Daily walks would lead me down

The tourist laden streets

Where people from all walks of life

Would congregate and meet

Buskers, singers, ne'er do wells

Would work throughout the throngs

But in back of Giannis restaurant

Sat an old man sharing songs

He didn't sing so much as talk

His voice was hoarse with age

But a milk box and an orange crate

Were his table, chair and stage

His instrument, an old guitar

Scarred, battle worn and black

His guitar strap was as old as he

An old potato sack

He sat and played to nobody

He just let the words be there

His audience could be a hundred deep

Sometimes it could be air

His music was his lifes blood

It was everything he had

So he shared it with the people

And the people....they were glad

The tourists, stayed away though

They were more attracted by the flair

Of the buskers and the jugglers

Not this man who wasn't there

He never left to join the crowd

And to sell his songs to those

Who really wanted nothing more

Than to hear some manufactured prose

The people who he played to

Were just others from the street

They worked the bars and restaurants

And at night they'd find a seat

In front of this old bluesman

Sitting by his orange box

Playing his guitar by candle light

Taking in his songs and talks

He sang songs from the heart, I guess

About those who'd he'd met

He'd sing about a dozen songs

That would constitue a set

Then he'd open up his silver flask

And ******* two gulps down

"This here's just my medicine"

"My past lives just to drown"

He sang of Truck Stop Beauty Queens

And of Walks out in the park

He sang of people living life

Not just hiding in the dark

He sang of things so real you'd see

Their pictures in your mind

He'd sing of places and of things

That others would not find

But tourists, they just stayed away

Near the buskers blowing fire

While yards away this old man sat

Just like an old town cryer

His audience would leave a bit

of change for their free show

He never asked for anything

For this was his row to ***

At two though when the street shut down

He closed his show down too

But he always had an extra song

A special one for you

His music came from in his heart

He shared it without fear

For once it left his throat it was

A sound that was so dear

The tourists went to hotels

Once the buskers all went home

But he just moved his crate and box

He slept out here alone

He sang his songs of characters

Who helped make us his life

His words were sometimes gentle

While others cut you like a knife

His world was just that orange crate

And his music helped unfurl

The melodies in this mans mind

It helped him share his world

He knew some things and people that

Would take rather than give

He sang about the street people

Because among them he did live

His home was just a cardboard box

Behind Giannis bar

And if you want to see a real good show

You don't have to go far

It's just a little beaten path

Away from tourist fare

Where this little, old, shy

Bluesman sings to hundreds or the air..

I know that you are always with me. I follow that scent, the calm folded crisp smell of cigars lit on the rainy morning in the streets of Calais. I pass through the art galleries, boat docks, pubs, markets and old churchyard buildings. That scent again? It draws me in and embraces me close into secluded streets. I see friendly faces wearing the same weepy eyes and bright smiles every day. They were buskers, street tramps, just in my eyes fellow lost rebels who I admire. They haven’t yet given up even now their naked without luxury, starved of food and clothing they wander around building up a new home every day.  

Every time the buskers see me they each greet me in turn shake and kiss my hands. I drop a penny down; they play out their beautiful music and sing their songs into the early hours of the evening. The air of the night is surrounded with the distinctive smell of cider and cigars. Outside the docks of boats the pub is festered with local communities drinking and talking about previous nostalgia. People laugh and cheer at the buskers who come into the pubs and applaud even louder when each of them comes on stage. They play, they dance, they rant in their own unique way in time to the guitar and banjo. When the evening is finally over music and laughter without question just stops, I can hear those... heavy awkward whispers, muffled voices and coughs of things left unsaid. At that point each of the smiles of the lost rebels fades out into the night, they know they must face and enter that filthy alley alone forced into the solitude of old cardboard boxes. I thought they did a splendid show and award them money and praise in return some of them come up to compliment and kiss me again.

The next morning I visit the library to indulge in my long lost passion of French poetry but I keep on getting distracted. I pick up on that very dangerous scent of cigars, wine and … aftershave. It was just so intoxicating, the fuel I craved. The aroma got stronger outside, something was around me. I was feeling that someone had just touched my breast, pinched my ******* then started to bite, caress and kiss my back but that feeling had quickly faded out.I sat down, unable to detect anything. I open up an loaned book of poems by Christina Rossetti. Before I could read her first poem, a written letter had fell to the floor. It was encrypted in my name with a place and time. I begun to read it out aloud as if it was some fairy tale enchantment.

