Cold War Dreams

I want to go to Cuba
and read some Graham Greene
and smoke cigars
upon the shore
with Russian spies
in linen suits
with perfectly
cultured
home county accents
and pretend
we’re all on business trips
travellers
in ladies undergarments
the disingenuous civility
making for the perfect
Caribbean evening
in 1956.

5-7-5 (take eighty-three : view from the window of inter city express #79)

clouds on the highwires
tightrope walking to heaven
with no safety net

Elementary

I need to know
everything,
everything about you
your nightly dreams
and daily desires
how you breathe
how you feel
(even how you taste…
…and smell)
each thought behind
the frowns
and smiles
how else
can you be
my show and tell?

5-7-5 (take eighty-three : cut roses)

my eyes spy beauty
despite time ever passing
and petals falling

One Minute Rhyme Mark II

Diabetic catnip
curled up in a ball
four and twenty schoolgirls
sitting on the wall
every little twinkle star
shines above for you
behind the velvet curtains
painted black and blue
In the cupboard’s second shelf
behind the Worcester sauce
snoring rather loudly
lives a tiny horse
he doesn’t have a jockey
and dreams of being free
like a wing-ed Pegasus
sat up in a tree.

5-7-5 (take eighty-two : the railway children)

Two homeless lovers
stroking each other’s faces
under platform one

Leggy Mountbatten

With my legs
it’s quite a bummer
to wear long trousers
in the summer
but knobbly knees
really shouldn’t ought
to be displayed
in a pair of shorts

5-7-5 (take eighty-one : ting-a-ling)

the windchime tickled
by a quiet summer breeze
rings out soft laughter

Notes with Seagulls

measure me in seagulls
that glide above the sand
to look down on the lovers
walking hand in hand
and call their names in cries
heard loud across the shore
that they may love each other
from now ’til evermore

Chainpub Blues

Back there in the olden days
the pubs had proper names
but going down The Cock and Donkey
just doesn’t sound the same.