at half past four
   the farthest moor
ran blood red
   with sinking sun

early gathered guttered leaves
   catching hint of winters breath
   decorously quiver
in the lingered still of dusk

while in one hundred kitchens
   baked beans simmer
beneath the steam-whistle of transition
   from the polarities of the classroom
   to the less defined contests of the home

this samian spl...

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before the vagina was the mop

beneath the merkin of the cropped

the sheath or scabbard took lusty knife

or plump the grain of the trusty wife

thus passed the girdle to the hips

never more to shape the lips

   of the fabled vase

the cover torn to make a rip

was rooted by the wag - to break or bite

the hollow root of wood so tight

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I still remember the meagre collection
- shirley bassey tihuana brass neil diamond's greatest hits -
and a couple of 45s
- one of which - tommy steele's confession - we never played -

but we would stack the rest
and dance until they dropped
- then dance some more

flared trousers swinging
- the green patterned pile carpet -
and my sisters osmond lp

later I asked my mother
what she ...

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from meduaern come bees
fresh as yon hard-back beck :
lufteme pulled
by the petrichor of spring :

drenc on thunder : drenc on cloud :
aelmesgeorn in verge well give :

them stamp the snaeb 
and drink the tear :
full fat their collared necks :
aswellan as swine in gor

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the fond view now remains
not the keep of then

not the face by numbers forged
each a windowed glance

just the flare of struck matches

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for years she called them parkies
- darkies - and mister to their face
and grew a wart upon her chin

don't come that - she stuck the door
made pot-noodles out of straw
and sold hot dogs out of date

don't bother your head with that
it's a bit of tat from butlins
I picked it up on the fair

she keeps it for a keepsake
forgot it was even there
a memento of the jubilee

her kid was t...

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the hush fell absolute
   mid-flow he had been tripped
she sipped the half drunk wine
and we all watched for response

come on she said answer me
   and he laughed in that way
that non-smokers cough - phlegmatic -
dismissive and surprised

so she sipped the wine once more
   - privately we clapped -
then she in good grace excused herself
and moved to another table

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I've been counting the winds of history
   that which blows through a window cracked
       and noticing the turks in the hills

measuring the length of the camel hair
    the grind of teeth bringing oranges -

or the longship slipping out of the fjord
   and spotting the lapis among the amber

the slaver with glistening teeth
   wrapped tight to the sandstorm wind

it does not blow t...

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the angel was not large
not church window size
yet it's illumination dazzled
at my frightened sense
in the choir of coming
it reached to me
and gave in what it took

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summer is the dead time

all winter - when dripping rain
within the bounds of a pulled in coat
- I have dreamed of this

but now it comes
   and like birthdays
   it does not satisfy

the flowers lack the brightness of spring
and the long evenings
- well they just lack
and can't compare -
to the darkness of winter teatimes

but give it a month
and the august heat

give it the ha...

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you want to know the blues

freedom
freedom

I see your hollow eyes
you stand as shocked as mine
at the trolling script scrolling text of now

freedom
freedom

those words never crossed a track
nor found the spirit of bach's fingers

they only tippy tap
for the pennies that linger
in the butter fingers of accidental fame
and the false gods
in the three coloured triangle
of forc...

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he said he was waiting for death
   eyes watchful over the sea
and on his knee - neatly wrapped -
   a triangle wax-papered parcel
      tied with string

winching at the badly kept beer
   my eye is caught by a picture
      of the house now hanging -
      captured then - with a paddock
         between it and the cliff

on the wall - more pictures -
nostalgic for a time - when peop...

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in the gap between the tarmac
a pink opium poppy
                 - tattered - blooms

and she walks with splayed feet
- in pastel clothes - half dyed -
washed up from the toes
past the turned in knees
to the polka-dot double pram'd shoulders
- gurgling lullabies in plodding tune

they say she had to choose a number
                     - one two three -
and whichever she picked
    ...

