Malcontented Walrus Man

Somehow he oozes free
from a car designed for a being
a fraction of his mass.
Ego-swollen, he appears to have made
an inescapable life jacket of his self importance.
His tiny, malice-filled head and disproportionately scrawny neck
are the knot on his body's balloon.
He patronises women
while imagining them naked.
Leering at their turned backs.
Sycophantic to their faces.
Bullying and deceitful
he counts tears and anguish as conquests.
I wonder, will he ever taste his own medicine?
Chaos and finger-pointing, gossip and harrasssment.
He does not deserve compassion.

Tuba Weasel

It is a testament to psychiatry
and a chip on her lumpy shoulders
that she is still alive.
Once so sensible by profession
now a narcissistic hysteric.
Her potato face over-condimented
with all-too-ready tears.
I dread to hear her wheedle,
to see her drunken-spider hand.
I understand her banishment.
I wonder if she'll feel relief
the day she finally gets her way.
Or if she'll feel only regret
at having worked so hard at something
inevitable.

18th Century Man

He is jarring against
the concrete, high street, 60% viscose, quick fix, app twisted backdrop.
He swims into focus-
rough hands, soft eyes, timeless face.
Canvas trousers and half tucked shirt.
Kindly, undistracted, universally caring.
His portal is behind an unremarkable, once well painted, brown gate.
I wonder if he notices when he emerges into this era?
He doesn't seem to.
I wonder is it a portal of the body or the mind?
His bicycle and mother are well tended.
His auburn thatch is not.
Without a single note of irony,
he whistles.

I wonder.
Is it a portal of the body or the mind?

Call To Arms

Every day I read the news with growing trepidation.

It’s regression on a massive scale. The end of civilisation.

We’re not punishing those that caused this mess with lies, with greed, with ego.

But blaming folk who’ve nothing done and warring with nations we don’t know.

What year is this? Who’s in control? Where is Lady Justice?

She’s bound and gagged in a divan bed. Ransomed for the fame of her captress.

Of equal weight (or so we’re told) to celebrities, diets and twerking.

The blood on her sword is only her own so clearly, this system’s not working.

The children that need us the most,

Tragically fall through the ‘net

And children are taken when good parents seek help and hysterical healthcare objects.

Open your eyes and ignore the damned press! They have profits to make, don’t you see?

Horrors that happen go unreported and affect us – that’s you - and it’s me.

I do not believe it is really so hard to lay aside neighbourly spite

And just keep an eye out, get involved and speak up if something just doesn’t seem right.

Notice the pensioned! They are people too and their stories are going untold.

As we focus on disposable incomes of youth and deny our own growing old.

I don’t have the answers. I’m not the Messiah (or even a naughty boy),

I am just one person, sick of the nonsense and sick of acting coy.

I’m not asking for money, or a signed petition, or change in far flung lands.

I’m saying your community needs you before it ends up in God-knows-whose hands.

Get involved. Take an interest. Speak up! Go out!

Disenfranchisement is dead.

Earnestness is the future!

And without it?

Total extinction instead.

Recipe for Disaster

A handful of sugar.
A penny of salt.
A pinch for your thoughts,
your light and your faults.
A tight squeeze. A light squeeze.
Freshly squeezed orange
and you.
We squeezed into my single bed:
room enough for two.
But only room for one
in my heart and in my head.

Freshers Love

You tongue your way to my pleasure.

Fist claws cotton.

Breath escapes.

The film plays on -

Unwatched.

Sunlight plays on your spine.

Life continues below.

Our world is now.

If only I could remember your name.

Clown.

Just one more clown in his circus you are.
Such a public mockery.
You are a tool in his all-consuming self-love.
Unwilling to face the one way, blackhole nature of it all.
You stand in painted smile.
The audience watch clutching breath
for him to pull out the chair.
The ringmaster owns your eyes and time.
Are you so blinded by footlights
that you can truly call this
astounding self-degradation
love?

Just one more clown in his circus you are.
Watch the pretty girls lead the horses away.
The spectacle is leaving town.

Lazy Dreveries

I blow chains of momentary beauty
But they cannot capture the moments with you.
Watching the world hurry past
I saunter through thoughts idle and unworried.
I know that you will still be as imperfect
as the day you lent me your coat in the rain.
The old dog smell of wet leather
still warm from your body.
In death our flaws are in perfect perspective.
Who cares that you were always late?
now that you are.
 

