Dreams are not the stuff of poets
We can do better, should not chase them
Dreams are the stuff of lost souls
and though some of them can write
I do not know why we reward it
with forgetful immortality, when the Gods
they have abandoned dreamers
to the desert of the real
my spine does not know of dreams
my tail lashing even in its rest
this whip-crack vertebrae does not forget
and the Gods can get ******

for all these words belong to you
I only hold them for a while
until the time when you are through
for all these words belong to you
I wonder with them what you'll do
perhaps to keep them with your smile
for all these words belong to you
I only hold them for a while

We are all dead
or we are all alive
We live in the grey
but there is no dividing line
Brown or pink
Black or white
Shades and shadows dividing
by what you think they think
  about why you are
  when what you are
            is living
In dying for difference
            we are lost
In thinking too much
and in not living enough

For this tree loves everybody
it is bright, it is lovely, it is … short
truncated yet hopeful
all the colours of the rainbow
This tree does not care who you ****
or what you put in to which hole
This tree has no holes, no cracked old bones
just a spectrum, a bole covered in a gentle bark
no reprimand, no judgement, an open elemental heart
It has no plateau of leaves to offer shelter
but it is here and it loves you whether
you care for the woods, for the rain or not
This tree loves everybody
Its bark is deep, it is cracked, it is flawed
and though it is aged and short, truncated
by fate and the nature of this place
it is unbowed echoing all that we hope
will come to pass, for this tree is yours
it grows all the colours of the rainbow
Let it brighten your grey sky grey day
Let it remind you that things may yet change
Let it smile for you when you can't raise
enough brightness inside to chase away
all that we've lost, all that we fight for
For this tree loves everybody
and so can we all,
                       so can we all,
                                      so can we all

I have words
   good words
      all the best words
         they come out of me
      in fountains
   cascading
waterfall words
   flushing away doubt
      over the edge
         over the precipice
      I speak
   falling words
splashing words
   drowning words
      there are rocks at the bottom
         broken bones
            buried treasure
               known unknowns
            wrapped in reedy words
         left here by thrill seekers
     terrorists, murderers      
   rapists
jumping off cliffs
   swimming over rivers
climbing the walls that I built
   I am a great builder, you see
      but it's not all about me and my words
   I have questions too
Why do the bubbles breathe when I can't?
   Is this light refracted a mirror of the dark?
      Is there such a thing as a grindelow?
         Can't we stop them?
           What is this weight
              pulling me down
                Can I swim?
              Will I drown if I don't win?
            Don't look too closely
       for I don't know anything
   I never did
Let me back in
   I always win
     You'll be sorry
         You will be sorry
     all that will be left
   is a scorched blonde wig
a scorched earth
   a pile of empty emperors clothes
      and legislated words
         captured in email,
            cooked until raw
         served over the body politic
      burnt and broken by the fall
    of ***** grabbing brawlers
  drowned and forgotten in a furore
of water hurtling towards the forgetful sea
   and it's endless tides will bring the bodies back to shore
won't wash away the misdeeds, you don't know that half of it
you will never be clean
  But not me
    I am very rich you see
       I will float away on an endless tide
         of empty promises
            corporate endorsements
               and established exploitations
                  leaving only the roaring echo of the flood
               in which all your words
            all your worthless worlds
         were washed away
      so ask yourself
  on voting day
   who do you hate less?
   who do you hate more?
will it always be this way?

Is there space in this system for new rules
Can we find them hiding behind old books
Some dusty office at the top of a pole
Bleak ivory with a view well known
to all of us, who have got what we want
Whose privileged breath breathes deep of high times
stuffed with all those norms and expectations
litigating obligations ignored,
ignored; yet enforced by free tyranny
of the individual, of ones rights
without the weight of responsible
judgement. NO, there is no space up here, NO
not for straighter rules or greater fools
though latter too many, former too few;
These old rules are crooked, like hind quarters
dragged up the long torrid stair to the top
held up by lofty ideals, righteous… no
We seem in these high places to have forgot
whyfore we came to be here or how rotten
we are, that rot set into the books, the rules
the shelves, the pages, the walls, the food
Into the words, the system, the wages
paid to those shoring up this modern day
Babel. No well-intentioned roads lead here
No one will choose to walk these ugly stairs
No one will come, those lonely inventions
Freedom, liberty, the individual
Let them gather and groan in old walls
Mildewed bricks and misted rattling bones
Left here forgotten by those living below
Seen from on high in this ivory tower
This pale tower where no one lives, no one.

This crooked timber set deep in these bones
Oh, when the wind blows how they wail, they moan
“Such a fine day for this human design
to wither, to char”. Unpicked fruit on the vine
lingers in sight such a tempting insult
to all we once were, before this result
was tempered by the unyielding seasons
and bone branches creaking for numerous reasons
cling to hold fast, but cannot hold on;
they drop like the fruit, lost and forgotten.
The wind does not care for wind never stops
the branches still creak, still grow old, they still rot.
The winds it blows on, to be bent is to crack
The fruit doesn’t know this, never looks back
to where the wind came from, wind never creeps
but like deadened roots sunk deep in the creek
searches for stones that they mistook for seeds
not held in the murk, carried off on the breeze.
Forget seeds and fruit, leaves or trees under
which we now lie, feeding bones to the sky
The wind won’t uproot you, no earth can unshake
endless regret for on eggshells we quake
at the notion of another long day
trying to reach through the stars in our way
trying to feel for the warmth of the sun
for deep in these bones we know there is none
this crooked timber when set to the rack
will remind these bones there is no way back.