10 little fingers, 9 little toes
Due to the topple of that Calor gas bottle
But still he took his first unsteady stumble
Between the sofa and the coffee table
And should have been grateful
For the outstretched hand that took the brunt
Of the sharp corner and the hot spill
But oblivious he bounced back

Right into a job with his mate’s dad down the garage,
Where he delved into the grease and spanners
That formed the bread and butter of a living wage.
And when the car fell on his toe that wasn’t there
He stumbled on without a care
Unstoppable, ready for the next obstacle,

And applied to the navy for a crazy venture round the world
Or he would have had the medical not red lined his missing digit
And said he wasn’t fit for the pitch and heave of a naval ship
Or so the story went as he took his grandkids
Hand in hand along Camber Sands,
With a wiggle of his nine hairy toes, raising familiar giggles

and the redraft:

10 little fingers, 9 little toes
Due to the topple of that Calor gas bottle
But still he took his first unsteady stumble
Between the sofa and the coffee table
And might have been grateful for the outstretched hand
That softened the corner and the hot spill
But oblivious he bounced back
Right into a job with his mate’s dad down the garage,
Where he delved into the grease and spanners,
The bread and butter of a living wage.
And when the car fell on his toe that wasn’t there
He stumbled on unstoppable, ready for the next obstacle,
And applied to the navy for worldwide venture
Or would have had the medical not red lined his missing digit
Cos he wasn’t fit for the pitch and heave of a naval ship
Or so the story went as he took his grandkids
Hand in hand along Camber Sands,
With a wiggle of his nine hairy toes,
Raising familiar giggles

Life subliminal,more than criminal,a nasty travesty to be able to look and be unable to see,to speak without sound and yet to drown in the clamour,
where the glamorous party long into the night but the night longs for rest and who knows but the best that the best's not what we've got.
And the ***** who tramps through his haze gazing at stars locked in his jailhouse behind mental bars knows nothing of this,
his life is an out take,his bones wait for day break but the night knows best.
The glamorous and the glum,a mansion and a slum and for some life's a scream,for others it's a dream and for me it just seems that we're all being beamed,
subliminal messages.

In the dream Ginsberg tells me I am beautiful,
he moves his stool a little closer to mine
to see me in the dull glow of the bar.
I sip at my cocktail as he takes Howl from his briefcase,
tells me Jack loves my baby-blue eyes.
Somewhere at the back of the bar
I can hear the jazz men munching sandwiches,
chatting to the girls who bring them empty beer glasses
for coins to be dropped into, for requests to fill.
The old poet with his Buddhist waistcoat
wants to change the world with his masturbatory atom bomb,
wants the President of the United States
to be silent, to be silent, to be
silent.

So Ginsberg calls the barman Moloch,
wants him to find himself in a wounded page
filled with Christmas catalogues that make the children sing.
It’s a bald-guy thing he tells the beer puller,
‘Look at the jazz boys **** the metal,
sweet sounds, Jimmy The Joe makes , sweet sounds.’
The barman wants the music to end
just long enough for him to miss the woman he loves.
‘So get your heart in a sonnet,’ Ginsy tells him
‘Get your heart in a ******* sonnet, gypsy caravan boy.’
I put my fingers to my temples, try to bring the poems together,
try to imagine the perfect microphone in the Kaddish hand.
Tell me another three line joke, Alan,
tell me the one about the Arabic love call you never heard
when your papyrus was just desert dust.
You know the one, Allen.  You know the one.

The jazz boys find their lips as Ginsberg finds his tear ducts;
I want him to chant his evolution into the mind of the sax solo.
‘It’s just us,’ he tells me, ‘we’re saving the world, Johnny Boy,
the greatest minds of my generation were ****** up the ***
so you ungrateful rhyming ******* could put colour on your book covers;
you see Lawrence throwing his spanners into the printing press?
That’s our little revolution: cherubic haiku page numbers
just waiting for the computer evolution to do something worthwhile.’
So Alan sorts his papers and gives that little attention-seeking-cough
the barman has been waiting all night for.
He pours the drinks, cuts the lime,
lets the poets supply their own anecdotes for this one-night-stand
that’s going to set every ******* pulse racing,
every heartbeat breaking for the goatee beard going grey.

