Humanity, in all its dreadful shades,
Shall shuffle and leap to its varnished doom.
It shall grind and break its very bones in selfie congratulatory glow;
A sickening dance of death,
Salty and twisted and sweet.
Tear-stained and hating, it claws the wall as the stairs fall towards the blank.
Laugh in fear, embrace yourselves and believe that we are climbing,
Whilst onwards, onwards unto the abyss.

I dream and when I dream, you are sometimes there.
You did not die.
Instead we talk of how scared we were that you would not make it through.
How it was a terrible time for all of us
But now things are back to normal.

It seems right and not strange at all that you are part of things as ever you were.
But this is a dream, though I do not know it,
I never do.
Only when I wake, does all the sense turn to nonsense
You did die. I did lose you.

But I grasp the notion that these dreams are perhaps a way of telling me that somehow you do survive.
And somewhere round the corner just ahead and out of view, you are.
One day dreams will be and I shall wake from waking.

Swirling its obscurity to envelope and disorientate,
Veiling the path both for and aft,
Creating shapes of mystery in the dense abstract.
Folk emerge and vanish as characters through the billowy grey,
Faces lost and found only to be lost again.
Everywhere is where it is,but where you seem to be
Yet I am shrouded just the same to those who strain to see.

The journey of the half-seeing eyes finds only fleeting refuge,
Streetlamps burn their blurry beacon for the weary and the lost,
The huddled and the homeless comfort in the glow within the gloom.
Yet peril lurks in the unknown nooks where illumination fears to dare
Hurry on before we discover what is waiting there...

So near, so far; my heart laments
Your presence, detached yet courteous.
Will not this fevered yearning find the strength to stand,
And ****** aside propriety?
Intimacy dressed in Sunday best, snags my soul as thorns on flesh.
A lighter burden would my heartstrings bear,
Should oceans part us - or my eyes should find you not so fair.

Just as it becomes too much
It becomes nothing at all.
And one is left with autumn leaves
That gather where they fall.
I thought that I had moved your heart
But you saw me shifting dust.
I had a diamond in my hand
How I fidgeted and fussed.
Now I stand on bended knees amongst
The proof of parties past
And know the glitter on my hands
Will never, ever last.

Almost all of the time, I do not notice it.
I distract myself unconsciously
And carry on.
I am me and all the people that others know me to be.
I smile and laugh and make amusing comments to make others laugh.
I maintain connections.
But every so often, I catch a glimpse out of the corner of my eye, of the figure crouching to hide in the dark corner of the room. Any room.
And then, almost never, I stare, to try and see his face.

When do you wake? When do you cry?
Is it both by yourself? What colour's your sky?

Do you still stare at the wall in your room?
Does it stare back in lamplit gloom?

When do you smile that smile that I knew?
Do you know, do you care that it rains here, too.

What do you think? What do you do? When you're being yourself and not being you.

Are you feeling the cold, with the nights drawing in - with leaves piled in corners and the sun getting thin?

When do you smile that smile that I knew?
Do you know, do you care that it rains here, too?

The future and the present sit,
Like magpies in a tree,
Reminding you how bad you’ve been,
And how bad you still might be.

I wish I had not seen them there,
Something else had held my gaze.
So now I would not have to worry,
How I spend my days.

But I see you and I see her,
And the air is strangely filled,
With the knowledge that at any moment,
I could end up killed.

I love her but I want you.
Exciting, frightening, cruel,
I love the pain I feel right now,
I’m danger’s dancing fool.

The floor is cracking round my feet,
Like ice about to break,
And I will fall and curse the risks
That lovers always take.

Here I stand, inside the close and turning walls,
Balancing my humours against the seasons,
Hoping against the tide that blood will beat the brood.
But I can see dogs on the Ferris Wheel
And I know there will be torches in the town.
So I will remain here,
Inside the close and turning walls.

For shame, I did not give myself away,
Though I did burn to bring her unto me,
I'm set to howl by night and rue the day.

My countenance had nothing good to say,
No brave emotion vying to break free,
For shame I did not give myself away.

Real life becomes more fickle than a play,
I stumble in the dark, I cannot see,
I'm set to howl by night and rue the day.

Dismiss me not as conceited, I pray,
Do not let silence be our legacy,
For shame I did not give myself away.

I yearn for her, yet keep it here at bay,
In order I may write my tragedy,
I'm set to howl by night and rue the day.

That she ignore it all and choose to stay,
Would surely constitute a lunacy,
For shame I did not give myself away,
I'm set to howl by night and rue the day.

Empty people fill a room,
Of dusty dreams, it’s like a tomb.
They stand and sip, all hieroglyphic,
Thinking this is just terrific.

A bite to eat, an idle chat,
She never did, well fancy that.
Michael’s looking well these days,
It’s been a very tricky phase.

I step outside to get some air,
And find a woman standing there.
She’s on the edge, with tear-stained cheeks,
Her heel has snapped, her breath, it reeks.

She asks me if I like her dress,
I take a look and tell her, yes.
She smiles at me and drawing breath,
Without a word, leaps to her death.

