We stand braced against the wind of words, Watching them felling trees as they go…. In the evening rooms, The silent smiles reach my gaze and go in We stared into what is behind the words Looking into them telling me as they go In the evening tombs Flashing TV smiles into our silent rooms
Gunning for my hours, reserving war The wordings are far from the ceiling In the evening rooms We are burying the TV But the sound is escaping and we smile, Not embarrassed but surprised Looking into the rooms next door As the evening looms The silence is in the carpets, the curtains, the glass.
We wait in bunches in the streaming words Listening for the only sound that moves In the evening rooms When the envelopes fly through all our windows No longer silent, we smile with teeth No longer shy we breathe our belief No longer on TV The silence leaves our evening rooms.
Dull day, watching as a newspaper sails away Blending splendidly with McDonalds' cartons Coca Cola metal edged and ugly - Thought s of a new day Very much the same as yesterday Lying here next door to Primark My caps water logged virtually penniless Matching my pockets frugality Searing the unfathomed reality - Where thousands walk past.
What they see is a pile of rags and inertia Some cursing “ we’re not in bloody Asia” Soaked Big Issues don’t bring in the dosh Not do prostrate grey heaps Lining the Strand or Charing Cross. Blue coated lighted the boys with batons Use your legs for football practice “move on you bastard, or you’ll get more” “It’s the sailors life for me!”
The joke’s not lost like earrings in the hay Nights are always worse than days Junkies knifing your veins for pennies Prostitutes complaining about trade failures Blaming the begging not their aging layers It’s not only the cold that claims The street dwellers in this city It’s the absence of guilt and pity The liars of the Media affect your livelihood As sure as someone mugging your food The stories of violence leave out the frenzy Of organised scapegoating Blaming the poverty stricken With anything from litter to the Footsie collapsing.
Well meaning professional cannibals Hand you their insincerities And wait for you to smile your promises So they can keep the score’s accurate Then report you to the police Telling of drunkenness because you are a vagrant Wandering half the night for a vacant Doorway facing away from the wind Piles of grey rags and snoring.
Known as the “beggars welcome” Staggering into Mothercare’s entrance? Smiling at the irony, with a wince That triggers the aching gut rush Empty organs are painful most of the time Cups of tea sandwiches crusts or bones Forever missing off my menu.
Duller day, much the same as yesterday Only it appears to be longer It is much redder than before Due to crack heads wielding blades I’m becoming slimmer by the minute By the time an ambulance is alerted I will have become significant at last Statistically speaking anyway.
And then the sun rose on the other side of the moon
But I wasn’t at all interested in its proximity
Looking out across the glistening seven seas
I was looking to expose my soul around noon
All the trees bowed in my direction and some collapsed
Could I expect more than this worship by nature,
Words were wrapped in cellophane, it was crinkled
It was inside out as I was walking through clouds
I wanted to unravel each piece of plastic, but could not
The sun danced in the river, I saw the fish scurrying about
The tension was leaving me I was laughing but I wanted out.
But the words could not escape the see through wrapping
What was the worth of talking – the speaking the rapping.
I was sliding inside the breaking waves upon the shore
My smile was stuck between the rocks and raging sea
I could not forecast in any way what was happening to me
Did the moon want my heart presented upon a plate
To show it to the blazing sun as it rose over the horizon
Did the blood of my aching limbs want to stop searching
I could not tell the time, nor did I hear the clocks chime
Clockwork heaven beckoned me to look up into the blue sky
Presenting the fluffy scudding clouds into my eye
I was laughing because the cause of the mirth was nowhere
I searched for it hour after hour but the aching was beyond pain
I could not carry on looking not now not ever again,
I sat down and laughed, why did it have to be this way, please explain.
Did I capture your freedom put it inside this rusty cage
What does it serve if not the free thinking natural age
I wipe away the blood from my legs and arms, naturally
Without a thought for what needed to be done I was there
Amongst the slippery rocks clambering for life to the beach.