In the dream Ginsberg tells me I am beautiful.
I tell him his spotlight is shining.

Come on down to your Fletcher’s Store
It has all your needs to complete your chore
Marshal has it all you see?
Be it tools or p.p.e.
Obtaining kit is not that hard
If you have your induction card
But without your little piece of plastic
The treatment you get could well be drastic
Other than that, a cost code will do
That will prevent any further ado
If Marshal is otherwise indisposed
Help is near, it has been disclosed
His faithful helper Spiderman
Will always help you where he can
On the PC he also goes
Logged on as Marshal, I suppose
But back to the master of the store
He knows what’s behind every closed door
What stock he has, he knows off hand
spanners, raincoats , every little gland
a special order or a request
You can be sure, he’ll do his best
He is a man of his word
At toolboxes you may have heard
Laying down the law, giving you grief
Hoping to catch the lowly thief
Spending time with him, I have found
He is a rock, steadfast, morally sound
And if at times you may need a friend
Someone to listen, maybe an ear to bend
Someone there, sound and steady
You can count on Marshal Geddie.

Ernest 28 July 2011  (VPT)

gudarna avgudar oss.

"Eight Geats and twenty-two Norwegians
on an exploration journey from Vinland to the west.
We had camp by two skerries
one day's journey north from this stone.

[We] have ten men by the sea to look after our ships,
fourteen days' travel from this island.  
We were [out] to fish one day.
After we came home [we] found ten men red of blood and dead.“

“save [us] from evil."

A record of the delightful piece
They're going to play this evening

Ladies and gentlemen
Your attention please
And now, the moment we've been waiting for is here
I- I have something to tell you

Que sera, sera
Whatever will be
(Remember) Will be

The birth was like a fat black tongue
Dripping tar and dung and dye
Slowly into my shivering eyes

I might walk upright
But then again
I might still try to die

Never prayed, never paid any attention
Never felt any inflection
Never a lot of thought to life

"Che gelida manina,
se la lasci riscaldar.
Cercar che giova?

Al buio non si trova."

And yet From listening to records
i just knew what to do
I mainly taught myself
And, you know, i did pretty well
Except there were a few mistakes
But um, that i made, uh
That i've just recently cleared up
And i'd like to just continue to be able to express myself
As best as i can with this instrument
And i feel like i have a lot of work to do
Still, i'm a student - of the voice
And i'm also a teacher of the voice too

I believe in the future
I don't believe in miracles

Can it be true?!
It must be true, no doubt!

Life is going on as normally as ever
But suddenly something seems to have happened
Everybody seems to be staring in one direction
People seem to be frightened, even terrified

Some nights it just gets worse than others
Some nights, it just
Gets worse
I feel terrible
But what can we do?
I don't know
It's just, a feeling I've got
Like, something's about to happen
But I don't know what

I want everybody to understand this

"I don't understand"
echoes
"I don't understand"

There're a lot of things we don't understand either

Where do we come from, who are we
And where are we going
Eternal questions never answered

"We need answers from you
What- What did you expect to find?
What is going to be our future?
It- It's your responsibility to do something about it!"

Well, I, uh...
I have the key in my hand
All I have to find is the lock
Now listen to me, all of you!

I fly to the strangest lands

And i would like to able to continue
To let what is inside of me
Which is, which comes from all the music that i hear
I would like for that to come out
And it's like, it's not really me that's coming
The music's coming through me

The music's coming through me

It caught me so that I may never
rest from pwondarement;
I will drink life from the bees.
All tore-ments I have enjoy'd greatly,
have suffer'd greatly,
both with throwse that loved me,
and alone; on tear,
and when thro' thudding rents the cravy Haeades
Vent-teh-din-see. I am become a thought;
For all-ways growming with a hungry deadhead
Much have I heard and throwned—
poprieities of Brads and Janets
And spanners,
prime-hates, clowncils, reed-covernments,
Myself too.
threast, i am tonor'd of them all,--
And drunk delight of rattle with my tyears,
Far on the stinging pains of dramatic irony.
I am a partition of all that I have kept;
Yet all expeerientse is an ark
wherethro' gleams that unpondere'd mind whose margin craves
metaforever
and 'fore ever
when
eyes
groove

To see the wizard!

