Let Me In

Let me into those well-worn corridors
Let me tread without a thread out of place
Like a matador before the stampede.

Let me take the stairs again, take them in;
banistered escalators, spirals of the hive-
Let me into those well-worn corridors.

Let me get the measure of my classrooms-
Take in family portraits on the walls
Like a matador before the stampede.

I had less to prove than I thought I had
To claim my neglected inheritance;
Let me into those well-worn corridors.

I will take stock and dust off ornaments
See my name engraved where I hang my hat
Like a matador before the stampede.

Let me savour this moment in silence
Before the classroom corals are bursting.
Let me into those well-worn corridors
Like a matador before the stampede.

Spawn

Why didn’t the paedophile voyeur frog
get excited when watching sex videos?
because it wasn’t frogspawn
it wasn’t frogspawn
wasn’t frog-
‘that dress’ was a deadend
it died as it dried out
in fibres-
remember?
some dynastic mother sperm that-
and on a roof of a department store in London
a dropped tadpole that died-freeze dried-
not even grade B quality-
anyway-
they said cut off the head
then the body dies but they forgot
about the bollocks beneath
and the spawn and
now we have a stream
of future seekers on the great journey;
like headless chicken sperm in a game now
in search of the egg-
we view a livestream, a GTA4 perspective
and see the game see
the tadpoles that have inched across a continent,
clinging to their programmed quest
-even the sun is magnetised-
to gather at the gates of England,
Dover’s ovaries,

we stare hard at our doorsteps
and the lawns we trim with nail scissors,
waiting-
the future is coming-

and they’re turning into frogs
and they’re leaping, they’re attaching
themselves to all these trucks,
they’re climbing into all these boxes
like unwanted gifts to the world;
its ‘cat and mouse’ apparently-
as if life is a game, if life is a game
the game is getting real and the shell
the shell we’re in is thin-
how long can we incubate?
while they queue up-
we’re going to have to up our offer
of consolation

Direct Attack

Gaddafi is dead and the whole cooking pot
has spilled over now.  He’d have kept a lid
on it but now they’re siphoning;
all that appeal money is getting redirected,
paying for ISIS and their version of events
they’ve got their Call Of Duty; we’ve got ours
but they can get through that to you and
our kids don’t know it,
but they can be playing the ISIS version!
watching ISIS TV, getting radicalised
without realising it, getting radicalised
without realising it…
every day nature calls
but duty keeps shouting

Project

I am nosing around coral;
a fairy ring spread from bed
to bed I have been a motor,
for two hours, self-cleaning;
propelled by tremulous fins
that will not relax and refuse
to allow me to join; be petrified-
what do I know?
I know for certain what vanity is
and how large it can loom-
as deprived as I am I am resilient-
I can’t wait to open the curtains again
and swim out of this room

Blues Club

    

18th

you are still life and the ignition
the sweet apple cushioned,
perfectly in position;
I had you framed
while my eye wandered
but now I’m back blinded
in apple juice tears
after eighteen years of ‘the mission’
to break the glass to take stock
pull you out and kiss you
to be reminded make you
the twinkle again, the little star
of my heart in your baby body
so far so good;
it is good
to go back
sometimes
I always tense up at any back patting
go missing at even a suggestion
of reminiscing-
I have too many songs only half
written-so far then and so good
from a spark a living flame
living in my blood, now in adulthood;
I will stop and let you catch me up
maybe, light a cigar of some kind.

Bananas

-Have you got any of the good stuff in?
-there you go; Ecuadorian.
-excellent. Dominican just don’t cut it these days.
-grown by the second richest man in the world.
-richest man in the world from selling bananas..
-and cocaine.
-bananas and cocaine. What more do you need in life?
-not much kid. it’s all about altitude. Best there is is Columbian. It’s like coffee.
-are you the go to man then?
-what for kid?
-bananas.
-well they won’t pay you see
-well I’ll be here every week if you can get hold of some Columbian.
-well it’s half a million quid..just to get through Panama Canal.
-how much?..you come through Panama canal to get to Huddersfield Market?!
-no the liners do. They gas them to get them here. These Ecuadorians are gased. Your Chiquitas aren’t gased. Ten years ago it was 100,000. It’s a racket and it’s not politicians. They’re just wankers. It’s multinationals.
-gangsters
-exactly. £1.50 to you 

Holmewood Bound

he is track
suited
he is street
deferential
he is plim
sold
nothing says everything
about him;
a grey sheep from the shadows
in sporty polyester fleece
pocketless pyjamas-
just a phonebag-
a droid in his tracks
he is capped
in an estate that has
no features
or gestures, not even
to high rise
just low sprawl

 

 

Dragged

I was dragged to Bradford by a chain
carried through banks of bracken, bramble
on rambling skidding carriages of a train
over hill and dale green, timeless freedom
formed like a family, a blood connection
called to go into open fields and woodland
dragged though through-
elderflower sycamore lupine buttercups
meadowsweet rhododendron rose holly
silver birch poplar apple ash oak hawthorne-
to be a blinkered stranger again 

Proper Happy

Come in children, take your seats
and have a think on me.
I’ve put a spread on
to simulate some stimulants
to show you-
safe beneath cling film for now-
what could be on the buffet table
at the party of life to come

today it is self-service; self-teach.
Absorb and explore them; imagine them
and find out about all these props
that have been put out of your reach

to be proper happy; know thy props.
Know what fizzes and what fizzles
what snaps and crackles and pops
and where the party starts
and where the party stops

here we have wacky-backy
donkey dust, Special K and wizz
nico-café-ketamine and
you need to know what is
a stimulant and a sedative
and what not to mix them with
categories, tolerances, types and doses-
you need to know your space cakes
from your party samosas-
your sugar coated diazepam
from your chocolate coated marzipan

we’ve got magic mushrooms
speed and cocaine, areosols and glue
anything that has a use is open to misuse
tranquilisers, hallucinogens
prescription drugs and skag
you could succumb to any of these
from the first inhalation of a fag

from chocoholism to solvent abuse
you’ve got to be aware-
for when you’re ‘out there’-
of all these other varieties of juice-
that are squeezed out of sight-
knowledge is power
and it has the power to dilute

to be proper happy; know thy props.
Know what fizzes and what fizzles
what snaps and crackles and pops
and where the party starts
and where the party stops