What am I?

We only talk to fill the silence
There is nothing that important left to say
I know your dreams as if they were mine
But inside them I am nowhere to be seen

What am I?
A question that has no answer
At least one you don't want to make
I often wonder
When the night is at its darkest
How much more of this I can take?

You only want to talk when you need something
And like the fish upon the line I heed your call
Once the deal is done and I am left wanting
It's back to the coldness I am forced to crawl

What am I?
This token act of friendship
A guttered candle that can barely survive
I often wonder
When the night is at its darkest
Will I come out of this alive

I can feel the dark waters calling
Cold upon my naked skin
And it takes all of my effort to keep on fighting
And yes, there are times I want to cave in
I can only fight these feelings for so long
Ride from low to high, low to high
I guess I have to weigh the options,
Am I too scared of living, or am I afraid to die?

Zen Navigation

I'm not lost, I just don't know where I'm going
I've got that Zen compass working in my head
Classic rock alive on the radio
Half the fun is just getting there
Windows down, the breeze through your golden hair

This is where I want to be
This is where we belong
On the open road, stretched out forever
Singing loudly to random songs

Carefree, high on the zest of living
Loving life, freedom is our prize possession
I steal a glance at you asleep on the back seat
And I pray that this is not a dream

This is where I want to be
This is what we wanted all along
Endless highways, and no time keeper
Yeah, this is where we belong

This is where I want to be
Aimless wandering from town A to B
Nothing more would I desire
So long as you're here with me

I'm not lost, but I don't know where I am going...

I've Just Seen A Face

I’ve just seen a face,

staring at me through the rain.

And through my clouded thoughts and crowded fears,

I wonder if I’ll ever see her again.

At night I lay, and for most of the day,

I’ve got her on my mind.

It’s hard to say, why am I feeling this way

am I just wasting my time?

You’re hiding in the shadows,

but I can still see your eyes.

Been trying to say some words to you;

God knows how hard I’ve tried.

But my tongue feels like a lump of wood

and my lips refuse to move

and any word I manage to say

leaves me feeling like a fool.

If I could only tell you I loved you

and would give you my heart.

And for you to say you loved me too

that would at least make a start.

It would all have been so easy

if I had just closed my eyes,

instead of walking away from you

pretending I was blind.

And now you’re turning your head away.

And I can’t stop thinking of you.

Though I’ve only just seen your face,

I know I’m in love with you.

Perfect Strangers

The moon is playing tricks again
Full and bright face in the night, again
Watching quietly, benign smile
Reflected and shimmering in your eyes
We take our prayers like God fearing pilgrims
Only our promises are made to be broken
Faithless, we know this is just for the moment
Neither of us have the patience to make this forever

And startled out of your reverie,
I catch you in a daydream, mind wandering
A finger playing at a loose strand of hair falling over your face

I'd like to think that I am in that world
In your imagination
But that would be foolish, I know
For I am far removed from such thoughts
That creep into your waking mind
As the shame burning on your cheeks shows

Soon, too soon, we will say goodbye, there will be no tears
Just an uncoupling, as of trains, gracious adieus
Nullifying our present fears
You will move on, that is your way
I'll just move out
And live my own existence just getting by
Which really means going without

Someday we might meet again, perfect strangers
Across the street
I doubt there would be much conversation
Just the scuffing of anxious feet
Each with other matters to attend
No time for delay,
'Twas a pleasant interlude

Goodbye.

Grey

I'm tired, fight to keep my eyes open
But afraid to sleep, I am
Scared of the dreams that rise from the deep
Parts of my mind
Best left in the darkness from which they come
Haunting me when I am awake forcing me
To look at the truth, in the cold light
Threatening my security, as I come undone

It would be easier to surrender
To let myself be dragged down in this grey
To dive headlong into the dark, still waters
Hide from the oncoming day
But I've come too far, even when doing so
Seems a mistake
And I hate failure too much to ever
Wish to fall from your grace

The clouds descend, the horizon of my mind... narrows
I tread water, but the water is dark and far from shallow...
So cold. In this grey.
I am too stubborn to just walk away.

