Cramped in that funnelled hole, they watched the dawn
Open a jagged rim around; a yawn
Of death's jaws, which had all but swallowed them
Stuck in the bottom of his throat of phlegm.

They were in one of many mouths of Hell
Not seen of seers in visions, only felt
As teeth of traps; when bones and the dead are smelt
Under the mud where long ago they fell
Mixed with the sour sharp odour of the shell.

the smell of a hospital
disinfecting hands and
identities
placed on the counter.
a passport-size ambition
a fingerprint of luck.
you have arrived.
you are here.

you came in
a bus full of languages
funnelled into the room
'welcome to - '
lost and found
in translation.
you cannot understand
you will try
to understand.

your newness.
new you.
you are new.
you do not understand
you are here.

Cranes cruelly claw back the Earth's green turfed hair,
These machines, these metallic prehistoric beasts,
Their sharp jagged teeth coldly rip
and tear the Earth's fertile face,
Poles, long and hard and gnarled and rigid,
They plunge viciously into Her soft soil,
These steel shafts of Man's insatiable desire ******
day and night without pause,

This lawless raw **** is ignored,

The crime comes to a gushing ******,
All the raging lust is funnelled
into the Earth's sighing thighs,
She gasps for air but her mouth is heavily gagged,
The Earth, her blood, black as the darkest galaxy,
It is siphoned and pumped away,
Sometimes it is into the sea spilled,
Have you seen the pelican king sinking?



©Rangzeb Hussain

Smoke left to curl against the sky
Toes crinkled under shoes
Funnelled out and contemplating
All he had to lose

She had left and flown as whispers leave
The lips of those who hush
An atlas crushed unto her *******
No guilt of burning trust

Bitter had she left him
Like the dregs from PG-Tips
And, burned into his memory,
Her swaying, leaving hips

His anchor was stripped away
He was flotsam in a sea
He shuffled out and left the edge
"Nothing now, for me."

no one laughs the dead houses
line the streets i
never had anything
before the ritz and lsd
funnelled into shopping malls
hypnagogic life
taught whither wither
a dying world.

this space this place
a shelter from the weather
wind the rain unclothed
the deer would huddle
in habitual restlessness alert
except when in the forests’ deepest
dark their great pale eyes would close

today this sheltering of souls
does not escape the weather
but life’s maltreated pattern
its daily flux and disarray
to sit in this observatory
of evening sky’s condition
seeking only quiet and rapture

on high-backed benches
settled as giants enthroned
pale orange light above our heads
glows within an architrave
to reach across the funnelled
ceilinged surface to the aperture  -
a heightened vision of the sky

we close our eyes prayer-like
to meet our solitary self
where teeming thoughts begin
mind images stream
discarding all intent and reason
until we raise our lidded sight
to this single square of sky

travelling the past and triggered
by undetermined thoughts
speech ringing in the ears
words flood and spawn
so intense this skied perfection
we are drugged towards
a kind of sleep: time waits

then a wakefulness resumes
and all is sound spun turbulence
from trees above that calm and fill
replacing or confusing thought
inside the noise of rising wind: a single
oaken leaf is tossed within the chamber
where it skids and quivers at our feet

unlike the deer who lack imagination’s marvel
we take our thoughts outside this present space
this containment empty of distraction save ourselves
our so-slightly shifting hands buttocks heads limbs eyes
towards a nether world we have no words to share
the salient features of this dreamscape we might glimpse
that is ourselves: distinct alone apart beyond

slowly shifting colour from grey of day to blue of night
the small square accumulates ephemeral
memos sent from our seated selves perhaps
to fly with the wind-tossed crows to roost
somewhere in nearby trees we cannot see -
with the handshake of Friends the meeting ends
and out of silence shyly we reconnect with speech

I have reached the end of this corridor.
The space between the walls either side; where I stand.
This space is tiny.

I have been funnelled here. The route was so direct, so easy.
The easiest.
The end, so predictable and terminal.

We walk this path so well. Along the way we read such inspirational things in such cheap places.
The sentiments and motivational words surround us so much that we are numb.

The inertia set in years ago, but sparks have ignited in me in these late times.. Each one all the more misguided and further from reality.
Far from this reality.
I suppose, where I crave to be?
The results are unsuccessful.

My dreams flicker through grey matter like remnants of a Universe lost.
The distance from whence I came?
So great that I can only produce tears in response, as I comprehend it.
Silent ones.
Nothing should be spoken of this - I see that now.
*Deaf ears

I heard three but there were more
languages in play, some silently running
through their viewpoints of a day so far.

Where we came from was uncertain.
Clouds of intent ,we had drifted from
indifferent mornings to find ourselves

funnelled for a few minutes into this
shared space. Going forward, diversity
meant nothing.For different reasons

we all needed the same destination.


Tony Noon

I feel completely soulless bar a few bars of an echoey song funnelled
-

© Copyright David Bosworth August 2013

tiny speck of gold,
an insignificant, grain of sand,
realised, it's equal to the land,
how could that be, tumbling wavewashed on shore?
how could so tiny, be deemed much more?
it took a lifetime shoved, and tossed by years,
eroded, polished, in saltwater tears.
Never even daring to dream,
sparkling tiny, in sunlights beam.
A fleck of dust, so small, so low,
how can it contain this sunlight so?

