three days later
you can still smell
the acrid smoke
on the wind
see the blackened
leaves a twiglets on
the green summer lawn

three days later
and  the town still
murmurs about
how close the
fire front came

close enough for
the northshore houses
to see the voracious  flame
to hear the crackle of it's burn

luck would have it,
that it turned,
luck and firefifighters
tested and tired, turned
the flame by art of backburn
back in on itself and then down to
the sea, down past the dunes
and then to die, to end in ash

five days of bushfire, haze and smoke
now just ash and grey black sculptures
on black ground canvas...

awaiting renewal......awaiting, awaiting

In little over two years
I have had more scans
Than a supermarket checkout
There is more of my blood in path labs
Than I have in my body
I've had nasty painful biopsies
Things up my **** and cameras down my neck
There have been countless appointments
At four different hospitals
As well as being hospitalised five times
Including one minor operation
And two major ones
I now have ******* up kidneys
Veins like ropes and arms like Twiglets
And more scars
Than a bad knife-throwers assistant
But what the hell !
I'm still growing old disgracefully
HA !!

                               By Phil Roberts

We almost got to where we were before we were and how we were so rudely interrupted,
it happens every time you're near and just
when I think that we're in the clear and
that things are moving up a gear
somehow
and
I don't know how
we never get to move at speed,

it's like I need a fuel injection
it'll never work
but
that's 'projection'
self fulfilling misery

she sees I don't fall in the trap,
but
I do fall deep into her eyes where
stars shine bright and where love lies,
sometimes love lays but that's on those other days.

It's just another tangent where this man went
off on one
because we almost really got there and
then the thing was gone.

Now it's Friday and we'll lie or lay
I have no say
I have to be
the slave to She
and her desires

I cross my fingers
she crosses wires
to interrupt
the
jump start.

In little over two years
I have had more scans
Than a supermarket checkout
There is more of my blood in path labs
Than I have in my body
I've had nasty painful biopsies
Things up my **** and cameras down my neck
There have been countless appointments
At four different hospitals
As well as being hospitalised five times
Including one minor operation
And two major ones
I now have ******* up kidneys
Veins like ropes and arms like Twiglets
And more scars
Than a bad knife-throwers assistant
But what the hell !
I'm still growing old disgracefully
HA !!

                               By Phil Roberts

In little over two years
I have had more scans
Than a supermarket checkout
There is more of my blood in path labs
Than I have in my body
I've had nasty painful biopsies
Things up my **** and cameras down my neck
There have been countless appointments
At four different hospitals
As well as being hospitalised five times
Including one minor operation
And two major ones
I now have ******* up kidneys
Veins like ropes and arms like Twiglets
And more scars
Than a bad knife-throwers assistant
But what the hell !
I'm still growing old disgracefully
HA !!

                               By Phil Roberts

In little over two years
I have had more scans
Than a supermarket checkout
There is more of my blood in path labs
Than I have in my body
I've had nasty painful biopsies
Things up my **** and cameras down my neck
There have been countless appointments
At four different hospitals
As well as being hospitalised five times
Including one minor operation
And two major ones
I now have ******* up kidneys
Veins like ropes and arms like Twiglets
And more scars
Than a bad knife-throwers assistant
But what the hell !
I'm still growing old disgracefully
HA !!

                               By Phil Roberts

In little over two years
I have had more scans
Than a supermarket checkout
There is more of my blood in path labs
Than I have in my body
I've had nasty painful biopsies
Things up my **** and cameras down my neck
There have been countless appointments
At four different hospitals
As well as being hospitalised five times
Including one minor operation
And two major ones
I now have ******* up kidneys
Veins like ropes and arms like Twiglets
And more scars
Than a bad knife-throwers assistant
But what the hell !
I'm still growing old disgracefully
HA !!

                               By Phil Roberts

I used to climb so high
Those trees that boughed
Unimportant limbs to
Mere twiglets that seemed
Were always budding.

How I loved the woods and how
Heaths heathers blether now.
Blether now.
When nature flowed
Next to my beck
Something sang to me
Louder than a lamphrey
And I knew fish didn't talk
Much but still kept to the bees.

It was easier then you know when we built castles from Twiglets and dreams from Meccano and Caroline was a radio station, party time meant fun and games, faces framed at seaside shows and everyone knows that bubblegum blows your stomach up if you swallow.

Ah,
the abuse of each hour when we had the power to play and what the **** have we got today?
unrest on the street where the immigrant meets the yokel,
local taxes that stun you
employers who shun you and
the police who just gun you
down.

We used to walk the mile and a half into town and it was mainly uphill all the way, but we did have the power to play way back then and now I sit here in the dark with a pen and a screen and it feels every time like a dream 'til I open my eyes and I scream,
'it's real'
do you ever feel like the sea's right inside you and the tide's going out in a rush?

We lost out with old money and not funny how decimalisation decapitated the imperial measure,
memories to treasure at a taxable standard rate
and doesn't it feel like the time's getting late when the Morning sun breaks in the East,
at least,
I think so and so I build more candy dreams with Meccano and go to sleep.

In little over two years
I have had more scans
Than a supermarket checkout
There is more of my blood in path labs
Than I have in my body
I've had nasty painful biopsies
Things up my **** and cameras down my neck
There have been countless appointments
At four different hospitals
As well as being hospitalised five times
Including one minor operation
And two major ones
I now have ******* up kidneys
Veins like ropes and arms like Twiglets
And more scars
Than a bad knife-throwers assistant
But what the hell !
I'm still growing old disgracefully
HA !!

                               By Phil Roberts

It must be past your bedtime
does your mother know you're out?

the old lines were the best lines
in the best times of our lives.

best being subjective
because our own perspective
changes
over time.

It's unlike liking a like,
unliking,
but I'll try anything
at least liking, unlike liking is
what people like to do.

I like word zoos
who's who's
and
twiglets.

Sometimes I struggle with
the words I like to juggle with
and I don't like that
unlikely as it may seem
and
now it's bedtime and
I like that liking that is
what I like.

Remember,
we are just distractions in some cosmic game of chess,

we're like Twiglets or maybe Spangles to be worn as lucky charms.
by those creators on the edges of the universe,
and we'll be gobbled up by black holes which we look upon as lost souls while the creatures who created fill their maws,

it's a sobering reality to realise we're disposable
and to think that we'll all end up being taken by
a Bishop.