Yet, even were you to see me in this trouble,
Would you stop to enquire after me?
As you glide away on gossamer beams, sunlight from your feet
No, our history is full of silent pauses
And it's me who always comes running when called
I can fix what needs fixing, except when it is me who is broken
But I can hide what I'm feeling all too well
A smile on the surface, nonetheless a smile
Covering the shipwreck that lurks inside
Though in the absence of feeling, of warmth and of touch
The grey smile on my face only hides so much.

Standing in the rain

Standing in the rain
Wash away my pain
Nature's cleansing gift
Feel my spirits lift

It's never too late to try
Never weak to cry
Please don't walk away
Leave me standing in the rain

Now all the pieces seem to fall in place

Now all the pieces seem to fall in place

And now it seems that love was another mistake

A narrow line etched into the sands of my mind

Was I the only one who was driving home blind?

Once thought that in your words was truth

Missed the signs, didn’t ask for the proof

Opened my mouth and I gave you my heart

Watched you turn away and tear it all apart

And now I’m hurting

And now I’m cursing

It’s too late to turn back

It’s too late to turn back

Time moves on and now I’m the one left standing alone

Should have seen from how you avoid my eyes

Everything you said was half truth and half lies

You said you loved me, and time would tell

If your love was heaven to me, or if it was hell

Took a walk down streets once filled with hope

Knowing that sometimes life is just like a joke

Maybe this time things just might change

I wanted miracles and I think I got the blame

And now I’m hurting

And now I’m cursing

It’s too late to turn back

It’s too late to turn back

Time moves on and now I’m the one left standing alone

What do you want?

Do you even know?

Why can’t you talk to me or let me go?

Do I want you?

Should I fight?

To hold onto your love or walk into the night?

Do you love me?

Do you even care?

I wonder sometimes why I ever went there...

What of style?

And what of grace?

If I run fast enough I might forget your face

And now I’m hurting

And now I’m cursing

It’s too late to turn back

It’s too late to turn back

Time moves on and now I’m the one left standing alone

Downhill from here

I cannot fathom why, in good conscience
I suffer through the lies, to find the evidence
Of why... I batter my hands and head against
This wall of silence
Am I a friend... or just something else?

This time I
No longer try
I sink
It's just too much... I cannot stand it
To think
There may have been some kind of connection
But that has been cut
Is more a dislocation
No ideas
No more to share
To remember, asking, did you ever care?
That's ok, I sort of know now where I stand

It's all downhill from here.

Beauty

There is beauty in the crystal carpet of frost
Covering the ground, broken only by defiant trees
And dog paw prints
How I enjoy standing in the crisp air, my breath
A halo around my head
My fingers detached and screaming in refreshing pain
Telling me I am alive
As I scrape at ice on the wind shield of my car

Overhead, stars litter the sky, an untidy splash
From some ancient God in a temper
Yet, beautiful in its randomness
With the sliver of moon, a pale face peering around her veil
Watching the white world awaken
Seeing one man in earnest to start his day
Offering no help, but nonetheless comfort
This companion, this eternal friend

In the deathly silence, I can hear my breathing
My heart beating
I am alone, but not lonely
Need no one, want no one, wanted by no one
Loveless? Maybe yes, maybe no.
But does it matter, under the blanket of frost
The canopy of open sky pin pricked with glitter
Being spied on by an unloving, cold faced moon?

No.
I am happy with who I am
What I am
Even happier when the car starts the first time
And I can glide into the morning, fresh.

Defence of Purpose

I want to be the explosion
Not the fuse
Not the one you're left with
But the one you choose
I don't want to be the in between
The prop to salve your pride
I don't want to draw the short straw
And be the next in the line
I don't want to be the one
Paying for other's mistakes
Nor the one forever giving
When all you seem to do is take
What I want most of all
Before the final act is done
Is acknowledgement of my existence
And a place beneath the sun.