06/04/04

As a teardrop I fall for you.
Melancholic. Mesmerised.
So far, so fast, so frail I fall.
Shattered before I crushed.
A stolen heartless kiss -
That thoughtless thief of trust.

Pools of blue that overflow.
Tissue peppered cheeks.
The condiments of grief.
I smile through gritted teeth.
And love love as my foe.

Hiding

Long sleeves. Long legs.
These lines are too telling.
I wish I could explain
how this pain helps that pain.
But language is limited.

20/03/2010 Dear Gio (but not for Gio)

Surrounded by vices as strange as sliced toast
Interacting with many half-living, half-ghost.
Some glowing brightly, some dulled by life's blade,
but everyone wants something from you, I'm afraid.
Some want your body, some want your mind
Some of them only want you to be kind.
The best are the ones who want you to be you
and the ones who just want you to smile.
The ones who will paint you with custard and glue
To away a fun little while.
Who'll help you survive, help you to say no,
teach you things about Glasgow you never would know.
Ride bikes with you, share with you, get you a job.
To share a good joke with, to share with a sob.
To drive one way round Nottingham, eight or nine times (!)
and hypnotise randoms with powers of rhyme.
A gallery cafe, a man in a dress
and all of the time at Paisley Road West.
The long walk home never seemed so long
when walking at five forty-five
And shiny posh bars never seemed so wrong.
You'd rather be seen in a dive.
And if you find these friends my boy, hold them tight.
They're rarer then wormholes, more precious than light
and all of the time that together you'd have
would be sacred, remembered, occasionally mad
but thoroughly lived - and that's the whole point.
In life's murky waters, I urge you: anoint!
Your life may transport you to a Dear Green Place
of culture, catastrophe, darkness and grace
and then, maybe then, you will make friends like these,
my long lost and ever-beloved Weegies.

Per Luciana Zapparoli - L'Anniversario D'Oro.

This

I drew this for my mother-in-law on the occasion of my in-laws' 50th wedding anniversary.

It is an image of her on her wedding day.

The "50 anni" on the top right is a dream, not even imagined to her on her wedding day.

All the things listed on the top left are the things that came to pass in their life together - the things she could have forseen: Children, love, problems, work, happiness, hard times, tears, grandchildren, friends, dreams.

The road she is walking is moving her from the past to the future.

The roots under her feet are the roots of their strong relationship, the things that have made their relationship work: Love; Family; Strength; Experience; Luck; Hope; Patience; Determination; Sacrifice; Humour; Morality; the Church; Propriety; Life Education; Faith (and faithfulness - the word is the same in Italian)

I know my sketching skills leave a lot to be desired, but hey. The idea was there, just not the technical ability. Perhaps with practice this is something I can work on.

14/10/13

I feel I am just waking up
from 10 years in Van Winkle dust.
Head is clearing, footsteps lighter.
Horizons wide and vision brighter.
Emotional ballast I've unburdened.
Old grievances I feel I've pardoned.
Not that I'll forget, of course,
But from that me I'm now divorced.

Is this me now growing up?
Or just a midlife crisis?
It's not too young, my half-full cup,
I'll probably die of bronchitis!
Those days we can't choose but to see,
when antibiotics don't work
because no company wants to fund
research with no glamorous perk.

I know what I want and how to get it.
All I need now is time.
And a canyon of work, of which I'm not afeared.
My life will be Reason from Rhyme.

Christmas 2002

Once there were three:
The magic number-
3 witches; 3 wishes; 3 wise men.
Maiden runs away; goes to see a crone.
The witch of the East
My, my - how she's grown.
They smile and compare notes
but will scars tell the whole story?

Then there were four.
Ugly; clunky; boxed.
4 sides. 4 corners. 4 angles.
Parallels everywhere.

There are no witches in mathematics.
Only mother's apples pi.

The Mermaid and The Sloth

Come and meet some friends of mine,
we'll go to where they stay
with toasting glasses held aloft
and witty repartee.
I'm sure we'll have a lovely time -
they're very welcoming.
They are the Mermaid and the Sloth
to them ourselves we'll bring.
Please don't mind their way with words.
Their oft-referenced archaic verse
is harmless at the very worst.
With intelligence they're cursed.
The Mermaid and the Sloth.

Mary Poppins

Idyllic, but my brain won't SHUT UP!

He Says, She Says

He says I'm not the me I was,
That I have changed irreparably.
He says we argue all the time.
Ironically, I disagree.
He says he looks at others now
And admits it's hungrily.
He says that there is nothing wrong,
then dredges fights long-dead to me.
He says he wants his favourite food;
My single staple kedgeree.

