None of this is preconceived.
Lesson One came in the knowing
That no animal, angel, or adult
Has any knowing at all.

Life never attains ideals.
There’s a sand-grained image of you:
“How did you manage sunburn in Great Yarmouth?”
The pain now forgotten as anecdote.

lives in yarmouth & seen the sky just today but he dont know why the day the date is reasonabily high or out of control out of ur mind that when it rains he always finds it like a wet sweater's on ur shoulders & he has nine & from down the road he looks fine up the road is where he dies across the road they're gettin high & beneath the snow is where he'll hide & with any luck intime he'll become a seed & grow up fine

I cannot write a sonnet
or funny limerick that will leave you
laughing into your third whiskey
of the night. I cannot spread your legs
with words and I guess geography and
lack of voice have always blighted
my route to a real home.
I cannot write greetings cards
to a second aunt sunbathing in
Great Yarmouth and coming back
with frostbite and head-lice.
I cannot write a song
and sing it to you in a way that will
leave you kissing your pillow
and wishing I was there to steady
your brand new appetite for living.
I cannot write a psalm for G-d
or an ode to nature without sounding
like a lost cause or reluctant romantic.
I cannot write the score to
the sounds of thunder that siren
with friction in the sky
nor can I give form to happenstance
memories of worms in the soil
and rainbow braids in your hair. I cannot
do much this year save from writing
an obituary and hoping you will understand
what it means to drown in open air.

Taking the green walk.

Which ever way you approach
This tunnel of green,
Whether from Yarmouth
And the incoming ferry,
Or nearer the Totland end
The experience was much the same.

Underfoot a mossy path,
Dampened by overhanging trees,
Deep puddles to navigate
And the stinging of nettles
In the bracken filled undergrowth;
Adjacent fields where bulls
Occasionally got out of hand,
Charging sporadically and scaring
The birds.

This route was both our outward
And homewards journey,
Taken on family picnics
To Fort Victoria,
A viaduct of small arcades,
With photographs
Of seafaring men lining walls,
And a cafeteria,
Selling limited produce.

Trips to Yarmouth to shop,
Collecting momentoes
And sticks of peppermint rock,
Allowed for the green walk,
Back to the coziness of a chalet.
We use to sing as we walked
The three miles or so,
I looking for blackberries
To take home for tea.

The only difference of route,
Was that of expectation,
The early day high spirits,
Fresh from sleep,
Looking forward to sandwiches
And perhaps an ice cream.
Returning was more arduous,
Tired feet and lagging behind,
The green road seemed longer,
And the holiday
Another day shorter.

Love Mary **

the Earl of Yarmouth (William Seymour)
a descendant of very late
(to the power of Google - ha) Jane Seymour,
Henry VIII's third wife
currently in a legal battle with his parents,
the Marquess and Marchioness of Hertford,
over the family estate, Ragley Hall
located in Alcester,
Warwickshire, England, at B49 5NJ
constitutes a 17th century
Palladian stately home
set in 450 acres of parkland in Warwickshire
sued his parents for "trauma"
after NOT inheriting a 6,000 acre,
$105 million estate for his thirtieth birthday
contrary to the rule of primogeniture.

how cruel, shameless and unspeakable
unnecessary psychological suffering
ensued, imposed, and ordained
upon talking head of said heir
being royal parentage Livin' on a Prayer
(courtesy Jon Bon Jovi)
lamented being shortchanged
courtesy supposed stingy parents,
who did not even bequeath a ****** weir.

if locked out of a sizable estate
yours truly too would fight tooth and nail
(no matter I wear dentures)
against being denied patrimony
(ranking as a worse fate than death),
cue marionette strings to pull tight
and the listener to pantomime
violins to orchestrate
voiding any chance at tête-à-tête
not deeding a modest fortune
to first born male heir,
hence forcing eldest son
to hire himself (with egg on his face)
out as a yokemate.

aforementioned tidy fortune
linkedin with tragi-comic high drama
will inevitably be exhausted
courtesy bickering as countless
court - battles him
of the republic in which it stands...
(plagiarizing pledge of allegiance
for personal mutinous gain)
ensue - forcing prodigal son against father,
and holy ghost supposed
descendent of Jane Seymour,
whose spirit can host the pity party
perhaps even reviving
the court of King Crimson
subtle allusion to King Henry VIII.
yours truly a fluent bloke,
which two words forged
together to create affluent
suddenly becomes only a tabloid fodder
for and about proletarian pennsylvanian poet
fancy and fantasy of mine
truth be told being born into wealth
and unabashedly crying the blues
generates no empathy from me,
and maybe sympathy
for the devil he will evoke,
but of course archaic contractual obligations
buried deep in the webbed wide world archives
of English law will invoke
paternal obligations reminding
twenty first century sophisticates
if any questionable breech to stint
(once again stretching
the legal limits of credulity)
concerning the welfare of menfolk
such ridiculous questionable logic,
the supposed traumatized young man
will quicken others infinitesimal chance
of securing riches due to *******
whose imagination,
the Earl of Yarmouth (William Seymour)
unwittingly did stoke
and even the writer of these words woke
to fabricate being linkedin
acquiring money and predilection
of jaw dropping wealth,
which delusions and illusions of grandeur
finds me to swallow my pride,
and feel the burden of invisible yoke.