Fortune

 “Fortune favours the brave” they say

in tones taut with untruth.

I'm cornered forcing

My face forward 

Hackles rising inside the fortress 

Of knives that I bought

With the battles I fought 

Just to get off my knees in the first place.

This misplaced faith reveals itself

a flasher in a dirty mac

Fangs cracked in grimace,

brown and beastly. 

I'm not easily broken.

Frustrated, choking

on unspoken fury, yes. 

Was I ever anything less?

With my back to three walls 

I'll chimney-crawl

Palms hot and slipping, knees burning, toes curling

Til I'm above it all.

I'm more than capable 

Your tricks pitiful, escapable.

Their hallmark unmistakable 

Little poison smirks and shirked responsibilities 

Leaving slickly silvered schistosomiasistic slithering ribbons of parasitic sleaze 

everywhere.

Like angel hair

 festoons in a Grimm fairytale forest

Leading not to freedom, but a furnace.

Adrift now on spinnerets deftly thrown threads

Money spiders claim me as their own.

 I dread

The battles ahead.

Despite my history of victory 

Complacency's amphigory

because 

The Future Belongs To Those Who Can See It Coming 

and I'm running towards it

My awestricken orbits

Entranced in the audit

Of plausible plaudits

Presented by Hope as possible pathways

To choose.

It's not a very cunning ruse, I'll admit that

But the patterns tell all, they love a bit of chit chat.

It's no mystery,

This cyclical long-form repetition 

of communal maladaptive dreams.

But Morpheus has forsaken me these past 30 years.

This sleepless lucidity is the blessing in the curse.

I'm well versed in the machinations and the misery.

You play chess 3D and I'm bored of games.

This hue and cry of shameful failures,

baying hounds on the heath 

“On a long enough timeline the survival rate of everything drops to zero”

Entropy and Apathy the anti-muses informing your decisions. 

Efforts at improvement abandoned, branded unrealistic by pessimism.

But pendulums swing by definition 

and your barbs of derision are blunted

By every ticking moment spent

In the prism of crystal vision.

Choose well.

Or perish.

Dangermoth

 I remember 

Rough rope knots digging into aching flesh

Dappled light

Sour sweetness of salted skin seasoning 

the scent of the clematis.

Top to toe, resting the rest the wicked rest.

Smoking and full of schemes.

Each time we contemplated the notion of eternal life

It was always on the premise that we'd both be there.

Still raising hell, climbing trees, eating flowers,

Sharing woes and being proud of our adventures.

Lessons dissected over wine and cigarettes 

Are better learned and it diminishes regrets.

I won't forget.

“We're survivors. We survive. That's what we do, me and you”

That's what you said. 

And you meant it at the time.

And every other time because you'd needed to remind me

When you'd rescue me from yet another trap. 

Knight in shining dreadlocks,

Penguin onesie,

Wooly jumper

You taught me

So

Much.

Now

Education incomplete 

I stand depressed, by life defeated

Hollow hearted, eyed and cheeked.

It hurts

How fucking dare you go without me?!

We had plans. We said we'd meet

When beards and tits both touched our feet.

Verandas, rocking chairs.

Our spouses friends, our kids alright 

And even grandkids if we played it right.

And now

There's too much time without you.

I don't know who I will go to

Just to tell my honest, open, truth.

You were the one who never judged

The one who gave me back my buzz.

And you gave me your St Christopher.

I gave it back, though; unlike you -

My favourite clothes all taxed and strewn

In far flung corners of your trotted globe.

We owned each other’s lives you said,

My home was always ours, my bed

“The velvet palace” yours instead 

Whenever you had need.

But now you'll never see this one

Nor the man my boy's become

Nor the firecracker your girl will be.

Seven days in sunny June.

A lifetime shared, imbibed, consumed.

Drawn to light, 

too much, too soon.

But now your tattered wings are flying free.

Only One

 The magpie brought the message sent.

It flew into the tree and then

I looked and looked and looked again 

But there was only one. 

It said nothing, shifted stance

And cocked it's head askew, askance 

At my concerned but accepting glance

I could see only one.

