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579 · Aug 2018
Norm
Eryri Aug 2018
During my summer of discontent,
I discovered a comedian who wasn't malcontent.
A revelation,
Not in humiliation,
But of deep thought disguised by a folksy charm,
Cloaked in banter that means no harm.
566 · Dec 2018
Dearest Sun, Do Not Set
Eryri Dec 2018
You rose gently this morning
As if wanting to ease me into the day.
I watched your slow-burn rise
Gifting me a kaleidoscope sky:
Reds, Greens, Yellows and Golds,
As befits a celestial Emperor
Whose power basks in its own brilliant light.

But you knew I was watching your daily coronation.
Was it your plan to make it so memorable?
Or was it a self-fulfilling prophecy?
Did I choose this day subconsciously
As the day of my life's blossoming...
Fruit overspilling,
Wine glass brimming.

Now, with our day underway
My joy is unabating.
Your radiance infectious warming my soul.
What will the rest of your tenure gift me?
I am where I want to be,
I am who I want to be,
Dearest Sun, please do not set on me.
565 · Feb 2020
Flat Earther
Eryri Feb 2020
Seven billion souls
On this flat Earth
A Double A-Side planet
Centre of its Universe
The Star of the show.
Revised in honour of the poor deluded flat Earther who passed away yesterday in a tragic accident of his own making.
541 · Feb 2019
Sickly Sweet
Eryri Feb 2019
Cotton candy mystery,
A fellow with no history.
Sugar cane disaster,
An apprentice with no master.
What befell the sickly boy
When he lost his favourite toy?
505 · Nov 2018
Catnap
Eryri Nov 2018
So many lost cats...

I really must give them back.
496 · Mar 2019
A Traveller's Monument
Eryri Mar 2019
It sits unsquare
Made of tumoured granite
In a dip on a peak
Overlooking a lush green carpeted landscape.

Hurriedly hewn by many hands,
And thrown up by makeshift stoneshifters,
It balances on large pebbles
Held together by Play-Doh mortar.

It is, for all its aesthetic faults,
A resilient testimony
To a family's love
And to a proud identity.
486 · Apr 2021
Temporal Vertigo
Eryri Apr 2021
Regrets set in canyons
The mind's gravity wells
Drawing in introspection
Crashing thoughts
Marooning moods
The day lost at sea
Eryri Apr 2019
Some day
SOMEONE
May come across
THIS.
But until then,
There is
YOU.
And you will
NOT DO
So please,
Put this
MESSAGE
Back where you
Found it.
484 · Oct 2018
The Fear of 'Looking Well'!
Eryri Oct 2018
"You look well!" are words I dread to hear;
It means I have put on weight;
Probably a result of all the beer,
Of which I drink many a crate!

I know it's affectionate,
Just a compliment and an observation,
And I know I've been a bit decadent:
Stuffed my face like a bear before hibernation!

So at the moment I'm full of self-pity,
No gym for me for the next twenty years,
I have two young kiddies,
Healthy living for me is now in arrears!

So what to do? What's the fix?
Go for a run when they've gone to bed?
Simply too tired and then there's Netflix,
See, I now have the motivation of the walking dead!

But seriously, I need to get fit,
Make the kids a part of a health regime,
Get me off my comfy seat,
And get me back some self-esteem!
483 · Mar 2019
Ringtone Trauma
Eryri Mar 2019
It always amused me,
How no one in the building
Had neither the time nor the inclination
To change that default ringtone...
That harbinger of problems upon problems.
It amuses me more that,
After a break and a change,
I find that default ringtone
Still echoes down the corridors,
Like incidental music in a bad horror
And how I still snap into action mode
Each time I hear that default ringtone,
How I enter crisis management mode
Each time I hear that default ringtone,
How I brace myself for bad news
Each time I hear that default ringtone.
What a thing the mind is!
Impressions made upon it,
Triggered by a catchy default ringtone!
Eryri Aug 2018
Don't go through the door Daniel,
We know it isn't fair
But forget the stairs are there,
They're not for you Daniel.
Your place is neither down nor up
But on the floor where all you need exists.
Please, Daniel, don't resist
You have your bed, your cutlery and your cup,
So please,
Don't go through the door Daniel.
473 · Oct 2018
A Little Light Can Overcome
Eryri Oct 2018
Lamp light show me the night
Cast your white-yellow reach
Blot out the darkness that blinds
And smother that which is lightless
With a blanket of warm light.

