Railway silence

 The ducks on the sharp pond

The eye of the ice

The glittering tear lake

There bitterns shy twice

And Egrets and Herons

Stalk upon the fronds

Crushing and stealing

The icing on the cake

The glittering tear lake

Where blue sky cries

Into the fears and mistaken

Lullabies

Out shoot the swallows and in the branches starlings twitter

All above the glitter

Of the glitterati lake

Come see the birds swoon in their dazzling displays

Play fiddler on the roof tunes

As we walk the golden highway

And the yellow brick road shines

But there's no way we can stay

As I see the Tin man from Japan

Pick up his bucket and spade

And the black lion roars in the railway sidings

And his iron coat soars

And his bronze mane shining

Like a Sun pirate coruscated

and laid out on the plain

Dorothy is skipping doing a dance for the rain

And I'm on the platform waiting for the last train

But it left several hours ago, and my waiting is in vain

Still the rocks pile sideways and the Wizard of Oz calls

Here come the fortunate ones who have climbed

Over the walls

An end of pity

 What a pity it's the end of the road

I came down here thinking

I'd find a city full of glittering gold

But the road got too gritty

And I never listened to what my heart foretold

Don't drive down dead ditties 

Or else you'll never know what might unfold

Vobster Quarry (for Denise)

 I'm going to Vobster Quay right now

There's no one else here, 

I think I am free

Driving down the drove

No need of a key

I'm unlocked already

I put on my gloves

I get ready to jump

But the water is black

Like an oil sump

And So I slip in so quietly

The cool takes my breath away

I am brave, I am strong I repeat

Under my breath, some place that can't be

Me

But is some how

Then so cold 

I must move

Keep moving

I get that euphoric feeling

That high

As my body adjusts

And I swim lengths like I'm an otter

all alone in this quarry

After I feel so brave and so happy

Time's wall

 Are you barely holding on?

