblestones
That old sunshine warmed our days.
But now I’m phasing out to sepia, Sweet,
Cos I’m the last cab on the rank
One quick kiss before departure, Pet,
For which..... I’ve you to thank.

M.
Auckland
22 April 2015

Tied to a point of view
Of pedantically avoiding you,
Embraced in retrenched stance
Of beetled brow’s dim elegance,
Inveigled in this shrouded glaze
These hooded eyes avoid your gaze….
But when I chance to glance, your smile,
I’m forced, my love, to reconcile.

M.

A caste of hawks at  a rage of maidens
Led a cete of badgers to a gaggle of geese
And a school of whales brought a shiver of sharks
To a fever of stingrays at fabulous feast.
An absence of waiters in a crackle of crickets
Served a band of brothers a bevy of beer
Then the army of ants in the choir of angels
Left a filth of starlings decidedly queer.
But the clew of worms in the hive of bees
Swapped the bike of wasps for a ghost of gnats
While the raft of otters in the den of iniquity
Turned the loveliness of ladybirds to a river of rats.
Why an array of eels fed a bunch of grapes
To a pod of dolphins…nobody knows
But a disputation of lawyers cawing
Killed your flock of lice in a ****** of crows.*

M.
11 April 2015

Oh, that (SHE), who once aglow
And lithe with youthfulness, would know,
That years must come to take their toll
Drape tiny fractures on the doll
Whose porcelain, once flawless smile
Now framed in tiny lattices, compiled
Of wrinkles, faint to puckered lips,
(to complement the shapely hips),
Which, when worn with grace of knowing years
Dispel all arrogance of tears,
Allowing, (SHE) to strut her style
Confounding raised eyebrows, awhile.
Allowing (SHE) to work her plan
Of adoring this discerning man.

M.

Q: Doctor, I've heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life. Is this true?
A: Heart only good for so many beats, and that it... Don't waste on exercise. Everything wear out eventually. Speeding up heart not make you live longer; it like saying you extend life of car by driving faster. Want to live longer? Take nap.

Q: Should I reduce my alcohol intake? ...
A: Oh no. Wine made from fruit. Fruit very good. Brandy distilled wine, that mean they take water out of fruity bit so you get even more of goodness that way. Beer also made of grain. Grain good too. Bottom up!

Q: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program?
A: Can't think of one, sorry. My philosophy: No pain...good!

Q: Aren't fried foods bad for you?
A: YOU NOT LISTENING! Food fried in vegetable oil. How getting more vegetable be bad?

Q: Is chocolate bad for me?
A: You crazy?!? HEL-LO-O!! Cocoa bean! Another vegetable! It best feel-good food around!

Q: Is swimming good for your figure?
A: If swimming good for figure, explain whale to me.

Q: Is getting in shape important for my lifestyle?
A: Hey! 'Round' is shape!

Well... I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets.

And remember:

Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways - Chardonnay in one hand - chocolate in the other - body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO-HOO, what a ride!!"

AND......

For those of you who watch what you eat, here's the final word on nutrition and health. It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies.

1. The Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than Brits.
2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than Brits.
3. The Chinese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than Brits.
4. The Italians drink a lot of red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than Brits.
5. The Germans drink a lot of beer and eat lots of sausages and fats and suffer fewer heart attacks than Brits.

CONCLUSION: Eat and drink what you like. Speaking English is apparently what kills you.


Concocted (for a sort of reconciliation)   ...for our weekly fatty club weigh in.

Ha!
M.

Flashing willow, spinning ball
Four million screaming Kiwis call
You champion of this far flung land
In World Cup Cricket’s greatest stand.

Tomorrow at the MCG
In Australia’s hostile field,
Black shall battle Green and Gold
To seize the Cup, to make them yield.

Flashing willow, spinning ball
The Black caps, as a team, enthrall
With inspirational de je Vue
In self belief, we’re backing you.

Tomorrow at the MCG
In Australia’s hostile field,
Black shall battle Green and Gold
To win the Cup, to watch them yield.

Flashing willow, spinning ball
Humble, proud…none can recall
A better cricket team to hand
To represent this Kiwi land.

Tomorrow at the MCG
Beneath Australia’s hostile sun
Black will hold the trophy high
This Cricket World Cup
SHALL BE WON!

M
Auckland, NZ
28 March2015
Black Caps v Australia,
Melbourne Cricket Ground.

This hollowness hangs in the air
Lines of mist doth chill the morn,
An estuary of shifting tide
Forlorn the sound of far fog horn.
Forlorn this sadness in my breast
I quietly gaze across the marsh
Within the heaviness of heart
Now melds the call of heron, harsh.
Still these waters, still and clear
Troubled eyes within my whole
Seek to see the reason why
These tranquil waters bleed my soul.
A fleeting shadow passed me bye,
A vestige of my old friend’s day
Where honesty’s grey eyes reflect
The depth in how still waters lay.
How I miss that wrinkled smile,
Recall quiet humour in the eyes…
To see the morning sun break mist
When ripples spread as heron flies.

M.
28 March 2015

Infinite these halls of time
These corridors of vast expanse,
Eternity of Universe
No preamble to the dance.
No start, no pause, no finish line
No courtship in this velvet sky,
Jewelled stars in vastness pass before
This cosmic, ink black curtain high.

Einstein touched, to reconcile
Gravity in quantum thought,
Interpretation’s multiverse
In parallel dimensions sought.
Postulations spectrum bright
In rainbow, cryogenic sky,
Now humankind, in wonder gasp…
Too insignificant to cry.

M.
On the eve of the re-commissioning of the Large Hadron Collider
In man’s effort to prove the existence of parallel dimensions in the actuality of an infinite, everlasting universe.
26 March 2015

Shipless in a foundering sea
Would that this, seem right to me?
Manless in a woman's world
Would, that some prefer, unfurled?
Hapless in a globe unmanned
Would, for they, be that as planned?
Planless in a thought unseen
Would that, this Kingdom's crown... unQueen?
M.

Tightening the rope as the fools dance and dither
Squandering the moments as hourglass falls,
Walking the tightrope in a world lost to thither
Assassins maraud as the fat General calls.
Flat fingers hover above plastic buttons
Hover in hesitant moments of pause,
Waiting in limbo instructions from Hades
Exultantly plunging to holocaust cause.
Plunging erotically down to the plastic
Smearing the sweat and blood in a pool,
Lusting your moment of utter destruction
Casting all humankind’s best …to be fool.

Doubt not veracity’s balance in tremor
Out there the Devil is dancing his jig,
Everywhere globally men flee in terror
Uncertainty slides with the squeal of the pig.
Russia inflates as tyrannical tyrant
Isis is spreading its carpet of blood,
Worldwide the military gird for battle
Appeasement disbursed in a torrent of flood
Shades of veracity flood Sarajevo
Memories taunt of that drumbeat to war,
Demagogues strut now the march of the scarlet
God flees reality….and is no more.

M.
17 March 2015