MOSTLY CRUSHING DESPAIR

MOSTLY CRUSHING DESPAIR

(Inspired by some recent exchanges and kind thoughts)

Sometimes I become quite excited

Brief optimism will fill the air

Considering trying to do this and that

That things that I try may be quite fair

Then out come demons to pounce on me

From the dark places wherever they lurk

To whisper and scratch at what’s left of my mind

To tell me that it simply won’t work

Hope turns to cinders in moments

Enthusiasm crashes to earth

Those big ideas now seem ridiculous

I fill with loathing and a lack of self-worth

Mostly I feel an overwhelming

Sense of crushing despair

Sometimes there’s a twinkle of hope

But mostly it’s crushing despair

Sometimes I believe that my poems

Really aren’t actually half bad

And I wonder if I might put my hat on

Contemplating a notion that’s quite mad

That I might sit on a tall stool and mutter

Sat in front of a live camera lens

Knowing I couldn’t do it in front of people

Even if it was a room full of friends

Instantly I decide that’s so arrogant

Immortalising my nonsense on video

What on earth must I have been drinking

It’s such a stupid idea - yes I know

Then I will feel that overwhelming

Sense of crushing despair

Sometimes there’s a twinkle of hope

But mostly it’s crushing despair

Sometimes there comes a kind suggestion

Send some of those thoughts off somewhere

Such a nice thing to say you'd be thinking

But then here comes that crushing despair

Why would anyone want to pay for a look

When they won’t even read if for free

Despite any of many encouraging comments

Why would anyone want to read thoughts by me

Since because we’re all our own worst enemy

Though some hide it far better it’s true

So determined I am from the outset to fail

These prophecies will turn out like they do

Mostly I feel an overwhelming

Sense of crushing despair

Sometimes there’s a twinkle of hope

But mostly it’s crushing despair

Sometimes I think about subtly screaming

Mainly at myself but at the whole of the world

I’m so dependent upon your enthusings

To fuel mine that it’s becoming absurd

The universe doesn’t give enough of a damn

About these strange ideas disguised as bad art

I need to do something about it myself

Though I realise I don’t know where to start

Next I’ll scuttle off under rocks devastated

Wondering if in life might offer a collaborator

Who’d put up with me and my little ways

Yet will understand that sooner or later

I’ll be feeling an overwhelming

Sense of crushing despair

And despite the occasional twinkle of hope

There’s always that crushing despair

MAWH, Jan 2018

THE MACHINE STOPS

THE MACHINE STOPS

My grandmother died

In her bedroom at home

With my mother on one side

And me on the other

She breathed out

She breathed in

She breathed out

Life passing so softly

Left alone it took us both

Several moments to wonder

And ask each other

If we each thought she'd gone

I went to call a Doctor

When my mother died

On a hospital ward

With me sitting at her side

No machines to bleep

Oxygen hissed

Through plastic

Oxygen hissed

Life escaped so gently

Leaving me contemplating

Moments of lonely wonder

Realising that

She had probably gone

Then I went to fetch a nurse

MAWH, Jan 2018

I HAVE NO BAROMETER

I HAVE NO BAROMETER

I have no barometer
The words pour out
Whether fair or bad
I could not tell
My proud daughter
Steps up to proudly
Accept the glittering prize
On a golden stage
Flashbulbs popping
Smiling her saddest smile
But I have no barometer

I have no barometer
For my own skills
If quality lingered here
I could not tell
Pluck out a dozen
Bundle away for
Unseen eyes wishing
I could tell where
Richest fruit might be
Or the starkest seed
But I have no barometer

I had no barometer
To learn the path
Fuelling such dismay
I can not tell
The proud daughter
I never had
Life's barren seed
Beat this empty heart
Alone and silent
In my darkest need
But I have no barometer

