It's hard to let go,
When we have so
Little to hang on to.

All those seeds once sown
Never took shoot to grow.
The soil that was tillered
And tethered to your heart
Lays fallow, unkempt,
Scorched away and torn apart.

Yet,

Even the ash that fell
Like autumnal rain
Will, with time, be blown away.
With time and space to grow
The land can breath
The heart can sow.

I lost my mind
Yet found a god.
Not yours
Nor Abraham's
Nor one I've met before.

It came between this world
And the one that lies beneath.
Reached forth with countless arms
That sought to caress relief.

It did not make the world
It merely rolled the dice.
We were a fluke of sorts.
An unexpected development
In the petri dish of life.

It is a scientist you see
That tinkered with what would be.
No omniscience
No omnipotence
Just a conscience none too clean.
For it despairs as much as we
At the horrors that have come to be.

I see now it has no power
To alter what has begun
No more than we can
Alter the colour of our sun.
Once I would rage at the sky
Calling yours a Sod.
Now I understand
For I have met Oh,
He/she/it is now my god.

We fight over what we want
At the expense of what we need.
Crippled by whims,
Lashed by whips of greed.

Love, compassion.
Food, water
And shelter
After a fashion.

No Falchion will safeguard our walls
Until we know what they are for.
No cheap parlor tricks , No following a flag
No cheap death, No bugle call.

Ocean spray flays ancient cloisters,
Darkening already withered stone.
Moonlit towers crumble, humbled
By the weight of stolen thrones.
Sound proclaimed in hollow domes
Found shallow, wanting and alone.
While wind rips down forgotten walls
Tapestries tap out in hallowed halls.
Memories shed shadows in the fall.
The call of rust, echoes of war.
Ruin and dust for now and evermore.

The future is strange is it not?
All our hopes and dreams
Aspirations sewn at the seams
Of a dwindling reality.
Everything is possible,
I suppose.
And if we concentrate just so,
We too can take a glimpse of the show
That lies behind drawn curtains.

Nothing is certain
This I think I know.
Yet at times we feel the ebb and flow
Of futures yet to pass.
Not to be divined from entrails
Of a broken looking glass.
Mirrors have their uses
To show what others see,
But no great revelations
Of what will come to be.

Have our minds been made,
Long before ourselves?
Are we cartesian nightmares
Unto which we delve?
Is our image of ourselves
As foolish as I think?
And what becomes of the world
In the instance that we blink.

Have these words been uttered
By anothers tongue.
Under the guise of destiny
A pointless race to run.
Thoughts implanted,
Minds enchanted
By the most temporal of enemies.
Throttle the future with me now
As we fight the tides of entropy.

They are reflections of the world
We inhabit. Mirrored shards
Flung high into the air.
Sharing in all of beautys passion,
Caught in the lensflare of compassion
Bound to the refraction of selfless care.
Compounded with the crux of inaction.
Falling shards are somewhat sharp.

They tend to draw blood.

No fault of their own
For fault implies Blame
Blame implies control.

The arrow does not make the bow

He lived his life on water,
Coming and going with the tide.
Caught in a clockwork rhythm.
Bottle of *** close by his side.

Sailing far toward the northern star,
The wind lashed sails bare his stride.
The gale fails, Neptune's breath subsides.
Veiled pride confides in an ocean's memoir.

A choir of crestfallen waves,
Lay dormant at his side,
Prepared to pave the path of secrets,
With untold misery and lies.
A choice to make, a course to take
Coordinates only he could decide.

With a sigh he held the helm,
Turned her steadily back to port.
Sailing back toward that beaten track,
To the town where his child was born.

Today I put down the pen
And raised my sword,
To charge down a path forlorn.
Past a river of scorn
That lies in the shade of
Humanity torn.

Branches that weep
And overhang this road,
Stand sentinel, skeletal and cold.
They whisper to us yet we shan't be told.
Now far gone from all moral code.

There are no good intentions
Once cursed by interventionist actions.
You sir shall ******* steel,
Eat well, for tomorrow you will
Dine on your final meal.

The trail of treachery is long,
And shall last till all bitterness is gone.
All that now remains
Is a feeling to try explain.
The thought that lies dormant in my head;
What's done is done,
No good can come from the dead.

With a sigh,
I put down my sword.
And withdraw my pen once more.

Our skin is like a canvass,
Etched upon by the lines of age.
Its tale is told by the scars that unfold.
Some made of sorrow,
Some born of rage.
An unturned page, ripped and unsold,
Tossed into the fiery blaze.

