if i never

If I never hear a No
From you
Then your Yes
Is worthless.
Otherwise all I hear
Is reflection
Not difference
& that
was what brought you to me.

half yeller

I don’t know who’s died, who’s alive
Who’s lying maimed
In some Spanish street at dawn.
Who died from alcohol
Tho’ one I know died from leukaemia
He married an ex girlfriend of mine
And
I can only hope
Wish
that he died in love
in her arms.
All those crazy young men
Riding black chrome deathtraps into
Blacktarred flat tops
Sunsets and shrouds
Gone from me
In my ignorance of their
Living
Passing.
I cannot imagine their lives
Only that some may still be
Alive
I wonder if they passed their days
In the same winsome way
I remember
Their adolescent ways
In some eternal half yeller sunny
Evening
Of golden cider
Stolen cigarettes
And girl women
with sticky knickers.
We were boys then
And some of us
Still are.

‘Good ole Sal’

I’m going to call her Sal, though she was never a Sal. Never an abbreviation, too deserving of time by attention gathering for that. Some girls carry abbreviation like a curse, dowdy and rotten, around thinned shoulders of burden, others carry them like torches deep into pysche: have you ever not liked a Pat? Pat’s serve good food, good functional sex and smoke strong untipped cigarettes deep into ample bosoms. One Pat I knew in my teens broke into a solicitor’s office just for us to shag into the deep pile. A Patricia could never do that… Patricia’s live in poky places where are all wants and needs never articulated and they can thrive on being poor misunderstood women. That or they acquire reputations early on as ball breakers and stand alone chain smoking in the corners of parties they gained invitation to by accident.
Bev’s too, are warm, slowly seductive, gently falling into sweet debauchery, open and willing to play but, Beverley’s? Beverley’s work in social work with a passion for poor downtrodden girls who have suffered at the hands of men. Beverley’s wear sensible shoes, eat good chocolate, share houses with other doughty women and fondle fat pussies into the night.
She was never a Sal, but I’m pissed off enough to call her that now. Sal’s serve you with a thumb in your greens, a cigarette dangling from lip corner, one eye squinting and hoping the ash settles somewhere other than gravy. But Sal wasn’t like that, she was short, sweet and blonde as autumn corn, with blue eyes to match cornflowers. The first time we met our eyes locked and I knew from the tingle that we would be lovers. I thought she played cool and so I played cool back, it wasn’t until much later that I discovered her coolness was not worldy cool but dumbness. No, that’s not quite right, she wasn’t stupid, but often she couldn’t or wouldn’t fire on all cylinders… she could infuriate me ceaselessly by her not thinking.
Some practise hours in meditation to ‘not exist’ to be ‘non minded,’ this girl had that in spades, she could non mind in the Olympics then just suddenly wake up to utter some vaguely relevant thought only to disappear inside herself again. These non sequiteurs seem fun at first then fade into one as faces of all ex lovers do: not quite dull but no longer interesting.
They tell me, those folks who swear by chicken gizzards and sky gazing that there are two types (or was it three?) of Scorpio people: Eagle and Grey Lizard. Eagles soar above the world, keen eyes looking, spotting prey and moving in for the kill. Grey Lizards don’t do this, they need sun, space and flies to come to them. Sal was a Scorpio, else I wouldn’t be telling you these things. Only I think now those who divine by the cosmos forget that none of these things apply to those who wander the earth as Zombies, walking, talking, with eyes shut to life. Walking, talking, sounds like a doll, I guess after so many years of being treated like so, then life becomes easier if you behave like one. But maybe that’s me making excuses again for others shortcomings, if so then that’s about wanting space for my own fuck ups and if this is the story of Sal’ it must also be mine of another fuck up.
If you met her, you wouldn’t believe this, a nice person you’d say, I can vouch this having heard others say same, first readings no matter what intuition tells, is crap. Sal had fucked her way through school, first her peers to get help in homework, then a young teacher who aided exam results. She ditched him of course when her needs shifted, this she told one cool evening when her sleep appeared disturbed after I’d introduced my cock into her ass, just to see if that would awaken her. As so often unfortunately happens with these first time experiences they are effective only once.
As all of us in those late times, those dark ages before sense prevailed and the new century starts ticking, she held a tale of woe. A mother who beat her with wooden spoons and shrewish tongue, of all, she preferred the spoons, the damage being lesser lasting. Then the smarter sister with duller looks and boyfriends who after counting to ten needed others assistance. Like any sap in those times I believed in tales of woe and the importance of listening: we men had to learn to hear women, to support them in their bad times, to pay penance for the gender sins of other men. I too was asleep at this time, having been put into trance by the babblings of twisted sisters with corkscrew agendas tracing shame as tattoos in unperfumed skin. I listened, hmmn’ed, tut-tutted, anything to be there: to be listening, seen to be listening, though now if I try to recall other than gossamer outlines all I get to hear is pink noise. All horror stories begin and end, to believe anything other is I guess now to purposefully miss the point. Lost in our little lives without guidance or sense we hold onto straws of others need and believe it to be profound, we make it so, or else we wake…
Sal’s horror stories were tinged with the disbelief of how these things could have been done to such a body. She did have a good body granted, a great look but then who doesn’t in youth? Blurring of physical outline occurs with age though blurring of boundary is for youth. If my memories are to be held hostage then I want/need more than surface, lip gloss and bi monthly visits to beauticians for eyelash tints, to remember. Though here is the rub, I don’t want to remember all, only that which is salient, all other is dross and clogs the memory. Sal was a pain, that is point here, yet I thought I loved her, wanted to be with her, blinded by needs I missed her being anywhere but herself. Sure she spoke, made love in dutiful ways only she wasn’t present. For this I carry now the burden of wanting to wake her. Her friends now cannot see this for they too need plenty of sleep delivered by narcotic, alcohol or gossip. Those pre occupations of those who regard themselves as bright, charming but others fall in amazement at their vacousity. Birds of a feather they say, I too wanted to be there amongst the flock, all chatter and then sleep. But too I wanted changes, a move toward life in love and meaning other than who does what to whom.
To be in this crowd was to be in isolation, to be with Sal’ meant letting go of self and following into dreams only slumber brings. Frustration builds at wanting something from others, knowing that they cannot do it and ignoring that as fact. I wanted Sal’ to be present, to be with me but she had run so far from mother that she had yet to find her way back, I too was to be added to the list of those who hurt her. I guess that’s true, I did want to hurt her for her cowardly ways, her spirit in absence, the betrayals, but I never could, to punch somebody not present only tires out my arms. She tells different now of course, telling of anger, violence, broken dreams and twisted faces, though now my name appears in place of mothers, others and the bogeyman. I cannot recall these events though clarity exists in memory of times she called wanting, needing me, her visits before she married another sleeper. He too coming from a similar background. I pass their house now, lights dimmed the better not to stir and curtains same as those I/we hung when I wanted her to wake and live.
To reject another is to reject part of ourselves, for if we are nothing but parts of the same consciousness reflecting upon each other, then possibly if we are all of the one then Sal is me and I was her. As such I cannot hate her, I recognise in myself the ability to sleep, that narcissism where nobody exists but I, that place where others are but a bore unless they carry out my whims. Where she becomes me is in her ability to hurt, wound and perhaps hurt self by the doing of these. God knows best perhaps but now I see no joy in her as the years take toll of that innocent look she first fostered in teens, as all flowers, time’s breeze renders all edges jagged. Those she stirs slowly with in somnolent circles around shopping places have achieved much the same look: that of the wise cat supping cream who recognised that to best gain love is to deny self, close doors marked personality and after a certain age hold on to whatever comes along that passes for warm flesh.
Scathing comes in many forms, that cuts deepest which passes for informed comment in polite circles or carries cowardly sucker punches over tea and sympathy. Sal for her share lives on now, having passed through fairly unscathed by my need to live life, dare to be and do. There was nothing I would not do then for her and now nothing I can do but smile as she passes by. I know and she knows that those horrible things she felt she had to say about me are untrue. I cannot call her on this to deny, challenge is but to confirm, all I can say that I held her in my arms and one day love was gone. I can call it betrayal, she can call it putting up with his ways or we can say goodbye and hold onto some tattered fragments of dignity, though I guess that’s a little late.

