Poems

A child's screeched retort, distorted by young sport childrens' swarming transport in the car-harbour port. Loud-voiced anger rebounds, tantrum-tempered sounds echo 'midst summer's day. Afternoon's angered play beneath the hot sun's spray, pecking order on display.

"You are Emanuel Nailmaker the Seventeenth?" "Yus!" Sniffs and then spits on the floor and clatters his teeth. "You make ... nails ... What are nails?" "Nailing. Nails ain't they. Nail-nails!!" "For what purpose are they?" Sighs, spits, clatters, "You see them trees,...

I have never enjoyed a cup of tea more Than with your mates on a hill when your knackered and sore The pain goes away with the jokes and the crack You cant even feel the Bergen blisters burst on your back The simple taste of the tea is not earl grey or PG Tips It...

Another British soldier lies dead over there, Mr Blair Do you care? He died in your illegal War Mr Blair They should not be there You once wore your CND hippy badge Mr Blair Now you send our brave men and woman to War Mr Blair You don’t care Your sons and daughters...

A dying tree stands beneath my window, rent and torn by wind and weather, its skin a coloured orange from the fungal Rusts. The sky has a sheened-grey, dull aspect and desolate drizzle hides the distance. Stark trees standing forlorn and water-logged, their remnants...

Where is here? Here, here is here. Here, as a wraith of shadow, here And here, over here. There? No, here. Here is now? Not now, but now - now. Also, henceforth now, therefore now, Now thence, and therefore, whence now. Here and now is terminal life, Death but an aged...

John opened his eyes on Christmas day a season of goodwill to all some say Over 30 years now since that Christmas day that he held his friend in his arms his life ebbing away 25th December 1967 a 19 year old marine slipped quietly away to heaven John cried so much in...

The sun-warmed smell of turpentine pine in the late afternoon to dusk sunshine. Four eider ducks are nestled together, rustling their feathers, beside the river. Riots of sunbeams scatter their warm light to catch the airy, flowing swallow's flight. A red squirrel...

Along the road outside, petrol-driven demons Demonstrate their wills; hurtling sermons To some modern, mechanical Hell. Fire and Damnation may delve and dwell In 'Priestley' minds, but God Cars career To some greater, better Hell, we hear. Faster, faster, less and...

Wash away my hatred and black pain Cleanse my soul of this earthly madness Creator if you have created why? Some sort of sick joke? Death Oh how a comfort it becomes To love to hate to Kill You have had your fill I bow at the feet of What? Its comical even though it...

Oh that comforting smell of rifle oil Cold metal against skin Strength through superior firepower Objective is to win Advance to contact rounds firing a wall of steel Dead mans click its bayonnet time Dear God this is for real I stab at the flesh Through fingers they...

The mist creeps seawards. The sea rattling against the pebbles; Mist, sky and sea, altogether; Rusty steel collars of the well-rotted Wooden uprights along the breakwater; Flints and conglomerates pebble banked Between the sea and the promenade; Black headed gulls...

My son sleeps in the cemetery; He is innocent commentary Against the pathwayside Power urge, Of some Motorist's auto-cross surge. "My God!! I didn't see him..." "But I always come this way..." "My God!! I didn't know him..." "I save ten minutes this way..." My son...

The guns fell silent his ears ringing like church bells Warm sunlight hit his face like a smile from God The mist of battle drifted over his friends, no one spoke Filling his lungs with air he could taste the cordite Eyes stinging he thought of nothing He was alive He...

The soldier sat in the packed bar all alone Drinking his whiskey Laughter and youthful exuberance filled the room But could not penetrate the armour of his heart His back against the wall giving him security With all round defence They never noticed him He liked it...

My friend, the dark has taken you - Wrapped your mind, soul. And your beautiful body and hart is stung into past traumatic paralysis. I feel your fear and taste your tear and touch your dead living limb and blink when you dive for cover. You cant see me and I cant...

Small hands grasp mine Pudgey fingers soft Like cotton balls in silk For a moment I have returned To a past I wished had never ended Now a sodden handkerchief lies in my hands Guns fired Empty words floated towards me Lifelessness overpowers me To soon you’re gone To...

See us! We are not just pictures Pieces of a tableau Or parts of a mosaic To make you weep We lived and breathed Held children in our arms Hugged family before we left And many only have that memory Think only of us as we were Not this two dimensional nothingness That...

Sitting watching all this news the fighter jets and all their crews The army sending in some more to fight this endless foreign war How much money will they spend? How many children will they send? How many wounded minds to tend? These boys and girls, how will they...

Off the train to waiting dogs schnell! schnell! and misery’s slog heil seig heil! from Aryan eyes Nazi flags and darkening skies. Tattoo needles sneer and snarl rasping all with ugly gnarl spectacles piled in blinding heap golden teeth corrode and weep. Sons and...

