Life is a maze.
Life is a phase
Life is a craze.
Life decays
Life can amaze
Life can be full of clichés
Life filled with schooldays, holidays, long delays.
Life is a labyrinth, with a Minotaur in the shades
Life is full of constraints
So leave the maze, untangle your hair and meet me in a different cabaret, I'll be there
I'll show you how life is just one big malaise, we need to fill the maze with a blaze of glory.
After all life is a story. The ending the same, we all die, but in between, we runaways from the maze can drop the chains and create our own tales of the maze.
*And those tales can be quite amazing!

In schooldays my aim was terribly perfect
add to that an attitude unfair
a soft teacher was an easy found target
not one bald head was allowed to be spared.

The moment the poor man turned to blackboard
his baldness shined as a gaming site
the sleeping devil woke up and deep roared
dispatched were chalks on windborne flight.

Only a few did land on wrong place
but found mostly their rightful targets
and bore no qualm the thrower's face
when cheered by the fellow classmates.

As the victim turned with ire's full steam
nursing stings that came with good force
we in the gang were such an honest team
never revealed it came from what source.

It went on smooth till luck failed one day
has to end all games one once starts
a traitor midst us the secret gave away
memory of the thrashing badly hurts.

From Qeshlaq-e Chukhli Quyi Bahadruhamat to Abraham's Woods
(Tom Brown's Schooldays)
William Bleakes' Wind on the Water at Guishan Island
or Telladevarapalli struck by 13424 Margalida
heard in the Somam Rural District by The Monk
So now Minister Samuel Shaw watches Nakshatratharattu
and eats Beef shank taking Action Against Medical Accidents

Remember...
When comic books were the real big thing
and kids everywhere waited eagerly
every week excited to start reading
the latest Beano or Dandy
Remember…
Enjoying Dennis the Menace and Gnasher,
Minnie the Minx and the Bash Street Kids,
Roger the Dodger, Scrapper and Basher,
Beryl the Peril and Billy Whizz.
Remember…
Thinking Bully Beef and Chips were so great;
the awful things that Bully would do!
Not forgetting Desperate Dan and Keyhole Kate
who were always fantastic too.
Remember…
When we used to read the Sparky or the Topper
or the Buster or even the Beezer
without of course forgetting the Victor
or Roy of the Rovers either.
Remember…
When they had the Bunty for girls too,
the Mandy and Judy as well,
which many boys would read it is true;
though all promised never to tell!
Remember…
Waiting patiently each year for Santa to bring
the Annual edition of your favourite one,
spending hours on Christmas Day just reading;
and reading was the best thing under the sun!
Remember…
When everyone joined their local libraries
soon after schooldays had begun
When you were sure to find a book to please
and reading was so much fun.
Remember…
When books transported us to another world,
each new book a revelation,
instilling in us a love of the written word;
really fuelling our imagination!
Remember…
How much enjoyment you got from reading
and what little effort it really took,
how the pressures of life soon began receding
when you immersed yourself in a book.
Remember…
To try and make time to read a good book,
to take time out every now and then,
and you never know, with a bit of luck;
You might fall in love with reading again.

I play the same song,
set that beat on repeat
so, I can write and think
or think and write
about my strange life.

A glass complexion,
distorted reflection
filled with old and new
shades and hues
of my personal truths.

Like a mirror I exist in
the dark hallways
from old schooldays
as I crept quietly
to get whatever ology
book I needed
to do my homework.

Like late Friday nights
working with my mom
at the daycare center
cleaning up
to save her a couple bucks
as I listen to the cheers
an see the searing stadium lights
from the high school
less than a block away.

Like red flesh swelling up
though not quite bruising,
from the anger of a parent
who felt some unknown rage
that I cannot decode;
Silent stares in contemplation
facing the man in the mirror
with a queer confused face,

My memory is
like a baby bird
that sat straddling
the thin brown branches
barely balancing
precariously
close to falling.

we only ever meet
in the mornings and
afternoons of schooldays

in the time we are apart
I think of a million
things to say

but the moment we meet
my mind goes blank,
words are lost,
I have no idea what to say

I walk awkwardly with you
not speaking a word until
you talk first

it ***** because
there are so many things
I want to say to you.