The cigar smoke started to rise, embrace and surround me it filled my eyes again. A young man appears at my feet. He is *****, long black hair; smile cheeky but eyes concrete and dreamy when magnified they melt into a fire. I gaze into his piercing green eyes; I can already feel my body heating up and chest feel tenser. We start to greet each with a handshake, he grabs my hand and begins to put each of my fingers into his mouth. Straight away I could feel this urge to share everything with him to plant that warm kiss onto his lips. We start with talking for hours about our previous past, poetry and art. I read out some of the poems in French and he was translating them for me. He asks whether I would want to go Paris with him; he knew the best historic sites to take pictures and then without any hesitation he flashes out two train tickets. A charmer no less, but I feel drawn to follow him hoping he would lead me to more adventure. We both catch a train together from Calais to Paris. He takes me into the French café near his apartment we end up drinking coffee together out in the balcony. He drove me around in his car; we end the day with having a great picnic of red wine, sandwiches, cakes and croissants out in the jardin. We end the first evening having a smoke or two out in the beautiful countryside air. He drops me back to my villa and kisses me slowly on the ears then begins to whisper softly the words k.i.m.m.y into my ear. I could feel the last of his words really start to linger, the final words before leaving me and promising to meet up the next evening outside his own apartment.

I came out the next evening wearing a tight red frock and bright red lipstick on the ****** cobbled streets. We both embrace each other with small kisses on the cheek, walking down with our tongues tied in knots and arms locked together to the local tavern drinking more wine. When it finally got late I was allured to follow him into his apartment a classy one bedroom with a double bed, rose flowers on each window ledge. There is another classy rose wine bottle on the table and a room of old books. We sit on the sofa watching movies, eating chocolate and sipping on wine. My head begins to spin, lose some focus. Could this really be love or was this just another drunken lusting daze? I droop to his shoulders; He recites bits of his own poem, I can’t help but stare into his deep eyes when he reads them, I look up again at his moist lips when he reads out aloud the final words. I yearn to snog him or for at least him to make that first move. I feel dizzy and high on red blooded wine and cigars. I could then feel him starting to kiss the temples of my neck and feel his soft teeth mingle and bite leaving small indented marks on my neck. I draw even closer towards his mouth; I can feel his beard tickle me. I love to taste him, love that aroma! He tastes of dimly lit cigars which mingle with my fruity perfume. At this point I feel that the ember inside surround and heat up my whole body. I want him to really light me up so I can explode into them blue flames. I begin to clench up my body as he bites my neck, we both kiss frantically. He whispers into my ears and begins to nibble on them. We end up huddled up together in bed! The window reflects that the sun is approaching, he sits on top of me staring at me blankly in silence. He takes time to admire my calm sleepy concrete clay features.

He knows that when the sun comes up that everlasting rainbow of color we created together will begin to melt and transform back into monochrome. It just comes to the end. we know we can not argue, we must leave each other. I know I must say the two forbidden words. The very two words that turn me back into this empty corpse. I hate them; I greet him with a long lost embrace, the in-completed hug and the final words to end everything! Bon- Voyage At the same time trying to hold myself together, I leave on that last train, feeling tired and drained but only for a second. The whispers of his voice fill up the station crying out… KIMMY, kimmy... kimmy! . They echo out and embrace me again, they always make me smile.

I catch the last train back to Calais then head off home to stormy England. I never feel sad to leave him or the place behind because I will always remember him. Just as any dying whisper, music of buskers, words of a poem. The bond you share is never really gone it ignites again to finally burn on eternally.

Now sit there, just a minute, hold on, hear my tale
for just a minute.
One of humanity, sincerity, tragedy
Of when I was there, live from the square.
Jackson Square.
Not the one of Coin Coin, the Nevilles, the Toussaints,
Allen or L’Overture.
This is one of a momma and her baby
in 2008.
Three years, three years,
three years after the flood, three years after the storm.
Let me paint you a picture of Orleans as it stood one day in 2008
as it stands today.

2008, NewOrleans:
What happens here, no one will remember in the morning.
The buskers, the tunes, why, even the voodoos get the blues.
Walking towards Bourbon
The lights, the sin, the history

New Orleans, where life ain't so easy.
There’s a family down there who don't survive so peacefully.
You can see them if you walk down Canal St., leisurely.
There, sleeping on the courthouse stairs,
A mother and her child who own only the clothes they wear.
The boy was young, elementary-aged
Curious too, I could hear him ask questions:
"Mama, why don't we got food?"
And her reply,
"Son, that's just the way it is, life's just hard for me and you."
Sitting there on the courthouse stairs.
I take my place on the opposite side of the stoop,
Watching the crowds go by.
The women in their high-heeled shoes
The men with their shirts half-open.
Grenades in hand, ***** in the blood,
Pockets full of cash and hearts full of lust

New Orleans
What happens there, no one will remember come morning.
The buskers, the tunes, why, even the voodoos get the blues.

