Sonnets 2

78 Sullen Sid

Sullen Sid waits silently for trade.

Today's day-glo special – battered hake.

Business is less likely than a police raid.

Once, he pulled a huge carp from a lake.

Poor Sid, it isn’t much of a life.

He fills the fryer, sings the same song

endures the moods of his trouble and strife.

His motto – the customer is always wrong.

Now they don’t come. Like a bitter old toad

he’ll blame everyone but himself.

He'll curse the bright new chippy down the road

lug more pickled onions onto the shelf.

The spent fat, the plump carp, his grumpy wife –

poor Sid. It isn’t much of a life.

79 King Ludd

Moving through the city sinuously

artefacts are frozen in its slime.

In the river’s flux is your history.

you're a carved effigy, frozen in time.

A city rose up, slowly, from the mud.

You watched each tide, each sacrifice of blood.

Its long ages moved under your head –

ages of pestilence, fire and flood.

From the underpass an echoing melody

flows like water from a violin.

Telling a story that moves through me

it breaks through the city’s grey skin.

I observe your city, your blood, your bone

King Ludd, crumbling man of stone.

80 Rye Lane

Sleek and red the sixty-three

bicycles and vans converge –

Peckham’s traffic mingled in

Cacophonous proximity.

The noisy vendors’ thrust and glare

flows to the pulse of Africa.

Beauty is on offer here –

false eyelashes and human hair

mobile phone accessories

scrawny chickens and breadfruit

the ocean’s harvest, fresh and dried

the emerald of the library

giant yams, cassava root.


81 Dressed to impress

Basking through winter skies

catching the sun, your metal skin

has the angular thrust of a shark’s fin.

Poets should celebrate your glories.

Rising on stilts above an agora

your pleasing palette of orange and green

seems to reconfigure the street scene –

you are a temple to Athena.

As if this were ancient Alexandria

you are home to a million stories

a towering knowledge repository.

You are a magnet, a cynosure.

Dressed in your coat of verdigris

you impress, you are Peckham library.

82 The Lord Nelson

The palms of Queens Road parade raggedly
as if in some listless Mediterranean
of pay-day loans and graffiti
bruised concrete, a pale yellow sun.
Trafalgar Street leads to the Old Kent Road
where each pub could have been Henry Cooper's gym.
You can almost smell his aftershave
‘splash it on all over’, they called him.
Through the frosted glass of The Lord Nelson
like a sallow ghost, see the faded potman
his fingers twitch for a cork-tipped Rothmans
he is shadow boxing with Charlie Chaplin.
The pub seems trapped in an eternal night.
No-one would enter; not even the daylight.

83 Penge High Street

Believed to be in talks with himself
mad Tom is shouting at the trees.
Years ago time left him on the shelf
to rant his crazed pavement philosophies.
Draped bunting dances across the square.
I watch the bubbles rise in my glass.
Slowly. Not much is happening here –
Tom ranting, the flags’ shadowed dance.
The High Street has no need to hurry.
I observe the dappled play of cloud and sun
in the guitar shop window. Why worry?
There is a hole in time’s continuum
a friendly, unostentatious tolerance.
Why, one could almost be in France.

84 Epiphany in Penge

It is like worship, this Easter queue.

We search the aisles like pilgrims

studying a curious theology –

there is a puzzle in each plank and screw.

We carry our dreams carefully –

a new light; a shelf to place our hopes on

a hint of Mediterranean sun

on some gloomy suburban patio

plants that will breast the snow

as if they will live eternally.

No-one knows what to do

and no-one wants to be alone.

All we want is to be happy.

It is like worship, this Easter queue. 

85 Gold rush

It is like an old Wild West saloon.

Memories of laughter and fights

are pushed into the shadows.

Its patrons lived mainly at night.

They are gone, but their tales and songs

seem congealed in the deep brown varnish.

The boom times ended; the world moved on

leaving only the lonely and damaged

tarnished cups, a broken-down piano.

Hooded like death in a grey cowl

the scrawny man who no-one talks to

sits alone in the dark on his bar stool –

Penge Pete. No-one can beat him on the drop

between Cash Converters and the pound shop.

86 The Pawleyne Arms, Penge

The local guitar slingers are all here

They are slightly frazzled from work and tax.

It’s a golden blur of music and beer –

come down to the Pawleyne Arms; bring your axe.

Dionysius beats up Apollo

in cycles, new forms emerge from decay

good times are replaced by bad tomorrows

but, here, the old songs don’t go away.

The riffs are passed on from father to son

battered and polished like prized old guitars.

Peter Green, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton

are remembered in these faded old bars.

Their hair is sparser now; these cavaliers

revive the glories of their former years.

87 The Chandos

This pub is London's unfriendliest scene.

The decor is brown and corrupted maroon –

stacked chairs, like a junk shop or lumber room

a pool table's violent shade of green.

The locals display their team's tattered flag.

It’s a faded badge of hostility.

Fierce pride. Grimy authenticity.

Everyone hating them is their bag.

