2003-2006

Then I saw the terrific red of his cape

as it was flown

in that moment I said

my cover is now truly blown

Then with lightning speed

he took his steed

and rode far away

I was left, my cover bereft

but to die another day

#2

Writing our fears in the wet sand

Angels dressed in armour whip us for more

so scared we cannot understand

when they spread their wings across the floor

The chiming clock was knocked on the head

Time quickened like a falling stone

As I listened to the creaking bed

Each second sounded like breaking bone

#3

The black wings blow

through the window

night breeze kisses our hollow rooms

As the caves under the sea

Fill with ocean sounds

And time, time

is flying like the black crow

against the arc of the white free dove

who explodes in flight

when the bells chime

 

#4The beige room

curdled in the  morning slant

of sunlight, the dragons heart

burns incandescently in the

under water weedy lake

 

in aging moonlight

 

#5 corollary man

No-one understands him like

a corollary can

He works in the mine with

other corollary men

solving problems

in terms of logic

 

#6

 

Like couples in the shadows

 you and I

go under the umbrella of the rose

Together with the crows

we fall and die

 

Together, together at last

The fresco of silence

blows through the leaves

unhanded the bees

drone on and on

into the night-time combine harvester

churning our last

into the earth

 

I was standing under the rose

When I heard you say

my name

by any other name I would

have come to you

but it was under the rose

that I could not move

 

The chiming sunlight on the ringing hills

the rolling landscape

the speechless views

I came and caught you

From under the rose

In a time of plenty

with the desert muse

 

In the land of heart ache

In the sky of crows

where summertime blossomed

under the rose

 

In a land of plenty

In the call of crows

when the pastures grew

under the rose

 

And tracks like snakes

leave us now

to where we wander

You and I with only its shadow

passing us by

under the sky

under the sky

the sky of the rose

 

#7

The ship in the bottle

The whisky has run dry

The stories and broken memories

have been thrown down

with the bones

the aching heart is broken too

It lies there with the stones

but high above

on ocean waves

Rolls the bobbing boat

I can pull it up

I know I can with my magic string

it joins me to the wonderworld

and the stormy ocean in

In the bottle

In the bottle

 

#8

Being a Daly person

down on the docks of Bombay

The clocks are melting on my wrist

The sky is bending like a closing fist

The first time I saw heaven

It was broke on the bridge

The second time it was hot as hell

All saints and angels dripping blood

into the wishing well

Fires flicked flames around swans

 

#9

I want to hold you

I want to hold your visions

I want to hold your stepping stones

As you dance across divisions

In the lime light of the salty day

I want to hold you

I want to make you stay

 

There cups and saucers falling

like broken winged birds

they're dismantling the sky

and their visions are

held in the palm of your hand

 

#10

The gadfly ignites his last

cigar of the hour

great pheasants dance to

the tune of a lepper

and Joseph pulls back his bedcover

to reveal a mask to discover

the strange places his love

for his lover

will drag the horse from a rubber

that wipes out the history of his mother

though not of his brother

In sinks and hat stands

Wine is passed round with a flower

The blind prophet takes bets

with the steel headed shower

as fine metal sheeting slips between the

known and the knower

For questions of philosophic truth of another

down drain pipes the sharks can devour

the locked minute within an hour

 

#11

Oh sweet apostrophy's moon

come back to me oh so soon

Recline on the surface of a spoon

and think of june

The cards on the table are shuffled

The mirror pikes voice has been muffled

in shipping yard quartz

are discoveffled

in the business man's shirt now ruffled

 We come back and haunt

down the loom

of telling yarns now festooned

a shape easy to see it's like a baboon

Though beauty is missed

(and your heart being kissed)

is left in the trees

by the binoculars of twitchers ees

The common moth has evolved

into a thing which his desire beholds

As docks mark the clocks

on the card when he folds

through living creatures he scolds

 

As I look out past the veneer

my mottled bird he is clear

the chastised spirit stays near

when the lungs begin to expire