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now is the fallow seeding time
   of grasses bending
children with counted ribs
   dash random as swifts
   their fun frantic as butterfly wings
foxglove proud they stand
   laughter punctuates
   like the yellow primrose
      rising through the tawning grass

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in displacement you plait my hair
as we share that moment of imagining
lyric in extreme - you fall as I have before

it is admiration in our jealousy
of that we feel but cannot express
with any of the capacity

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the wild cotton dots the brush
as if a flock of sheep was chased
by giant bouldered feet in hunger
which rose in wanton violence
beneath the flash of thunder

and what sheep remain are thin in the haunch
they graze with waggled ear
lazy roll a bulge'd eye
at the backpacked tramp of feet
on rain softened tussocky grass

as I crest them out of view
I hear the conversation
the wind and ...

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this isn't widely known
whisper it
build up the suspense
wipe the memory of the young
push the mammary to their lips

hate your parents
hate them
hate them

this isn't widely known
whisper it
build the suspense
wipe the memory from their past
implant the falseness of the present

sieg apple
sieg bbc

this isn't widely known
whisper it

whisper it

history doesn't have lines
...

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this stone
   more dense than diamond
   smooth as a bird's egg
   cold in my palm
      like a forearmed sheet beneath the pillow in summer

this stone
I hold indecisive
between the dismissive toss for the common-place
   and the pocket

that stone whet
   knew that I would hear the call of birds
   and taste the butter
and laugh at the off-hand description
   of apple orchards and...

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you
for whom everything is certain
brush through the late spring
with the eager disinterest of a spaniel
stealing sandwiches from a stranger's picnic

you
do not notice these ferns
curled around in turning cartwheel
fingers held in buddhist contemplation
of shared energy of the body

you
want to know why I am interested
in these plants immemorial
that have not been mentioned
in thi...

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below the decked black clouds
the upper reaching moor shines emerald now
lit by the slashing sun
between the rain soaked rungs
of the ladder bent above
without rainbow or climbing feet

the raw bouldered hanging cliff
yellow in the evening state
stripped to demerara soft
to mock their hardness and their weight

as all melt away at night
to their beds again they go
but those of us uns...

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she's too brass tacks banged into the head
but there's something else
seen over coffee
a stifled creative thrust
which if allowed to fly free
would shatter the basis of everything

you see it peel the curtain aside
in stories of school mistresses
redolent with tapioca topped with jam
and cold backsides
in coal-tarred outhouses

she just wants to be heard
wants that fire
   instilled...

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locked in a room
hearing lives roll around
in braying cries
the lacking pound of doom

head in hands
the dreams revisit
this time more honest
of my faults

in each offered passage
between the life evolved
in the shadows and the diverts
a pearl bearing clam
prized open now
by prison dirty fingers

now that name I spat with ire
sticking to me disgrace drooling
of all superiority i...

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we walk together through the fields
hand in hand touching souls
our eyes aglow like falling rain
when moonlight seeps through the clouds
droplets illuminate the flowers

it is then I note
the brightest day
three sons ablaze
in cloudless sky

one shines brighter than the rest
serene the fire and so blue
and one so faint not for the eye
it's light shines from deep within
the third a c...

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he was like any other nasty old man
- smug - his waistline at his breasts -
a wife skittering at his pleasure

but there was something nastier -
a certain glint in his eye - an arrogance -
glistening like the whiskers briskly shaven

'they made me build roads' he laments -
chewing on a kaiser roll - tongue lapping-
moist bread churning on his gums

'ten years they worked me like a slav...

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today my youngest son climbed a tree
using all his might balance and strength
standing amid the highest boughs
he reached out his arms
               crying 'look at me'

a girl in his class told him to 'stop showing off'
for he had climbed higher than she

and I thought of pentheus
- that most stupid of men -
who failed to see
that aside from tampons
and wiping their arse backwards
...