A giant screen dominates every angle.

Raptly, they watch inarticulate men

prod a small white ball, gracefully

around a vivid green rectangle.

For Christ's sake don't tell them.

It’s a kind of poetry. They would kill me.

88 The Paper Moon

They are demolishing the Paper Moon 

its thin walls were fragile, after all

moving, slowly, to oblivion

the fatal touch of the wrecking ball.

Soon they will be stripped back to air

leaving, merely, a residuum

a faint echo of our evenings there

nights of moon-drenched delirium.

A smudged thumbprint of reflected light

all the time, she was haunting our skies

like a shadowy ghost, vague and white

the begetter of our mysteries –

occasions of revelry and song.

Happily, the real moon will go on.

89 The Railway Telegraph

My father would have liked this hotel

its shabbiness and faded aspiration.

Years ago, the last train left the station

but no-one has told the clientele.

It speaks to the edge of town – their dress

the blaring television and pool

the day-glo flyers, the poker school

the bar-huggers, one step from loneliness

like moths drawn to a guttering flame.

Gwen Dickey, the voice of Rose Royce

and Bob Marley their music of choice.

It was the kind of place to which he came

The Parkas and Rasta hats here say

not failure but a colourful decay.

90 Remembering the Stamford Arms SE1

Welcome to the ‘Thirsty Bear’, your hosts

of what used to be an alehouse or tavern

exiled the former customers – their ghosts

linger like the shades in Plato’s cavern.

On the new menu, sausage of wild boar

replaces crisps and toasted cheese and ham.

The ice blue walls and iPads I am sure

are contemporary, yet I am

nostalgic for the former boozed up nights

the bloke from Loaded who used to hold court

the booming television and the fights

to get to the bar. England on Sky Sport.

The gassy beer, the time that Bonehead played

the rowdy nights whose memories don't fade.

91 Of irony and cool English pop

Past the new coffee place, a chilled refectory 

close to the station and the chip shop

a cool black hulk, it invites you to stop

with its flyers for music and poetry.

In transit, from doorway to doorway

I observe them – the wraiths

the cold air silvers their breath –

the coming up and the going away.

It looms through the mist, like a ghost ship.

In this Bohemia, this cabaret

thin young men are doing stand-up.

Close to the station and the chip shop

they are talking of music and Jean Genet

of irony and cool English pop.

92 Blackberries

The autumn berries sweet from the earth

are clambering over the graveyard fence.

The hawthorns shower us with rebirth

in the spring, in a cloud of incense.

Exposing our human fallibility

are the neat instructions by the gate.

In a hymn of praise to gravity

the stones’ comic refusal to stand straight

and their poignant and useless pleas

fill us with a sense of levity

Yet, here, the natural mysteries

are a consolation for our brevity –

the cosmic cycles of light and dark

in Shakespeare’s arcadia – a kind of park.

93 In memoriam

They cannot harm us, they are scattered

beneath oak and sycamore. Littered stones

express a vague hope for the interred

ash trees are whispering through their bones.

What on earth must they think of me

the curious dog-walkers who pass by

as I observe the leaves’ shifting filigree

lying flat on my back, watching the sky?

I could watch the trees’ liquid skin for hours

and study each miniature vignette

of bent mourners with their shop flowers.

Some are not forgotten – at least not yet.

We hope that someone will do the same for us.

Through hawthorns, the scarlet flash of a bus.

94 Nunhead Cemetery

There’s headless Harry or at least his ghost

the street that was blitzed by an air raid

the boy VC who died, too soon, at his post

all of them runners up in life’s parade.

Inscriptions plead for a future life

upstairs, but, then, there is downstairs as well.

Dear, x, a devoted husband, or wife

deserves to be in heaven – not hell.

Like primed fuses in the burial ground

it is in nettle and white campion

not the graves that eternity is found.

Life, not death, is time’s true champion.

There is no heaven or hell, only now.

See, it is breaking through each jumbled row.

95 The new rector

You came to Warehorne to give them hope.

Their swampy lives were short and harsh

they lived in fear of gibbet and rope

the lawless tribes of Romney Marsh.

They smiled as you offered them the host –

the new rector at St Matthew’s.

Already, they could see your ghost.

It was not men, but the ague that killed you.

The marshes claimed you; you won’t go back.

A yellow chill made you fall asleep.

Now, in the burial ground by The Woolpack

your grave is nibbled by the Romney sheep.

Like the others, you were corruptible.

A lonely bell tolls for your funeral.

96 The departed

They watch us, coolly, from their beds of slate.

They regard us, with their cold eyes –

the obscure and those who were merely great.

Their pale image offers no surprise.

They have left us, into eternal night,

slipped into the darkness, like rusty ships.

They smile faintly. They are in black and white.

Our warm faces will never touch their lips.

All has been evened out, even their sin.

They have departed, into the great shade.

Only the newly-gone can prick our skin

although a colour photograph can fade.

They are still watching us; their sepia ghosts

float through these albums of the lost .

