sports and social club

the union jack flaps in the sunday breeze,
it's threadbare and almost transparent.
next door, the roof is lower than the rest
and 'this building has 24 hour CCTV'.
it's a private club - members only,
and the members are smokers.
fag ends float in brown foam,
preferring the drain to the ashtray.
it houses the three-fold joy of quiz, bingo
and races on thursday nights.
it's here you'll find the disco,
and live sport on the big screen.
an escapee blinks his way out
wearing a t-shirt: 'if found, return to bar'.
he asks 'what're you doing, love?'
and i chance a truthful answer.
'there's nowt creative to be found
in there', he snorts,
as he steps inside the house next door.

still life at tan hill

just after sunrise, in the sticky sweetness of a tent for two.
there'll be no need for an umberella this weekend.

the remanants of a fire; burnt carrot coals cooled to ash
and smouldering with memory.

memories of kinks of ink black hair and careful caresses,
of drinking cammomile tea with the stars,

these two seekers of secrets and lovers of solitude;
settled, for a weekend in wilderness.

surrounding green envelops, an ampitheatre for peace
and new love. there are only the bleats of sheep for company

and the landscape is bleak, and beautiful, but never, ever twee.

harvelin park, stoodley pike

would this stone-finger waggle if it could?
residing as it does atop lumps and bumps
that cry out to be discovered, covered
in boot-clad feet, made for walking in bogs.

the standing statues magnificent,
juxtaposed with the tractor-hum
at seven pm on a sunday evening;
stillness and movement is simultaneous.

there's an aged house here on the hill,
where he peeled damp,
flowery wallpaper as a child,
found expletives hurled at the walls.

who would scatter swear-words
at the inanimate?
take the time to inscribe
them in fat black pen?

in the shadow, stansfield view.
cold coats and white cells
quarantined madness,
but when was it catching?

such black histories lodged in the hillside.
the toy-town homes are sore in the
twilight sun, such man-made creations
unwelcome in nature.

in the morning, you hear nothing
but the birds,
and his mother's
roses really are my favourite scent.

salento

a stop sign advances
by the power of unison.
abstract wings are
cock-eyed and ramshackle.
libertarian-crows fly
across the stage,
where a back arches
like a vicious bridge
(not made for crossing).
that same spine
is a shoal of fish,
creating time
for spiral highs
as salento lifts.

distance

above,


your full weight
brought to bear
upon me, who is
a 'delicate creature'.

even as you
lay     there,
i feel you

disappear

inwards, folding
like a sphere.

this fear
becomes
and grows
and can
go nowhere
in this L-shaped room.

L for love                
becomes one I         
and another,             r
yet you're just          e
around the               n
                          c o r

he burrows a hole,
head bowed
into myths and
literary criticism.
i want to ask,
'what have you found?'

but my words are
dr
       ow
             ne
                    d
in self-sabotage.
it's that damned
vishudda again.

i need to scream
and gargle
with salt-water,
sing a song
to the oceans
and splurt
hurt into sinks.

this poor frog                    s
in my throat;                    t
time and again               a
have i washed              o
him away,                   l
but the bloody thing  f

the strangled kitten
manifests as laryngitis
and ineptitude of
expression.                      
i may be sensitive,               v   e
but i don't want to call it  o         r.

little worlds

my rasping heart
clasped one hundred pictures,
but observed them not.

my skinned pink feet
sought just one kindred soul,
but touched it not.

my wavy fingers
grasped one thousand treasures,
but freed them not,

and then i saw
all within and without,
for a timeless second

and i needed not
to clasp, seek or grasp anything,
within this mikros cosmos.

midnight cowgirl

positioned between two mirrors,
she observes a warped vision;
there's two of her,
twelve fingers and three noses.

she rocks back on hardened heels;
shorn with contact, cracked and fraught
in contrast to the sheet -
which is virginal, in non-judgement.

she strokes it's cotton-skin 
long before the lines creep in,
but bloodstains still flower,
spreading sordid tye-dye across the bed.

faint grey lines emerge and
she picks up a rubber,
but the lines remain,
persistant grass stains or period knickers.

her voice withers with
explanation as the mirror
beckons; she is resting-less
for the lack of the lotus.

i suppose it's a question
of freedoms exchanged,
peeling the onion, layer after layer,
crying out freeing fears
but weary woe betide her;

for i wonder what we will find
when she is all gone?

lotus flower

just call me nymphaea (or ms nelumbo, if you please!)
under favourable circumstance, my seeds
remain viable for as long as 300 years ...
even when recovered from a
barren lake-bed in china, i thrive.
i am the aquatic perennial;
ever fertile, and emerging baptised
and disguised as a mermaid.
how strange to be the lofty lotus;
sacred with sexual purity and divine beauty,
it's petals unfold like lovers souls'
alongside one another, in perfect unity. 
i like the anecdote about growing from the earth -
that my flesh and blood will return to mud
is certain, but meanwhile,
i will try my best to make a pretty seat
for the feet of deities.

a riddle-poem

they decorate oreilles;
snail negatives of open space,
in which the tunnel funnels down
in sound.

like dream-catchers,
these dangly apparatus
capture secret worlds
for little girls,

and twirling them
between fingers
is somehow
always comforting.

plain paper

i love to write poetry on plain paper,
i find it more natural
to create on this fresh slate.

and you are a human being
in plain paper form,
with the rare simplicity

of nourishment without the adornment
of sweet decorative barriers,
all the better to contain me with.

fences, hedges and pledges of allegiance
all melt, there are no taboos
between me and you.

it's exponentially true
that i could observe the freedom of this
woodland creature for time immemorial.

the beauty of blank paper again,
the eternal sunshine of the spotless mind
and the unconditioned energy of touching souls.