Without.

I am without myself.
A flat whisper through the trees
where once there was a hurricane.
The dullest of all aches
where once there laid the sweetest pain.
The sun sets into vanilla skies,
lest anything greater should be slain.
A slow burning match on an almighty arctic shelf.
Bind my hands and blind my eyes:
I am already without myself.

Summer.

There's a sweating, balding man in front.
It's not that I'm offended by his choice to occupy
half of the pavement by holding his elbows up
like some Wild West gunslinger;
I am offended by the fact that he does so
with a hugely knowing and chocolate glued
grin that guns down my patience.

There's a woman stood, with a pram.
The pram must remain side-on with
the pedestrian traffic so that her offspring
might watch us duck and weave;
kayaking through the heat and crowds
in this little seaside paradise which is
long overdue indifference.

There's a jovial family crossing the road.
They move at the pace of a diazepammed
slug that has just realised it really has
no place to be at all;
whilst staring, bemused, at the cars that honk
and the drivers that raise their hands in protest
"Hey! We're walking here".

There are two parents shouting nearby.
I don't know what their children did but
they were dragged to the alley beside my house
so the adults could rabidly declare their disdain;
a small hand is raised and the shouting pauses
before one of the kids urinates besides my garden,
pissing away my patience.

Absolution.

A hundred sweating, writhing bodies
stamp their weekday laden feet
upon the tainted deck.

The felt between throbbing speakers
and hordes of lust-drunk stompers
shakes as though it may tear.

Indiscriminate forget-me-nots are
handed out with grins and hips
to those whose memory blurs.

Cups of midnight absolution
are desperately sought by
self appointed social paragons.

Pulsing lights from a ceiling unknown
pour out their golden net and catch
two hundred wide-eyed glares.

And in the darkness they may move
like fairytale monsters under cover,
but all stay still once caught.

Spotlight.

There's a wind up spotlight
shining over a midnight battleground.
Snow, several inches thick,
renders defining the terrain
entirely impossible.

The Operator works harder,
the snow becomes brighter,
but the mechanism creaks
and breaks under the strain.
The light tilts downwards
and grants the Dark its reign.

Thorn.

Round the back of a house older than ourselves,
there rests an unkempt garden.

The grass shoots upwards from the earth,
tall enough to hide away the ground
and let forgotten creatures travel undetected.
The hum of the wings of bees and wasps
synchronise, drowning out all other sound,
whilst the multitude of bird songs go unrespected.

The forever growing canopy of leaves
threatens to hide the Sun and all its light
from everything dwelling below.
The arctic wind throws the branches about,
making them them snap, whip, and bite
at the whim of a bloody beaked crow.

Vines grapple with the house itself,
getting in between mortar and brick
as they slowly tear the place down.
Trampled flowers lie besides those
who stand with stems sturdy and thick,
but with petals beaten and brown.

I don't care for grass, or trees, or the everyday flower.
The sins of each don't seem worthy of my scorn.
There's only one thing in this garden I'd like to address -
the Roses weighed down by their Thorn.

Departure.

The train should have left already.

There's a woman across the aisle
breathing deeply between expletives -
a panic attack which she seeks to defeat
with a veritable verbal assault.
She files a broken nail as if she
holds her hands responsible for the delay.
"I cannot fucking believe it!
This train should have left already."

There's another man scrawling thoughts
into a notebook that only he can see.
After each phrase he raises his hand
and scratches between his nose and upper-lip.
This, combined with covert coffee sips,
satisfies his thirst for inspiration.
A quick peek over his shoulder
and his thoughts are all laid bare.
"What an assault upon the decent!
This train should have left already!"

A suited man, complete with greying stubble
and thick-framed glasses, seems entirely more composed.
The leisurely descent of each newspaper page
suggests an air of calm acceptance:
an embrace of his South Eastern fate.
The only tell I can spot,
is the rapid tapping
upon the face of his watch.
I'm not sure if he sees It as the
Sovereign of Time, or if he's tapping
out some code to Morse -
"Save. Our. Souls.
This train should have left already."

And through the window stands a woman
whose high-vis jacket draws all kind of questions.
She points to different platforms,
and confirms for one startled commuter -
"Yes, this is the right train.
Yes, I know, it should have left already."

Kings.

There stands only an easel;
a canvas; and a vase'd bouquet.
The sun had set some time ago,
but The Artist painted day.

He'd transcribed splintered wood
into a lavish carpet - "Fit For Kings".
The simple, cobwebbed windows gone -
covered by "The Finer Things".
Flowing curtains shielded rot;
and mahogany dotted the wings.
The tired floral yellows, and quiet blues,
were replaced by entwined rosen rings.
(There sits a fattened fly upon a petal,
but He ignored the flower to which it clings).
To the loaded paint brush - the power,
and to the Artist - The Kings.

Ascension.

I'll wade through the morning like
the ankle-high mire that it is.
I'll crawl beyond the craters
of the barb'd afternoon,
into the rolling hills of eventide...
where the whipping Sun dies too soon.
I won't glide upon the morning's gaze
nor relish in its attention.
I'll ignore the sweet lull of noon
and fall to those rolling hills,
where I might delight in convention.
The thick web of night will fall,
and amongst it's netting catch
a man who stood tall,
but forever defied ascension.

Burrow.