Night is full of uncertainties,
Is unpredictable and a mystery.
But night need not be dark;
A small beacon can overpower dimness,
And can ***** out a patch of night.
470 · Jul 2019
Astronaut
Eryri Jul 2019
My dear Astronaut,
Love you to the moon and back:
Easy on splashdown
467 · Mar 2019
Flat Earth
Eryri Mar 2019
Seven billion souls
Being spun around
On this flat Earth;
A rotating disc,
Master of its Domain,
At the centre of the Solar System,
Where it belongs,
The star of the show,
A Double A-Side planet.
Flat Earth: of course, I'm not a Flat Earther.
466 · Apr 2019
Loyal Highness
Eryri Apr 2019
My my, your royal Highness
How your drug of choice
Overcomes your shyness!
We haven't seen you in a while,
We've missed that wicked smile.
Stick around, take a seat
Take that weight right off your feet.
We were just saying,
There's no point complaining;
Old habits will never die,
So sit back and let's get high!
Eryri Jun 2019
The weather was changeable,
A warming sun for the previous hour,
Then, without warning,
The wind rose high,
The roof rose higher:
No use running for cover, I thought,
Since the cover had gone the way of my courage.
You see, I had a role to fulfil
Sure, its fulfillment in sunny spells was a breeze
But in a Force Ten gale?
(Cue howls of laughter)
Progress was at the pace of a snail
And nerves are torn to ribbons
(Much like the poor flags).
Was it life or death?
Well, it depended on how much you didn't wish to die.
Luckily for me, my aim in life is not to witness death
And that is why I pushed on,
And huffed and puffed
Until we got our Lifeboat to the stricken drunken Jetski pilots.
450 · Mar 2019
Keys
Eryri Mar 2019
These jangling keys
I have in hand
Call out for locks
That no longer exist.
The building is gone,
Knocked out of site,
But still, I carry these keys
That jingle and jangle
For naught but the breeze.
446 · Sep 2018
Neighbourlie
Eryri Sep 2018
My neighbour's a big hitter,
Within the Chartered Institute of Bullshitters,
He tells me he's a spy,
But he knows I know it's a lie!

Why does he say these things?!

Like the time he defused a bomb,
Or when he came first in a marathon.
I do, though, admire his conviction,
When telling me these outrageous fictions.

Why does he say these things?!

One day I will challenge his ****-and-bull stories,
Tell him I know it's all jack-a-nory.
But for now I take delight in stories, like:
His solo circumnavigation of the globe...on a tandem bike!

So I ask for the last time:

Why, oh why, does he say say these things?!
445 · Feb 2019
Eye Spy
Eryri Feb 2019
I spy with my twitching eye:
Sleep deprivation.
413 · Feb 2019
Sat-Nav Mishap
Eryri Feb 2019
Touring County Sligo
In my Toyota Aygo.

In-built Sat Nav Mishap,
No real road map.

Lost in County Sligo
Cursing my Toyota Aygo.
407 · Jul 2019
Human Constellation
Eryri Jul 2019
Two of you,
One in a lunar limbo
And billions of us.
Armstrong and Aldrin
And Collins
And Earth.
One small step
Two deep breaths
A billion or more gasps.
Mother Earth, Module and Moon:
a human constellation.
397 · Mar 2019
Who's Boring?
Eryri Mar 2019
I am boring,
I am boring.
Am I boring?
Are you boring?
Are we boring?
We are boring.
Eryri Jun 2019
Memories compressed under a thin sheet of glass,
A camera first and telephone last.
My laughter, my pride and my joy it stores,
Joylessly sealed in a glass and metal sandwich.
But this little device taking over my life,
Has one disadvantage:
A finite memory full to bursting,
Warning me it's 'Dangerously Low on Space'.
359 · Apr 2019
The Jesus Mug
Eryri Apr 2019
"Jesus Makes You Smug"
Is was it said on his coffee mug.
"****** atheist is lucky I'm a pacifist"
Thought the very angry Jesuit.
More nonsence.
351 · May 2019
Death and The Devil
Eryri May 2019
I met the Devil the other night.
But, try as he might,
He couldn't deceive this old Knight.

I'd met Death the previous day.
I'd lost my way,
But I convinced her to go away.

God has spoken to me in the past.
Been a long time since we spoke last.
It's time He stuck His colours to His mast.
348 · Mar 2019
Grief Robbing
Eryri Mar 2019
Some seize on death,
Just as they seized on a siblings' toy,
They want it for themselves.
No one else should possess it;
It must be about them
And the validating sympathy that it elicits.
    
