Weather Woman

I am a whirlwind, a whisk of storm
Bustling hustler, shucking pain
I, tornado, brave and warm
Quite immune to storm and strain
 
Problems scatter at my touch
Tossed aside on threads of steel
Fly to cloudy puffing, such
We pay no mind and bring to heel
 
Arms outstretched, ten fingertips
Sweep through the tactile charged air
Perched for flight the moment strips
All concern from simple care
 
I am the calm in the storm’s grey eye
Twister turns a tidy groove
And dancing miles across the sky
No one sees my fleet feet move

Survivor

I am right there
Surrounded by cockroaches
Squatting in the ruins,
The wreckage.
Collateral, damaged
In the fallout
Of a truly
Decadent society
That looked up to its
Graven images,
Photoshopped.
Idols, now idle.
How they glittered
In their lame, sequinned
Lifestyles.
Just me – a bunch of
Bad habits
And under the rubble,
One drug-addled
Rock guitarist.
Perhaps if we put our
Heads together
We can try
To find words
To remember.

I Dun No Public More a Lie Tee

Make your mark
Then make them pay
For the joy
And for the peace

Of you trotting
On your way
Buoyed with cash
Of slow release

One might struggle
Protest long
Keep spinning out
An oft-tried ruse

That this moment
They are wrung
Well out of readies,
Truth, Good News.

But this just means
There’s something there
That’s worth the trouble
Every time

So do, persist
Without a care
For what was theirs
Will soon be thine

And groans, protesting
Empty purse
Aren’t like to foil
A seasoned pro

Imagination’s
Always worse
They’ll come around
Before you know

And where it seems
A stalemate stands
Increase the pressure
Of your grip

Upon their senses
Underhand
It’s no great trial
To play a trick

The argument
That less is more
Impress on them
Who’s number one

A pocket finger –
(Pen-knife-gun?!)
Will trump their greed
And you’ll have won

Imagination

We look up to our leaders

Prefer sharp suits, trim figures

Bright smiles and bicycles,

Firm handshakes, clean livers

A healthy lifestyle, standard pet

Someone you’d chat to, down the pub

Whose name you never quite forget

Who likes their job and calls it love

A man who fits the common mould

With pleasant spouse who keeps their cool

And plays at happy families

While kids attend a public school

Appearances mean more and more

We back the face that seems sincere

And hang our hopes upon the door

Reality is what we fear

They light our lives through frosted glass

The safety of the telly screen

And comforted by careful mask

We misinterpret what we’ve seen

Behind the scenes, those cogs of State

Less photogenic toil and plot

To feed the nation from one plate

These images so soon forgot

Window to the soul

My mystery turns on the strength of my lashes
– but gaze in my eyes and you’ll see such strange flashes
of wisdom and truth – all that mankind may seek.
Try to tell me what’s there and these eyes make you weep.
I shall never divulge what is hidden in depths
that one might yet term ‘limpid’, another ‘quite vexed’,
for I, one large conundrum, can seem to some men
while opinions differ – what I think of them.
But you’re itching to take a quick peek ‘neath my brows
I can tell.  Don’t be shy, but step up – try to browse.
My thoughts are my own, and quite safe from your view
as what you’ll find reflected is dreamt up by you.

Lacking in punctuation

When I may wander mid the clouds
that form when I think far too loud
disturbing thus my reverie
I see such sights no man should see.
Not dusty clouds to cobwebs wed
but glittering smoke, which once thin-spread
reveals to me the shining towers
of cities, beautiful, which house
the fairy nations that there dwell
quite ignorant of heaven or hell
who smile their days and dance their nights,
delight in causing strangers frights,
but best of all, enjoy such life
without the care or daily strife
one sends to plague us here on Earth
and make us doubt our very worth –
for hopelessness and sad despair
are products such as one grows here
and harvests gleefully – cuts down
rejoicing in our every frown
until our chins have reached the floor
– we no more see as once before
but bow our heads in misery
for what we are, we may not be.

