Lucy in the Skype with dial up

 Sorry I lost you

The connections bad today

I'm sorry I thought we

Would have more time to say

What we really needed

To come out with 

but I'm

Sorry I lost you

I can't hear what you say

Out break

 Although you could say that I asked for this

The advance warning of your kiss

The night was young

I didn't know who is

Friend or enemy

Jerrymander or carpet bagger

Of the socio-political scene

Who am I kidding there was no Queen

The scene was a bar just after dark

The comedians on stage giving it their all

Being brave the crowd enthralled

Or not so be the case

It was a usual night of comedy

And the old hats brought out their new acts

And the fact checkers were counting their money

The fried dinners kept running in

Delivered by skinny bunnies

In Alcapone costumes

And I knew that something was up but I couldn't

Quite sniff it

So I kept my nose clean and my eyes down listening

Like in a Bingo ring

And yet again I listened

Envious of the cheers

The actors on stage were receiving,

Sneers or sniffles at first

kerfuffles in which coughs fought with emergent laughs

In the throats of the nervous crowd

Who hadn't yet drowned out their

Nerves in beer or other beverage

Like myself

Though slowly the beer I had ordered and begun to drink

Started to take effect

And I took off my scarf

I relaxed from the cold

And began to chat to the woman with the dog

My companion for the evening

As if by magic,

By chance

She knew Dave the host

And my landlord

And I who had previously been half willing to accept his invitation of a spot

Was now getting cold feet

In fact the whole night hadn't given rise to anymore willingness on my part to perform

The larger numbers in the crowd than usual, their young age, all of this put me off

I wondered what true confidence was

To just get up on stage and act regardless

Perhaps my second beer had killed any false bravery or suicidal instinct I had to go up on stage

But the result was the same, since

When Dave came around and asked if I was going to perform

I declined.

My beer rested on the plastic wallet that contain my printed off poem

Printed from the afternoon,

That I had neglected and even the very sight of,

The very process of sorting or choosing a reading had

filled

my gut with nerves

I wondered what mental resources was needed for this kind of work.

I used to be a good little performer in school

But I do not think I ever really wanted to be

It was always what my dad wanted of me, for some reason

I suppose to break out of my shyness

It was a good idea,

Make friends

Make a statement

But it wasn't me

Perhaps this neurotic fool is what I am

destined to be forever

Without any formal recognition of the fact

Who cares

What does it matter?

Knock me down with a zoo loo telegraph

 Well it's been a night and a day

of delight

It's been a grey sky rising

But the sway and the way of

The newly threshed hay,

I feel my spirit's horizon

I suckered the punch

I learned to eat lunch

Without much food nor much money

But no lunch is free

And a supper's not a tea

Not unless 

Your thieves are inviting 

COME TAKE ME TO DINNER

i am a winner

I beg and I steal and hob nob

And the cheek of the butter

Is in the pudding you nutter

Don't go off before you finish the job

Of salient cheese

All down on my knees

Begging for a piece of mind

Well you can give me a jerk

Or a forty dollar shirt

But it won't ease the trouble I find

I'm back on the farm

But they sold the estate

No you can make hay or you can placate

The love of a hansom mare or jump gate

 Just let her run wild

Until it's too late

THEn CLOSE THE STABLE DOOR

And watch her escape 

for time is a post-modern construct of late

And women need boundaries

just as men do

You would hear me say such diplomatic make-do

Such poppy-cock of reason

OR WHAT A TREASON

 But brother no woman is blameless

And I am capricious

When they are delicious

But it's just a season of mind

I only knew one saint in my life

And I tried to marry her

But she wouldn't be my wife

She would never stab me in the back it was

true

So I had to do it

And passover to you

We all survived the ghettoization

Of souls

But glass houses couldn't stem

Our migration

And now it is gone there is more to go wrong

Than a bottle of bud and a barrel of rum

You must be Jo King

 Oh the clowns lined up

Two or three deep rows

Like an army of Edom

All marching from Rome

The clowns are freed from their slavery

In bondage to the King of the laughing gnomes

He lays them out upon his lawn

And sprinkles them about

With wild corn

They must laugh now

They mustn't cry

For the first clown to do so

Will surely die

Oh what became of those

Laughing slaves?