97 Time thief    12 February 2011

You take, easily, what the others seek.

In fact, you make them look half-asleep

You are like quicksilver – a time thief.

Your glorious exploits bookmark the week.

Like the rest of us you must talk, eat –

a mixture or cliche and modesty –

On the dreaming field, you're a deity.

The white football is a world at your feet.

On this planet of ours much is wrong –

too much violence and stupidity.

It all vanishes when you play for us.

Your game is like a beautiful song.

It banishes fear and cupidity.

You are no satyr, you are Orpheus

98 Out first ball

Hair cut close, like a squaddie's bristle

they're well turned-out today, these guys.

With their smart blazers and striped ties

They'll go over the top on the whistle.

Torpor, snobbery – an English afternoon.

The cloying smell of newly-mown grass

hangs thick over the field, like trench gas.

Fear clenched in the knotted gut. Go on son!

For the school. It's your chance to stand tall.

Mortified. The rancid sweat and hollow laughter

of the changing room, a prelude to slaughter.

A black grenade drops from the sun. Out first ball.

It's only your legs gone. You girl! Hide your pain.

I hated cricket. I never played again.

99 Single Combat  3 July 2011

It’s almost medieval, this thrust and thwack.

It’s a denatured form of war

this trial of strength – defence, attack.

No one dies. Instead, there’s a score.

For honour, they disguise their pain.

Their favours and colours are on show –

the bloodless knights of Serbia and Spain

Novak and Rafael, in stereo.

The Serb’s the hero of the tournament

behind his smile, is what all knight’s must know.

That, soon, the prize money will be spent

the cup will fade, his lady’s look will go.

Human memory is all too short

Wars are soon forgotten, so is sport.

100 World Cup 2014

We’ll patch up some half-baked side

and impose upon bemused strangers

the delusion of our national pride

as if in some latter-day crusade.

To shore up our failed imperium

we’ll hitch up our beer bellies and tattoos

and mount a futile campaign.

We never win. We know we’ll lose.

With our polite lies and cucumbers

we say that winning does not count

when the game goes to penalties

But we are only lying to ourselves.

We’ll watch our dream soar over the bar.

It’s losing that shows us who we are.

101 Tommy Sheridan  December 2010

Tommy Sheridan, you're the new Oscar.

Your indiscretions are a national sport.

You are half-socialist, half-rock star.

Your dirty linen was wrung-out in court.

You had your silk ties and your perma tan

you played the courtroom – an alpha male

Wilde had his collars of astrakhan

you both had followers – you your wife, Gail.

That you could take on the establishment

was a delusion of your stubborn pride

a cell door closes on your predicament

sealing your fate, a few weeks spent inside.

Wandsworth and Reading broke poor Wilde, it's said

Let's hope that you fare better, and stay red.

102 Stop the war  23 March 2011

Ensure that a foreign tyrant goes free.

We can protest, without a violent end

but of what value is our liberty?

He is a Socialist, therefore our friend.

Utopia is for another day.

Democracy is far too us; too now.

You see, it must always be far away

in the doctrines of Lenin and Mao.

Their casual murder was justified

to guard the purity of communism

from the enemies at the gate, outside.

From us – it was merely altruism.

Put on your t-shirt, comrade, take your side

for a fashionable kind of genocide.

103  The British Way  26 March 2011

Cairo, Tripoli and London today.

Confronted by brute force, the state yields.

But understatement is the British way.

The police, pushing us back with their shields,

attempt to kettle a revolution.

Pink smoke blows down Burlington Arcade

Fortnum's displays an anarchist icon.

It's how our insurrections are made

with ironic slogans and paint, not tanks –

take a sound system to your attack.

Masked youths, with sticks, flail at high street banks.

This season's colours are red and black.

In Old Bond Street, which shows the latest fashion

thin young anarchists display their passion.

104 In praise of intolerance

What this country needs is ignorance –

to let the unenlightened have their say

those with knowledge have had their chance

let’s close down all the libraries today.

Political correctness has gone mad

modern fads have led us all astray

the increase in tolerance is sad

we need to end this liberal tyranny!

We should put prejudice back on the bus

and make casual racism our position

foreigners are funny, not like us –

human rights an alien imposition.

Let’s put an end to all this innocence

turn Britain blue as Stilton, it makes sense.

105 Blue flame        September 2011

With the kind of wave that says, ‘hi’

young Edward turns down the flame to blue.

You know, he says, I’m your kind of guy

that’s what I think and so do you.

The too well-pressed suit and strange hair

the wild, staring eyes and awkward pose

form a question – Redwood or Blair?

In the faint blue glow from a silver rose

the faithful punctuate his stilted speech –

applaud politely each artless glissando.

A curious camera plays on each

as they rise to his awkward crescendo.

A nerd in a debate one would have said.

No blood in his veins. At this rate, Ed is dead

106 What I love   (for Ralph Miliband)

It's the heft of winter that I love –

green tunnels through beech trees

boiled sweets and corned beef

country railways. The constant apologies.

