The pile of boxes
Lay at the end of the bed
She stands
Researching
Rehearsing
Each line he said

Her horizons
Endless, nameless
A story starting with her sun

She acted all day
Perfecting the play
Of forgotten summers

At night, her mind in transit
Musical interlude
Records spin on repeat
Arms stretching
Around every boy she meets

Staring
She looks at them now
Vinyl sleeves worn thin
Each song tells a story
Needle scratches
beneath her skin

She'll never forget his face
Feelings transcend time
But still the rock
keeps turning
Burning, forever

Telling tales of youth gone by
Eternally lost
In the orbit
of her mind's eye.

Market car parks all but empty.
Wind blown bags and wrappers plenty.
Windows mirror deep depression.
Wily whizz-kids lack discretion.

Hoardings, dulling, staining, tearing.
People facing lack of caring.
People scraping, scrounging, screaming.
People coping, calming, hoping

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.

Column by column the legions' feet
march disciplined down Watling Street,
followed by rumbling carts and grumbling
stragglers leaving villas crumbling.

To Rome to save the imperial home,
making Britain an enterprise zone
for Saxons, Vikings, Celts and Angles,
savage battles and local wrangles.

Weeds weave tapestry around a tomb.
Dust encrusts a silent Roman room.
Mosaics stare at the rotted roof.
Painted plaster falls, jigsaw proof.

Perhaps when shopping centres fail,
and motor cars no more prevail,
when wattle homes are reinvented,
then thinking time will be augmented.

He's looking at me again.
Eyes fixed like he was insane.
Clay pipe propped on lips, pondering,
seriously sepia wondering.
No name on the severe brown frame.

He stares but doesn't see me.
I don't see him for what he was.
I see a fictional facsimile,
conflation of another's fantasies
- comic working class
- salt of the Earth
- his own man
- hero or Caliban.

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?

I'm partly this and partly that
partly veggie partly fat
trying to be a new man
and as she says partly human.

I'm a puzzle
But half of my pieces
were thrown away
So I keep adding pieces
From different puzzles
I guess I'd rather be whole
Than be right

He had his vision
wouldn't listen
Mother sad
Father angry

He despised advice
discounted the price
Mother sad
Father angry

Shunned his closest friends
wouldn't make amends
Mother sad
Father angry

Finally he went
all arguments spent
Mother and Father despondent.

They're sorry to announce she's dead
peacefully passed over in bed
with family and dearest friends
a blessing for her in the end

They always use such clichéd weasel words
to avoid offence or create pretence
kindly perpetuate lying-in-state
wash the slate and cleanse cool reference

Seems strange I don't see her going gently
I saw her manically playing the Shrew
she cast two gentle husbands aside
ever the screaming cheating bride
but on stage and screen ever the radiant queen

We're told to celebrate A-list lives
but I contemplate my own losses
those parts of my life that passed away
watching old films is my afterlife.