Do you feel it?

I feel full with the load of peppy pop songs.
The love songs swirl and stir within my belly
Unleashing a plume of hot, steamy puke.
Do you know what it's like to feel love?
True love?
Do you know how far a person would go to maintain it?
Do you know how crazy it can make a person;
How paranoid?
It's not simply a perfunctory fascination.
It's not even an infatuation.
It's end-game.
It's the realisation that everything you've ever
Searched for rests within her being.
And you could lose her at any moment.
You may retreat within your ego if you're losing her,
But you'll despair for all time;
If not, it's not love you feel.
Love is indescribable.
Love is dangerous;
True love makes people bow to the mechanisms of insanity.
Love can imbue within a person a deep irrationality.
True love reduces us to half-arsed sentences,
Muddled sentiments
And a gratifying uncomfortability.
When I look into her eyes I feel peaceful -
Like I'm flying.
She's my parachute.
Now watch as she cuts me loose.

Council estate state of mind.

It's a council estate state of mind -
You tenant the house and then you die.
The smoke-stained ceiling's corners peel;
Real life can't be this real.

The weeds are seaping through the cracks.
The buildings loom like widows in black.
You go to school and make cheeky retorts.
You play ball games in the court.

Your mum says she loves you dear.
Her boyfriend calls you a little queer.
Your sister's out getting fucked
By dead-end boys dead on bucks.

The TV screens release blue blares
From council estates everywhere.
The bingo hall is your mum's home.
It seems that tragedy is your throne.

Underground.

Through darkened tubes in the belly of the Earth
we ride.
Eyes glaring like the bloodshot peepers of an imsomniac light the darkness ahead.
A wind ruffles the papers as it passes through the station.
People are packed like sardines in the little box-cars.
People sit at the platforms like perched golems;
The standing ones try to keep themselves distracted.
I sit on the train looking at my shoes;
That or the black nothingness behind the windows.
I step out into stuffy, sweaty summer air
And ascend from the bowels of the Earth
Like bad wind through a drunk's oesophagus.
I'm back in daylight.

On the line.

I'm standing somewhere on the line
between light and darkness.

There are no forces pulling me forwards other than hope.

Behind me, beings clogged with the intoxication

of my rotten attitude 

grope at me.

Faces smile and frown.

Light plays through the glass ceilings 

and startles me.

I'm on a train.

There's a girl in front of me.

Etiquette demands I don't stare at her

So I look at some far-off point in the distance

with a distant, removed gaze -

a poor man's Byron.

She probably has a boyfriend.

The skin on my elbows is blistered 

so I can't feel the water.

I might jump in and be boiled to death;

not too unlike the proverbial frog.

I guess in life one must take chances.

But how many chances must one take?

I'll try harder to resist these repulsive forces

which keep me removed.

A certain amount of objectivity is required to remain sane,

but I feel like shaking loose my sobriety for once.

McDonalds - an account of a spoiled lunch.

I went for lunch at 12.15
in need of some grub.
I eyed the facades eagerly
but bypassed all the pubs.

Out of the corner of my eye
I saw a golden arch.
I thought: 'I could use the Wi-Fi'.
My throat was rather parched.

I ordered some disgusting meal
complete with vanilla shake.
I sat and tried to connect
but the connection had a break.

I requested some assistance
on how I should connect.
A lady brought a booklet
which I then eagerly read.

The convoluted directions
put me in a daze.
But, after several minutes,
I'd passed that blurry phase.

I still could not connect,
and now my meal was gone.
I left the tray upon the table and fled;
they couldn't see me hither or yon.

I wouldn't have gone in there
except for my need to surf.
My lunch was rather awful,
and that rigmarole made it worse.

Making love.

We fumble around.
Lovers in a field of cotton.
I don't utter a word;
Neither do you.
My words could not clarify any better
The feelings expressed in our clammy, loving embrace.
Our flesh is full of heat.
And our heads are full of pleasure chemicals.
Adrenaline has my heart pounding.
Making love is never how one imagines it to be,
But we try to transcend that.
Losing all sense of position in the heat of the moment
Seems the daftest thing.
I kiss your neck and nibble at your earlobes.
You do the same.
The twilight of the room is overcome marginally
By two large candles burning with diminished flames.
We sleep without sheets.
We smoke cigarettes and drink strong coffee.
I hold you to my chest and stroke your hair.
You kiss my stomach, just around the navel.
It feels peculiar but love renders exceptions real.
I wish the morning never to come.
But it will.
And I'll love you just as strongly when the new day begins.
For once this is more than just sex.
I've had it a thousand times;
I could never have sex again.
Making love with you can't be reduced to an activity.
You're a lifestyle.
You're my lifestyle.
I live you; I breathe you.
I think that you breathe me.
And I've never ever felt like this before.

Sunday night; Monday morning.

It's Sunday night in Brighton.
The businesses put out their trash.
It's 2am. Seagulls draw in and enact what's in their nature.
It's 8am. Trash is strewn over pavements about town.

I leave the house.
The whole town reeks of rotten fish
and the acridness of human nature.
Is it me that smells so bad?

Council workers patrol, taking pictures of offending businesses.
Dustbinmen will arrive shortly.
The cycle will go on indefinitely; uninterrupted.
The morning air will carry the scents of rose perfume and decay.

Come.

Come in darkness and reflect in light.
Bathe in beauty; die in blight.
Genuflect; extend your arms.
Life is made of charmless charms.

Every hour is whittled down
Into the fumblings of a clown.
Come today and you will see;
Come as you are and you shall be.

