Vermilion skies pass me by
and into the night the chasm opines
an imagined Ferris wheel at a carnival
turns contra against smothering bindweed,
is this a metaphor for confusion ?
a turnaround of sorts
and with a habitual doff of my hat I bid
to draw this recurring dream to an end,
the naked view now seems surreal.
Should  I then hear the adjacent marching feet of others
surrendering their names in juxtaposition.

The  Contra jour man hid his  grimace,
watching the Punch and Judy show
with vignettes of spectators in like denial,
he  clenched his fists
fearful of the spotlight
yet he could not surrender pain

Eventually he try to break the  rules
and heal underneath.
Yet his crucifix a new seaside town
with a floodlit vaudeville
presenting songs of  belied memories
to which he can only  raise a mug
of  out of season white burgundy
apparently leading the dance  nowhere.

Fine legged Samantha held my hand
emerging from her shell,
buttermilk from Safeway's
matching her milk skin,
then a stroll to buy a camera.
Being that intentional,
she only wanted a semi automatic,
a shutter priority to capture my widening smiles.
I was  fully into manual
to capture both
her occasional wiles
and throw of tousled hair.
With slide film
we walked to Lloyds Park
Camelot of the possible,
as though Manhattan peered
from the east.
Clearly the days before
the Summer drought,
our slides captured well preserved images
lasting into time.

Give a little bit of my Shangri La
back to me.
Lets recall the 99p Scotch best at JD Weatherspoons,
revisiting  Bradford by National Express
because we saw  "Bob Sue and Rita too" on Channel 4
and on a whim had to have
B&B; down Manning Lane.
Let's see tea shops show civic pride
serving a strong Bergamont.
No queue jumping,
spitting or cussing in the streets.
Lets not be afraid to care,
and go back to the early 1990s
on the cusp of the Premiership
to see  Notts County verses Luton Town.
Their six pointer
with an overturned milk float to presage the desperation
and long before the aerobic  internet entertained us.
Funded Public libraries
venturing openings on Sunday's
and thank Steg from
Scorpion records at High Wycombe,
grateful for all those post restantes.

Tuesday's wallet brandished its spoils
National Express to Stoke again
to partake in oatcakes and
dreams of smoking Embassy No 6 ****
as tall as bottle kilns.
On Wednesday we will meander
to Trentham Gardens
next to Monkey's World
for a roll of cheese and pickle,
washed down with English Breakfast Tea
and later by the canal's edge
unearth some seasonal pottery.

absconding beneath the open skies
perhaps she was never accepted enough,
the hills sought her as an ionic bond
colonnades made a  portend for her
as amber resin, to beseech
the seeming evidence she alone withheld
that infinity excludes capture.

She sang hymns of praise,
appearing distant,
for which marvel she did not know
a Rowan or Wren
virtues of fortitude  in an unsteady World.
Her eyes worn
had fallen upon this empty shell.
What seed corn do we grapple
a hoarse breath
and in her very own Garden of Eden.

She became brazen
or so he thought,
having come home with Monday's rain,
so he forgave her.
She thought out aloud
Stoke and pottery classes
once the greatest of eases
but with the wherewithal -
in parenthesis to "gently nurture".

The mirror of the  soul
a spectre of sepia
besides an unassuming smile.
How could we ever save ourselves
when the gold turns to silver
on parched lips we were led
to where dahlias  preside
in buckets of sand,
albeit temporal
How can we ever be said to boast?

Scoffed Pink pigtails nestle on rusted wire.
Captives  and their butterflies,
borrow hope till  dawn .
Way back they surrendered their dignity.
Hallowed chapters of  Collegiate sobriety
tussled  wearing a dress like a **** of hay.
How can they un- burden future  perception?
I know of the fire storm back home
but the expectancy is forgone
Extended with shame
Pink Rayon complies disparagingly
already moribund.

