The long way round

 I wanted a walk and I wanted a talk

But a friend just could not be found

So I practised the lean art of the mean

And I took the long way round

Well I longed for a song

To be weak not strong

I longed not to be ground into the ground

I cried I'm a man not machine

And the trees all looked green

And I took the long way round

It's not much

 You know I'm not asking for much am I?

I'm not asking for England's crown

I'm just asking for a little pitch

Down on the green and the brown

I'm not asking for much am I?

I'm just asking to live

In a place I don't need to pay the earth for

Just to buy a round in the pub

On my own ground

Is it hallowed well, what on earth for?

I mean I know it's owned

He sadly frowned

But what if mirth was worth

The dearth of laughter

That you could hope for

But never expound

She Shanty

 While singing sailors sang

The sanguine signs of Sam

Who's on a Samsung ship

Who's paying with his lip

The service of the seas

Slip ship, slip,

shibboleths and fifths 

In harmonies of seven heavens

On the lonesome seas

So down to the lowlands

the lady of the lake stands

Upon the water's fake glands

And shakes hands 

With Jesus

She is such a shanty or a Canty Katy

Pantry of Pandas

Alexander of Anders in the Andes

She is showing, 

shining the showers

Of golden lining

No silverware is whining

To be polished by the sea

But the shore is sibilant

shibboleths

of batholiths

and will-o-the-wisps

of fairy kisses

foot idioms

 be back on your feet

land on your feet

get your feet wet

get a/your foot in the door

get off on the right/wrong foot

have a foot in both camps

have feet of clay

have one foot in the grave

have/keep your feet on the ground

my foot

 More idioms

not put a foot wrong

put your foot down

put your foot in it

hardly/barely put one foot in front of the other

rush/run sb off their feet

set foot in somewhere

under your feet

as good as it gets

 This is as good as it gets

So you might as well live without regrets

Down the road as far as you see

There is life

And that life can be

Something good if you want it to be

Counting your blessings

Say "I'm glad to be me"

This is as good as it gets

So you might as well live without regrets

She lived her life

Well we each have our turn 

On the stage of life we can learn

To be slow or to be fast and burn

This is as good as it gets

So you might as well live without regrets

Policeman

 If I were a policeman

In the beginning they made me study maths

bronze my skin and put make up on my face

all i wan to do is get stage

If I were a policeman

I'd Bang you all to rights

I was looking for a job

and now I've got one

 I'm so miserable

We know don't go

anywhere you want

you don't want to go

Stop going to the places

You don't want to go

You might like it it if try it

But you don't want to

Everyone who lived my life

Would be the same as I am

don't suggest anything

I'm free to do what I please

gonna move into town

you're all

a load of witches

You're getting me so down

You're so judgemental

 What gives you the right

To tell me how to get around

I'm a creep

What the hell am I doing here?

I'm a yellow belly

All I do is watch telly

Made an ear job

They cut off my dad's ear

I put it in a box and

I made a necklace

I'm thinking

of going away

Everytime I have to think about 

my cat

It stops at that

Poor Rosemary!

 Rosemary it's so plain to see

That I don't need you as you don't need me

Your heart is weak, you're jowl by cheek

I feel the sleek brush with death

Somehow

Your breath

You cow

Leaves much to bow wow

You dog, you growl

I hold my nose when I see you scowl

You are so foul

The lowest bowel

Could not speak better

Than when you sign your letter

Rosemary, I made my vow

Never to see your ugly maw

Chomp and talk

Like a pale wan stork

Who needed a chalk

Outlining or two

It's murder she wrote

When the dog's at your throat

Has the cat got your goat

Has the frog rocked your boat?

Your ugly rapacious mug  

Really reminds me

Of a giant sea slug

So I'll let you bottom feeders

Hoover the rug

Of the ocean floor

And won't see you no more

Poor Rosemary

Rosemary, you're so poor

Poor Rosemary!