Fried breakfasts and mugs of tea

ancient churches and old rectories

walks on the heath, with my dog

the tolerance of eccentricities

the throaty roar of a Jaguar

lichen on walls, the green of a thistle

the taste of marmalade, sour and sweet

buttered toast, the milkman’s whistle

the way that darkness falls unexpectedly

like an anvil over the old cemetery

107 You don't like us

Let’s be honest; you don’t like us.

We imposed on you our useless royalty

and we’ve done nothing to earn your trust.

Frankly, we do not deserve your loyalty.

We drank your whisky; we shot your grouse

we gave you our Victorian Christmas

you gave us Balmoral: the big house.

But, let’s be honest, you made fun of us.

Each year, we watched your cheesy Hogmanay

we paid for you; you cost us zillions

you gave us Baxter and Connolly

you died for us, in your millions.

You don’t like us and we feel guilty

we won’t be sad if you go away.

108 Last night

Last night it was whisky and tartan
Alex was king. We partied for hours.
We were blood brothers, we were a clan
The air was blue with saltires.
Last night we re-opened the shipyards
we popped Champagne, we ended the truce.
Last night, the future was ours
we were Robert the frigging Bruce.
This morning we woke to a cold, grey dawn.
We'd been stiffed by dough-faced Cameron
by Murdoch, by Edinburgh again
by bankers,  by pin-striped businessmen
by Miliband the wee little clown.
We burst the balloons – what a let down.

109 Rural poverty

Don’t bang on over what’s not fair

I’ve ditched the Volvo for a hatch

we’re down to only one au pair

there’s something mouldy in the thatch

It’s hell in Chipping Sodbury.

The hardships of our Cotswolds life

the day-to-day indignity

have made a martyr of my wife.

The pinch of rural poverty

is written on her face, the fear

of scrimping to pay stable fees

there’ll be no skiing trip this year!

She squabbles with the Aga louts

fiighting over cut price sprouts.

110 Our world

Helpless dolphins are herded to slaughter

as the sea runs scarlet with their blood.
Most of Purely is underwater
sinkholes are threatening Hemel Hempstead.

The jet stream is weaving crazily

the changing climate gives a sense of dread

life’s undertow, a vague insecurity

dark presentiments trouble our bed.

Each morning brings a new anxiety

competition for oil, water or food

species lost, a toll of war and poverty

the Miss Waldron’s red colobus is dead.

We would exit our planet if we could

and leave its spoil and beauty to our god.

111 Is this the end?

Season of easy forgetfulness.
Season of false economies.
Season of empty promises.
Season of inequalities.
Season of cut-down trees.
Season of food with no taste.
Season of poisoned seas.
Season of plastic waste.
Season of inactivity.
Season of loosening the belt.
Season of duplicity.
Season of glacial melt.
Season of disappearing snow.
Season of where did the seasons go?

112 The problem of evil

I study your resting face on the train –

a powdered carapace. You are on standby.

Soon, you will leave and be human again

exercise judgment, laugh and cry.

We merge our black clothes into the crowd

our faces frozen, because to smile

is to be human; it's not allowed

for each stretched minute, attenuated mile.

We work and rest, breathe easily or cough.

Our lives are finite, for good or ill.

We are human. The light goes on and off.

There is no goodness in the surrendered will.

Measured steps define our humanity.

Without ego, there is no morality.

113  On feeling pain in Sainsbury's

Self-service machines are speaking to us now

soothingly; they never argue or shout.

Only plodders are using the checkout

the grey-haired nodders with nowhere to go.

At least, they are not in a tearing hurry.

Their pace is infuriatingly slow

They fumble with pills, talk to the radio

stumble to Wetherspoons for a curry.

Today, I am travelling down their road.

I ignore the machines that stutter and blip.

Are you collecting your nectar points, sir? No.

Why not? Because I am more than a bar code

You cannot interrogate me from a strip.

I feel pain, I walk in sun and shadow.

114 Recipe

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Take a grey November day

add a late Romantic symphony

season with crimson poppy.

Watch as it bubbles nicely

let it thicken slowly around you

like a childhood Sunday

congealing like a glutinous gravy

as you listen to Tchaikovsky.

It’s good but you are not finished yet.

In order to perfect your recipe

sprinkle a final garnish of regret –

an unfulfilled desire, a memory.

The last dance at the school disco –

the one that you did not go to.

115 Today’s a day

Today's a day for being in

it's supposed to be a holiday

well that’s my opinion

it justifies my lethargy.

Like a feral pigeon’s wing

the sky's a million shades of grey.

Some rotter has stolen my zing

the swine's taken my energy.

On these occasions, the best thing

is an absorbing radio play.

Scrunched-up paper misses the bin

even though it’s four feet away.

To do nothing is not a sin.

Today's a day for being in.

116 Am I happy?

Peer through the spindle of an ash tree

so as to interrogate the sky.

Of its pale leaves seek a reply.

Look up to address your inquiry.

