the night’s stones weigh
heavy like the cloud -

everything sinks.  

the cry of a bird -
eerie like a ghost -

the night speaks
of autumn, of windows
now shuttered to the
stars, of leaves painted
silver and gold.

a cat wires his claws to the
dark, drops down from a wall,
lands with his fur full of sky.

the night’s unfamiliar
shiver of last leaves
from trees silent
as frost.
the world is gold
and bronze.
the shadows melt,
flame, bend, unwind
discover still currents
of dark earth
where the sleepy
stream murmurs
that the moon
is a ghost of
water,
that her midnight
streams are
the strangest of
strangest
songs.

i.

the ocean breathes....
like a tapestry on the
wall you weave silken threads.

ii.

like a moon beam
caught in a silver sky
emotions deepening
the heart like a dome
coleridge in my liquid, ghostly heart.

iii.

imagination ripples,
slumbering dreams
crescendo and then die,
or travel on in their lucid
consciousness, streams of
effortless light taking me
to flower gardens and
moon-ful paths.

iv.

trembling, where the
ghosts lie hidden,
i gasp for breath.

v.

set me free, of these
lonely tides
where the sea beckons
throws its driftwood
at the shore, will eventually
break the land with its swaying
wave-like grasses.

the ocean dreams...
colours like burnt kisses,
the blue mist tangles the air.
the shore shook out its creases
like old linen, fell under
the tumbling wave.
i drank the silence,
walking where the moon,
carried along by the song
of a ripple, dipped
her feet in the foam,
dancing, dancing...
beneath her ivory tongue,
a glistening jewel,
her alabaster skin
night's whitest rose,
and where the stars
wrapped december in
ghosts and the
gleaming water was the
quietest echo of love,
i could no longer bear
to be alone, and my tears
were the wilderness
and how it grew inside me,
and everything i loved was there
the wave carrying the wind
and i felt alive, as joyful
as the silver shore, a dark-pooled
painting of you, a river-eyed song.

the poetry meanders like
a pleasant stream
singing of autumn leaves,
    
breath as tranquil as a star in
the blue night,

our margins gather space
wait for the poetry to emerge
like trembling smoke,

our love rushing to wake
to gather songs of an
october sea.

i.

the quiet of the meadows
as wildflower listens to the
babbling stream,
stones washed by the silvery
water,
the sun pressing the land into ghosts.

ii.

dusk sags like a balloon
remembers a darkening sky.

iii.

it has grown late,
poetry quivers on the
windowsill,
taps nonchalantly at the door.

iv.

the clouds turn emptiness into dreams
like morning frocks billowing on a line,

the moon walks over
sings of darkness and blue smoke,

the cold starts to sink into
the crevices, conjures its ice
like brittle honeycomb.

v.

tomorrow waits like
a hungry child,
she eats our fingers
and our hands
and we let her
for we can’t bear for her to go hungry
as she carries everything of us
forward with a little push.

the river flows into
the night,
stars parade,
ghosts of the air
chant strange songs,
the flowers once
spellbound
close with the breath
of the moon,
floating
i am a ghost too.

the river longs for the sea,
stars like blue arcs,
ghostly voices
hum on the breeze,
the flowers of
the night
blossom in the starlight,
the air seems to soften
and clouds drift and drift,
puddles of grey inks with
even greyer moods.

i.

her dress laced with
icicles, winter streams,
on her head she
wore a bluebell hat.

her hair wild roses,
her little hands gathered love like
wild roses, until her
cheeks melted like wild
roses, and everything of
her was the rose wild wind and
the silvery song of the moon.

ii.

winter wove it's dull aches,
it's rose powder rains, its
clouds of dream around
her, but she refused to believe
in the scrolled iron gates of winter
where nothing would open into
the garden of her dreams and
she was left a wood sprite,
magical as freezing midnight
cloud-like in her roses and
blanched cheeks, a snow-rose,
deeply beautiful.


iii.

pale as a midnight cloud,
the flowerbeds soft stars
of february, moments of

ice, tears, tears of a doll
in the frost.


iv.

love, surreal and ceramic,
pink blossom kisses on your
cheeks and your cherry-white lips
winter harness of bells and softest
leather.

v.

clouds sing of roses, winter sinks
like a dark rose, magical inks, rose-
girl, roses, dark thorn of black,
muse in the hedgerow, singing
of a long forgotten world. wounded
bird, drawn of paper and the ringing,
ringing air.

the sea murmurs of moonstones
and loneliness, every breath
the drowning dark,
every leaf of its emerald
tree, a whisper, a cry of
sorrow, a silver dream.

the sea and its ghosts,
water falling,
clouds like peaceful
monasteries,
somewhere beyond.

