Category: poetry

God, at last

Human sacrifice had disappeared
Would God bring it back to  strike with fear
The hearts of children washed in Jesus’ blood
His heart so sacred died, does that sound good?

Why stress the Cross, the  crown of thorns, the fear
As if God is a sadist,  cold yet nuclear
Who  might wish to   propagate this myth?
In Eden  dwell to hear the snakes that hiss

Jesus, kind and brave,  had no cruel wish
To feed a crowd he conjured loaves and fish
He  walked on water,  perhaps he loved to tease
No Caesar he,  his stories were decrees. 

And in the night, he wept  but never cursed
God, at last, knew humans at their worst

The whisper

I walk in sadness as fish swim the sea
I can’t  rememeber  how life felt before
The foetus  and the feel of gravity

Death  will come with ,without decree
The other world   a room with a   closed door
I walk in sadness as fish swim  the sea

The pain, the blood, the whisper and the grief
Could any woman wish for any more?
The foetus lost, the ropes of gravity

What  is human dies without a plea
Ah, the garments in the baby store
I walk as sad as fish flow with sea

From such  anguish,  we may wish to flee
Unless beneath our  feet there’s solid floor
To hold the foetus wrapped in love. oh, thief!

Life may cackle like a randy whore
You can’t buy babies in the liquor store
I walk in sadness as fish fill the sea
The foetus  drowned, the  urgent grave, now you.

 

 

The poor can’t take this lockdown for too long

The poor can’t take this lockdown for too long
They have no back gardens, no birdsong
Their  bed rooms shared, or they have none at all
No privacy, no silence, it appalls

I hear them talked about in cruel ways
“They go into McDonalds every day”
Would you  cook your meals in red wine bathed
If you had   only got  a  microwave?

They  can’t keep warm in winter  in their homes
McDonald’s is a luxury  they earn
Clean and neat  with heating and hot drinks
They sit and look at me , like I’m the Sphinx

The   average reading age in Britain’s only nine
They can’t read Boris’ letter, that’s malign

Who commands these viruses like flu?

 Who commands these viruses  like flu?
Consternation makes our hearts feel blue
Do we have a lifeboat or an Ark?
The situation does feel rather stark

Who  decided we could work while sick?
Our energy depleted , brains feel think
Decisions  so important  need clear minds
Not one both  unravelling and blind

We  travel  round the globe, a virus ride
Our garments are as louche as fratricide
We snap some photos of the Golden Dome
Then jump on a plane and turn to Rome

Why not stay in Britain  or in France?
The piper plays but  only demons dance

Uncertainty,unease, a maverick flu?

The government  may need one maverick
In addition, we may need a  leader  new
Too many , they  try  out ingenious tricks

In Great Britain there are many eccentrics
Inventing light bulbs, rifles and beef stew
The government  should have one maverick

Did we invent that much used  red clay brick?
Did we shoot  down  birds and peasants too?
Daft M Ps  who try  out  madmen’s tricks

If you’re wearing boots,let noone lick
Cov19 may  kill them, just like flu
The government  should have one  maverick

Everyone agreed that we are sick
Post-modern  theories  stick around like glue
To our M Ps  they are a  subtle threat

Some days I feel well,I think you do
Uncertainty,unease, a maverick flu?
The government  may need one maverick
Too many , they  wear out the new Chief’s Whip

 

Ignite

If Boris Johnson  frequently told lies
This is very common  nowadays
No-one sane would be at all surprised

If  Boris Johnson could not breath ,so died 
Everyone for his soul might now pray
Though Boris Johnson  told some  dreadful lies

Even Peter , Jesus thrice denied
This was human, of such fears we’re prey
No-one sane would be at all surprised

If Boris was with women, he  was wry
But not enough to  stage one in his  play
Oh,Boris Johnson you should not have lied

   Oh Boris  has more children than his bride 
   Now he wants another though he’s grey   
   No-one sane admits they are surprised

I dreamed  of him last night,  he was so gay
To my surprise he charmed me  with love play
If Boris Johnson   lost his head and died
The  people would be frightened and ignite

 

 

 

 

In deep water, luminous as fog

If I should live again, I’d be a frog
For tadpoles ,insubstantial, cause no fright
Yet they change but not into a log

They change their being, leap up from the bog,
As bread is changed by holy, priestly rites,
If I should live again, I’d be a frog

