My friend once boxed a kangaroo in the desert!
She got punched in the face but fought strong through the hurt.
A week after the fight she beat a tough black belt.
One so big he could crush a nut with his force dealt.
It was a mighty battle but she had quick speed!
She punched him in the mouth so hard, he had his feed.
Like a weightless ballerina she defeated him.
Used his power against him, she knocked him out dim!
The champion of the world, her heat like the sun,
Shone through the desert, kangaroo, and everyone!

What’s for tea tonight?
Stomach rumbles inside me.
Food will do the job!

What is hiding in your face?
Behind the mask of disgrace.
Unlocked by a soul embrace.
Shines out with a smile in place.

———————

Don’t look for everything, on one certain path.
All paths are stitched from fragments of time.
Walk where your feet are now, whatever your path.
Everything‘s always there, all of the time.

———————

Watch, curled up cat sleeps
Not of this world are his dreams
I’ll join him tonight

I am writing this to you
Even though you feel poo
To let you know
And try to show
You are loved

Soon you will feel better
So read carefully every letter
You might not feel it now
But I promise you somehow
You are loved

Bad times don’t last forever
Hold tight, never say never
Together we can get through
Me, you, and cats too
You are loved

It’s ok to feel bad
Or had, mad, or sad
With hope we can see
A bright future to be
And remember you are loved

Fighting is difficult
The system is rigged
The children are vulnerable
They climb a never ending mountain
To grasp at stars always out of reach

Endless paperwork
The trust don’t have faith
The kids are at risk
Set up to fail on their journey
Some destined to fall through the gaps

This fight is more than a video game, it’s life

Inevitable, he will stop at nothing
Killer of legacies, destroyer of lineage
The gift our mothers gave us will expire
Resistance is futile

He arrives peacefully in your sleep
An end to the experience
A creator of ghostly memories
But what is a memory when there is no one to remember it?

He stalks our every second of existence
Ready to pounce on a moments misfortune
Roots always reach downwards
To keep us fed until is time for terror from above

He is a faithful companion
Agile, like swift retribution
Not always fair
To him it is sport

Those in control amplify his effects
The ever diminishing resources
Fire erupts in his steadfast gaze
Like his heat that will consume us all

A column of water from the tap
Falls down past the sink bowl into the gap
Glugs in the drain through the trap
And back up again to the gutters wrap

Drop to the sewer a waste of water
Dilutes a foul mix towards the sorter
At the treatment plant works her daughter
Helping recycle like she taught her

Overflow the sewage because it’s raining
Cry do the bosses as investment is waining
Not for lack of profit sustaining
The wealth of the richest always obtaining

Nationalise it so the profits rebuild
The infrastructure and talent so skilled
Repair it where damage got spilled
And improve it all as payments fulfilled

I don’t know much
The more I know
The more I don’t
The ever expanding universe

In a tapestry of vibrant diversity, we find,
Bound by shared humanity, hearts aligned.
Together we stand, breaking barriers confined,
Embracing differences, unity enshrined.

In a symphony of colours, we unite,
Honouring uniqueness, with radiance bright.
For every voice resonates, shining light,
In this grand mosaic, love takes flight.

Let prejudice crumble, injustice fades away,
As empathy and compassion hold sway.
For in our shared journey, we strive each day,
A world where acceptance has the final say.

No divisions shall hinder our united stride,
But solidarity and respect, side by side.
With open hearts, bridges we build wide,
Harbouring the worth of each life’s pride.

Let kindness be the language we employ,
A force that transcends, bringing lasting joy.
With every heartbeat, harmonise we shall enjoy,
A world where equality we all employ.

In this ode to togetherness, we convey,
The strength of bonds that guide our way.
With unwavering spirit, let’s ignite,
A future where inclusivity shines bright.

Rhymes fucking suck
They just make it cheesy
But once I had luck
And they particularly pleased me

In a haze considering every thought and feeling she ever had.
Loving me more than a helpless pet on the street.
Appreciating the highest but lifting the lowest of art.
Queen of the clouds, even her sarcastic scowl envelops the sky.

Quietly spoken she said to me that only the fierce survive.
She smelled like a familiar indescribable aroma.
Standing next to me she looked like a million rainbow sighs.
Her touch felt like a teardrop on my lips.

