I’ll take my chances by the crater’s edge

And hold my partner to the windswept ledge

Our heads thrown back as we await the crash

Of pumice stone and hot volcanic ash

With molten lava there is just one chance

To swoon and tango in one last romance

So take me in your arms and squeeze me tight

Erupting embers make the earth ignite

He holds her waist she grips his wri...

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There’s a shoot-out on the bowling green

The pianola’s full of holes

The Man with No Name’s

Got a Zimmer frame 

And a tray of sausage rolls

He’s a High Plains drifter 

Not from round here

The strong and silent type

Got a dance partner, can’t lift her

They practice moves on Skype

At the monthly hoedown 

At the nursing home 

He wears a felt ten-gallon hat

It’s ...

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There’s a Viking Warrior around the back

With a multi-tool and a Power Pack

Keeps nuts and bolts in a padlocked sack

He’s a DIY Man, he’s building a shack

With his manic ScrewFix lust

He’ll transform that hedge into dust

It makes no odds, he’s not fussed

He’s a DIY Man, born to rust

He wears a John Deere branded shirt

Recharges himself when he feels inert

Wa...

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"My how you've grown"

Said the kindly old dear.

"Last time I held you

you burped in my ear.

The truth of the matter

I just have to say

it's been twenty long years

since they put me away.

It's a long stretch of time

which I passed saving stamps

but that's what they gave me

for killing your Gramps.

I know you're an orphan

'cause I poisoned y...

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6th December

Sunday

Leeds

There was a monk
well, a former monk
and he was handing out free cups of tea
to passers-by
As he did he spoke of
Great Energies
Oneness
and letting go of material possessions.

I took him up on his offer and we conversed
but then he asked me about my job
and I ashamedly admitted that I felt down
because
I work for a corporation
but he held me in a s...

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weak ankles took me to a clinic

in the nineteen fifties.

Mum worrying enough for us both

low chairs for kids

alice in wonderland

long stinking corridors

the grim reaper in white coat

sun shining through crittall windows

brave new world.

I couldn't speak for fear

they surrounded me like interrogators

that was the nineteen fifties

sixty years later

an oste...

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They laugh in all the wrong places

turn life into a joke

often the joke is on you

but the laugh is paramount

the humour is gone

but the malady lingers on..

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It struck me that when I worked with bereavement counsellors some of them seemed just a bit too happy in their work. I speculated on this and wrote it down. This is the result. It bears no resemblance to any indivisual person and is a generalisation of events.     

GRIEF VOYEUR

Julie was a voyeur person, a voyeur person, Julie, was she

She'd morbidly watch a train crash ...

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