In deep water, luminous as fog,
The frogs live on the edge of human sight
Yes they croak but not till we’re in bed

As lovers lie down naked on their rug
They tempt the frog, the adder, the termite
Then they rage upon the death of God

As the wheel turns, see, it drips with blood
The human race is ground up, we’re a blight
Yes, someone, somewhere, once did something good

Oh dark, oh grey, oh where is the new light?
Seems like the frogs, the Lord leapt out of sight
If I should live again, I’d be your god
I’d save the world by turning us to frogs

As the river  must submit to sea

The broad sands  of old Redcar bright and bare
Dark ochre with  a touch of  lighter tones
Easter time we walked  to Saltburn pier

Cold  but happy  with my love right there
Hand in hand, I felt his very bones
The broad sands  of old Redcar  town were  bare

They say the perfect love casts out all fear
As if  a person’s found their rightful home
Easter time we wandered to  the pier

Loved and known, who has not shed a tear?
Teesmouth is as wide as  winter storm
The broad sands  of old Redcar  town still  bare

As the river  must submit  to sea
So  loving does much more than keep us warm
Joyous days we walked to Saltburn pier

 

The river rushing downhill like a hare
Made  next a valley  fertile   in its charm
The broadening  river mouth ate sand like air

How  we laughed, like children arm in arm
Smiling at the sky and tickling palms
From the  sands  of  Redcar,  rapt we stared
Saw North Sea   and gazed  at Saltburn pier

Green flowers

 The  bowling green, the clack of ball on ball 
Across the grass as perfect as  the dawn
We sit down on a bench,new painted too
Lumpy paint  but good enough to do

Round the edge, the dahlias  bloomed  like suns
No irony was meant nor overcome.
Goldenrod, geranium were bold
The earth was   hot and rich in summer’s hold

Past virgin rhodedendrons , children  played
Swings and see-saws, all somewhat decayed
Painted with the same paint as the bench
I saw my father fall, I felt the wrench

Where shall we sit, my sweetheart, by the lawn?
I have lost your face. my heart lies torn

A jellied eel is rarely served today

Smoke your fish in grandad’s polished pipe
Unless by accident you caught a pike
Foxes  tails are not a brush for hair
Without a tail, a fox will need repair

Herrings  caught in Whitby harbour glare
They may be dead but that is their affair
A jellied eel is rarely served today
If you eat one piece then  do not say

Bacon. ham and sausages despair
Moses said to eat them was unfair
Can we  reverse the  process we have used
And make some pigs, if only to amuse

Did smoking food  conceal the smell of death
The pig is  gone, it’s not holding its breath
Smoking pipes did not keep men alive
Some smoke in their grave. as I have spied

In the end  it’s  burial  or fire
The ashes of  the dead   are not for hire

Senseless we will suffer, we are sick

We believe  just what we want and then we find
All unaware, unconsciously, within
The evidence we need to close our minds

We might as well be deaf and if not, blind
Perception lies, conception is then thin
We believe  just what we want which  we  then find

We justify our actions, are unkind
Cast    first stones as if we never sin
With evidence invented by closed minds

By the blood of others our own soul is stained
Starving children  grovel in waste tips
Affectless we look, we cast off blame

The widespread wars, the  rage, the napalm aimed
The slaves who make our clothes, who feel the whip
Are evidence  we  choose to close our minds

The punishment for blindness will  now stick
Our souls and minds degraded by one click
We believe  what suits us and then we  surely find
The evidence we need to shut our minds

 

 

 

Wild statistics

Shall we die of flu or suicide?
Or shall we live  as sanguine as  sweet joy
Who  by wild statistic is deprived?

Which man shall now look out in wild surmise
Perception  is  not truth,does  that annoy?
Shall we die of flu or suicide?

What will shops sell now when noone  buys
Do not   yet despair when  self employed
Such  daft statistics   make old people cry

Think about the sadness of a bride
A cancelled wedding, her good day destroyed
Would she die  if anger  brewed inside?

I ate ten bars of chocolate  in my rage
That was all the food I could afford
When  by strange statistics I was caged

Write sweet songs and do not folk ignore
Then   turn  again to love, that aged  whore
Shall we die of flu or suicide?
Who  by damned statistic is deprived?

 

 

 

 

The kettle too sat on the fire, I played and then I dreamed

I remember mother’s beauty and her coal stained and cracked hands
Each  little line was etched in black,   like a map to other lands
She always wore an apron that  she made from an old dress
How I loved my mother,I did I must confess.

