Herself, Also

Beyond the prospect of all reason
Out-with the confines of one mind
I reach for the reaching season
Give the visions time to redefine

There is a break that isn’t broken
A continuum of the weavers line
With words that remain unspoken
As if this journey is so free of sign

Without the scope of trap, or treason
Before the stateliness of humankind
Weep for the last, of past preseason
Retain the tears, preserved in brine

There is a tool that is no token
As insidious as the words it finds
Out of our windmills thus awoken
As if the turning, was so still in time

Further than the last horizon
Nearer than the heart so kind
I smile at the frieze to lean-on
Offer gifts, so infinite, and sublime

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Journeyman

I am not here to write
But write I will

My practice began with a letter
About butterflies, set against
A backdrop of bright green leaves
About craftsmen, set against
A wall of Cotswold Stone

There is a second letter
A more difficult proposal
Using my vast reserves
Of conscious procrastination

This letter may also
Be concerned with butterflies
Yet set against I know not what
Perhaps it may be
About a jobbing builder

Set against a background
Of far trickier times

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Between These Lines

A packing crate of memories
Nights of mobile phones, and bridges
Of deciding to cross America
On a Honda-Goldwing motorcycle

Or connect to parties with milk
Bottles, and milking machines
As we watch the microlight pilot
First lose, and then find, his engine

Tomorrow the Atlantic coast
A place with a lighthouse
Miles of deserted beaches
All the ways we go, to find a desert

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Timid

Within the four walls of my own inadequacy
I refuse
And as many times as I refuse I say
Go on, take the risk
Knowing, full well, that it won’t happen

Only once in a lifetime
I accept
And as often as I accept I say
Take it easy, stay calm
Knowing, equally well, the gremlins will enter

For that time, that time only
I remember
And as I am, for certain, shorn of love
There looking back, no trouble
Knowing, absolutely, it wasn’t so, it wasn’t

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Awake in Sleep

These are fluid times
There is lucidity
Clear edges to the thoughts
A rationale, for further
Research and development

Scattered fragments
Are drawn together
Fractious egos
Are washed with calm
Complex endocrines
Are strung into the loop

I am more than me
More than what you see
The highs and the lows
The carbon glows
They are a part of me

On the borders of perception
A place far away from thought
By canals of introspection
Water; deeper, undone by nought
I am more than me
Yet still I see the uncertainty

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Relapse

Flies or crows or
Spiders
Long forgotten

Still I chose
To go back to sleep

Only fifteen minutes
To the alarm

Shortly
Afterwards
In the stillness of the day

The early light
With movement only
Of birds and superstitions

Not a breath of breeze
The white sky sure

To turn to blue
In the fullness of the day

Time to move on
Work out
What is meant

By crows
Or flies or spiders
Long since forgotten

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Unfathomable Security

I am still in search, of all
That you think I’ve found
I am still on the lookout
For far less solid ground

With no light
He might have said
The night he read your story
Of the also after dead

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Guthrie

You sang, of being amongst the dust bowls

I write, of cornfields, sunbeams on the rapeseed, walks by streams and meadows, willows no longer for the weeping, fresh shoots, that reach up to the sky

You sang on, of having been brought through the great depression

I write on, of motor homes, jet-streams beyond the blue day, talk shows with entrepreneurs, moguls no longer there for the reaping, fresh shoots, that think they’ll never die

Your boy sang, he made it to the big time

As my mother’s son I write, of families tormented by suppression, repressed with hopes they could not call; the little girl skips, swings her pink handbag, thank heaven their souls eternally tried

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Guillemots

Swoop

Dive

Soar

Glide

Cliff tops

Grey skies

Raindrops

Sea spray

Listen; hear sigh

The mournful cry 

Of the guillemots

Listen

Silent in 

Your own self

To call the guillemots

Another night of theatre 

Another night

Of crowd control

Take me to your sky life

Pass on by

Your broken heart

Take me to your soul

Listen to the call, listen

And be silent 

In your own self

Hear the call

The mournful cry

From the grey skies

& the cliff tops

The call

From the raindrops

& the sea spray

The squawk

& sigh 

The beautiful cry

Of the guillemots

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All made up and nowhere to go

