Wednesday 14 June 2017

Ten o'clock


and ‘good evening’ you say,

with your will to encapsulate

a world

in two simple words.



you drag me to your angle,

box up,

shrink wrap,

present me with

a moment.



then boil down

condense,

or sugar-coat

a movement.  



replay and frame

the mise-en-scene

of a ticking clock.

do you believe

you own it,

that you can make it

stop?



you slip me

a slick sales-pitch:

a sound,

to be bitten,

chewed,

swallowed or

spat out

on the ground.



you bring me faces

i don’t wish to see.

villains to demonise,

devour,

victims to pour pity on for an hour,

then rationalise.



you loose your circling acid sharks

in neutral waters,

to echolocate,

smell blood,

sniff out,

go in for the kill,

expose, expound.



then comfort with the thought  

of tragedy’s ebbing tide,

you leave me

safe

for now

removed in sandy shallows

this side of the screen.



you move me on

and tell me of the glitzy games

revisited

year on year

in cosmic colosseum circuses,

round the globe.



then forecast

rain or snow

as if you own the day,

and run the show.



willingly appalled, I bow

to sample simple snapshots of disgrace,

your gun held to my head,

your mirror to my face

to mould me to your point of view

to bring me down

right here

right now.



you are the evening news

you try your toxic best

and

finally,

reminding me,

you were the evening news,

I watch you laid to rest.

Tuesday 6 June 2017

The Magic Money Tree (or mixing metaphors for the proletariat).

Billions slip along its bullion branches
sliding towards
the grasping, greedy, greasy
palms,
of the high/
mighty,
fake empty pockets wafting,
to placate the ones
they stood upon,
to climb the limbs:
the maddened crowd
(mere cuttings,
mere deadheads)
who tend the roots,
of the *magic money tree*
and salvage the acid soil
and patch the bruised bark
for those besides them,
ground in the grind,
drowned under the discoloured leaves,
agendas dropped like arsenic manna
from the crown and
crowded canopy.

(Just tell them,
send whispers to their fear...
There is no *magic money tree*
There is no *magic money tree*
There is no *magic money tree*
and say
instead we steer,
veer,
career,
this strong and stable
unfragmentable
iceberg
through uncertain waters.)

Don't rock this boat
we need to stay afloat,
they state,
we need your vote,
in order to
disintegrate.


.

Wednesday 12 April 2017

Thief

Put in my place,
a hanging basket of weeds,
for all to mock,
I hear you say 'forgive'.

Not knowing how to start,
I ask you to remember me,
as light begins to stalk,
Your frank assurance drops,
pick-pocketing the fear
of these ticking clocks,
with a word in my ear,
'Today you will be with me'
in paradox.

Lessons from Trees

Last night's frantic branches now nestle, long shorn of hair, dignified in recovery. Resolute, versatile, vertical, forming your be...