Facing North

Once I held mountain in my hands
But they turned to mountains of ash
Fell through my fingers like sand

Like an empire of dust
Blown away are the ghosts of lust
Blown to seed another field
Thrown out to birds the bone meal

Field of fish heads
Turning tail
Running through the burning hail
Stones are thrown, the first to cast
Will be the one who laughs the last

And crows count the merry pipers
Walking home on country roads
Reddening their apple vipers
For their wives to fill their calves

Spilling all the beans in saucers
Breaking bread with the cat
Whose nine tails like the vipers
Whip the cream until its flat

Down the road to elements
The natural gases heaven sent
But omnibuses carry on
As octopuses carry guns

And none stops a floating thief
As the moon rides the tide's relief

Red fox

 I saw a red fox, just

chillin' on the hillin

He looked so happy

like Just after a killin,

killin' a chicken

Skulking away

Like he was making hay

But he was in the field

In December not the month of May

I saw a red fox just a chillin' on the hill

and I saw a brown box

just millin in the mill

Nobody asked the cockerel

If he was crowing for the sun

Nobody even noticed

The day was nearly done

Coal tits

 Under the arches the coal tits dart

Around the quarry they flurry

Down over that little bit of swamp

Where the railway men's waste was dumped

Over the piles of rubble, brick work and industrial trash

The leached-into, the sodden ground, near the river, brown bushes grow

That make homes for the Coal Tits, they flit and dart between them

And hang on to the brick work

With their little claws

In the embers of December, they are the spark

In the grey rainy Novembers, they come again like filaments

of colours in the filigrees of green and brown, agricultural hedgerows

In the borders of the town, where the dogs and dog walkers

go around

Not forgotten about

But just hanging around

Like a resident nobody knows

Except you'd miss their sound

Because they're like a loved one

In the fabric of the town

A backdrop scenic prop

Except they chose to stop

There who knows, what senses

Just an ideal bit of real estate

To live beneath the arches of the viaduct

Close to where the Sheppey flows

Nature line

 In the brambles underfoot

The brash that's slashed with bill hook

As volunteers go rolling by

Swinging slashers and hedge trimmers high

Hear the sound of What exactly?

Slow worms crawling through the debris?

If this is nature unbound I ask thee

What next will they find to tell ee?

I saw a Robin, that I did

Hanging around the neighbourhood

He was interested in the action

The hewn stalks of bramble were his passion

He flew amongst the swinging workers

Willing to do what nature shirkers

Would not do, but oh we few

We merry few the strawberry line crew

Still you mention where is nature?

Well, it's thorns and rotten tapers

Of fallen trees long since died

Heads in the earth, fungi multiplied

Purple patches, even velvet ears

Grow on dead logs rotting near

And they crumble underfoot

Nature found it hard to look

But after humans abandoned it

Soon started bramble that didn't quit

And now we come to reclaim the land

Nature gives us a helping hand

And palms us back this great high five

Saying come and take me I'm still alive

It is something that doesn't want to die

It will strive, and suffer and survive

And every change or drop in pressure

It will respond more robust and better

Ultimately it holds all the cards

To life's big mysteries we find so hard

Love upon Love/ upon all

 

I came upon loves fence

Out from a walk in wilderness

And sat there for a while

Many a thought did come to me 

As I rested upon loves stile

And many a feeling too

Though so fleeting were the clouds above

That soon I abandoned love

and walked on

In that time all was white and fine

For the briefest moment all was bright

I said good bye to blackest night

And in my hand

I felt her hand

In my heart I heard her voice

Each was nothing

but ever most

She was too real

Yet she seemed a ghost

Each was hard yet soft

In my dilemma I had no choice

I had to return to love

Either to win the moon and stars

or to lose all of creation

Either to be bold to match the feeling

Or as ash and star dust

be blown away

Nothing was near yet nothing far

As all in Love's landscape

had been changed by trust

And silence moved my very soul

Yet in my heart

I heard music of harps

And all this I found in loves place

This love I found in her sweet face

This is obviously Pigeon Street

 Coo, coo, Ha, Haa, Ho, ho, He, he,

The slap and tickle the cackle free

Of turned up turnips

Tourniquet, tie around

a dignified neck

Telescopic voice calls out

Not a laugh, but a shout

You've reached the corner

Now turn about

back onto Pigeon Street

Real lives turn fake

Taken pride, prison cake

Somewhere within you find

The key to 15 Pigeon Street

Now yours, now his,

This wide eyed blink

Can you believe no Kitchen sink?!

Can you cry out, what drought, what drought,

Its dry on Pigeon Street

Come pour with rain

Come fill your pain

With Tears so distant they

Fall in vain

When windows blow

The prison cell

You'll know too well

You're living on Pigeon Street

Two eyes collide

head on with stuff

Graveyards, bones

Now I scoff at

Flies inside the beggar's belly

Calling out for Pigeon Street

Reading lines from long lost poems

Who wrote the Mayans

When they last wrote Home

Because they died because they lived

In the house on Pigeon Street

Railings cold, and trailers scuffed

Tears dry on tombes

You learnt your books off

And libraries close

And Roman roads all lead

to Pigeon Street

Coo, coo, Ha, ha, hee, hee

Hoo, ho

You know you are a prisoner now

Your keys are gone

but thought lives on

Inside the cracks on Pigeon Street

Take heed my friend

It does not end

That road which leads from here

there wends

When the light is gone

And all is cold

You know you've reached the pigeon road

And there no friend

One may meet

Unless its to ask

Is this Pigeon Street

elephant hearts

 Funny how it starts

And funny how it ends

In the chambers of the heart

Where we might find a friend

Elephants fart

And little mice mend

The holes in dresses and truse

Of the confessions of shrews

Who also need a friend