I says he spends no time with me.
I've substituted him because
we spend our evenings silently.
He is not moved by beat or rhyme
or language - aural gold to me.
I know I've changed, but badly? How?
It's all improvements I can see.
Does someone always end up wrong?
Or is it plainly sad to see
That Jude is our saint-patronly.

Dispensary Blues

I am sick of helping the sick
And getting nothing in return.
No sick pay, no thanks.
Just above minimum wage I earn.
I am sick of hearing how things will improve
As another friend's hours get cut or removed.
I am sick of the blame and the lawsuits I risk
Because of mis-prescribed medicines that do not exist.
The lack of support and unbearable pressure
When every day things just get worse and not better.
Vocations unvalued and talents deterred
instead of encouraged. Profits preferred.
Insomnia's nightmares curse all those that care.
Long term dispensers in this firm are rare.

Speaker Celebrity

Three years of ridding myself of my rage
left me bellaputrescent and old for my age.
I appear to you now as a mere wizened spectre;
A wrinkled and cynical regret collector.
My most squalid and heartbroken version of self.
Insurmountable walls built on negative wealth.
Don't judge me on all of my confident bluster.
The truth is so human, severely lacklustre.
The best metaphor is that I am a pearl;
A wist-wasteful woman in guise of a girl.
Layers of glamour, a heart made of sh**;
My place in this world an uncomfortable fit.
Now hollow of eye, of cheek and of heart
I fantasise daily of ways to depart
and romanticise leaving no remnant behind;
Of wiping all memories of me from all minds.
Don't get me wrong, it's not my own demise
that's driving me now - I'm no suicide.
I want retrospectively not to exist.
I would never have chosen a life such as this,
knowing now what I know. If I knew then
that my life would be guided by follies of men
so selfish and cold they can't even admit
when they've lied. Would I want it? Not in a fit!
They tell me that if I pretend long enough
-at happiness, love and all of that stuff-
that one day I'll wake up and I'll feel content
walking this finite and f***** firmament.
They tell me that life isn't really so bad,
that I am environmentally sad,
that all will improve, given hope, given time.
"It's just circumstantial. Try going outside."
So I straighten my face and strengthen my defense
And once more construct my perfected pretence -
That I'm choosing to live, I've the world on a plate.
That I'm not just a selfish and boring ingrate.
And who knows what will be in the days still to come?
Not me, if I freak, chicken out and just run.
Now I bid you good day, tip my hat, flash a smile
and invite you to wander this path for a while
and keep walking until we emerge in the sun.
For my life in the shadows is near enough done.

Surely?

17/02/08 The Unit

Hang ups fall of in The Basement.
Woven webs hang fallen girls.
Pricey silence and finite liberty.
Safety in networking.
Too tangled to drop
Politics. No peace.
Never released.
To fall is freedom. To land, death.
Drop - Stumble - Trip - Tumble
Care full of the key
Whole
A turned ankle. A twisted cheek
Bruised blush and a greying glow.
Disco damaged discs.
Ribs and wrists resist.
Curiosity provokes.
Cowardice persists.
Is there anything behind those eyes anymore?

Life as a Legal Drug Dealer

Daily I hunch as a pensive Paolo
Upon the stool of derailed dreams.
Bathing in burning garlic fumes
and the stench of chip fat
long since past its best.
Squinting at the scores on miracle cures
purporting to prolong a painful life.
Apothecary's emanuensis.
Tightrope ballerina between
The Junky
and
The Medicated.
I paddle in their suffering,
bailing out water where I can.
These dosette boats only float for so long.
When they finally drown
I step out.
And carefully dry the skin between my toes.

Roundhouse, London, 12/07/2013

I steamed and spun one London night,
As trains did long ago.
Euphoria; experimental;
Honesty and woe.
My facial vines of eyeliner
mystified the wasted
and a one-off song from Palmer's tongue
set straight the rag-most-hated.
Unexpected overwhelm
and floodgates rattled open.
Lost and then the Bed Song
un-numbed my heart so broken.
The gift she gave - an awesome show.
An unguarded performance.
The gift I took - the strength to glow
and keep on moving forwards.

Lorrainespotting

Choose existence. Choose to talk to your firiends. Choose to get the fuck on with it, even if it means you'll have bad dreams. Choose to give affection to those who deserve it. Choose to tell the others to fuck off. Choose to ignore paranoia. Choose to dance. Choose laughter and 6AM eternal.Choose reality. Choose yourself. Choose to remember the choices you have made. Choose not to regret. Choose hope over nostalgia. Choose everything. Choose to be fabulous.

