287 (30.05.2014)

That chocolate cake was really scrummy-yum,
I ate so much I think I'm gonna burst
I love the taste of sugar in my tum
In that I guess I'm sort of blessed and cursed.
Now Auntie Jo she never eats dessert,
She says it makes her feel bloated and slow,
But I can eat cake till my belly's hurt
And when I die I know just where I'll go...
Off down the road to join The Pudding Club
I'll stuff my face with every single treat
I'll be a ghost, of course, and there's the rub
What if I cannot savor what I eat?
Can you imagine more torturous waste
Than eating cake forever without taste?





286 (29.04.2015)

Sometimes the world moves just a bit too fast,
Although it's a mere thousand miles an hour,
And all the minutes that I wish would last
The turning world like Pac-man does devour.
And so I reach the end of every day
And wonder where those precious moments went
If only I could somehow find a way
To win back all the hours that I've spent.
But obviously no one can turn back time,
And nobody will ever work out how
Yet still our lives can once more be sublime
If we appreciate the 'Here' and 'Now'.
So once again tomorrow I will try,
To stop the speeding day from flashing by.


285 (28.04.2015)

My hands they hold a tiny speck of dust
The dust is here upon the earth with me
But how do I know I can really trust
The things that I think my eyes they can see?
Sometimes I think I see something ahead,
Perhaps I think I see a sleeping cat,
But when I'm there it's something else instead...
A plastic bag or someone's disused hat.
And so the thing I thought it was I saw
Is different from the way it had once been
The cat has changed from what it was before
To something that I didn't know I'd seen.
So if I cannot even trust my eyes,
How can I know what's real and what is lies?

284 (27.04.2015)

I'd like to give you something you might need,
A tiny moment just between us two,
Forget yourself a little while and read
These humble lines I'm writing just for you.
The world is often hurried as you know,
We rush around from place to place all day
But wait with me a minute and be slow
And let those speedy seconds slip away.
Stop now and look around you at this place,
The sun, the clouds, the stars up in the sky
Look in the mirror at that well known face,
The universe was made for you and I.
Escape with me a little while and then,
Go back into your busy world again.



283 (26.04.2015)

O Children! My Children what have I done?
What time I've wasted and not been with you,
The world spins round a slowly burning sun
And little we pursue will make it new.
But when I stop myself and give you time,
And let your youthful joy infect my heart
Then suddenly to rush becomes a crime
And all at once my worries they depart.
So when I see you playing I will hold
My tongue and not tell you to go to bed
But rather I will stop being so old
And sit a while and play with you instead.
For when we play together I can see,
It's you that should be Captains over me.

282 (25.04.2015)

Isla's blowing bubbles in the garden
A billion tiny spheres fly in the wind
Light as childish hearts that never harden,
As rare as finding man who's never sinned.
Isla's dancing round between the bubbles
They're bursting on her head and in her hands
Helping me forget about my troubles
And helping me forget about my plans.
Bubbles flying off into the morning
Up high they float into the waiting air
Up to where the perfect sun is dawning
To burst up in the sky without a care.
Oh bubbles flying off into the blue,
Can I perhaps, please, come along with you.



281 (24.04.2015)

Go into each day like it is your last
Greet sun and rain with inquisitive joy
Remember how fast present becomes past
And don't discard your time like it's a toy.
There are so many minutes in a day
There are so many days within a year
But if we do not notice them they stray
And none of them will ever reappear.
See clearly all the little things in life
Take heed of all the moments that you smile
The possibilities of joy are rife
But only if you notice them awhile.
So notice, notice, know don't just believe
That suddenly it will be time to leave.


Enrik

Although the world seems to have lost its light
Those years ago when you were called away
We know that in the darkest, blackest night
The memory of your life in us will stay.
And all the smiles and all the good you did
And all the friends and loved ones that you knew
Together they unite and they forbid
The light you shone from slipping out of view.
And it’s that light that helps us understand,
The light that fills our memories with your grace,
That earth is nothing but a shadowed land
And you are in a far, far better place.
And when God says our time on earth is through,
Then Enrik we will once more be with you.

(23.04.2015)

279 (22.04.2014)

I need glasses now, the world is all blurred,
When I try to focus things just get worse
Thoughts jump from pure to totally absurd
Like seeing things too clearly is a curse.
And even when it works the eye deceives
If I look at the trees I just see green,
But I cannot count any of the leaves.
There's something deep inside me being mean.
As though my time on earth is running out
And gradually my body's breaking down,
There's less and less for me to brag about
Without sounding a bit like I'm a clown.
So, slowly, slowly, slowly draws the end,
For you and me and everyone my friend.

