Seagull versus Egret

Egret: 

I have no regrets

Be like me I'm free and light

Like a feather from the flight

I have no regrets, Je n'Egret rien

For I'm the Egret, the Egret I am

Light of foot

High stepping wader

Small compact, a pint-sized invader,

Stout as Guinness, white as lightning

Drink me down river fish frightening

But don't you cuckoo spit me out

Or curdle me like cheese about

For now I'm in cider

Once I was an outsider

But now here's me level's home

I have nothing more to say Seagull crone

But if you don't like me leave me alone

Seagull:

Here I am the old salty dog

Hopscotching across a grassy bog

Just a field, where the cows graze

I'm on a rubbish tip holiday, hoorah

Now you might not think I belong in your field

But a bird like me has got make a meal

Take your worms or fish where you can get 'em I say

Never mind your fancy prancing pins

I'm down here in my flappers looking for fins

And if you don't like how I've waded in

Well just you keep your beak shut Egret thin

Egret:

Go push your boat out to sea

Why come inland and bother me?

Have you lost your sea legs?

Or are you a landlubber now?

I'll give you a hand you fat blubber cow

If you get any bigger seagull I'd stand on your rump

And peck your hide pa rum pa pump pump!

Seagull:

Now who are you calling fat?

Ok I've put on a few stone, but my stomach's flat

So what if I like Kentucky fried chicken

 in the seaside town it's slim pickins

And inland there's more tasty things than fish

To wrap my lips around out of bins of rubbish

Oh I do love fast food, cos' I ain't slow like you

You just stand there for hours waiting for a minnow

I'd get bored of being like a statue I prefer to hustle

Push your way in if you want to get ahead use your muscle

You're always gently treading avoiding causing offense

Why don't you get off your high horse pick a side of the fence

Egret:

I'm the greatest fisherman that's ever been around

If you wanna know who's the King fisher, I wear the crown

I'm lighter than a Heron, he's like an accordion that flies

My beak's long and sleek, like lightning from the skies

I'm the featherweight boxer, dancing like Cassius Clay

You wanna see me shadow box then get in the ring, let's play

Seagull

Oh well you don't think a Seagull packs a punch?

Well, I'm gonna chop and dice you, eat you for my lunch

I like a nice bit of sushi, and your Egret feng shui 

Don't impress me much, you can just dance, well phooi

It ain't no song and dance, I can do the seagull sailor's jig

I'll dance all up the town, along the roofs and over oil rig

So while you tip toe, I'll be on show for all the world to see

I'm the main man, the Seagull heavyweight boxing free

You stick to your river banks, and sedate country streams

I'm more used to fighting crows, rough seas are my dreams

Worse things happen at sea

 A bomb went off in a parking lot

My best man married my niece

King Arthur was jealous of lancelot

Cyprus was ceded by Greece

Well all of these things could make you cry a lot

Some might have you down on your knees

But it's best to remind that I think you will find

Worse things happen at sea

Mount Enta blew off her top hat

Pompei got burnt in larva grease

The water in alaska will freeze if they ask her

And New Orleans the rains may never cease

Yet you've got to make the best of what you've got

Just carry on rowing keeping going don't lose the plot

For worse things happen at sea 

The day we went to land the whale or A Whale’s Tale by Chris Scully

 

The day we went to land the whale  or A Whale’s Tale

by Chris Scully

(G)We went to land a whale (D7) just as the sun was (G) dawning

(C) The gulls were swinging(G)  in the air, (A7) crying out their (D7) warning

We(G) scrubbed the decks and bent our backs, (D7)  haulin’ up the (G) sail

(C) Gleaming were all the brass (G) tacks, the day we (D7) went to land the (G)whale

 

Oh(G) me laddie, (D7) bet your britches (G)daddy

(C) Get harpoon and (G)fork or spoon, we're(A7) off to land a (D7) baddy

(G)Now Sam's aboard with a scope and swore(D7) that he spied a (G)tail

(C) Waving in the (G)Bristol docks, the day we went(D7) to land the (G) whale

 

As (G) we put out from the Bristol dock’s, (D7)  sea-wind chapped our(G)  lipses

(C) The flood tide towed the(G)  seaweed locks, like (A7) green sea monster(D7)  shipes

(G) Then just between Flatholm and (D7)Steep we saw the spraying(G)  traces

(C) Of Whale flukes like Roy(G) al Dukes, off to see(D7)  the Cheltenham (G)races

Chorus

As (G) Sam hollered there’s whales collared (D7) in a swirling (G) ocean

Try (C) ing to swim (G) against the tide, (A7) without much loco (D7) -motion

(G) Eventually they’ll tire see (D7) said First mate with great (G) aplomb

(C) But Captain hammered and(G)- First mate stammered (D7) okay Cap you’ve (G) won

Chorus

So (G)we lowered and chased the whale (D7) all about the -(G)- harbour

There’s(C) nothing more to a (G)- whaleman’s taste than for (A7) something he must (D7) labour

And (G)-there we faced the steely pace (D7) of a whale set to (G) beat us

But (C)  I couldn’t recall (G) a time at all (D7) the way this whale did (G) treat us

Chorus

Capt(G) ain threw a mighty screw and it (D7) hit the whale on (G) the right

And(C)-we on board all hauled on(G)-the line but (A7) the whale never quit(D7) the fight

