Wren story

 Straight as lace she walks

As an arrow down the catwalk

Tartan tinged with mace

The pace of hell and scarper

Escape the rate race

Come out West

Where the air is clear

And all that forgotten grace

Will return to ring in your ear

Sing little wren of the hedgerows

Sing and show that you matter

Sing because the cruel wind blows

And will tear your nest to tatters

Hold on little wren, your home

Is a growing thing

The buds will blossom

The wood will lengthen

And protection come in Spring

Hold true to the hedgerows

And eek out existence here

Raise some young

Or hold the one

That you feel most dear

Tragedy is a circling crow

Hungry for its meal

So fly, fly to the deep hedgerow

Or hide down low in the field

Fakery

 I've always wanted to work as a faker

And I finally got the job at the local fakery

I have to get up at 3 am to start faking.

Friend zone

 I tried to be your friend

But it just seems like in the end

I'm extra cargo, out in Key Largo

Jettisoned from the jetty

No more need of confetti

It was a dream on my head not a crown

But a cloud,

Just vapours of my stale air

Like inside a bell jar

All I saw was you

It's like you obscured my view

And I saw through your hue

Oh January

You're always looking forward to April

That foolish month

That opening of the year

Let's look forward to it together (They said)

We're going to plan to get clear

Together

Each year

(They said)

I'm born looking into the abyss

The darkness

Of a holiness

No idea how to conquer fear

So confused by the dichotomies

Wish my birthday meant a good thing

But it means a twisting changing

Like a rope twined until it's tight

And strong enough

Then doubles up and coils

Almost in a knot

It unravels

But needs the space to do that

That's me

Like cargo in Key Largo

Jettisoned out to sea

Mr Stephen Jarvis

 Mr Stephen Jarvis

Stepped into a Tardis

And went back fifty million years

To a land of dinosaurs

And minotaurs

And a place without no tears

It's a steaming jungle out there

It's a kettle full of fish

It's a piece of urban furniture

That is an artwork he can't miss

And flying through directories

The birds have found their perch

In alcoves and near rectories

Where alcoholics go to church

He's bound by books and fakeries

To drown his human woes

But finds in sound bread bakeries

His soul food fills his holes

I should have been his friend

I should have held the knife

I should have shattered the mirror

That would end his strife

But I made a mistake

I've dulled the edge of life

With broken hearted bottle's

Recycled absent wife

I've lived with joy and sorrow

I've come out feeling blue

There'll likely be rain tomorrow

And I've got a hole in my shoe

So if you have a love 

Don't trade it to the winds

For fat or thin, the dove

Will fly and never come again 

Miss Jennifer Parker

 Miss Jennifer Parker

Is a most elegant dresser

She's even a Fashion Professor

Dressed to kill in traitor's style

She'll catch you with her wiles

Walks as fast as a steam train or a car

There she goes, Miss Jennifer Parker

So trim the hem, and cut the shawl

And fill your glass with wine

So sew the sleeve, patch the heart

And follow the line til we shall part

There goes Miss Jennifer Parker

She's on her hands and knees

All day long

Pinning up a hem, trimming a sarong

She's in the store room mapping out history

With her pins and pleats

Kith and kin complete

With well written blurb

Never a wrong or missing verb

Then in the Front room she's window dressing

The models all stand there awaiting her blessing

They're ready for her and to be honest

She never puts bees in their bonnets

She'll stick it and pin it

She stays through thick it and thin it

There she goes Miss Jennifer Parker

So trim the hem, and cut the shawl

And fill your glass with wine

So sew the sleeve, patch the heart

And follow the line til we shall part

Miss Jennifer Parker

You go up and ask her

What's brighter or darker

She always knows what goes

What colours flow

What lines meet or cross like streams

Into the river of her fashion dreams

On point, like a dancer, a pinhole camera

That lets in just enough light to show

In polaroid, the cones and rods of colour and shade

Whether natural or man-made

Going back through the kings and queens of history

Going back through their stately home parades

Of the upper classes, mind not pint glasses

But the grape pitchers, she's in the sorority

A sister of mercy and the wine bar

It won't sound terse if I say she will go far

There she goes, Miss Jennifer Parker 

Love labours day and night

 Trying to find the words

To say I love you

But nothing seems to come to mind

It's like it was just on the tip of my tongue

But now however much I look I can't find

Searching for it in books I've read

Looking for it in signs on the street

Seeking it in the faces of people I meet

And in the pavements I tread

Nothing seems to work, no

nothing seems to work

The more I seek, the less I find

i'm wearing the same shirt then rolling in the dirt

And I wash away the stains from my mind

Yet nothing seems to work, no nothing seems to work

Even if I say it, you cannot hear

It's like at the pitch of a bat

Oh the dogs all have my back

But it never rings a bell in your ear

Yes my love it labours day and night

At the coal face of your heart

But I can't seem to break the ice

No matter how hard I fight

The hammer blows, they echo below

And up the valley resound

But no matter how I work at it

The right words I have not found

So I'm going on strike

I won't work for dirt

The love I have is in my shirt

It's on my sleeve, I still believe

But this just can't be right

For my love it labours day and night

A lack of diplomacy

 He was a diplomatic diplodocus

Long necked hocus pocus

Ranging around like an evil wizard

On his high horse like a terrible lizard

Willing to wager the country's treasure

All for some new shoes made of Spanish leather

Left the foreign office in a state

Ordered his love like a takeaway plate

Shining his star, but shone it too late

Oh that worrisome bore

Of diplomacy's fate