Come on, let me take you down
Where there are bouquets piled all around
An old oak tree trunk, thick and round

The Hanging Tree

Tributes and teddies all around
No-one knows what brought this down
Hanging two feet off the ground

The Hanging Tree

Fifty-four long years old
His body hung there, stiff and cold
There's a story here that needs to be told

The Hanging Tree

A two-line newspaper obituary
That most people just don't see
A tragic end for anybody

The Hanging Tree

A spring morning, crisp and clear
The neighbours garden was so near
No-one knows what happened here

The Hanging Tree

A meaningless death in a small town
Some poor ******* had to cut him down
Fate looks on, wearing a frown

The Hanging Tree

Yes, fate looked on wearing a frown
Mental Health Services let him down
Just a small story in a small town

The Hanging Tree

The swings and slides are empty
As the rain it falls
The children are watching T.V.
As the night begins to call

To the older, teenage kids
With bottles in their hands
To the park, the slides on which they slid
Holding on to their parent's hands

Obnoxious, arrogant and loud
With a drink or two inside
Stood next to where their parents proud
Watched them down the slide

How long has this park been here?
I used to come with my mum and dad
Filled with excitement and fear
At all of the fun to be had

I wonder how many generations
It will be that this park will​ last
And in silent contemplation
Will see present turn once more to past

Gold that glitters under toughened glass
Once gifts of love and all that entails
The love disappeared now, gone with the past
Now just rings awaiting a sale.

' MUM ' lettered in gold, to whom was this given
What  trauma has brought this thing forth
Drugs to get high or food needed to live on
I can't help but wonder what that money was for

Staring all of the small velvet boxes unnerves me
A sadness inside me it twists and it churns
I hear a ' next please ' so I take off my jewelry
Step to the counter and then​ it's my turn.

What's scarier than strangers
And all the things that they don't know
Don't know, don't feel and if they did
They'd never let it show

They have no fears, definitely no phobias
No terrors in the night
No doubts, no worries, not even concerns
They always know that they are right

These strangers are the ones in an angry mob
In the lynch party too
They join the army, even the police
They are not like me and you

They vote Conservative, own pit- bulls
Get involved in, even start pub fights
I've never really known one of them
But I can spot one on sight

These strangers include the rapists
Child molesters​ too
I even believe in traffic, they are the ones in front of you

They​ used to buy Phil Collins
Now they buy U2
They put Englebert Humperdinck at No. 1
When ' Strawberry Fields ' got stuck at No.2

These strangers are so scary
I don't know what to do
Now I never dare to go anywhere
In case I become a stranger too

Time crawls so slowly tonight
A Friday evening in the setting sun
Even at this time of my life
Surely I should be somewhere having fun
Not necessarily a drunken, drugged binge
Just socialising with my peers
My timidity makes me cringe
I sit here alone, except for my fears
45 years old and I've got nothing left
Just a long, slow, sad decline
Battling boredom whilst awaiting death
My life a burnt out relic of what once was  mine
I watch the clock's hands slowly turn
Waiting until it's time to sleep
A life-long loser, what have I learned ?
Nothing, and makes me want to weep

Come take a walk with me downtown
Where the ancient spirits may be found
The dull thump of techno is not the sound
That assaults your senses, now
It's the baying hounds

Suddenly you're enveloped in a must
Although you're not drinking you feel quite ******
You've never known a feeling like this
No all the times on acid and mushrooms you've tripped

This must be the wrong alley, you've turned in
It's​ like a tiny hurricane in which you spin
The lights blur, your stomach churns
You have definitely taken a wrong turn

It must be the 19th Century in which you're found
The way the men's coattails skirt the ground
You want to scream, you can't make a sound
People walk right through you, like there's no one around

All of the shops have shrunk in size
Changed from concrete to marble before your eyes
The windows are smaller, tiny panes of glass
As through the mud and ****, you wander past

The black horses stomp, their breath it steams
The silver on their bridles gleams
Sewage runs through the gutters like a stream
Stuck in a 19th Century nightmare dream

The words in the drunken shouts  don't really differ
But the accent's changed, grown coarser, thicker
. It's gaslight, not neon now that flickers
But you could probably get a decent pint of bitter