The sea had the reins of misfortune all around me, out of reach
For the shoreline I saw what was naturally needed for my life
Could I help my attitude towards the routine ever circling sun
I wasn’t to blame – the time was out of my mind, it would not settle
No matter what I tried to do to rectify the situation, the metal
Of the rusting cage was crumbling buckling under the weight
What could I do here in this place other than be bored and wait
I have read your book, tossed it aside, laughed, it was not for me.
3 Oct 2023.
(For all those people who know there is something missing.)
What in our lives is missing, what are we missing? This feeling uses great effort in the many at listing The missing facets that allow us to feel unreal, Like some punishment for no crimes – I did not steal I did not kill – nor did I trample upon anyone’s dignity. But something has been taken away even though not guilty.
What did we do to feel this way or was it someone else? This heavy burden of taking away common sense And leaving us in a sea of irrationality – a horrible dance In the fires of someone else’s condemnation and insults. What did we do to deserve to be on the receiving end, Was it a personal slight, was it trickery by a close friend?
Whatever it was we continue to waste time on speculation There’s a way out of here when we entertain a realisation, A discovery that sits well in the heart says what is missing It’s a warmth in our lives that feels like a cocoon encompassing Our whole body and mind reminding us we deserve to be loved But the tears won’t stop because we know we live in a cloud,
Where sunlight has been banished from our sight and hearing All we have is the reminders of the absent wanted healing, When we cried as a child the missing was the comforting When we lost a loved one missing was the understanding When we were bullied by life missing were words of comfort When bedded with a partner the missing was the arms about.
The missing element that can pull us out of dark despond That can lift the heaviest of hearts now aching far beyond This place filled with missing, can be replaced on this Earth With loving, being loved, feeling that we are of real worth. We yearn to be a real person for another and to ourselves too, The missing is the absence of self-love, needed by me and you.
It is not raining in my mind today, I switched it off, If only! It is not that it makes me feel wet it is the cold That makes me look upon the rain as an adversary.
I have sat in many dusty old halls with cardboard people Who never return a smile when I smile at them, Why don’t they? Is it because they’re feeling too unwell? Probably!
For my own sake I stay away from large halls like these And places where there are people dressed in sadness. In halls great and small I’ve been involved in conversations about karma effect.
One day someone at the back of the room who arrived late Objected to the idea of allowing themselves to be abused For the sake of their karma – he was very loud too! He pointed at the heads of the people in the room.
“Will their karmas be improved by taking abuse this way?” No one answered. There was an embarrassed silence now. The man surmised that what he had said may be getting through, Who knows?
What the people had failed to notice was the Angel with him, For most people the Angel was invisible – but some could see. They were amazed by the Light and they listened carefully. “There are some among you who want their karma to grow Through doing good – over coming great obstacles, you know.
There are those of you who suffer abuse and hurt by another! Who’s to say by what course does a person’s karma glow?” The Angel posited the question "is there some kind of universal Law governing all aspects of one’s own psyche we all know?" No one spoke!
The silence was eventually broken by coughing and shuffling. At last a small voice rose from the front row a fresh faced woman, She spoke of her Karma being nourished by all kinds Of experiences – some of which she had learned the hard way
Some of which she was lucky enough to be given Light! She spoke about her friend who lived in the depths of anguish. She said it was as if her friend took the abuse to be punished, But could not recall why she was to be cruelly admonished.
The Angel turned to this woman and said steadily, “It is your Karma that you should see your friend abused – But the conundrum is that your friend’s karma is diminished!” The lady in the front row burst into tears and cried aloud
“But why does she apparently allow herself to be abused?” To which the other people around her started murmuring. The Angel went to the front of the rows before them and said, “Only your friend knows the answer to that difficult question.
Only they can say why they stand in the crossfire of pain. No one can see into this person’s mind or know the feeling That comes from feeling unworthy, it is necessary this thing Should be taken away from your friend” indicated the Angel
As she knelt down and embraced the sobbing front row woman. Agitated conversations now spread all around the hall. People were asking questions, not at all feeling small – looking for answers, and receiving them after all.