There’s a family on vacation there
In such a sinful city, a family.
White, middle-class, suburban, all too WASP-y.
mom, dad, a daughter and a son,
elementary aged, with a pop in his cheerful step,
On the way to a nice restaurant
gon’ eat crawfish, gator, red beans and rice, jambalaya.
They’ll forget to tip the waiter.

New Orleans,
What happens here, no one will remember come morning.

That happy family, walking down Canal St.
Like walking out the gates of hell
Where the lost souls sit on the stairs
Begging for something, anything at all
The happy family had ‘bout reached the courthouse when the young boy asked
"Daddy, why don't they have any food?"
His father covered his son’s eyes with his white hand and replied,
"Here son, let's go and find a toy for you to buy."
And the kid shrank after seeing this mom and her son
His innocent eyes died and he said,
"I don't want a toy.  I don't want anything"
They walked on by, the happy boys' head turned the whole time,
those eyes.  Stuck on the family that was stuck on the stairs
Mom dad, a daughter and a son,
Elementary-aged with a slump in his sunken step.

Now, in my mind I wonder:
was it more monumental that my life changed
or that a had life changed before my eyes

New Orleans, two thousand and eight.
New Orleans, today,
what happens there, no one will remember come morning.

The streets will belong to the beggars and buskers
who'll paint the ivory towers red and
take out the old tuskers who sit and scribe laws in
dusty old books..
..here I shall pause,because I'm not sure of what laws.

But these fossils who will us away,
the same who turn night into a much longer day
and don't pay us no wage
are quite sage about this,
they knew that the 'kiss off' would kiss them away and
have made laws to outlaw the coming of that day.

The buskers and beggars can sit playing chequers and
make Kings on the boards
and on the boards of multinationals where they can
rationalise it all,
they'll make more ivory towers to refill more empty spaces
and more laws to put beggars and buskers
in their places.

But we are used to this krap and so
we sing or we busk for a penny
in our flat cap
and the streets remain the same,
it's just the name that
changes.

Going down to Festival Park, just to see the sights

Neve know what you might see, It changes every night

Buskers, dancers, singers too, kids with faces painted

Pickpockets, con men and others who, live life by methods tainted

A hundred years ago or so the park was then donated

The family Billings, gave the land and their lovely gift was feted

Every year a party held in honour of the Billings

Until that time in fifty one, when the town had all those killings

No one in the town that year was safe while he was out there

He didn't pick just one set type, he didn't seem to care

Couples parked in cars at night at the far end of the park

It wasn't a safe place to be, especially after dark

Two men were found with bullet wounds, dead upon a bench

The Wylie boy was found because a dog had liked the stench

Yourng Tommy Wylie, 12 years old, was found behind the boat shed

The only thing to tie his case was the bullet in the head

The park though nice in daylight, at night became a veldt

Everyone was scared to death, that;s the way the whole town felt

A young man by the cenothaph and two more by the lake

The police had no clear suspect, they needed a mistake

The party at the park was stopped and other functions too

For the killer could be from this town, and who nobody knew

Eleven deaths in that dark summer put the town upon the map

Tourists would not visit, they would not come to his trap

The police were inundated with phone calls far and wide

People turning in everyone and making others hide

A task force was assembled, 30 cops from out of state

They had to find this killer before it was too late

While they interviewed the suspects the park had no events

You could go on through in daytime, but it still made one feel tense

The city added lighting to walkways and no luck

The only thing it added was taxes went up a buck

No other killings happened until that one in sixty two

It was just like all the others, so they thought that they knew who

Was back in town gone hunting, but there only was that one

A young man in his rambler, sitting drinking in the sun

The task force was abandoned back in fifty five

But after this last ******, they called back only five

This time it would be different, this time they'd get their man

Technolgy had changed alot, he'd be caught before he ran

A shell casing was found beside the wall down by the bridge

And it had a print upon it, they identified the ridge

Years ago they'd interviewed about three hundred men

But with this single ridge print, it was narrowed down to ten

Eight were dead and one left town, so with only one to find

A dragnet and a takedown plan were carefully designed

They knew that he'd be running if they called him back to talk

And they couldn't risk to lose him, or their whole case would walk

So with some misinformation printed in a column in the post

They hoped they flush their suspect, the one they wanted most

They said they'd made the capture, confessing every crime

They would take away his thunder, dropping hints on every crime

But, they would omit one last case, the one he started with

For this was information that they wanted him to give

It worked, he dropped a letter to the paper that same week

Threatening to strike again, and the first case he did leak

In his anger and his hurry he would leave another clue

They found another print to help them out and with this they had two

They swooped in and arrested a man of no abode

He lived in city missions he had no moral code

His capture freed the city from the monster in the park

It was now a place where you could go, and feel safe after dark

The festival committee for the city planned a fete

The victims of this monster, their lives they'd celebrate

A monument to those who died would be erected in their honor

And the whole thing would be organized by the Mayor...Mayor John B Connor

The names were read of each victim and then two minutes silence reigned

And a wreath for every family involved, these then were laid

New trees were planted for them all in a corner near a wall

And the park would schedule new events and brand new festivals

But, every year on this same day, on the tenth day of month ten

They would hold a special service for these women and these men

The park was now a joyous place, like it was meant to be

And if you're there, out by the wall...then you just might locate me.
.

