An age ago, the summer of our youth;
That Eden where those sun kissed memories burnt their legacies deep into our wounds.
Oh those days, the fire within our souls,
A rage of youth that lovers yearn thereafter;
A squall of passion, a fire unquenched,
Those days of days, that time of our lives
Which still ember glow and light our now,
Where we will forever see and grieve
With gladdened hearts and grateful minds.

A certain darkness smothers me
There is no way out.
A certain horror waits for me
The hope I go without.

An endless torture pays for me
No one hears me shout.
An endless fear plays out in me
The light in me gone out.

2021

Strike a match in the dark,
Watch your childhood spark to life.
In a momentary flicker of the past
Relive the scent of bonfire nights;
Where sulphur rockets are heaven bound,
And the orange glow of fire lit faces
Come congoured from the dark of time.
But burns short the magic in that light,
It dwindles fast like youth itself,
Each memory blown away like smoke.
But for just one moment that magic shone
And in those seconds a child came home.

Tom Lefort 2024

Here upon my throne of idiocy
I command a thousand memories.
Where each proclaim their majesty
Through mysteries woven into time.
And here I robe myself in that splendour,
Of the love and pain they muster;
Self inflicted wounds, too deep and dear
For time and tears to heal,
So, there to worship at the feet
Of this man whose future they will plunder.

'All of you.' August 2020.

All the lost souls, see them
Counting shallow blessings;
Forgotten causes, fallen idols,
Open wounds and seeping hopes.
So many broken dreams, hear them
Crying for their hollow faith;
Darkened hearts, bitter taste,
Shattered lives and loves laid waste.

Tom Lefort 2022

There are such sweet beginnings
And there are our bitter ends.
Decades roll and crash like tides;
We live, we love, we fall aside.
Cut deep the wounds we all inflict,
Lasts long the legacy of our shame.
Left behind those broken lives,
Lost in time the reasons why.
There is such hope in our beginnings
And this the comfort at our end.

Tom Lefort June 2023.

Those still left, bereft, bereft,
Nothing left, nothing left
But empty places, fading faces;
No one here, just this fear
Of forgetting all we said
Within those hallowed years,
That now speak just in whispers
As they are quietly left for dead.

TS Lefort 2020

Be ready should the moment take you there;
When that unexpected pull of yesteryear
Wraps firm it's fingers upon your soul.
Digs deep on heartbeat echoes old.

Be still within those shadows of your past;
Where such reflection heals our wounds
Calms now the storms aroused by youth.
Holds firm our every hidden truth.

Tom Lefort 2024

The failure in us both runs free;
Bleeding out from wounds of love,
Snagged on broken bones of trust.
The futile attempts in all of us.

I chose to take a painful path,
Where my bloodied footprints
Trailed upon life's broken glass,
Bleeding out across the shards
Of shattered hopes, discarded hearts.

In loves gutter I found my truth,
Face down in that waste of you
Which bittered every taste of youth,
Spat out your words so dearly held
And choked that hope on cruel untruths.

TS Lefort 2021

Upon the shore of washed up men
Those floundering breaths draw deep,
Such guttural sobs of broken boys
Spill loves now but a weep.

Within the shallows man's tide casts
Fabled depths their lovers seek,
Those tragic cries of hopeless girls
The one thing that runs deep.

TS Lefort 2021

Twist and turn the lid you keep on everything,
Release the madness sobriety holds within;
Pour out the darkness, drink it up.
Carry me home on the rapids and rivers of gin.

TS Lefort 2021

You were the light of dawn, the hue of dusk,
The fingers gently curled within my hand.
A promise that all would be as we dreamed,
The breath of hope upon my lips.
You were the life in me, the reason I rose each day,
The yearning for which all hearts will sigh.
A depth of friendship few could ever understand.

When disappointment comes to call
I will be there, laid bare, find me there;
Open wounded and standing small,
Arms outstretched like a fool.
When just my fears are standing tall
I will be there, I would dare, leave me there,
To prove my worth was nothing much,
A slight of touch, fingers slipping,
Dreams were nothing, all I held
Were little more than grains of pain.
I will be there, still, always, just the same.

TS Lefort

I held you once. Lips sealed, eyes closed;
Hearts as one.
I loved you once. Passions fire, reason lost;
A life undone.
I mourn you now. Years past, shadows drawn;
Consequence now come.

Tom Lefort 2023

Consumes me, controls me with a Poisoned passion that cracks my face
Against the past;
The horrors of my idiocy, the idiocy of
My horrors,
Falling and failing, falling further still
From my fainthearted present toward
Those broken, bitter,
Love soaked memories.

