Their boat turned in towards us
ready to board our vessel
to take us to their island,
a fastness, craggy, bleak, treeless.

To winter peat fires, gales, darkness,
weird northern tales of gods and trolls,
black nights seared by bright light curtains,
a violent Viking heritage.

A place where cold sea and ocean
overturn the crippled sea stacks,
our lives in the boarding party's
hands and our skilful Shetland pilot.

I wandered lonely in a crowd
a ghost among the people
whose arms were raised and heads were bowed
in solemn salutation to the gods
of contemporary communication.
She didn't, did she was the cry.
I'll never know. Why should I?

The bin lorry had been.
I picked up a fragment
of our neighbours lives,
litter they must have scrapped.

We do not know them.
They're always moving on.
Urban Bedouin,
with a thousand and one
domestic tales untold.

We met in the rain, wet, distraught,
too short a moment ot engage,
to wrapped up to become enraptured,
too uncomfortable for comforting.
The rain created our chance meeting,
then dampened our greetings.

Some say you can't read someone's thoughts.
Some claim to read them like a book.
It's phantom pages may engage
but I move on from thought to thought.

Those readings choke like a bindweed cloak,
coiling, twining, transmuting brutes.
Stereotypes shape many folk,
stifling, stunting valuable fruit.

It's half past four and the Red Rose
is Doppler dashing across
bullying slow fourth class hikers bikers
who dare to share the bridge walkway.

Puffing pumping its steam sweat smoke
straining through the shielding lattice
smogging choking foot folk
who snort its sulphur scented smuts.

Are those tiny strands really me?
They say each set is unique
but no one is anonymous
like an inherited trace book.

I carry my history with me.
No wonder I'm overweight
celt viking or anglo-saxon
or two out of three a cross breed.

I even passed this burden to my kids
left slivers all over the place
though I was always told to tidy up.

Gold and silver battle *****
torn from swords saddles and crosses
lying beneath a farmer's field
tributes to kings and bellicose gods.

Fierce birds of prey snakes fish and bears
framed in filigree geometry
guarded warriors' savage souls.
No mercy in Mercia.

Archeologists anthropologists
historians librarians
curators and consertvators
collect confer and classify
while I just try to connect.

Walking along the narrow track,
parents shepherding ice cream kids,
making way for pushchairs, making waves.
The lakeside watch on ducks and swans.
The nodding smiles and genteel grins,
like a 50's Sunday promenade,
while walking sticks wait by benches
dreams die when mobiles chime.

Finger soldered brilliant new gold band
proudly circling nuptial sun
orbiting eclipsing the clans
completing a family connexion
with others ovoid chipped but fondly funded
wearing thin on hardened blue veined hands
some waving some proclaiming all belonging.

Two cultures worlds apart
some love science and others art
we're told they'll never jell
though Da Vinci drew quite well

The arts and the sciences
the sciences and the arts
the arts of the sciences
and the sciences of the arts
competing in their parts
yet cohabiting in our hearts

They huddle in the cold damp darkness
grateful for the sheltering sandstone
shuddering at each echoing blast
a remorseless dull ache
like their meagre rations
eyelids shutting wrinkling between attacks
seeking peace and inner sleepless solace.

'Them docks is taking a pasting.'
'Me Dad works there.'

Another attack, tunnels rumble
evoking century old echoes
of rusty trundling drum-line wagons
bearing sandstone blocks to build the docks
now being blitzed blighting the night sky.

The morning brings a dusty disquiet.
Merseyside emerges curses soldiers on.

Visitors pass from empty bed
to empty bed, like Royals,
silently soaking up the dread
atmosphere with remote respect.

Examining clipboard histories,
rehearsing their medical soaps.
Volunteers answer questions,
the front line troops in trying
to raise our war dead back to life.

Have a care John Willie was not
just a private, not a number,
nor a diagnosis. He was
a person and a brave soldier.

Old photos frame soldiers' pains,
they're wearing posterity masks,
hiding feelings and memories
that lurch back again and again.

A patch of sunlight
like a slow spotlight
searches the table-top
for stuff to browse.

It warms my clenched hand,
cold-blooded creature,
charms my temper's inner,
all too selfish strand.

Cocooned under a web of road
rail and footpath at Top Locks
five narrow boats await their fate
stuck in a canal trade ice age.