Ask yourself, honestly, am I happy?

Go on. I know you must do it a lot.

The leaves are just hanging there, shot.

The birds don’t seem to be. They merely fly

In intricate patterns of repetition.

Seek an answer throughout the galaxy

from alpha to omega, dot to dot.

I can only admire the ambition

of your question but, quite honestly

if you have to ask it, you are not.

117 On being happy

Having a future makes us happy.

The prospect of a new season.

Frozen in now we are in prison.

A sense of perspective makes us free.

Trapped in its human condition

the confined soul needs to see

emerald fields, topiary

something on the horizon.

We need, not to be solitary

a shelf to place our hopes on

a holiday in a new country.

Blue water and sky are the key

to release our human vision.

A sense of perspective makes us free.

118 The wrong colours

This is the washing machine we bought.

This is the painting that didn’t win.

This is the chipped mug you left.

These are my tears, to have a bath in.

These are my records, both of them.

These are all of your picture hooks.

This is the rose bush you never liked.

This is your shelf – with no books.

This is the orange blossom almost in bloom.

This is our Habitat settee.

This is today’s bottle of wine.

Today’s footballing catastrophe.

This was our room – yellow and blue.

This is the rest of my life, without you.

119 My new kitchen

I watched grey flakes drift from the sky.

It came on the back of a big lorry

I made the driver coffee – a Polish guy.

Three sugars. (You would have liked that)

Your ghost was with me in B&Q.

Looking at finishes I could hear your voice

as I matched the surfaces – teal or blue?

steering me through each hopeless choice

I have dreamed a room for us to occupy.

I know that the kitchen will look good

but I will hear your gentle mockery as I

feel the screws chew through the wood

level the cabinets, line up each tile

in a union that time cannot annul.

120 My new living room

I am going to edit my emotions.

From now, only plain colours are allowed –

no violent clashes of tones

nothing too strident, or loud.

I will prohibit cadmium yellow

and splashes of tantrum-spilled wine.

No manic crows will peck at my skull

there will be no burgundy, or carmine.

My moods will be rationed to five-a-day.

I’ll allow pale green or duck-egg blue.

I’ll move through a hum of beige and grey.

No burnt sienna – I’ll ban that too.

No sabre dances or bouts of Slavic gloom.

Tranquility will reign in my new room.

121 Ecstasy

I have been there, bought the tee-shirt, done that

and so, I no longer desire to be

some hippy loon sitting under a tree

spaced out, grinning like a Cheshire cat.

To be frank, I prefer reality

to a full-frontal chemical attack.

If I were to go there, I would have to come back –

a return ticket from epiphany.

I've dropped a tab or two, I've been there

I've read the manual, but now it grates –

the druggy one by Timothy Leary.

Now, in a circular world, I am square.

I'd much rather be with the straights

than zonked out of my head on ecstasy.

123 Reflection

The barber's mirror makes me want to hide.

As we look at each other, warily –

today's me and the thin man inside.

We resemble each other scarily.

Certainly, we share the same skin.

He studies with dispassionate eyes

the rumpled shirt, the folds around the chin.

This is it mate; your new disguise.

Part of me would like to walk out as him –

my mind with a new body – oh wow!

But I am lazy. I'd have to join a gym.

Probably, it's too late for that now.

Anyway, I would have to lose my history

experience; the years that thickened me.

124 Travelling hopefully

It is a noble act to labour and save

to thrash the motorways, to work hard.

Their charcoal grey suits and aftershave

radiate a modest self-regard.

In a hierarchy of vertical esteem

they cluster, in groups, around the bar.

Travelling salesmen. Of what do they dream?

Of a quicker route, a superior car

a freshly-ironed shirt, a silk tie.

They travel hopefully eternally.

It was the rim for them, not the bulls-eye.

They work hard for the family.

In the middle lane, neither peasant nor king

on the motorway, hopefully travelling.

125 Work

The same journey. The same journey each day.

Every morning, a parade of sensation

on our odyssey to bus stop or station

is imploring us silently – run away!

Daily we are welcomed by the same face

into a lonely world of stationery.

Why do we live in this kingdom of grey

on the starting blocks of the rat race?

As each new season comes and goes

we walk blindly from Friday to Friday.

Spring exposes the blossoms of May

the trees on the common change their clothes.

Without our days of work where would we be?

In the terror of mere anarchy.

126  The betrayal

Our human pulses are warmed by the sun’s fires.

But, sometimes, we turn away from the sun

to go down alleyways. We glance up at the skies.

One evening, when the cold white moon shone

bewitched by her icy brilliance

I was drawn in by her dark glamour

her shy demeanour, her veiled glance.

Of the cold white moon I was enamoured.

I passed through the gate of my desires

and felt the delicate touch of a new bride

but in her body I discovered yours

as if we were touching, side by side.

Embers cool down that once glowed red.

It was you I wanted. Now our love is dead.

127 No such colour

Now black, now bright, now in shadow

changing her face to suit the time

she displays herself in the sky’s window

she haunts our dream life like a floating mime.