I remember mother’s beauty and the row of nappy pins
She always wore them like a brooch,  while we kids made a din
The baby had her rusks and milk, she had a little pot
She slept inside a cradle then she moved into a cot

I remember  most Mum’s  cooking, the apple dumplings steamed
The kettle too sat on the fire , I played and   then I dreamed
She had a tin of buttons, she  was ace at making clothes
She knitted like an acrobat  to forget her many woes

Her daddy was a miner till he had a heart attack
He came home   black and dusty, then he filled his old tin bath
When he retired he got a dog,  he loved her very well
He called  her Lassie for her name, she was  beautiful , my belle

Her daddy came to see us after our own daddy died
He help my mother with odd jobs, then we  all ate cake and cried

Where does logic go to in the night?

Where  do dreams  go while we are awake?
Where does logic go to in the night?
Why does laughter make our body shake?

Why do  men like eating home made cake?
Why  do little children want to bite?
Where  do dreams go while we are awake?

Why is Windermere not Winderlake?
Why do we have wars and want to fight?
Why does laughter make our body shake?

Why do people not read William Blake?
Why is it so rare to have insight
Where  do dreams go while we are awake?

Why do we so often feel like fakes?
Why do people like to see the Light
Why does laughter make our body shake?

Oh, to see an eagle high in flight
Oh, to see  a friend   and love the sight
Where  do dreams  go while we are awake?
Why does laughter make our body shake?

 

Contorted faces wincing as they pass

Excited by the epidemic ruse
The front page item of the evening news
People rush together to convey
What they   do not know  or cannot say

Contorted faces wincing as they pass
No funeral. no wedding and no Mass
Lost inside the nightmare of the head
Imagination captured  and well fed

Will Cremation kill the bug widespread?
Can we know the judgement of the dead?
People die in accidents and cars
Flying through the air and seeing stars

Are we bored by ordinary life?
No wars, no murders, just the death of wives

 

In the  sighing woodland ,birds go by

Acer-palmatum-2020

In the wanton woodland ,birds flash by
Busy with their mates and with their nests
Caught a glimpse  there in my cornered eye

I walk held up by silence  undefied
Life is plain when  we don’t send the texts
In the gentle woodland ,birds flash by

I call out softly with a plaintive cry
No bird will understand  my strange request
Caught in movement  from my cornered eye

The sun showed through the highest branches  sly
Lit the birds up as it wandered West
In the mossy woodland ,birds arise

Nature’s  not in lockdown as we are
They find their food, the insects and the rest.
The many coloured berries  gleam like stars

We do not see the murders and the feasts
The magpies eating  nestlings we detest
In the  shadowed woodland ,birds flash by
I see this from the corner of my eye

God  is murdered daily, we perceive

How precious is the life that we will lose
The joy of senses open  like new leaves
The  holy sun, the air,  our attitudes

Our boundary, our skin  protects, is bruised
By those who  claim to love but soon deceive
How precious is the life that we will lose

The mind  and body open  for new views
Are vulnerable, yet glad, as they receive
The  holy sun, the air,  our attitudes

And Jesus came to Earth, a holy Jew
God  is murdered daily, we perceive
How precious is the life that we will lose

We are   torn apart, love, hate ,confused
Yet every  moment, God   is re-conceived
In  holy sun, in air,  in gratitude

First we love  our neighbour , then believe
The web of  holy actions, who can weave?
How precious is the life that we will lose
The  holy sun, the air, its magnitude

Words or sin

The paradox  of praise is that we’re judged
Yet how can judgement place us on a dot
The eye is wet, the dropped tear is a smudge
A line in-finite,  dense with its own spots

Whether beauty of the body-mind
Or depth of thought,  now hanged by awe
Where many alien eyes look out unkind
And noone knows what we each saw

How can we be ranked on things long passed
Yet  not forget the lessons  we took in?
We sat  matric in school while Jews were gassed
With children  backward, queers and gypsy kin

We learned to  read the maps we  now live in,
Forget the world is more than words and sin

Ecstasy can’t last,can’t be pursued

Maybe Meghan  knew we’d have a storm
A hurricane of doubt,  the leaders scorned
She’s back in Canada, I wish I were
Seeing Leonard Cohen every where

A thousand kisses deep may be too much
Especially  for those who’re unrehearsed
The tower of song is just a maisonette
Joan of Arc burns as she pirouettes

Suzanne  bore his children then she left
She fell out of  love, he was bereft
Poets need their time alone to muse
Ecstasy can’t last,can’t be  pursued

We still lose  the space to enjoy dreams
While up above our leader stands and screams

Terror and rage

 

A force far deeper than our anger
Elemental as a storm
Annihilating all before it
Terror makes our rage perform.