Ghost lanes

 In the rain, in the rain

I can call out your name

In the rain of the wild wood air

No pain, no pain

When I touch the flame

That burns in my heart somewhere

In vain, in vain

I play in the game

But the pack is always one card spare

The lane, the lane

Where held your picture frame

And I looked at your long brown hair

Insane, insane

To be be feeling this shame

For a ghost who I know isn't there

Don't go, don't go

Sweet Sally Malone

Don't go where the pale horse rides

How long, how long

Will this carry on

How long before you turn out your light

Sleepers in rivers

 Sleepers in the river

Leaving their wake

Mourners in silver

Walking in moonlight 

Sleepers in the river

Catch them before they wake

Jumper lack the shivers 

Lumper jacks make

Timbers for archers

Whose aim must be straight

Flying fletchers

And fledglings flake

At the thought of jumping 

From a great height

But sleepers in rivers

Leave them til they wake

Hands at Work

Scrape on the river bed

Raise the rocks like you raise the dead

Pick the ground with the axe find the hole

Take out its claws

Clip Devils toenails, shells and barnacles

 Imbue with life ammonites and Brachiopods

Bring them back out of the dark

Lying there mud-bound for millennia quite happily

Read the lie of the land

This slope that dip

Roll up the rocks lift

With your hand

Dig up the turf,

Throw it down

Bore into the bank like a thief for the sand

Use the spade to cut out cubes of stringy

Rooty sodden peat, that is so water logged

You can hardly lift it

Precious, so precious this harboured flesh

Like a surgeon cutting out the Fat of the Land

It takes grit, it takes belief to make a path

A determination to reclaim that little piece of wild

Counting cows

 Now all the hills are calling

and the weigh bridge  is asleep

All the the candles blowing

And I can't see to peep

Out of the curtains

On the people on the street

Because it

all looks

As if it's snowing

Or maybe it is sleet

I hold the parcel

And they hold the meal

We win the castle

But we cannot take the field

If you had asked

Where I'd be ten years

From now

I'd turn and I'd answer

I'd probably

be counting cows

Troy town

 I used to be a policeman

but then didn't like it, didn't it

didn't didn't it

If were a policeman I would bang you

to rights

You have got so many vices

And it isn't nice

Come you must rearrange how you treat

The strangers

In your town

You bring me down

I didn't like, didn't like

Didn't like it

Don't you know that we're all the same

You call us by a different name

So treat us like the other

We could be your long lost brother

I don't think you have read that much

Never heard of Ulysses and such

Well there was once a place named Troy

And they spoiled the life of a little boy

He was just an innocent shepherd

Until he thought he'd be something better

The bright city lights

Changed his mind over night

And I didn't like it, didn't like it,

didn't like it

He fell in love with girl named Helen

He thought he could take her

And they'd be in heaven

So he tricked the palace by being their friends

But they never knew he wouldn't make amends

Helen was the girl next door

But he was rich and she wasn't poor

He stole her from Menelaus

Who got angry said Paris would pay us

Then he got Agamemnon involved

And it all went to hell in a hand cart I'm told

And they didn't like it, didn't like it, didn't like it

So next time you refuse a stranger a hand

Just remember what happened in that ancient land

The Greeks got pissed and they destroyed Troy

Well with a little help from Odysseus' toy

A little gift horse they looked in the mouth

Turned out to be the whole world went south

And they didn't like it, didn't like it, didn't like it

So you want to accuse and to blame

a perfect stranger of what's never named

So you want to mock and defame

A guest who's come to your house, for shame

They didn't like it, didn't like it, and I feel the same

I didn't like it, didn't like it, didn't like it

And every time you try to slander my name

And put out a rumour that tries to declaim

I did something that I've never done

Well I don't like that and your time will come

Yes your time will come, your time will come

Too many heads

 Nanny state and nanny's arms

Bubble gum childish charms

No one holds responsibility

No one talks it through

Nanny goat, nono nono

Nanny the boats coming through

Given women undue power

 Their troubled terms

Of Trump tower

I was sitting direct to trump 

He was small and irrelevant

In the corner another overheard

And I thought it was Donald bird

There was a swimming pool

the fast lane it was full of fools

The slow lane too contained tools

The middle contained nuts and rules

You wake and realise the irrelevance

Of all these theories of equivalence

Power is in others' hands

until it's wrestled by he who stands

To take back control

From  the bourgeoise capital

The monkey and the monk

 Monkey: I'm a monkey

Monk: And I’m a monk

Monkey: I've got a pocket full of junk

Monk: I’ve got a skeleton in the trunk

Monkey: And it smells like a skunk

 

Monkey: I am hunky

Monk: I’m not a hunk

Monkey: I am chunky

Monk: I’m a chunk

Monkey: I play the honky-tonk

Monk : Well, he’s a monkey not a monk

 

Both: We’re in a one-horse town

Both: We don't wanna let ourselves down

Monkey: He’s in a one-horse town

Monk: He keeps letting me down

Monk: Oh so won't you let me in?

