Song without birds

 I listened to the song 

The one without birds

And all I could hear were

A series of hollow words

I felt my life spiralling 

Way out of control

And leant into the wind

Of a hot blowing soul

The song was quiet

The birds were a sleep

Upon their stick nests

Nestled in deep

And nothing disturbed them

Because no-one could speak

When the birds fell silent

At the end of the week

Tuesday

 Tuesday is the longest day

Tuesday, Tuesday

Tuesday is the longest day

That is all I have to say

Give me Monday anyday

I'd rather Sunday without pay

Than waiting all day long they say

For another bloody Tuesday

If you think that Wednesday's good

Then bully for you and may Robin hood

Come and rob you for you ain't no good

But give me Wednesday anyday

Over another bloody Tuesday

Flash in the pan 2

 

The midwives were busying themselves on the ward

The porters were portering, and the waiting patients looked bored

Nothing much was happening, it was the usual rap

When a certain tapping began to tap

The matron cried "Ahoy there! I smell smoke between the sheets,

Either some aberrant's been smoking or there's a fire on the beat."

Just then the fire alarm raised a chilling sound as if to confirm her suspicion

And a-wailey-wailey went the sirens, calling for an intervention

The hospital crew acted bravely and with brilliance 

To remove the maternal mothers to a safer distance

Down the stairs they were evacuated

While around the bed pan macerating machine smoke circulated

Just then the fire brigade rocked up with their hard hats and their hoses

And they told all those locked up to hold on tight to their noses

And they stormed  up the stairwell, to fight the fire they knew how so well

The new mothers stared on with the look of one who had been stunned,

But then they relaxed with the resilience of the matron

But as they charged through the waiting room lane

A man decided to come down with an attack of chest pain 

The matron called for calm and order

So that her nurses could help the unfortunate border

Who had already had to wait to be seen

Now he had been seen he couldn't wait to leave

So what with fire burning in the upper quarter 

The mothers were gathered down at the breakwater

Of the emergency waiting room doors

But you know when it rains it never rains but it pours

And all these things were sent to try us

Including bed pan macerating machine fires

And before you ask if you can use the can

You better be sure it's not a flash in the pan

2003-2006

Then I saw the terrific red of his cape

as it was flown

in that moment I said

my cover is now truly blown

Then with lightning speed

he took his steed

and rode far away

I was left, my cover bereft

but to die another day

#2

Writing our fears in the wet sand

Angels dressed in armour whip us for more

so scared we cannot understand

when they spread their wings across the floor

The chiming clock was knocked on the head

Time quickened like a falling stone

As I listened to the creaking bed

Each second sounded like breaking bone

#3

The black wings blow

through the window

night breeze kisses our hollow rooms

As the caves under the sea

Fill with ocean sounds

And time, time

is flying like the black crow

against the arc of the white free dove

who explodes in flight

when the bells chime

 

#4The beige room

curdled in the  morning slant

of sunlight, the dragons heart

burns incandescently in the

under water weedy lake

 

in aging moonlight

 

#5 corollary man

No-one understands him like

a corollary can

He works in the mine with

other corollary men

solving problems

in terms of logic

 

#6

 

Like couples in the shadows

 you and I

go under the umbrella of the rose

Together with the crows

we fall and die

 

Together, together at last

The fresco of silence

blows through the leaves

unhanded the bees

drone on and on

into the night-time combine harvester

churning our last

into the earth

 

I was standing under the rose

When I heard you say

my name

by any other name I would

have come to you

but it was under the rose

that I could not move

 

The chiming sunlight on the ringing hills

the rolling landscape

the speechless views

I came and caught you

From under the rose

In a time of plenty

with the desert muse

 

In the land of heart ache

In the sky of crows

where summertime blossomed

under the rose

 

In a land of plenty

In the call of crows

when the pastures grew

under the rose

 

And tracks like snakes

leave us now

to where we wander

You and I with only its shadow

passing us by

under the sky

under the sky

the sky of the rose

 

#7

The ship in the bottle

The whisky has run dry

The stories and broken memories

have been thrown down

with the bones

the aching heart is broken too

It lies there with the stones

but high above

on ocean waves

Rolls the bobbing boat

I can pull it up

I know I can with my magic string

it joins me to the wonderworld

and the stormy ocean in

In the bottle

In the bottle

 

#8

Being a Daly person

down on the docks of Bombay

The clocks are melting on my wrist

The sky is bending like a closing fist

The first time I saw heaven

It was broke on the bridge

The second time it was hot as hell

All saints and angels dripping blood

into the wishing well

Fires flicked flames around swans

 

#9

I want to hold you

I want to hold your visions

I want to hold your stepping stones

As you dance across divisions

In the lime light of the salty day

I want to hold you

I want to make you stay

 