I'm fine

I'm fine, thanks for asking
Fine: that word that has myriad meanings
That really amount to an understatement of something
A lot deeper, something brooding and grey
Far from good, but a few rungs up the ladder from
Not good, which is another way of saying bad.
I'm fine, that blow off phrase
Used to distance feigned concern, or to create breathing space,
An apathetic response.
I am fine.
Uncaring answer to an uncaring question,
Posed mainly as an afterthought, having already
Divulged yourself of what you felt was important to put into words
Because you're not fine, or you have an axe to grind
Or you simply feel pissed off about something small or trivial or sometimes big
And my ears are attentive, and my heart open
Hopeful of exchange
But no.

I am fine.
Just fine.
Forget my hurt. Let's deal with yours.
It is infinitely more interesting, or so you seem to think.
My smile hides the pain I don't want you to see.
But you don't know, until I lapse into silence
And simply fade away.

Fine.

I am fine.

Wooden word. Token statement. Empty gesture.

Make of it what you will.

Winter

Winter, most inhuman

Cruel and cold, destroying all

Locks of ice and chains of frost the world it holds in its grip

With cold fire stealing our last breath

A shroud of white, darker than the blackest pall

This bitter mistress, harsh, unrelenting

There is no truth greater than that

At the centre of this still heart

As the world sleeps beneath this frigid shroud

A mock death; a mocking laugh

In these manacles we are bound

(Pick me up) Watch me fly

Stolen glance
Crowded room
Love struck
Sonic boom

Don't stop, make her yours
Pick me up, watch out the claws
Stand in line, wait in cue
What do I have to do just to get to you

Please

Watch me fly, auto pilot, baby
Under clean blue skies
Be my trash, diamonds and lace
Pouting lips, but a pretty face
Oh, my

Credit card
Daddy's car
Private jet
And caviar

Don't stop, make her yours
Pick me up, no time to pause
Wait in line, all day all night
Just one more kiss before I go tonight

Please

Watch me fly, auto glide, honey
Through the crystal skies
Use me twice, stockings and lace
Ruby lips, but such a disgrace
My, oh my...

Now she's gone
She doesn't care
Another broken heart
But no cross to bear

A haughty laugh
A private joke
She takes the cigarette
She doesn't smoke

Pretty girl, out to impress
Diamond ring and see through dress

Oh, my

What have we got?
Serial storyline, non linear plot
She moves from beau to beau
Like connect the dots

Watch me fly, collision course, baby
Through these hazy skies
Shower me with cold rain on my face
Bore me now, put you back in place

Dangerous? Yes
But you know I will fail the test

Watch me fly
Pick me up
Watch me fly
Let me go
Watch me fly
Up high, down low, too slow

She moves on...

Tainted treasure

To know what you want, but can't hold
Is like a million shards of broken glass
Buried like tainted treasure in the depths of your soul

From the depths of despair, with a primal scream
You come to realise, perhaps too late that
Life without is more nightmare than ever it was dream

Longer nights, and fitful days, spent in desperate yearning
Too much time spent inside daydream conversations
To understand that your soul is burning

How long can you wait, precious heart?
Before you're torn asunder
When the world you trust, comes apart
And you're battered by lightning and thunder

Once committed it's too late to turn back to retrace that path
You can only move forward on Time's resolute wheel
And steer a course beyond the aftermath

I may pluck the courage like lint from my sleeves

                I could form words around the tongue in my mouth

                I could stand before you and preen and gesticulate like the best Sophist

                I could speculate on the wonders of the Spheres

                And in time,

                I could win you

                                                …but…

A blunder

A blunder
Staggering blindly
Falling over one's feet in haste to flee
Burning cheeks, tear stained eyes. Blind.
Quickened heart racing, aching.
Pain in your chest, a million sorry excuses
In your brain.
The flower, hand picked from rows of its contemporaries
The card, hand written lines of now tacky poetry
Both crushed, discarded.
At least the Chardonnay corked in green
Shall not go to waste
That and the others, conspiring to erase
That painful moment, to fill that awkward silence
As those words slip easily into the past.