278 (21.04.2015)

I've no idea why I keep coming back
I'm like a wave that can't escape the shore
And though I know my sails are all too slack
I find myself returning more and more.
It's just like there are magnets in your heart
And they keep dragging my steel heart to you
So every time that we are swept apart
The windy waves they make my dreams come true...
And I am washed up in your precious arms
And all at once I am no more alone
The gentleness of you it gently calms
The worries that had turned my heart to stone.
So although I am lost alone at sea,
The love we have it draws me back to thee.


277 (21.04.2015)

Let us look forward now towards free verse
And ignore those ten syllables and rhymes
You know that too much structure is a curse
And being loose is all that counts at times.
So bollocks to the rigid sonnet form
Iambic pentameter's days are done
There's nothing here that keeps a fellow warm
Like spouting bits of free verse at the sun.
So put down those traditions that we had
The sonnet's shrivelled up and turned to grey
And now there's nothing that is quite so sad
As show-offs with their rhymes all on display.
So pack your bags and come along with me
Into a world where verse and man are free.

276 (20.04.2015)

When I hear birds that sing their chorus now
Reminding me that this day's just begun
I know that where my duties lie somehow
These words will show and strengthen in the sun.
Explain to me you letters, notes and lines,
My ears are waiting for your precious words,
Enveloping the way that sound defines
A rule set out for man and beast and birds.
So spring is in the air, I hope it lasts
On days like this you know that dreams come true
No one can doubt the power of our pasts
No one can doubt there's nothing we can't do.
Each of us we can work hard and can show,
Together we can change the world we know.

275 (19.04.2015)

Today I set my sights as high as high
And shoot my arrows off toward the sun
And I know gradually that by and by
They will return replenished one by one.
And faltering is not a word I speak
And I will not let doubts inside my mind
As I trudge on towards the highest peak
And watch the normal world fall far behind.
I will keep on and then keep on some more
No negative will enter in my brain
And I will be the things that I adore
A little free and blest and quite insane.
The future I see clearly now today,
With not even myself stood in my way.

274 (18.04.2015)

How can you still be true blue through and through,
Despite the fact you've lived here for so long?
Does nothing in your conscience stick like glue?
Has nothing in the world gone slightly wrong?
When you see those statistics on parade,
And when you see those films so often shown
Does not the joy in your consumption fade?
D'you never cry a little on your own?
So, seven families' financial wealth
Is worth more than the 40 poorest lands
And still the poor man's left to feed himself
With not even a dollar in his hands.
"The rich," you say, "they've earned it fair square..."
But I say that it's sin if they don't share.

273 (17.04.2015)

I missed the boat and she got a sleep train,
I've got to get her when she's in the mood
And now she's rattled off inside her brain
And I have missed my chance at playing crude.
I'll keep this in my mind tomorrow night
While weaving with my sharp poetic sword
If she says that she wants and it's alright
I'd better drop my pen and climb on board.
So now I sit here with my heavy hand
Imagining the things that didn't be,
And she is travelling through sleeps distant land
While snoring in the bed beside of me.
I hope I keep reminding me of this,
The next time she turns round and wants to kiss.

272 (16.04.2015)

The elephant's grey and wrinkled old face,
The elephant's bright and brilliant tusk.
The saw and the hammer drawn to displace,
Priceless the ivory, African dusk.
The blood and the flies and the watchful ones,
Laughing hyenas sense death in the air,
Panic and fear and the rattle of guns,
Stripped to the bone and with nothing to spare.
The buying and selling the profits made
Thundering elephants, stumble and fall
Money and murder, the Ivory trade,
Worship mankind who is master of all.
Yet who is to blame, poacher or client?
Bloody and butchered, African giant.


271 (15.04.2015)

The little rabbit, Jelly Bean, he sits
Upon the table with his bright pink nose
Perfectly in my daughter's hand he fits
And where she wanders this small chap he goes.
So every night they cuddle up in bed
She holds him in her arms and he lies still
As she tells stories straight out of her head,
His polyester dreaming ears to fill.
Oh Jelly Bean and Isla are such friends
Though she's the only one that really gives,
But maybe that's why their love never ends,
It's only when he's with her that he lives.
Like me. When you're not here, yes I confess,
I'm nothing but a pool of emptiness.


270 (14.04.2015)

Give us the strength to ignore this pressure
To sit back and watch as the world goes by
Give us a pep talk make us feel fresher
Just to remind us we're all gonna fly.
So much to do and so much going on
So many strings that are pulling our time
So many moments just wasted and gone
So much ambition that's still left to climb.
Give us the strength to see straight and be clear
To not be dismayed by troubles to come
Nothing is lost when the end it is near
And when we know what we wish to become.
So eyes on the target, focus ahead,
Best to be living than be living dead.