It ain’t too bad to be from there
Just ask my family and friends
But it’s too flat, ain’t no way out
The roads are all dead ends.
Sometime soon I’ll find a place
Where the music I’ll enjoy
But for now I keep on tryin’
To escape from Illinois!

There’s a river on the border west
That moves a lot of dirt
Mighty Muddy Mississipp
Drowns the pain and covers hurt
Yeah, I’m movin’ south to New Orleans
Maybe I can find employ
In a blues bar down on Bourbon Street
Escape from Illinois!

Well I stopped a week along the way
When I saw the Gateway Arch.
But the folks out by the airport
Were stagin’ up a march.
Seems a white cop fired a shot that killed
An unarmed teenage boy
Oh yeah, the teenage boy was black,
Escape from Illinois.

Kept walkin’ to the Landing
(Named for Pierre Laclede)
It has most every thing you want
But nothing that you need
Some travelin’ folk told me some news
That made me jump for joy
Memphis maybe had some work
Escape from Illinois!

Found the haunted house called Graceland
And the grave where Elvis lay
Where half a million go each year
(Fifteen thousand every day)
They all want to pay respects
To the rockin’ – rollin’ boy
Put their finger in the bullet holes
Escape from Illinois.

Went downtown, knocked on some doors
Once or twice I went inside
But Beale Street was broken
The travelin’ folks had lied.
‘Cuz there ain’t no jobs in Memphis,
Or maybe I’m too coy
So I hitched a ride to Nashville
Escape from Illinois.

Nashville’s a big old meltin’ ***
Lots of great ones started here
But most end up as tourists
Getting’ ****** and drinkin’ beer
So money’s at a premium
And fame’s a fake decoy
End up workin’ in a record store
Escape from Illinois?

From Asheville to Atlanta
From Austin to LA
From Biloxi back to Baton Rouge
Need a place where I can play
I’ll follow all the buskers,
Form a musical convoy
Livin’ day by day and town by town
Escape from Illinois!

I’m a minstrel, like a rubber band
I keep on snappin’ back
I’m gonna make it somewhere
Singing somewhere, that’s a fact
Got my guitar and my music
Gotta do what I enjoy
Find a place to sing my songs for you,
Hell, it may be Illinois!
Phil Lindsey  6/4/15

We've got bagpipes and buskers,
cannons, and clip.
Lots of marijuana, and tons of tall ships.
Plenty of seafood, and point pleasent park.
It looks pretty lame, until the streets become dark.
Weve got the Citadel hill, and pavilion kids.
lockups, and lockdown. All things that we did.
Plenty of days, where we fell on our *** ,
smokin dope in the glade, and layin on grass.
With colt 45, and 151.
Alexander keiths, and malibou ***.
Weve all jumped a fence, and swam chocolate lake.
No other province could handle the risks that we take.
Cause were crazy,obviously, were maritimers.
Dartmouth, and spryfeild.. Hell, our schools are the worst.
But its halifax, Nova scotia.
We do it our way.
Live like the east coast,
Cause i do everyday.

Back behind Gianni's bar
The Bluesman sings his tunes
To all the local n'er do wells
And to the stars and to the moon

His voice is coarse as forty grit
His playing smooths it out
He plays upon an orange crate
Comfort is not what he's about

Bluesman, Bluesman play a song
One sung just for me
One that paints pictures in my head
A song that I can see

Buskers, lined the concourse
The street where he was not
This was just a place for tourist fare
He was where the world forgot

His tunes were sung for no one but
Himself and to the air
Out front, that was another world
Bluesman, did not live out there

A crowd has gathered slowly
More of a group, than a real crowd
They heard about the bluesman
And out front was too **** loud

In back, you heard the feelings
Felt the music, heard the strings
You experienced the atmosphere
That a good old bluesman brings

Out of the crowd of fandom
Working his way through the mass
Was a young, tousled haired boy
Everybody let him pass

He rocked in one position
He felt the music ebb and flow
He looked where the notes were airborne
He saw the music go

The bluesman sat and watched him
playing stories, telling tales
Of drunks in old Las Vegas
And of sailors fighting gales

the young boy stood and rocked some
always looking at the air
He wasn't looking at the bluesman
He didn't know that he was there

