Mr Stephen Jarvis

 Mr Stephen Jarvis

Stepped into a Tardis

And went back fifty million years

To a land of dinosaurs

And minotaurs

And a place without no tears

It's a steaming jungle out there

It's a kettle full of fish

It's a piece of urban furniture

That is an artwork he can't miss

And flying through directories

The birds have found their perch

In alcoves and near rectories

Where alcoholics go to church

He's bound by books and fakeries

To drown his human woes

But finds in sound bread bakeries

His soul food fills his holes

I should have been his friend

I should have held the knife

I should have shattered the mirror

That would end his strife

But I made a mistake

I've dulled the edge of life

With broken hearted bottle's

Recycled absent wife

I've lived with joy and sorrow

I've come out feeling blue

There'll likely be rain tomorrow

And I've got a hole in my shoe

So if you have a love 

Don't trade it to the winds

For fat or thin, the dove

Will fly and never come again 

Miss Jennifer Parker

 Miss Jennifer Parker

Is a most elegant dresser

She's even a Fashion Professor

Dressed to kill in traitor's style

She'll catch you with her wiles

Walks as fast as a steam train or a car

There she goes, Miss Jennifer Parker

So trim the hem, and cut the shawl

And fill your glass with wine

So sew the sleeve, patch the heart

And follow the line til we shall part

There goes Miss Jennifer Parker

She's on her hands and knees

All day long

Pinning up a hem, trimming a sarong

She's in the store room mapping out history

With her pins and pleats

Kith and kin complete

With well written blurb

Never a wrong or missing verb

Then in the Front room she's window dressing

The models all stand there awaiting her blessing

They're ready for her and to be honest

She never puts bees in their bonnets

She'll stick it and pin it

She stays through thick it and thin it

There she goes Miss Jennifer Parker

So trim the hem, and cut the shawl

And fill your glass with wine

So sew the sleeve, patch the heart

And follow the line til we shall part

Miss Jennifer Parker

You go up and ask her

What's brighter or darker

She always knows what goes

What colours flow

What lines meet or cross like streams

Into the river of her fashion dreams

On point, like a dancer, a pinhole camera

That lets in just enough light to show

In polaroid, the cones and rods of colour and shade

Whether natural or man-made

Going back through the kings and queens of history

Going back through their stately home parades

Of the upper classes, mind not pint glasses

But the grape pitchers, she's in the sorority

A sister of mercy and the wine bar

It won't sound terse if I say she will go far

There she goes, Miss Jennifer Parker 

Love labours day and night

 Trying to find the words

To say I love you

But nothing seems to come to mind

It's like it was just on the tip of my tongue

But now however much I look I can't find

Searching for it in books I've read

Looking for it in signs on the street

Seeking it in the faces of people I meet

And in the pavements I tread

Nothing seems to work, no

nothing seems to work

The more I seek, the less I find

i'm wearing the same shirt then rolling in the dirt

And I wash away the stains from my mind

Yet nothing seems to work, no nothing seems to work

Even if I say it, you cannot hear

It's like at the pitch of a bat

Oh the dogs all have my back

But it never rings a bell in your ear

Yes my love it labours day and night

At the coal face of your heart

But I can't seem to break the ice

No matter how hard I fight

The hammer blows, they echo below

And up the valley resound

But no matter how I work at it

The right words I have not found

So I'm going on strike

I won't work for dirt

The love I have is in my shirt

It's on my sleeve, I still believe

But this just can't be right

For my love it labours day and night

A lack of diplomacy

 He was a diplomatic diplodocus

Long necked hocus pocus

Ranging around like an evil wizard

On his high horse like a terrible lizard

Willing to wager the country's treasure

All for some new shoes made of Spanish leather

Left the foreign office in a state

Ordered his love like a takeaway plate

Shining his star, but shone it too late

Oh that worrisome bore

Of diplomacy's fate

Beef

 He said I've got a beef with you

I don't wanna beefburger,

Don't wanna commit murder

It's just this thing that you do

You've been out on the tiles

For miles and miles

And now you're drunk as a screw

I have a beef with you

You come here in your state

And throw up on your plate

You shake and shiver and vomit

Can't you try a washer or gromit

Put a cork in it won't you

Yes I have a beef with you

Temp

 Temporary

You're one in a million

Hard to catch

Just like a cloud

You evaporate

Like a ghost

I could walk along your coast

All day

But you're so temporary

Temporary

We all have to grow

Change from the first things we were

I can't tell

If this is heaven or hell

Or if I'm in purgatory

As you're so temporary

Indigo bay

 The river floods with our blood

Like wine

All indigo in hue

And you, I miss you

In the river of indigo

The swollen towers of pride

Have fallen down beside

Its banks

And all the children have cried

All the mothers given thanks

I have no other lover

I want to make you mine

But I don't want to steal you from another

I have only our precious time

There is nothing left beside to say

Except the river between us flows on

into the Indigo bay