(G) The whale dove like a mighty Jove(D7) and pulled the ship (G) down under  

Then (C) up he came again(G) playin’ his game a(D7) -gain and hit our hull (G) like thunder

Chorus

A (G) sinking we were ship-wrecked u(D7)  pon a sandy bank (G) marooned

But(C) still attached was the whale (G) not catched (A7) but tied up by our (D7) harpoon

Up(G) on the deck the Captain hexed(D7)  and the First mate danced (G) a jig

To (C) think of all the dam(G) aged blows done to(D7)  their one and only (G)  rig

Chorus

The (G) whale turned to us with (D7) a weary look (G) askance

The(C) tide was coming in a(G) gain and the whale (A7) thought he’d take (D7) his chance

But(G) as he left he pulled the wreck(D7)  of our ship full (G) with him

So  (C) we rode the tide   (G) had a whale a time (D7) from his rolling (G)  rhythm

Chorus

But(G) the Whale showed us mercy, oh (D7) just before he swam (G) off

We (C) cried  “Gramer cy”  when (G) back on shore he(A7) kindly dropped us (D7) off

And (G) we bade him a fond farewell (D7) and thanked him for (G) his tail

That(C) had taken us(G) home safe n well the day we (D7) went to land the (G) whale

Chorus

Last line x2

 C D7 G

Northern lights

 In the north I saw the star

And in the North like a burning scar

across the horizon

Glazed so bright

The shimmering green Northern lights

Oh northern lights like an absinthe fairy

Dancing its tinkerbell

Dust so starry

In my ship I crossed waves like mountains

As in the sky were green lights like fountains

blooming over like a holy chalice

The rim of the horizon 

A broken palace

Let the hearts of Angels sing aloud

There I saw a castle in the clouds

Rain bow road

 The rainbow road

Tied me down below

The golden road 

The sun ran down

Burning golden, shining shield

Rain tied me to her, rain tied to her

Oh the motorway is a rainbow road

Full of all colourful lights

And we always believe at the end

Of the road

There will be a pot of gold

full of all our delights

But it is just another river of souls

One we may step into for a spell

And dip our toe, just to know

What it may be like

If we really took flight

But it is all back down in our lap

Yes it's in the lap of the gods we reside

If we only stop at home on the map

And take a good look inside

So tell me if you are rain tied

If you are caught up or hooked down inside

To the rain of your love or the love of the road

For love is a road to abide

And love it is a rainbow road

Shining in clear blue skies

So get back that blue sky thinking

Before you start sinking

Down like the sun or the tide

Open season

Jarred the feeling in my mind,
Like a door left open,
I've slipped on a lemon rind
And the taste is bitter to tell the truth
Like when I trip over
And chip a tooth
Or lift the chip on my shoulder
And discover its a scab
Covering something older
Than an cold kebab
Skewering me through
With the rod I made myself
Standing in the queue
For God to check my health
When he does answer my prayer
I become a soldier there's nothing
I can't bear
But a cart wheeling
I go down the hill
The jacks have been thrown
When he broke up with Jill
Humpty Dumpty's crown
Is in pieces on the ground

And his mind is tripping
On banana skins
Forecasting shipping
Is how the play begins
Somewhere off the coast
Of the Shetland isles
A captain gives a toast
To a room full of smiles
And now he sees her ghost
In the corner by the piles
Of rope left over
After the fishing net miles

A gull looms above
As a wanton crow
Flies in a straight line
But with nowhere to go
Than Follow the ship
The Fellowship
Of Worship
In the sea
Of snow
ho, ho

Caveman cometh

 Some people call me the caveman

Because they don't understand

I like to eat my mash potatoes and meat

But I do behave and when life is on a lathe I am

The one who can shave a dollar off the street

So don't roar in your hunger

Oh you saber toothed tiger

I feel nothing any longer

From the day I grew incisors

And my molars crushed my vegetable matter

In my teeth

So I'll be singing all day long to you

You know that I belong to you

I'm your songbird

Singing sweetly tweet tweet tweet

Fem ale

 Fem ale - ale for women

Lizard Tale

 To cut a long tail short

The lizard bought a new tail

In a tail sale

For her own tail went pale

And dropped off

For me it was beyond the pale

So I had some curly Kale

Mag pie versus Jay

 Magpie versus Jay

Jay

Chitta Chatta, chitta chatta Hey

I'm the Jay

In the the studio today

Recording my bite

It's open mic night

And I know what I've come down here to say

Yo Magpie, wight

Little black and white knight

Flitter like the litter

Outta my sight

I ain't saluting nothing

You're like a puffin

Always duffin

Looking for a fight

But you ain't got might

Not like dude Jay, he hit the heights

See the muscle in my hustle

My wing nuts are taut tight

Magpie

Hey dude, hey dude, hey Jay

Go make your hay on the motorway

You overstayed your parking bay

You owe me money, that aint funny

So pay up, this pay day day Jay

Cough up or shut up

Cos I'm gonna stick you in a coffin

With the lid nailed shut

Six feet under ground like a pig nut

You just go on telling porkies

About Magpies you gonna get cut

Jay

Well hey there sausage 

You've come to the right shop

I'm the butcher with his carving knives up

Whats up, you seen somein you like huh

I can cut you into rashers like a pork chop

Fry you in the pan like bacon

I aint makin some kind a joke

You  gonna be smokin

Like a pig in a poke

Chokin' on your words

Like a faux king

A sailor's carol

The bells are ringing in the rigging

From the mast they toll

Scotty's up in the crow's nest

Christmas time's on his soul

Hanging up the bunting

Safe and warm at home

Out here a storm's a blowing

Far out to sea they roam

Christmas ghosts move the sails

Christmas memories snap the ropes

All are filled with year-end tales

Tailing off in Christmas hopes

They hope they'll make it back for Christmas

Before the loving fire's embers

Have glowed in a reddened pulp

In the heart of late December

How does your love keep burning

In the hearts of Captain and seamen

Out amongst waves outrageous

To put out the bravest lights?