Wake up, the roughest
In the name of, birds fly
(the light, march)
Reach the wizard
Follow, follow, follow
-by league, birds fly

They move on tracks of never-ending light
Like neon beams
stardust

I see it when I look up at the night sky and I know
that yes we are part of this universe
we are in this universe but perhaps
more importantly than both of those things
is that the universe
is in us

And since we cannot escape mother nature
We attempt to placate it
Modern civilization stems from the simple act
Of placing seeds and plants into the ground
When the plants are ready for harvest
We invest so much time and energy in tending our plants
We must stay around to enjoy the fruits of our labor

we can hear her voice whimper,
as wind through leaves,
while we speak:

Cara bella, cara mia bella!
Mia bambina, o Chell!
Ché la stimo...
Ché la stimo.

O cara mia, addio!
La mia bambina cara,
Perché non passi lontana?
Sì, lontana da natura,
Cara, cara mia bambina?
Ah, mia bella!
Ah, mia cara!
Ah, mia cara!
Ah, mia bambina!
O cara, cara mia...

Mia cara!
Ah, mia cara!
Ah, mia bambina!
O cara, cara mia...

Orville and Wilbur
Cold cut the anchor's from their ankle
Carving propellers from whale fins
In the back of a bicycle shop...
And thus begins the tale
Of the thumb trigger cloud ****
At last the Wright's reinvented the horse with wings
Another invention only fit for a mannequin

And One by one the angels fell
Ode had sent a horrible plague of deaths
Why do you think that Ode would do a thing like that?

Well, You put a veil up when you
Took all your things underground
You covered your own footprints
So no one saw you hide
You heard Ode treading in the
Shadows of the sycamore
You turned to Ode and you said
"I will learn nothing from you"

And so it was that Memories burn
On the black and white horizon
Of your knowledge of
What was never said
you've had enough of the road
That was laid along beside you
Like a lover meant
For another bed
And so you left in the morning
And all that's left behind you
Are the fading frames
That you've got instead

And I tried to keep my distance as
Ode changed The Face again
Ode fakes direction so
I don't see where Ode could go
And in the panic I saw that
They had dropped a “note to self”
I picked it up and it read
"I can't learn anything new"

When you've had too much
And the weight of the expected
Has got you feeling introspective
Can I give you the perspective that you need?

Remember that language is power.

"I will, I will. I'll remember that"

Thank you, I'll say goodbye soon
Though its the end of the word
Don't blame yourself now
And if its true
I will surround you and give life to a word
That's our own

Order of the day to come
Thus the end, the ends
Darkest hour, obsidian
Cast of stone, the Night
With a slight of who not harmed
Hit or touched
What will be, the end
How come the rising sun
Matches still
In to gold, it holds
Comes the dawn, golden dawn
Darkness turn to day

I'll take you to the place where you
Come down and just react
To what you're about to see

Early time machine's
Will have tended to leave you
Left screaming
On a dinosaur's dish
In da Vinci's "Bike Accident'
An outerspace whodunit?
Monkeys play Magellan
As the next ex-Edison
Standing out in the crowd with a unicycle

Physics of a unicycle...
Twice the remarkable
Um, did a little little, um, did a lot
Someone's splitting atoms under flag barbed wire
Up in the sky where the war planes fly
Dead in the clouds, hear the God's cold lie
Um, did a little little, um, did a lot

You've had enough
Too much
And all you have collected
Is heavy with the taste
Of ambition misdirected
Bitter 'bout the pace that you keep

Well Good Ode almighty, all that other *******
Is here today and going tomorrow

'Tis better to have loved and lost,
than never to have loved at all!
Come cheer up, my lad

'el Da'
Qb'a'
Oh-kie
YIjah, Qey' 'oH
YIjah, Qey' 'oH

And When I have plucked the rose above
Whatever will be,
will be below

... or, who took the MAN out?