At least it kept us warm.
For the winter was rough,
The land cracked and torn.
The trees lay barren,
Bark scorched, for ever more.

Turn the page and start anew!
Yet still the scars remain.
We look ourselves, for now at least,
Though we will never be the same.

The smile beneath the shadow
Of our eyes, anointed red,
Can never belie what we have endured.
The hopelessness of being burned
From a trial by fires warming allure.

So although the flesh may falter,
No longer to be found anew,
Our eyes shall burn with a fiery purpose.
Till the day life's debt is due.

We ride in on night winged eagles
Three harbingers of fate.
Circling over the city of the dead
We land awkwardly at the gate.
Trudging through the streets of mist
Treading on cobbled hopes,
Gathering jackets close
We barge through crowds of ghosts.

Three wise men, with nothing much to say.
Gather round in the rain by the side of the Grave.
Bringing the gift of silence,
Golden memories and mirth.
The city takes another back into the earth.
The rain starts to lighten, a feint mist
Over fresh turned turf.
The burden is lightened
The journey back is not so tough.
Even the city of the dead is filled
With towers of love.

You will know them not from the smiles
And frowns etched upon stoic faces,
But from the virtue of their hearts
Found in all but the darkest of places.
More often then not they reside deep
Within a tepid grey.
Hunting in the twilight between the
Dusk and the day.
Everything in moderation
Yet nothing is in isolation
Moths to the flame we stray.
Bound to the light
Forever fighting to fly away

What have we become?
When poetry resides
In two lines, then we're done?
Have you nothing more to say?

Pretending to be profound,
Applause all around.
Nothing more than a passing thought.
If thought was required at all?

You call this poetry?
I don't.

Perhaps I'm just old fashioned,
Believing in meaning
And the power of words.
Yet on occasion i have heard
Voices of angels and demons
Faint but undeterred,
Laughing in the face of mediocrity.

A virus fed by popularity,
So what have we learned?
From your instagram friendly
Twitter assembly,
We realise you have said
Absolutely nothing at all.

Her eyes, Belie,
The darkness deep inside.
Her smile, Defiles,
Laws of nature running wild.
Her hair, It don't care,
If it's right or fair.
She'll take you by your soul,
Eat your heart in just one go.

Her tongue, it runs,
This city of the sun.
In her mind, you'll find,
A piece of the divine
Lost within her thighs.
Don't fight the coming tide,
Embrace the genocide.
Sand proscribed, a bandaid tried
And weary from repeat.
Lost to the waves, sweat and sleet.
Ocean licks brine from
Timeless, restless feet.

The time comes!
Whispers from seashells
Claim much to be done.
Already the shadows seem tall.
Darkness grows bold
The Sun falls old,
Tired by the sight of all.

And as the watcher slumbers
Stars peek around the curtains
Once drawn tight by the light of day.
Their time to shine and show mankind the way.
But mans gaze is glazed, eyes distant, far away.

The stratosphere beckoned closer.
Vertigo took its toll.
Soaring higher than we could ever know.
These wings weren't made of wax
They melted all the same.
The ground seemed far once
Now it's as clear as day.
The clouds get out of my way
Their softness is a lie.
Cunning *******
Floating the atmospheric tide.

I have no such luck.

****

I Think I can see my house...

*crunch

A mind made of marble
And pristene granite walls.
Intricate mosaics,
Oak carved skirting boards.

Mahagony knights
Prize their ivory pawns.
On unto the fight,
Iron locks with horn.

Sweet Mother of pearl,
Stern Father of pride,
Find a place called home,
Stand sentry for the night.

Fountains maintain order
The force of flowing water,
Both violent and yet serene.
Soothing currents of the sea
Slaying dragons in our dreams.

A bleak horizon. No sign of life
Save weak paw prints,
Etched light upon the white
Expanse of silence.
Boreal moon rising belies the violence
That had ensued.
One set of prints where once there were two.
Fallen prince among wolves
Arctic Gods have had their due.
As the wind howled, cried and blew
The hunter stopped and shuddered.
Wondered, about the beast he slew.
The wind cries once more.
The wind or the wolves?
He is no longer so sure.

They never gave a ****.
A silhouetted master plan,
A shadow of a man,
Summons a feeble grasping hand.

A grip that's none too tight,
Sand slips through fickle fingers' sight.
Hour glasses and tricks of the light.
The hand of time, immovable might.

Despite of

Inspite of?

Rivers and oceans in our minds
Defy, turn the tide, divide.
Ox bow truths and eroded lies.
Mountain streams serenade the blind.
And those unwilling to see.
Blinkered to the plight of man.
Banned from the light of eternity.

