Good

I’m starting to feel old
The wisdom jettisoned
Towards oncoming oracles
Whose tongues still
Perform magic tricks
Righteous oratory slicks
Combing over the arid
Plain singing
In one of two tones,
Complexity is
Messier than a
Simple song about
Right and wrong.
I understand, I do,
The verses that used
To froth from my lips
Were full of shit, too
Life was, is, unfair
I burned through
The energy to give
Something back by
Singing selfishly about
Structures I barely understood
Using kitchen towels
To mop up a flood
Nobody noticed when
I stood up and cursed
Maybe, now’s the time
To get out and do something
For the greater good

Holes

The holes were crater deep
An impact had left its mark
Punching through the solid surface
Till it crumbled into single specks
A quick of pressure
Blew the dust skyward
Above atmospheres and
Realms of precious space
Sun-kissed blonde baked
Solid squeezed into new shapes
Outer layers absorb and suck
Quantum object in
To build new mountains
Around the plains
To stand tall and glare
Down at the rifts beneath

Lines

Two lines shape my skin
Clinical scars
Precisely define the boundary
Between here and there
I step aboard a steam train
Feel the rush of vapour blowing
Hard towards the future
I left a part of me behind
On that table, turning
Cards to grant me leave
As long as I change
The way I speak
It’s a little secret code
I smuggle, nodding
To the guard
A wink of reassurance.
There is a line
Hand drawn, abrasive
Shards dug into the land
We exit through the smoke
Stand on the other side
Staring at the mirage
In the distance
Hollywood picture moving
Circular loops where roads
Bulldozed straight through
Street left with
Scores of imagined people

Known

Wars start with words
Self-important chums
Foresight shortened
By bridges burned

Controllers long to be
Stroked by boys only
Club restricts entrance
Without a phallic trick

Wars start words
Each bruise felt by
A well drilled machine
Or terrified teen

Both too scared to defy
Orders from above
Hearts condensed
Into blood red milk

A death only felt
As a sharp intake of breath
Respawn, false player
We need someone to be killed.

Wars start with words
Sabre teeth rattle
In glass cased
Clinks of victory sips

It’s easier to say
What you think
When the flightless bird
Accepts its extinct

Wars end with words
False hope of new boys
In tailored suits
Promising to fix

The lessons of the past
Tarmacked mass graves
Infusing the taps
For an amnesiac’s sense

So we never forget
But forget to remember
Trauma on the tip
Of a tab under the tongue

When street litter limbs
Lined the roads
Marking the edge
Of the known world

Skin

Your beauty is only skin deep
One lash will fall
Impede the eye of mystery
It’s waisted.
On the size of your
Corrected curves
The vessels
Soon ooze
With treacle, black
The sweetness
Burns an acid sour
Retracing those steps
To get back to where
Laughter lives
In the young cubs.
You swallow them whole
With a veinous wrath
Your smoke leaks
The horrors of blackness
Skin bare, cold hands
Vanity rips through another
Pair of lungs.
I lack the heart
To tell you how to behave
But it once pounded
In a cage of your making
The monster, afraid
Not becoming what becomes
Of each living thing
Organ stitches sew
New paths to bleed
Young love, not
Always what it seems
Skin touching skin

Litter

I’m a literary fearist
Literally in fear of
Being lit and critically
Burned by unforeseen
Circumstances from
Those reading books
In cultured scenes.
Litter lines my street
Neat rows of planted cans
Flowers sprout up
Through chicken wings
Bodies, fleshed out
Plots of land spread thin
Not a single metaphor
Mixed in the cracked
Pavement weed skin.
It’s a tarnished hole
Of thoughtless crimes
Against the wordy world
In library lobbies
Where the whispers swirl
I’ll admit my guilt
Emit the fear, cuff me
Before I stray within
A hundred yards
Of a keyboard, pen
Or pencil case. Laptop
Desk or a paperchase
The furious snapping of
Scholars flexing twigs
Burning every copy
They find sitting on a shelf
Come light the kindle
Destroy the notes
Relieve the world
This storyboard needs
To find a deep tarmac grave
So no-one has to suffer
The fear of it
Being read.

Right

The way society works
Is to reach an invisible
Hand in to crush a heart
Without warning
As a selfish man reaps
The rewards of coming
First in the evolutionary race
The rights of two
More important than one
Solid friends need
Close stimulation
The exhausting experience
Of invasive spacial perception.
I see the hazard light
Flash in my eyes
Who am I to refuse?
Security, remove this bastard
From the bus.
I’m in the wrong, and I know it
But despite the hostile muttering
Not a punch was thrown
But inwardly I dig myself
A little shelter
For the four hour siege
Trying not to eat
The sensitive areas of brain
Sometimes, it’s best to forget
The momentary lapses
Of your own contradictions

Flake

Brushing off loose
White flakes, powdery
Talc fizzles gently
Through the air
Leaving a brief residue
Fleeting dust, settling
As individual parts
Where light cannot penetrate.
Blinking cartoon eyes
Wide and white, watching
From the dark, words
Vibrate meaning, strength
To carry loaded terms
Till the boulder flecks its flint
Floorward fleeing
The structural sleeve
It disintegrates to ash
An urn to mourn an ancient feeling
The anxiety of being alone
When people rush by
Without any thought
Off to lick a cool wafered cone
As solid cream slowly melts
In the searing midday heat
The bleached white expands
Spread along the matted grey stone
Spilling out lengthways
Leaving a flake, exposed
Atop the splattered mess

Shadow

The bright blue cloudless
Oblivion casts its dominance
Over my furrowed brow
Feeling the heat drift
Into a shadowy individual
Sucking sweat
Mimicking movements
Using predictive tricks
To keep my eyes
From seeing the leech
The blue dome stretches
Across the line of sight
Not obstructed from
Above the valley drop
I sleep more, and find the toil
Too much to carry on
The shade beckons me
My shadow carefully extricates
Itself, in search of a new host
Till I feel half
The bag of bones, relieved
On the cool forest floor
Breathing some life
Back into my springs

Uniform

I’m from a time
When green land was punctured
By grey men, fertile
Features homogenous
Blades of sweet screaming
Little land of golden bricks
Shook under the weight
Of demolition dating.
Concrete jungles swung
Through tired old tin roof shacks
Replaced by luxury
Façades, sat high above
The natural eye line
They flaunted their wealth
From the top floor
Cash would have landed
Like bombs, if any had
Trickled down.
We could customise ourselves
In ways future thinkers
Could never have foreseen
But we accepted our uniform
The grey replaced the green