Having seen your website I only but knew My poems had to go on there To help get through I now know well after a year That while you sat and wrote to me You had job responsibilities your own life to steer I often sit and I wonder What does our dearest Annie look like?...

The day I die I wish to lie With two coins placed upon my eyes So that my soul may rest in peace and grace You may say I may not be here in person, But you and I know I will always be here As your guardian angel. To love and protect you Through thick and thin And...

Life gives chances to find out who you are to find out where to go to find your own shadow Live issues decisions for you to make chances you could take visions of your fate Life bestows People for you to love people for you to hate people who’ll you forsake Life...

A moments silence amidst the victory. will the hustings hush for remembrance? for one young man of the war machine, one cog consigned to the silent scrapheap, where concrete ears are discreetly deaf …to the grief of reunion tears. Keeping his kit forever clean, she...

We raced outside into the night so cold, Mother tells me I was but two years old, The Anderson shelter was the place to hide, From the nasty bombs of the German side, For what good the shelter was she said, You’re better off in Dad’s potting shed, Or sitting...

The young men ran to join the queue, As millions more were sure to do, They read the posters on every wall, “Your country needs you” the carrion call, They came from every walk of life, Most men single but some with a wife, All wanted medals with a living wage, To...

The Irish aren’t as stupid As we make them out to be They’ve put a lot of water Between the kid’s and you and me. They think we enjoy being here Away from kith and kin With sleepless nights out on the streets Watching them lot make a din There’s no work for our men...

SOMETIMES I GUESS I WAS SOMEONES CHILD SENT OUT THERE TO DIE GOD IM WILD YOU ARE YOUNG YOU ARE FREE BABY YOU ARE EVERYTHING TO ME. I CHEAT YOU ARE YOUNG YOU ARE FREE BABY YOU ARE EVERYTHING TO ME. IF I DRINK WOTS THAT REPEAT GOD MAKES YOU THINK GOD GAVE ME HUMOUR I...

When the leaves fall away Your church comes into view What can I say? I thought you new My gods not a prefect My god is you So my son life is perfect Why you so blue I thought I had the answers So why am I lookin at you I loved the dancers And the second chance so new...

Two lovers enjoy the early evening sun, Their idle chatter disturbed by the arrival of the one. The one who has been drinking, the one who wants to fight. The one who’ll shatter a mind on that perfect summer night. Insults hurled by the one, ignored by the two. But...

Up there above the windy sky a million miles or more is a world where every soul is sent in thru a narrow door They are counted as they enter and entered on a roll to ensure that they have made it every single soul Then one by one they are asked where they would like...

They came from counties far and wide, Ex-servicemen who served with pride, In Aden, (that’s a port in Yemen), From the year of sixty seven, To a reunion planned by Ian, Of English, Welsh and Jacobean, Many of them are now retired, With stories that are still inspired,...

He sits and watches his crimson flow, As he feels his furrowed forehead glow, Consternation slowly dawns just then, As his beating heart falls silent when, His body, cold with sweat, he’s felt, As he fumbles with his now tight belt, Trying to push back coils of his...

Into his Spitfire, the bullets flew, How could it happen to one of the few, Who had shot his share of pilots down, Whilst laughing deliriously like a clown, Now his turn to die was here at last, His life becoming forfeit to the past, Was it because God thought him...

you men of steel do you really know how i feel. im a deep soul nice to you but hey hell right iraq i believe in but ill stay here tonight even if thats a sin i love my country so whats new expcept the poems and feeling blue well mr my god aint short of cash neither my...

There is a beast inside me I don’t know what it is It hides deep down within me I don’t know where it lives. I never know when he’s around He comes and goes at will. I don’t want him to come around, And yet he visits still. He starts to heat my feet, A flame burning...

The Cenotaph soldier stands a post a glorious youth from a slaughter of ghosts. His soul enthroned for all to see Lee from Enfield 303. He never got beyond the trench where life was worn-out, warred and wrenched. He fell as night, in nameless place and frozen earth...

Caretaker, caretaker, why are you here? Caretaker, caretaker, have you no cheer? Visitors, if you come, bring your own cleaner and cook, rations and washer, and pad-locker. Visitors, if you come, please DO remember the Duties, and the food for the caretaker. Bring...

The walls and ceiling are heat-slicked grease Covering an inadequate white. Scant. The yellow linoleum: now grimy, Now smelling of too much disinfectant And carrying tracks of mildewed grease. Lino.. Roof for a secret, insect world. Cockroaches compete with beetles,...

Tonight, while I should be in bed I’m thinking about you I wonder why you didn’t e-mail me And what, at night, you do You must believe I’m crazy And, hey, it may be true The only thing that keeps me sane Is my eternal love for you

As the 8th grade nears its end I say my good-byes Until next year, my friends Anytime you want, just stop by Well spend our time hanging out Sending our teeth into rot I’ll start off the remember-when’s And you’ll recall what I forget I’ll confess all there is to...