Who took the MAN out of romance?
Who plucked the peacock of quill?
Was it a private performance?
Was it by sheer force of will?

Who took the MAN out of manners?
Did it take magical powers?
Who threw in the nails and spanners?
Perhaps they emulate ours.

Who took the FEM out of feminine?
Was it a trial? A test?
Is it SO cool to be masculine?
***inine's what we have left!

Do we all need to lose gender?
Do all the answers lie there?
Should we all be as the blenders?
Is that decree really fair?

I'm for the lady. The gentleman.
SORRY. It's been building a while.
I just came to air out the sentiment
I love the ol' fashion styles!

Who took the MAN from romantic?
I'm guessing. It's only a hunch.
It may be the one who's got plastic
And insists upon

BUYING HER LUNCH!


SoulSurvivor
(C) 12/29/2015
All rights protected

Walking through the regiments of
old red,cold,dead
tenements
giving compliments
to the planners who put spanners in the works
of parliaments.

The ghosts of raggy arsed kids still play football on the grass,
not caring a rats *** for the 'no ball games' sign and
lining up for 'nitty Nora' the bug explorer,
lice ain't nice even in the afterlife.

I sit in the corner,
Drawing blanks and thanks,
Among brushes so loaded with hues.

I whisper the answer
To an invalid dancer who's strokes
Are ill-peppered with clues.

Reflections are daggers,
And purgings are spanners.
Too sharp or too dull for a muse.

Blue Phoenix reports
In that lackluster court,
"This defendant has no pleading to choose."

Hey Johnny where are you now?
You left, and never came back, just like you said you would.
And now i have heard that you died, my Darling.

You were always my Darling, and i was always your 'little bit of fluff'
And if what they say is true, i know you'd be ****** as all hell if you ended up in heaven, because hell was always more your style.

But i do hope, if you are in heaven, that it's a heaven made just for you.
I reckon they would have a jukebox that only played Kansas and the Eagles, beautiful women and had Stella and black on  tap.
Oh and a GPZ1100, with no speed limit..
And you know what i mean by that.. you little ****.
You'd be in heaven.. oh the irony

You were the first person i told that i like girls too.
I told you i love their softness, there beauty, their curves, their taste,
the way they taste like me, feel like me, are soft like me and that i had *** while watching a video on MTV with girls singing in the swimming pool.
You said you needed a minute to think about things...
for a very long time.. in the bathroom... on your own..

Your tattoos were beautiful, covering you from head to toe.
My favorite one was the pirate that your friend Pervy Pete did
while he was baked, it was meant to be Long John Silver, but it looked like your Nan.

You gave me my first snakebite and took me to my first gig.
Wembley... Metallica.. ****** out of my head..
Best night ever..
probably.

I taught you how to crochet and you let me paint your toenails..
only the once. And you taught me how to whistle with my fingers.
In the end you told me to shut the **** up, because any minute now a whole **** heard of sheep dogs are going to come running over the hill, and **** us both.

I held your spanners, sat on a crate and had fork oil, all over my summer dress. You said it was a good look on me and i told you that you were beautiful. You smelt of sweat and juniper oil and i could have *** from that smell alone.

Your eyes were the same brown as mine, you used to put your face so close to mine so i could see myself in your eyes. I only wish you could have seen yourself through mine.

If we had ever been together, i would have wanted to have saved you.
And i would have too.
But you didn't want to be saved.
I would have spent my whole life trying. You said you would have hated yourself, to have been the one to have killed me like that.

In my heart we will always be. I knew you loved me because, while i slept in your arms on the way back from the Bulldog Fest, you whispered it to me.

Good bye and sweet dreams my tattooed greasy biker.. my Darling.