A drop of scotch, a swig of gin,
Which bedroom is my jacket in?
Andy said he’d run me home,
But he’s in the bog and not alone.

Parties are the strangest things,
Nothing moves unless it swings.
I guess I’m just not in the groove,
Time, I think, to make a move.

I could make up lots of things just to throw at you,
But this isn't a movie or a play and we won't get to do it again.
This is real and the truth is whatever look I'm giving.
I loved you and still do.
And the pain is knowing that it isn't enough.

Songs I sung and films I watched will puncture my skin,
When I recall them without warning.
The sea has receded and left me beached; the tide was too fast.
There is no plan yet for how I stand up.

I wish you well because the man I want to be would say that,
But there is a child inside that wants what is not permitted.
This facet of me is threatening the peace.
This is real and I do not wish to leave an indelible scar in the shape of a mistake.

You are the great love of my life that never was,
Neither love nor life.
Think of me; don't think of me,
Let me see you but stay out of my sight.
I don't know how this can go on from here,
But I know it is real.

I shall be destroyed.

Roses are red; violets are blue,
This is the kind of thing I said to you.
Roses are dying; violets are dead,
I can’t forget all of the things that YOU said.

Suppose all the crying’s ‘cause the pilot has fled,
Tears level buildings, much less than I’ve shed.
Moses was right; violence is wrong,
Pray for me and hope that the tablets are strong.

Repose in my bed whilst millions lie too,
Hoods cover falsely; only one north is true.
Violins are playing: losers are bled,
Carrion on, whilst to crows they are fed.

Silence is golden, like the gun at my head,
Bullets are always so easily lead.
Blue leads to anger; red is the mist,
If only I’d known all of this when we kissed.

Roses aren’t ready, away violets blew
I really can’t say that I know what I knew.

She is a spoon.
She is bright. And when I look at her, I see myself reflected.
But it is not the face I completely recognise.
Sometimes she shines and sparkles when she does what she does best.
She is a comfortable position into which I neatly fit.
She yields to reveal an illusion of vulnerability when touched with the heat from my finger tips.
I have lost my spoon of late.

Stray dogs and sweethearts both wander through the street,
Appearing lost to everyone that they should stop and meet.
Balloons and broken dreams do fly away from those who care,
Leaving them with tear-stained cheeks as they just stand and stare.

It's difficult to know, right now, which category I fit,
I've tasted love's sweet bitterness and had my fill of it.
But day's cold light has shown me that although this truth I know,
Sure as the night preceded it, my thirst for love will grow.

It was that time of year again,
When cold winds came to call and bite fingers,
And stiffen air and water underfoot,
Turning the traveller’s weary trudge into a muffled creak.
Trees, stark and bare, stand with arms unburdened for the season,
Held forth in yearning for a friend to perch for company,
Looking, for all the world, like cracks in winter’s window.

It was that time of year again,
When smoke snaked from the chimneys of lonely cottages,
Strewn, carelessly along windy lanes, covered in nature’s blanket,
All colours bled to white; a canvass clear and clean,
For hands and feet to leave their mark; proof of life in the bitter blank.
Bells from yonder chapel call believers to their faith, but faith was lost,
When my love, abandoned to the cold a year ago, died a frozen death.

And now it was that time of year again

Some, life burns, some it saves,
Though we're all just corpses looking for our graves.
Tender petals brace as the north wind blows,
But why and to what we cling on to, no-one knows.

Bring me back and tell me that you were joking when you said,
That all the things we felt for one another are now dead.
The truth is somewhat harsher though, I'm having to admit,
Your loving never lived for me. That's right now isn't it?

So now I look like just another stranger on the street,
And not the man who promised you the earth beneath your feet.

The atmosphere lately was a signal loud and clear,
The frostiness between us, more than just the time of year.
The food of love's gone rotten and everything is wrong,
When you can't even bring yourself to sing our favourite song.

The quake has undermined us both, I can feel the magma heat,
How can I offer now to you, the earth beneath your feet?

Show bit of backbone will you?
No-one cares a bit.
Stiffen up your top lip
Coz no-one gives a ****.

Don't pour your heart on paper
It only serves to show
Others, their own pain in rhyme
Why do they need to know?

You're a man and you'll **** up
But your problems are your own.
They're not the masses *****
Broadcast from your phone.

To wallow in anxiety
Is boring, sad and sick.
Just shut up and get on with things
Stop being such a *****.

The crooked picture in the room without a door,
Is a jar to my settled thoughts.
Things upon which we dwell in vain,
Maintain the opaque wonder of life's baseless advantage,

Your hold upon my waking mind,
Testament to this fretful musing,
But all the while we strain to know -we hope we do not see,
For our solace lurks in that some things remain a mystery.

Thinking of quitting
Thinking of sand
Thinking of lying
A hand in my hand

Thinking of breathing
Thinking to just
Stop me from thinking
Of you, if I must

One more second til I leave the present far behind,
One step until I stand in future's place.
Again tomorrow is but only one more day away,
When Then and Now shall merge in their embrace.

The clock ticks on without a care; never looking back,
Its optimistic rhythm fills the room.
No lament of history shall alter future's shape,
For now is just an echo far too soon.