Golden words penned long ago
when I was young and zesty
occupied with lofty things
perhaps a lot less testy.

That which clouds my vision
tragic losses which destroyed
sweet perceptions
dark deceptions
left me underjoyed.

Of boyfriends unattainable
rejection would then smite
the hope of finding love,
which left me
just a bit uptight.

in the stretch to earn a living
well my boss is kind of rough
In trying to say something nice I'm on ice
'cause she's hard-headed, driving, and tough.

The high cost of living and then there's the tax
puts a strain on my old bank account
but that backbiting back-riding queen battleaxe
can jump from the ground to the mount.

and every day's the same old thing
like a hamster on the wheel
the same old thing is looking old
and I’m feeling cold as steel.

but still I ignore the passing of time
and balance hard work with clean fun
and believing that this is as good as it gets
I'll settle for less than the one.

seeking distraction from everything dull
and attracted to that which you are
I read self help books while you eats what I cooks
and you're lost in the Harper's Bazaar.

My cellulite was ill replete
and disappointments grew
and long before the smog moved in
it choked the thrill from you.

and out of this stress comes the need to digress
so we sleep and we play and we drink
and we drain our desires and ***** up our wires
and leave our *** life on the brink.

Simple amusements, the clutter of things
common to man and his beast
from the pretense of knowledge and so many things
to the Thanksgiving holiday feast.

And now we're blown out, you lie and I shout
there's a palpable distance that's haunted
I long for the day that you'll hold me and say
I was always the THE ONE that you wanted.

But now mediocre, you opt to play poker
and run with a sweat-pool of stink
and hoping to find something good on the street
in the morning you feel like a fink.

Left to your own devices
sleeping soundly, your heart's one desire
for passion it waits, while the office debates
and will do so until you expire.

Displacing my anger I'm less satisfied
and will never see straight, as you'll see
my own crooked finger was put through the wringer
and now it points straight back at me.

His uncle **** asked Benedict
if he would mow the lawn
of the old lady at the cottage,
which he did, then clean out
the cowsheds at the farm,
which he did, then take some eggs
to the local shop, which he did.

It was a hot day, he felt a thirst
so went to pub called the Battleaxe
and ordered a pint and sat and drank
it slow outside in the sun. He thought
of the clarinet he'd brought with him,
the jazz he played in the front lounge,
which his aunt Eileen said was very good.

Do you still have and play your accordion?
he asked her. No, she said not now;
I've not played for years. He remembered
her playing and singing Goodnight Irene
on it when he had stayed as a kid.

Long ago now, he thought, finishing his pint.
He also mused on his recent visited
to see the MJQ in the City and afterwards
he met the band on the coach at the back.
Asked questions, got autographs.

Then another visit to the City with his
two cousins to watch them do their martial arts
and afterwards showed them judo moves
he and his friends had done a few years before.

He took his empty glass to the counter
of the pub and walked out in the sunshine
wondering what his uncle **** would have
lined up for him next. There was talk of
digging trenches in the churchyard some
evening to lay pipes to the church and there
was that mowing of the grass he'd been
shown the other day. Yes, he'd do that now,
he thought, while the sun was out, the grass dry.

The mower was in a shed at the back, one
of those modern jobs, less work, less elbow grease,
less sweat. But also, those peas to pick
and shuck for his aunt. He wasn't done with his
chores for his keep, for six weeks, least not yet.

I can hardly remember your face,
left here in a chair,
room aglow with the muted television,
drunk as hell.
A man becomes a pigsty without a woman.
***** stains on the sports sock,
a battleaxe hangover,
bills piled by the toaster
and **** over the kitchen sink.

The bailiffs came.
I cried like a child through the burglary,
drank the Ganges in stout when it was over.

I have been drinking ever since
the Christmas lights turned on,
the town bathed in absinthe, teenage smokers,
Lithuanian women;
no chance of collision with you.
Eternal ashtray, brick upon brick,
cylindrical beams - an empire of ash
and odour. I can't smell you anymore.
How senses die, yet you remain,

stubborn as a **** on a concrete street,
stubborn in your deceit,
my old crutch, my faded ***** in heat.

I am a mess of old exchanges
whilst ****-stars **** on screen.
Fantasy is dead
as my first dog, defunct,
birthing colonies beneath the ground,
frozen over in winter.
I feel nothing. No thing.
Urges clamour for attention to keep me alive,
vague hunger, the need to bleed.