To sit without suggestion

As protected by the dream

Black spots of resurrection

Connected altogether too clean

To sit as an observed dimension

The dementia of a scheme

White dots of self infection

Reflect the step to true demean

To sit await collection

For inspection by the team

Blood clots of doubt detection

Deflect the specs it seems

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Observations At An Exhibition

Another blood test Friday

Pink socks, painted toenails

Soft brown sandals

Society magazines; real people

We all get tired don’t we

Wonder if all’s worthwhile

Then the soft breeze

Catches the hair on my arm

A friend points me

Towards some new direction

For a moment, in my mind

All is replenished

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Fantasies: Movement 4

The pamphlet title: The A Road Numbers

Twixt home and work 

Where much of this stuff is composed

Word-wrecks that wrack around my head 

Before being committed to paper

Per se

Up and down the Wolds

Round the long and soft turned corners

Early in the morning

As the worlds day begins again

The procession is ever so

Truly, unruly, she’s duly being processed

Around half way

Just a shade of moments further

A breakfast stop

Bacon & eggs; some days the full monty

Occasionally a yoghurt drink

With fresh mango from the Caribbean

The tea time radio DJ

In casual conversation

Said he had not heard the word experiential

Not before yesterday; neither had his friend

I found that odd

That’s all this is. I hope you follow

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Magic Numbers

Number 8 has just stubbed out her fag

I’m number 22

Sat beside

A season ticket holder

Mr. Number 23

I would have got here earlier

But the doctor’s receptionist said

To wait for the phone rush to die down

Anyhow

8 and 9 are done now

Both looked a bit dodgy to me

Then, I’m no doctor, and anyway

I guess you wouldn’t come here

To pick your team for the Olympics

A bit dodgy; not a bad diagnosis

Then, my daughter is a doctor

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Pace

They’re on the doctor’s list, the pills to give and take; pitchers for improved digestion, potions to calm the tangled nerves, twelve steps for alcohol addiction, rough retreats for heroin withdrawal, patches for nicotine starvation, grave misgivings for chronic depression

Small cars that go nowhere fast, hundred and twenty miles to the gallon; run outs, four days a week, weekends on the driveway, by the caravan. Not so this fine-tuned body of an engine, nippy in the slipstream; up front & peppy, no need for medication or search for meditation; shudder, blood-wrack at the very thought of it

Still though the headaches, the guilt of kept silent complications, pace up and down outside the firmly closed door. Still also, the numbness, at first light, wake up to the smokers cough silenced by the solidarity of solitude

Think on of cortisone injections, joints that twinge with your every move; hinges, old and crusted, memories, of all that you forgot to ask. Will you be at the party come a week on Sunday? Will you wear the rosette and the flowered gown? Are your parents going to stay over? Say, are those your tears, kindly turned upside down?

It is that time of day, time for automatic pilot; thoughts to be handled one thought at a time:

Brake, accelerate, change gear, turn the wheel, steal away, gone

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The Poets Depth According To Nietzsche

I went to get the deck chair

But found

As with other human foibles

That it had gone, moved on

Removed to a storage space

Away from the summer’s sun

I turned on the water feature

Simple streams cascade

From copper tray to copper tray

I imagine that you can hear it

I daydream that you see & think

Of the dragonfly

The brick wall

Has fallen easy prey to the ivy

No contest without the frost

To hold the either of you back

Nor to the potted plants

That in league with you

Gathered their weeds incognito

Over the fence the breeze blows

How many thousand miles

The air plumes must have travelled

Together, concurrent and countercurrent

That you may see their swirls over the Azores

It would not matter

Although I hope you understand

There are days like these

Also days when truly

All our champagne tomorrows

Are our brown ale yesterdays

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In Season

It is an obsession, to put into words the opium of the lilies; I hear you talk of headiness, of thighs melted with oil; I hear you talk of gentleness, of boys at a wander in the meadow. 

Dusk brings out the stronger scent, as if she is mistress of the night times; a sultry seducer who waits for the wine to flow; a damsel to distress, who waits for the music to unwind our sobrieties. 

But here, in the breath of daylight, the breezes catch her open cleavage, deliver her consignments to be ravished; a rummage through the undergrowth, before afternoon tea. 

