It seems like only yesterday
That the first lambs of spring
Were running, bleating, over the fields.
Perhaps it was. Perhaps it was.
As seasons rush relentlessly
Down tracks that may, or may not
Lead to hell, the dogs of hell
Are barking: Can you hear their demon cry?
They cry as one: wolves undone,
The hounds let down their hair.
The night turns to day and
The summer to winter. The winter to spring.
A pin drops: does a mouse
Hear it with an ear attuned to silence?
Or does it crouch oblivious,
Awaiting scraps and scrapes, cats and shapes
That shadow its every move
Along the wall? Whilst standing tall,
The ruthless dance: a dervish trance
Has them in its dreadful spell
And with its whirling wisdom
Leads them down to burning hell.
And us as well.
And us as well.

the baby next door and i sob in unison;
he because he has felt such love in his small world
and he wants it with him
all the time;
and i because my world is bigger,
and i know that there is too much world,
and too little love.

The hair falls, blonde and long:
A cherished doll. Birdsong
Echoes through the dale, as
Twilight casts its gaze and vixens wail.
Sparks driven out as spikes driven in
Places gone, things untold; people she's been.
An openness: the silky vapour
Evaporates, yet cannot escape her
Cocoa eyes, wide as the day they met.
He sees her yet. He hears her yet.
Though she says no words, casts a glance
Over her shoulder, flying askance
Ringlets quiver in the breeze,
Yet in the shadow of the trees,
No man appears. And yet she hears
A pheasant's cry: the yellowest canary
Its song a desperate scream, contrary
Muntjacs dance with target tails,
But the *****, ever hidden, wails.

"i shall bring you stars," she said
and she did
but the pleasure of her company
shone so bright that
it eclipsed them all.

grass spinning by the window of the car
whipping round and round
round and round
far above my head.

a memory like an oil painting
the first time i saw evil
shining from someone's eyes
like a beacon.

running, packing, running
as the roof came crashing down
the insects gathered, parasitic
on the shell of their burnt-out home.

thirteen snails and i
making a journey
oblivious to how it would shape the course
of our lives.

they're blue eyes, not brown
you're wrong
how do you know?
my answer rocked the very sky.

crawling pathetically
dragging my exhausted self across the grey
like some kind of bizarre slow worm
a leech on my own house.

the swooping, the draining, the sepia walls
it was the fault of the beads, of course
of me, and of her
for giving them.

seeing her slumped on the floor
dressed in glass
with crimson make-up
shivering in my nightclothes
as the dogs howled behind.

he had fuzzy caterpillar eyebrows
and the evillest laugh i ever heard
his wife gave me a sink
and signalled to keep quiet.

soon i learned
not to trust items with censored details:
boarded-up windows, blacked-out vans and
chained-up rooms.

soon i learned
so many things

A regal nose leads down to luscious lips
A tiny waist yields to imperial hips
The wasp-like figure zips past, fairy-fast
And leaves him dangling in her wake, aghast.

"Like young deer on the mountain-top" says he,
"They rise and fall as shivers come to me.
They rack my soul with conquests sweet as wine,
And raise me up to lofty heights sublime."

She smiles gently; wrens tap tiny dance
Upon her gaze, he looks and finds his trance
Her eyes as blackened hazel, all afire
With love and lust and mirrors of desire.

He reaches out his hand to touch her own
As skin grasps pastel flesh, lets out a moan
As softly she caresses him so light,
Then disappears into the dark of night.

She wants to wax artistic
Her audience so rapt
Are watching every movement
As something in her snaps.

She raises up the scalpel
Her canvas takes the brunt
Of artistry in temper,
Of truth she daren't confront.

Her pencil lead stabs slowly
In repetition bland
It draws out lines, it stabs out points
Misguided by her hand.

She lifts her palette higher
As red ink starts to dash
Down lines made by the pencil
On the canvas she has slashed.

She's showing her life story
For she knows no words to say
What the horrors are that taunt her,
Flaunt her, haunt her every day.

She spills a can of petrol,
She lights a tiny match
And down her canvas one last time
Her fingernails scratch.

She throws it in the fire
And she dances round the flames
Crying, screaming and repeating:
"My life story I disclaim!"