I have seen her stippled beauty laid bare.

I do not appear at night, but she

darts into cloud cover like a hare

and rides through the heavens wantonly.

Ethereal, she always come back

sometimes veiled to cover her innocence.

Now in shadow, now bright, now black

she cannot outdo me in  radiance

for she merely returns my light

and there is no such colour as white.

128 The stranger

You’re the shyest guest at the party

your changing face has many moods

you charmed the guests on the balcony

you lit up the old house in the woods

you whipped the sea into a frenzy.

you taught Orpheus to play the lyre

without you there would no poetry

I bathed my face in your cold fire.

You’re the witch doctor at the carnival

you gave us fever, you gave us rhyme

you loiter around the hospital

without you, there would be no time.

Always invited you don’t always come

you’re mysterious, the zero in the sum.

129 The bulls at Knossos

Oh you think you are so good.

No-one asked you to pass by

with your vampires and fake blood.

You make wolves howl and babies cry.

Like some moth-eaten Svengali

carefully, you coached each Muse.

You’re an embarrassment, a cliché

at Knossus, you ran the sacred bulls.

You float, like an anaemic flower

in your fortress of selenium.

You are passive, you have no real power.

Your religion is delirium.

Though you merely reflect the sun’s light

some are led by you to dream or fight.


130 Poor Odysseus

You are known in the local nick

and, also, down at the police station

for inspiring every lunatic

in this inebriated nation.

Look what you did to poor Odysseus –

you gave Circe the potion for his wine.

in order to make a fool of us

you turned all of his men into swine.

As you creep around the sky at night

staring down with your owl's eye

you like to make us argue and fight.

But, if I were to use as an alibi

the fact that you toy with us for sport

my words would simply be laughed out of court.

131 World of interiors

Dreaming, we move from room to room

through interiors that flatter our eyes

easily seduced by ink and perfume

filling our lives – we are like magpies.

Through the shadows thrown onto a blank wall

it is the condition of fashion

to provide a Platonic ideal.

Each page is a blueprint for our passion.

I like that one; this one is so cool.

A bright, uncluttered kitchen to walk through

the perfect room; that picture of a girl

I love that. It’s so minimalist. Do you?

Our interior templates can be seen

in the pages of this glossy magazine.

132 Vampires

Great slabs of light-refracting gloom

are laid out, dismally, across the lobby.

They seem to suck light from the room

shocking the easily shocked was your hobby.

Life is short. You gave them a new angle

an offering for your vampiric brood.

You gave them a dark red rectangle.

It was a metaphor made from your blood.

You knew that you would die soon.

No light for you. You liked to look down.

Let this growling tantrum in maroon

this absence of light, this sullen frown

this dismal slab, be your memorial

It worked for them. Your art was janitorial.

133 The new faces of 1958

The future is beckoning them

from a bedsit in Notting Hall Gate.

They'll smash colour, like an atom

They’re the new faces of 1958!

Have you seen the Jackson Pollock?
It’s taking Whitechapel by storm
like Tommy Steele and his caveman rock.
With a Ginsberg howl, they’ve all gone freeform.
Being shocking and new is their riff.
They are excited about Rothko.
They’re taking a waltz on grandad’s quiff
They loved This is Tomorrow.

It's strange how things come back again –

Rita Ora is the new Alma Cogan.

134 The art dealer

I says, ‘put on your coat’.

She wouldn’t stop her yap

so I’ve grabbed her round throat
I ain’t given her no slap!
OK, it don’t look good
but them cameras, they lied.
Look at it this way, blood
She’s hardly even cried!
She’s made me do it, the tart
by flirting with every bloke.
She knows nuffink about art
She’s turned me into joke!
She's made me do it, I swear.
She’s scared I’m looking elsewhere

135 Goddess

Think of me as your Cavalier.

You are my Tigra, my Golf, my Yaris.

I would like to take you for a beer

or for a leisurely weekend, in Paris.

Think of me as your Subaru.

You are my Clio, my Saxo my Polo.

There is little I wouldn’t do for you

I would even give you my last Rolo.

Think of me as your Granada.

I would lend you my best winter coat.

I would be kinder, try harder

than that brute who grabbed you round the throat.

You are my Prius, Nigella.

My Cherry; I’m your kind of fella.

136 Thin ice   (in memory of Seamus Heaney 1939-2013)

The ice is thin, we risk falling through

and yet we cross the frozen lake.

Is it because we have no choice

or is it because we want to?

You showed us how. You had been there before.

We were reassured by your voice

your strong narratives of blood and place

the grace of your words, your nonchalance.

To be human is to edge calamity 

and yet, you crossed the lake effortlessly.

Your poems were not merely beautiful.

You were never afraid to look down and

you were perfect in your ordariness.

Rockstars attended your funeral.

137  Mr Stone

Ballads of sailors on the Spanish Main.

With these, and others, he would punish us.

Tales of grieving for dead fishermen

as outmoded as ruffle or blunderbuss.