There cups and saucers falling

like broken winged birds

they're dismantling the sky

and their visions are

held in the palm of your hand

 

#10

The gadfly ignites his last

cigar of the hour

great pheasants dance to

the tune of a lepper

and Joseph pulls back his bedcover

to reveal a mask to discover

the strange places his love

for his lover

will drag the horse from a rubber

that wipes out the history of his mother

though not of his brother

In sinks and hat stands

Wine is passed round with a flower

The blind prophet takes bets

with the steel headed shower

as fine metal sheeting slips between the

known and the knower

For questions of philosophic truth of another

down drain pipes the sharks can devour

the locked minute within an hour

 

#11

Oh sweet apostrophy's moon

come back to me oh so soon

Recline on the surface of a spoon

and think of june

The cards on the table are shuffled

The mirror pikes voice has been muffled

in shipping yard quartz

are discoveffled

in the business man's shirt now ruffled

 We come back and haunt

down the loom

of telling yarns now festooned

a shape easy to see it's like a baboon

Though beauty is missed

(and your heart being kissed)

is left in the trees

by the binoculars of twitchers ees

The common moth has evolved

into a thing which his desire beholds

As docks mark the clocks

on the card when he folds

through living creatures he scolds

 

As I look out past the veneer

my mottled bird he is clear

the chastised spirit stays near

when the lungs begin to expire

 

This is obviously me being on my own too long

 And all the burning of the hour

all the magic dissolved in supernatural power

what's bad is good

when someone cries

in the land of the blind

fortune favours the man of one eye

there was no beginning

and will be no end

love is a lane

so travel my friend

To be all good is never

to live

This is obviously me

being on my own too long

 

This is obviously me being

on my own too long

This is torpedo sand

this is turgid eel of electricity

wrapped in life

affirmed in the sea

This is obviously me being

on my own too long

This is obviously me

 

This is the sign language of the sea

all the crustaceans by their birthright

are free

we all live in shells it seems to me

 

I heard the sermon on the mount

But after ten commandments

I lost count

It all just seemed too hard to get

The economy is thrashing under the weight of all the lies

Walking around 2007

 I made a last ditch attempt

to gain justice from finality

 

There ain't no pigs

in control of the farm

proletariat are worried

the birds are alarmed

the cockerels of the bourgeoisie

go cock of the walk

But its bread and circus'

they want

not God Knives and forks

There's sinews of power

struggling to be heard

Ain't nothing in particular

Sorry is a regular word

So frequent in the parlours

it's served with a cocktail

But the waitress is on strike

And I can't hear myself think

 

I stand by the piano

the blind tuners tinkering tink

the city is on fire

this is not where the judges come to drink

So I set down my own laws

in a tablet of stone

but they're easily broken

like human bone

They refer to the just wars

and pockets of rice

which America have borrowed

and so China look twice

It's a dirty plot

someone's running the game

but you 've gotta be in it

else you might go insane

 

When I walked to the hill tops

and walked in the bowers

the Chiming sounds of bells

I heard in the moral towers

 

Lords and lady's of the hedgerows

invited me to court

And there I lay with fairies

and dragonfly's me they escort

 

The tomes are shattered on the steps

the nightingale's song flows on

but like rivers' depths

the bird's drowned song

in tormented twists

like tormentile throngs

and jesters wear the masks of men

In animal spirits they rise again

The king is dead

the queen will follow

But so lives summer merrily

As she sleeps on the wing of a swallow

 

Ten thousand earths

are buried near

And human flesh is

soon to appear

 

on the coat of the stag

who does battle in spring

In the guise of a rat

who rattles like a Cobra king

mooring at the water's edge

where reeds mark man's emotions

like the scars of a lover's pledge

to die forever

or never live for tomorrow

As the forget me nots come out

I cannot feel ought but sorrow

 

Loneliness of youth

 What is this ? loneliness? - about?

 

You might meet me on the footsteps

You might see me on the train

You might leave me in the cupboard

or in the pouring rain

You might leave me with mother hubbard

or fry me on a stone

I might not look like an egg

But I crack like a bone

 

 

 

Has your mind been born

by bar maids braids

burnt like the skin

out of certain shades

Where sunlight reveals

the priests purples parades

When he throws down his herbs

and picked up more charades

 

Angel islington spit in my eye

the doves of paradise

have further to fly

if not for you

I would fall from the sky

And heaven becomes earth

the more that you try

There are words like coins

bushes of cherry

Born yesterday crusaders

In the pubs drinking merry

if you ask for an ambulance

I'd sooner walk by

I don't look at accidents

but they don't make me cry

I love you the emptiness

love is a loom

its wove into words

plucked from the moon

if you cancel out being

What makes the soul move

But a thought like a cherry

ripened in june