Poetry

Monday, 16 February 2026

love times

 I loved you left, I loved you right

I loved you wrong and in your flight

I loved you day, I loved you night

There's nothing left, you're out of sight


I loved your soul, I loved your body

I cannot control, or mollycoddle

The sense your life is precious light

I loved you dark, I loved you bright


So don't leave me now

I can't bear the weight

Of sorrow

Of the pain

It is too late

To lie to you now

Of the shame

Of the shadow

But how can my love be wrong

When I love someone so good and strong?

Everything must go

 Sometimes, everything must go

The windows are rattling

As spring winds blow

Clearing out the clutter of last year in tow

Dredges from ditches of ideas that flow

Sometimes everything must go


And it's like I need to let go

Of all those fugitive pieces I stole

Shards of hearts exploded

Glass animals collected in menageries

They all got shattered

Precious though they were

They are all dust in the desert now

Everything must go

Sunday, 15 February 2026

Back in the Land of the living

 I'll let you know 

If I'm still in the land of the living


I'll see you tomorrow

I've never seen a ghost

In the land of the living


I'm glad to be back in the land of the living

Glad to be the black cat and not grave digging

Glad for your life hack that kept me breathing

Glad to be back in the land of the living


 Am I really? Yes! Well why?

I guess, it's that we were born to die

And all our days are numbered

But if I thumbed a lift with Thumbelina

For a little time her trampolina

If I humbled myself at her cortina

A courtly show for a fashionista

But nothing must glow as hot and cold as

The sun we are all under

We regret to inform you

That it will not rise tomorrow

Has never crossed anyone's mind

But for the fact that she breathes

I cannot detach myself so well


I've tried to pull her out of my heart

But the seed was planted, love kick started

And now it's banished by her rule

I fell apart for a bit, not sure if I'm

Together again, just yet

It's just a letter I write from the base of wall

Which I fell off last night

It was just my pride that's hurt, I'll bet

I'm back in the land of the living

And I'm trying to live without regret


The body snatchers

 Moving the mannequins

How do we carry them?

How can the body be spare?

Nobodies, everybody nowhere

Nothing to wear, no hair, no air

But graceful poises, not making noises

Standing so silently, spare

In use or out of it, in storage in the cupboard

Up in the attic

Wholly vacant like some static

The status quo of not moving at all

All hail human existence


Looking in the mirror at the dummy

The numb, dumb country bumpkin

The straw man, scarecrow

Worzel Gummidge figure

Come in to transfigure the interior design

Portfolio of foliage

Caught a cold you know like Coleridge

Walking out in the snow and storm like Keats

Cathy come home staring out the window

For Heathcliff

On the cold moors, the dale

That separates our homes


Mechanical walking of limbs

Legs and spare arms carried

As if by medical students to the 

Dissecting theatre

The autopsy of the dead relative begins

Where is she now?

Where is her soul, I can't find it

In her model's eyes

What do I want with her body?

With her imperialist grey skies

That have dominated me

From sunrise to moonrise

The set order of a regimen of lies

To get me down the endless catwalk of Winter

Into Spring

Looking in shop window reflections

To make sure I still exist

And have not been turned into

Yet another of her mannequins

On her archived list 

Saturday, 14 February 2026

Forty something

 I'm over forty

I've got Dr Wolff at my door

Howling out he's got a cure

For my grey hair


I'm over forty

Now I'm a victim of time and fate

If I wasn't before

Well now there's no time to wait


You see my father was over forty

Before I turned naughty

You see he is behind a bullet proof glass plate

And history always comes to those too late


They tell me to inject caffeine in my pores

They tell me to believe in the male menopause

Well I believe, I have no cause, it goes

The same with Santa Clause

But I don't remember anyone getting on his case

About his over rosy cheeks, rotund belly

Or beardy white fakes

Why didn't he ever use Just for Men?

I suppose they wouldn't trust any dark haired strangers

Coming undercover down chimney ranges

Probably would have burnt him in the grate

Than suffer the indignity of a milk tray lover

Whose cover's blown as is his sperm count of late

But as I say I'm an over forty victim of fate


I'm an over forty son of

A man who's over eighty

Who's father never run the clock so late

But you can't say I've begun to hate

I still feel love could come by my gate

And we'd meet

At number 28b

 or not 28B

Two score and twenty four blackbirds

Baked in a pie,

on Pigeon street

And don't be late

Thursday, 12 February 2026

Valentines

 It's when you love the wrong woman

Valentines is a traitor's heart

broken in two

Pieces of a queen's tart

Lay it on thick

Holding all the cards

She's ready to take their heads

Queen of broken hearts 

How I wish you were dead


I thought I loved a woman

But in fact I loved the wine

That's where thinking gets you

Thinking, such a waste of time

Back in Blighty

 Returning to old blighty

It feels oh so mighty

With it's castles and mists

And memories of being kissed

In the dams and caravans

In the Springs and the Wells

Where I sprung a Welsh leek

And held a Scottish thistle

And the teacher blew their whistle

And I ran to pick up the sandbag

And I can't run anymore

I've been run down

Until I'm sore

Primary school against the wall

Counting down

Turning around

Looking for the wolf

He's always at your back

Ready to attack

Coming back to good old blighty

What a mighty time we had

But who are the good

And who the bad

How can we forget?

How can we ever be sad

Except what else do you do here

Kiss the salty sand

Wait for one gland after another to pack up

Take up the slack and bear the share

The burden

It's no curtain to draw

No blanket of sack cloth to wear

Nothing is for certain

It's all fair

Love and war

You've been trained for

Ever since you grew up

In good old blighty

They train you to be mighty

Have a mighty heart

And to save the ones you love

For you to play your part

They told you how to live

How to run the game

How to take and how to give

And how to feel love and shame

And that's why blighty's in your bones

That's why you are always called home

But that's why you must escape the chrome

Nelson, the brass buckles

The shining buttons and waistcoats

The statues in museums

You saw history through

Like a peach black wind through hair

But love was a cummerbund

Of your joy and despair