England now is stretched too thin

twixt

Birdsong and where throng begin

The thicket and the wooded edge

retreat

as does the honoured pledge

Now where two worlds existed clear

jaded

shades of life appear

Diminished of their rich appeal

devoured

by destructive zeal

Each precious field each sacred stone

buried

like a flesh stripped b...

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My grandfather was a paedophile

but otherwise he was great,

always there to meet me

at the school yard gate.

He often seemed distracted

I never quite new why,

he had a funny look

in his evil little eye.

He killed my cat one Christmas

I never could forgive,

So I vowed myself to vengeance

that he should cease to live.

He wallowed in his cancer

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The Farnborough Airshow is much more than that. It is one of the countries largest Arms Fairs. The deals are made beyond the public gaze, the corporate days outnumber the public days. This poem relates to the masquerade that is The Farnborough Air Show and Murder Incorporated.

Women, Children, Ice cream, Balloons,

excitement, enticement, sonic booms...

Shattered Stree...

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All along the railed paths from Regents Park to Notting Hill,

we feel the gaze of those long passed whose sightless eyes are on us

Still.

Through the Parks of Royal note St James up to Marble Arch,

we tread the lawns as lowly folk and take our pause as Soldiers

March. 

Beneath broad streets unpaved of gold from Camden Town to Bethnal Green,

we transi...

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Caterpillar on a stone beach wall

its concertinaed wavy crawl,

did hypnotised a boy so small

that breeze snuffed out his Mothers call.

Another hand had taken his

as in the jar the insect sits,

two tiny lives broke into bits

as Seagulls screeched the ages tripped.

Caterpillar on a stone beach wall

that never found its wings at all,

but like the child was...

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Words were once no more than shapes

like humans formed from lowly apes,

who dragged their violent knuckles down

yet rose to Coronate a Crown.

Beneath such weight the mind succumbs

with pummelling fists its reason numbed,

from apes to men cruel jungles rise

to build fine cages full of lies...

bejewelled and vast with gold adorned

the "Uneasy Head" lies sev...

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Words fall into dreams like waterfalls

at precipice, where flat earth fools

congregate in village halls

and ponder how to subvert schools

with grappling hooks cross playground walls.

It's just a dream with raining words

no sense required in slumbered peace,

in forests where trees fall unheard

and kingdoms end yet never cease...

a rainbow'd storm of tumbling wo...

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The house stands quiet behind its useless walls,

as if a wedding cake cut but not devoured.

Discarded tools and children’s toys, the crumbs of life.

Inside, a stagnant calm of dust breathes for no-one.

Patches of earth curled with weeds.

The scratchings of beasts consumed by men

score the kill pen floor. Men who ate with fingers

greased with blood and vengeful mind...

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It's a chair,

just a chair

on four legs

standing there.

Facing out,

turned away

been empty now

more than a day.

The cleaner

fumigates all trace,

of he who filled

its cushioned space.

As indentations

slowly fade,

the invoice settled

the debts all paid.

Will the trees outside

miss his stare

when someone else

sits in h...

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These eyes now laid on natures’ wings
have seen the sum of hateful things,
enough that English Winter Skies
as Pale as death cannot disguise

the salty sorrow in a tear,
intrusive nightmares ever near.
An empty voice shocked free from words
which when it speaks is never heard.

Yet by the River from the hide
I saw a bird and almost cried,
as through its feathered curtain shone
a ...

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Chalk and flint the Saintly path

that wends its tranquil peaceful way,

its steepled skies belie the wrath

that split the clouds on darker days.

The refuge of the oaken pew

the coolness of the sacred stone,

that drew the workers, poor and few

to ask they give all they had known.

With barley grain and nurtured lamb

on harvest thanks the faithful came,

as ...

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Buried in her wedding dress

the tomb a ruin now,

cracked open is what once was blessed

where dogs and vermin prowl.

On fertile steps of Grove and Vine

where boots so cruelly stamped,

once yours, now theirs’, that once was mine,

too many tribes encamped.

But hearts and minds don't document

with paper, pen and deed,

what's taken, forced, was never lent

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