I hear you’re moving to North Carolina Is this true, what they say I don’t really want you to leave Why can’t you just stay You say, your parents are forcing you I say that they can rot You say, don’t look so sad, okay For forget you, I’ll not You say that I was a...

Years have passed without word from you So, every night I cry You’d e-mail me if you really knew What I am feeling inside Years pass But not my love for you So when I see you in lunch I can’t believe it’s true I push through the crowd And then you see me too Now...

I cry a little puddle trail To insanity I was driven I know that my life won’t be a fairy tale For now the truth has risen You must know this too It seems For you make it just so You make my life so miserable Please leave and let go You tell me why you do these things...

In my book of poetry Is where I put the truth? In my book of poetry You’ll read of my blooming youth The book contains My sorrow My pain The books contains My virtues What I’ve gained The book contains Stories of those whom I love And those whom I hate The book...

My tongue lashed soul whispers to yours you need to find love my friend go and open some doors I'll be with you till the end I can’t give you back your body parts but I can tell you you’ve got souls in your hearts you’ve got me why so blue I’m not brave and I'm no...

Granddad is such a lovely chap, Thinks the Grandson on his lap, Not that Granddad says so much, Just a nod, a wink and such, He’d taught him to play dominoes, And other games that he now knows, He helps him light his cigarette, But not quite understanding yet, What on...

This is not a poem as such, More a Rhyme for a Gouv,t out of touch, You take from families that have paid & paid, Look at Norn Iron and enoughs been said. We as Soldiers know what to do, And still we follow orders from,and given by the likes of you, When our MEN &...

These mutterings from the old and bold brigade Whence young and fit, Were the lions of England, who roared And didst defend this mighty country’s shores Through their bravery and their deeds Are these then the same men Who now old, cackle and wail Pointing the finger...

We walked across the hills together we didn't care about the weather The wind was cold, the sun was bright, over the hills and out of sight Onto youth we held so tight, no day went by without a fight Years passed by when hope did fail, the light went out when I was...

Seasons changing getting worse Could this be the industrial curse The price we pay for our inventions Killing the world by good intentions The more we learn the less we know As another step forward means something must go Lost in a mindless search for speed Instead of...

The war hero lays there weak and stilled, At death’s door eighty years he’s filled, But the essence of his very soul, Has not begun to reach its goal, He’d fought bravely in the war, On the Somme, gassed and more, He’d got his medals for being brave, As the enemy...

We proudly serve our Queen and Realm, Many years of taking crap, shafted even You know what I mean, starting out fresh faced Finishing up a cynical wreck Remembering the mind games you used to play whilst on stag, We actually imagine folks back home give a shit, We...

I sometimes hear the whisper of my softly spoken name. Sometimes I hear them tapping, upon the window frame. Or I can see their shadows dart, like the flicker of a flame. And then I hear them, temptingly, invite me to their game. The sceptics queue to tell me, that...

You were brought home On the wings of a metal angel To your body’s final resting place No fanfares marked your return Only the booming pain in our hearts That you were no longer ours God had taken you to join His celestial forces Our countries flag draped you As my...

In a place some call the "Emerald Isle," for the past year or two has been home. I'd never have guessed the effect it would have on a man with a heart made of stone. I knew not a thing of "the troubles" out here, but I learnt as my life trickled by. The country so...

I laid a thousand roses every where you walked on each a piece of my undying heart all the time I watched the people as they talked but to me it was just the start Every time my heart beats it's you who are inside my head like a disease you are the universe but yet...

Oh god I'm floating so high above our humans dying the ones left wondering why and who are the ones REALLY lying? I feel guilty everyday when the bodies come back I tell them I’m an ex soldier but all I got was the sack I am lost between anger and a pretend world...

I joined up on the Monday Me eyes were full and bright By Tuesday they were black and blue I’d landed in the shite I marched along all tall and proud Me corporal shouting words It wasn’t how he shouted But he called us little turds I weren’t a happy chappy Of that you...

Death passed me by, but he touched my soul. While his scythe of fiery lead, cut a swathe through the pre-morn light. Bony fingers plucked holes in mortal flesh. To quench the reaper’s thirst. He passed me by, this time.

I’ve walked the leafy lanes of England. Climbed the daunting mountains of Wales. I’ve sat cramped in Irish darkness, whilst my Scot’s blood boiled. I’ve lived like a cowboy, on the north American plains. Drank for tomorrow, and the day after that. I’ve listened to the...

Looking out’ the window Into the dead of night I see the stars far up above, The moon it shines so bright. The shadows in the garden And cats upon the prowl, The silence it is broken By the hooting of an owl. Looking out’ the window, As the morning starts to break,...