Oh the world I want to see
Anything and everything
All the adventures out there to be had...
The desires in my heart...
They clash
I want to travel the world
But not without you
Could we make it?
Would you try?
Help me make my dreams collide

Ireland, Italy, Spain, France
England, Australia, Austria, Japan
All over England, then wherever calls to us
So many places
Such a short life...
But...
I'd give it all up to keep you by my side
I want a family too...
Kids of our own
We can show them the world too
After we've had our fun
Oh the adventures, Oh the laughs
Places to discover, People to meet

Mountains, Oceans, Trees
So much to do...
So much to see...
I have one question ,
Will you come with me?
I make such big plans
Create enormous ideas in my mind
But I'm really bad at following through
I can't live up to my own expectations
Say? Do you think you could help me make my dreams a reality?
I want to see the world so bad
Write about all the experiences I have
In the end there is only one thing to ask,
Would you like to experience it together, cause oh won't it be better
With you by my side
My incredible lover for all of time

a trip across Europe
we would sit
on a train
taking us
                                      far
away.
my head would lean against your shoulder
as we
listen to music
until I
fall asleep

the train goes faster
through the fields and the marsh and the mist and the cities and the sky
it takes us
                                 far
across this corner of the world
as you
read me stories of the empires that once traversed these lands
how they came to be
how they fell
socio economics
and all the things that tickle you pink as the sweet pea flowers growing
                              far
as you can see throughout the meadow.  

our fingertips rest against on top of each other
the train goes faster
the train goes faster
the train goes faster
and

I wake up
I have not seen Europe from the window of a train
and  I have not seen you, lately
you are
after all
quite
                         far
away.

I've got a new friend, he is called... I forgot.
He told me the other day.
He said he's got many names. At least four.
He told me how is he called.
But I don't remember at all.
He said:
- Don't worry, maybe it's even better that you don't remember,
don't worry my friend. Just call me a friend.
Sometimes I forget my names myself. Who cares!

My new friend comes from... I can't remember.
He said he was born in one country,
and raised in another, then moved somewhere else,
only to move yet somewhere else.
He told me all these countries names,
but I forgot. What a shame.
I said to him: My friend, I'm sorry, but I don't remember them,
the countries you were born and raised, and the countries
you lived before we met.
But he said:
- Don't worry, my friend, I don't take offence,
maybe it's even better that you forgot it,  mate.
It's fine. Let's forget the past. Let's say I'm from here, okay?
Okay. But...
- No, no but, mate. It's not a problem at all.
Sometimes even me I forget when I was born
and where I lived. Who cares! I don't care myself.
It doesn't matter anymore what's your name, where are you from.
It was never a big deal to me. Never something to be proud of, to brag,
more likely something to hide, to cry about.
I asked him: Why?
He replied:
- You wouldn't wanna know.
I said: I would.
He said:
- Nevermind.

Strangers looking in my direction
Because I am strange to them
Their hawkish hostility
Meets with my awkward awareness

I clutch on to my pride
One of the few possessions I have left
My dignity is long gone
I feel bare on the road to nowhere

My feelings of hope
Have been pushed aside by hunger
The never ending guilt
And the gloomy sense of senselessness

We used to be alike
United in our pursuit of happiness
Once a human being, now a beggar
Bound to be a burden

From citizen to refugee
I washed up on these shores
Once a human being, now a stranger
To my hawkish, hostile hosts

1.

The light that agitates the equator
bounds across your southern frontier,

and being higher in the wage scale
enables trips there to be easier

than the odysseys of those passing
away in the opposite direction.

Where once bandaged soles went
now many machines tie the stitches

between the divides where once again
bandaged souls will traverse.


2.

Our footprint will be larger than life
and beat the earth to an abstract plain.

Where once many names were needed,
our editorial, read as obituary, will need few.

It’s a recursive gesture to prune in order to grow
but who’s hand truly closes the symphony?

Here I find legumes, tubers, a display of sage
and a cold comfort in my palm.

The perfect chicane of the fern’s stem,
tributaries unfurled, reflects in the plastic bucket.

I gazed upon a weary field
Where wayward seeds had blown,
And plots were laid and borders sealed
Beneath a golden crown,
And rising from a ghastly host
Of unkempt thorny briar,
On writhing mist a fallen ghost
Lit up a spectral pyre.

Cold shivered flames shot heavenward
Convulsing time to freeze,
The fertile land was drowned in mud
And clouded with disease.
Across the field a battle raged
Beneath an orange flare,
Old roots entwined as limbs engaged
And tussled for the air.

In eager rows defenders fell
Supplanted by their foe,
A mud draped rug of pod and shell
Buried the ground below,
And racing upwards in a spire
To reach Heaven's domain
They sought to steal the sun's bright fire
To use for their own gain.

Fresh saplings withered in the heat
That scorched the living soil,
And ashes rained down like a sheet
To form an acrid pile;
The sweet decay of rotting limbs
Pervaded like a shield,
As evening sang her doleful hymns
Across a barren field.

A new refrain,
something fresh for the tongue.
A bright lemon in the wake of
chocolate
and chilis.
Something softer,
less harsh.
Not quite sweet.
I could never stand saccharine sentiment.
Not too sour,
acid leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Not ice cream.
Italian ice while walking the streets of Venice,
smiling and nodding at the men whose words we can’t understand.

coffee tastes better in Spain

a simple hello is groundbreaking

comfort can be a warm bed or a “like” of a picture

the cold is different in the UK (you can feel it in your bones)

they will always give you a knife and fork to eat a hamburger

sometimes you need to eat at a Hard Rock in Lisbon to be reminded of home

if you eat the bread, they will charge you 1€

crying alone in a hotel room or at a Chinese restaurant in Italy is perfectly normal

never doubt the power of distance

now you can never say you didn’t try

just because you don’t speak the same language, doesn’t mean “*******” isn’t universal

sometimes sleeping next to someone who peeled your outermost layer off is the most intimate you need to be

“I’ll never see these people ever again”

have pride

ask me now what it is that I want

I have come to loathe all brown bags and black suitcases

vulnerability does not necessarily equal intimacy

remember that you pulled yourself out of the sea

your feet tread castles and cathedrals where thousands walked

art galleries are best enjoyed alone

now you understand when mom and dad don’t answer how agonizing it is

write it down if you want to forget it

acknowledge buried truths

eat paella and shnitzel and pizza and fish and chips and don’t think

go to movies at the tallest cinema

slip a little on the cobblestones

lay for hours on the beach

then

go home
be humble
remember
reminisce
teach
embrace

Glasgow – 1/8/15

Look at the child with the rifle
She's posing for a photo
She just doesn't know what it means.
Give it three years, and she still won't know.
Except now her people,now her country have nowhere to go
She's 6 years old with an arms embargo
The country is suddenly three now
The people inside can't see,the people murdered along its beaches can't see.
The people washed ashore can't see.
Air strikes fall somewhere distant.
Militants front and center
Nothing else but to surrender
The country's identity is reduced to its language,their colors and the violence around them
Never did it experience serenity
Fully get the wealth from their oil and luxury
Nobody could guess that people could shake and shimmy along the beaches
Where the nameless faces appear,dreams dust in their open and clenched fists.