Quiet desperation is the English style

In a struggle with the Gods

And yourself for a while

Until something splits 

The pea breaks

The willow cracks

And a viper spits

And Then you fall 

To endless

Time

Oh Time's wall

The wall of now

For ever we climb

Trying to reach it

The present moment

Like a summit

That we keep sliding

Off of

Like ice

You see you cannot ride 

Or overshoot the wave

That crests ever on

And never breaks

But is always breaking and being reclaimed

The endless cusp of tomorrow

Though you can look through if you are brave

And see tomorrow and tomorrow save

A moment from the future

A moment from the now

Like an eternal suture

heals over

A wounded brow

And the closer to the summit 

The more clearer your vision through

The medium of tomorrow

Time's eternal blue

Ocean of forever

Man your surly crew

All hands on deck

Else we break our necks

When we try to push on through

Keep reaching for tomorrow

Keep striving for today

Keep letting go of sorrow

Like a pearl lost to the clay

It will be found by someone else

Another day

And its wisdom impart

Like the shaking bough

Interprets the wind's thoughts in its way

Snow Drops

 Like a lyric licks

The barley splits

The corn in fits and starts

Skits and parts chaff on the wind

Winnowing billowing gusts

And blasts that fast the breaking 

lines and rows and straps tied down

Over bales

And needles caught in Haystacks

Softly fall the snows on maps

Of our hearts and backs

And elbows tummies where

Tumble weed blows

And youth is but a refraction through

The glass of a crystal

Shatters snow flake

That breaks

But is still whole

In and of itself 

Contains itself

Again and again

Like a hologram

from the past

We ourselves change like snowflakes

Melting after a thaw

Our identity a fluid concept

That runs in and out of open doors

We are water based life forms

Beings of the vapours

And as the shore moves the pebbles

Through the tide

So we move heaven and earth

We tried

But temperatures froze us

impassable blockages dammed us in

And we could not flow

And still we waited cold and deep

Until across our surface

The ice did creep

And skaters came to play and score us with 

The lines of age

But nothing lasts that doesn't change

Upon time's stage

And in spring we thawed and our frozen expansion

Had cracked the walls of the pond

Until once again we spilled out

down new rivers and streams

And rills, rivulets culverts

and dives

And dipped into the caves

Where the bat thrives

And stalagmites and stalactites

Give us standing ovations and built statues 

Of our mineral foundations

And we deposit the past's baggage in river beds

And silt lakes

and we flow on more clearly forgetting

Not regretting our mistakes

Clear minded to the sea

Of all calm consolation

To join the mass hoards of starlit conversation

With sea birds and crustaceans

And bubbles where we glitter

And sparkle in deviations from

The winter bitter

And warm in gulf streams

And volcanic underground conurbations

A jet of steam is found 

To pass us through evaporation

Into the endless swirling ether of our imaginations

Where we write our names upon clouds

With all illuminations

Until the sun's head like lion proud

Roars in love and indignation

That he cannot see the crowds

Who to him offer their libations

And we scatter down

In snow flake crystallizations

Of the word for first softly fell then loud

But all in syncopation

On the hillside forest where the snow drops

Are praying

To welcome in the new spring

In pure white jubilation  

Christmas Swansong

 Talking of politics in the bookshop

And the rights of the individual

That Boris should be shot

The Money made by May for speeches of a kind

And others far too intellectual

They talk on the sofa of Feminism

And communism and dogmatism 

And letting go of leashes 

And losing all control

And I hold on to quiches

And break eggs to make omelettes

Of the friends I did not know

And put all my eggs in a basket of change

And hope to goodness that it doesn't feel strange

Because I have forgotten the weight of coins

In my pocket

And the feel of rain on my skin

When I enjoyed it

And Chocolate

saved up for and bought like a child

Or unwrapped at Christmas

And where has Christmas gone?

Is this its swan song that Morrisons

Are putting Easter Eggs up for sale

On Christmas Eve

What has it come to?

That you can't get served by a human being anymore you must meet a machine

A mechanized weigher

Do it your self

It will save us time and money

It will give us more Leisure time

Baloney

Leisure time is fine if you have the money

So who will have the money?

A state of lazy people who do not want to

Work

Nothing to do all day but pray

Or eat

Hopefully the former

But then their minds can be moulded better

They say

They can evolve like the Latter

Saints of the day

We will become a society of Saints all on our merry way

Doing Yoga saying howdy do neighbour

Oh you are committing a crime?

Well you know there is another way

Try being happy

Maybe that is the cure

But to be happy you must stop being poor

So we are back to the rich government handing out money to their citizens

The decadent society

The happy ones?

But then we look across the water to Eastern Europe

Are they not happier there, yet poorer?

Freedom to follow group traditions that bond each other in a fixed identity

Not this pluralism of mass individualism which

is driven by capitalism and greed and getting rich quick

Getting more and more is the religion

So where is Christmas, where are the Christian values?

Everything changes, they say

You have to let it go

We have ethnic diversity

Well we have enclaves, we have ghettoes

No we have love and strong community and rising above the fear

and hatred

Onwards and upwards like Peter Pan

Onwards and outwards and off to Japan

Sea fog

 They talk about sea fog and letting go

I can't see clearly to the land

They talk about white grog and hurting hands

Living with dinosaurs

And relics of bygone lands

They talk about sea fog that rolls in from the coast

The dirty men who love a ghost

The shattered, spent

And turned up hulls

Wrecked on the rocks

Of overdose

They talk about sea fog

And I can't see clearly

Through the melt water mud

Of frost and ice

I feel the pelt of rain

And The Celt in me smelt

Pain long before the dinosaur bones

Were turned up,

exposed

They talk about sea fog

And a withered hand

Holding a torch of freedom and

Perhaps the most I've ever wanted

From this land is a home

They talk about sea fog

And feeling gross

In far flung corners

And roller coast

Ers

But I switch off the forecast

And watch the football news