Hold fast men of Truro's ageless

Sentinels of land and sea

See the burning lighthouse wageless

Fight fraught and dauntless be

Until the tide rings in the changes

And brings your boats back to me

Oh come all ye faithful sailors

Make it back to hope's town free

Egret versus Swan

 Egret:

What you want to beat your wings for you lapping labrador

You lolloping lady of lake

Gliding graceful like a rake

Sucking up all the algae

Filtering through leaf

Sifting spattering beak

Gurgling and gargling

Like a kid at MacDonald's

Really beggars belief

And you call yourself a classy bird?

The King's own bird indeed

Well I think you need a reality check

This rhein ain't your own private beach

Get on over to the other ditch

You go and swan it up with the rich

This here patch is Egret land

You slippery bacon flitch

Swan:

Well, never in my life have I heard

Such words issue from the mouth of a thief

You come over here from Africa

And think you can steal my reef

Immigration indeed, I say

Well white is right, but then I say

I'd rather have a cormorant anyday

Than this bull ass biting beast

Go and huddle with the cattle

Go on an peck up their fleas

These banks are ours I say

This ain't the Mediterranean sea

You could have landed anywhere but

You chose the Wetlands of Shapwick Heath!

Egret:

Listen here my swanee whistle 

you've been blowing your hot air

If you could blow like a thorny thistle

Why don't you go blow over there?!

We Egrets have been migrating sure

From many a foreign shore before

But here we've camped, and here we've stamped

Our mark like a proud cow's hoof

Indeed if you need to hear the proof

We live in the trees see we can build nests

Hidden in the branches for we are blessed

By the Egyptian God Osiris

And it's in his footprint that we walk the Iris

You'll be flagging on the flag stones

And I'm making no bones

About it

We've got skills you can't kill

Or ever hope to match

Hopping over stepping stones

Looking for a fish to catch

If you want to lily pad

You lily livered beast

Then go along and motorhome

You know it's best at least

Swan:

I think that you should read the tome

Of bird etiquette related manual

To show you the map of your way home

That you should be able to handle

But don't come to me with your complaint

That there ain't enough room for us both

You will have to push the boat out

It's covered in your oily greasy

And slip along back to Rome

And the better fortunes find your feet

Than in this dome that is my home

My kingdom

Of Swan retreat

I'm calling up my royal friends

I've got friends in high places you know

I can get you kicked out the country

If I just wave my wings

So don't you dare, try to scare

Or insult a swan at leat

The only ones you need to phone

Are your friends on loser's street

Tamara

 D Tamara, Tamara, E she's gone away

Em I wish tomorrow D7 that she could stay 

D I love ya Tamara, E I've gotta say

 Em I've got love D7 to borrow

G And a bed D in the hay

D But Tamara, Tamara

E She's gone away

Em Tamara, Tamara, D I wish that you'd stay

G Tomorrow, Tomorrow D7 is a long, long way

Em To wait for Tamara D today

D Oh Tamara, oh Tamara, E she's faraway

Em She'll be gone til tomorrow

D7 Down the lonely highway

Oh Tamara, Oh Tamara, she's the one that got away

The love that we cherished

has been threshed like the hay

Well tomorrow, well tomorrow

Is just another day

Still in the hollow morrow

I'll be wishing she'd stayed

Oh Tamara, oh tamara , she's faraway

And in the light of the morrow

I'll think of promises made

Oh tomorrow, oh tomorrow

Is just another day

I'll be thinking of Tamara

like yesterday's hay

Winds a blowing, winds a blowing

And the chimes they do say

Don't you dwell on Tamara

For tomorrow is another day

The whale in me or Jonah the man

 The whale I am

The whale 

in me

I swallowed a whale

I have a big mouth

So they told me down south

And I just wail free

Oh the wail in me

Just had to come out

Oh try to be a man

But there's a whale in me

I talk then I spout

A lot of nonsense

And I'm often blowing hot air

When I walk I tend to beat my own tail

And throw my arse in the air

And when I go down

Oh when I go down

I do so without any care

For the man that I am

Aint worth a damn

But for the whale in me

They told me I was Jonah

But I'm more Jonah lomu

They said I was unlucky 

To be swallowed by a whale

But it was my lucky day

My sister Joan of Ark

Was sailing up with Noah

She said Whoa!

I said Hey!

Won't you give a man a hand

Out of a dark interior

Joan of Ark

She caused a spark

To burn a fire strong

Inside the belly of the whale

Which turned to jelly

Then got a smelly pong

And the whales tongue did burn

He spat me out

And Joan rescued me from the sea

I ended on an island

Full of all the brown boys and girls

Smiling and a laughing

Look at that man with a whale

In his belly

I looked and realized the whale was now inside of me

Whereas I'd been inside of it

And now every time I spit

I spout

I've got that feeling he wants out

Moon wave

 The dogs were howling because the moon was broke

And everyone thought the sun was a joke

But I knew better and knew it a yoke

Of an egg on Easter day

But should I say?