The softest fluffy grey cardigan hung on her shoulders.
Dressed to kill all the badness in the neighbourhood.
She’s tired but gives life to the trees and grass and the moss.
She’s the rain and these days she’s crying all the time.

He’s cold in this hollow box
It’s warm on the outside he begs
She’s the only blanket he wants
Followed by a bow to play at courting

Summer has gone away for a while
He feels a key change of the weather
She’s unlocking her viola case and
Reading a mournful note from her lover

Harmonies sing when he’s around
Her heart grows big, her hair on end
The vibrations of love flow up her spine
Through cords of silken electricity

They used to relax into each other’s arms
When time proved to be an illusion
A song that is always there
Kept safe in the instrument of her desire

Sat to one side
You cling to your negativity
Anything good is a ride
A catastrophe for any opportunity

Carrying baggage
You sing without purity
But still you manage
To survive and cope with adversity

No one can hear you
Signalling so quietly
Righteous fury flows through
Your every action and quality

So one day stop
And listen to nothing
No more luggage to cop
Find some peace in your own belonging

My mother taught me to speak.
My father taught my tone.
Lessons learned are easily forgotten
without an environment in which to thrive.

The hourglass trees recycle the atmosphere.
Sending their roots down as anchors.
A reminder to balance when stationary.
Moving is an effort not to be taken for granted.

A struggle in my mind can be repetitive.
The same thoughts dripping out of my mind.
Like some sort of water torture
Or buzzing and ringing at an uncomfortable pitch.

We are responsible for each other.
For the animals and plants.
The seas and the skies.
Suffering, at our inadequate hands.

An overdue lesson my birthday came like a chocolate torte

My family my classmates demanding no time for any thought

Get the food ready said the dinnerlady to my tired self

So focused on this schoolwork I had no time for my mental health

Mid life crisis at break time but I’d forgot my packed lunch

Celebrating another year with three generations an unruly bunch

Take me back in time and I’d drop out all over again

Exams like a shootout but when it’s my turn I miss my pen

Typing notes on my phone I’ve forgotten how to write

It’ll take me 35 years to remember but one day I just might

Trigger warning: Self harm.

As the world had closed up I stared into my mouth, mirrored forth.
I saw the world opening amongst broken, yellow pearls.
Paths revealed themselves in front of me, some south, some north.
Unfamiliar and not a crossroads, as such, my hazy vision swirled.

The glass holding my toothbrush smashed on the floor.
A reverberation of the crash seemed to last forever.
I looked down. Red blood at my feet. A hole opened up to the door.
Once imprisoned. Now an escape route of falling and landing never.

Is this flight? Surely not fight. More likely fright.
I felt trapped, caught, constrained in this emotional hell.
Beyond repair, hoping for a fix, another episode at the dentist might.
I used a brush to sweep up the shards. In guilt, shame and fear I dwell.

Over read and over thought; chewed up and thrown out.
Told to a friend but in it goes in one ear and out the other.
“If only you knew him like I know him.” They’d say.
Not possible when it’s just one story for them but an encyclopaedia for you.

Scratched and worn,
I wear a coat of guilt.
It hides my shame.

Pride wilts in greyscale norms,
Society’s potential colour wilts.
No reason not to choose your own names.

The pandemic’s shine is becoming worn.
The party engine will be at full tilt.
Dancing alone; no longer my forced aim.

You couldn’t sleep,
I wouldn’t think.
All our fears were here,
We had started to sink.

You were so uncomfortable
A mouthful of cotton to mend.
No moment felt finished,
Gravely gathered at the end.

We held Time’s hand,
We held onto each other.

As we sat this one out
In the safety cupboard together.
A stopwatch and a timer
Couldn’t stop it either.

Sound to distraction,
Calls to the ether,
Rising tides so far away
No blip on our meter.

We held Time’s hand
We held onto each other.

And all the luck in the world wouldn’t find you here

All the same things happen every year, I hear

Changes come and go but you are always the same

Ideals fluid enough to know who win this frame

A double kiss then pulled off early before the next sesh

I couldn’t look at you but I still knew you were a mess

The tension mounted all around

Out of position I couldn’t bear it when you frowned

I love you.

Is that what I should say?

I don’t know what will come of it

But I’ll say it anyway

Cold winds blow through my wide open window.

Freezing in this moment; I look and listen.

You’re asleep. Outspoken in your dream.

An electric shiver up my back.

A foot kicks out. A cat climbs on.