I'm grateful you never found out about the life i had without you.
You would have killed him.

styles change,
in everything,
can no longer
catch your passing fancy

I am Gap,
says the sign of the four,
no interest no more
for what's behind the door,
just samo samo variations
on a four note theme,
been there, done that,
khaki is just so blah

you're H&M;,
four weeks, in store,
then gone,
no more, no returns,
ever,
edgy, trendy, and usually
quickly, careless made,
with haste cheap manufacture

words are like clothes,
patterns, cut, style,
oft looking ridiculous
a season later,
it's the readers taste,
ever seeking out the newest face

the man's words,
reversed alchemy, ha!
golden-into-leaden,
potpourri of variable seasonings
from gardens of  ancient seasons,
lol, stale, lacking efficacy,
now ready for a burial permanent,
deserving a small museum exhibition

too long, too long,
so wrong, so wrong,
for quick and the digital attention spanners
the easy riders of today

these words, these words,
so wrung, so wrung, so earned,
from a life's stories reservoir
an accumulated dictionary,
now shared with
modulated crafted care

labelled by the new zoo review
archaic, obsolete, old fashioned,
worse curse,
too **** long,
hot ****
if that's
exactly not,
how the man feels
his days, these days,
exacting and extracting,
too **** long

so drips and drops,
will yet be
canvas spotted and plotted,
for those among us
who
taste the music,
tingling skin with words,
cherish the artistry of
caring, workmanship,
buying the best of
what didn't come cheap,

stuff that can't be bought
in any store,
in any style,
the slow pleasure
of taking care...

gotta go,
new store in town
UNIQLO,
hope there is in that name,
maybe a chance, something unique,
something that will glow

mesmerized by minutiae
am now a mermaid
on the mainland
mindlessly milling about
without
control of musclebound legs
both manacled and free

minor mishaps and major setbacks
mirror the inside maniacal mentality
currently managing me

making frankenstienish manners
a mockery of the model citizen
I purport to be...

mild dyslexia, myopia, melancholy
hormonal changes,  missing ******
mindless weeping....throwing spanners
and all manners of fits
.....not to mention drooping bits....

madness beckons, second...seconds
each day an adventure in
crazed endocrinematic revelry

so tired and weary,
living the life of bleary wide eyed misery

good news though...
those in the know
say it only lasts
for three to five years

menopause.....give three flippin cheers

mercy...please

Who would have thought the storm would come
So soon, from a pale blue sky,
When the weather man said, ‘Fine til noon,
And the afternoon, quite dry.’
But moisture fell in a feathery squall
On the morning of that day,
Blown from the top of an anvil cloud
Some twenty miles away.

By two o’clock, the cumulonimbus
Cloud had drifted in,
Its anvil top like a dreadful shroud
As black as the darkest sin,
And lightning crackled within that cloud
Before it was given birth,
And loosed in chains with the driving rains
As it found its way to earth.

We pulled the blanket off the beach
And we closed the hamper top,
As the wind picked the umbrella up
And bowled it, til it dropped,
While Helen stood with her hands on hips,
Stared balefully at the sky,
‘Thanks, you ruined our picnic,
With never a warning, why?’

As if in answer to Helen’s taunt
The lightning struck her tongue,
Her face lit up in a brilliant glow
As bright as the morning sun,
She stood for a moment, paralysed
Then she toppled onto her face,
I’d never seen anyone crash to earth
Face down, with such little grace.

I rolled her over the sand, face up
And I gave her mouth to mouth,
Her head was facing magnetic north
And her feet were pointing south,
Her lips were black as the weirdest Goth
And her cheeks were pale and white,
I managed to get her breathing then
But something wasn’t right.

She stared at me with her purple eyes
That before, I’m sure were blue,
And lightning sparked in her retina
As she said, ‘Thank God for you!’
She wouldn’t go to the hospital,
She staggered back to the car,
And said, ‘I’m needing a drink, for sure,
Let’s find the nearest bar.’

I took her home in an hour or two
And I put her straight to bed,
She said her stomach was rumbling,
There was lightning in her head,
She slept right though to the early hours
And got up before the dawn,
She stood and stared out the window, then,
‘I think I’ve just been born!’

I heard her go to the kitchen then,
Where she said that coffee called,
Then heard the clatter of cutlery
Went down, and was appalled,
For spoons were sliding along the bench
Each time that she waved her hand,
When the coffee *** spun off its top
She said, ‘Now ain’t this grand!’

‘That lightning’s made you magnetic,
I don’t know what we’re going to do,
For all things loose and metallic now
Are turning to follow you.’
I called a friend who was trained in this,
I thought he was more than wise,
‘We’ll have to construct a Growler, but
It has to be oversize.’