MAWH, Jan 2018

SOME MUSINGS ON THE IMPRACTICALITY OF CHOOSING MERPEOPLE AS MATES

SOME MUSINGS ON THE IMPRACTICALITY OF CHOOSING MERPEOPLE AS MATES

Gather around - you may think there’s something fishy afoot

But in the life I am living I have been known to have

Some quite interesting - if not fascinating - debates

Like some recent musings on the impracticality

Or otherwise of seamen - or possibly seawomen -

Choosing to take Merpeople as mates

It is - I imagine - pretty well understood in these modern days

That the sailors of old who in such times almost certainly

Were probably quite frustrated and most usually men

All of whom a very long way from their home ports

So they might understandably be tempted and titillated

By a siren's longing song every now and then

Far from home a bare-chested apparently fair maiden

With an alluring dazzling halo of golden sea-spun hair

Sometimes would bewitch them and bring them delight

But despite everything I really can’t help but wonder

If such yearning lustful delight turned into despair

When it came to matters much later at night

You’d imagine far earlier in their encounter than this

It would occur to even the most randy of frustrated sailors

Upon more intimate investigation of their new found dish

Despite anatomical ignorance I’m sure they could tell

They might not have much future if their lovely new belle

From the waist down was nothing but fish

The more romantically minded amongst us might think

And argue of course that such things are never all about

When it comes to matters concerning the love in our hearts

Physical attributes and the interaction of incompatible bodily bits

Wondering where and what and how a thing might be able to fit

But where’s the relationship without the naughty parts

Then - because I do - I have many other strange thoughts

Like where on a body should the fish-scales start to sprout

Are there half-fleshy scales from the belly button down below

Or do they just begin at a hard line like a peculiar belt

After all if you were a someone who was really half fish

The fish part’s hardly like wearing trousers you know

Ah - They all cry – I see now that you don’t understand

It’s not about matters Piscean or ectothermic cordates

Like people - whales and dolphins are mammals too

So why – I reply – do those fictional depictions

Always choose to show them on porpoise as half fish

With scales and fins and the whole ballyhoo

On those long lonely nights when the first flush has passed

What do humans and Merfolk find in common to talk about

Are Merpeople interested in human art or science or fiction

What would their own undersea books and interests be

With nothing to talk about but seaweed, shells and fish

Interspecies love could fast turn to friction

Moving onwards to matters more practical and everyday

Is it half-fish or man who gets to clean all the laundry

At sea it cannot be easy to handle the washing chores

When those terrible week old rotten fish whiffs fill the air

Without legs to brace you as you rinse and you soak

Do Merpeople merely flap about on the laundry floor

Perhaps long-term relationships were never anyone’s plan

A quick fumble with a mermaid who’d slip away over the side

Tall tales told by seamen to make all of the other men feel green

Of exotic beauties in mystical lands forever remaining unseen

Or guiltily stitched fabrications only meant for covering up

Saucy salty tales that were far more obscene

Personally I believe that the Merpeople were myth

Made up to disguise more basic seaborne lusts and urges

When you’re long away from your home and your hearth

Far too long in confined spaces with foul-smelling blokes

Then home to a family oblivious of such aquatic betrayals

Whose first request is that you take a bath

MAWH, Jan 2018

TRAINSPOTTING

TRAINSPOTTING

Dragging your ailing failing self from a cold sick bed
To cough retch and splutter your way to the supermarket
For powders and pills and tissues and juice and bread
Whilst a cricket match half a world away crackles into life
High and ahead - sky high and dead ahead
Through the windscreen a shape turns and stops
For a moment time stands poised waiting but still

A kestrel pauses in the sky
Above where the viaducts meet
Fruitlessly trainspotting
On a Sunday morning

In the briefest of moments the air holds that stare of death
Coldest eyes seeking out the slightest careless movement
A dozen or a hundred or a thousand feet beneath its wings
It turns again a soaring striking moment already passing
There and then gone - right there and blinking gone
Shapely feathers silhouetted against a darkening sky
In a moment the timetable resumes yet still

A kestrel paused in the sky
Above where the viaducts meet
Fruitlessly trainspotting
On that Sunday morning

MAWH, 280118