Calling for new boat people
to change course from speed and stress
they're refitted cleaned and preened
for slow lane contemplation.

Slowly ne vessels pump life blood
branching out across old veins
filling the ships with goods again.

A makeshift camp of hardy souls,
the air is cold but we are free
and hold to our common causes.
Little is said. There's much quiet thought.

The crackling fire makes it all
real, fans our fellowship of feelings,
casting shadows of mysterious
creatures . The flames flay our faces red.

Limbs stiffen, ache, but only eyes move
for fear of breaking our charmed circle.
Minds are moving fast over unknown
futures, over people from the past.

Newton, Shakespeare and Lady Day
on the shoulders of giants I totter
science technology and poetry
politics media and philosophy
layer on layer of ideology
collide like matter and antimatter.
Rules from school and infancy
loyalty influence and love.
You ask me what makes me tick.
The clock ticks. My watch ticks.
I quietly wonder - tick, tick, tick.

We're here for a couple of days
weather OK in some ways
went to the end of the pier
then back again for a beer
Beer was best.

Sunbathing without a vest
beetroot coloured painful chest
back for fish 'n chip tea
salt 'n vinegar free
Salt 'n vinegar best.

There's plenty to see and do
sideshows and slot machines too
glad to get home tomorrow
then we'll have to borrow
The Beer was best.

There's a drawing on my wall
a pen and ink impression
of the old transporter bridge
- a Meccano masterpiece.

It's my Tardis, my time machine,
portal to a vast interior
of vivid early images,
sounds of a rumbling grumbling bogie
pulling me back through time.

The clatter as our boarding gate swings shut,
an alert pause in the varnished cabin.
We listen for the next familiar step,
the creaking **** towards Runcorn Gap,
passing over Aethelfleda's Castle,
the mid-crossing windblown waltzing,
the bustling landing in the other county.

A small speck in a spectacular church.
I seek some smaller, simpler works.
A green man worms through wooden leaves,
struggling for freedom from nature.

Blank eyes return my straining stare.
Sharp sculptings scratch my cautious touch.
Brooding, symbolic soul,
nightmare archetype,
stalker of the psyche.

Nature greedily grips the green man,
growing through gaping eyes and nose,
reaching for modern eco-man,
who disputes to his final throes.

Two living statues,
a man of silver
and one who sits mid-air.
Crowds pause wonder stare.

A trench foot Tommy
stands lonely unremarked,
bronzed as his medal,
braced for our next war.

I leaned on the rail, stared through
my mental zoom and wondered.
Were ther footprints in the sand
of that island to the windward?

No sign of man. Startled cliff caves
gaped at us, seagulls dived at us,
while whales schooled us and led us away.
We passed by and the North Channel sighed.

Now it's just a floater in my eye,
a landscape's distant daub of grey-green,
a mystery mote that still returns,
but I pass by praising Gaia.

From glistening streamlet stones
the sparkling sun life river
ripples with ephemeral gems,
priceless, richer than diamonds.

Unavailable to the banker's vault.
Unmeasurable by the carat.
Free to anyone who cares to look.
Frames memories of lovers' smiles.

There's a flap on - flying fluttering
olympian feeding before the frosts
competitive cooperation
repetitive consternation
tribal territories transgressed
survival of the fattest.

Darker days dominate.
The land browns bare.
Animals hibernate.

'It's not the same', the doctor said,
'Don't do it or you'll become obese.
Their diet would put you in bed.
You'd die before your time
of some terrible disease.
Follow my special diet.
And run if it's fun .'

'But don't be a convert to anorexia.
That's a perverse faith.
You'd never make it as a wraith.
Take a tablet for your headache.'

Musing at my bedroom window
proscenium to the street scene
parents in the back room snoring
St. Michael's sandstones frowning
at poor sally shambling shuffling
from secret shadow to moonshine
bottles clanking - guilty glancing
bulging stout bag - liquor dancing.

Standing at our poet's corner
spectators pilgrims commentators.
Ectoplasmis streams rise and flare
hot heaving lungs to cold dry air.
They stare - prepare explanations
poltergeist premeditations.

Some tell me Blackpool's cool,
so I sit in the cool,
watching a darkening sky,
wrapped against the onshore breeze,
stifling a day's end sigh.