The prehensile snout of a Tapir
is  posturally renowned,
but  I am no caricaturist
unless I required Rhinoplasty
Neither am I an
Air Force Major or a Fireman,
never having shot or doused in anger
never clanged quid pro quo,
I am a wordsmith, without  a necessarily  dangerous  course,
a wedgeless door stop this side of juxtaposition,
trying for a profile,
riding on a buzz,
to think so few images
could  conjure so much verdure

We still see and hear their annoying class,
business Blackberry users amplify their relic, a discourse with the plebs,
plumb clipped tones from deepest
Home counties and southern coast
tired men with families
moved to gentrified London,
at any farmers market you catch them
in their 4x4, dress down best
a pram in tow, Pomfrey  junior
their prodigal Norman sounding offspring
rhetorically the promised land,
a seed bank unending.

The Gods have forgotten how to die,
in the Serengeti the Lion fills his cup.
Gerrymander those dreams furnished as overkill,
for safekeeping store them in a crucible so that,
Warriors pledge wherewithal returns,
a monstrous bounty to wrench
the loadstone enduring.

String vests with spittle trailing
Budvar to invariably show independence,
they snare the spectacles of the respectable evenings sheen,
later calling the night *****, and kicking  hoardings
as if they had wanted to disinter the dammed.
The former love of parakeets,
by once fine people,
also released Yellow to this New World
matching the jaundiced jab
of a hooligan denying  his head

the bundles of mulched cannas  thickens like Autumn's bracken
and the orange hues of the acer
plays hide and seek amongst the glowing skies
solitary magpies forever  speculate caution
as overgrown paths beckons the occasional stranger.
Contre jour light frames my mission
at once I understand the message
a seasonal transformation
pitches the earnestness of renewal.

The inner city is relocating
every day there's new direction,
sash windows replaced by double-glazing
robust masonry sandexted,
the muffling of the bespoke past proceeds.
Yet Parties and boom music,
testify to weekend strain,
Sometimes we get more than we need !
How I have longed to reside in Catsfield
nr Pudding Hill Lane
amongst  the 888 parishioners
and live with a Battersea rescue cat
a victim of London neglect,
someone's got to live with  Phoenix  rising, I suppose.

Push and Punt
I wander where you are heading,
punching above your weight?
Sometimes resolvent
with a leathered face
where's the forgiveness?
like a two way mirror
it stretches  both ways,
culpability I hear you opine,
when you kick the germane tin can,
if you had known the source
of your ails,
you'd have less of the turbulence

twined like bristle on ordinance days
but not quite as mystical.
Where are we going
and what have we cast,
responsibilty  came yodelling
by torrents
and plainly unsettled withdtew
to her plot.

Threatened curiosity rhymes better than I
A panic attack infused with sinusitis
Willesden digs clang its tentacles
into blobbed concrete.
Cringing as I walked by
Anita scrawled her unsavoury - mercy.
She could not endure a Son of a Publican
on a weekend jolt,
a hand washed duvet potested,
pitch and putt compressed
too many red lines crossed.

Colours buy silence.
I publicly deny Prussian Blue was my first,
the colour of a Paratrooper
but my Lover bequested the time.
I subterfuge the lower end scale of green,
like hopeless moss
coilling my Adversaries dreams
I am sunk with a kiss -
deeper than quagmire
she will obtuse my decree,
home is the tireless winds
further than the cut of her high cheekbones

The singles game had the power to change,
all it requires is believability
and prosaic earrings with stories about Turkish exes,
welcome together in a taxi to Blackheath
home to Father's Anchor butter
and her  tireless Cat Stevens dreams
an open secret she's got an addictive habit.
Gin and on off days  
Tobacco for cultivating asthmatic lungs.
Could never understand was this an
altering cry for help.

I watch her and know my friend's Cat has a soul
why greet me and chase away the strays ?
Go figure out the unity, it last
and you will realise
there's instinctual maturity,
the pride of her groom
the health regime of cat grass
prawns auto reckoning !
the decision that Rock N Roll
is a tacky tail, is gracious,
her class suitably ignores
associated man made discordance

Wassell with cleft mouth
saw beyond you
pale hand in blue light,
cannot stay here.
Dietrich he would not die for you,
he sees Angels elsewhere.
He'll rather unfurl their muslin robes
under dappled silhouette,
swelling the Danube.