The wind speaks in warnings
Passed fast from leaf to leaf.
The rustle of the undergrow
Stirs firm in disbelief.
Pitters and patters scatter
The fallen pain.
The last acorn of the season
Falls,
A final act of treason.
A beacon among the coming rain.

Once down the old Caledonian road,
There walked a broken man
Who walked all on his own.
Entombed in tattered cloak
Against Decembers cold,
The man fell to pavement
Fell to pavement all alone.

None would descend from
High misguided thrones,
Have a heart and pass the starving
Man a bone.
And not a soul would stop and save him.
Once down the old Caledonian road.

When this mortal frame does falter,
If there be left a body still to burn
Cast my ash from the cliffs of Dover
For on the winds I shall return.
Though my soul may be lost to water,
Bones bleached and turned to dust
My heart will soar across the forests
Climbing mountains in the dusk.
Then as the daylight rises
And darkness gives way to light
I will cast these eyes, one last time,
Across the shores of life.

An Iron Sky, sighs.
Provides the rusted
Rhythm of the night.
Silence supplied,
Swiftly denied.
Wisps of winter light
Smitten by the smile of night.
That obelisk of shade,
That monolith of shadow,
Minor burns,
Wounds carved shallow onto skin,
Flesh lays fallow
Till iron breaths again.

If you were a god for a day
With the world in your hands,
To mould as clay,
Would you delay to start anew?
Wipe the slate clean
Bidding evil adieu.

Personally?

If it walks then let it run,
If it talks then let it sing,
If it flies then let it soar
Higher than it's ever been.
If if wanders let it roam,
If it absconds then leave it so,
If it dares then let it dream
That it is greater than it seems.
And if it all shall stumble
Shoulders once held firm
That start to crumble,
Under the weight of our
Burdened thoughts.
Then let those bones reform,
Skin sewn anew,
Or it shall forever be for naught.

I miss finding your hair
On jumpers you had never worn,
I miss the way our chargers
Plugged in together at the wall.
I miss the way you looked at me
When now all I see is scorn
I miss the way you seemed to care
The way we stood against the storm.

I miss feeling as if I had worth,
Finally, I wasn't alone on this earth.
I miss huddling for warmth,
Cuddling, chocolate and the hearth.
I miss you when we had heart
The days I would drive you home in the dark.
I miss the days I was by your side
Shoulder there every time you cried.
I miss not being miserable,
I miss wanting to be alive.
Mostly I miss being missed by you,
That sweet lie of I love you to.

A city stirs, chaos ensues.
A thousand feet shuffle on
Into the gloom.
As markets spew skewed
Statistics, of
Fortunes faded
And riches made in minutes.

I see the lightning.
I can smell the thunder.
With all the rancid sounds
Of society torn asunder.

They have the need.
The need for greed
And new age prophets.
Preaching and predicting
The rise and fall.
Like Benedictine's of old.
So secure and safe,
Kept warm by misguided faith
In numbers.

As stocks begin to slumber
And those feet go shuffling home,
The city sighs a relief.
Guiding it's flock
Through trains and planes
Like a Shepard leads his sheep.

If life is a ride
Then I wish for it to cease,
Just for a moment
Let its chains release.
Let all of its highs,
And all of its lows
Roll solemnly off the breeze.

If life is a game
Then show me my red card.
The training never helped,
The fight was much too hard

If life is a race,
Then let me fall behind
As the dust from all their feet
Creates a storm and casts me blind.

If life is to be conscious
Then confine me unto sleep.
Mind locked in the tallest tower
Forever out of reach.

If life is to be loved
And to love again in turn.
Then rip this failing *****
From my chest and let it burn.
For these are some life lessons,
Those lessons hardest to learn.

What kind of magician are you?
One who would carve a heart in two.
Offered as truth, the audience view
Miraged oceans made of sand.
Light retracts, distracts,
Sight fights sleight of hand.

The eyes will see what you will show,
The mind will always think it knows.
The heart will lie, cheat and steal.
While smiles conceal, frowns reveal
That still we can't say what is real.

At the start we are all helpless,
Utterly reliant.
We stand
We fall
We cry
We crawl.
Not always so compliant.

In the middle we are at our peak.
Suddenly defiant,
We smoke
We drink
We ****
We think,
We forge our own alliance.

At the end we are all frightened.
Our life is at its tether.
We think
We're ******
So we'll drink
To good luck.
And hope that we'll all
Live forever.