Takes me, betrays me, awakens me
From my calm to reap my soul
For lovers still held fast;
In that pain of passions fire,
The scars of youth;
Beautiful but fading, fading faster still
To a shadow of a hope once held fast
In my reckless,
Broken, love provoked yesterday.

This old fool stumbles on toward
A final, futile curtain call.
The lights are out, the audience gone;
Takes his bow in silence.

This old fool recounts the words
He never cared to learn.
All played out, the script so wrong;
His show goes on and on.

TS Lefort 2020

Darkness returns like a beloved friend,
Wrapping its arms around my life—
Throttling, comforting, confounding.
In its embrace, I find my peace,
A place to claim as mine alone,
Gentle, fervent, sublime.

It holds me like a long-lost love,
Casting its spell upon my days,
Hallowed, addled, entwined.

Tom Lefort 2024

All those yesterday's are my tomorrow,
A dawn of memories run astray;
Nostalgia's spell from which I borrow,
The dusk and embers of our ways.

Tom Lefort

Each drink revives that cry for home,
Swallow now the heavy thirst for time.
Where oceans of much loved pasts
Come crashing down in wine.
Each night revokes my every day,
Drink deep the endless need for then.
That swell of longed for yesterday's
Each drop a love of mine.

Tom Lefort 2023

Every step of all my many paths
Have reached their bitter end.
No lights of life are left to guide,
I put them out along the way.
Like scattered truths behind me
The embers of a fire once mine;
I left them there to fade and die,
Yet once they lit my way.

Tom Lefort 2024

Whisper not, hold that word of truth,
They are watching us.
Think not to stand your ground,
They are imprisoning us.
Write not the words that burn within,
They are beating us.
Surrender not, evil won't prevail,
They are blaming us.

England 2024

Fallen people are the common ground,
Relentless pursuits of no avail,
Desperate illusions of a promised land,
Flaying limbs no hands that join,
No hope no help no heaven;
Falling people screaming without a sound.

Like fireflies we burned so bright,
Hope eternal, life inferno
Through the darkness of the blackest night;
We blazed our trails yet now must go
To that place in which we rest our wings,
Humbled, quietly troubled
In reverence to the King of Kings.

So fierce the flame of ageing man,
Regrets eternal, death too certain
Burns up those dreams and best-laid plans;
Leaves just the ash of our untruths,
Fading, sadly aching
For that firefly light burnt out for you.

TS Lefort

Mournful footsteps toward our yesterdays,
Twilight now but heartbeats lead the way.
The flicker of love lost still lights this path,
As we search forever the echoes of our past.

Gentle go we toward that hallowed ground,
Where all our heartbreak happiness is found.
The hopes we had are a passion still ablaze,
Still it burns for us in these our darker days.

That place outlives each and everyone of us,
In that eternity we find the only things we trust.
The faith we placed upon that sacred ground,
Upon which all our hopes and dreams are found.

Quiet now, close your eyes;
Take the outstretched hand of yesteryear.
Let our fingers touch, entwine and hold,
To feel the pulse of much loved pasts
Where our pain and passion remains untold.

Remember now, open your hearts;
Run toward the open arms of all those days.
Long for her embrace, press closer home,
To hear the beating heart of all we shared
When our lives and loves were all we owned.

Tom Lefort

Mourned are the times we so loved but lost,
Wasted are the words we spoke in years forgot;
Regrets now all that bind as one our fractured hearts,
Broken be our lives yet still entwined by lovers knots.

TS Lefort 2017

You can dredge your mire of memories,
Try and touch those years by way of empties;
Pretend to yourself again and again
That it was really truly better then.
But the dawning light of sobriety
Will run dry those lies we tell ourselves,
Dim the light of yesteryear;
Cast cold the shadow of our today
Upon the hangover our past still plays.

TS Lefort 2021

fake #me #desperatewannabe,
Instagram selfie Facebook lies,
Snapchat fraud did you see
#truth #nothing #sadnessinmyeyes?

TS Lefort January 2021

Hold those moments dear
Never let them go,
In the darkest of times
They will light your way.
Hold close those memories deep
Never let them drift,
Upon the sea of uncertainty
They will guide you home.
Hold near the song of yesteryear
Let that siren sing,
She beckons you toward the rock
Your life is anchored from.

T S Lefort 2021

Breathlessly broken, yes we are,
Nothing more, nothing less;
Held together by cheap regrets,
And the stains of beer and cigarettes.
Shamelessly spoken, yes it's true,
The passing of life, nothing left;
Soaked to the skin in compromise,
Burnt from within by our troubling lies.

TS Lefort. May 2020

Your life was a precious gift,
Thrown, owned, ******, blown.
Exquisite youth and sapphire eyes,
Faded, wasted, jaded, hated.
Your strife was preditors gain,
Used, abused, refused, excused.

