How Did It Get So Late So Soon?

The man who scared the ghosts away,

The woman who healed wounds with a kiss,

I think of them more nowadays

In sad and troubled times like this.

No longer there to hug the pain

From tired bones and broken hearts,

To shield you from the winter rain

That permeates where old age starts.

Another day of fleeting tasks

From rising su...

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Aching All Over

My back aches and my head aches

And my eyes ache in bright light

My arms ache and my hands ache

When I go to bed at night

But when anybody asks me

I just say that ‘I’m alright’

Aching All Over

My ears ache when I listen

To those heavy metal hits

My stomach aches after a curry

My arse aches after the shits

My toes and fingers ache

As ...

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Dead Leaves

You once grew green

On lofty branches

Defiant against the clouds

Fluttering in the breeze

But now the tree has gone

Just a pale ghost of memory

And the sky is dominant

In my front windows

Your first death was brittle

Old man skeleton scratching

Whipping up your decline

In whorls of frustration

And when the rain came

Like falling tears

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Janus

When we were young

we raged against the storm

biting at our hormones,

engulfing our senses

and our sensibilities.

The deep penetrating

oxblood on our

Doctor Martin boots

polished

to an indignant sheen.

Pre-conditioner hair,

split ends and acne,

Shredded Wheat moustache.

A groove worn on the chin

by pondering fingers.

Myopic ...

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I Am The Scarecrow

I am the scarecrow.

Hanging from this wooden frame,

a skeleton of twisted wood

that creaks and groans in protest

at the ravages of age.

The ice cold rain

trickles through my straw flesh

bringing chills to every movement

and dull aches to the knotted joints.

I am the scarecrow.

My sack-cloth head

full of sawdust ideas

that spill fr...

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Forget Me Not

“Be grateful for the light”,

my mum would say.

I remember that

as if it were only yesterday.

“Because, without it

the dark will never go away

and what’s hidden in it

will be inclined to stay”.

I had a son -

but I forget his name.

Yesterday,

someone like him came

to visit me -

but he was not the same,

because m...

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A STEP TOWARDS WINTER.

I look into the mirror’s depthless space

and note the wrinkles that, somehow have grown

into something I wish I didn’t own.

The knife of age has cut into my face.

The greys within my hair have moved apace

from where the bird of youth had lightly flown

to make a nest of life that it could own.

I wish it hadn’t sprinted in that race.

...

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