This force saying self is threatened
Runs to rise and to protect,
Most murderous when we’re most alarmed
Rage the enemy detects
.
Over-riding other feelings
Deprives us of the power to think
Like a nuclear tsunami
Disconnecting human links.

Reddened vision,focused,narrow;
Eyes locked onto enemy’s
All the wider context losing,
Wipes out our good memories

Like a mother tiger fighting,
And the cornered eagle’s force;
We will destroy what we think other
Without bitter,pained remorse.

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Nature made such to protect us;
Yet our perception can be wrong
. Once the flood of feeling takes us
All reflections seems too long

Later, if we see our victims,
Will we know that we have erred?
For hate deceives ourselves and others
When our inmost terror’s bared.

How can we step back and ponder,
See life from a wider view?
How can we become less blinded,
So we see our world anew?

Succumb not to final despond
Succumb not black despair
Always there are those who see.
Always there are those that care.

Tempered by reflective wisdom
Rage can change when understood.
When we find another being
Who  helps hold our frightful flood

Fragility is measured by the glass

As fragile as the sacred crystal glass
Which  broken was smashed up like any cup
Till its particles invaded us at Mass

Uncontained,  how will this  moment pass?
Suffering  breaks us down, what helps us up?
Hearts as fragile as  a crystal glass

Do not climb the cliff  in love’s mad  rush
Height  endangers, vertigo, a drop
Whose particles invade us at the Mass?

Feeling like the flower tramped underfoot
Never to be raised,  true life has stopped
When fragility is measured by the glass

Did Jesus know that physics  would  forecast
That he could be alive mixed in, not mocked
His particles  shall dance with ours at Mass

When we die, the shop is out of stock
There is no other I in any book
As fragile as the ancient crystal glass
Whose particles  fly solo in the Mass

A cruel hill

We measure walls and windows and the rain
But not the patterns painted on  the  pane
We measure flour and butter and  the tin
But not the love with which we mix them in

There is  no  linear scale in human  minds
Where you are up above and I’m behind
Complexity and wisdom  intertwine
No measure seems quite apt  for those who’re blind

There’s something  Nazi in  the way we rank
The industry of measurement now stinks
Every human  is a  unique  world
Yet into the abyss , they might hurled

We do  not   get perfection as we kill
The Christs who stumble up   their cruel hill

Abbey Steps

I’d like to visit Whitby and its shores
See the Abbey ruins on the cliff
I can’t climb those steep steps any more

The whip of salty sea, the shells, the lore
The  old town with its alleys and its fish
I’d like to visit Whitby and its shores

We heard the seagulls shrieking, Jesus rose
We were in a cottage but in fact
I  won’t climb  those abbey steps no more

In my mind I find an unmarked door
A dream comes by,  who  whipped my tender flesh?
I’d like to visit Whitby and its shores

Fish don’t die like sheep in abbatoirs
But yet it must gruesome so to thrash
I can’t climb those steep steps any more

I don’t like eating fish,I hate their whiff
It makes me conscious of my father’s death
I’d like to visit Whitby and its shores
Who can’t climb those Abbey steps no more?

I wish we were on Sutton Bank again

I wish we were on Sutton Bank again
The Cleveland Hills with heather and bright bees
We lay down in the heather in the sun

We hitched a lift, Osmotherley, a van
Another day was Whitby and the sea
I wish we were on Sutton Bank again

I wish that you were near, my loving one
Your suffering  face was   very  sad to see
We   lay in  purple heather in the sun

What shall I do, what am I  to become?
I  waken up  too early, make my tea
I wish we  lay on Sutton Bank again

Our backs ,warm earth , our faces smiled as one
The  heather a warm bed, no shady tree
We  once lay in the heather in the sun

I miss your face, your eyes, their loving plea
The sun above, the windswept  leafless tree
I wish we were on Sutton Bank again
We ‘d lay down in the heather ,where’ve you gone?