269 (13.04.2015)

They wrote him sonnets based on being brave
And not letting those: "No, no!"s grind you down
And working out the best way he could save
Himself the wrinkles of a worried frown.
So he packed up and then was on his way
Just watching as the wind filled up those sails
Tomorrow is a brighter, lighter day
It's only he who resists change that fails.
The wideness of the earth it waits for us
We never told the rest to stand and wait,
If they think it's okay, don't make a fuss,
Most people don't know why, they just stagnate.
There's little point in sitting hanging on,
I'm here right now, but in my head I'm gone.

268 (12.04.2015)

Can all the world be circled in one verse,
Can all of human nature be thus shown?
From happiest smiling face to darkest curse
From friendship, to the life of man alone?
If one verse is the breadth of all it takes
To show how multi-faceted this place
Perhaps then each word every poet makes
Is just a part of one great big embrace.
And all the words that we've laid down in lines
And every thought that flowed from mind to page
Is just a part of something that defines
A blessing that is passed from age to age.
So all the words we've written they disperse,
And join the poem called the universe.


267 (11.04.2015)

Today I am not writing a sonnet
I'm still a bit ill and not in the mood
A sleep train's leaving, I'm getting on it,
I need to sleep, I don't mean to be rude.
I'll snuggle up now under my duvet
Close up my eyes and let my dreams appear
Just while away this rainy, cloudy day,
And try to get myself back into gear.
I have no obligations to do this
I choose to do it but today I don't,
There's nothing about writing that I'll miss
I write lots of sonnets, today I won't.
I lie in bed and wheeze and moan and cough
Enjoying my sonnet-a-day day off.


266 (10.04.2015)

Let's wave a white flag and lie down in peace
And let's give up when all the goings tough
Just say that we want all the ills to cease
Or stay in bed and say we're feeling rough.
Yet I don't want to lie down and give up,
I'm still looking for that place in the sun
The dreams I drink pour from a golden cup
And I think that my life has just begun.
So when I'm tired and ill and can't be arsed
And all I want to do is lay in bed,
I try hard to put illness in the past
But often I just fail and flop instead.
Oh snotty bug inside my snotty brain,
Please leave me now, I want my health again.

265 (09.04.2015)

Oh Cameron take a lie detector test
(Although, of course, you'd beat it easily.)
I wonder if you really think it's best
That politics is done so sleazily?
Why can't we have a nice society
In which some moral values can be found
In which the world is run with decency,
And not like England is a battle ground?
I understand divide and rule is good,
And bread and circus all we really need,
But what happened to good old Robin Hood
Are human's really doomed to die of greed?
You're here to serve us all, not just the rich...
Or am I wrong, and are you just their bitch?

264 (09.04.2015)

The people at expensive private schools
Know somehow that they're not like all the rest,
They do not mix with idiots, plebs or fools
And know that everything they do is best.
If you don't speak exactly how they do
You're nothing but some peasant, gobbo, scum
And though they might be quite polite to you
They think you're an obnoxious little bum.
They get taught not to let their feelings show,
They get taught to be tough and never cry
They promise something but you never know,
It might be just a psychopathic lie.
And then they leave and go and rule the world,
And this is how injustice is unfurled.

263 (08.04.2015)

At the top of the tree the Magpie cleans
Its beak. Free from cares and worries and woes
I think. But I'm not sure by any means
He might be just as stressed as me, who knows?
I bet the world looks really good from there
I wonder if those birds can see the sea?
If I had wings I think I'd like to share
With all my friends the things revealed to me.
My children walk and run and laugh and play,
With not a thought to gratitude or fear,
They know, I think, that nighttime follows day,
But sense also that dawn is always near.
From deepest earth to highest stars above,
I wish that I could fill the world with love.

262 (07.04.2014)

"Stay where you are, stay where you are be safe,
"Don't let temptations' fingers drag you round."
Although your itchy feet begin to chafe,
Ignore the possibilities you've found."
"Be safe, be safe, be where you are and stay,
From nothing will come nothing while we're here,
The safety keeps the loneliness at bay,
If we wait long enough dreams disappear."
D'you hear the voices filled with fear and fright?
D' you see the people scared that things might change?
They cling to all the things they need at night
And place their dreams and hopes just out of range.
But see the birds so high up in the sky,
They spread their wings, they jump, and then they fly.