He walked up to the old man
staring out into the space
that streamed the bluesmans music
right into the young boys face

the bluesman watched intently
As the young lad touched his hand
And he held the bluesmans old guitar
He became a member of the band

The boy moved even closer
If that were possible at all
He was feeling the sweet music
He was having quite a ball

The crowd watched as the bluesman
and the boy became as one
The boy resting his head now
On the guitar, having fun

He couldn't see the bluesman
But the music, it was there
The boy was blind, autistic
He saw the notes that filled the air

The bluesman kept on playing
For that was what the bluesman did
He was playing for the starry sky
And for this wondrous little kid

His mother came and held him
She took the bluesman by the hand
She said thank you for the music
For letting him be in your band

In a voice as smooth as Bourbon
The bluesman told her that her son
Could come and feel the music
The music makes us one

Bluesman, Bluesman play a song
One that's only just for me
Bluesman, Bluesman play a song
That only I can see....

Holy Spirits
flow freely
like the Mississippi
down the border
of Mississippi.
The girls with
the purple party beads
and the sax buskers
on the brown streetcars
drink through their
Mardi Gras,
down streetcars named Desire.

Holy Spirits
flow freely
like the slow jams
from the Apollo
during Locke's Renaissance.
The young gangsters
down every block
drop their
fists sticks knives guns
and shake to albee.

Holy Spirits
move through
vast cathedrals
and through
empty pews.
The zealous hearts
and the corrupt voices
all drink
and listen
to the voice
of the serpent.

Just taking time out to see who's on the park. Been here for a while and there are a few guys who know what the board's for. There's a lad from Deptford who can turn a neat Olley on a Grind. Bit of a curiosity with my long board and northern street style. Had a couple of skate offs and found where the cracks are. Pulled the shoulder AGAIN but nothing serious. Thought there might be the odd ramp here seeing as it's London, the South Bank and all.

Been working on my rotationals. Three Sixty is just fine but the Five Forty is ****. I don't think any of these guys here know what a One Seventy is. Well they do now.

Nobody here seems to skate off-park even though there are some well good grind rails and step jumps. Too many people about I suppose.

 Saw this lass hitting Toe Edge to Heal Edge turns - VERY bright. Wappo better watch out! She's got him covered. The guys from Wakey would probably clean up down here, but we're guerilla skaters and would probably have the 'ol blue boys on our backs if we did the business. Maybe we should do a recce one weekend? Sleep on my sister's floor.

Reckon Paris is better though - there's those parcours guys about to show you the space. When my Dad goes to Centre Pompidou there's all these great buskers - some serious ****. Nobody playing anything round here.

Ok back to the park and a few Primos I reckon. Seen no one doing a glimmer of a Rail Stand so time to clean up a bit.

I watched from Farringdon as Satan fell;
I’ve battled for my soul at Leicester Square;
I’ve laid a ghost with Oystercard and bell;
I’ve tracked the wolf of Wembley to his lair;
I’ve drawn Heathrow’s enchantment in rotation;
at Bank I played the devil for his fare;
I laugh at lesser modes of transportation.
I change at Aldgate East because it’s there.

The Waterloo and City cast its spell;
I watched it slip away, and could not care,
the Northern Line descending into hell
until King’s Cross was more than I could bear;
he left me there in fear for my salvation,
a Mansion House in heaven to prepare:
so why return to any lesser station?
I change at Aldgate East because it’s there.

Three days beneath the earth in stench and smell
I lay, and let the enemy beware:
I learned the truth of tales the children tell:
an Angel plucked me homeward by the hair,
to glory from the depths of condemnation,
to where I started long ago from where
I missed my stop through long procrastination.
I change at Aldgate East because it’s there.

Prince of the buskers, sing your new creation:
the change you ask is more than I can spare;
a change of spirit, soul, imagination.
I change at Aldgate East because it’s there.

It's a thousand tiny cuts that you receive
From the moment you're born
Waiting for someone to tell you that you are beautiful.
You yearn to stay youthful
You've learned the indisputable fact.
Your inherent value as a person
Reduced to your physical appearance
And given a numerical value online
For what is a selfie without it likes?

This is enough to make anyone cynical
Because everyone is the enemy
Like buskers on a busy street
All are competing for the attention
Of the passing indifferent crowds
All singing to be seen, to be known
Even just for one fleeting moment

It is a strange but primary emotion of the human condition
Decreed at birth to need validation
And this foundation is firmly instilled in us.
We never learn to fuss about it, as society reminds us
That there is nothing to discuss.
Sign up and accept the terms and conditions.
Show yourself to the world.
Nothing beats the sensation of adoration.
Even now, right now, I am showing myself to you.

So tell me I'm pretty, world.
Tell me I matter.
Tell me I exist.