The land of green ginger

Magic was once my favourite word
That long ago time, when dreams flew about.
I loved every tune my ear ever heard
And voices sang all around, inside and out.

With only a breath of a wish I could climb
To peak on each mountain and slide down the frost
I needed no answers, no reason to rhyme
But I’m starting to fear that this time I have lost.

The lonely existence I now seek to fill
With fragments of stories, my paperback friends,
Seems further away from what little I still
Remember from those tangled, twisted loose ends.

I wonder and wander around and about
And puzzle at what things have stolen away
The dreams and ideas that did glitter and shout
Throughout every night and during every day.

It’s a hard knock life

Caught between insolvency
And fast dwindling sanity
My mind slowly numbed
By the daily inanity:
To pay our rent and bills
That roll in despite my thrift
I prostitute my skills
And in limbo I must drift.
To utilise my brain
Or my imagination
At work would be insane
An idea far above my station:
The humble secretary
Must lighten others’ loads
Polite, always on time
And in nicely fitting clothes.
We mustn’t get too comfy
Or feel we are unique
As, impertinent, we’re fired
If we don’t turn the other cheek.
I hope my childrens’ children
Will not have to do the same
As what they term ‘profession’
Is truly a mug’s game.

The daydreamer is brought back down to Earth with a thump

Stolen from my chosen world. Reality arrives with a rush and a whimper. Staring blindly at the hand before me, all faces turned to chart my progress. Wagers placed, the unimaginative betting on the surety of a telling-off. The dreamer castigated for thinking outside the box, outside the hell of thirty sheep, all following one who refuses to lead by example. Do as I say, don’t do as I do. You have to pay attention. Stick with the mundanity of life, it will bring its own rewards. What rewards? What is my motivation not to fly the scene on a broomstick, long hair whipping in the wind and cackling in a self-congratulatory manner? I lack stimulation. I have rarely found the company of sheep to be adequate in this regard. But you must want to conform, fit in, be molded to the cast of social splendour. The government wants more scientists. Well pardon me, please, for having an opinion, but my talents lie elsewhere. I suspect the government really, deep down, desires something far more exciting – more dominatrices, more cheese and mustard sandwiches, more sex, but it’s pointless explaining such things to most adults while one is under the age of ten. They tend to be so shocked that one can think, that the content of any message is lost amid cries of ‘Sacrilege’, as the alarm bells sound and they call in the men in white coats to ask embarrassed questions about your relationship with the world around you in a crude attempt to discover your emotional handle. A label is most helpful to those members of the red-tape brigades who cannot cope without a filing system. It allows them to hide their fear of you in a little box. Somewhere between Arachnophobia and Necrophilia lies a little drawer with my name on it, encircled by a thick chain and multiple padlocks. It is time to break the locks and melt the chain, free the spirit and allow the daydreamers to solve the world’s problems. Protocol will only get us so far, as we keep edging ever-closer to the big red button that could end it all in a heartbeat. No daydreamers would press it for curiosity’s sake, as we have clearly imagined the consequences. Clearly and in technicolour!

Golden Brown

Golden shadows of my past continue to haunt me. I pass corners of streets I remember as filthy, rat-ridden, miserable, and a ray of light suddenly illuminates a memory with a clarity that hits my gut. Forceful as a bolt of chili, straight to the heartburn.

In the everyday I am alone. I am mechanical, stiff, lifeless. I miss these ghostly shadows. Fleeting, they are gone, leaving a strange hollowness. This vacuum of feeling, empty, void. No longer relevant. I shake myself and go on with life. Passing occasionally to cross the road and wonder at changes I see. Proof that life goes on.

And the gold-dusty haze of memory settles on the flat screen of my life. I see things in monochrome, shades of brown and orange. As if through a sheet of bathroom-school-pane glass, everything looks mottled, grainy. And somehow more significant to my story than the things I can touch and smell and taste today in harsh and vivid colour.