But, ultimately, which is sadder?
The death itself?
Or...
The looting of grief?
345 · Mar 2019
Learnt Opinions
Eryri Mar 2019
A child assumes adults' superiority
Hero worships older members of the family
Absorbs opinions overheard over teas and coffees
And tries them on for size at school
Just as he might sneakily try on an Uncle's cool leather jacket
- comforting, macho and confidence-giving -
But he eventually outgrows the jacket
Casts aside those learnt opinions;
Tough, stubborn opinions
With rugged exteriors
And lined with silken narratives
That, thankfully, perished over time.
343 · Jan 2019
Blossomate
Eryri Jan 2019
Hands tremble,
Words evaporate
Velvet shoots poke out of soil,
Premature flowering.
Weather cool
Tempers hot,
Nurtured growth stalls.
Weather hot
Tempers cool
Reanimate
Rejuvinate
Blossomate
340 · Oct 2019
I See the Other Side of You
Eryri Oct 2019
The moon keeps it's good side to us,
It basks in the positive
Projecting joy and happiness.
But it conceals its darker side,
Draws upon the depths of the Dark.
This side is a mystery,
It wallows in a shady history
Shared only with
Its nearest and dearest:
Victims of the dark.
335 · Jan 2019
Estate of the Times
Eryri Jan 2019
Friends with Star Wars figures
And friends with football stickers.
Friends with bikes,
Friends with footballs;
The road was Wembley,
The neighbours' van our goalpost,
No one seemed to care
That their cars were being trashed
By wayward shots and way-off volleys
Or their lawns were being wrecked
By 10 year olds with football studs
Crossing themselves à la Maradona
Before vital penalties.
Happy days indeed,
Playing Block,
Headers and Volleys,
Sixty Seconds,
Laughing, smiling, laughing.
But that same estate,
Thirty years hence,
Is clogged with cars,
No room for makeshift crossbars
To help nurture future soccer stars!
Lawns are tarmacked drives.
Children forced into sedentary lives
Not by social media or XBox Live
But by lack of playing spaces.
So, no more cycle races,
Or street-football with undone laces,
Just kids with nowhere to play
And no power with which to sway
Those ignorant adults who simply say
"Kids today, eh? Too lazy to play".
Eryri Oct 2018
The boy and his dog,
Went for a walk in the fog,
They got really lost,
Tripped up on the frost,
And ended up deep in a bog!

The boy shouted for help,
As his dog barked and yelped,
Still nobody came,
And so they remained,
Up to their knees in the bog!

When the fog disappeared,
They suddenly cheered.
"Soon we'll be seen!" said the boy.
Within the hour a girl did walk by
And rescued them both from the bog.

The two arrived home,
To soup and a bone;
The girl they forgot,
For her help they cared not,
So she plans to push them back in the bog!
Realised halfway through writing this that no one, let alone children, really uses the word 'bog' anymore! Oh well.
322 · Oct 2018
Everybody Has An ism
Eryri Oct 2018
No one's perfect,
Everybody has an ism.
Don't deny it,
Share your ism with us,
We reserve the right to judge you,
One way or another,
But we'll be nice about it.
Except those who campaign against your ism;
They will make your life hell.
312 · Jan 2022
The Soothing
Eryri Jan 2022
Silken shroud of flowing water
Softens rock to rounded pebbles
Much as time sooths the memory
Eryri May 2019
Was it never more than lust
Looking back at all the fuss?!
Let me white-out 'love' from my biography
And write out 'lust' on that paper's scab.

And when I think back on those romantic notions,
It's clear that all those loving feelings I thought I had
Were triggered by lotions and potions
Perfumes, cocktails and blind devotions.

But now, with the benefit of hindsight,
I see the cheap trick youth plays on the mind;
Naivety conspires with shallowness,
And confuses lust with love!
307 · Jun 2019
MY SYMPTOMS
Eryri Jun 2019
"The rash keeps coming back!
They've given me a cream,
But it keeps coming back"
Public symptoms announcements:
It never ceases to amaze me
The willingness to declare illness.
297 · Jan 2019
Nain in Faded Colour
Eryri Jan 2019
I saw a photo of you yesterday of granular colour
Fading fast, poor in quality.
Hurriedly taken, poorly processed:
It was one I'd never seen.

A second glance made me pause.
You were not quite as I recall:
Strange, that I would forget details;
Laugh lines here and there, and the sheer whiteness of your hair.