When I'm seeking shade from a relentless sun,
And brush a rejected leaf off my shoulder,
I feel poetry.

When I brought my girls home,
From hospital, school, a bad night out,
I've experienced poetry.

Walking Front St., or  Centennial Park,
While the buskers are busy,
The children are laughing,
The dogs are barking,
I've heard poetry.

If fortunate to espy a shooting star,
Enjoy the fullness of an autumn moon,
Witness the dawn light up my lawn,
Like a diamond mine,
I've seen poetry.

I've tasted poetry on my lips
With kisses and endearing words,
And lingering tastes from what you serve.
Yes, I've savored poetry's flavors.

Who reads poetry.

As the guitar plucked the buskers strings
The endless space was made of things
For many are the few who sing
The birth of doom one day did spring

The truth I lie through muted speech
Without my arms and many legged reach
My instructor learned I refused to teach
The carnivorous mouth of the vegan peach

A block from the office
the city is tearing down an overpass.
Today they're beating the **** out of it
with a pneumatic hammer
the size of a freight train.
Its pounding
in time with my heartbeat
like the worlds largest metronome
suspended from the end of a crane.

Bang – Bang – Bang – Bang

I keep wondering
what’s going to happen
to all those buskers and hookers
who peddle their wares under that bridge.
I'm not seeing it though and
no observation means no poetry.
No poetry means no catharsis, and
my guts are full of hornets.

Bang – Bang – Bang – Bang

It’s the great whisky **** of the spirit,
the all-encompassing lack of passion;
the longing for old friends;
the desire to lean on old habits
the chinks in something resembling old armor.
the crease, the seam, the fold.

Bang – Bang – Bang – Bang

Misfire on eight.
Misfire on eight.
Misfire on eight.
There’s this pain in my head;
behind the left eye
where the secrets live.
driving and grief stricken.
(misfire on eight.)
The headache has no name, but
it sings a song.

Bang – Bang – Bang – Bang

The city buskers don't speak til six;
After they've stored the aluminum paint,
Their instruments packed,
The clever boxes stacked,
The clink of coins counted.
Now ready for a pint, a blink and stretch.
Flame spitters, robots, Victorian mannequins,
Chimney sweeps, a Little Bo Peep,
All muted on the street.

On the steps I asked,
Which one are you?
I stand on my head in a bucket, he said.
Yeah, said I, I know what you mean.
I did the same for thirty years.

(A perfect metaphor, thought I).

No, really, I continued, What's your gig?
I stand on my head in a bucket, he said.
He wasn't being poetic.
Here's a man who stands on his head in a bucket, I said,
More than once.
So many do this on their feet,
Hearing the echo of their own voice,
Shutting off our daily travails
In an insular pail,
Seeing one's reflection distorted,
With little involvement.
He said he learned his trade
Watching the pigs on his father's farm,
And perfected his talent
Watching CNN.

Maybe if you leave, we can work it out.

I need a permanent blanket of nimbus clouds more oppressive than a Roman Catholic Court.

But, moving to London might convict me back to the cityscape of wasted Fridays and Saturdays.

Because without it, the Betrand Russell in me might just start to wake up. And then I’d remember - there has to be more to life than the 9 to 5 daze.

Washington DC stopped being fun after week two, and now I see it for what it is — a crush of desperate tourists blowing cigarette smoke in your face while you sweat last night’s drinks and Jumbo slice crash.

Anywhere that sells Nutella crepes is pretty sweet, and I love all the kite flyers and buskers festivals. I long ago realized that while Christiania has hundreds of market stalls, they’re all selling the same material things on a Groundhog Day loop: baked goods, stolen bikes, old furniture, cheap phones, and bags of open air hash.

Climbing up Carcassonne, a fortified medieval French town, probably is the best thing ever, but somehow, the two-hour lines to get into Berghain seem more worth it — all that dirt, grunge, and spinning feels as close to Dante’s Inferno; as close to feeling alive as it gets.

But now my Sunday afternoons are spent curled on top of my clean bedsheets, twitching about like a decapitated blue whale - batshit exhausted and depressed but somehow grinning like The Joker, wondering if sleep ever sets.

Falling pink petals
Plinking my head
A saxophone serenade

Kind of kind of blue
A solitary birch among many hundreds
Of deciduous trees, its paper

Bark scored with age
White among shadows
And the endless breeze takes me up

Into Tiffany-blue sky
Pollen clumps litter the edges of lawn
Calliope streaming from a mared and seahorsed

Carousel dances in my head
Disobedient canine in exodus
Defiant against the silhouette

Of a circled dog
Line diagonally cutting across
Wah wah wah as the ducks in the pond

Are chased away.
Endless verdant day criss-crossed with
Walking paths and robin’s-egg sky punctuated

With drifting cotton shapes.
Brazen squirrels accustomed to the pleasant
Bustle and hustle

Bat City, unopened, in my lap
Mothers feeding children
Hungry mouths to breast.

