It started underground In the dark A fluttering of awareness A pulsing heartbeat A distant drum of war. It started underground Waiting out the cold Gathering it’s resources Biding it’s time Waiting for its moment. It started underground Until conditions were ripe, Then everything exploded; The rush for the light Breaking into the sun Claiming […]
Poetry
BLAKE’S WAKE
Corridors and doors; strip-lighting; more corridors; fast-walking, important walking. Blake was escorted at top-speed. Blake was on his way to see God. They led him into a bullet-shaped capsule then followed him in… Whoosh of doors. The windows were tinted thus Blake could not see out. He knew they were travelling at great speed […]
Advent
The inky dark December sky outside is punctured Holed by a luminous moon, cold and full and bright. But inside, there are three candles and eleven tea lights burning There is peace, there is warmth, there is complete quiet. Shifting currents below the surface are heralding something good An almost imperceptible sense of […]
Umbrae
You can’t run away from ghosts. They’re too sly for that. They slip and slide after you, seeping through cracks In your consciousness. That grey silence just before dawn Where your fears rush in and create a gap? That’s their favourite place. Their space. Throw yourself into your work. Go on. Add hours to […]
Vampire Limousine
We are people of the world you and I Literally we are of this world Though the makers of this world despise us -We eat unremarkable food and agonise from time to time over the price of a piece of fillet steak Or some of us learn to content ourselves with non-nutritious chemical substitutes […]
BLOOD MOON
I’m your master set in alabaster And though my self-aggrandising policies Are laundered and spun-dry through media machines There are always certain aspects that require The old distraction or filibuster schemes And if resistance hits my purse And the worse comes to the worse Then dare you even mention The tried and trusted strategy of […]
Another Revolting Peasant
Don’t look the homeless man in the eye Hold your chin up as you walk by Just another revolting peasant Trying to get some free pay They’ve all got jobs and houses anyway Foodbank collectors, scrounging again Why should you pay for society’s drains? Just another revolting peasant Trying to get a free meal Don’t […]
At the Beetle Supper
At the Beetle Supper My ankles itch. Crack! The black shells pop like champagne corks at every table. Feeling sick, I look for cover. There’s none. Something shattered flops with six legs waving. I ask for an alternative. The waiter tells me, “No, the country’s free but this is all you get”. “Don’t argue”, […]
Rat
Rat When it came into our cellar, the rat brought fear with it, fear that lingers even though the rat itself is long dead, poisoned by the blue pellets that we fed to it. Like the burglar that came the year before, we thought we might have glimpsed it once or twice in the […]
The King Is Mad
The King Is Mad The king is mad. The queen bears his children like a malady. It would be a simple solution, were she to eat them before they grow into their own madness. She does not. She lets them scamper about, small birds that twitter and fret in every corner of the palace. The […]