The working girls are still around
They look even dirtier, more​ worn down
Money for Gin, not crack must now be found
But still the sordid beat they pound

Suddenly, the mist it clears
The smell of horseshit disappears
You were there for a minute, now you're back here
Now you slowly walk back home, shaking with fear

What was I supposed to say ?
What was I supposed to do ?
I just went out for a walk today
And then I bumped into you

At first I didn't recognise
Behind the clothes, and that hair-do
But when I saw those deep brown eyes
I suddenly realised it​ was you

We awkwardly talked of this and that
The dogs that we both were walking
Not even " How are you ", no normal chat
We really didn't want to be talking

There's too much that's happened, much too much
For us to try to just pass the time
I found it hard to look at, never mind touch
What I used to be  proud to call mine

Tomorrow, my​ missus goes away
Leaves me on my own for twelve days
I don't mind the odd weekend alone
But for this long, I know boredom will gnaw on my bones
Oh well, I'll have more time to write
More to write about as long grow the nights
I'll play my music so loudly
Have my choice of what's on T.V.
But I have to admit I'll miss her so much
No human contact, no human touch
I'll take the dog for lots of walks
And hope that the dog can learn to talk

Under a large, round, yellow
Full November moon
The chill of the cold, dark night
Slips in through my window
It fights against the heating
To send a shuddering shiver down my spine

Under the full November moon
People spill out of noisy pubs
Leaving heat, light, music
A false, inebriated happiness
To stagger, swirling home
To warm beds of love
Or cold, empty houses
And late night T.V.

Under the full November moon
Teenager's breath leaves clouds in the air
Hanging heavy and mingling with smoke
From spliffs secretly held in cupped hands
Hanging around shops, parks
Even the disappearing phone boxes
Feeling the arrogance of youth
Course through their veins

Under the full November moon
The middle aged sit
In armchairs with tea mugs
T.V. droning as they dream of their youth
When they were slim and ****
Or hungry and virile
Before it all slipped so quickly away

Under the full November moon
Swingers swap flesh and fluids
In hotels and motels
With no more passion or emotion
Than passing the salt

Under the full November moon
Prostitutes haul their tired, aching bodies
From car to car for the price of a hit
The dealers  swagger, stoked full of *******​
With the power and arrogance of mediaeval lords

Under the full November moon
People sweat in police cells
Under grey, itchy blankets
On blue rubber mattresses
In a white - tiled nightmare

Under the full November moon
I think of them all
As I sir writing ideas
In a cheap, lined pad
Then turn off the lights
As the full November moon
Bids goodnight
To us all

Am I getting washed up on the rocks
Heading into stormy waters
The white-tipped waves are giving me a shock
I should slow down, I know I ought to

Sailing too fast into the wind
With adrenaline I'm wired
My heart is racing, my eyes are pinned
My brain is getting tired

It's getting too much every day
Sailing upon the high seas
It's costing more than I can afford to pay
It's all getting too much for me

Am I getting washed up on the rocks
Heading into stormy waters
The white-tipped waves are giving me a shock
I should slow down, I know I ought to

I hate when it goes dark at half past four,
Even earlier if the weather's poor.
Whether it's S.A.D. or just natural depression
At how the seasons change in such quick succession.
As you get older and the years fly past
And time just doesn't seem to last
As soon as the year has begun
It seems we're waving goodbye to the sun
And another long, cold winter starts
To chill our bones and freeze our hearts
And the winters always seem to last
A lot longer than the summers fly past
I blame it all on growing old
This hatred of the dark and cold
As a kid, I loved the long, dark nights
Halloween, Bonfire night, then snowball fights
Now, none of them fit in with my desires
I prefer to sit and read by the warmth of the fire
Book in one hand, in the other a drink
I'll relax and hibernate until Spring

The sun finally came out today
After 12 hours of murk
And now it's faded away
Drifted into dark

I hate the way the winter arrives
When it goes dark at  4 'O' Clock
The darkness comes into our lives
And depression starts to knock

Upon our door, we let it enter
And it turns out our lights
At 4'O' Clock it has sent a
Dart into our lives

Every year this darkness hits
At this time of year it starts
I've got to learn not to give a ****
Not to let the dark into my heart