Once fairies said to a little girl,
"the truth, can bring you to our world,
we in fairy can be met,  let truth ring like a bell."
Believing their story, remembering well,
a speck of gold, caught in giant golden hive,
which entered the room, lying down on its side.
Cogs moved and whirred,
lifted this vessell up,
an insignificant, tiny head, bowed down,
two angels, one  placed a medalion, another a crown.

Returning to earth with invisible, otherworld treasure,
pushed aside by the men, snided down by their measure.
Her little heart buzzed, like a bee aloud,
mood altering peace, floated high on a cloud,
been swatted, and hurt before and then,
karmically bound, to unravelling men.
They hit out at small, they trample it down,
those haughty sunflowers, came tumbling down,
sat amongst grasses  crushed,
down and trampled,
bending and blowing
tho' eternally growing,
throughout all lifes storms, never fully broke,
ribbon of grass stronger than windfallen oak.

Fairytales are true,
if only men knew,
they definitely would not, do the things, that they do.
It's never too late to learn,
how to avoid infrared, radiation burn,
funnelled and furnaced in a cosmic dance,
never dare leave destiny, to luck and chance.

The billowing
Invisible pillows
Of oven air
Pressing
Surrounding
Attempting
To mollify
Liquefy or
Bake
A dense
Imperative to
Change state
Figures
Droop and
Drip
Bottled water
Is
Initially
Sipped
And
Then
****** at
With placid
Desperation
Until plastic vessel
Is an empty lung
That inhales with
A suctioned
Creak
Then exhales
Vapour
Breathing on lip’s
Sweat
That then slides
Down
Ever
Down
Pulled by
Under ground gravity
Forming
A river of
Consciousness
A blurring of
Memory and
Passive observation
Until everyone
Seems to be
Part of one
Melted mind
A slippery hive
Of semi-conscious cogs
Slowly turning
Turning
Forgetting where
Left is
Where right is
Instead
Moving forward
Pooling with the masses
As they slink
Forward
Up stairs
Through tunnels
Funnelled ever forward
Pushed out
Rising ever up
At pace with
Steam

Then
Then

Rush of wind
And
Out into the open air
Aware
Suddenly of
Sun
Clouds
Pavement
Nostrils
Filling
The feeling of
Remembering
A loosening
A separation
From the sweaty
Stream of commuters
A grounding
Knowing suddenly
Here
There
Here
Lip still sweaty
The wind blows cool

You pause

Then swept
Into another
Current
Of people
With a purpose
That can’t be gleaned
March on
March on
Till your front door

Then
Then

Hide as you slide down
Pressing your self
Against the solid dam
A shield against the rush
Another day is done

But
The city still sweats
Outside
Beneath the blanket
Of the season
Tossing turning
Fitful and full of
Floating dreams
And the glossy steamed
Mirage of a nightmare

Then
Then

You sleep

They might have already come
from a far distant planet upon the death of their sun
they might have already come

I think I've seen them
and not the little green men
we suppose.

They may walk beside you
are there aliens inside you?
do you even know who you are?

and are we aliens then
to the little green men
we suppose them to be?

I wonder what kind of creatures
they see.

do they see powers lines and sockets?
several billion different rocket ships
stranded on the 'third rock'

are they taking stock of us and
wondering what to do with us?

I think they're already here and we are being funnelled through some astronomic tunnels by some warp factor tractor beams.

Seems unlikely to some,
but preferable I think to their own death underneath a dying sun on a planet far away.

they might have already come
and yet I'll go blindly on
believing I'm  the
chosen one
and we all know
that's not right.

As they sparkle and glisten in the ebony sky I see those effervescent stars and as the darkness drapes along the sides of my vision and I am funnelled towards the glory the have and as I run my hands through the grass and feel the dew on the grass and it seems to make everything seem more translucent and as I am able to see a little more clearly the curtains of darkness are becoming more light and I see them wave among the breeze and it's that hair the hypnotized me and as the stars becoming more visible it's the stars of your eyes that are so resplendent and captivating I am in heaven if even for a moment I will capture it for the eternity of what it is

funnelled through the eye of circumstance
Mankind, Womankind,
pushed out through the hips of history
born to die to rise a spirit beyond comprehension
alas time is short to make peace with your neighbour
to fill the bellies of the starving
for natural justice to reign supreme.

Good enough lips for old discussions; acoustic ears pulling
at the strings of all we get to hear; I wish you were still here
Turning the dial, that familiar sensual feeling on life’s radio;
you were just a stereo—two channels away from falling in love,
in a forgotten tune of something close to an old love

My slow breaths exhaling, to your many breaths
inhaling; swallowing words to a prayer; happily fasting
on every time it takes, to admit why you actually fell in love
Filtering most of the hate I once had for you, funnelled out
of my folded brain— paper notes of love letters I kept away
from my curious friends

Dreaming of falling in love; soaked tears in my eyes, during-
to just to recall it all, as a *******; as if I were falling
from mountain springs; cold to your very touch of another
winter’s rain. And in a single way, I kind of enjoyed being
single for just another day