the sea in ribbons,
blue lands of the tide,
surreal as summer
with her plastic suns,
her moons of smoke,
her endless rivers.

the sea sings of
all my sadness,
i hear it in the waves that
beat relentlessly,
in the sky that dreams of softness,
in the sands that stretch like golden tides.

the sea with her songs and her freedom,
a rose in the desert tonight,

while the night with her beauteous wisdom,
holds the sky like the wings of a kite,


the moon is a ghost white and eerie,
skies carry the bird’s weary cry,

while the clouds dream of rain, brimming teary,
with each hollow sigh.


our love lies like ash long departed
and freedom's the wilds of the coast

and the sky where the swallow once darted,
has no star with their silvery frost,


oh, lover no love then could ever
be wiser or bolder than ours,

or lost as quickly with each new endeavour,
bewitched like the flo'ers.



so lover i wait here forever,
where the waves of the blue ocean swell,

a bride to the storm and the ether,
my song the sea's silvery knell,


for the muse sings of darkness forever,
and dark is the song ever sung,

and the sea finds its bow and its quiver,
and air fills her lung.


i'll wrap all my dreams in white paper,
and carefully tie with a bow,

then lay them all out with the ashes,
that lie where the wild berries grow,


and no one will ever e'er find me
and i will be lost in the end,

torn under the coast where the seas be
the voice of the land.


night grows from the death of the evening,
evening carries her stars and her seas,

the morning without ever seeming,
delights the bright sighs of the breeze,


dark voice of the sky and the landscape,
dark eye of the turbulent sea,

moon emperor, discoverer, wan dreamscape,
love jealous and free.

the sound of a wave lapping,
summer thickens

and suddenly everything is
vaguely surreal, under the
hidden stomach of the stars

ghosts of silver struggle
in the white light.

when the water splashes
little islands croon.

love, rescues me from
the millions of pieces
where i lie scattered.

the hidden staircase fascinated me,
the wooden steps, oak panels on the wall,
behind an unexpected door you couldn’t see,
a narrow entrance in the spacious hall.
who ever would have thought to find it here,
a masterpiece of silent secrecy,
whose trepidation full of pounding fear
climbed up those stairs in frightened urgency?
while candles drip hot wax from chandeliers
they gallop in the night, the carriage wheel
leaves furrows in the mud, whose trembling ears
await the sweeping toll-bells heavy peel?
and as the night drifts ever closer in,
who bolts the windows, deafens out the din?

the star of the star of the morning
is restful and breathful and free

the star of the star of the evening
blossoms dark as a shadowy tree,


the waves drive out far in their rivers
as blue as a star in the sky,

and the darkness relents for her shivers
must finally die.


waves turning and burning and dancing
clouds wandering e'er ever on

and the darkness that finds the new morning,
as cold as stark night's bitter song,


oh, brother who wept for my sisters
no tears as alive as their breath

swept out where the wild sea blisters
and pain knows of death.


wild whispers, wild birds and the fury
of waves that sing out to the clouds

the death then of life that we bury
laid out in the whitest of shrouds


the sea, oh, the sea, how she sings me
a song of a dance never sung

and her rhythms soon calm and placate me
her bell solemn rung.


and sweet love is the journey i strive for
as blue as a mysterious sea

and the love is a fruit full of succor,
and the moment will live e'er free,


you stand tragic as a painting so mournful
alone as a poet who rests,

and the lull of the storms here at night fall
the sea's treasure chests.


the day wraps the night in her roses
and night wraps the day in her sight

and midnight's soft moonlight supposes
that day is a journey e'er bright,


and love was a love still forever
and love had no rose in her bower

for the floor of the sea like a feather
the delicatest flower.

the star of the star of the morning
is restful and tranquil and free

the star of the star of the evening
blossoms dark as a shadowy tree,


the waves drive out far in their rivers
as blue as a star in the sky,

and the darkness relents for her shivers
must finally die.


waves turning and burning and dancing
clouds wandering e'er ever on

and the darkness that finds the new morning,
as cold as stark night's bitter song,


oh, brother who wept for my sisters
no tears as alive as their breath

swept out where the wild sea blisters
and pain knows of death.


wild whispers, wild birds and the fury
of waves that sing out to the clouds

the death then of life that we bury
laid out in the whitest of shrouds


the sea, oh, the sea, how she sings me
a song of a dance never sung

and her rhythms soon calm and placate me
her bell solemn rung.


and sweet love is the journey i strive for
as blue as a mysterious sea

and the love is a fruit full of succour,
and the moment will live e'er free,


you stand tragic as a painting so mournful
alone as a poet who rests,

and the lull of the storms here at night fall
the sea's treasure chests.