Seeking out a lemonade stand
Near Winter Street in spring
A yellow burst of sour notes sing

On my palate
A bargain at a fiver on a day as this
Soundtrack peppered by buskers and

An ***** grinder turning the crank on his street ***** and
Birds and
The woo of occasional sirens.

A mother wheeling her child along
In a stroller
Mohawked, tattooed, pierced lip and

She smiles on by.
Ivied brownstones and balconies railed
With wrought iron

End our stay
On this idyllic day
In month of May.

The rain and the wind, ragged and wet weather
unlike any other out in the forlorn West.
We go at it all the same, buzzin'
in the soaking precipitation.

That night I saw a man realize he'd spent years of his life
wasting around G-town, and'd naught to show for it.
The lure of endless craic and perpetual sessioning
had ensnared him and he'd lost himself to this place,
Became a character in the local scene that recited his lines
and acted out his part.
What was all that he felt?
Were it at the behest of his
town, the jester himself
knows this place well.
Artsy-types, buskers,
Hippies and jugglers,
Crusties, line-backers
Shams and knackers,
Sesh-heads all.
Passing students, wanna-be teens.
All pretending they're larger than life
or whatever, in this way they almost are
but in-keeping their company you'd easily

become a fixture of the town. Ah,
You can't blame the city for its nature,
Though you may certainly curse it some.
After all you're the changeable one, being.

I feel like taking a tab of acid
and disappearing
to town in my worn suit.

Buskers bathe in the eternal winter,
clamouring sounds at passers-by
until Jericho falls in on itself,
money spilling out of its sides
like a fast food waiter
on his cigarette break.

Trawling through the record shops,
I feel as if I've travelled through time;
each bootleg, a manuscript,
each seven-inch, a sonnet.
Pulling fingers through Venetian sounds,
I have found my place
in the library of New Alexandria.

The pigeons are swollen at the ankles.
Like humans, they are losing height
at the promise of another meal,
at another chance to rifle through the crumb.

School kids are waiting for the bus
as I go walking past.
They're unaware of the ease of tread
they have over land,
unaware of how quickly it can fall
and the scathing jealousy
I feel for each of them.

In eyes wet and wide, I turn to go home,
I walk in the rain, before settling for the bus
and returning to that familiar, lofted view
of the world passing by through a maniac's eyes.

It is only then that the world shifts in focus
and lotus flowers crop up through the carpet,
the world outside has grown far too unreal,
to the point hallucinating makes sense of it all.

The Miss Daisy sank
She was two hundred feet tall
With no worries at all
There are buskers all around and about

The swamp bar is clean
For my good friend Jimmy
He's here to play
He's come a long way

He is music to my ears
With my pack of 'Boros and my bourbon glass
He straightens the queers

The music floods me with joy
Like a dark cloud of sunshine

I drink to him
I'm the last to stay
I'm dying to play

*Dauphine cries to the sounds of sunken hope and dread
The sound is buried with dying laughter
The drummer is dead
The band plays on

“He is a dreamer; let us leave him – pass.” Julius Caesar I.ii.24

Strident philosophers at Hyde Park Corner
Poor buskers at Queen Victoria’s feet
Chalk artists remaking the pavement as Rome
A Seventh Sister with her folk guitar

These are not dreamers passive in their beds
Or supplicants awaiting permission:
They are the worker bees; they know of pain
And sweat, and sunstroke in the fields - and truth

When a sidewalk artist notes that the Ides
Have come, Caesar indeed should turn to hear

The homeless ask for change
Not only the spare pence pieces you have in your pocket,
But the change that can make them sheltered and warm.

The buskers ask for change
Not only compensation for their musical vibes
But the kind of coinage for a different kind of awareness
Atmospheric positive energy
And peace

The travelers ask for change
Aid their way through the world to gain a bit more perspective
So they may prove others wrong when making horrendous generalisations
Or to see everything with better lenses

The activists ask for change
Breaking through social etiquette
Politeness is overruled by injustice
They take the streets their own suggestions
Vocal with rage…

The man in the suit doesn’t want your change
He wants your notes
Hard earned money from your wallet to feed his own
Grown grotesquely fat with gluttony
He wants your sense of self worth blinded with what he envisions
Making incisions into your mind
Of how you should act
And why you should cry.
Forget what’s inside.
Become a player on the stage of the world and fail to remember that you’re just another teenage girl too impressionable to hide
Rather then see you thrive he wants profit
Leaving you high and dry
Thirsty for nothing you can actually buy.