Poor Mr Stone – his tortured life.

Staring dolefully from the piano

telling us stories about his wife.

He must have been depressed. I know that now.

With a dull ache of melancholy

I remember him, poor Mr Stone

his long face and wounded gentility

the sound of his plangent baritone

in those music lessons at my school –

the sea shanty and Negro spiritual.

138 The king of bores

Life was happening. You did not see.

It was being unboxed around the bus –

colours, shutters, clouds in windows, graffiti.

You did not see them. Instead you annoyed us.

You acted as if we were not there.

To appropriate a metaphor

you showed us your underwear.

A blind person would have noticed more.

You did not acknowledge us; instead

you invited us into your brain

through the implement clamped to your head

in a soliloquy of the inane.

Some voices are mellifluous. Not yours.

It irritates. You are the king of bores

139 Alpha

His suits are sharp, he works at night

a hint of stubble, shadowed eyes

his website is in black and white

to cross him would be most unwise.

He hunts wild animal for sport

antlered creatures in a wood.

His car is the high-octane sort –

He’d suck the tailpipe if he could.

The papers love his bad-boy looks

the craggy fissures of his face

he is the alpha of the cooks.

See his keen blade unzip a place.

His bounty from the blood and dark

a home in leafy Holland Park.

140 Good while it lasted

He is resting somewhere below

the game is over, his bolt is shot

his lonely spot is a woodlouse disco

a vanishing stain, an empty plot.

Say goodbye now to the vile old sicko

God pulled his tracksuit down, he’s parked

the old DJ is going commando.

They took his stone, his grave’s unmarked.

Forget him. Let the harsh studio lights

fade down to a russet glow.

Let insects perform his final rites

unroll the credits, cancel his last show.

Let no date commemorate his birth

as his molecules melt softly into earth.

141 The philanthropist

You reject wealth to honour other's needs.

In tax you pay far more than is your due.

In city slums, observing beggars' weeds

no-one is more generous than you.

A saintly man, a humble mendicant

you take no stock in houses, cars or food

and live quite simply, for your wants are scant –

your only pleasure, merely doing good.

To serve the poor is your ascetic creed.

A respected philanthropist, you bestow

your well-earned riches like scattering seed

whether in Tottenham or Monaco.

If not on earth, you will be praised by Him.

Welcomed to glory by the seraphim.

142 Speeding ticket

Those bloody cops, they were always stopping me.

I had nine points, I couldn’t risk another one.

And those grubby hacks on my back – it’s jealousy.

They were going to give me a driving ban.

That’s why I said it was mummy.

You left mum. I hate you. You stupid man.

By the way, she won’t be going to Holloway!

Those years of rushing, they were no holiday.

I love you. Hope you know that. It was all for you, son.

I despise you. My anger grows more each day.

I could never stop. I had to push, on and on.

Remember mum's birthday. Good luck in your exam.

Don’t text me again. You don't know who I am.

143 Limelight

You did not suffer exactly

at worst, a benign indifference.

Being outshone was your cruelty

you were eclipsed by brilliance.

Your skin grew pale on your shelf

all that time in the dark was lost

you turned in on yourself

not hardened by fire or frost.

Your introspection dulled your spark

there was too much time for thinking

your green eyes grew wide in the dark

and when you emerged white and blinking

into the day, it was far too bright.

You missed the darkness. Now you shun the limelight.

144 A wolf’s tale

In my dream was a long corridor –

wood-paneled, an important meeting

A crimson coat hung outside the door

Could it be yours? My heart was beating.

A hunter's role is assigned to me.

I waited outside, as I always had.

It is unfair, my villainous history

for I am mad, I am not merely bad.

This time, you did not turn or take flight.

We talked, calmly. We had left the wood.

I miss it so much, stalking you, at night.

Your eyes widening – Little Red Riding Hood.

Our lives are not long. I miss them, creeping through

Your heart moving beneath mine, hunting you.

145 Humming bird

Apart from us – taut, exotic and svelte

your existence is parallel to ours

with your dreadlocks, nose rings and bullet belt.

You are fast. Your minutes are our hours.

I infer the beating of your caged heart.

On your thin bike, the wheels are a sliver

You do not see me. Your narrow eyes dart.

If I am clay, you are like quicksilver.

Some hunt singly, some gather, some herd

some esteem eating, or books, or song

you are an exotic – a humming bird.

In a moment you will flit away, be gone.

In humans, we valued beauty and good.

You are different. I'd follow if I could.

146 Jazz pigeons

They’re not gloomy, like crow or raven.
As twilight falls, just before dark
their self-confidence is craven.
Jazz pigeons have invaded the park!
These hooligans in fluorescent suits
are far too colourful for round here.
In a hungry cloud they strip our fruits.
Our birds are dowdy, like our beer.
Shocking in their bright green livery
they are massing around the station
like a gang of Mods on a bank holiday.
Their raucous squawk is a provocation.
Who will liberate the English streets
of these foreign intruders, the parakeets!