Again the fist unfolds.
Fingers unfurl red
Petal blossom of a rose.
Scent of a broken nose,
Stain shed on shaven heads.
Kings with no crown nor throne
Lay prone in whitewashed beds.

Thorns in their own sides,
****** in their own right.
These manicured monsters
Cry a challenge unto the night.
Marching on through kebab dreams,
Weeks 'for we speak of Halloween.

Banished to the grey.
A conglomerate of clouds
Surround and shroud the day.
A world found still
Shrill sound of silence.
Echoes of shadows
Grace violence on our walls.
The blood of our compatriots
Our lovers, our fools.
Ours, not yours.
Potential and not a tool.
"Too little, too late"
Muttered the lips of fate,
For the ending is well overdue.

He met a girl down in a bar,
She had eyes like a hurricane.
Lost within the winds of her smile,
He was spinning like a weathervane.

He said,
"Girl there's guna be rain,
So we had better take cover."
She said,
"Now boy don't be insane,
I'm no sunshine lover."

Now they stand together
Drenched to the bone,
Her lips taste like summer,

An oasis alone in the cold.

The words that flowed unchecked yet tidal
Lay dammed by life not calm but idle.
Serene is a dream for these words of water
That slipped through the fingers of another man's daughter.
For life plays heavy on liquid minds
Which dwell too long on the swells of time.

Yet when the moon shines true,
Reflected in that greatest hue,
Horizon of the deepest blue
Deep within our minds.
The words torrent, cascade and surge
To purge unworthy from our sight.
Waters rage, fires billow.
Carrying carrion far into the night.

What is the promise of a stranger worth?
Lavender smiles and honeyed words,
Submerged in the sound of hope disturbed.
Usurped and flayed for misbehavior
Hung from a tree, sacrificial favour.

The flavour was sweet, at least for a while.
A taste of haste fried ripe in denial.
Smothered in smiles and candyfloss
Lightly glazed glances, a dusting of loss.
A promise made pays a heavy cost.

Flashes of long lost decadence
Clothed in shabby cloaks of misdemeanor.
Windswept nostalgia, stayed and sleeved
By the breeze that haunts a forests tree.

Leave it be, the wind said to me.
Let the leaves be leaves,  
Let the trees be trees,
For their roots run deep,
Far deeper than you may perceive.

Spontaneous yet flexible
Confident and malleable.
Able to go with the times
And go with the flow,
Finger on the pulse
Presentations to show.
Laser pointers and
Laser printers
Pressed for time.
Nothings here
But what here's mine.

Climb over colleagues
Through Ivy leagues
And Redbrick universities.
Shadowed by a letter.
A,
B,
C,
D?

"And extra-curricular activities?"
"Literature?"
"Theatre?"
"Ah...well......I see........."

"......Well....there is an opening.......
.....Not great hours I'm afraid.....
.....But the pay is competitive...............
...Beyond the market rate......."

An inward sigh and a signature.
Uniforms and moral aperture.
We do what "must be done"
And whisper other soft lies
While we hide from the Sun.

We cling to dead air
Holding on to broken promises
And feelings that are not there.
We dwell on the scars
Carved with care across our heart.
Trying to place our finger on
The beginning of the end
Or the end of the start.

Our dearest departed
Left us used and disheartened.
While the sins of the father
Gave birth to disaster
Born in the shape of a man.
The harder we cling to shadows
The more we long for shade.
The more our grip shall weaken
As those we love slip far away.

If I had but one wish,
I would wish to live forever.
Find the ties of mortal life
Cut quick the binds we sever.
Become a watcher in the mist,
A homeless, timeless clan
Caught in the currents of the rift.
No Steins Gate will be entered
World lines locked from our reach.
Fighting the tides of entropy
Fist, nail and bloodied teeth.
Again and again and again
Unto the breach.
Drowning,
From the pressure of the deep.

And if in that moment we falter
Our power lost to the trees.
Alder, Maple, Ash.
Vines strangling our cities.
Choking on what we were told.
The earth takes us in a headlock
Strangles tight and wont let go.

Its fingers slipped in the nuclear snow
Withered tendril arms, retreating
To where they used to go.
Exiled below
Deep within the darkest reaches
Far from the reach of the human throne.
In the dark it patiently plotted,
Schemed to overthrow.

Every triumph that we forge
And every evil that we lay
Are etched on the quilt of reality
Brought out to the light of day.

There is always a witness,
Even if it's you.
Walls are a sign of something hidden,
Something we wish to be out of view.
But our masonry is shoddy,
Our archers ill prepared.
The walls will fall transparent
As hollow as our flaws that all are aired.