Starlings do maths in the sky,
imaginary numbers,
imaginative paths,
sweeping, forming swarming,
hereditary helix,
genetic genuflection.

She called me from downstairs.
There's some gear, medical stuff
outside, two cases, a midwife's
instruments, why put them here?

Don't touch them, you never know
these days, perhaps they're from next
door. She's a midwife, so I hear.
I'll ask them to identify.

They checked and foud her car unlocked.
But why left for us to find?
A joke? A cruel comment,
mocking us who nest no more.

They're making cuts
The office shuts
The workshop's still
There's time to ****.

What shall I do
With nothing due
I'll start again
But how and when.

Forget me not
You're all I've got
We'll see it through
If you'll be true.

They're digging up the cobbles in our street,
moving them to a classier area.
We'll be given tarmac, black and soft in the sun.

Yes, even here it shines - on men's vests.
They're red faced, drinking from lager cans,
while their women finger scarved curlers.
At least, that's what others think they see.

But neighbours do talk with us.
There's a code of decency,
though Mum says, 'some have hearts
as black as the tarmac'.

There's a hierarchy,
in minds and heads,
if not in pockets.

Some day the toffs will turf us out,
gentrify our street. We'll be moved,
filed vertically, pigeon lofts in the sky.
Then they'll bring our cobbles back.

We're boating on Brindley's cut
cruising to the cotton city
Manchester where it all goes on
the engine of our empire.

Eight hours of ease from Top Locks,
meals provided, plenty to see
here on the cutting edge
of British engineering.

A night out on the tiles
then back again to dear old Runcorn,
something to tell our kids,
the start of a transport revolution.

My wife wears the sandals.
I never could. Must wear socks.
She says, No socks with sandals.
It's just not done! Sorry, don't
see myself with scented candles,
wispy beard smoking ***.
No disregards, it's just not my lot.

'I'll see that plate clean,' she said,
'Or I'll send you straight to bed.'
Liver and onions lie in wait,
two choices up for debate.

'I won't hear a word till you've finished.'
It lay there still undiminished.
It's cold, unfit to eat, congealed,
and nowhere can it be concealed.

'You should have thought of that before.'
When I grow up I'll eat no more
of that cabbage, liver - lousy crud.
Give me sweets and crisps, perhaps rice pud'.

She should have thrown it in the bin.
Now I'm stuck, a locust for my sin.
I must eat all, my waists expanding.
Though Mother's gone, her ghost's demanding.

Shop windows dazzle in the sun,
attracting tourist moths with money.
They gape and point and squint and pay.

Behind the glass the ugly cuddly
stare back, glare in disgust at the stack
of dazed outsize heads on parade.

Ranks of captured trolls boil with rage,
their destinies - slobbering kids,
hot rooms, pink rabbits, red balloons.
No match for their cool mountain caves.

Beware these creatures of mischief
and fear. They bear malice - kitsch, occult.
Do not mock them. Stick them on your shelves.
They are our other selves.

Musing at my bedroom window
proscenium to the street scene
parents in the back room snoring.
St. Michael's sandstones frowning
at poor Sally shambling shuffling
from sectret shadow to moonshine
bottles clanking guilty glancing
bulging stout bag liquor dancing.

Standing at the poet's corner
spectators pilgrims commentators
ectoplasmic streams rise and flare
hot heaving lungs to cold dry air
they star prepare explanations
poltergeist premeditations.

Someone's speaking in the kitchen,
though I know I'm on my own.
It's no ordinary sound of house.
We do not usually converse.
Its chatter is perverse,
so dialogue leads to friction,
when it nags me into cleaning,
while competing for attention
with the garden, growing, greening.
Like twins they twist my tolerance.

That speaker's spoiled my thinking,
so easy to displace,
but I'll stop his broadcast bleating
and tune to inner space.

Here he lies with family
his name and dates given
what other data's wanting
to relive his love and hates

Norman -old English-North Man
Victorian Saxon son
though several times removed
a memory scratched on stone

Or was his bloodline Viking
his longboat in the offing
vicariously fighting
through his seven seas of time

He might have lived much longer
been stronger named for William
ruthless feudal Norman King
but my mind is just dancing.

