Banker from Yorkshire

When train rattles south

- warmth - it is - we face

and warmer still - we might arrive

kipping with an open mouth

and b’hat self-pity

leavin’ snow behind a pace

into a sleepy London city

and t’other willful acts we may conceive.

Just now

inside a notebook, on a table in front,

I wrote lots of words - with letters revealing

something not around before; I suppose

a relationship - paper and pen and tipping nib

- and I’m hoping that between the scratchy paper,

turns and lines, a spirit-charge of

electricity could light a shadow,

unleash a note, arise from a dream

that I scribbled in a word in a

notebook on a tabletop out there.

Double Dream

One day I dreamed a tiny dream

and dreamed of dreaming up a dream,

conjured from my brighter side

dancing in the high-day sun,

sand between my tiny toes,

hands and fingers up and reaching far,

far out into a web of stars.

But, in the dream, my dark side rose

and howled a wolf onto the moon,

chased a rabbit down a hole,

savage supper all I caught,

until I woke up in this dream

and jumped into a well - to cool -

before I woke up in my dream.

Facing Andrew

It’s not too easy

facing a boy

who looks at you sideways

without fear or anger

but softly and friendly

wiser in brainbox

and subtle in secret

hearing the feeling

rhythm and obvious

you and him here, now,

drilling no damage

softening edges

beating the beating,

tip, of your hardening heart.

Talent

Body and voice seem hunted

throughout a haunting performance.

Sometimes a song,

a joke and song,

an instrument, song.

Sweet and strange

to tip-up as dancers

(not minotaurs)

but as people from streets

with hands and prints

and, here and hopeful, an older man,

teenager spinning, a green

moment, lifting red

to blue; lifting them selves,

us, up, up and up. You’re on – you’re up.

Spreadsheet

Tap into a cell again

- far too hard for me, old chap, this sum

arithmetic is way, like, too much pain

 - I need to hit the wine bar, stagger home.

Subtract and multiply and add

 - I do believe it’s time - another round:

ask my PC, Apple, iphone, ipad;

move the cursor up - along - and down.

She is a rather super looking mare

 - Paypal up an order to the bar

and we can be what, we, forever were;

self important, humbled, pissed and poor.

Fool

About the tarot trumps, masters claim, the strongest

is the fool.

                        This morning, when a long-eared nut

confabulated out from my fingers into long, long grass,

away I flew! Oh no – my car – won’t start – the time! Come on!

Old melancholy whacked me hard inside like a pillow fight

and pity wrapped me in cloaks – like a sad, old clown

Andrew would laugh! In front of engineer, red king or purple pope

he’d use a fool’s strategy;

                                                dance or smile,

hugging forces – like a yellow rose

exuding the garden for a while,

innocent and knowing – nothing – zero- footloose,

free and funny, stranger, stronger stuff – more like – inside,

deeply inside – out.