My own memory's snapshot is a composite.
A mish-mash of impressions developed by my mind,
Fading fast as time goes by.
Eryri Mar 2019
There's a comedian,
The Comedian's Comedian in fact,
Who is spending his later years
On a Quixotic tragi-comic quest,
Because he's obsessed.
Obsessed with creating
The perfect joke.

He pursues a Unifying Theory of Mirth:
Opening line,
Set up,
Opening line repeated as a punchline.

A joke folding in on itself,
A funny infinite loop.
The teller doubling and doubling over in laughter,
Laughing to infinity
Where, some say,
Madness lies.

Still, is madness not a small price to pay
For infinite amusement?
291 · Jan 23
Elsewhere
Eryri Jan 23
Basking in a borrowed light...
too short is the conjuring of joy
while infinite degrees of freedom
tumble tombola-like elsewhere
out of sight and out of mind
Can there be beauty in the rot?
Is that not enough?
290 · Jan 2019
Quenched
Eryri Jan 2019
River water flows
Quenches imagination
On scorched riverbank
287 · Jul 2019
Language Botherers
Eryri Jul 2019
An ancient language,
Perhaps the oldest,
But still a target
And the **** of jokes
From many many English folk.
Yet another ignorant joke about the Welsh language on Twitter, again by someone who should know better. Seem Welsh is always fair game. I do stress, it's not ALL English folk
281 · Jun 2019
Attachments
Eryri Jun 2019
You ripped the door off:
The electro-magnetic attachment
Was no match for your frustration,
Which goes to show,
You cannot guard against
A young man's anguish
Manifested as rage,
A judged and stigmatised rage,
Born of poor attachment:
An open door that was never closed.
273 · Mar 2019
The Song Thrush
Eryri Mar 2019
A luckless boy
With a disc camera
Chases a picture of beauty.
A picture of his favourite bird:
The Song Thrush.

This boy feels as free
As the bird he seeks.
This boy sings his own song
Unaware of a bigger chorus
That will, one day soon,
Drown out his naïve tune.

Still, with tail up,
He chases that elusive bird
With a camera he does not understand
On a film he will never develop.

But he is lost in the moment,
Skulking and flitting
From one place to the next
Trying quietly (but loudly)
Not to startle the Song Thrush
As it whistles its timeless song.
Revised
269 · Nov 2018
Night's Aria
Eryri Nov 2018
Night's aria plays 'til morning's chorus.

Sunlight's stretching fingers
touches and illuminates all for us.

With such speed does morning arrive,
the calm of night seems but a distant playful dream.
268 · Mar 2022
Hindsight
Eryri Mar 2022
That vintage ache circulates
Intoxicates and sobers alternately
Spreads shame then clarity

Hindsight is a cruel curator of the mind.
268 · Jan 2019
Unreliable Narrator
Eryri Jan 2019
It was a dark and stormy night...
...or was it a light and sunny morning?
I cannot remember.
Anyway, it was November...
...or was it September?

'Tis a boring tale anyhow.

THE END
264 · Jan 2019
Greyed Out
Eryri Jan 2019
Ghostly type,
Greyed out.
Sell your soul
To a solid type.
263 · Oct 2018
Post-Session Blues
Eryri Oct 2018
Don't get me wrong, the trip was a blast.
I loved the chatter and drinking,
The joking and the mishaps were hilarious.
Did I mention the drinking?

The heel snapping off your "good expensive" new shoe was a hoot,
As was the train letting everyone off but you!
Did I mention the drinking?

But when I get home something odd occurs,
A completely baseless melancholy descends,
Joined by a stubborn belly ache.
Was it all the drinking?

I am very lucky, I do not suffer with depression,
But I've noticed a pattern,
And diagnose the post-session blues.
It must be the drinking.
263 · Sep 2022
Quintet
Eryri Sep 2022
The Quintet in my head do not harmonise.
They theorise and jeapordise.
261 · Apr 2021
A Death And A Half
Eryri Apr 2021
Your careworn heart broke
When death came to claim
The life it had coveted so long
The life you shielded for so long

An end to a doomed purpose
Anti climactic? A death and a half?
The shackles a tightened privilege:
Release did not bring you peace.

House and soul were empty that night
No shallow breath for company
The thermostat's click a reminder
Of the warmth he enjoyed.
258 · Jul 2019
Death and Life
Eryri Jul 2019
Death comes and death goes,
Leaving the living living and grieving.
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