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just before we parted
in the space between the final word

just before a blackbird sang

evening rose with a sour milk moon
the countryside beyond
stood but a single broad bounded step

just before that final word

in that time
when our as yet unremembered day
trailed out to the low grassland

a shrouded whiteness fell
as cobwebs on happiness
threaded by the hope of love

that...

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in a world of false opposites
where very little has meaning
I pick at the word angst

first in the german
- then in translation
and back to the root cause

the necrotic neurons of neurosis
and dally in denial
at the prettiness of daisy chains

bitten lipped slit and threaded
and threaded by girls in summer dresses
cross legged
   they show the V of their knickers

http://blue...

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I always did what charlie said
never played in disused fridges
always looked both ways because tufty told me
and ate birds-eye burgers to be like ben

- yes I was a good boy
who believed the cavalry would save the day -

so it was a shock
- when dipping half a fish-finger
in the residue of bean juice -
to learn from john craven
   that saigon had fallen
   and america had lost

ther...

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I'm not looking at the bloody business end
just talking for the sake of hope
and holding the squeezing hand
all emotion pushed deep down
                            or I'll drown

the spring light is bright upon the pimpled wall
as I slide light-headed to the floor
noting the dust on the skirting board
all emotion is pushed deep down
as I gasp for the air or be drowned

between the suc...

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I'm all bustle - all action and I get goals -
box to box through mud and rain - filling holes
on the break away

the local paper loves me for my commitment
to the cause - for the last ditch tackle
that won the game

for my always staying late to train -
of course they don't report the whiskey bottles
now containing urine

that huddle round the x-box
beside the single chair - all the b...

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you forget - in those stories in which you were the hero -
how much of childhood is spent following and not leading -
how often it was you standing by the drinking fountain
watching others run laughing - in a time out

or the wasted time spent trying to be friends
with your friends - and the compromises -
that as an adult are unacceptable - because -
well just because you've got better thi...

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it's in that bedtime kiss
we miss out - at our peril -
that our worth as a parent lies

or listening when we cannot
   to the whirl of chatter -
and from it picking strands
of past conduct to chastise

and finding words beyond
the three simple words of love
to express that deep - deep -
expression of our hope

but none of this makes any sense
to our children grinning in our face -
...

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echoing footsteps of leather soled shoes
nails slightly caught
in that stillness of the rush hour

the day has not lost it's greyness
and the watery air
enhances that clipping plod

as men in light raincoats and kagools
slope shoulders
toward respective garden gates

one can almost hear the ticking
of hand wound watches
in this hour of silence as shops close

their lights dark behi...

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only when one stops to consider the meaning of trees
can one grasp the deeper meaning of history -
of the branches - the broken hollowed eyes
which but for a cold spring may have been -
                            but shriveled scorched on frosty wind

nothing comes from nothing or so they say -
that false trunk - now over-shadowed -
which in vainful passion carries a pen-knifed heart
of ...

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compared to my drooping sweating sandwich
   the noodles of mouse tugged by the kestrel
appear much sweeter - certainly he fears I want some -
    for with each greedy gulping beakful
    the pierrot painted eyes accusingly look my way -

despite the speed with which he eats
no gravy is spilled on his black buttoned dolman
   which perfectly suits the cherry brown strata
of his rock cafe ...

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I am reminded of why I take pictures of flowers
with each intrusive click of the camera

the sky has a hungry air - ribbed white clouds -
above an unusual stillness in centenary square

there are professionals circling
looking for the money shot of a woman crying

and one man consciously edges out of my pictures
despite my consciously not edging him in

what looks exchange are thin as ...

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one hears stories of the day the fifty six died
whispered tales over a whiskey at closing
the words coming more from the eyes than the lips

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the other day I noticed this woman -
chin cocked - hip handed - hair swept -
tits up and out - and this bloke
with a camera held like burning paper -

in the time it took me to walk from
                           oxfam to wh-smith
    they still hadn't taken the bloody photograph

but then there was no point
   she had her clothes on -
and posed as she was
there nothing about her to s...