I ask for change.
I ask for the power to transform within me
To give the change all these people are asking of me.
Maybe I’ve not got the money,
But I can empty myself with all I have
And see if it makes a difference…

Kiss the man in the suit goodbye.

it is my mother’s birthday.

we stood and watched
punch and judy yesterday,
while god was all behind us.

he bashed, we laughed,
he bashed, laughed more,
he bashed.

children were removed
from the vicinity,
others stayed.

incorrect musings
regrading life and buskers.

pastel buildings mask
the incorecctness of it all.

it is my mothers birthday.

sbm.

Life is fair,
when the day is dying,
and I can see pigs flying
over Trafalgar Square.

The fountain is singing,
the drunkard is drinking,
the homeless sparechanging
the night.

Sir Nelson is chilling.
The busker is screaming
and blind men are dreaming
about light.

The moon is starwatching.
The buskers Beatlesing.

Im trafalgarsquare'ing
my rounded dreams
Nothing is as real as it seems.

he has
blue eyes
and fluffy hair
and stands stiff
in the town square

he gives money to buskers
and smiles at people who pass
he buys me coffee
and looks into my eyes to see my past
he knows what i am
and he knows what ive done
but he said that i
am his only one

1

Soon it'll be Christmas
carols and lights in the town
buskers play louder

2   Think of Santa Claus
in his red suit and white beard
    he hates the whole thing  


3   Christmas without snow
     it's summer in Down Under
     welcome, warm Christmas

4

Over-indulgence
same story every Christmas
complaints thereafter

5  

  Christmas is for kids
  parents say they spend too much
  the kids call the shots

North Cork Mystery Busk Tour.©
    (2021 Limited Venues)

We'll busk in the the back streets
of Buttevant
And we'll sing at the cross roads in
Bweeng
we'll juggle our ***** in
Kildorrery
and we'll whistle some airs in
between

We'll recite a new poem in Killavullen
that we learned back in Ballydaheen
As we've yet to perform it in Cullen
After Doneraile, it remains to be seen.

We mustn’t forget to do Churchtown
but there’s no way we'll travel to Schneem
we'd rather play for the Sanctuary Donkey’s
Or even drive up to Ballaghaderreen

We’ll do Mitchelstown on our way back
from Charleville, Dromahane and Kanturk
we’ve not been, but if we miss out a town
or a village, it will mean that you’re not
very keen.

Sponsored by St Anne’s Shanakiel.

Ray Neville (Guitar)
Holly Barrett (Guitar)
Finn Mac Eoin (Harmonica & Tin Whistle) bit of Guitar?
Willie Eaton (Washboard & Plunger)
Mickey Flynn (Band Saw)

If I could visit magical Kyiv,
     In the bright effulgence of spring
I would feast my eyes on the
     Architectural splendors
That mirror her people’s sturdy souls.

Then I’d stroll along the Dnieper    
     Where children frolic in cool waters
I’d hear buskers playing fabled songs    
     That sprang from ancestral souls.

The intoxicating aroma of fresh borsht,
     Meats and pastries would so allure
That I would gravitate like a magnet    
     To a charming café to savour each delight.

Sunflowers and trees would be blossomed full  
     And cheerful birdsongs would grace the air.
The streets would be a blur of bikes and autos -    
     All a-scurry with the bustle of  daily enterprise.

I would exchange the required hryvnia    
     For a chair at the Municipal Opera
To weep or laugh with Bohéme or Zauberflöte      
      Or perhaps a Shevchenko work or two.

I close my eyes in prayer for the peace
      That all Ukrainians are meant to have.    
My burning soul is with you always  
       And aches to tell you, face to face

See them go..
A million suicidal shamblers, staring out
Hatred and beauty and dilated eyes
And long hair punks waiting for a revolution that will save them. United in disunity, calmed by deaths and shocked by wonders of medicine
Cool and collected, lost and dyslexic
They wonder at the halogen lights and stare at extinguished candles
Catching at the edge of their sight a whiff of angel-smoke
How many were cast out and how many ran
To this mecca, this eden, this dying heaven
Filled with the dead? Who knows
They are the ones who wander in daylight through the city square
Swigging red wine and chanting obscene hymns
Naked millennial drag kings of all they survey
living in art deco flats, old factories and empty rooms
they lie awake and listening to the shunting streets outside
and the symphony of buskers on the corner.
They love each other in wild ******
Dancing to rhythms stolen from slave songs
Screaming, bellies full of claret
And brassic basic dysphoric cravings they writhe and fall
And hum against each others’ bodies
Drawing knives along each others’ veins
And hope,
Frozen,
Waiting for the revolution.

That will save them.

We all are buskers, here
this street
full of paper gravestones
written reminders to,
to go one better
strive to catch the ear
of a Mankind on the move.