the day wraps the night in her roses
and night wraps the day in her sight

and midnight's soft moonlight supposes
that day is a journey e'er bright,


and love was a love still forever
and love had no rose in her bower

for the floor of the sea like a feather
the most delicate flower.

the thunder of
a small bird.

a poem grows shadows
and moonscapes,

the moon,
withered sapphires,
undone,
her open windows
a thread of bright
light.

the trees like
iron masts
ships of steel,
the leaves,
whirring and circling,
scattering the shadows of
the dark lanes
with their golden inks.

the trees settle their ghosts,
in the yellows of the sinking day
a strange wood
that waits for it to grow dark,
that sinks like a cloud
as falling leaves flood the sandy isles
with their sighs of fire,
as the trees ripple and flow
to a wind of immense breath,
rocking, floating down,
a sapphire ring left on a branch
by a girl who dreams of snow.

goodness is more powerful than evil
never hurt a child
the meek shall inherit the earth
love is, luck is, skin is,
we never have to hurt ourselves
to feel our love for someone,
we spoke to the evil, it said
that it was too evil, it said it
was fed up of the evil and that it
just wanted to go. everyone who
is kind and gentle helps goodness.

the water carves its caves
out of the black rock,
little turrets of the wind
walking the battlements
of the sea's dark fortress.

the water dreams,
wild as a sea,
tranquil as a star.

the whiteness of ghosts,
winter flowers,

songs of the night
falling through
the leaves,

the old dark ache
of the skies,

our love
naked in its seas.

sea, soft slumbering
its ghosts green nettles
once woven into shirts,
princess with fingers
badly stung
for love you sew
nettle to poison nettle
bearing the pain
for brotherly love
and as the nettle shirts
are thrown over their
backs, they become
human once more
and the bonfire to burn you
becomes soft flowers,
under a wintery sky that was once
a flock of wild swans.

the wind wrapping
the water into grey ghosts,
the darkness twisting
like a flower.

the wind whispers
to the shore
of blue grasses
and falling waves.
i love you so much
that i can’t wait to be with you,
to touch your hair,
to cover you in kisses
and drown in all your beautiful love,
know only the fierce fires,
the sweet, sweet, blowing tides
of your burning heart.

this is the moon's
quiet rose, the unfolding
of the clouds, tranquility
resting her head,
the beautiful sea.

the land was a slumbering bird that had not yet opened
its eyes. the morning roared like a thunder

cloud and i gazed at the sky with her cornflower blues
and orchestral flutes, her dark bones whitening

in the yellow-threaded light. silence wrapped me like
a shawl, and love settled on my shoulders like

a bird. it was too early for the swallow to return
with its spring-tinted wings, the winter settled

in the nooks and crannies of the earth, sweet
as your mouth, crisp and cold as the ashen north.

and while you lay beside me, warm, nocturnal
and dreaming of the sea, i kissed your lips

and told you to hush, not because you had spoken but
because night had been so gentle to you that i

wanted to keep you wrapped in her star-scented arms.

tide, the moon-flow of the
sea a soft ghost.

smouldering in shadowy inks
the night with its luminous clouds.

as we
loom
our hands

tethered
like a
cat's
cradle to
the sky,

a slight shift
of foot and
the landscape
scatters
drunk
as the blue
seas of the
cloud,

the tide
strides to
the open shore,
wind in her
arms,
salt on her
breath,

every step
decadent and
rebellious,

every sip of the
wind an icy
storm,

and the sky
hangs like
a pendulum
in an old
grandfather
clock,

calling out
crazy minutes,
breathful
seconds,

i stand next to you,
knock on the door
of the airy sea
stare out,

curve like
an echo in a
cave,

a handwritten
poem, carved
out of air

while you,
boy of dream,
kiss me like
a wild sea,
restring the
broken violin
of my heart.

the sea flows in,
rolls thunderous waves
against the shore until the
sands are buried in the
deepening water
and the grey rocks
can no longer be seen.

each wave is like
the row of an audience
in a theatre, whistling to
the shrieks of the wind.

it is winter and the
rushing tide
melts in the cold
below a steely mist
that the broad sky
wears like a mask,
gathering her skirts
of cloudy inks.

i hear the water fall
and i sense that i’m alone
with the crying tide,
watching as it speeds
to the shore, spraying
its foamy mist
in the air.

i am isolate, drowning
in the cloudy thunders
of the waves, hearing
the mighty barrels
hiss and whir, dreaming
of love.

tides of dark ink,
the rocks buried
by the drowning waves
where the water  
falls in little grooves,
sweeps the shore like
a sudden gust of wind,
the sea surreal as gleaming stars,
the sea surreal as an evening star.

tonight i can't write poetry,
a star is just a star.