Plump plums laid on soft velvet, skinned with musk perfume; all the temperaments of the orient to be ravished; a rummage before afternoon tea. 

I hear you talk of obsession, of bodies heaved and thrown; I hear you talk of opium, of bodies with minds, that the scented breeze has blown.

But here, in the breath of daylight, all I can think of, is a rummage before afternoon tea.

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Light of Amber Nectar

In my right ear the sound of water

Almost a stream, into nearly a pool

All the rest we imagine

On the beach, tiptoe cold water

Shared lonesome interrogations

“You seem unsettled

Can you not look at me”

I turn to see your smile:

Red lips; all the words say 

I love you

It takes a while

But I settle

Here among the simple folk

Drinking the Moonshine pale ale

Where arrangements are made

To meet a week on Tuesday

By when apparently all will be sorted

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Sandilands in May

This is how we feel. Alive on the beach, in the breeze, with hands over our eyes to create the vibrant, purple, geodesic domes that Buckminster Fuller spoke of so lovingly. Out towards the vague horizon, the waves roll over onto the podiatrist’s feet; she moves the camera blindly from one frame to the next, past the horses and the waves of water

The chasm beneath Edinburgh’s streets sure struck a chord; the author sincere with her research, whatever the year, whatever the festival, whatever the danger she was later to speak of. We all need some space; the brown and white hoofs splash their exited riders into the tides surprises, the dogs that barked have left the sand sunk pools, left the faraway roar of motor cycles

We all need some space, also to talk to the stranger dressed in white muslin, he moves away, steps up a gear, jogs along, and levitates to the next breakwater. We all need some space, he checks his pulse and pedometer; with my blurred vision I can easily make him out to be two, turn his outfit to become ever more flight bound and exotic

The sands become a desert, the sound of waves are thanks to the ever present wind noise; winds that stir the particles into a massed morass, for all in which to sink. Better then to wear my spectacles, or look for the shorter, more distinctive view, see what can be seen; reign in my over active imagination, once more caught unseen on film

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One for the road

Suspended inanimate

Blood and bones helplessly hang

Under less than supple skin

No voice at home to articulate

Push buttoned purred engine 

Depress the clutch, pull away

The body falls in for the ride, held

At a safe distance, safely levitated

Tick-tock, tick-tock; slower, but

Still a pulse of circulation

A station to move through

A moment more awake than last

Stretches with unsugared tea

Tea and meditation

The engines inclinations ingested

The fuel kicks in; hot ear lobes listen

To soft rock played on the radio

The sun is up, in the cloudless sky

Hung over

The seventeen fields of rapeseed

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All dressed up and…

At the early morning bus stop

First cigarette of the day

Think on - of lovers left in bed

Think on, of lovers 

If only you had said

Baby can I walk you home

Roam around those thoughts

Alive, twirled fast inside your head

At the early morning bus stop

Baby, for certain you could have said

Can I share your life forever

Can I wake inside your head

Instead, you think on: 

Too much make up

Too dreary perm set hair

Too tight the crimplene trousers

Too late the finals of the beauty cup…

Can I share your life forever

Can I wake inside your head

Instead you stare

Beyond the early morning

Beyond the bust stop and the flair

You think on – of lovers left in bed

You think on, lover, if only you had said

Baby can I walk you home

Can I share your life forever

Can I wake one day beside you

In your silk laced, soft skin, bed

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Glass Houses

Noise
Surrounded by inadequate lives
Black and white noise
Counselled out of expectations

I saw it on the news
Kids out of control
In Time magazine
Young people
Without direction
Youthfulness
Without correction

Noise
Picked on by the big boys
Black and white noise
Torn apart, by media mogul dedications

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More Than This

There are many separate rooms
We are all alone in the separation
How soon are we to shrivel up and die
Without a light or some familiar fragrance
The talk is of the vagrancy of the youth who
Celebrates tramps boxed up on the pavements
Talk of parents, undone by truth, purely agents
Unsure of their place in society’s rearrangements
Rooms with open doors; places to sit and to search
For that inner self, behind a screened containment
The talk is of open prisons, declassified because
The prisoners no longer do desire to escape
The talk is of economic depression, of
Contested paternity, of council house
Relocation; old walls to knock out
Perfumed gardens to make over
The poem talks of redemption