There's a small spot in the forest
where the thicket reigns as King.
A canopy of dying leaves ensures
no chance of sunshine seeping in.
Where the worms and beetles
burrow forever down to join their kin;
blissfully ignorant automatons,
free of will and all our sin.

All around, faint glows lie.
It draws those burrowing beasts
to trample, touch and pry.
No sooner did that faint glow emerge
than it had to say goodbye.
Amongst the forest thicket King,
the Fireflies go to die.

Painting.

Lights suspended from the ceiling come to life
and drape the creaking wooden floor
in a dull approximation of daylight.
The footsteps of tourists and
the ruffling of their brochures
do not quite drown out the
emphatic and fallacious
"ahhs" and "hmms",
as they pass painting and sculpture
with equal disinterest.

Some way down the line
a small congregation forms
that is silenced by adoration.
A golden, twirling frame keeps captive
the most gorgeous of women
upon the most fantastic landscape...
though she will never see such beauty.
Her eyes are painted in place upon the page,
to forever gaze beyond the frame.

Beasts.

Amidst the bustle of a Sunday car boot sale,
stands a man supported by an ageing cane.
The table before him is adorned with
all manner of statues and idols:
goblins and demons that mostly look the same.
The car in which he'd arrived had
tinted windows to keep curiosity outside -
to a world in which he'd often thought
all manner of wicked beasts reside.
It wasn't until he found his wife
draped over another man,
that he then realised:
the greatest evil lies inside.

Silence.

The moment transcends silence and slips into serenity.
A fisherman casts his line into the water
beating against the rocks.
The clouds above shed the water that binds them
and the gentle breeze gathers its forces
into a gust that makes theatre of golden locks.
Walking in our direction, a group of teenagers
wearing hoodies and their attitudes
stop to watch a bird fly overhead.
The fisherman checks that his watch
still ticks and tocks,
but hears distant teenage profanities instead.
I can barely feel the rain and cold
whilst your lips are between my own.
The world becomes but a distant distraction
and our surroundings cease to be.
The moment transcends silence
and slips into serenity.

Rose.

It was the height of Winter.
The cold soared and the wind whistled
as a dense darkness descended onto the city.
What little light the street lamps could afford
was spent upon the city square;
for a crowd of murmuring passers-by
had ceased to pass and gathered there.
The clouds too, seemed to slow -
as if the Heavens themselves should care.
A few now sat upon the snow,
but all stayed fixed as if by snare.
For stood where nothing ever grows -
a solitary Moscow rose.

Unforgettable.

I've been grappling with my words all month.

I've twisted phrases and fired metaphors,
searching for words of comfort and love.
They rolled pleasantly off of the tongue...
but ultimately were empty.

Nothing more than expressions of obligation,
lacking sentiment but carrying hyperbole aplenty.
Broken prose masquerading as poetry...
both verbose and regrettable.

So I'll go with words from a friend more eloquent than I:
"I need you to understand that you are entirely unforgettable."

Prisoner.

The flash of lightning turned her beauty to a silhouette,

and the consequent thunder conquered her voice

when the young Prisoner and the Dark Knight met.

She knelt before the Knight's steed

as the rider made his choice,

still sat upon the saddle watching the Prisoner beg and plead.

His ebony armour still carrying innocent blood,

he slowly lowered himself to the ground -

a scorched landscape drowned in mud.

The Knight raised his crimson sword above his head.

It sang to the storm-filled sky as it

swung towards the girl,

but it hit her chains instead.

Simmer.

A haunting shade of blue covers the dashboard
as the dull roar of the engine turns to a whimper.
Between specks of dirt and dust lies a road,
where the street lamps' pools of light can make thoughts linger.
One by one they flicker and fade,
submerging the road
into a desperate darkness that will fill your mind and slowly simmer.
The wheels start to turn as the brakes are released,
and the gap between you and the unknown becomes thinner.

Sepia.

Let the sepia tones
drown in a hundred shades of passion,

let the black and white fade
from pages filled with artless fashion,

let your own hue and verse
with time, be realised,

and iIlluminate a path where
once a darkness lied.

Ensnared.

The door was of a dark mahogany,
and only just accommodated my height.
I knocked once, then twice and again once more,
but despite persuasion, the door sat tight.
"I've got things to do, places to be" -
I reminded those that I could not see.
The room felt too enclosed -
I was trapped there. Ensnared.

To Hell with knocking.

I hit upon that dark mahogany
and felt splinters and Earth spit back at me.
Suddenly the walls were so immediate, as if
in this sombre system I was the centre of all gravity.
They did not just keep me in, but pushed and shoved.
The entire weight of the world resting on those wooden walls,
as if it all would collapse if just one of them falls.
It was not a room at all.
That was not a door to another side,
just the lid on a chamber where memories reside.
I hit out once, then twice, and again once more.
No use. I was buried - alive.

Muse.

Let me create a canvas,
so that I might capture your essence.
Let me put a pen to paper
so a reader can bask in your presence.
Let me play the game
for win or lose,
you'll stand alone -
my only muse.

Captain.

Furious skies of Olympic thunder
cast down a sheet of hail on the deck.
A cacophony of panic wrenches at the crew
as they adjust the bearing for skies a brighter blue.
"Captain! Captain! What left is there to do?"
He peers into the abyss below and declares:
"These waves you cannot ride nor tame,
this bullet must already know your name."
Adorned with clear blue shirt and hat
his voice can barely brave the biting wind -
as he tells them all - "I'm so sorry men,
but it seems we must go back."