hand reaching over
the phantom scars on her leg,
eyes profoundly broken as
flickering christmas lights,
a child weeping inside
the grown woman.
she smiles, she sighs.
there is grey where there
used to be sunshine,
there are desolate trees,
where the birds used to sing,
and crane their necks
like curious strangers,
at women who sit on lone benches
cradling palms,
stirring up memories of
touch so gentle it hurt.
until people float in and out
like a lifebuoy at sea,
until a wolfish man in scruffs
whistles and waves slowly,
as though time itself has broken.
she sinks deeper into herself,
into the womb of mothers;
into all the love
and all the heartache.

a torn sole which collect
painful rocks all along the
way.

the heels have collected
wedges formed by the
pounding of the stone.

collection of scruffs that's
formed rough art from the
miles of travel each day.

tied to fake comfort to
makes the steps easier
to make.

old and no longer needed
but faith has it grips to say
take one more step today.

A midnight daydream could not match my prolonged slumber,
but the ice cold grin of isolation prohibits my resistance
and such theology burns crisp justifications into my hands.
Golden locks of hair surround the frayed edges of a rug
conversing ideas and mocking the unscripted door I stand on.
So I fabricated a tasteless disposition
to leak through a thousand inconspicuous sermons
that lean against me like a pile of corpses.
Without a single whisper, I abandoned all but a faulty quest
which holds me like a rotting prisoner
between the contrived confessions of a minister
who is required to dress into the eligible axiom,
so he repairs his scattered dependence in the light of day
and polishes the scruffs of his boots with the blessed liquid of God.
But I required none but the shimmer of this crescent
which produced this aberrant midnight daydream.

Its Friday and school is ended
Home we run, both trying to win the race to the garden gate
Hot and red faced, my brother beats me by an inch
I tell myself "I let him touch the post before me"

Into weekend scruffs we climb, piles of school clothes left behind
For mum to gather, washing to be done
My brother and I have something more important to do
We need to make sure they are ready

And they are, all washed and clean and ready for 7-0'clock
When the pop van comes.

4 empty bottles, waiting to be handed back and reborn
4 empty bottles, worth 5p each off the next ones!
4 empty bottles to exchange for 4 full
But what will we choose
When the pop van comes ?

7-0'clock
4 bottles, 2 each
We march to where the van full of wonderful fizziness will stop
My brother and I stand in line, there are children all around with their bottles too
All waiting for their turn to swap
1 empty for one full
with 5p off!
When the pop van comes

My brother chooses first as he beat me to the gate (I let him win)
Raspberryade!
Now me, Shandy please, (I like to pretend its beer)
Finally mum joins us and chooses orangeade and a bottle of dandelion and burdock for dad
We take back our bottles, excited, thirsty,
Into the glass I pour my 'beer'
Glug glug, glug, glug, fizzzzzzzzzzzzz,
gulp, gulp, gulp, gulp, gulp.
Too much!
Bubbles tickle my tongue, I lose my breath, too fizzy
Buuuuuuurp!
I love it when the pop van comes

Life in solitude, emptiness surrounds
Silent mist rising in the serene woods

The birds seldom sing their songs
Satins, sapphire, and soul

The stream slithers in slender streaks
Squeezing past senile saplings

Squirming into the smooth sky,
Set clouds slink upon the heavens

Brush speechless under solemn gaze
Tranquility seduces scruffs of leaves

From past autumn, someday stalling
Another year, or another two

And life keeps skidding, sliding
Around the slow line of time

No stopping, no pause
Sanctified continuum.

The gates to the mill at the top of *** hill
close at one minute past five,
they open again in the evening at six to
let the mill workers go home.

God it were tough in the sheds
the overseer banging heads and
shouting wake up you lazy scruffs,
but he were on a bonus
while us poor sods
were on bread and dripping.

They try to sanitise what's gone
but the muck and the grime
and the clanking of the looms
pass beyond the test of time
and will remain
in our collective memories.