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I've never understood the england you paint for me -
everything corrupt and black - and everywhere else
is better - though somehow you are never included
in this hell of venal sinners - seemingly because -
- well - you're an internationalist - or some other ist -
and being an ist exempts reason and decency and ist truth -

bluebells I am told are a sign of ancient woodland -
not unlike the...

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when last I sat here the sky was azure blue
but now it swirls as if a watercolourist
grew tired of painting sky and cleaned her brush

passing lazy sunlight shafts the greening hills
and now one clearly sees the flocked sheep of lambing
graze in fields around the slowly dressing trees

the grandeur of the khaki stone manor stands proud
no longer matching it's surround
   as the moorland ...

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I keep checking if otley manor is aflame - again -
under attack from hordes of marauding scots
   yet the sunset appears just like any other

but then nichola the bruce will burn the scots
more - and perhaps before - she burns us -
for that is the history of scotland writ small -

still I'm sure there is a general monck
to rise from the civil war predicted
- all these covenants in stone ...

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I can't recall the last time I measured a nose
with calipers - or compared brains in a weighing pan -
but apparently I have to check my privileged
position of constantly being branded a racist

last week I learned that now it is racist
to call people thugs - but not if you are black -
as if you are black - it is a term of endearment -
oh those ruffians are such fun to be around -

which ...

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the room lay up three flights of stairs
the telephone three flights down again
and those below never climbed
   when it rang
- which suited me just fine -

for in my simple life of luxury
- of foldout bed - I sipped my tea
from the finest china tea cup I have owned -

when the door closed behind me I was alone -
free to view from chimney height
   the backs of houses opposite
and the ...

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there's something splendidly naff about an english carnival
those smiling children in costumes plucked from the dressing up trunk
and the town crier ringing his bell - crying 'god save the queen'

boxes with holes cut for the head and for the arms
   on which are sketched big ben or books or playing cards

the brass band - marching to the beat of big bass drum -
playing colonel bogey and d...

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grey night shrinking without sunset settles
in like a moth on paper - as rainclouds
swaying full gutted and black scut tittle
the moon in malicious jest - for night
knows best - knows the hidden corners
of our shadow - collects our shrouded
self in sleep and pours in those things
often misforgotten - often slight -
but grey as this shrinking into night

when we look again through the win...

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I shan't buy a mug nor wave a flag
or run excited naked through the streets
my life won't change - rearrange -
in fact nothing about it will have the slightest effect
                                                                         on me

but I am glad that a child has been born
and I'll not succumb to the fascist wittering
of those dullards who hate the royals
and complain
oh ho...

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the rain so light is
so light it hardly noticed be
tickles the ransom
   and the bluebell
to fill this world of wood
   budding leaf pale green
with all the powers of the earth

no birds sing today
clustering within themself
taking shelter where they may

and in this silence footsteps
   against this thickening
   wall of summer
coming drown from the hills
    in the drying drainin...

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footprints in the bacon fat
the pin-tin upset of it's contents
   red-head green-head blue-head
   settle where they will
for angels rise on point
                                    but not to scare
the sheep of the field - now in the garden -
    and barely disturb the flapping red curtain
    at the cracked window pane -
       for black roses and lilies taste too good

but not as go...

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for what it is to forget
to live bereft of regret
and watch the sun gently set
thus to wait morning come

..

 there is always that moment
when you say you are a poet
the wings sprout
and your fey nature is revealed

..

 one day manchester will be built
the cranes will take wing
without girders in their beaks

...

 across the valley rain hangs like ghosts
phantom shafted rai...

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twice nightly
   - three time at weekends -
   they die
in pealing laughter
   - bow to the paltry applause -
in seaside cabaret

it doesn't help
that the false bottom of the cage
   gets stuck
so he never knows if the dove is gone
   when he pulls the cape

nor that wanda
   - real name beryl -
has got ideas of spring in rhyl
and fallen in love with a bouncer
called errol
who do...

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