Water is boiling,
oven is warming,
children sleep softly
ar hyd y nos.
This is my morning respite.
I slide back in bed beside you.
Everything ends too soon.
But you sleep on in my spoon.
The wind outside has cornered a desperate demon,
It sobs and screams in our roof beams
I wrap our furs closer around us.
Nothing here will disturb you.
Lovers sleeping softly, lay nightly intertwined
while mice run round the mantle clock
and shadows mask the sun.
It’s late to leave with work undone.
The clock has just struck one.
The mice are swiftly gone,
The fire is dying in the grate
as the cat prowls out
The lovers breath spreads out, deep into the gloom
He inhales her scent and dreams of wildly circling wolves
while she comes closer into him, huddled to his chest
and feels herself enshrined, held safe, peacefully possessed.
But he looks up to the sky and knows that he is lost
The birdsong he had heard before
is drowned out now by constant chimes and clocks
I may not deserve to be loved
but I have served my time
in the hard knocks school
maybe breaking some rules
but trying to learn
Too long I have felt as if nobody feels me,
wrapped in a bubble that touch doesn’t pierce
locked in a transparent vacuum,
surrounded by screens,
trying to silence my head
‘I see nothing but love in your eyes,” she said
Her words raised me up from the dead.
I saw my hands in a dream
They were small and far away
What did it mean?
They didn’t seem to be mine
I looked at them in great detail
Every aspect defined
But still they didn’t seem mine.
Their size was due to the distance I thought
But the finger nails were tragically aged and the thought of death was persistent.
Then I remembered the rivers that flow
Meandering down to the depths of the sea
And the waves and the tides
And the weighty drag of the undertow
In the deep dark dead of the night
Long before dawns spreading light
When everything appears black or white
Enfolded in gentler greys
A lady steps into my forest
Quite naked
To bathe in the light of the stars
To me this has never seemed strange.
She’s my beautiful fairy wife. Her wings are gently throbbing.
And I always watch
Though she says I must not
She could damn my eyes but I know she won’t
By muscle bone, and seed-sack
By the lancing glance of my eyes
I will bring her to my bed
I am the king of the wood and will do as I must.
I am bound by lust
And night is the time for love and passion.
We must always make time to make love
Don’t ever ask me to be your Master
It would be a descent
and almost certainly lead to disaster.
The loss of your freedom would make me sad
Like losing a key that was heaven sent,
If I wanted to be your Master.
Our time together would vanish faster
The best of us would be rapidly spent
Wrong intention brings disaster.
So I set you free to be honoured and loved.
I don’t ever need to be your Master.
You have eagerly welded yourself to my heart.
Do you miss my attention when we’re apart?
So do you have any innocence left and are people kind?
Innocence no.
When I look in the mirror I see two eyes and I think I have lived two lives.
I still am.
One sadly tragic, a cynic, the other, ecstatic, euphoric.
So I can’t complain
My soul doesn’t show in my eyes as it did before.
And when I came to the edge of survival
I rested my faith in the kindness of strangers.
Yes there is kindness. Perhaps there are angels.
So what do you think of the world now?
Beauty, greed, wickedness, utter stupidity and lack of wisdom.
The curable won’t be cured.
That’s the worst.
I do remember the angels.
Perhaps kindness will save the earth.
That’s only my favourite dream
It’s not my nightmare.
In the Black Country heavy industries squatted like giants
with their legs in chains and shrouded by steam.
Coal dust and dark rains stoked and smothered the foundry fires
Burning day and night in the iron works
While workers suffered, sweated and laboured
In the mine shafts deep underground
And ruined their lungs for the sake of the empire.
These men today speak of thee and thou as they count through the hours ’til they wither away in the black and the red.
Not a Cobra, not a Viper, not an Adder
Only a little green grass snake sliding through the shadows
But out of panic and fear
A boy on the path beat you to death with a stick.
Now little green snake with your flickering tongue
You are gone.
The fields are diminished without you
Expand my pupils while I gaze
let me see you drenched in the light
while I hear the sudden racing of my strained and pounding heart
before I slip beneath the shades of darkness
into everlasting night
in the beauty of your cruel glance
and feel no lasting trouble.