In a patch of sundried earth
dark cracks emerge.. forms resembling maps
remembered from schooldays and Google..
Appearance of arbitrary lines depicting
States newborn..
Our everyday maps also born of the Sun..
the Sun's artistry with rainfall..the points
of assembly of water in place and flow..forms of
unique identities each subdivided patch..
Raising the question of new possibility of finding
an Awareness.. becoming the Sun and seeing
the patches and lines and States anew
as images projected.. from that projector..
those many miles away...

Schooldays are all but over
the bells will stop ringing soon.
the children will be yelling all day long as they play.
summer is coming
hot dogs and swimming
baseball and hamburgers
as the days get hotter.
summer is coming
fire up the RV for that camping trip.
to the water park we must go.
bike riding and horseshoes
bake bean and ice cream cones.
summer is coming
when will school start again??

September

The summer
fights its eternal
battle with autumn.
The tired green leaves
hang tightly to the branches.
Not understanding
the coming changes.
Summer lovers
still hold each other
In defiance of holiday romances
and schooldays.
The nights are cool
But they all proceed
as if Autumn will
Somehow
miss us this year.

Bright fall leaves hold branches of thick fall trees,
They hug them tight against the brisk fall breeze.

None fall to the road, they leave it clear,
And thank you for that, for I shall pass here,

And onwards and forwards, I will wander on,
Farther and farther, it is time to be getting gone,

For this road stretches on through tunnels of fall leaves,
Over hills and under skies, between walls of fall trees.

Where it ends, I do not know,
But that is where I intend to go,

Here, it is fall with its leaves and its trees,
But onwards march and what shall be seen?

Will there be beaches of bright white sand?
Or dark black sand? Or another brand?

Where the fall leaves point lies my compass needle,
And just behind I, though, sometimes feet are feeble,

But I suppose fall trees will give strength where I lack.
Is that not the purpose of their bark at my back?

But while their color is strong, fall leaves are feeble as feet,
And will be swept away by storm someday, swept by winter breeze,

And the dead winter leaves will make cold winter trees,
So cold that winter branches will freeze.

And with branches, too, shall I?
When the ice freezes fast, shall I?

And shall I follow the leaves that disperse with the season?
Or shall I settle down? I have every reason.

There are tests that need taking, diagrams need gluing,
Study cards need making, work that needs doing,

Winter...will that be it, with schooldays I must attend?

Does my road stop running around in loops and bends?

...So, is this where my adventure ends?

Will my adventure be swept with fall leaves in winter winds?

No, I let it not, as fall is here and time is great,
So I won’t let myself think of winter hate,

There is good that comes with changing seasons, too,
And every wanderer must rest sometimes, it’s true.

But for now I will run, like the brisk fall breeze,
And wind up somewhere new by the winter freeze.

(Maybe, just maybe, far enough away,
That I’m not there on that first school day).

The sky hides behind the bushy fall trees, invitingly,
But sits so softly and asks so quietly,

So the road is serenely empty, open for me,
So I will go and see what I shall see.

And if you like...maybe…
You could come with me?

setting here waiting as the days go bye.
nothing to do but look at you as the days go bye.
fun times are long but not forgotten as the days go bye
schooldays have past and so have friends as the days go bye.
growing old each day year by year as the days go bye.
now is the time to leave and let the next one wait as the days go bye..