A Growler’s simply an A/C coil
That you drop the magnet in,
It only takes a moment or so
To reverse that power within,
It took him over a day to make,
We stood her inside the coil,
I turned my back when he switched it on
And listened to Midnight Oil.

She blew every circuit in that thing
The coil was glowing red,
And lightning was flashing in her eyes
While thunder burst from her head,
She was twice as strong as she’d been before
And everything metal stuck,
We peeled the spanners off at the door
While Helen just ran amuck.

She went to live on a mountain top
Away from the bustle and pace
She said she couldn’t come back to me,
Nor even the human race,
There’s nothing metallic up there, she says
So lives up close to the sky,
And hopes to be struck by lightning, once,
She says that it’s worth a try!

David Lewis Paget

RECORD: GET A MOVE ON!
FROGMAN: MR. SCRUFF

Johnny's and Suzy's: It caught me so that I may never

... rest from pwondarement;
I will drink life from the bees.
All tore-ments I have enjoy'd greatly,
have suffer'd greatly,
both with throwse that loved me,
and alone; on tear,
and when thro' thudding rents the cravy Haeades
Vent-teh-din-see. I am become a thought;
For all-ways growming with a hungry deadhead
Much have I heard and throwned—
poprieities of Brads and Janets
And spanners,
prime-hates, clowncils, reed-covernments,
Myself too.
threast, i am tonor'd of them all,--
And drunk delight of rattle with my tyears,
Far on the stinging pains of dramatic irony.
I am a partition of all that I have kept;
Yet all expeerientse is an ark
wherethro' gleams that unpondere'd mind whose margin craves
metaforever
and 'fore ever
when
eyes
groove.
-- Ulysses, Frogman

STOP: TURN THOUGHT

Library lifter
Came to my study
He made all precautions
Mom’s sleeping
Mind’s blowing
He’s stepping smoothly
Right into my precious hub
With fairly ***** intentions

He carries his box of instruments
With screwdrivers of all types
To turn my guts inside out
With spanners of all sizes
To tighten up my nuts

He’s sitting on my lap
Reading me my book
My favorite childish book
He’s putting me down
Into a deep slumber
With his sweet lullaby
My grave been prepped in advance
Somewhere down the street
Next to the Milky Way  

Library lifter
Soul collector  
Made a good job
Once again

I haven't found peace
And I'm guessing I should
Like it is fundamental for my journey
Yet my journey has come to a halt
Well at least part of it
Like I'm in one car going at the speed of light
While I'm in car that has stopped moving because it broke down and a guy named Joe refuses to fix it, even though he has all the spanners and whatnots

So while one me is almost at the destination
The other me is hopelessly lost

where can I get
metric spanners
for a
quantum mechanic?

Carelessness



His large toolbox fell with a crash from the car
Spanners and wrenches and nails spread afar
But he gathered them all as best as he could
And piled them back into the boot as you would
Then he started the engine and set off down the road
Feeling quite weary from the day's heavy load.

It hadn't occurred to him to look under his car
He was tired and his journey was really quite far
But a large six-inch nail had got caught in the tar
And it punctured a tyre in a fast moving car.
The driver of that was too reckless that day
And the speed he was going was so fast they now say.

The car made a lurch and spun out of control
Then it veered to one side as it started to roll
It spun as it rolled and hit the side of a coach
The glass in the sides smashed like a cheap five-bob broach
But the damage was done and some passengers fell down
Right into the path of the car spinning round.

It scythed through their legs in a horrible way
The sounds of the screaming just wouldn't go away
And six folk lost their lives as the carnage went on
Imagination strained it was something beyond
The driver of course he was one of the dead
As the car wrapped around him and damaged his head.

The other man arrived at the end of his trip
Grabbed his box from the boot with a good grip
And set out to do the job he'd come her for
But could only find three six-inch nails not now four
He was sure he'd purposely put four of them in
He'd just have to and get another one again.

