DEMENTIA

It's lunchtime in the nursing home.
"Not enough salt",you say.
"They never put enough salt on."
Suspended in twilight,neither dead nor alive,
frozen in a time that isn't mine.
"You're not my daughter",you say.

We sit on the promenade watching giant ships.
"My father works on the Mersey",you say.
"...skipper of a survey launch,out in all weathers.
You're not my daughter."

You slip a tiny hand in mine,
like a small child about to cross the road.
I am your mother for now.
Yet I'll always be
who you say I'm not.

ROCK WIDOW

A Les Paul spinning for the crowds
to rapturous applause.
Twisted and curled in the music world
Ignoring marital laws.

The groupies love your image
and clamour for a sign.
The camera lens may shoot your friends
but they'll never capture mine.

THE RAT

Fired pellets rattled the fence.
A bloodied rat,like some disorientated soldier stumbling in mud,
sniffed the air
and crawled beneath the rain-drenched hollyhocks.
Next door,the neighbour whooped for joy
like Goldings' Jack,
and waited for the little soldier to be still.

BAILIFFS

They took my T.V out today.
Cut me from the virtual world
and left me entangled in disconnected phone wires.
"You can have any colour you want,
as long as it's black",said Ford.
No sight,no sound
no food,no money
no feeling, no point.
No wonder.

WITCH

          I didn't ask to be
         cast into orange Hell
          where angry flame envelops my soul
          and steals the flesh.
         Words crackling and sparking,
          disappear from view to brand your being.
          Burning and shrinking
          Burning and shrinking.
         I always saw the truth.
         Remember the ember.
         

THE SHELL

              Darling son,the war is won
              although your battle rages on.
             I hold your head in hands to cry
             yet cannot feel the reasons why.
 
             Close to me, I'll take your pain
             and hope the enemy feels the same.
             Your terrors will be safe with me.
             I'll shoot them from your mind.
             You'll see.
                   x     
   
        

           

ONLY YOU

                       Come inside and rape my mind
                        of heightened sense and flame.
                       
                        Hold my eyes and my attention
                        Take me to a new dimension
                        Love was never my intention.
         
                        Only you to blame.

THE CHEMISTRY

                              Rigorous testing,latent heat
                              alkali and acid meet.
                             Spontaneity versus fact
                             Poles apart,yet they attract.     

THE TAROT

               As I was walking through the fields
               with each new day the same,
               a Romany behind a tree
               was calling out my name.

               "So you're the Queen of staves" she said
                "I 'm so glad we have met-
                The Julia Seizer of his heart,
                 the one he can't forget".

               "The man I see is black as knight
                he haunts you in your dreams,
                and with the moon card shining bright
                all's not quite as it seems".

               I felt that she had rumbled me,
               and as I hit the floor,
                she beckoned to me once again
              and made me hear some more.

              She then upturned another card
              and looked me in the eyes.
              "I see the ten of cups my dear,
               the tarot never lies.

HITTING THE MARK

            I tried to tell him but he wouldn't listen.
            I skimmed a transatlantic stone
            that sank without a trace.
            The siren waiting on the rocks
             the one who knew what he knew.
             Ripples never come back.

TWITTER

           "I can't stop now!",the author cried,fondling her pen.
            "It's so exciting all this writing,turn my page again."

            "I've never heard your voice",she scrawled
             across updated letter.
             "We've never met,I know ,and yet
              Our diction's getting better"

              "I saw your face an hour ago.
               You always look so cool
              when you're behind your avatar
               and I'm behind at school."

             "However",she continued
              as she bled the Tweetdeck dry,
              "We'll strike a bargain in the margin.
               Forever twit and die".



     

A GIFT RETURNED

                         I sit amidst chaotic papers,
                        Scriptorial passions of a cyclothymic past.
                        Dozing dogs on dusty drafts
                        opening one eye to confirm my existence.

                        Defied the act of mental health
                        to care for others,not myself.
                        Renewing my poetic liscence
                        before the date expires.
      

UNDERGROUND

               I can feel you when you tread
              scattering flowers overhead.
               Crouching ruby-eyed with wreath
              on memories that lie beneath.

               Here's the casket,open wide
               and see who really lies inside.

              Me and my mates down here live on
             outnumbering you by three to one.
              Underground.
             Wish you were here.
             Never did like Floyd.
               
    

SHEDDING SKINZ

               There are goldfish on the manicured grass.
              Now you see them,  
             "No you don't".
             Through rose coloured gothic windows he cries"Nurse!,
              and realising he meant me,
             I tried to soothe his visions with my newfound ego.

             Tortured by emotions some call genius,
             with twisted tongue writhing like a rabid dog.
              Abject glassy eyes roll skyward
             for a gentler place than this.
            
             Sedated gargoyles incognito ,
             haunting pathways Mr.Average fears to tread.
             No more candles on his cake to count the years.
             No one at home.

            And I in uniform, clutch my knees
            to rock amongst the goldfish on the manicured grass.
            Weaving baskets
            and shedding skinz.




            
             
                                                                                         

FOR JACK

I died the day he walked the streets
and brawled in bars in the early hours .
Loose cannon and Pamplona bull.


I died the day he joined the army.
Russian roulette on foot patrol.
Mothers' heart in bloodstained hands.

I died the day I watched the news.
Fallen innocents all flown home,
and he who sat and buffed his boots
to take his chance again with war.