The ****** for any Allotment holder
is harvesting Pumpkins with foliage,
for October, with the clocks back
they'll relish digging over the ground
looking forward to another year.
Meanwhile the Farmers markets at Herne  Hill and Dulwich
will set our retro chic spiraling,
a half loaf of brioche and a Mrouzia Tajine purchased
amidst the newly  penny conscious
"adequate provision" becomes our norm.

Don't let the Human Race down
theres too much loitering on the breeze.
Best un- invite their crypto smiles.
and Everything is Corporate,  
bumbling politicians with no screen presence,
gauche PR  and easy pretensions.
Foreign intervention snowballs
as an afterthought
by men of limited intellect
balancing their variegated inconsistencies.

Even as a ******* symbol
the Shard looks worn
like a prison grandee
without a stipend to
command protection

The false Autumn when the leafs shed
like your sleeveless bridal gown,
in a cooler than expected September
that gave you goose bumps
and I imagined like a rumour
you had a tattoo of some past love.
For when I said I do
the past should be a spent,
bereft of decayed leafs and longings.
We have our own pinnacle to the stars,
an unspoken trust
and no false reasons
to be other than who we are.

Do they value  quietude
as we do?
passing through their cul de sac
with the same red blood causing through
our veins ?
The cold stone buildings are arcane
clematis seemingly  choking.them.
A wider sentence permeates.
The nightingale squabbles with the swallow
and all is not as same it seems.
How peace was wished for
but the inhabitants  are loathed  to admit
an underlining struggle re emerges.

In New Brighton,
in the Wirral they gently laugh at
anyone who thinks the Beatles
could be bettered
Still to this day I think
The Big Three's " Some other Guy"
was the better version.
In Stoke, dear Staffordshire
they apportion YMCA mentors
to the homeless teenage kids
who haven't yet navigated
the logistical hub of the new Potteries,
yet can only dream of open spaces
where weeds will flourish
Trentham Gardens being  one.
Each of us would agree
there's a nuance in self preservation,
only recently carried to extremes by the vitriolic
of the late Summer Riots
whose fiefdom cry
"preponderant re-distribution"
turned England over.

I wonder if she can chalk her hollow face
Sometimes her plumage wrangles in indisposition
Like Cormorants lacking buoyancy with  a sea breeze

Stay put Owner occupiers  are now envied
corners of smudged wealth,
suburbian renters isotope
brandish new England
more the continental model.
In derelict public houses
inside weightless Box Rooms
every blade of concrete counts.
I shall play in once Lavender fields
and usher questions.
How many times
do we render our knowledge?
ghost town forms are in submission,
again recession chimes
more than a lack of opportunities,
but who are these  newcomers arriving en masse
to once bespoke areas
with money earned
from former unfashionable abodes ?

Her ruffled hair and trailing headphone
she stands amongst the seated
perhaps impervious to inconvenience.
Her momentary gaze out of the darkened window
sheds her personality
she meet life on an even keel
thoughtful
honest and assured over
never intending to surrender her
next stop Battersea Park.

abjectness is a form of inroads
toil the Woodlands Trust
all hail no coppiced beeches,
my first sighted R.S.P.B Avocet
the perplexed scale comparable
to competing blank stares,
endorphins withstanding,
clueless  and unconscionable
instinctual pomposity
suffers Nature's either
way.

The dawning oasis
with vin d'une nuit  drenching the sand
sees the good driven out
The long haired suitors
are voided by decree.
Storks bask  in the sun,
as Saint  Nicola's Paris jolt
ends before the carnival begins,
the fools largely spent.

The Riche brothers and sisters
compile the remainders
of Manchester City programmes
from 1958 onwards, rusted staples asides
in a shuttered room,
Moorhens and crab apple bloom outside
keeps their e bay cottage industry bearable,
residual poverty waxes and wanes,
children always inheriting Granddads' stuff.

He smashed  his toy gun in seventy four.
Desperation - his face soured.
The shopkeeper knew he was more than kaput
and as for missing the xmas disco ~
he world never walk under the moon of love
from that day beyond.
The bullies had ran their cause
carefully formulating the groundswell.
Who were they his enduring question?