One man several rows back suddenly stood noisily His chair fell and skated across the floor quickly. “But what of the abuser? Where is their karma in this?” “clearly the person is likely to be deranged or sick, Do they avoid the justice meted out so very quick.
To those who transgress decency honour and respect?” The Angel rose from the floor and stretched out their arms “It is a good question” they returned, “but what harms Would follow by applying justice to someone who is mad?” The agitations now ceased and silence now was to be had.
The woman in the front row stood up and looked at the man She said “Do you think it is my job to interfere or stand Back and watch my friend be reduced to sorrow and tears?” The man felt cast down and a lump was in his throat, He stood still and concentrated on her words and about Why she’d said that to him at this time and this place.
Note - this is a stronger poem, the title was inspired by the name of Capt Beefheart's second album Strictly Personal - it is interesting how I used the idea of an Angel conversing with a hall of people exploring the concept of Karma.
It never rains in my garden, the ground is parched, flowers drooped I spy the rain clouds but they pass me by again, I am stooped Over this gardening fork wondering why the water does not come Is there a shortage of liquid where I go, why do I become dumb With uncertainty about the rains that refuse to soak my skin. There is a conspiracy amongst the clouds in my regard I think.
Rain rain upon my solid unyielding ground where I stand Let me feel the pitter patter of rain drops on my dry hands, I want to look to the heavens and feel the water on my face I am desperate to experience the watery waves in this space. Let the storms of indifference go their own way, away away, Why should I really care about where they end up one day.
It never rains in my house even when all the windows are open I send personal messages to the darkening skies hoping then They will release the prize I am so keen to have all around me Their reply disappoints for they say there is a delay, I must see That it’s important for the rains to soak the more deserving, I am not counted in that number, this I have been observing.
Rain rain I beseech you train your dripping and cascading Unique cargo upon my eyes, my ears, my mind, ranging Down upon the months where rain was never going to be, I wanted to be soaked in the kindness of the waterfall, see It was my desire, it was my inspiration it is my reality, I can’t change the weather, I am now without water really.
It never rains upon the page I use to write my poetry, I am relieved that it spares me the task of drying leaves Of paper, and saves the ink from smudging, being unclear And creating patterns that laugh loudly into my inner ear, Rain rain why can’t you comfort my wild and edgy mind Why can’t I have dampness that rain always leaves behind?
Does it matter if I stop breathing and smiling inanely With thoughts that can cut veins ever so insanely? I don’t know how deep is the grand Canyon I have never been there, nor have I carried on Any desire to meet Stanley Livingstone alone In an African jungle worrying about his pension What are we doing wading through streams Of information that have no meaning but seems To occupy even the smallest minds inside heads, I’m steeped in memory but then that is my age Where memory takes the place of reality, on my page Anything goes and it usually does, and it returns But that is hardly my fault I was only looking to relearn A lesson no one had taught me so the laughing begins My head on the arms whilst sleeping in class wins My praise because the lessons are full of horse manure And teachers need to be culled for the biggest cure that humans have ever known, then we start again swimming every ocean climbing every mountain. There are dots all over my page where a universe sits And I can see the people inside, they want a real fix I smoked weed, spoke to the caterpillar on a mushroom he was half way to coming back again, so very soon but had missed every bus put out by Transport of London. I left my heart in an English Gardener said Christian Barnard I gave him the wrong blue pills and he swore revenge. Did I drive a Triumph Toledo in the raging cold snow I think about it but honestly I don’t really know, In café bars, sleazy saloons I feel the cheap perfume With smudged lipstick red faces and failing mascara The ladies of the night settled for the usual routine Even on days when they wanted to be never seen Walking that street devoid of humanity and so mean wrenched out their hearts, now it’s like a money machine. Does it matter that Mickey Mouse may have been a girl, Some say so, but then they have the tolerance of Goering, His sandwiches were wet because his wife liked tomatoes, His face looked like he’d eaten a ton of lemons though. Then I met this guy standing at a bus stop and he told me Buses I want are going in the opposite direction you see, He knew he was standing at the wrong bus stop and boasted about it, I thought he’d been watching the BBC that fucks up the brain rearranges logic and vomits garbage into my lap so that I stank of corrupted news, I could not listen to the smiling faces nor their biased views, I knew they suffered from withered cocks without juices But you try interviewing one of them, you need a banana Each time you try, for they ape reality without knowing. Allen Ginsberg was going to move in next door so I was told I said but he died years ago – I was trashed for being bold Never a Howl was heard so I knew he hadn’t moved near, It doesn't matter, really?