static voices through the speaker
our monitors are beacons
guiding us through schooldays to each and every weekend
hack smoke
crack jokes
art room artifice & insubordination
I'll retrogress

from experience,
Alzheimer's in males is
more bearable
than in females,
given the example of
my grandfather,
there are always
dasein coordinates
of memory laying
siege to the inanimate
present...
under a veil and curtain
of solipsism
and schizophrenia
(respectively)...
"i" play truant...
      not that there is
a gender neutrality of
pronouns, there is also
a neutrality of pluralism...
thesaurus subtleties;
bull riddling *******!
males deflect
memory and coordination
of the present,
hence the "presumptive"
"thought"...
       that,
even if Elijah is to return:
a son's heart will turn
to his father's...
we both share a nostalgia,
me and Joseph...
   how we used to ride bicycles
and went fishing...
now he sleeps, and
I'm bound to drinking
till sunrise I wish will
never come...
irony... the anomaly of
premature "Alzheimer's",
namely the calculative
mind, a Macchievelian
"syndrome":
  Venetian contra
Milanese familiar...
    what? talk! talk!
"he" sure as **** will not
climb down off a cross and
give his Judas due
to another iconoclasm project
akin to: Metallica's
before it sleeps...
      a game of chess
between a schizophrenic
and an Alzheimer's project
uno...
      guess who's bluffing
toying with solipsism...
mind you, both are jacked up
on pharma placebos,
which are, so short of the true
psychedelic escapades...
     then they throw IN
a ******* in a wheelchair to
balance the books,
get a medium,
    churn out a no man's land...
get all body-realistic
and shove the brain
from basic piston dynamics
into artificial intelligence
webbing custard,
which later becomes
dog food, cartilage for
prosthetics,
         and a canvas for
medical students...
     since the blood never gushes
out of grey... mint...  
not even if I tried,
given that certain mental illnesses
are pure pilitoco...
there's market on easily accessible
terminology,
  again, borrowed from the medical
profession...
   the reason they are taboo,
is because they are too politically
useful, unless of course,
the "surprising" happens,
akin to a Texans shootout...
    straight away, gobs into the trough,
eyes into the precursor *******'
worth of **** stipends at
the Vatican...
                   if only...
       **** could run the world...
you ******* donning a bow-tie
to talk such plain-policed-talk?
apparently there's a tomorrow...
to be honest,
to me that only means
a yesterday that just happened
today...
   memory,
outside the schooldays living
plasticine...
   head in a churner,
and the sick vogue of
peacocking psychopathy,
before, the glued eyes to the void
starts swerving his
multifaceted scream of ideas...
see em, dull eyes...
toad eyes... eaten by amphibian
apathy...
    saliva on the oculus...
     and twice the venom
akin to an immovable statue...
like a copper statue of Montgomery,
so too, the one pence,
two pence in the pavement...
copper herald: the screeching
shaman of the collective death...
while tomorrow,
the dead night in sloth's *****
awaiting suckling for a dream...
a kite was flown,
an ice cream was turned into
a fancy quasi-arctic inverted
dollop...
               empire strikes back:
the Rolling Stones / the Beatles
SCHIZOPHRENIA
         was debated by the titilated
public...
         unless you're not
bilingual...
imagine...
       Pacquiau vs. Klitschko...
honey... your depression
narrative isn't going to be some
David contra Goliath anomaly...
    like that *****-whiff of a man
'aving a pint,
sliding into tango...
   while me 'aving a 50cl of *****,
doing an hour's worth of
Buckingham duck-snap
       salutations in:
                         'eet up! 'ed do'n!
sorry...
    there are too many exceptions
at the zenith that are a
turkey-feeding antithesis of
bulimia made believable...
as ever... too few exceptions at
the nadir, that are somehow
precursors to
a grief upon the plateau,
communal...
    altogether worrying...
slyly, rather than shyly,
within e.g., trying to...
      do you know that Rasputin
gave me an old Tsar rüble banknote
from the grave,  via
a Jew, that earned a Monte Casino
cross for bravery?
    the Poles still think
the Mongols are coming...
   like the Arabs...
who still think water is
       a...
                  whatever happens
in Las Vegas...
              doesn't leave Las Vegas?
about time "they" figured
out how to water the plants
with dog ****...
mind you, with a back
to the future hindsight 100 years on...
it wasn't so much that
we were ignorant,
but rather that we were:
                       misinformed...
catch you next time,
experiencing a barage of
information,
and interacting with
a self-modified
          censor-***-filter...
"thing".

