people

Soon?

Posted on by zaphodfreek

While at home,
Yours not mine,
Missiles flare and blank out
Square foot after square foot
Of children, mothers and fathers
Supposedly likewise bent on destruction,

Here you flex and bend
Your head low
Almost to my breaking point.

I can easily overlook death
When you bare your teeth
And curl that tongue.
In this moment
What hold does sorrow have
On me.

But Sorrow,
Sorrow can wait
Leaning against the back wall
Of her Northern Celtic Cave
Eyes cast downwards
The corners of her mouth
Curl slowly into a smile.

‘Soon’

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The Spector had a heart shaped hole in her just waiting to be pasted over.

Posted on by zaphodfreek

You can tell it’s a good song
When you slow down
So you don’t make it home
Before it’s over.

Select weaknesses in me
Set fire to my brain
And spiderweb around my heart.

I hold the glass up to my eye
But I can’t tell whether it’s
Too full or too empty.
For certain, it’s draining fast.

The piano may not be firewood
But it sets a merry blaze.
And the cloth rests over my face,
Over my eyelids,
Like a hood.

If everyone knows it’s going to hurt,
Then why wasn’t I expecting it?
One day I turned around
And realised I was fucked

And there’s nothing I can do about it
Except take the clock off the wall
And set about winding it back again.
Right back to the beginning.

A Lot Of Dreaming

Posted on by zaphodfreek

Something is very wrong.
In my mind thoughts are clear
And lucidly float behind my eyes.
I can feel soft words,
Some of them for you,
Dangling from my fingertips,
Hiding in the drowned spaces
between my glistening teeth.

But up close this mirror
Is muddied and scratched
With fingernail marks and
Something closely resembling
My very own brand
Of unsettling bullshit.
My tongue drips sour,
The saliva frothing and bursting
And steadily becoming
More embittered and lonesome.
Suddenly there are things
That I can no longer impart,
Not nearly so readily at least.

These problems course
Through my arteries and veins,
Through the skin on the
Back of my hands,
Along the bloodlines
That feed my brain,
My arrow-filled mind.

They lead me to believe
That some creatures were designed
To break with natures bonds.
And perhaps we will always blame others
For what we refuse to believe.
Or hate ourselves
For what we know to be true.

Finally Alive

Posted on by zaphodfreek

At night he has a tendency
To put himself in awkward
Situations. He let’s his heart
Confuse his head. Passing
Under street lamps the
Shadows make him feel
As if he is moving in a group,
A troupe of similarly silhouetted
Brethren, but in reality he
Is still walking along alone.

She is a creature of some
Desperate intrigue.
Dark, sensitive and obvious.
She plays heavy, bass-filled
Music and swings her hair
To the thumping, throbbing beat.
In crowds she drops her eyes,
Fists clenched, and swears
Under her breath. Every move
She makes is a disaster but one
That has already happened.

Thinking about her now his heart
Races and pearly beads of sweat
Pulse on his brow and down his back.
He begins to pick up his pace,
Slowing only momentarily to look
Back down the street. Back at the
Pools of light and the sea of darkness
Stretched out behind him. He seems
distracted and elsewhere. His eyes dart.
He is running from something.

Only the lonely fear love.
It looms in front of their lives
Beautiful and unobtainable.
They have grasped at it.
Reached out for it with their
Fingers and their hearts.
But those who have fallen
Will fear the fall again
And will avoid the leap.
They have grown comfortable
With their own broken thoughts
And pull them up around them.
More like a warming blanket than
Walls but use whatever metaphor
You wish. We are all dead
Until, finally, we live.

Of All The Luck

Posted on by zaphodfreek

All of these stars above us
Are as distant as your eyes
On the days when you betray,
The days you dream about him.

On those days I am a dreamer too.
I am a dancer in the dark, my mind
Full of deep reds and cigarettes,
Flower boxes and the Suffolk coastline.

Your gaze, for now, drifts back to me.
Your stars shimmer in a haze and vanish.
I relish the hours of neglect
And dream of days and her.

Fill In The Blanks

Posted on by zaphodfreek

So here I
am

Trying to cross town in
Some godawful rush
But all the while maintaining
That it doesn’t really
matter, that I’m
Enjoying the trip

When all I can really do
Is stare longingly at the
taxicabs
Gliding by. So breathtaking.

All the good ones are taken.

Courage

Posted on by zaphodfreek

He put her slippers
in a clear plastic bag
and hid them inside
an old shoebox
under his bed.

When she asked
if he had seen them
he told her he had
burned them
in an old oil drum
out by the docks
with the seagulls
screaming overhead.

Bretagne in the raw.

Posted on by zaphodfreek

We lie
hand in hand,
your head in my lap,
under the shade of a low tree
beside a Normandy coastline,
in a field full of
white stone crosses.

And as the wind blows
huge, silent, grey-white clouds
across an otherwise clear sky,
and the hair across your still face,
I think about how many lives were lost
how much blood and tears were spilled,
so that we two could lie here,
so that I could watch you sleep in my arms
and dream of the future
and your silent charms.

Bemusement

Posted on by zaphodfreek

Walking home from the train station
on one of those long summer evenings.
Someone had written in large letters
on the wall outside the bowling alley
the word ‘BONDAGE’,
and I pondered the implications of this.
I had never been much good with aggression

or knots.