Monkey: I don't wanna live without sin

 

Monkey: I'm a sinner

Monk: I’m a saint

Monkey: I'm painter who has to paint

Monkey: I'm gonna cater for you Cate

Monk: I'll see you later don't be late

 

Monkey: I am funky

Monk: I’m in a funk

Monkey: I'm not your a donkey

Monk: No, you’re my donk

Monkey: I'm wonky

Monk: And I’m a wonk

Monk: Well, he’s a monkey

Monkey: And he’s a monk

Monk not a monkey

 I'm a monk not a monkey

I'm in a funk, I'm not funky

My ship has sunk, I'm a song key

Singing out

I'm a monk not a monkey

I'm in six ton van

Gonna go uptown

I'm in a six ton van

Gonna drive uptown

So won't you turf me out

I'm gonna surf some trout

I'm a monk not a monkey

I'm a shonk not a shonkey

I'm a chunk not a chunky

I'm a monk not a monkey

I'm a saint not a sinner

I wanna lose weight and get thinner

So if you can strip my paint

I'm not looking for a taint

Leave me be at the pearly gate

I'm gonna meet Saint Peter who won't wait

The Demon Buzzard of the Marchy Moor

He will follow you tonight
It's no use closing your door
He will come tapping at your window
You're never safe
Always look over your shoulder

You might see a black shape circling in the sky
It might seem quite innocuous just a regular birdie fly

But look in your binocular, take a good look at his eye
He has a demon green sparkle in it, he knows you'll have to die

You might be out late one night returning home from the boozer
You might walk down the straight long road and be ready for a snoozer
You'll be wrong when hear his song, like a screeching upon high
Don't be long, you better run, because tonight might be your turn to die

Oh look over your shoulder, look back you better beware
Just watch out for that attack, never think that he's not there

But now he's got the taste for human meat,
Perhaps one night he robbed a baby from a pram
Unattended down the street
And now he knows the tender flesh crunching in his beak
He wants to take your head in his talons until you cannot speak

2020 visions

Well you married for money
Ah well you married for love
Well it matters not just what you've done
Because it's better than being alone

There are two worlds full of fire
And there's a land of the rising sun
Well it matters not who you desire
Unless you're the man who's holding the gun

Well I watched you in the window
That night when you should have gone home
Well who was that you were with babe
While you left me here all alone?
The dogs bark at midnight
The fireflies dance to the light
And blacks birds peck
At the wooden deck
In time to sea shanties songs

Life's just a dream that we all must
Live through alone but it's the fool
Who makes his world cooler
For the price that they put on his bones

Long Sutton Cricket club open Mic night -Silly point poetry

 Long Sutton, Long Sutton

You've treated us so kind

Though we may be legs of mutton

Our roads to you still wind

We all wish we were still lambs

You see for they are fair and kind

And yet the beat of iams

Still gives us our peace of mind

Your cricket team, they are a dream

But to me only a figment of my mind

For I always arrive at close of day

And the players having left I find

I wish one day to explore your moors

Oh amore a moor amore

Like those Romans of ancient times

Their feet walked on mosaic dimes

Each step a shining ducat or talent find

Like us pining to say fuck it valentine

They explored the world of gluttony

Using a feather to induce a vomit

Loved pleasure like Cleopatra and Anthony

Loved comedy as Wallace and Gromit

So not too different except for tragedy

They had a few mad despots

But let's not split hairs, ours not theirs

We've still got these open mic spots

So thank you Long Sutton Cricket club

For your haranguing and arranging

Now we've paid the ticket price for the night

The venue, hall rental and even more far ranging

Paid for the privilege of reading our rhymes 

in a space defined by performers

Just mind you keep well away from the crimes

Of pushing the boundaries of ex-reformers

For then like the Roman invaders who imposed

Their will upon the Britons

We hope our rhymes are better composed

And fill up the chairs we sit on

Freedom notes

 I met her at a party

I didn't know she was your wife

I only kissed her partly

It was once and never twice

She was leaving as it was ending

But the dancing carried through the night

I thought I was expending 

So much energy on living this life

All the parrots they are flocking

Across the rainforest canopy

I can see it now my head unlocking

That I just wanted to be free

I saw her much later on

And she recognized me

But I had already sung my song

Like a bird trying to be free

She was sitting up at the bar

She looked lonely to me

What was it that had gone wrong so far

She said the night was setting her free

I regret I should have spoken some more

I should have helped unlock her with my key

But I was already heading for the door

And my momentum was carrying me

There's a place and there's a silence

You must find within yourself

If it comes it ends the violence

And it's a key to your mental health

I can't be the one to save you

You must rescue you

But the world is full of charlatans and fools

Who will try and lead you away from truth

So what was she doing there

Hanging out in a crowd like that

They were all lost in their own way

Playing at life's blackjack

I want to tell her not to gamble

When she's feeling so vulnerable

The road is long and you must ramble

Along it, but it's understandable

I caught a feather in the air

The bird had already flown

I wish I knew if she was still sitting there

While I had already walked home 

Frog chorus of the river bank

 Coming out of the blue

I saw you in red

Coming out of the fog

I raised my head

And leaping onto logs

I said

I'm out I'm alive

Don't make me go 

Back down that pithole

I don't want to work underground

It'll destroy my soul

But likewise

I don't have the energy

To rise above this dull chorus of frogs

Who ribbet and bekekex bekekex

koax koax

croak their throats

At river boats

passing over