Floating uphill I have been taken by the night.

A technicolour sky and bright green grass.

The tightrope bridge falls and I with it.

The cat jumps down. You’ve farted.

Alpha had small touch of my cardigan.
A nice way of saying hello with warmth.

She was happy to see me that day.
Walking through halls of an old school.
A beta test for future studies with some of my favourite people.

My anxiety was high that day.
Like gamma rays flying straight through me.
A panic on some stairs.
Overwhelmed with the attention.

Her model’s features were hidden by her smile.
It was as a wide as a delta.
Her hair was thin.
Her heart was not.
Her blood flowing through me so fast.

How are we so different
but essentially the same?

How do I care so much
when I have nothing to gain?

Why did I stay when you
gave me that pain?

Because you showed me hope in a way
where it never can wain.

You are a star that will never supernova.

All I want is your suffering to be over.

We can heal each other and show the world what’s good.

And value ourselves and stay alive like people should.

Vast universe. Not afraid.

Hard feelings. Gently expose.

Soft inside. Be kind.

Love you. Always.

Close your eyes. Where are you now? Open your eyes. You’re somewhere else. If you ever need to refresh; just blink.

A tired voice sounds sexy to some ears. It’s ok to be worn out. If you are not feeling sexy time tonight, eat something, get some rest.

A goblin could devour every nerve on your skin and you’ll live inside your isolation tank brain forever. Enjoy the fleeting because it’s not sticking around. Remember that when you’re in the depths of the bog.

Quieten your sense of subjective self. A part that feels like a whole is still a part. And when that black hole inside makes itself known then tell it to swallow the bits you don’t like.

Feed others and your brain will be fed. Keep people happy. Provide food, shelter, and an open heart.

Today is a break in the cloud of yesterday’s depression and tomorrow’s anxiety.

A point of light, almost piercing in its clarity, highlights the gift of the present.

Do not fear this focus; this freedom: It is a vacuum playground for you to fill or observe.

As patterns are set here they can easily be unravelled. In this moment knit together your life as you see fit.

Past loss and future gain are dreams kept either side of your real life. A plain cup that sits between decorated spectres.

These ghosts of prize and pain in years from now and times gone by are with you now only because you have been given the present.

The skill you were born with was to just do things without intention. Use this and yesterday’s depression and tomorrow’s anxiety will disappear.

Beans climbing up the bamboo canes
Wigwams reaching for the light
We could grow if we didn’t know your name
Steady and solid like a tortoise preserving it’s might

Houses lined up in the streets
Each their own universe
Food tonight provides a treat
My own recipe for these leftovers it could be worse

Hiding away with my favourite sounds
Nothing much could be better than this bass
I found nothing and nothing I have found
These moments are the greatest gift – they’re ace

A colossal foundation for an ideal life
From the ashes of branded waste
Self sufficiency and recycled joy frees our strife
Our wants illusions frequenting at haste

Slowed water but not still
The ashes can settle
The feeling of will
Thoughts wrought by metal
The ground we cannot refill
Our wares smash – so brittle
Trees we kill
Burn for our kettle

***

Tea revives our energy unspent
Groups of believers tell us to repent
Guilty of the same crimes if not more
Do we have to tell them the score?

Time is on our side

one day the pope will be an ai programmed to guide us away from sin

there was an eyelash stuck to my slice of cheese so i closed my eyes and ate it

announcement. we are having a party at 8pm to join you must lie on the floor of a cold dark room alone and listen to erik satie gnossienne no 1 on repeat for twenty minutes. there is a strict policy of no alcohol only lukewarm salt water. dress code is dark. pets are mandatory

Sometime ago. I came across a fellow. He looked so bright and gay. On that sunny day in May.

It felt so good with him. Somehow we just fit. So I asked his name. He looked at me with disdain.

He said “you are not desirable. I do not want you”. My heart sank. Was this a prank?

“Please, I beg, no.” I cried out to him. He walked out the door. I dried my eyes and looked at the floor.

Several years past. I grew my beard out. Maybe he won’t recognise me now. Maybe he was just a silly cow.

we’re poets

of course

we don’t know what paragraphs are for. i hummed along to the same old song – a song for the encumbered #instapoet

Holland is not the Netherlands, Colin, what you say and what is

are different.

Things.