Oh should I heck!

How many have died or broke their neck

Trying to climb the ladder to laugh and play

When they got egg on their face

No, space

Is not the place for me

I'd rather stay humble, on bended knee

And celebrate just being me

born on Christmas day

(I wasn't by the way)

That was just for dramatic effect

To end the poem

In a convenient way

Now it's ended

I think

Anyway

History

 History isn't even a thing

If you don't remember

What someone else is yelling

It's just like a dream

Of Goya's scream

Or perhaps it's a beautiful thing

You can paint it as you wish

For it's just a dish

Set for the eating

You sit down to dine

With lamb and fine wine

But you find yourself repeating

History isn't really a thing

It's just a memory painting

All there is is now

So let's start living

Edelweiss the gangster

 Edelweiss, Edelweiss

I'm not good and half as nice

Look at me in my clothes of vice

Edelweiss, Edelweiss

Possession

 Once when I was young

I once had a love,

A love all of my own

But then a storm came along

And swallowed my song

And now I am all alone

The love in the trees

The birds know the breeze

The song of the wind they own

But their love has wings

And it does sing

Of song all on its own

I knew about the bees

And have sold many fleas

In the market of the lost souls

Who sweetly pass the day

Making their hay

Singing of the nothing they own

WolfAlice

 Wolf Alice, Wolf Alice

What's it all about?

Got a bullet in your shirt

It's gonna make you shout

Crying out loud with the

Pain of the world

Well you cry like a wolf

But you're just a little girl

Shoot me from your wigwam

Shoot at me through the trees

There's plenty of lice on Alice's knees

Got a gun, got a sun

And whole row of fleas

All jumping around

your sandcastles by the seas

Wolf Alice I love ya

You're gonna make me bleed

All the way to Alabama with

Your mouth full of greed

return your red coat to the fire

Wolf Alice you were trapped

By one man's desire

I should have held your hand 

as you walked through the wood

But I was just a wolf not a Robin Hood

I should have delivered you safe 

to your grandma's house

But instead I ate her up

Now I feel such a louse

My mother always told me

Not to carry a loaded gun

But now when I look at her

I think that I'm not her son

I'm a failure as a man

And I never made it as a wolf

I hope you understand

Or is it that you needed proof?

I should eat my ham

And shoot my bears

But I'm in a wigwam

Full of my own cares

Well they're looking to me

To fill in the black gap

But I'm lost in the wood

And I don't have a map

I should've been born a wolf

But I was only born a man

Now there's a big gulf

Between what I want and 

what I am

Burn me with your fire

Hurt me with your stakes

It was all my own desire

That made my mistakes

I've got ruby red shoes

I stole from a witch

And poisonous potion

That's making me itch

I start to grow hairs

On the end of my nose

And I keep climbing the stairs

And taking off my clothes

Shoot me once inside the temple

I've come here to prey

Because I don't like the hemp oil

Now I've fallen in love 

With a fallen Angel

She flies like a dove

Just as the bells toll

 

Quack a day duck

 Well someone said hey

And I said duck

What! Watch out!

It's a submersible, fuck!

So Quack away

Come on Quack away

The flippers kick fast

But it's smooth on top

So come on Quack, Quack

Around New Zealand

The times may come that it's hard to say

Come on Quack away, oh Quack away

It's all just water off a duck's back

So let's Quack, Quack

Around New Zealand

A tufty tail

And a beak that Quacks

Quack away, come on Quack away

You could be a Quaker or you could be a Crack

Come on Quack, Quack 

around New Zealand

Well it's jus de l'orange

Or it's crispy or chop sui

Quack away, come on Quack away

You might talk strange

But I think it's phooey

Quack, Quack around New Zealand

I think I need a doctor

For I've hurt my back

Come on Quack away, yes Quack away

But they give me a witch doctor 

who talks like a Quack

So Quack, Quack around New Zealand 

Flowers

 Well I brought you flowers in the morning

And I brought you flowers in the day

Well I brought you flowers

because of their special powers

I thought that they might make you stay

Well I brought you flowers in the evening

And I brought you flowers in the day

Well I brought you flowers

In the night time hours

Because I thought that they might make you stay

My heart is like a clock winding down

It keeps chiming for your love in town

Well time keeps slipping away 

like the sand in the bay

And I keeping trying 

to take your hand to make you stay

But the tide washes the shore

And I can't see our footprints anymore

And I hope with these flowers 

you'll understand that these hours

Are like the love that I pour on you every day

Well the flowers stand wilting in the vase

And the sand washes away in the bay

But in the evening hours

In the evening hours

I keep bringing you flowers

Trying to say that I wanted you to stay

And this day, now it is done

And the sun in its way has shone, 

But tomorrow is another day

And my heart is full to the brim

It's being sung out in every hymn

And just like the sun 

It is going, going now it's gone

While your flowers keep

Growing in your vase

Dead men's shoes blues

 I'm walking around in a dead man's shoes

But he had a big foot print

So I know I can't lose

I'm still walking around

In a dead man's shoes

I wouldn't say it harms me

I wouldn't say I've got

The same size feet as him

But I can still fill his plot

He's got big boots to fill

And currently I've not

Still I ain't got the blues

Just walking around in

A dead man's shoes

Don't kill me with kindness

But you can kill me with love

Hate is an engine 

And its mind is hot

I've seen a freight train

Rolling into the lot

But these dead man's shoes

Keep me living my plot

Your kind of love 2

 Your kind of love

Always comes with proviso

You can't give enough

Then you leave me in limbo

Going to to the supermarket

Looking for the best price Oh

Your kind of love 

always comes with proviso

I might walk the line

Then miss it by a mile oh

Your kind of love

Always comes with proviso

I see the dove fall apart

Tumble into the Nile oh

The dogs cease their bark

And the Cheshire cat smile oh

Frogs spit their dart

Of poisonous bile oh

Your kind of love

Always comes with proviso

Robin versus Blue Tit Rap battle

 Robin:

Hey what you think about me

Think I must be just a loser

Hanging round in a tree

Well, I'm the boss in the moss

I'm the stig on the twig

You see a red bolt

You better run, see

I'll be Robbin', I'll be bobbin'

I'll be mother freakin' hobbin'

In the cobbin, I'll be knobbin'

Knocking on your door like a dobbin

Blue Tit:

Yeah, yeah Robin you be fly

You be cruisin in my big blue sky

But watch out

You don't get a stick in your eye

Cos I'm pullin out out my bazooka

Gonna shoot ya in the pig sty

Gonna cream ya, double dream ya

Gonna make me some red robin pie

You ain't getting out of the net I set

I'm gonna trap ya in the lap of the God's Say Ey!

Robin:

Yeah Blue Tit tittin' you be spittin'

Some dope rhymes, I see you try

But don't be pittin' yourself against the best

You know I'm blest, I'm the freakin' one and only

Robin red breast

Now what you wanna talk shit for

Acting like you're True Grit your

Out on a limb Blue Tit, 

Just a Nip on a rose hip

You're a cold lip, But I'm some red hot shit

I'm gonna bee bop, beat drop

and sink you and your Blue Peter ship

Sure You think you're all that

Parading with your buddies

Round the one mile flat

But you be Mulberry bushing

You best be shushing in the hat

Drop your keys on the mat

You be leaving my territory

Like a little pussy cat

Blue Tit:

Now Robin you be Robbin

You be stealin' those things that don't belong

To ya bro,

You think you're my friend no!

Or that you can overthrow my reign

No, now go, 

I'm the only king of the tree

It's my Blue zone territory

I wear the blue crown, 

cos I'm real regal see

You're the false one

Like false teeth

You be chatting and prattling

Yap, yap yapping

Well little doggy

go bark up somebody else's tree

I'm the sayer, I'm the player

I play tic tac toe

On your little Robin show

I'm the slayer, mine's the wolf's lair

if it's tit for tat, then take that Red Crow

Hey yeah

Robin:

Yo, yo, now you're in my way it ain't good

And only I do the Robbin in my neighbourhood

I'm the thief, I'm gonna rob, gonna lob and corn cob ya

Stick you on a spike, gonna kibbab you on the MIC

You be fryin' ,

you be cryin' in the fire of my rage

You talk like Blue thunder, 

but I think you're a canary in a cage, 

you be so yellow, 

I could drop you on the brick road 

when you say hello

I'm gonna sellotape your beak shut, 

You dumb beech nut see?! 

speak when you're spoken to only

This my freakin tree 

Inside of my soul

D  I wish I could be young

(E open )But I feel so G old

D I don't know what's going on 

E Inside of my G soul G7

D I've got pictures of you

E Hanging in my G hall

D It's like it's all painted blue

E Inside of my G soul

 C And I need you in G my life

C And I want you as G my wife

C7And I feel you like G7 a knife

D Cutting deep E inside of my G7 soul

D I've got a heart made of flesh

E And a body of G bone

D And it's all such a mess

E When I am living G alone

D I call you the best

E That I've ever G known

D The only one to live deep

E Inside of my G soul G7

And I need you in my life

And I want you as my wife

And I feel you like a knife

Cutting deep inside of my soul

The outside is dark

And the moon it is whole

I think of the park

So I go for a stroll

And I guess that a lark

In the morning will roll

out it's beautiful tune

Inside of my soul

C And I need you in D my life

C And I want you as D my wife

D7 And I feel you like a knife

C Cutting deep inside of  G my soul

Too many Roses

 I walked upon a clotted hill

Too many, many roses

I fought for Virginia for capital

Too many, many roses

I thought of where the creeper lies

Too many, many roses

And blow my bubble gum dollar bills

On too many many roses

But what fore art you loathe to kill

Too many, many Roses

Love shall kill from window sill

Too many many roses

Said Romeo to her Juliet will

You marry me for my poesies?