By ten o'clock, you shall be merrily pissed
Eleven, abed but sleep won't be forthcoming
The chances of dreaming too strong
And the cracks in the ceiling form ideograms of loss
While playful fingers of rain and wind
Dance over the tin roof.
What once was sanctuary is now isolation,
Solitude, imprisonment.
Would have been easier to just forget, to have made
Excuses and denied.
Denial, the weapon of the hopeless, the shield
But it's too late
The blunder has been made
Time only goes forward, but memories remain,
To leap unbidden in those quiet moments
Haunting wraiths that force you again and again
And again
To watch the dagger fall

How soothing, then, the midnight hour
Wrestling insomnia
The rose, hand picked, now dashed to pieces,
The note and its hasty verse ashes in the hearth.
No more blunders you promise
Your heart now tucked securely in another layer of ice.

Until next time.

Secret Love

This is the end, I can tell
Lips moving fishlike around soundless words
Drowning in the air
Gulping as realisation, keen as sharpened swords
Cuts swathes through any form of reason

This is the end, this bitter silence
Recriminations dragged up from a past wished dead
Excuses applied with trowels
Those whispered disparaging voices in my head
All hell bent fury, laying claims of unjustified treason

What other wonders, I suppose
Am I to expect with this detachment?
Performed clinically, a veritable surgeon with a scalpel
Pulling apart pieces of our secret love
That saw no daylight

Who else could claim to be a witness
Of that we held but briefly
When even what we held now crumbles apart
This our secret love
At home only in the darkest night?

It's not fair that this is the end, this last barbed parry
The half full mug of coffee, the hole in the wall
Cold nights alone, the red hot mutters
The sense of going nowhere, of being stalled
But in love, naught is fair; out of love, fair is war
And in secret, the hurt, unconfided, is salt in open wounds

So, with nary a pause
I'll close the casket
On this
Our secret love

The Storm

Flashes of lightning split the sky
Tears from heaven, cold wind racing
We huddle around a dancing candle flame
The wavering light meagre protection
Yes, we will weather out this storm
And there will be tales to tell

Outside, the roar reaches a crescendo
The patter on the panes a million drumming fingers
Begging entrance, held off by thin slivers of glass
How the wind howls its anguish at our denial
But there is naught but evil intent on its mind
It wants to thrash out and extinguish our sanctuary

Eye to eye we sit, the wavering shadows dance across
Unsmiling faces. We each take turns spinning tales
Of haunted houses and things that in the dark... bump
Our pacing is terrible, the suspense, unbearable
Every fright made the more terrifying
When thunder punctuates lightning slashed exclamation points

Morning finds us entangled in our own private dreams
Sleeping bags and mattresses scattered on the floor
The shed skins of slumbering serpents
Where the night before, cocoons of safety and warmth
Brave now, in the morning light, we can guffaw
And deny that our hearts raced last night, primitive fear

Ah, how innocent and childlike we were that night
Held by the pall of riotous stormy weather
And captives of the dark broken by naught but a pillar of tiniest flame
In whose brilliance our trust was total
I cannot wonder, with the wild eyes of speculation
What fate might have befallen
Had the flame puttered into waxy smoke
And the fingers at the panes became tormenting fists
And drove with full fury into our tiny lives
Invading our sanctuary

Of course, such fancy is lost
In the golden rays of glorious sun
Forgotten, at least
Until next time

Square One

O, if not for the folly of past miss-steps

I could look forward

Without regret

And take that chance that beckons.

But nay, my glass heart, fragile

And ready to crack

Keeps me wary

Holds me back.

And lost, all I can do is stare

And wish for things that are not there,

And rather than enquire and seek the truth,

I merely sit back and await the proof.

Gentle, gently, o, wicked deceitful heart

Precious, precocious, you fiend, this art

A poet winding words, an actor struck dumb

And chances like sand through open fingers pour

If but a chance I could find, some way to get inside

But I am on the wrong side of this door.

