Don’t you come around here I’m warning you, don’t you come around here, boy Cos I won’t be home, d’you hear ? Cos I won’t be here when you come around here, boy So don’t you come knocking I know that you’re in there Said don’t you come knocking You’re silent as sin there There’s nobody home, cos I won’t be unlocking There’s nobody home, so you don’t you come knocking Your TV is flickering somewhere within there You’re neighbours are bickering, winos are liquoring Street kids are snickering. What do I care ? And I can wait days And I will I can wait days, and I’m waiting until You open your door and you find me here still You open your door, cos I’m knocking Why you so stubborn ? I guess I just am So stupid and stubborn I’ve no sense for damn You’re shabby and sloven, a slacker and screw I bet you’re on acid, and reefer, and glue Your vision is flaccid – your timing is too I guess I’m a bit of a shambles, a clam I guess that I get it from you Now if you was plumbing to tap me for shaking You’d better just come in, there’s nothing worth taking It really ain’t that way, I’m hitting a wall I just need to talk yer, was all You just need to talk, eh ? And split a few beers You just need to talk, after how many years ? Thing is, there’s nobody else I could try Not Ma. Not the guys. Not Father MacKay My girl, see, my girl is – well, she’s gone and got… Well, me too, I guess, it was my fault alot But I never got no sense for damn You mean you done gone and got your girl with kid ? Jeez, of all the stupid skid you did ! This takes the slam I know, I know ! What could I do but scram ? Oh. Now I see You rabbit out and think of me And hope you find a life so bad It grits you up to be a dad But maybe what you find, my lad, is reasons worth to flee But then one day, some years away, when you ain’t clocking They may come knocking.
“A poem that never has thoughts within lines, but which carries each phrase and each sentence about between one line and next, as its structure is cut into sliver and strand that looks hard to read out”
– The Oxford Iambic Dictionary
No. You’ve done that wrong. This is a poem – notice the lines. They’re not just there to say “this is a poem”, Or to make for pretty layout designs. They are there to guide us along – This is crucial – notice the pause – The extra beats we don’t say, but we know ’em, That little silence that underscores. And the rhymes, the heart of the song, Don’t bury them all in the throng. So once again, and let ’em come strong –
“A poem that never has thoughts within lines but which carries each phrase and each sentence about between one line and next as its structure is cut into sliver and strand that looks hard to read out”
No, you’re still not that tight how you’re fitting it, No, it’s still not quite right how you’re hitting it, You’ve really gotta recite as they’ve written it, There’s no need to fight it to get it to knit – The breaks, the breaks, That break up each sentence In separate takes Of its clauses and thoughts. Look to the breaks as the structure and entrance, And look to the pauses that each line supports. Trust in the poet not to blow it, but to know, How to slow it, how to go it, and to show it all so. Follow their signs, let their lines set the flow –
“A poem that never has Lines within lines, but Which carries each phrase and Each sentence about Between one line and next as Its structure is cut Into sliver and strand That looks hard to read out”
The Audacious Free Will of the Predestined Chrononaut
Into the future we charge, We travellers in time, Past all of the past and into the future. Tachyon trekkers at large, In our own time, From marcher to moocher – But all of us heading in one direction, Through the temporal intersection: Into the future we barge our way, Each and every day.
There’s some say the future already exists And it does ! We’re in it today. This is the future, as this is the past, And the one hold the other in sway. We may like to think that we’re free how we choose, But however we choose it, a future arrives. So best to ignore it and get on with living, Before we have run out of lives.
We are the eyes of the future, Spying on history, Witnessing first-hand the long-dead past. We are the ones who are there, And writing it down, So the future can read it at last. They pay us with hope, from their endless supplies, Of the glories to come if we only choose wise. So the eyes of the long-ago future will see In time with the past yet-to-be.
There’s some say free will is just an illusion And lives are determined and fast. That’s true for the future – their choices are narrowed By what we do now in the past. We may like to think that we’re free how we choose, But however we choose it, we still live our lives. So best to ignore it and get on with living, Before all that future arrives.
She did not wake this morning, nor this afternoon, nor eve, And all this week she’s spawning ev’ry dream she can conceive, And the daylight still she’s scorning for the visions she shall weave, Till her health begins its pawning for the means to stall her leave.
The poem is not about a statue, but I do like this sculpture.
Filing, filing, They must be got in order, Thought who’d be such a hoarder To let them stack so deep ?
Filing, filing, A papery assortment Of doggery deportment, And thoroughly asleep.
Do they rustle out in vain, And yearn to be of use again ? Or do they long to end their plight With damp or flame or paper mite ? Either way, the data’s piling – Only remedy is
Filing, filing, So endlessly abundant, So battered and redundant, So crumpled and a-crease.
Filing, filing, They served so well their placement, So box them in the basement, And let them rest in peace.
Oh, shut up Wendy, carping still, Like a Guardian trendy, elite and crabby. I suppose you write your poems with a quill By candlelight, in a world chock-full of balladeers. But I warn yer, without the engineers There wouldn’t be a corner, for there wouldn’t be an abbey.
The Brutal & Misogynistic Murder of the Tyrant-Enabler Jezebel at the Hands of the Baying Mob by Gustave Doré
A Rose by Any Other Name but This
Atheist parents do not breed Jezebels, Their daughters are precious, not pawns in a game. Atheist parents may mock what the Bible tells, But that is no reason to resurrect the name. It may sound pretty, and the Bible may teach slander, But why would any parent choose a stripper’s name to brand her ?
Atheist parents do not breed Jezebels, Their daughters are Marys and Sarahs and Janes. Atheist parents may not fear burning hells, But that is no reason for bully-bate names. It may sound pretty, but it’s home to tarts and brats: For we cannot name our children in the way we name our cats.
So much emotion invested In teams over which we have little control – So many loyalties tested, Where happiness hangs on a single damn goal. We buy into brands and we swear that we’re theirs, But we’ve nothing to offer ’cept hoping and prayers – So they win or they lose – and at least someone cares, Though we act like it cost us our soul.
But all of that devotion For an empty sporting rite Must leaves no spare emotion To our fellow humans’ plight – There’s torture to be ending, and forests to be saving, There’s justice to be tending, and freedom to be braving – There’s too much needs defending to waste our flags with waving, Let’s get our passions working here instead. We need to get ignited for the good of all the blighted, Regardless if they’re wearing blue or red.
English: a right bastard-son of a language – A teenage two-fingers to logical sense. With lucky-dip spelling – a standardless gauge, An anarchist mang’ling our logical cage – We think that we’ve captured it dry on the page With pronouns and adverbs and grammars immense, But this is one battle it’s folly to wage – It breaks ev’ry rule in the end, so dispense\ With these thoughts we can tame it, or even condense – There’s no passive mood in its imperfect tense. It’s waiting to trip us, bamboozle, upstage, And piss on our tenets in nat’ral defence.
English: a beautiful fluke of a toolkit, And we are its masters, and never its slaves. And each time we use it, it’s changed just a little bit, Changed just a little – but should we permit ? Yet if we can follow, it must be legit. So don’t stem the growth and the sparkle it craves, But keep it adapting, surprising, and fit – And bring on the jargon and slang that ‘depraves’, And don’t mourn the umlauts and genders in graves, For this is precisely how Darwin behaves – Red in its verbs and its nouns and its wit. You can’t turn the tide, but you can ride its waves.
Rhyming Couplets 