And She said Romeo, I surely will

For too many, many roses

I lifted the lid on the fairy tale til

Too many many roses

Surrounded the castle where rapunzel shrill

Cried too many, many roses

And dead men tell no lies still

under too many, many roses

The Bloody Chamber

 We've read about necrophilia

paedophilia, and sarcophagia,

Never was it sillier 

than in the foothills of Transylvania, 

it was real turn pager

 blood sucking villanella

Sometimes a bit like Norman Mailer

But always made me chillier

Like on a cold November

But let's always remember

Not to forget the Bloody Chamber

There were hounds of love

And bats that bite

There were velvet gloves

And sword fights

Pistols at dawn

And chilling cold nights

Til you almost gave up your birth rights

As in a cold November

So let's all just remember

Not to forget the Bloody Chamber

Carter was smarter

Than a dumb darter

Her arrows hit the mark

Her archers were marchers

Who walked with triumph through the dark

Her heroines were Amazons

Her Amazons were Transylvanians

Her heroes were English men and women

But so were her villains

The Marquis did some bloody deeds

All grown out of twisted lily seeds

Of Ancestries that forced him to dismember

So let's just remember 

in this cold November

Not to forget the Bloody Chamber

Her mirrors were clearer than the hearer

With the lupin lugs

Her hugs were colder than the shoulder

That to a lover shrugs

Her characters saw themselves

Finally walk off her bookshelves

And into bright sunlight

And even the moon could sing her tune

And sew her yarn through silvery night

So let's remember on this cold November

Not to forget the Bloody Chamber

alright!

We've read of Dukes that make you Puke

Counts that had to mount

A child meek and mild

And pure as driven snow

Driven mad by his desire

She melts like ice in fire

And it's in the seeds the countess sews

A Countess I confess

I couldn't count a less

Unless she wore a headdress

made of Desmond Tutu's

Underwear

But a panting and a vamping

Went The Lady of the House 

Camping out under the stars

Of Jupiter and Mars

And Lily Plants and Geraniums

Rose gardens and Mister Lyons

Falling from Iron railings

And fathers breaking cars

And a daughter who never oughta

had got with that sorta

Fella, 

but at least he was a beast

And not a Vampirella

All under my umbrella

ella, ella, ella

Wolf Alice

Just like Cinderella

Sweeping up her Cinders

In the kitchen cellar

On a cold November 

So let's all just remember

Not to forget the bleeding, bleeping

Expleting and secreting, let's have

a secret meeting

I'll get some dead meat in

Bloody Chamber

Alright?

There were spaniels

 serving Jack Daniels

Pulling thorns from Lyons sandals

And midnight candles

Burning in the halls

There were vandals

Door handles

and phones

There were crones and bones

And stones

And Exs and hexes

And four poster bedzes

And medzes of witch doctor

Tones

There were juvenilia paraphernalia

Not a paranormal failure

Nor a whiff of a storm

To be seen

Just a dream or a nightmare

Just Christ or a grizzly bear

Bearing his teeth at me

Devourings and showerings

With dollars for dowries

And flowery soury swedes

And powers that be, and powers that won't

And the wont of the seas

And the tides and the moat

And votives and motives

And ravens and cravens

And graveyard eyes of big blue skies

And whole goodbyes

And half moon sighs

And long white lies

Like fingernail size

That grow in your hand

In the night

On cold a November like this

So let's just remember 

Not to forget the Bloody Chamber

Of Angela Carter

Alright!

Homophones

 Buy some new shoes Hungary

sole - soul

Will that bee be on the flower in an hour?

Our house in the middle of our street.

hour - our

In an hour we will be at our house

In an hour the bee will be on our flower

I keep my soul in the sole of my feet

It's way passed the hour, our hourglass is passed the time in the present not the past

Two bees or not to be said the hour to our hourglass

The harder they come

 I was on the up

I was ready to fly

I was so hung up

And left out to dry

But I sure messed up didn't I

Well the harder they come

The harder they fall

I was all used up

On a dirty road

Far from the sump

Of the motherload

The gold was dark

And the dark turned cold

But the harder they come

The harder they fall

So slew me now

So that I may die

But be quick with your draw

Mind that stick in your eye

You know they'll make you turn

Or they'll watch you burn

But all you can do

Is die or learn

So the harder they come

The harder they fall

Just like that rock

High up on the wall

The harder they come

The harder they fall

And it could be a boy

Or it could be a girl

But the harder they come

The harder they fall

You could be a pebble

Upon the shore

When the tide comes

up you're gonna roll for sure

Because the harder they come

The harder they fall

And how many are there

Who could answer your call

When the lights go down

And the curtains draw

The harder they come

The harder they fall

And some nights are hard

Too hard for sure

When there's no shoulder to cry on

Except the shadow on the wall

The harder they come

The harder they fall

Don't make up your make-up

Before your tears start to stall

I won't believe your eyes

Before you believe yours

The harder they come

The harder they fall

How to be alone

 I never learnt how to hold my own

Before I met you

I never learnt about the great unknown

Before you kicked me out of house and home

I never learnt but now I'm learning

how to be alone

Oh the tiger's of the night they 

are my rescue

Growling mouths and eyes bright

stalking through the fescue

And if you turn to me and laugh

About how all the photographs

Come out overexposed or under

Developed

Then I'll say I was learning how

to be alone

Stop wearing my heart on your sleeve

 If we can make it through to Christmas

Then

Maybe it won't be half so bad

If we make it through to Christmas

I will laugh and shake hands with your dad

My heart was on the table

In the heart transplant

I really thought him able

But the surgeon said "I can't"

"I can't do it, Frank!" 

"This isn't what I was meant to do

Now I'm starting to cry"

Go on and pass me a tissue

I said to him look here Steve, just try!

This is your job

Just try to be a professional

Get back in the Zone

And make whole the decimal

He said, no I won't, I'm leaving

Now that's what I'm going to do

But I cried you can't leave

Why not, you can't stop me!

Well you're wearing my heart on your sleeve

Oh at least donate to me your kidney

Or play me the smallest violin

You must surely be kidding me?