Last Cigarette

He leans into the recessed doorway
Hand cupped to protect the flame
Guides the tip of his last cigarette into that dancing wraith
She doesn't like the habit
He doesn't like the sewer mouth after taste
But the ritual is enough to calm his nerves
As he ponders his next move
Rain fills the narrow vista
Beyond the oblong mouth of the recess
And the orange glow of a street light is a smear of lavish
Whore's make up in the puddles gathered along the gutters
He can't be too sure if he is weeping
The cold is like a punch in the nose
But the hot breath of cigarette smoke calms
As much as it clams
Sharpens his mind, he recalls
Her fading smile, the dimness of the light dying in her eyes
When she told him she no longer felt for him
The way he felt for her
He'd only just said those three words, thinking
That is what she wants to hear
But it's too intimate, this was a passing phase
And those words are a manacle, chaining her bony wrist to his
It was a promise she had no plan to keep
So he pounded the pavement, three blocks away
In the driving rain
Found the gap in the mason work to pitch this last flame
Blue grey cloud destroyed in the downpour
The last cigarette drawn down to the butt
Before with a deft flick, discarded;
Discarded like his heart
No doubt, she'll move on; they always do
They always have
And he will clutch his wounded heart tighter
Frozen it is with vehement ice
Cursing love, cursing life, his misbegotten need for poetry
Everything within his narrow grasp
At length, in despair, he wears instead of a coat
He will take that step from the plinth
Into the rain
Into his future
The last cigarette tossed like a coin into the wet
An augury, a machine of fate
Or simply a change of perspective
Tomorrow is just another day

Work

Sometimes life is a joke without a punch line
And we're left gasping for air
Clinging to the straws of normality, hoping
But mostly we live without a care
So long as this day and the next day and every day thereafter
Doesn't step outside the line

We work
Work, it's all we know

We are born to serve the common good

To eat the food and to burn the wood

To tread on the heads of the lowly and the weak

To govern our thoughts and what we speak

We were moulded to fit the production line

And given a certain amount of time

To make the best of what we’re given

To come out at the end forgiven

In ill and in health, for the commonwealth

We are the pawns in the game of life

We work
Work, it's all we know

We work

Work, harvest what we sow

From sunrise to sunset

Thinking life is complete

We return to our little patch of lawn

Home, sweet... our domain, our retreat

Holding precious onto possessions we've sold our souls to buy

Began the journey as lovers, grew apart, dissolved with no goodbye

Yet, we work

Work, it's all we know

We work

Work, afraid to disrupt the common flow

And in the end, that inevitable slide

A hole six feet deep and three feet wide

Onto our souls, one last hasty verse

We leave this plane, with no remorse

From all these pressures, we are divorced

Will there be somewhere thereafter to seek recourse

For that we leave behind, stays behind

The final insult, the contract binds

We beg our deity for our souls to be saved

But your conscience is all you can take to the grave

Scarecrow

Scarecrow

sits by himself in the field

listens to the bird on his shoulders

smells the smoke of the burning season

watches as the corn fields smoulder

never sleeps at night

under moonlight

you see he has no eyes to see

but he sees just as well as you or me

and the wind teases his arms in the apparition way

but his lips don’t move around the words he can’t say

he has been here before you know

in another disguise

this scarecrow strung up before your eyes

have you seen him before

have you seen him before

have you seen him before

I believe you have.

You watched him bleeding tears for you

You let him heal your fears for you

You even gave him bread and wine and a final place to dine

Before you nailed him to a tree…

Scarecrow

sits all alone in a field of barley

thinking thoughts of how it was that other time

when he held his hand out for the whip of another’s crime

and bore the pain with a tight-lipped grimace

painted on his head

and he got to thinking to himself

“I could have lived forever but I chose to die instead.”

A fool

A fool

A fool you say?

Thank you

Thank you

Go away?

he has been here before you know

in another disguise

this saviour strung up before your eyes

have you seen him before

have you seen him before

have you seen him before

you know you have

You watched him weeping blood for you

You gave him a crown to put on his head

And just when he was going to call you a friend

You watched the pagans nail him dead.

And only then did you weep

As he wept for you

Scarecrow

sits alone as the sun goes down

and the lights turn on around the town

his stuffed face of straw nods in a gentle breeze

and he wonders “What the fuck is wrong with me?

Why do I take what they dish me out to me?

Didn’t I learn my lesson the first time around?

Little ingrates will pin me to the ground

Before they’ll offer me their thanks

It’s just the same

It’s just the same

As last time

I died for nothing.

I died for nothing.”

I died for you!