cheers ears

Sucking on my beers
Man, you’re so morbid
and it’s ache again
why do I bother
with these fuckheads?
another, I tried:
I feel like an alien
here to observe, learn
disconnected, yet excited
by the unobvious
Man, you been smoking?
poetry is wasted
tho’ they think its me
get off your high horse
tilted yet another
fuckwits are everywhere
yet I don’t see them
with the answers
to why this is that
or the insane order
of things
I’m still searching
For an ear to understand

Whisper that again…

Girlies who do phone calls
end calls
in whisper
and those
who talk in sibilant whine
and whistle
or lisps
sighs
and giggles…

I want to fuck them in the ass
their pretty
Lipsticked mouths
and
perfumed pinked cunts…
I did too
slashing innocence
ripping reticence
to open
replacing virginal
with vixen
though sadly
so often after torrid
they turn back to child
and
left with so such choices
I took the goodbyes…

Adore Me

Jane Sucked
like she was
hoovering golf balls through a hose
and that was also picture
on a birthday card she sent me
Though
after she’d captured me by the balls
(which sadly didn’t take that long)
she stopped doing it.
my balls stayed in her pocket though
I was so far gone
with mind games and head fucks
(not that hers was anymore)
that they stayed there
atrophied
into prunes maybe sultanas
and escape
no longer seemed possible
but thankfully
as they became smaller
she forgot they were there
and I was left
to live on without her
Thank God
they’ve grown again now
and others have continued on with the job
she started
and when they stop
I move on.

I feel

I feel like I’m living
when
Love is good
Lust kicks in
Beauty swims by
Sunshine warms me
Dawns grow in a corner of the sky
Cover the ice in blue flame
Cicadas wake me
Horizons glow red at night
Food happens
My shoes fit
Sam the dog barks
Waves break right
Or left
Money gets paid
on time
In time
For my time
gin n’ tonic is cold
lemon just-so bitter
underwear don’t ride
trees sound like rain
grass sweet against my teeth
old friends call
traffic flowing
lights all on green
courtesy given
taken
mist over the ocean
yachts reflected still
herons fishing
sweet latte & good company
beer and humour
music from the centuries
I’ve lived
dancing like a mad thing
for the glory of it
baby gurgles
soft hands
big as my finger
first words
from all the above
and YOU.

Hannibal

The weather improves whenever I think of hannibal, those elephants and the flowers that must have improved after the visit, sure trails widened, got broken, but think of those Flowers…

new dawn

A lovers promise
A junkies kiss
Or
was it the other way round?
I know you promised
to love me forever
never leave me
to hold me
in a new dawn
to never let me go.
you’re not here
the bed stays cold
this is sunset
my love feels empty
somehow
much like you.

knives

Knives like lovers need to stay sharp
Blunt is for strangers
Passing by
Knives like lovers need a point
Knives like lovers
Need direction
Knives like lovers used carelessly
Cost lives
Knives like lovers
get tossed in drawers
Forgotten until needed
Knives like lovers grow dull with age
Worn
Rusty
Knives like lovers
Need a sheath…