Who marched across

The sea of waves

They left him laughing in his throne

Belly aching tongue lolling

Beads of sweat on his brow

And shaking violently

Epileptic King

Whose madness was

The lust of laughing

The joke it seemed was at last on him

And all his castle walls so thin

For the laughing wolf pack

They soon got in

The howling hyenas of Jo King

His soul was buried in the rubble

When the clowns

exploded their laughter bomb

The joke went off, but was a dud

The real punch line came from God

Who let lightning fall and strike

The spire that conducted down into

The choir

And the singers burned as they were singing

For the king

His praises learned practicing

The joke which taught the king to kneel

The Clowns left off, high tailed across the field

Brush the cobwebs away

 All the spices

Of taste

And colours in the spotless mind

That sweep away the day

And in the corners

Cobwebs find

And pine needles

Of the Christmas Spruce

She used to sew

Her fine cloth through

All abandoned now lays

On the slate of the window sil

I used to climb through

On summer days

Now I dare not touch the handle

Even in my dreams

For the spiders there

Are multiplying

And the cloth unravels

At the seams

Oh to keep

This love alive

But in the end the body dies

And all that once

Was love and roses

Now wilts down

To tears and blown noses

Keep me with you when you go

But in the end

I let you go

For this world

Can't keep us both

And life has its way to show us

Take out again the Christmas wreath

And hang it on the door beneath

The mantle and the step

That guards the house

of no regret

Let the bunting splay

And the holly shine on the holiday

All these images of my youth

And whole childhood is proof

Of love once had

Must be removed

But recreated again under new roof

Sometime near dark

 Some time near dark

When you walk away

I understand you you couldn't stay

But the darkness falls

And the sky turns grey

And blue light walls

They fill my day

Some time near to dark

It's not easy to see

The line that marks you from me

You hold my hand but you do not say

There's a silence there just like falling rain

And I need no words to show I care

For when it's near dark I know you'll be there

Some time near dark

In a twilight hour 

When the gloming starts

And a glowing fire

I warm my heart on your embrace

Somewhere near dark I can see your face

So hold me close

Don't let me fall

When the night comes down

And the curtain calls

We step out, out of the place

We each have our roles on the stage

But now near dark

You leave me here

To watch the stars

In the night so clear

The tip of the cigarette

 There is truth at the tip of a cigarette

Which you cannot forget

Truth, truth for us all

At the tip of the cigarette

There are lies where it lies

between the index finger and the middle

But don't ignore it's like a door

On the tip of a cigarette

The truth it burns so hot

It burns down to forget-me-nots

It is the flower of the age

Of everything, everything we say

There is a truth of the cigarette

On the tip when you put it out

you find not regrets

The truth is on the tip

of the cigarette 

It is up to me to me to blow

away the cobwebs

The truth is gonna burn your fingers yet

It is coming down the line

It is burning up the paper

It is making you see fine

On the tip of a cigareete

You can etch it on the wall

You can stump it out at all

You can try to kill off the burning flame

But nobody will blame you

If you leave it there

If you never smoked it

It will still be smoking yet

And it settles like an ash on

Every last stash

And you can't get away from the smell

You can find, find the truth

At the tip of a cigarette

And you need it

Like you need life's proof

You can hold it in your fingers

Or you can hold it in your lips

But eventually it's gonna burn you

it's gonna burn you 

With its tip

So you better breath it in

And you better take within

Whatever truth you find, 

truth you find

Cos it's out of touch

And you can put it out in the Ash tray

You can leave out for the birds of prey

To find

Oh the truth is in the tip of the cigarette

It is burning for all to see

Burning in the darkness

When you haven't got a light

They will tell you

You've got something worth the fight

And it can get you through the night

The truth will get you through the night

Eventually you'll see the morning light