Fracking Alternatives

I’ve been wracking my brains
Why we should need to go fracking
When there’s so many planes
To such a many sided coin

Sure, it fracks up my mind –
There’d be more sense in car-jacking
And a good deal more pleasure
Gained from jumping a groyne

But now it seems at the sea
When off in holiday glee
We’ve such a need to sit sulking
We no longer enjoy

The sport of hunting for shells
Of turning green at the smells
Splashing past nappies and tampons
That we pass at the buoy

Yeah, Blackpool’s not such a gas
They’ve fracked the lights and the glass
Until the Biggest of Dippers
Is a red saveloy

The very thought is a joke
We leave the dirty Big Smoke
And spend our cash on a cuppa
While the ground spills its coke

No refunds, no money back
When your vacationing snack
Has turned the tables, bit the big one
With a seismic attack

It’s all a plateful of fun
Beneath the cool English sun
While you can ignite the water
That you get from the tap

Kidulthood

This is written for all those among us who had to play two parts at once, that of the child, the so-called dependent, and the often contradictory role of the full-time carer.

I pity those people
Who never were children
Who never knew life at its best

When rules were unknown
All the days seeming golden
Decisions meant – wearing a vest?

Maturity settled
Like dust on their shoulders
Through circumstance beyond control

And taking the reins
In the place of one, older
They gave up this part of their soul

So small wonder, the faces
In various places
Seem aged beyond years on this Earth

It’s hard for a kid
Doing all that we did
While absorbing an adult’s self-worth

Wordcount

A challenge of words
Daily mileage to clock
When accustomed to torrents
May come as a shock

It appears that such distance
Brings a limit to speed
And more haste, fewer sentences
Grammar and greed

So I packed up the monitor,
The keyboard and mouse
And I, tentative, ventured
Outside of the house

As I strolled to the shops
In a shower of drizzle
My memory pops
At epiphany’s sizzle

A notepad, a new one
With freshly ruled page
And a packet of biros
Will surely assuage

My brain’s seeming outrage
At such a production –
Line focus to fiction
Instinctive and touching

The odd one out

Thirtysomething, sane and settled
With a house, a partner, cat
Suddenly in hostile ground
‘Mid twentysomethings’ silly spat

No compassion, new companion
Spent a decade, getting fat
Understanding sorely lacking
Image all, or on the mat

Children playing games and cracking
Jealous, unprepared for that
Which comes to those who seek a reason
To offend a stranger, flat

And yet may age bring more than wisdom
Social skills, a bit of tact
To end a quarrel, out of season
Takes a woman, not a brat

Life Cycles

Grabbing life by the pedals
With no chains to break through
Slipping, sliding past medals
With one goal, tried and true

Just to get through the city
Home in time for your tea
Though the bicycle’s pretty
It’s not really for me

For the traffic’s horrendous
And the weather is bad
Exercise, yes, tremendous!
But I’m not bloody mad!

I tried it twice in the summer
With too many regrets
For though the speed was a hummer
There’s a bummer: Tourette’s

Ev’ry vehicle encounter
Be they quick, be they slow
My vernacular banter
All too willing to flow

As I zoomed past the kiddies
On their way to first class
Educational ditties
It was not gonna last

So I’m glad for the saddles
That we see on the street
But for safety, I’ve had to
Swear I won’t try to beat

Track records for the expletives
That came splattering when
I biked from Clapham to work
Then back to Clapham again

Appetiser

Sometimes I really struggle
Not to rhyme with toil and trouble
I don’t mean to burst your bubble
But there’s telescopes to steal

And it need not really matter
If I end things with a clatter
For I’ve other dreams to scatter
That may show you how I feel

Do try to see my point of view
What I may write ain’t up to you
Vocabulary seasons stew
Until a sentence may appeal

To more than literary taste
For modern verbage dislikes waste
Then with the settings all in place
We’ll serve a very tasty meal