The roughness of unshaven sandstone,
dark from the morning's early growth,
jutting its chin estuarywards,
cold until lathered in the midday sun.

A platform for he who would rule
all Merseyside for an instant,
taking in deep breaths of fantasy
for his private meditation.

We studied sine waves at school,
reassuringly regular,
continuously cyclic,
unendingly, bendingly cool.
Consistent in order and logic.

Then I turned to poetry.
People poems moved my mind,
many rudely peculiar,
some consistently inclined,
unbending or heart rending,
often playing the fool.

Sunday - the weekend's tombstone,
burying the worst of last week.
The silent ringing of church bells,
best suit coffined in my wardrobe.

I see proud parents pushing prams,
grandads toddling after toddlers,
but no young couples promenade,
as we did when teenagers.

Some sought their compensation
in sensational Sunday press.
It's surely generational.
We were schooled for Sunday rest.

Alone on this dark wet flagstone
hiding not hibernating place
no hedge to hug no worms to dig
stunned torchlit searchlight target
awaiting attack from hostiles
spine chilling prying naturephiles.

Some sit turning handles,
minds lit by candles.
But do their arc lamps flash
when freed from making cash.

While some are wriggling, book worming,
their minds inflamed, brightly burning.
The difference, some time to think,
nature's race or nurture's link.

As I sat in the café,
and said to myself,
'Coffee's bad for the health,
but can it be worse than tea'

What to write about cafes?
The smell of the food
induces a mood,
a feeling that life is free.

She asks why I don't speak of it.
I will not. It is a lake of blood
of flesh and bones and limbs and stink.
I fear to sink but will not let go.

I am as one with it. there is no me.
So I must guard its dam, stop any leaks,
for a breach would drown us both, leave nothing
but acid bog, infertile, insensate.

She seeks to cure me, to 'get it off my chest'.
There's no rest. The pressure builds and I need ale
to stem the pains and blames she cannot share.

Here they come to seek a symbol
of seaside sun - a cruise ship
castaway, beached,rain stained,
landlubbers hamock and griddle.

But first they collapse me and curse me.
Doing it properly should be
part of their curriculum vitae,
a test of nationality.

Then I'm candy flossed, ice creamed, Blackpool
rocked, salted and crisped, generally stuffed,
while they lie back, roast and relax.
Good job it's not a nudist beach.

Sit tight. Do nowt. Say nowt.Hear all. See all.
Watch the deadly idiotboard of news unfurl.
Watch the deserving rich desert the poor.

A featureless snowstorm of foreign fear,
eyes glazing over, lacking focus. Fearing
zealots within and without. Without power
of intervention. Beyond comprehension.

There is a drawing on my wall,
a pen and ink impression
of the old Transporter Bridge,
a Mecccano masterpiece.

It's my tardis, my time machine,
portal to a vast interior
of vivid early images,
sounds of a rumbling grumbling bogie,
pulling me back through time.

The clatter as our boarding gate swings shut,
an alert pause in the varnished cabin,
we listen for the next familiar step,
the creaking **** towards Runcorn Gap,
passing over Aethelfleda's Castle,
the mid-crossing windblown waltzing,
the bustling landing in the other county.

There's something special about a named train,
the Mallard, the Royal Scot,
more romantic than a mere number.
Ours was the Red Rose, pride of LMS.

The London-Liverpool express
flahing North, four-thirty on the dot,
a sight not to be missed, exciting
street players of jacks and hopscotch.

She thundered through the blue brick tunnel,
erupted into the grass-lined cutting,
swallowed our footbridge in smog and sulphur.
The we loyal fans ran home to eat our spam.

Gudron graced many a viking's visions,
like a Helen or a Guenevere.
But no ray of light could be shone
on her four disturbing dreams.

Until one day a wise kinsman called,
a dream interpreter, who told her
that she would outlast four husbands.
His foretelling came to pass.

But she never wed the man she loved.
He set sail. Gudron remained.
Iceland's first christian nun.

The first round is celebrities,
probably a knockout for me.
Most people I could mention would
be lucky still to be on pension.

My geography now is history.
Leningrad has already been purged
but where have they put Calcutta?
Oh! Calcutta - the internet I suppose.

I'm told that trivia and me don't fit.
Still, not much does these days.
Pass the cocoa and Rich Teas, please.