Restoration

Trying to recapture
Thoughts and dreams like light
Falling through cracks
At the back of the shuttered casements
Of our lives
We turn we shift
Into a fifth dimension
As an act of Faith
A twist of Fate
Or Hope
Or desperate clutching at straws
Concealing the flaws
Glazed, fired, dried,
We ride the currents, whirling
Flailing for light
We cling ever tighter
To something or nothing
That we can understand

Rage against Fate

Who sanctioned you at birth to burn me deep?
For I was good; am good, I will keep
Your poison in my bottle while you sleep
Those were the best of times
These are the worst of times
Who sanctioned you at birth to use your teeth?

Holding On

You hold my heart in your hand, unheeding
A curio to you, though mine, is thine
Dropping from your slender fingers, bleeding,
A proffered challenge throughout both space and time

But I must release from all obligation
Your faithless love, but glamour to my eye
Your sharp distance scissors my delusion
A hopeless love bids you a long goodbye

Hands

When life was simple,
Dimpled,
These plump, pink hands,
Now turned to lizards
Grey and white,
Blue and bruised
By life’s long
Corridor of experience
Gnarled and scarred,
Drained of blood
And stained;
A habit, which will be
The end of me
Kills, in the end,
Untended friends
Who serve without complaint, or
Vanity
Left and right and naked,
Functional, to task
This mother’s bitter iron grasp,
A badge of this humanity

Love and War

At war with myself
And bisected by his love and gentleness
My own hard shell enclosing more
Like Baboushka Dolls, unlovable.
Inspiring alternating passions
Like battling internecine factions
Born to confuse, cajole, enrage
Incandescent with violence and brutality
Yet
He betrays me
My oblivious Judas
Exposing love and rage
He cannot lie for me or receive my adoration
Yet lies with me, man, woman
Tough as leather
As I caress and stone to death
His innocence with my feathered kiss
He comes between me inside my bliss
And stones me altogether

Cyanide Snides

Slide and jive, snide and jibe
Your half-life on this stage
In this clinical theatre of threat and menace
You operate your sugar surgery
Strapping down, in gowns
Your coached conversations
Buckled at the knees you suck
Poached perspiration
This mutual ingestion
Injecting toxins to feed
The Cyanide Snides needs;
Your greed
Open hearts
Affections infected
You’re threading the needle
Making stitches to suit you
Cracked mirrors reflect
Your bitterest pill
And barbed wire sutures

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________
I suppose this is a hymn to all those people who enjoy hurting peoples feelings and putting them down who then turn around to say “it’s for your own good” as if it was their job to make the world better somehow by being as horrible as possible about someone else’s appearance or ability (or lack of) People can only change themselves. They need encouragement not disparagement.

Ghost Town

This place
A place I know so well
Where I am known
Where I now stand
Alone
Is strangely hollow to the bone
And full of shades of
Days, now gone
Shadows, dark corners hide
A haemorrhage of friends
Inside dappled deeps
Keeping their secrets in silence
The living have all moved away or on, or back
Where they belong
Yet I stay
A tiny dot, insignificant
Rooted to the spot
I hear them say
“We’ll keep in touch. It’s been great!
Love you very much, Best Mate!”
And smiling for their sakes through all the pain
My choices seem to dwindle
As their voices fade away

Shallows

On summer afternoons
On sun-drenched sunny days
The glamour of the Shallows
Brought children out to play
Their carefree parents saw natural beauty
Not the danger
Not below the surface, its
Sophistication
The simple local people know
Never let their children go
For therein lies the catch
Of rip-tides
The treacherous snatch
Of hidden depths
Trashes the pleasure
Of holiday snaps
Leaves gaps
Remember now, while they weep
Beauty is rarely more than skin-deep

Sister

Your youth, your passion
Little sister, once was mine
In thought, in mind only
Love, not reality
More than just a dream
A scheme of coping, with wanting
And hoping,
A Silent scream
The death knell of the dream

But profoundly, I know truly
That this hope of mine can never be
More than but the still-born baby
Of ragged thoughts and putrid fantasy
For Freewill is the watchword and the proof
That hearts desires cannot vanquish Truth.

Thanks

Thank you for the time
You gave to my belief,
The space for grief,
And my rabid self indulgence.
You gave me time enough to weave my little net,
And while it cannot trap
Or catch the stuff of which sad dreams
Are made;
Yet it saved me….
Nightmares and dreams found voices
In the scenes that streamed between us.
It all now seems so distant,
Another life,
Not time enough.