But Steve said I'm maudlin

I said Steve, I don't care if you're Admiral Nelson

Or Napoleon with one arm

You can't leave the operating theatre

With my heart, you could do me harm

Come right back in here this instant

And put it back where it's meant to be

Attached by the left ventricle

And by the pulmonary artery, is that clear

But Steve did come back and he attached it,

But his head wasn't thinking straight

For he attached on end to my nose

And I've had more nose bleeds of late

Then he tried the right ear

And oh I filled up with blood

It wasn't that I was seeing red,

but that auditory canal did flood

Finally I said Steve

Put my heart back where it's meant to be

Hove

 Heave ho

There are the cliffs

Westward bound

Heave ho

Shove off the sandy banks

In these mermaid ground

Low lie the jellyfish

Wriggling and writhing

While I'm in the crows nest

Rigging up the line 

Then

Hove, there she blows

She hove into view

Heave ho

On the line

That brings her into view

Over dunes falling down

Like deserts of sand

A thousand diamond water droplets

Crash in my hand

Heave ho

And the fluke splashes the water

Heave ho like rebukes

run from the mouth of the daughter

Heave ho as the lances

Shove in for the slaughter

All as the whale hove into view

Come through

 Did you come here?

Did you come there?

Did you come through for me?

When the night starts to darken

And cold is the air

Oh did you come through for me?

Where are the fireworks?

Where's the marching band?

Did you come through for me?

Where are the jugglers?

Sword swallowers and

Did you come through for me?

I put it in your hands

I left it up to you

Oh did you come through for me?

Did a landslide happen 

Did it slip out of your hands

Did you come through for me?

While I was looking for salvation

Did you make a stand?

Oh did you come through for me?

I was condemned to resignation

Like a wanted man

But did you come through for me?

Once I held the cup of nations

But you left for a foreign land

And didn't come through for me

Now I'm calling out on all stations

We've got to make a plan

I've got to come through for me

Islands in the channel

 The gulls are curbing the cold salty air

Beyond and above the house they glide

Confrontational wilful against the wind

A dark tan fence runs along the garden perimeter

Beyond it is the wild

The rabbit plane of rocks and burrows

And again to the west are the abandoned buildings

Decaying hospital ruins, the end walls of Nissan huts

Left over from the war

And the gulls keep these only

Except perhaps some ghosts of the cholera

Who must have died there

And hundreds of years before

St Caddock lived here, in its deep peace

 

I go swimming in the little bay of a morning

It is fresh and cold to leap in at first

From off the jetty

The inexorable tide rolls on and pulls in undercurrents

The shifting vortices beneath my feet

I made the mistake once of going through an arch way called castle rock

Which lead me into open water

Immediately the tidal force of the eddying channel tried to pull me out

I had to hang onto the rock for dear life

And it took all my strength to pull myself back in

And Swim to the shore

The monks who lived here all drowned once when visting neighbouring Steep Holm

The island is safety

A haven in the stream of the sea

The torrent of the water which rushes past spells out doom

To any swimmer or boat not strong enough to fight the tide

Back on the island

Gulls swamp the colony

In voices of communal caterwauling

And intoxicating alarms and panics are set off

At intruders, a visiting buzzard, a peregrine hunting rabbit

They are hounded and harrowed by the gulls

A gull that has eaten a baddie from the mainland dump

Is suffering botulism and is dying, the others harangue it

In gangs take pieces out of the weary bird

There is no mercy and nothing is spared

Weakness is despised by their vicious natures

 

We walk through their nesting colony on daily walks

And they hound us and swoop down, screeching like witches

Shitting their foul substances onto our cloaked heads and backs

Like vast covens of these pre-pagan, primordial beings

Left to their own devices for years on end before mainlanders rediscovered the island

They feel certain rights and privileges over their conquered territory

Especially that over humans, from our waste they feed, but want nothing more

From us.

It is enough they eye us with their harsh cold fish eyes

 Like hooks, each adopts a manful posture of chest out

And their stride about the path we walk just in front dares our confrontation

They are hard

Fishermen, sailors not respecters of land lubbers or those

Who cannot show aerial skill, which they do

Like crosses in the sky, no matter how hard a gale they take off

Like spitfires in the war

Brave as iron, steadying the eddies of wind over their trembling wing

Until that incredible scything moment of aerodynamic equilibrium

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Castle Rock 1 / Western coast

 Slipping off the ring of the horizon

A new dawn breaks with the sun’s rising

Ringed by land

Like a bride’s finger

Turned around a golden band

The lipless ruff  

   

Where are my hands

Upon whose back do they fall?

The land as a lady’s side in profile

Dimples, breasts caverns measureless to man that call

And the Rock giant of flat Holm

Has touched them all

But they wore him down that knowledge

Too much wisdom has led to his destruction

Fog Horn Station 1

 The vigil kept by Fog Horn’s people

Daily, nightly they go out

To worship in the weather’s steeple

And trace the veins of the clouds

Like an atlas, a weather map of the skies

And if by mishap, or kismet

The conditions combine

Temperature, humidity, wind direction, tides

To create that fog belt, that blanket

These souls so devout to their religion

Express their faith and reveal their vision

So that others may see though with blinded eyes

And as if a miracle had occurred those who were lost are found

Those who were blind can see with their ears

Hear through the mouths that tiredly yawn

A benediction and blessing that horn sound

As clear as the Sun’s first rays through the darkness before dawn

Last Poem of Flat Holm Island

 She with her cloves so black

She bitter crow, tooth by claw

The rattling steam cooker

Boiling the red hot hob

Hobbling as horses hooves

Clattering shore

 