The paramedics came.
I cried like a child through the gift-wrapping,
drank from a plastic cup as they covered your face.

I can hardly form a sentence
in this fast world
of slow days and long aches in silence:
this is hell.
A man becomes a pigsty without a woman.
I see you in my ridiculous moments,
the insanity that stands in your place,
fractured light in the doorway-
my obsessive state, your forgotten face.

On the night of our attack we’re ordered to keep the fires damped. We huddle close to our horses and hum war lullabies under our breaths and the loudest sounds are the stars, creaking from their hooks.

We got the Speech that afternoon, when we’d rounded the valley and found the city resplendent and open and inviting in an overtly ****** way before us.

“Kids” we were told

“Tonight we are boys and girls for the last time. Tomorrow we will be dead and will have become new as warriors and fools. We will never be accountants. We will never be lawyers. We will never heal the sick unless with spit, and harsh words, and duck tape. We will never teach anything but strength through violence and stoicism. Philosophy to us is nothing but an action incomplete. Poetry will never move us – words will never have the beauty of the bottle, or the fist.”

Now hidden by the dark, I curl myself up in my hoodie and silently whisper to my mare. She’s oak brown and placid but for when we ride into battle, and then she is a battleaxe and has no fear, only forward, as if ‘into the black night’ are the only words she knows.

But she understands me when I look around our camp and into the shadowed faces of my compatriots who will not be here with me tomorrow, and those that remain will no longer be singing lullabies, of any kind.

Tomorrow we will fight, and account for our dead, even if we won’t write it down.

Tomorrow we will make our own laws, with swords and decision and violence that would only beget more violence and only leaves everything ******, scattered, alone.

Tomorrow we will ride into laughter and remind those who have forgotten that this is Chance, this is Life. That in itself is a lesson.

Tomorrow we will fight and die and be resurrected and in what manner that will happen will be a form of philosophy.

And when you slap me on the back and wipe away a drop of blood from my cheekbone and smile, saying ‘you done did good’, that will be like medicine to me, bitter.

Tomorrow we will ride into heaven and make bedlam out of it. That in itself is a kind of poetry.

And when I watch you walk away, the sway of your hips will also be poetry to me.  

And if I find myself a bottle it will not be poetry, only a soliloquy, a lament for something lost.

And the plunder that we’ll have won from this? Well, that won’t be worth anything.

But I am that which would have the war wounds rather than the name of coward etched upon on my cheek.

And so I hum my last lullaby, and prepare for tomorrow.

fortunately thwarted courtesy
mine tall tale telling flair.

Mine irretrievable brilliant masterpiece...
all for naught after mental cogs and wheels
I did apply creative juice metaphorical grease
regarding tour de force pièce de résistance writing
forever lost to the annals of human history.

So much for escaping to paradise island
(Garden of Eden) and experiencing zen
Impossible mission to earn untold yen
concerning prosaic poem/ poetic prose titled
The old battleaxe and her henchwomen
irrecoverable linkedin to sinking feeling
hours, days, weeks... all spent for naught
dharma *** - me got doled out unfair

injustice though scoreboard (tabulating
when yours truly acted immoral) oddly even
Steven after I repented against
marital infidelities nearly cost priceless
paternal love of daughters, whereby
their father experienced
suicidal ideations thought
to drown his sorrows
overdosing on fen-phen.

A transcendent awakening
occurred within noggin of one simian
a clothed outlier caged within human zoo
predicated upon his overactive imagination
inextricably favorable ratings did woo,
albeit ephemerally savored renown, and true
value viz his great Magnus Opus,
whereby riches couped courtesy
brief brush with fame and glory
found countless people lined in queue

(and moment of morning glory
subsequently slipped
thru gnarly butter fingers
symptomatic of nervousness
exhibited courtesy an aspiring Nehru
case in point my pal Joey, a kangaroo
dear reader pardon
tardy greeting regarding helloo
cuz decided against formalities,
a nonestablishmentarian he doth eschew
no ghostly chance I merely utter boo!

Unlikely I scared
the living daylights out of you,
nor would that be intent
regarding self taught amateur
practitioner of voodoo
I rarely if ever cast spells,
nevertheless yours truly
still under probation
and peer review
so breathe easy, cuz Matthew
Scott Harris would hate
to tarnish reputation of Guru,
that charming humble fellow
he taught me wizardry.