Poetry

Friday 10 February 2023

Red town

 Oh the skeleton traffic lights

Burn through the night

And I wish I could tell you I'm born

Born in a green town

And Die in a red

But I'm stuck on amber in my head


Oh the Bunsen burners

Light up the lab

Like the rigs in the cold North Sea

And I'm on a ship and I'm waving my flag

It is white for all souls to see


Don't make a mystery out of a fact

Don't turn the red light green

Before your history has been written in an act

Of pure white dishonesty's gleam


Shine out the fortesque, shine round the bend

Shine on your street lamp parade

For the bones of the dead street

Still hold sway on the ghost ship

As the Ocean cries hush to the waves


And the bin men come out

And they rattle about 

bottles go clinkety clink 

The indicators flash, in a cold hard dash

Like shire horses blinking at graves


I was born in a green town

Where the monkeys play

And the tin men follow their dreams

And the red light of day

Falls a lonely gloom on the streams

And I'm in a red dawn down at the bay




Tortoise who taught us a lesson

 once there was a very old tortoise

He was a very wise teacher and was 300 hundred years old

And then he forgot what he taught us

He began to think he was a turtle

and he wandered into the sea and drowned

That just shows you should practice what you preach

Lapse land

 lapse land where the reindeers go to forget

Buzz Aldrin's Wedding Poem - dedicated to Buzz

 I'm a moon monkey and not a Space Monk

And I'm gonna get married amongst all this space junk

There's no room to put anything

up on the moon

Yet it's full of these big holes

Where they grow space mushrooms


I want a honeymoon on the moon

I want to see you taste the honey

as it drips off the spoon


I can see stars in your eyes

And the sun through your dress

Reveals a new Earth rise


Can you paint me a picture from your room

After we've lived here a year

Tell me do you still have

Moon dust in your ears?


Don't you want to go for a moonwalk with me

We'll look into craters and eat space potatoes

And the lake of serenity will be our home

And the mountains of the moon

you can sweep up with a broom

And vacuum the moon dust in your hair


Speak sweet nothings to me on our Romantic walk

I think we are like the moon made of cheese and chalk


Birds are singing on the moon,

It's very quiet I can't hear their tune

There's not much atmosphere to speak of between us

But at least the lunar module will soon return us

Back down to earth

Where the air is clear

And I breath like a space monkey

With you my dear

Saturday 4 February 2023

Whistle stop

 South bound whistle

On a northbound train

You better get on the chance won't come again

Living in the breathing moment


Don't stand on the platform 

For your train will run passed

There's no use holding onto

The ghosts of the past

Here we come on the strawberry line


We slash and we hack

Beat a path down the track

But there's no use in regretting

We never look back

Here we come

On the train called now


Oh the wheels are turning and it's never the same

The platform you get on at will not come again

The wheels squeal engines throb

However you feel you finish the job,

When the whistle blows we'll be getting on the train

Here we come, hear us coming the chance won't come again


And the steam billows out through the tunnel dark

You might try to out run it but it's lit in you a spark

But time's train is gonna follow whether you do or not

Just keep moving forward through the blind spot

Here we come, hear us coming

Ecuador

 I in shoulders if

The back rights

And ships of knees

Carry me

To sleep

In dungeons of burgeoning

Twigs

Feasts for birds and beasts

And only oils of rain forests

Speak

Brazenly beaks

Boa constrictors

tiger cubs and 

Tolls

Of fiends and friends

And Pandas

On Panther lagoons

Driving Howler monkeys

Across the moon

In balustrades of vines

In Ballerina Kinds

And a love of Ecuador and

All Jungle is in me now

Jonny the train driver

 Jonny was a steam Engine driver

He knew his way around like a spider

Through dark tunnels

He would ride her

Oh Jonny you won't ride no more


Lay down that old track

Don't stop to sleep, don't look back

Rest will come when you're off the clock 

Jonny you've still got a long long way to ride


That steam train whistle's gonna find ya

On your back lying with the sleepers they will bind ya

But you didn't see something black move like a creeper

Snake bit Jonny like the grim reaper


Oh Jonny come back down the tunnel

Jonny, Jonny

Oh Jonny come down the tunnel again

On your slow steam train

On your slow steam train

Jonny come round again


Jonny saw the shadow of an eagle

Come down out the sky, it wasn't legal

And on his ankle lay a beagle

But he'll never ride the train again


Lay down that steam train track

Lay down the sleepers on their backs

Come make it narrow gauge

Just pay him his darn wage

He's got smoke in his eyes turning black


So lay down your pick and your axe

Lay down your word and your tax

We've paid you enough

With our blood and toil it was tough

And you sure didn't help with throwing jacks 


Lay down your spade and your ace

We can't dig your maid and her face

She's carrying a water bucket through tunnel hill

That's the place that she came when Jack met Jill