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After The Alarm

Inspired by a broken nights sleep
Too late
The disappearance came to overwhelm me

Creep in daylight, stars behind grey skies
Too soon
The reappearance came forward to call me

I hold on to those last few words
Too kind
Goodbye, I love you; I will see you this evening

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Spatial

The poetry of Scandinavian log cabins
Days are shorter
Nights are dark
Time sits precisely
In the writers remainder park

Leave the forest to permeate
Make the tea
Make the toast
Make time tick on
For me, and for my Norwegian host

Cold water, clear water, archipelago’s
Roads are passable
Lakes are free from tide
Ingrained with work
The journeys (where we all for sure) reside

In translation I argue against the rhyme
Words are transferable
Thoughts are less tangible
Emotions, dark secrets
Find themselves lost; sounds seem less edible

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Spirit

So soon the thaw comes
So lucky
Those who live one day at a time

Free of overloaded baggage
Free
Just enough cloth for the day ahead

A capful of smiles
In readiness
For the gaiety of conversation

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Snow Covered Easter

On this day of snowfall
Are you at work
On a boat bobbing across the bay

On this day of white skies
Are your brushes
Again all covered in blue

The blue of the cleaner seas
Of the warmer skies
Of summer all over springtime

On this day of northern weather
Are your peninsulas sultry
Your sunrises painted to oblivion

The certainty of unclear horizons
Of faithful merged occupations
Of time; daylight all over the night



In Memory 
of the Cornish Artist John Miller

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Late Risers

The weathervane sets itself
To the West; East is further distant
Sunrise brings on the brighter skies
Snow thaws, without resilience

Kettles boil, showers run; daylight
Turns on its own persistent charm
Settled loads fall, slight of movement
Snow avalanches, but means no harm

Bloody hell; the unexpected cry
From upstairs as my love takes
That first look out of the window
Floorboards creak, o happy sigh

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Rooms And Gardens

My lover sleeps; warm, settled
Unaware of the snowfall
So much excitement awaits her
So much that I dare not wake her
Nor lay too close as to cause disturbance

Her wide white smile will radiate love
Joy, deep and open, will be apparent
There will be concerns, of course
How her young boy will travel
How long before the thaw

The photographer emerges, click
And point, point and click; snowballs
Flurry on the video, laughter of life
Surges; kickbacks into our childhood
Settled, well aware of the snowfall

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One Window, One Morning

Have you read of the direction of trees
Seen the cat at play on the carpet
Tapped your feet to intricate intimate music
Soft songs talk, of the time when cotton falls

The tree goes on and on into the backdrop
No more to see but trunk and bough and
Branch and snow; the poet talks of Nelson
Or was it Napoleon, on snow covered seas

Brighter light enters the garden, the audience
Applauds, I hear my own voice; outside there
Is no horizon, twigs divide the canvas, chimneys
Smoke signals merge; unread, they too disappear

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Drift

Snowfall you have covered all the
Imperfections, you have them sleep
On the roadsides and bus stations

Two pigeons share a branch in an
Otherwise snow covered tree, they
Are deep in a coo of conversation
I turn the alabaster statue, to look out
Of the window and onto the garden, to
Watch the snowflakes fall ever so slowly

This is Christmas at Easter, families gather
Share their past years reflections, sleep off
The drink, on an altogether lazy morning
I listen to music through my headphones
Take photographs of no-one in the snow
Write these words; alive in my own world

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Half Scape

Two trees; in this time before the leaf
A pair of them planted, yet planted too closely together
An invasion of their personal space, space set against space
In sight of the East to West winds that prevail hereabouts

Straight furrows reign along the perimeter
The trees are erect, but erected too soon, and now about to weather
All of this reminds me of the unseen fragility, fragile
At the inside and the outside of the indirect pathways of life

Man set against man; man under delivers
Man set against the wind; man under delivers
Man set against the plough; man under delivers
Man set against the mist; man fades into insignificance
Man set against the money; man sure finds resilience

Big ungainly lads, footballs at their feet, footballers
In conversation, their football clubs in administration
Straight furrows scrolled over unfashionable ground
Protected; too soon for all, too soon to fall forever

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