#debbie1977

For the past I have ever raised the glass,
It's as close as I can get;
Reawakening each drop of lovers poison
Thrown down my neck;
In memories name again and again
I pour out that lament,
Reaffirming the love of such great regret.
For those years I fumble for the glass,
It's the soaking up that always lasts,
That warming spirit to my soul
But burns cold as ice this eternal toll.

Tom Lefort 2022

What's done is done,
What's said is said,
So cast those regrets upon the dead.

When gone is gone,
When past is past,
Let go the ruins that still hold fast.

Where all was all,
Where then was then,
Drink up those dreams of troubled men.

Love still etched upon the page
Fading yes but still this rage
Where hearts that pounded, best as one
Will forever live, are never done.
I run my fingers across those words
Recorded there a love unheard
But bound in time, two lives as one
Now torn and stained, our hopes undone.

Vinyl, old, crackle and turn,
Intimate moments scored into grooves;
Atmosphere burns,
A revolving truth.

Needle, record, goosebump skin,
Long played moments again and again;
Our favourite track
An unrepented sin.

TS Lefort 2021

Struggle for time, fighting for breath,
Fading from sight, forgotten by all;
My life I leave for you in words.

Cradling hopes, fumbling vows,
Falling from grace, forsaken by all;
The shadow I cast is left for you.

Running from truth, hiding the pain,
Escaping the now, embracing the end;
My secret I spill upon this page.

Forgiving lies, regretting loves,
Pursuing the past, rejected by time;
The years I hid will now be found.

2021

Lovers walk across the beach.
Tread carefully now;
Your footprints fade upon the sand.

Lovers float among the stars.
Reach gently now;
Your light diminishes with every dawn.

Lovers fall upon their dreams.
Weep softly now;
Your hopes impaled on lonely nights.

Lovers torn by lovers lies.
Leave quietly now;
Your regrets reveal those stolen times.

Tom Lefort. May 2023

Forty year's pass.
Then and now the same.
I don't recall the differences.
Emotions never change.

From boy to man.
Him and I unchanged.
I won't repent my sinfulness.
Mistakes of which I'm made.

Tom Lefort 2023

Ink blue sky,
Silhouette arms that reach for you.
Cold the breath of God,
Awash this hallowed isle.
Twilight is here,
Hold the march of time.
England you my England,
For yet a little while.

Sing loud the failings of my past,
Each a tune for which I long.
I don't regret those faults of mine,
The beat of which are still my song.

Tom Lefort 2024

Nostalgia, what a beautiful *****,
That unquenchable thirst and unstoppable itch;
The tap on the shoulder from the people you miss,
That kick in the ***** from the girls that you kissed,
Whose names you forgot through years on the ****.
Oh Nostalgia, such a beautiful, *******;
The sum of my memories that make life so rich.  

TS Lefort. 2019

Pour me a scotch son and let your father talk.
Untie his tongue and hear his secrets sing.
Release the torrent there within.

And repressed within that sacred silence
Recollections hold their breath to survive.
Let go this man who was once alive.

Tom Lefort 2024

Beginnings that betray us,
Childhoods that forsake us,
Decisions that break us,
Life that evades us.

Careers that deceive us,
Ambitions that fail us,
Lovers that shatter us,
Time that passes us.

Threads that bind us,
Scars that define us,
Years that blind us,
Death that finds us.

Tom Lefort 2022

Within desperate men
Such desperate secrets hide;
Where Hidden yesterday's hold their smile,
And broken promises rest a while.

Within hopeless men
Those hopeless moment's sigh;
Where forbidden moment's still stand strong,
The folly of all their reckless wrongs.

When the glass runs empty,
When the bottle falls
And drops of life all are that's left,
The emptiness I consume
Betrays the man we best forget.

When all that pours is nothingness,
When the end is all that calls
And drinks the days I now forget,
The darkness I will choose
Hides this man and his regrets.

TS Lefort 2020

Deeper than these scars within,
Cuts the fear of failing you;
Runs wider than the seas combined,
Tides of time are crashing down,
I cannot stop this drowning man;
Gasps of truth still hurting you,
Sinking now in waves of shame,
I can never find my breath again.

TS Lefort

Run your fingers along the lines of time
Scored across my skin, the marks of sin.
The aftermath of everything.

TS Lefort 2021

I was born of troubled love,
Those who searched but never found,
My first steps were upon their broken ground.

There upon that sinking sand
I sank my feet and ran aground,
And to their score of lies my hands are bound.

I am he who pays their price,
A child who bore that wage of shame,
This man so lost within the shadow of that pain.

TS Lefort