Mackerel sky dotted with hungry birds

Deflated poet, pen in hand, running out of words

Fallen seeds sown by the late summer wind

Take sprout next spring lest the birds find

Isolation. Taking pill after pill. Quell the screaming. Yet still making myself ill.

Turn your backs. The help is for themselves. The darkness that cannot be lit. Not even by the elves.

Systemic failures. Arise in solidarity. But faced with walls upon walls. No fall for this city.

Carried to the morgue. In a car with an anonymous driver. A symbol of us all. Hope and happiness yet neither.

A turn in a walk. Giving up yet pages turn. A book can teach a lot. But we will never learn.

Diffused. Our bodies no longer intertwined. Breathing without our lungs we just work for the colony. Stolen hope. Stolen lives. Stolen Queen.

Carrying a massive twig several times my size. Easily I admit but I have no audience to brag to. At least, no one who listens. How is time perceived to a lost ant finding his way in the world?

We are many. I am few. Alone in a crowd. The same cliches trapped in my mind. Going around and around and around. What do they want this twig for anyway?

Disenfranchised and abandoned. A cold wind is simply not felt. We are impervious.

Likeminded support. Are they just as bad as me?

A bunch of lies served to ease the pain. They just rewrote history and we forgot our joy. I’m sure in at least two late nineties 3D animation feature films. You can see me now. Hurting.

Grit spread across the road. Ice falls from the sky. A woman carrying a heavy load. He’s stood at home making curry pie.

A thoughtless word. Shrugged off as a joke. Another whisper of discontent heard. So much tea he’s feeling woke.

Hypocrisy from the soul. Conflicting needs. An animal within has control. The monster inside silently feeds.

Translucent like a glass fish.

Embellished as a plank of wood.

Battered by localised solar wind.

Neutrino holes in my soul.

Collective agony brought together with a symphony

of fingers and thumbs mashing screens we see.

We’re not alone, we can chew on this wood, together.

Nothing happens all at once

so pandas take their time.

Shared experiences and friendly faces,

voices that don’t quite fit the words,

and group chats that can last forever.

It’s forever November. I am hurting. You’re my medicine and my poison. It’s not working.

I cannot remember. The good times had. When the sun last rose. Now things are always bad.

The leaves have left. Everything is black. The beginning was the end of it all. The emotions I lack.

Something is wrong. I binge but I’m empty. Just a bucket wanting to be filled and emptied. Quick fixes so tempting.

I don’t trust you. But I don’t trust myself. I need you in my life so much. Is it good for my health?

Crashing branches smack against the ground after the sky’s electric bolt severs the tree in two.

Car alarms are heard, dogs bark, rough pavements sink underwater in the precipitation’s deluge.

A coffin of pine holds the dearly beloved, the recently deceased, the forgotten man. His Alzheimer’s his parting gift to the ashes for a jar.

The door is shut. I want in. Please listen whilst I struggle. I can’t find the words to say. I hope my presence is enough.

You found me lost in a field of snow.
You kept me and took me home to live in your secret drawer.
No longer depressed but I always will be your blue friend.
I made a home in your posession. I had belonging. A buzzing love.
Then you left me and you moved out to be with a real flesh boy.
I am lost in a field of snow.

A frostbite wind cuts across the field
Six horses gallop from one side to the other
And back. The wind does not relent.
Seek shelter horses for collapse is upon us.

My main drive has weakened I have not eaten
My food on the floor. What service is this?
It is winter and the cold crosses riot within my harness and braces tighten.
A contract to count here and stop there. My food is not orange it is silver frozen dew.

A metallic container is my vessel to a unlikely doom.
Travelling whilst trapped; a hijack of hooves and a late delivery of hay.
I career up the side. Trot my vocation. A lost dream in this nation.
The ice pick in my back is a permanent end to what might have been.

Blowing bubbles from my nose.
An infectious calamity on my back.
The ruin of all we have. Not the viruses we carry but a unhelpful destructive nature.
The weather is in my mirror this time of year. Why the long face?

***

This poem was written with a pencil held taut in my anus.

Flora had a feeling in her gut.

Stuck in a rut. She struts and hurts her foot.

She didn’t know what she did feel. Without an even keel. She didn’t feel he was real.

He wanted to cause an explosion in her life. To cut herself free from strife. He wanted her for his wife for life.

She left him for another man. Because she can. She went in with no plan for Dan.

He had hope. Her heart said nope. He felt like a dope and could only just cope.