"where night is...the integrity
of the voyaging star..."


will flowers blossom soon in this
nearby petal-edged spring? the day

is full of buds, the night carries its ghosts,
the night-lily singing of magnolia and cloud.


in the sweet-breathed sky
the silver stars are like tiny pins,

my love is carved in their reflections,
i see his face in their waters,


our love still lasts, scented like the spring,
promising each other the ghosts of forever,

i could never let him go and now he says
he wants to die by the sea, in my arms,


and we create a new dream, out of night's
shadows, a new beginning before the new end

for all our love and all our hate.
i lie numbed or over-joyed seeking


his tenderness in every crevis waiting
for the kind word, the gentle kiss.

sometimes he gives me love, sometimes his hate -
how tired the world, its hidden ghosts


soaking in the rain, the clouds subdued,
the poem built of the night's sweet edge

enamel-glazed, hypnotic like the stars.
how tired the world- how empty-


and how the poetry spins like a top, full
of the dark sky, the sad farewell,

the pretty ghost.

tonight i can't write poetry,
a star is just a star.

cloud in the sky,
drifting, rose of
the skies, wanderer.

elation, wild heart,
sea of wild stars,
sea, incredible love.

winter sea, wilderness
and wild flowers,
stars burning the skies.

i am jealous,
because all of my
love wants you,

i am jealous,
because my beautiful
love wanted you

rippling like a stream,
sighing like a ghost,
like the waves of the sea i so love.

tonight i want the sea more
than your love, some days
my heart just longs to be wild.

tonight i will make you jealous
of the sea.

the sea sings its august notes,
curtsies and prances like
a two year old colt,

believes that the wind
forgives its cold voice,
rises and falls –

its icy engines strong warriors
battling beneath the clouds,

its flowing barrels voices
of gossiping steel.

tranquility and stars,
the earth gives way,
the drowning
of the dark,
your love-cries in
your sleep,
tender and then harsh
beneath a blanket
of dream.

sweet chloe have you tamed that pretty bird,
as light as southern breezes on your arm?
how many hours have you beguiled and heard
your sparrow sing for you with graceful charm?
my poet's pen falls restless to the ground,
my fevered mind can find no peace today,
for all you do is praise his lilting sound
and pay no heed to anything i say.
great neptune throws his trident in despair,
apollo breathes, his tresses filled with fire
and i am left with solitary care
for jove cannot bring comfort with his lyre.
i do not wait forever at your door,
the burdened ocean storming to the shore.

hot, hot sun, golds and yellows,
sky like a tranquil lake,

in the cave-like hollows of the wood,
the smooth leaves glide,

shadows, falling like dark water,
cooled by a wanton breeze,

sink like a gentle flow of air
woven out of breathing silk and the

dim space that catches its breath -
collides with the sun –

hangs dampened branches out to dry.

dancer of the clouds,
ink of dream,
as if the sky, hushed
and utterly forlorn,
turned a pirouette.

love poem
"where love is a wave that splashes on the sand"

when a heart
loves
the stars surrender
to the heavens,
the moon catches her breath
and the avenues
of silence become
voice. i follow the
path to my love,
i die for him,
i live for him,
like a spartan
in the heat of battle,
like a flower in the
mist.

Surrounded by peals of
thunder,
Little Cat rides the tree,
Gripping with talons
****** deep in the wood
Lashed by the wind that
blows no good,
Soaked by the rain,
So misunderstood,
Then lightning strikes,
Oh!
Poor Kit-e
'spose she'll make a
change,
From KFC.

sea, soft harbour of summer,
where the breezes drift
and the dawn tide pales like cloud.

summer’s roses bloom
while the dawn tide pales like cloud
and sweet breezes drift.

where sweet breezes drift
the dawn tide pales like cloud, the
rose of summer blooms.

moon, bright lamp
of grey,

sky, open and brave,
colossal dream of
drifting love,

sweet journey of
the night, lifting
her pretty head,
worn and unholy

like the falling petals of
the stars.

i see your stars, glazed
and fearless, glistening
like a spectrum

and i understand wonder,
that life is that sharp intake
of air.

the summer roses
flower then unsettle,
crumple in the storm,
blow red to brown.

i.

the last leaves of autumn
have fallen like birds
floating on the breezes,
catching at the windows,
gathering the golds of the sun.

ii.

the first chill of winter
anchors its petals
to the earth, gathers
its frosts and its ice.

iii.

lady of the winter winds,
black waters that wait,
shimmering to a softened moon,
harbouring the drifting stars
like little boats.

iv.

sunken into dream
the night sky maps its path
blows into the corners of the wind
conjures its caverns and
dark caves.

v.

i’ll never let go of your love
for my legs,
your love warm honey,
my yesterday’s caught
in tomorrows, sweetened
only by your lips,
i drift into your love-
i’m in love with your love.