Those steely stolen feet of stone

Clabbered the pebble dash dawn

Sorted in the graves

Of fish, rolling out the crease of sea

Ironing flat the deep

 

The bees of sleep have sung and hum

The waxwork town of men

All fixed are they

Henna brushed the tattoo lanes

Which wild willows blow

Shutters sound of shop door bells

Cling, clang ring of moneyed tills

Billowed bills and dollared dills

That faintly smell of sea sprayed sills

And that joyful, lawful wind

Which judges not least itself be judged

Just moronically mows down the morrow in moans

Dredges cats from alleys in calls from bins

Winds dogs barks around lamp posts

Their authors and owners

Trailing as cod fish on a leash

Clasping gawp gobbling as turkeys at the goblet air

Of homespun hamlets and heavy Irish hair

Just blandishments of bandicoots

And boron rods of care

In the cooker of his dreams

And machinations of a mind’s lair

 

Just hag the egg men

And hog the sea weed

Dredge the cock spurs from out the chicken feed

Chafe the chaffinch and fetch the Magpie

Palaeolithic the mega myth before I die

Follow the saintly swan too all white bread

The skatey scanty sea of scurvy hunger

And weevil whales that bore through

The biscuit of the big belly jelly deep

As leviathanic gloves that slip the silky thin night

From the dread grey sea

The shimmering shining sun as a smoky fish house glade

  Hung up to dry in a witch watchful sky

The sun is Gaol and Heights goosing by

The chimney pot pig sties

And roofs of ribbon rotted warmth that ties

All of death’s cold down to earth

Birding

 Can you catch an oyster with an oyster catcher?

Or shank a red, redshank

Can you shell the shell of a shell duck?

Or dun a Dunnock to his bank

And are you the one to witness the whim of a Whimbrel?

Or take cool turns with an Arctic Tern

Oh please tell me what Birding is in the end all about

Will you buzz a buzzard out on a panel show of ornithological knowledge?

To be cock of the walk, rank high in the pecking order of chickens in the run

While the sun is out

Will you gan at a Gannet, like you may gander a goose

Or might you take a puff at a puffin

Before with a sly smile turn him loose?

Might you throw a wad at a wader

Or take a snipe at a snipe

With your lens he is in the eye of the beholder

But do you see an eye for an eye

Or a tooth for a tooth

Can you turn over every stone in your search for a Turnstone?

Will you turn tail and run from a gull

Or gull at him back through the clear light of truth

May you lessen his black back?

Simply by painting him grey like the weather

Or fledge a fletch of his juvenile feathers

In the arrows of a Robin’s Hood

To hoodwink a Starling who sparred with a Sparrow

Tell me kindly if you’ve understood

Did you put the black bird down in your little black book?

Or put down the lark as a clown with a stern black look?

Did you flinch at a finch when he came around?

Was it you who took the voice from the mute swan?

Do any of you really have a choice in your wan?

Or like the grey goose do your clothes have some use?

You may hide in your hides, ride down your rides

Or follow the moth and the fly

For an insect is a gift to the very fast swift

As a wood pigeon is

To the peregrine or the Lord of the Sky

And not forgetting the crow

Who you too well may know

For his Corvidian cousin the Raven

Has driven you stark raving Mad

With his gang of dark vandals

Who are no strangers to scandals

In amongst the nests and eggs of the coot

And should you hold a full suit

Or a good gambit of feathery friends in your hand

Please keep them safe and

Sound advice is this :You may remember it is best

To believe you are blest

And unlike the cuckoo who intrudes on a nest

For the others' eggs out he will push

But know without doubt

Your life is not worth a short snout

For a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush

Buteo

Buteo, Buteo

Wherefore art thou Buteo?

On what holy wooded hedge

Where you make our hooded ledge

And wherefore do you fly?

Forever a convict of the sky

And conviction yes

More is the less

As with auspices make your pledge

Your blood bond to swear by

Vow your vows

Bow your heads

Here comes the vouchsafe

Of your lives

Give money, give roses, poses of heather

Black is the beak, brown is the feather

The air in some torpid atmosphere

Breaks like breakers of a wild sea

Snapping like a belt of leather

Sends up vapours

On whose thermals see thee

Oh how grubby are the praying hands

When they come together

Beneath wedding bands

And marriage yet between

Sky and land

Though thou art unknowable times of sand

For where do you come from?

Who is your mother?

Thy father is every falcon

Every hunter back to the age of man

But how many mothers can

Give birth to your skill

Your art is the destroyer

How learnt thou to kill?

Who taught you? Treacherous sky and wind

Tempest belly was thy womb

But land that keeps your harboured pledge

Vouchsafe in him

Your meat and bread

Father provider to a son born of the air

Always crossing the sun

But what cares the sun for poor Buteo Buteo?

He is forever a traveller

In search of his carrion loot

In search of dead gold

When the sun is treasure chest

Enough for this pirate

Who sails blue pastures

What more wealth can be searched for?

When wisdom is the treasure the sun has in store

And he but transmuted

The vessel of nature’s law

Sign giver and guide all those

Who worship him and him adore

Yet his auspice given, rewards

Neither love nor hate

But like the majesty of heaven

Reigns down equal upon those from His pearly gate