.

Angelina for the love of the Stars,
wrists feel listless
chilling self belief delusional
your wardrobe has claw marks.
A World apart?
I wonder where you keep your screams boxed in?
surely you are not rewinding
the "Cry of the Banshee" again?
Abba he indelibly forsakes
your funereal  fatigue,
for your score years has
gone to seed.

Down Tempest Lane
I wish they could turn off the search lights.
Smoke and mirrors interloping
back at the Copters
through the blinds,
blades weeping in symphonic sympathy,
before the Pantyhose and Plunge bras peel off,
some of us can get it on for real.
Others' frigid halves
fake it, like blades of grass,
who is the real snake
the appointed shooter or liar ?

Stunned by the oyster beds
Arrow-smiths lost their pledge,
the silted whispers of the dying
sighed as peacefulness.

Let true conventionalism light the pathways.
Upright, always  thinking  of others,
never running a rapier  through  the artery
of true feelings.
Sometimes impervious  ideals,  unmasks the man  
by being unopen to the  gusts of  change
one  must  never  question preparedness.

Commonality we've surrendered
the Public House now a seeming  relic,
we've been paid with others speculation
and remember convenience always gate crashes,
neighbourhoods now meekly surrender,
still November is our mono chrome
a telling time
stating past standards did exist,
the corner shop is now boarded
primordial no more:
the proliferate supermarkets triumphant
advertising opportunities for local people !

It could not be better than
to discover the music of the early 70s
It was so more than Prog
the singer songwriter hold his sway
under the tree cultivated by Bob
and his one time bandmates the Band,
gave a template back to basics
The Beatles shadow set the standards
in creativity.
before Glam rock lifted the lid,
leading a fallacious path into Punk Rock
and our music savious were truly shot.

My Copal Square bladed shutter
Calibrated, adjusted, lubricated,with tlc
re-captures fields of Shirley poppies
tight roping Nevada's mountainous ranges.

You don't look a day older than bad manners
Remember to let people off the Train first.
Old fashion common sense has gone,
we are generating our everyday Cleopatra
where the private  is as imperative  as the  public persona ,
unbeknown nail polish is on a reconnaissance mission
for  blase solvent effects,
and as for Gentleman  I cannot think of a
suitable Mass observation survey yet,
but if i did,
there wouldn't be enough Stradivarius volins to avail.
Note too how bus drivers aren't generally slow
and bicyclists are veering militant
driving instructors take chances through the red  lights,
city life is
not necessarily construed as a public safety issue,
but everything  is considered less relevant
in the pursuit of balanced manners.

Before the decade spat us out,
on our bicycles we had options,
the electric blaze truly sped by
with the years
and Dad's knew their sons interests
lay in Rock, where musicians in de rigueur denims
sign posted the alpha roost
and we all had dreams of blondes,
their beacons crafting
secrets and desires about growing up.
This was the surest way
to catch an education for life

I am anchored to thoughts of Brugge.
My gastronomical panache is set.
Walking in a medieval town is like
voyaging  to the summits,
the stillness of the morning air
comes with a sense of belief.
Rossie our  tour guide
quilts you with the  knowledge
and a  knowing boon.
Nowhere else provides such testimony.

Ersatz coffee, chicory and dandelion,
a dream of self sufficiency
the town has regained its prominence
reverting to old style timber
chevaux de bois,
a smithy as new
as time unfolding,
the spaces between buildings
allowing the sun to divine down
sentimentality decked on back- stools,
speckled sepia blossoming
a petite fleur coronation crown
becomes renewed strangers.

The best of dying is
nil by mouth
morphine the last delirium then
laid out to rest,
he ain't the big hitter  now.
Stella the shirtless got meaner
down by Cirrhosis avenue.
King's for the Christmas duration
profaning in Erse
we all thought he was an Englishman.
The leaking mercury fillings
or Toxoplasmosis Cat dishes
should have made him more paranoiac,
the statute of a Man
unprotected.