I am in this café looking out towards the cars listening, To the rain as it pats the windowpane and glistening In the light of the streetlamps standing sentinel pose, The rhythm of the rain interposing thoughts I suppose. There is no control over the places the rain will fall But at least I have something to listen to after all.
I am in this living room in silence but listening always, There is only my heartbeat I notice pounding away As the quiet cuts decidedly across my concentration There are brief clatters as my keyboard is a distraction But I am not worried my thoughts are in need of renewal, As I discover past mind pictures in places I can recall.
I am in this wooded area and while listening the air is cool, The birds are all of a chatter and sing their songs in tall Trees that sway to the winds that disturb their very leaves, I love the rustling of the leaves and the fresh air I breathe, In this place increasingly I sense I’m becoming more real Listening can be a tonic but within me the sounds will still.
I am in this holiday place where gulls cry out to no one, But they sail on passed me in a cocky way; are you done They scream as I lay listening in the warm afternoon sun, The sea in the distance beckons me to join in the throng I expect nothing more than to hear my best ever song That echoes around inside my head all the day long.
I am on this doorstep listening to the people on the inside Trapped I am wondering whether the door bell on the outside Will scream obscenities to all within beyond this door, What matter is it to me if they hear the truth and much more What do I care, they do deserve an earful of fuck and bloody I rang the bell and moved away not speaking until I’m ready.
I am in this bed listening to the clock mocking my sleepy eyes I can’t sleep, as usual, the whirring of my brain I now realise Doesn’t want me to put head to pillow and get down to sleeping No it wants me at its mercy it repeats over a phrase I’m keeping, Hidden away inside my heart where I wait for its completion. It’s been a long long time, I am aware of its possible depletion.
I am on a carousel most people would call life and listening To what they say about it only makes me feel like disappearing, So I can gather evidence of an energy to discover the feeling Down inside of me that I have lost something of true meaning I see pictures of lakes, ducks dragon flies, geese and cranes, In the sunlight I spy a shadow that needs to be in light again.
I was walking on a cracked pavement without knowing, I was where I was but I did not care I did not calculate the date or the year But I could not declare Just why I was there I could not guess so I laid it open to suggestion But there it is
Right in front of everything bar invention In my new waterproof coat of anxiety I was staring passed a dream into the empty Regions where dreams finally went to sleep But there it is
An impossible laying down of the phrases That really meant nothing at all in all phases The colour of each dream I took notice piled them up against the firmly closed door did I hear you screaming for more what is this where people stop talking laughter strangled at birth a slaughter took place instead of mirth But I could not switch it off I was crestfallen and wretched in lines I looked to the skies I was wanting a kind Hand to lift me up to sing a song But there it is
I was knee deep in this river of life Where all the leaves in my tree departed Could I not control this subtle strife Or was I open to a savage strap across my back I was unaware of the weight in this or the lack Until I turned my face to the sun What is it that turns tragedy into fun The smiles are not false the eyes are gleaming When I called out your name I fell to my knees – I was next to shame But there it is
An anchor for a safety device Over the top against all the advice If it works why worry about safety I don’t My resolve is stiffened against the rising moon It would be placed at my feet and soon Because each moonbeam would be weighed by clouds Time to unravel each strand in the silence not out loud. But there it is.
DISSENTERS VOICE 