I remember this
time I was walking
down a hallway during
my schooldays
and fumbling with
what was currency
among students
--chewing gum
and I had paid
a dollar fifty
for this pack of cinnamon
gum
so when a person
with whom I’d spoken
twice
came up to me and said
“yo, zach, gimme some
of that gum”
I said
“Hell no.”
and he asked why.
“Because I don’t like you!”
and the collective shouts
of ooh’s and ****’s
made me feel as though
I had done something
both great and bad
and the reality was I didn’t mind
the guy at all I just didn’t want
to continue having the discussion
but I wondered if I hurt his feelings
and if the cinnamon gum was worth
the endless re-tellings of me being rude
to a perfect stranger
and a little part of my
soul crumbled that day
all cinnamon and fresh

Mists  collude  mysteriously  watching  
jungle  canopy  tops.  Irish  soldiers  
In their  base  on  a  verdant  mountain  side.  
By  the  pebble  track  and  the  graveyard,  
Our  tents  erected  inside  a  village  
school  ruins.  

Paths  built  from  river  rock,  
gullies  and  drainage  dug  around  
strong  tents.  Hard  work,  determined  grit.  
Water  supplies  and  rations  flown  in  
by  Chilean  helicopter  pilots.  
Existence  eked  normality  a  chore.  

I  gaze  at  their  barefoot  black  feet  
kicking  an  empty  plastic  bottle.  
Make  believe  goals  erected  in  the  slanting  field.  
Two  ad-hoc  teams  and  a  game  of  sorts.  
I  compare  it  to  my  schooldays.  

Red  windsock  unfurls  east  to  west  
also  proud  Tricolour  in  a  firm  wind.  
Behind  the  game,  dappled  horses  graze,  
branded  cattle  munch  wild  grass.  
Water  buffalo  lull  lazily,  comforting  
mud  pool  shielding  sun,  Clint  Eastwood  
stares.  Don't  mess  with  them.  

Coffee  in  my  hand  I  survey  all  
from  the  outside  wooden  table.  
Some  lads  jog  the  road;  duty  sentry  
at  the ******. Backdrop  tropical  trees  
and  fauna.  By  cicadas  bleat,  generator  grinds.  

Sport  during  my  youth  built  character  
I  was  told.  But  of  what  horrors  these  
infant  minds  were  exposed.  Collage  
******,  ****,  humiliation,  Bad  auguries  
which  corollaries  their  future  ideals.
  
They  have  no  ball  or  boots  
no  posts  to  shoot  at  and  no  nets  
to  burst.  I  hear  their  innocent  delightful  
cries  and  wish,  just  once,  I  had  the  power  
to  take  them  out  of  this  mire.  

Just  a  mere  glimpse  could  
perhaps  do  it.  Or  maybe  
take  them  all  up  in  an  aeroplane  
to  my  world  and  just  once  maybe  
hope  they  could  have  the  time  of  
their  lives  .To  touch  Cornucopia?  

Supermarket  shelves  packed  with  food  
and  sweets.  Fast  motorcars  in  beautiful  
cities  with  Walt  Disney  theme  parks.  
Shoe  shops,  football  boots,  new  cloths.  
Hot  showers  in  things  they  call  hotels!  
How  they  would  laugh  at  Bugs  Bunny  
And  awe  at  a  cinema  screen.
  
But  it  gets  chilly  now  and  my  
coffee  is  gone.  Twilight  assembles  
the  children  up  the  road  home.  
'Botarde' they  shout  to  me,  big  
Wave  and  smiles.  
And  I  realise  in  my  realistic  
heart  of  hearts,  that  probably  
they  have  just  had  the  time  of  their  lives.

Mother said,
go to Ryelands park,
the fairground's on
here's two bob
and don't you stay 'til
after dark
I want you home
it's school tomorrow.

Those yesterdays lay heavy on me.

it was all a fairground then,
even schooldays had their share of fun
but to be honest
I preferred the riverbanks
where I think I learned much more.

I got home late
it didn't seem like it
and though I won a coconut
my dad played merry hell with me
which was not as tuneful as the
waltzer.