Whispers in a Jar.

Hard, dry, crumbling ground,

quietly cracking from the explosives

hidden, breathless beneath.

Sixty years before

small, grimy, gentle little hands

in the darkness before dawn

had dug deep, with determination

to hide something within them.

It was a secret that

wouldn’t be known for six long decades.

Those children grew

into stunted, tortured, twisted bodies

that could not escape

those harsh, tense touches in the night.

Lying in bed,

they wait for the creaking crack

in the door to grow in size

and for the shadow to flirt with the ground

and the decision of whether or not

to rape a child.

Eyes surrounded by puffy wrinkles

still wait, with the covers

pulled up tight to their chins.

The home for children

was meant to be a haven

of safety and security;

but instead of colourful crayon

drawings placed proudly on the walls

there were whispered words

written in light, shaky hands.

Light enough to be almost invisible,

these children were hidden from a world

not yet ready to understand.

In that day and age such things

did not exist

and were easily missed by blind eyes,

milky with the dew of patriotism and ignorance.

Sixty years on and those brittle,

broken words are finally heard.

They escape from the cracked jars

they had been banging on,

burdened and buried under the crumbling ground.

Like a phoenix they rise

free from those lies and the perversion

of people who were meant to care.

No Average Joe.

Mighty Joe Young is on T.V,

wild and feral,

wrecking the place

due to the injustice

of his situation;

and all I can think is

“Joe, please pick up some drumsticks

and play Phil Collins.”

My sympathy for gorilla’s

has been destroyed by Cadbury’s chocolate.

Judgement Day.

A million-million millennium domes,

the year is 2010

and I am a Judge,

Father Christmas

or in the clouds.

Heat rises as the downpour

of heat

falls

causing the clouds to rise to attention

higher and higher

until they are a jury of mountains,

created by fountains.

The only leaky tap is my nose.

This unknown creature

glides over my skin,

intimate like a lover,

and looks up

with its billion eyes

staring and accusing.

So many eyes,

all with slightly different

and slightly skewered reflections

and perceptions of the truth.

The heat is on

and clouds the mirror

of the small society

created by Radox.

A wet knife can not slice away

the many miniscule details

that make Santa’s beard

but a dry pointed finger can out rule a Judge.

The plug is pulled on this court case.

I rise.

Leaves on a Tree.

It’s brought up,

that time,

in the regurgitation of your past

as it falls down the toilet bowl.

In passing comments,

brief,

like little jabs with pins

or a swift burn on the top of the oven.

You can’t cremate the past

and blow it away

with a typical blustery British wind.

A typical English family,

not the last in England

but one of them.

We cling together,

pale leaves on a tree,

whimpering and dying out,

falling one by one

onto an urban cracked ground.

You fell first,

you fell with pills in your hand

and tears in your eyes.

You fell for him

years before

and he repays you

by raping your trust

and shredding your confidence

while enjoying the heat

in the Mediteranian.

Did he ever think of us?

You keened, a wild animal,

destroyed by a sight you couldn’t forget

of young firm tits,

a smiling face

and an exotic background.

Why didn’t he take you,

try and make it work

instead of an easier,

more ego stroking option?

You can only leave him

by falling off our tree

into a soft wind

of whispers and clouds.

It wasn’t the end

and thank God for that

because I love you

and you broke my heart.

My leaf fell too,

the family split in two.

Now there is one less perfect family

in England.

Birds in the Dusk.

The soft red glow

warms a room with no windows

to the outside world.

A world that is an unwelcome distraction

to us

as we travel around

the planets that are our bodies.

I circle you,

kissing and chasing

expanses of land, hills and caves.

The island of your plump lip,

juicy and moist,

presses against mine.

I look inside your bra

and see far away birds,

little “m” shapes in an areola dusk

flying towards the pink, pointed sun.

I too reach for this dream location,

and take this vision of serenity

into my mouth.

As the birds remain static,

frozen by the dusk turning to night,

I go further south

to warmer and more welcoming climates,

our travelling quickens pace

and with urgency

and sharpened breaths

we both come to the same destination.

Saving Face

I brought a mask

from a charity shop

in Richmond;

one of those classy shops

with decent shit.

The mask was softly textured,

yet solid

and firm in its morals

which was clear

when you knocked on the wood

and also in the carvings

of its regal, native, nomad face.

Two moons later

as the sucked smartie,

derived of colour, dissipated

into the blue of morning

my wife found out

about my affair.

It wasn’t the knickers

in the

c

r

e

v

i

c

e

of my back pocket,

still stained from the action

in the back seat of my car.

It wasn’t the condom wrapper,

crisp, clinical and open

as it released the demons

from Pandora’s box.

It wasn’t even the sordid texts

over the period

of a gasping, sweating, lusting year.

It wasn’t any of these things.

No.

That mask was fucking cursed.

Scissors

You sit there

holding hands in a circle

of other little girls

that wear skirts with no knickers

and strap-ons underneath their clothes.

You make daisy chains

of dew, milking out of sacred holes

that you give too easily.

Fingers delve in,

hard and probing

but they don’t probe into you,

who you are

and what you do.

You sit in your chain,

tied to a web

based on dating sites.

Has your Gaydar gone off yet?

Like cheese left out in the open,

you will grow bluey-green

with new holes in your naked

alien body

and bruises from gone teeth.

What happened to real love?

The girl you sit next to

tells you what you want to hear

and you listen, interested

and sincere,

only for you both to turn,

a mirror image of one another,

and repeat the same Ground hog words

to the smiling, interested

and sincere girl

next to you.

I smile and listen to your tales

of arrogance,

as you talk of girls you “blew off”

for other dates

and girls who cling and cry

like they are a game in an

amusement arcade.

Insert your silver in her slot

and watch her go.

I smile,

because somewhere in the circle

two links were broken

only for them to connect to each other

and make their own circle.

Not vicious, repetitive,

cheap or cruel,

but a circle of what real sisterly love is.

We lock legs,

create an instrument that wounds

but neither of us gets hurt.