Procession

Please tell us how to proceed
When there's no one to lead us
When there's no living prophet among us
No Jesus
Tell us how to pray in the night
When the dark conquers the light
And we walk like lost sheep in a crisis

Please tell us what to do when you need us to
Please shine your light, please shine your light

There's a raft in the river, and a queen is a quiver
Because her Kingfisher king is not near
And a far off fairy is singing to Queen Mary
Shine your light, please shine your light

And as I wade through the reeds
I can gather what I want, but it's not what I need
So please tell me how shall we proceed?

The doors of time are flung open
And it's like the whole world has awoken
But the black crows above are crowding a white dove
And the Blackbird is yet to have spoken

So when I get what I want, but not what I need
Oh lord, please tell me
How shall we proceed?

Can I get a witness to this whiteness or some might call it grey

 

Failing the willingness to key your car

I stole it as I did the gold bar

And ferreted away the science

Of the screw that turned loose heads upon

The windowsill

And kept out good conscience and art at a tick

Because all that fall

Are not in want of a stick

Some who fall are great

And some who mix their chalk and cheese

Are wont to agitate

The grumbling rill where water's fettered course does take

Me back again to scenes that I have missed of late

 

This scene here is grumbling of lorries burring the edges of reason

And trundling armies of surveyors who count and mark each

Fork in the road while simultaneously

Breaking the back of the toad

Who sits and waits in a midnight road

For a miracle to occur

Or an asteroid to strike

Yet no it never does

Or very rarely because

We are stones thrown in space

And space is a glass house

Already shattered yet on the remake

Space part Deux

The big bang' big squeeze

You've got to break some eggs to make

An omelette I believe

And racing drivers take turns to buy ferries instead of Ferraris

And slow snakes squeal in the gears of dead Jewish armies

Who have raised the dead

But not turned over a new leaf

Who have prophesized their dead profits

In a game of stark relief

So, failing this and that I sit and cogitate my fate

To be counting rainbows thrown up

By the leaves I rake

And colour blindness fools me into thinking

Shit is gold

And not everything that washes ashore is jetsam

Which can be sold

But even if it were I'm tired of being told

I can have more of fairy dust when Disney's getting old

And Tinkerbell robbed Peter Pan

When he left open his dustpan

She got out the dumpster dust

and shook herself off

And told him he could sling his hook

And he did with his brother Captain Kid

And they all sailed down the Nile

In search of Cleopatra’s guile

but

Instead found their Mummies in the socks

They had left in draws

Behind their pictures of Santa Claus

Who is getting old not young

Being too long in the tooth

Just like his mum

He has false teeth and sucks his gums

But you can't teach him to suck

Anything else like lemons

Drive

 

Why did you drive that way?

Crazy hazy rainy day

When the managers pulled up their socks

And the power line fell in electric shocks

Why did you have to drive that way?

 

Why'd you take that turn,

Couldn't you have ever learned

Don't burn your bridges

In the road

Don't live in fridges

Like the cold

How all that I have taught

You've knowed

Why'd you have to drive that way?

 

Why when the petrol killed the sea gull

Why when the oil slick

Lay upon the seal

Why did the chicken cross the road?

And why'd you have to drive that way?

 

Why are the blue moons so far apart?

But when you got in your cart

It was as if the seas did part

And all the little fishes there

Stood still and did not dart

Why'd you have to drive that way?

 

Well perhaps it was your conscience

Or maybe it was your skill

At knowing all the unctuous medicines

Of the ill,

That you thought a doctor could never

be the kill

But the actor he spoke his lines

Like they were a drill

Why'd you have to drive that way?

Of times up

 How come I only feel happy when I'm sad?

Who or what is the false narrative of my dreams?

When it seems as if nothing is what it seems

And the dog in the chocolate cart has cut up all the beans

And lent me his kidney saying some goats have these

And shallow sharks that bite at bait and need the dough

Of my mistakes until the bread rises and snow 

falls onto the hot oven

Aw mum the witches coven 

have coveted my TV

And they are performing soliloquys on day time shows for me

And finally the darkness in my soul has robbed me of my bee

She flew off to sting her last, her very own

Virgin suicide vest inside the nest of vipers who controlled her buzzing mind

Oh hive, hive, behave beehive

I wish my bonnet to stay on my car while Jane Austen drives it

And for leprous dogs to shake their tales at Shakespeare’s sonnets

Who drives the wild geese of foment and town turmoil

Into a frenzy of unaccustomed peace

So this say last, the day is done when Virgins may bomb my dinner party

I wish for no more terrorist virgins to be invited to my party

And when they die as surely they must

I wonder if they will go up to heaven and meet 20 terrorists

Or perhaps forty down in hell

For tea is what one needs these days

Tea and a grumbling that life is urgent and must be spoken about and told

And lived and never sniffed at or denied

Or envied although that is hard granted but lived oh lived 

And danced and slanted hats at parties of vats and tax collectors

Whose shirts are all ironed is boring and superman even

Was invited but threw up when he drank the Kryptonite punch

I told him it was strong but would he listen to poor old Green Lantern

No he would not and that is what you get when you date

Some one named Jade or was it louis,

Well none's the difference she was Chinese and I'm sure she had a thing or two to tell me

But I've run out of chalk in this mill of words and the board clerk is filling his next bill

So be quick don't squark for there is more time to kill,

No let's never kill time, only live it

And let it breath life into us

We must be brave 

We must be strong and positive

For there are some who aren't and some who were but never got the chance

To live and experience this time we may waste

But instead let's hold it precious

And live it in haste

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