Come down to the river and drink the tears
The sky has cried for a thousand years.
The Earth's beauty is not for you;
The stars are simply but a view.

Come in throngs and come in droves.
The pathways diverge from the roads.
Walk along in rushes and grass.
Come to see the minutes pass.

Come to view the insects dart
And warblers sing; come to hark.
With each morning see the sights,
And rest your eyes each solemn night.

Come to till the very earth
Which fed your kin and gave you birth.
Again, will you crawl from the sea?
Come out to reach for what could be.

Come to me and take my hand,
And I'll take yours; we'll roam this land
For ever and another day.
Come and tell what you've to say.

Come to see the sky and stars.
The heavens drip a tinge of Mars.
This corner of the universe
Will grow as space swells and spurts.

One day when we have walked
The very roads which dreams have stalked,
The times may swing in view of change.
Our place we'll know - and not in vain.

The road (inspired by and dedicated to the novel of the same name).

We walk the road hand-in-hand.
The wind ruffles our hair and coats it with dust.
The air is chilled and still
Like it's hanging heavily in suspense.
The trees are ashen stumps
Reduced to stick-thin remnants.
The soil is grey and sogent.
The sun is merely a bleached whiteness in the mottled sky.
The fires blaze about the hills.
The shopping trolley is a third companion,
Along with a six-shooter I keep at my side.
The storms blunder through the sky
And the rain flees from the crushing clouds
Like hastening refugees.
This road leads to the coast, I think.
God knows what's happened here.
I walk with my boy.
He's still carrying the fire.
I'm carrying the fire, too.
We must champion the fire.
Horrid spectres stalk the road searching for flesh.
What do we do now?
There is only the road.

Coast road.

We went driving down the coast road
and we ended up far from home.
We found a little, snug cove
and we parked up our car.

Just another dead or dying town
with a visible town-wide frown.
We snuggled up 'neath the sunscreen.
I don't need the stars: they're in my memory.

We packed blankets and a bag of food
and we slept in the wind.
The dust can't collect on you
if you're the dust's kin.

We went driving down the coast road
and we saw old naval yards.
Where once were colossal death boats
there are now just sailors' bars.

We drove on to the next town.
I looked for a sign to direct us out.
We're heading off just God knows where -
and I'm sure he forgets.
Maybe we'll find a fork in the road
and have our dinner there.

You can't cage free birds;
not even for a charge.
It's just not our season.
We'll live and die in cars.*

*I'd like to dedicate this poem to Bruce Springsteen.

An amourous flood.

An amourous flood shall traverse this towering mount;
And, with perpetual brawn, through sense's doors shall crash.
You'll be swept up, caressed and not held to account
For the fact you don't resist or appear abashed.

An amourous flood shall swell before your eyes,
And only your eyes shall see its true meaning.
For this flood of crimson passion is in the disguise
Of my love rushing, yet gently swashing and careening.

An amourous flood shall lift you from the depths
Of a loveless swell, sullen and vast.
You'll be carried to the gates of Eden in a bubble,
So hold your breath, and savour it for life's treasures past.

I'll take you where the flowers tell of Babylon's ancient scents.
For you're the only one deserving; all love's pleasures for you are meant.

Identity.

Oh, I wish, I wish I wasn't here,
Then I wouldn't have identity to fear.
Feeling good inside my shell,
Decorated with clothes and sure-tells.

My core is vibrant but my skin is black;
My spirit was slacking so it got the sack.
Hunched inside a towering block,
Feeling like a pitted rock.

Someone take me and add some spice;
Trade my mixing bowl and insert a surprise.
The inventory inside me is untagged
And finding an item is tiring and staggered.

Your disappointment only feeds my beast,
And informs me you find my courage fleeced.

The gluttony killer.

I'll stab for kebabs and kill for wings.
I'll murder and maim for tasty foodie things.
I'll take my discontention out onto the streets
and pound, 'til ground, other people's meat.

I'll stuff my guts 'til full to burst
and fill my need 'til needing hurts.
As long as contracts come my way,
I'll kill for food; food is my pay.

The tacos drip a blood-like sauce.
My rippled body's dappled with sores.
I'll feed until my final hour.
If time were food, time I'd devour.

Please, allow me to consume.
I'll eat the Earth and I'll eat the Moon.
Life is just a feeding spoon.
Death is just life consumed.

War.

Land is the canvas on which war is painted;
War: the product of minds tainted.
Deluded with delusions of self-grandeur,
And couched in feelings of splendour,
Men will claim their gods in candour,
And ask for valour to fight their contenders.
The points they fight upon are ownership
And the memories of an ignorant few;
They'll claim their spoils for themselves
And cite the texts that grant them their actions.
When every last square yard has been claimed,
And every spot is peppered with their ruddy, vessel-bound fuel,
Maybe then they'll rest easy.
Maybe then they'll know the actions of fools.

Words.

The words envelop and inter me,
Forcing me down into a non-descript crypt.
I choke, unable to form a single word.
Every syllable is foamy and glottled;
My tongue is weighted with the lead of a lolling giant.
I cry unknowingly as I wonder why these words possess me.
Why must they, like parasites, inflict their long, drawn-out punishments?
And so down into blackness I go, groped by the hands of invisible ghosts;
Spectres of a long-dead part of me.
I'll let my maggots eat away the decaying flesh,
Leaving just the once-ripe centre to glow and unglow into nothingness.
Seamless clarity gives way to a shapeless void.