 

 

This treasure

Absenting ourselves from presence in this life
Glued onto the pictures in our minds
It neither matters if  we wish for strife

Or whether they fill needs of better kind.

We know that wish fulfilment comes in dreams
And also in our fantasies by day
When anxious worry fills our mind with schemes
Guilt and shame impede us from our play.

Creative thought requires the loss of self,
And needs our empty soil to plant its gifts
So throw out selfish fancies for this wealth
We’ll let ourselves  go slow, so minds can shift

To waste our days in suffering or false pleasure
Will lose for us this vital, vivid treasure

No map

The more I  write, the more I feel the gap
From  the immense, the real  of skin and eye
To what  I write or draw upon a map

When you  lay still, my skin around you wrapped
I touched you with my  nerves   but made no cry
The more I  write, the more I feel the gap

We can hold  a baby on our lap
But not a  husband who needs space to die
What  could I write or show upon a map?

Words like little wires,  a  rabbit trap,
Catch a moving moment as it flies
The more I  write, the more I feel that gap

There is a silence, music is surpassed
A puzzled truth and not  wordly lie
What to  write or show upon a map?

Can we close the lids, the lover’s eyes
Sorrow  follows  couples like a spy
The more  the words, the more I feel the gap
The real  hides as I write, there is no map

He won’t like  the crap you shed

I am frightened I’ll run out of food
My   insides are in knots that feel glued
I  feel sick tonight
What was I ate?
The cat’s looking mad  yet amused

The Whiska’s beef ‘s  meant for the cat
I trod on him, he is now flat
I stole his dinner
I am a great sinner
I should eat  both the snake and the bat

This epidemic is my fault, you see
I gave away bat food for free
The homeless have soup
And suffer from croup
The rich  folk denounce liberty

A huge sense of guilt is conceit
In a sense it is also deceit
We’re not omnipotent
Nor are we impotent
We’re in the grey, be discreet

I wonder  what new world we’ll get
When Boris  in aspic is set
He’s having a  baby
It happens  now daily
It’s the mother who’s caught in his net

Fancy  a nappy change now?
Boris  is taking a bow
He won’t like  the crap you shed
When you are in his bed
Well, it’s far too late after the plough

I eat cartoons for breakfast with a knife

I  lack the skill of mimicking   a cat
Mimesis  makes me copy  acrobats
I cannot do the crossword in the Times
If I’m free, I marry many  rhymes

A cartoon left me cold,I needed words
I preferred  to talk except to  birds
But now I reach the higher slopes of life
I eat cartoons for breakfast with a knife

In mathematics we use little signs
The science of pattern  circles all my lines
We learn to write  what others knew by craft,
The hand precedes the brain, the warp, the weft

The Scribes were groups  who wrote what others said
Scroll by scroll the Hebrew Bible’s read

That God who weaves me

The world is woven  in such different ways
Struts the vertical, the flat below
Oh God who weaves me shall by me be praised

Oh, shall the mystic reach what she may crave
When all  the strings release and she falls low
The world is woven  in its different ways

Timed by ritual Lady Lazarus rose
And all the eyes that gazed were burning slow
Yes, God who weaves me shall by me be praised

There is a hollow  only Ariel knows
As horse and rider as one being flow
The world is sensed  in  wholly different ways

The body ,home of mind, will   run astray
Oh, what seams of evidence forego
  Fallen God  who unacknowledged knows

Beneath the sea of green the undertow,
Spirits sidle  deep like melting snow
The world is woven  in such different ways
That God who weaves me shall by me be praised

 

How can  a fake virus make men cry?

Fake news,  fake life, fake thought,fake love,fake bug
How  can we know what is a genuine lie?
And I cannot greet you with a hug

Be sure to boil some bleach in every mug
Pour dettol on your head before you fly
Fake news,  fake life,fake love,fake songs,fake bug

Should we tell the children we’ve lost God
New creators seem  in short supply
And I cannot greet all with a hug 

As he drily coughs, peach Don feels  odd
How can  a fake virus make men cry?
Fake news,  fake life,fake love,fake  cries.fake bug

Fighting in the aisles will do us good
Mass may not be said  though  priests may sigh
And  they cannot see God when they would

Self  isolated, God hears babies cry
He withdraws his favours saunters  by
Fake news,  fake life,fake love,fake other bugs
Would a polar bear safe to hug?