It’s not a lie to bring them inside
and pretend spring

with central heating
drying sad eyes and itching skin
at least they offer a semblance
of a truth balefully missed

though the distant future
still promises such
current hands are hamfisted
in the art of wish fulfilment

In the streets of Delhi advertised on every sign,
Is the British army’s need for you to buy buy buy.
It may cost your turban, your home your family, and the worn clothes.
But it’s for the greater good right? of the empire of them ‘s and those.

When you pass the gender and notice his cracked lips,
And coughing and dying son,
You feel sympathy as you would for anyone.
But you can parch him as your son cant starve too,
And that’s just the law of the untouchable that are below you.

Despite your status being not much better,
You walk a stranger to their leering eyes,
As you were the clean white sashes and ties,
But they don’t realise the shackles you are also in.
As the phrase goes that you see on all the ads.

“You can’t make your own confections,
You can’t save your own possessions,
You can’t even built out of your own wood,
Because for the good of the empire of the greater good,
You will serve to pay the fees that are higher than you can afford to do.”

When you think of that as you walk these deep streets you can’t help walking in a way of shame,
As you know you can’t blame these overlords,
But the submissions and laws of old,
That they stole and now uphold.
Never to be loss of my shackles,
I pass these streets, and go on to Mumbai for the next delivery meet.

I still think in-sync with the ceremonial intro.
Even though its reduced to unclaimed brick,
I visit naughty corridors and assembly halls
decorated in sports equipment.

After showing off my award,
I ***** out candles
and bolt that horse to a new port village
where clubs buried in earth
begin to dent
my naivity.

But tweed remained fashion.
A collage of uniform, green fields and tennis courts
resembled my life in the trench.
Words like 'posh' and 'snob' were the only examples of difference

until I became a witness.
Discovered homelessness
meant vagrants. They
became as common as a boxed sandwich.

Everybody has their own intoxication of choice.
Bargain of choice, newspaper
of choice, where Brookside
is a crossword answer
filled whilst feeding mallards
white bread in the park.

Writing that
makes me the biggest hypocrite of all.
I grew fond of plays. Began to write poetry.
What would they think of me?
A **** football match where the ref cost us the game
still pumps through my veins,

I assure thee.
That left ventricle breathes here too.
War has never been declared
but the battles have existed since
before Shakespeare wrote Hamlet.

It's estate versus estate.
As much as I'm up for a fight,
history won't change overnight -
especially in an election,
selfie posted
or status shared
with a handful of friends
who actually voted.

Living in the middle of Common-
wealth is a lonely place.
But there will be a hotel monopoly of vacancies
built on my mediocre grave
if I acknowledge the better
or lesser sort
themselves. After all,
I ate processed chicken breast
and ignored politics myself.

Perhaps now,
it's time
to act like the squirrel.
Barks become growls, become
quacks, become
the fool
again.

Alfred Edward Housman wrote about this county from London,
we smoke pipes and drink pints to honour the scholar's story,
which can be checked out the library, former learning quarters
of an explorer named Charles Darwin, who sits in grey outside,
despite leaving town in adolescence, returning from Galapagos
to The Mount, where my parents met in mental health sickness,
gave life to an original species that theories would have hated,
like Robert Clive, who earned his knighthood by looting India,
cried in parliament, now we want his stage ousted, his house is
next to the cottage where I sleep restless because myself and
a few other Shropshire lads failed to escape, even after studying
centurion debates, athletic form and getting serenaded by greats,
where are the names of those who rose from minimum wage?

Punters only buy into words
if they believe there’s worth.
I’ve been begging for buyers
before premature birthdays.
Let earth spin unaware –
never questioned its axis.
Hid from the anxious parties,
continued chewing table cloths,
then choked on the spike of a train stub.

Not much value in a decade thrice lived –
standing on the coast in yesterday’s underwear,
a teenage busker sits between hip-hop legacy
as new marble faces arrive in constant rotation.
I’m waiting for my estranged brother dance,
who ran out on me despite his free diary entries.
Desperate for reunion. Bitter for the jives lost.

I’ve stepped further than I ever pictured
but I’ll never walk away from the stalking wolves.
Cubs are warned but continue to ignore all advice.
Lions that scrap with the pack tell me to enjoy the plains.
So I forget the bites and burn this poem in my future face.

Body clock set to Vienna day trips,
walks atop the white cliffs of Dover,
avoiding sunburn in Roman forums -

only here it's flexed bare chests,
belly buttons pierce snail trail hair,
while tattoos sweat through skin.

Discount ***** hangs on booming breath,
headache-inducing marijuana stench
crawls up nostrils from inside pockets

like a chef advertising to the streets
via an air vent. Craving cartoon fantasy -
empathy in the world, even for humidity,

as we wait for a break in proceedings,
I pray the thunderstorms bring fresh relief.

I turn on the news
Scroll all day on my phone
The first words on my tongue
Are how can this be so

I walk down the street
And see those without homes
I ask once again
How can this be so

I hear people talk
Of our great country so bold
But still the words on my tongue
Are how can be this so

The people with power
Spit on those down below
I cry out the words
How can this be so

Those around me are bleeding
While their pockets grow
I beg them to tell me
How can this be so

The whole world is on fire
And still we work to the bone
I get tired of asking
How can this be so

They would fall from their perch
If we all threw a stone
The system is broken
That I do know

My theory was written on the other side of town.
Eyes that had only watched the world through
a single pane of glass, found reflections all round.
Where I used to see grey, crisp formations of cloud.
Even in the house, blocks of door painted one colour
were replaced with dreamlike figures cutting cake.

Anyway, yesterday a man wearing a Union Jack
flag on his waist and sleeve told me his worries.
Five or six cars parked, eight or nine bedrooms
lying cold and lonely while in the south of France.
To lose count of the windows in one's life, I thought,
as he asked me about the proletariat. Luxury indeed.