147 The Age of Heroes

Men with beards who play guitars

who feel no pain from their tattoos.

Men who know the parts of cars

secretive about their views.

Their personal philosophies

display the awesome power of Zen.

They can punch through steel with ease

their whisper has the power of ten.

Men who chase their wildest dreams

in TV documentaries

Men who double-stitch their seams.

They cross the world in SUVs

and return with gifts for us –

A yeti’s ear, a colobus.

148 Why do you want to be Miss Hip Hop Beauty UK?

You ask the question; in response, I say

it's currently, my top priority

because the sky over Birmingham is grey

because the house sparrows have gone away

because I’m hot; because it’s my birthday

because the linear notion of time

was placed in jeopardy by Albert Einstein

and jus cos, well … it’s what I want, OK.

You say my desire lacks moral integrity

‘miss’, ‘hip hop’ and ‘beauty’, you interject

are all politically incorrect

and my main reason is a tautology.

You know what. I don’t care so … hey

I want to be Miss Hip Hop Beauty UK.

149 Bus stop Venus

Posed on an unseen beach, you casually

hook a curved thumb into your waistband.

Sapphire sea shades into an azure sky

your arms are dusted with fine white sand.

Your poised limbs’ artful informality

and the perfection of your symmetry

make you a Photoshop Aphrodite

a vision of carved mahogany.

Your swimming costume hints at what is not

visible more than what it reveal to us.

You are a living statue. God, you are hot!

Your half-closed lids are ambiguous.

Only £3.99 for your top!

You're a Venus for the bus stop.

150 A history of dust

Our world is made from rags and feathers

from silver, pearl and ivory.

Carefully, we model our treasures

from iron and mahogany.

We design them; artfully

we measure and saw, grind and scutch

but time degrades our industry

reducing our efforts to, not much.

It refashions our endeavours.

They swirl around us, here and there

a silky residue of wind-blown particles

soft to the touch, returned to air

with atoms of used skin and rust –

our vanity, a history of dust.

151 Tadpoles

They are signs of omission or possession.

Some seek them everywhere – pedantic souls.

They pursue their strange obsession

like pond dippers hunting for tadpoles

They perceive in the misused apostrophe –

a faulty plural or mangled contraction –

a sign of their superiority

not just a grammatical infraction

but a signal that order is breaking down

an ineluctable moral decline

at least in the poorer parts of town.

It doesn’t matter. But I’ll keep mine

in the right places. I know where they go

and where they don’t. Or at least I should do.

152 Shoes

Most of us wear them every day –
fllip-flops, boots or ballet pumps.
Without them, the ends of our legs might fray
they are useful on parachute jumps.
Leathered servants of the nether regions
unobserved usually, at least by me
they accompany us through the seasons.
To some, they are fashion accessories.
We are given them before we can talk.
Not wearing the right ones, we might
look like a plank on the catwalk
or lose all of our toes from frostbite.
They mark us out from other species.
They protect us from rain and feaces.

153 The abacus

Using algorithms and calculus

juggling with numbers like Euclid

it draws a map of our loneliness

it knows what we desire, what we did.

Peering through our curtains at night

it knows what we have done, where we have been.

Stuttering in patterns of light

it reads our minds through its screen.

We know that there’s something divine in us

that we are the flame to its spark

that it is merely a computer –

a grey box that glimmers in the dark –

we are divine, we contain godliness

but it is a glorified abacus.

154 His life

That was his favourite guitar.

That was the place where he sat.
He would play at night, usually a 12–bar.
Often, he would share the sofa with his cat.
That was where he parked his car.
He tried to be warm and fed like all of us –
perhaps to be like his father
to be secure; to push back chaos.
Like him, he always looked for a bargain.
That was where he watched TV.
He would drift, gently, into oblivion.
See where it is hollow, the old settee.
No-one told him different. He had no wife.
Those were his things, his habits, his life.


155 Clouds

The brooding of clouds is a fallacy
but, there again, locked inside a house
in the held breath of a prolonged holiday
they can weigh us down, like an albatross.
Any yet I realise that I am not unhappy
I can fill the kitchen with the blues
with roast meat and wine-laced gravy
with red cabbage, with cinnamon and cloves.
Later, the wine glugged down
I notice my hands; something is wrong –
their slack skin like a Christmas goose
tells me, suddenly, that I have grown old.
The dark clouds are pressing in on me
they expand in my skull like a tsunami.


156 Queen of the rain

Just imagine if the rain did not stop.
I would float through life like a shadow
glide down a ribbon of light to the shops.
I would enjoy going to work in my canoe.
Rye Lane Peckham would be my Amazon.
Like a suburban hunter gatherer
I would paddle to Morrisons
and scan its watery aisles for treasure.
To perfect my journeys, a new craft.
Smoothed like glass with sandpaper and plane
she would be sleek and graceful, not like a raft.
She would be the turquoise queen of the rain. 
Her planks bent to the shape of my dreams
she would  flit like a kingfisher down narrow streams.