Ignored

When he goes
People will say
They worried a bit,

Slightly,
From time to time,
For years,

He struggled with his sleep,
Always looked pale,
Seemed old for his age,
Drawn and gaunt;

But he’s here
And he sings
Like a sparrow met sunshine,

Like a morning
With handshakes,

All knowing,

His bad skin glowing
Like meat
In a butcher’s shop window,

A wandering wind chime,

His heart
A sweet swollen caress.

He rattles through the streets
Imagining conversations
And intrigue,

He whistles at stray gods
And prays to his one dog,

Buys humbugs on Sundays
And drifts.

Maybe they’ll say
There’s a forgotten sub plot

To the short shrift
They supply him in spades,

Life moves at speed
Don’t you know?

Lost truths
Come and go

And the ending’s

Just a kaleidoscope
Of falling fruit
And surprises,

No more guessing,

Just expiration dates
And hindsight,

The gasps around
All rising,

Full stop.

On The Other Side

On the other side
They closed the forests,
Odd ferns hit the alleyways
And the town played wander;

It was run all random,
The sides had horizons,
The high streets and car parks
Wrestled ruin without hope

And the strange whirring sounds
That came from gutters and doorways
Hypnotically battered
The sorry, crestfallen birds,

Just the odd eye recording
Their another world whistles.

Clouds assembled like soldiers
Through the mouth of a monolith,

A dark carpet unravelling
With a crumpling stutter;

Loudly I lay down
There were art things
And war wounds,

A giddy abandon
Twisted in patterns,
A flattering grumble
Lying through tatters,

There were mountainsides
Cradling rainfall
And a scatter of stars
Running wild,

On the other side of the child,

Near the branches
Of crooked abandon and loss,

The quiet street when dawn yawns,

Where the creased shirt decisions
Roll into light.

The Echo

I am the one
That helped pickle
Their organs,
That set fire
To their insects,
Slit cuts like a collage

And shipped questions
To the back of their minds

Without warning.

The charcoal black nightmares
Scattered like dancers
On huge open stages,

The quench of belonging
In mouths that tickle sour,

It’s all here in your bibles,
Your friendships forever,

Your quicksand emotions
And the oceans we float on,

Inbetween us the landslides,

The differences and hollows
The sinkholes that we balance
On tomorrows, yes, the basics.

I am the one
That helped pick up
The broken,
That sweetened
Their stories
To sleep sound through the night

And I took my percentage
To the dogs and I spent it,

Without warning,

Without warning,

Goodnight.

The New Sundays

They carried the rocks here,
Nothing dropped from the sky
Except ten million years of rain

And all it ever did
Was cry directions
And form its accidental shapes
Oh so slowly.

Now people are out here
Hunting for new truths,
Alive with wit and guile,
Bright eyed and slightly crooked,

Walking dizzy down pathways
Just trying to regulate heartbeats
And find lost, simple thoughts
That unlock their identified traps;

They’ve been told
The fresh air helps
And epiphanies yield better
From up high.

They are dots on a hillside
Freckled under the shadows
Cast by migrating birds
And all they all really want is peace,

The ferns to stop rustling
And the bushes to settle,
The air to stay crisp
And the numbers to lessen,

Wired up to silence and clouds,
Dizzy and ready for baptisms,
They are the new Sundays,
The mass slowly scattered adrift.