Choose Lorraine.

Return from Sonar

The signs above my head read thusly:
It is 18 degrees C.
It is 4:42 AM
It is prohibited to smoke.
I must wear a seat-belt.
To my right, Americans who are in a pissed off mood with each other.
To my left, the speedy retreat of the Spanish countryside and the lights of Barcelona.
It is now 17 degrees C.
It is now 4:44 AM.
I still can't smoke.
I've taking my seat-belt off.
I am listening to E talking and contemplating my joyful life.
My arse is getting numb.
Bloody rock hard coach seats.
And me with no padding.
My mouth is as dry as a badger and twice as furry.
It is 17 degrees C.
It is 4:47 AM
I really want a fag now.
Fiddling with seat-belt instead.

Five - Six - Thirteen

After a glorious production the sun
bows graciously behind the trees on my right
to rapturous vesperturnal applause.
To my left the bats fight their nightly battle
against the ravenous grasp of mortality.
Pheasants overrule the avian debate
ahead of me in the comfort of sakura silhouettes.
I see the detritus of a summer holiday
strewn on uncut grass. Cars. Watering cans.
The bag of wet swimming things I meant to unpack.
Tea steams in the cool air.
Behind me the warmth of love coaxes, calls, caresses my name.

I close the door to outer beauty
and open my heart.

He

He is a misanthropic Dr Seuss character
Fantastic and forlorn.
In his tower, viewing Camelot.
A spaceful time; timeless but for
A dinosaur. And memorabilia of a time
More fabulous than now.
Self evident truths. Pained. Personally haunted.
Exquisite facade. Visually gifted.
Betrayed by sight.
Stand alone at arms length.
Internationally adored.

Never change.

Affirmation

Even in the midst of night
the distant wail of T-Rex's cousins
reach me.
And even when I am not right
and fall and fail I let the lessons
teach me.
And in the hours I feel alone
I remind myself of the myriad network
around me.
And all the things as yet unknown;
Concerns of health and joy that lurk
astound me.                            [impound me]                           (glass is half...)

I refuse to forget who I am.
I refuse to forget who I am.
I refuse to forget.

work in progress...

just beyond the precipice in the corner of the sky exists a land as hard to see as huckleberry pie. The creatures there are bound by light but sageleaf liberates their forms to rise from leaden shells to fly a single night. For all they crave is this brief burst; a particle of free. But in doing so they can't go back and very quickly freeze. The atmosphere (to hold them back) is a boiling mass of cloud. The violet fetid soupy air muffles every sound. Sageleaf grows so woefully, unnurtured by the Glaikens. These lumpen gaolers trog the earth. They've no kindness to awaken.
Within this world the fungii thrive but hold a place most sacred. There are fungii wars and fungii homes and Commune-Cities gated.
We meet our hero, Roodrellac and join him in ablutions. For now he scrubs and dons his clothes for he has work to go to. But if he knew his soon to bes he'd be sure to pack a knife, too...

A Good Talking To

Heed the prophet as she comes;
bitten nails, mascara runs.
What once entranced now nauseates.
Love once inspired, now apathates.
No balls for you, young Cinder-Zappa.
Weak and cowardly. Empty wrapper.
Betrayer of your youthly self,
Now 9 to 5 and on the shelf.
Uncreative, antisocial.
So far removed it's downright woeful.
The slip so far to what you are
can only treasured memories marr.
Reclaim yourself, take back the night.
Keep your goals within your sight.
Self-sabotage and confidence lack
have stolen years you'll never get back.
Forget the times you could have made it,
before your chance and youth have faded.
Focus now on what will be
as working truly sets you free.

Baby Weight

If love is love as love should be,

then why does it enslave, not free?

Love is a power - nay, a force

that rivals all but gravity

and as said best by Spiderman:

"Power is responsibility".

You, the product of our love;

that spiralling arcing meteor.

Those fireworks, rockets, sleepless nights

that bred into a lifetime more.

And slavery was none more false

for waged I am by your sweet smile;

to relive that first one again

I'd crawl on cliche a million miles.

The perfume of your morning hair

outweighs the months of colicked hell.

To watch you grow and learn and love

I'd give again my childless self.

The birth of you one snowy day

shackled me with steely bonds.

But witnessing your joyful play

is all the freedom I could want.