261 (07.04.2015)

The days they start so well but then they fade
And everything we'd hoped for disappears
Like military people on parade
Who aren't allowed to show their natural fears.
And all the good we might have hoped would be
Is suddenly replaced by emptiness
And, though there might be light, we cannot see
So in our minds we feel life's beautiless.
Yet friends are like a burning, blinding light,
Giving me somehow deep within some hope,
And though at times the world seems dark as night
I know that with my friends' help I can cope.
So my days start and roll on to their ends,
Through ups and downs I travel with my friends.

260 (07.04.2015)

I don't know what I expect from these days
It just never seems to materialise
The world goes wrong in oh so many ways
And things fall apart right before our eyes.
I wake up and another day begins
And each day starts with expectations joy
But gradually the tiredness it wins
And all my hopes and dreams it does destroy.
I wish I had the energy of kids
They run about like nothing is too hard
And do whatever their young passion bids
Unlike myself who time from speed has barred.
Yet I will be consoled in stumbling night,
By memories of those sweet eyes that shine so bright.

259 (06.04.2015)

When we can't move we know what moving is,
When unable to eat know hunger burns
And when we touch the serpent's tail the hiss,
It warns us that in pain the body learns.
I click my back and paralyse myself,
I did this once when visiting old friends
And just today while putting up a shelf,
I've got a back that inner turmoil ends.
We warn ourselves to slow down just a bit,
We often bite off more than we can chew,
And then we have to work a while with it
Until at long, long last we make it through.
But bodies warn us, with a little pain,
And say "Slow down, or else be damned again."

258 (05.04.2015)

I have no idea what I'll write today
In fact, you know, I'd rather go to sleep
But obligation sends me on my way,
And through my fingers inspirations creep.
Maybe a sonnet about writing this
And not knowing exactly how to start
And waiting for my muse's tender kiss
To come and warm my cold, poetic heart.
So if I choose to write a sonnet now
But do not really know what I should write
Is it a kind of waste of time somehow,
Or does the act of doing make it right?
Perhaps today I won't write one at all,
Just go to bed and wait for dreams to call.


257 (04.04.2015)

Get all my children's names across my back
And get myself a sleeve upon my arm
Some angels on my pecs in blue and black
And in Chinese the marks for "Peace" and "Calm".
Bluebird hovers on an ancient shoulder
The checkout girl's got roses on her wrist
That stay the same, just as she grows older,
Her boyfriend's got the word "Love" on his fist.
Rock singer: Demons writing "Hard as Nails",
And snakes appearing from a woman's holes.
There's different dots for different gangs in jails
There's ripping flesh that shows off burning souls.
But it's just skin, there's nothing much to lose
'Cause all the prettiest people have tattoos.

256 (04.04.2015)

I don't really enjoy the play Macbeth,
With all that horror and those golden words
The shadows and the thrusting ways of death
The evil omen, squawking raven birds.
The lady's power that bends a husband's will
The questions that arise from all those things
The simple man's ability to kill
The injustice of greed and wealth and kings.
Oh Shakespeare the most harrowing of bards
Who knows both sides of arguments within
And knows just how to deal his sacred cards
To balance all mankind in hope and sin.
And then says things such as "...stars hide your fires...
Let not light see my black and deep desires."

255 (03.04.2015)

A funny day, a funny day it's been
Read sonnet Two-Five-Two down at The Pig
For all my friends, that's irony unseen,
And all the talent at the Seaview gig.
A lovely crowd, makes lovely evenings out,
A chance to get priorities in place,
A chance to get emotional and shout
Or let some gentle tears roll down my face.
So thank you Tom for asking me to play
And thanks to everyone who sang along,
And my two guests that made it on the day,
And made me feel that here's where I belong.
A funny day, I practiced, played and wept,
Another though will come when I have slept.


254 (02.04.2015)

Something about sacrifice in this world
Should humble us on earth that have too much,
And let us know that beauty is unfurled
Whenever we display the human touch.
To give is always worth more than to take
So I give you my time and trust and love
And in your hands a glorious sight they make
As they shine brighter than the stars above.
Much greater sacrificed than things possessed
Love-given flowers have the best perfume
Though for myself I often have confessed
That only when you're near do flowers bloom.
See? The loving poet juxtaposes,
Sacrifice, the scent of you, and roses.

253 (01.04.2015)

Who am I and why am I here I won...
Der? What if there is no answer really
Or I make something up that's just for fun?
My eyes are gone, I see nothing clearly
Anymore... April fool's my only guide,
So many people younger than me now
A second or two more and we can hide
And when we are discovered take a bow.
So who am I and why am I not him?
And why do all my thoughts go round and round?
And why am I susceptible to whim?
Why care for these sweet things that I have found?
So many questions swirling in my head,
Perhaps it's time to stop and go to bed.