I'd seen this omen once before 

In brutal clarity’s recall

I wept and wept and wept some more

And cursed that only one.

But now I know the message sent

Is not to torture or torment

Just warn of loss to the extent

It can, as only one.

Tuxedo donned in noble rite

Its visits solemn and polite

Piebald Mercury takes flight

And leaves me only one. 

End of the End

 Another one gone.

Another three songs 

poisoned by emotional association.

It's a strange wave that breaks when they shoulder that box.

Raw, real and final.

The ritual is primal.

Elegies and eulogies hang 

as a forlorn fog, a longing 

we would call nostalgia

if it weren't so immediate.

So overwhelming.

Remains

 Counting down the days and ways that I have missed you.

The moments that we haven't shared.

The times I know that I was scared

but to others it looked like anger.

To others it looked like idiocy, 

like flippant avoidance of serious thought. 

The objects and experiences I bought

after you bought the farm.

It took years

and it's only now,

drowning in the hourglass

that I realise how much time has passed.

And how much 

I have left.

The Bells

 Another one gone! 

Brothers left without brothers

and mother's with hands so wrung 

they become the bell that tolls for grief.

Rare and not so rare 

their share of hard won wisdom 

is gone.

Vanished. Lost.

And what a loss it is, 

The lessons they shared with us

lessen the din of

 disharmonious hum into

sympathetic resonance.

Marvellous

 This year is brought to you by the word Marvellous.

The more I use it the truer this becomes.

It's funny the way things go, sometimes 

it feels the rain will never end.

And yet the brief kisses of sunshine leave ghosts of sensations

you can almost taste.

It's marvellous.

And so it is! Despite the rain,

 despite the Teran's rage, 

despite the pain of losing another of us, 

we're choosing to be just as much of us

and keep our humour high.

The days fly by, unfettered,

ever bettered 

by the promises of flowers planted 

in the hours nothing was granted 

gracefully, but striven after, 

relentlessly.

Collectors

Some people collect stamps.
Some people collect coins.
Some people make air fix models so well
You can barely see the joins.

Some people collect conquests.
Some people collect scars.
Some people collect experiences
during which they see stars.

I've got a new collection,
and not through conscious act.
It's been kind of foisted on me and
I'd rather give it back.
I'll put it in an album,
Neat, protected, labelled, proud
private slice of all the lives
that used to be around.
Past tense.
You see it's all the funeral cards
with photos and songs and poems.
It's hard
to watch the collection grow.
I have no control
over this.
It's not like pokemon cards or vintage picture discs.
They're all limited editions,
all one off works of art.
All threads in one rich tapestry
of which we're just one part.
And the pattern that they weave glistens
Crystallised in wisdom.
Passed through timely advice
and an ear willing to listen.
It's not like I can display it.
For flat living it's highly compatible.
For the major part of it,
It's completely intangible.
The cards are merely a symbol:
A trinket in place of a jewel.
One hydrogen atom representing
Each universe of you.
So I'll put them in an album,
neat, protected,  labelled,  proud
and share them with the enthusiasm
of the traction engine crowd.

Some people collect conquests.
Some people collect scars.
Some people collect experiences
during which they see stars.

Some people collect stamps.
Some people collect coins.
Some people make air fix models so well
You can barely see the joins. 

Dear World

Look, we need to have a chat.

I’m getting a bit fed up

with dealing with the fall out

of your drama.

And it’s not only that,

my son keeps waking up

crying, calling my name out.

I’m trying to teach him about karma.

You see, he’s noticed (as have I)

that the bad guys keep winning.

Every time I leave the house

without him he cries.

I don’t want to raise a fearful child.

and his awareness is just beginning

but with news of more killings day in, day out

he’s convinced I’m going to die.

Not helped when I say

“Well, one day, I will”

through desire to tell him the truth.

So he says “But not today?”

And I’m swept over ill

tempting fate to give me liar’s proof.

So look, World I’m asking

you to buck your ideas up.

I love to share in positives

and I’m sick of masking

cracked ideals in cover ups.

Show them you get back what you give.

Sincerely,

Georgia. Xxxx