Joe Wilson - Carelessness...2014

Many years ago I witnessed a similar accident to this. As with most accidents it didn't need to happen.

it's the sudden drop at the top of the roller coaster.

when you realize that
falling in love isn't some sort of
fairy tale descent into
wonderland of
warm scintillating certainty

no one told me that it hurts

that you can feel your stomach
lurch violently
and lodge directly in your throat
leaving you gagging and
gasping for any small
tenuous
breath you can pull
searing lungs screaming in your ears
to just expand and
take in the sweetest gulp of air
let go of the feeling
and run

this love thing isn't like a key sliding into a lock

something that fits perfectly
that has no imperfections
and sports no defects
to throw spanners into the engine
propelling me blindly forward
through acid rain showers of tears
smearing my mascara under my eyes
and scorching paths of fire down the cliff of my cheeks

he's had to pick my lock

meticulously listening for that
telling click that will
finally allow him to know
all of me
those uncharted regions he
sees just at the edge
of the falling sun's light
the shadowlands
those forgotten spaces i've cut out of myself
but can't rid myself of

is it love

when i accept that maybe
that peaceful high of simply
his company
his presence
is worth sacrificing to Janus and
shattering the locks that
seal off my heart

am i ready to say i love you

it is more than
an eddy at the top
of Niagara Falls where
you can relax in calm water
just at the Falls' edge
inches from a
stomach clenching freefall
and frigid water turned to cement.

My wife said ‘I’d like a new kitchen’
And I had a Saturday free
With ambition designs for the project
We both had a wild spending spree

We picked up a range made of flat pack
And then went to the café to eat
The choice of hot food was extensive
And we both had a Swedish meat treat

My mancave was short of some gadgets
So, I thought I would pick up a few
You know, gizmos I’d need for the project
You can find in a big B & Q

Like chrome plated long nose snipe pliers
With a bright coloured high friction grip
A high-powered well-balanced hand drill
With a full set of carbonised bits

To help with the cutting and drilling
I bought me a fancy work bench
I got several adjustable spanners
And an American style monkey-wrench

With devices galore in my kitchen
A heart full of hope and a song
The flat pack was open and waiting
And a belief that nowt can go wrong

The kitchen was stripped of its cupboards
(Destruction sound so much like me)
The skip filled with trash and detritus
The air filled with cursed deities

The cupboards assembled, but wobbled
With left over dowels and screws
They collapsed right back into flat pack
And the air turns a little more blue

It can’t have been too many gadgets
So clearly, I needed some more
And after a hot steamy cuppa
I bought most of the rest of the store

I picked up a taper pin punch set
The label said “high tension steel”
I don’t know if that makes a difference
I just thought that it had a nice feel

Who needs a wall grooving chisel?
I don’t know but had one to hand
A magnesium carbon disc grinder
In case I was tempted to sand

I tried ultra-thin premium somethings
A large milling thingamajig
A jig made for holding a widget
And widgets from small up to big

By midnight the flatpack was kindling
There was no Sunday roast the next day
There were no scrambled eggs Monday breakfast
For a week we just ate takeaways

Come Friday raw bacon and sausage
Were beginning to look appetising
The wife gave me fairly blunt warnings
That showed her blood pressure was rising

It was time for a nail gun and ladder
And extension bars for my all sockets
It was taking so long I bought knee pads
And a tool belt with 15 large pockets

The riveting gun seemed quite boring
But I just loved the boring device
I had not a clue how to use them
But simply to own them was nice

Counter sinks for sinking the counter
A compressor for compressing some air
I also bought 3 different augers.  No reason
But because they were there

With the credit card pushed to its limits
And a month filled with heartache and trouble
I was craving hot food or a cuppa
From a kitchen all gadgets and rubble

But every contraption just vexed me
I was starving and then lost my cool
I condemned all of the useless devices
My wife just blamed one useless tool

We had not had a hot meal in ages
Since the meatballs we bought at IKEA
I guess gadgets are pretty much useless
If the one using them has got no idea

Who does she see
when she doesn’t see me
and who do I see
who can this be
Ghosts and Phantoms
creeping about
underworld demons
causing confusion and doubt
Matrix monkeys
with hands full of spanners
going berserk
jamming the works
We don’t see with eyes
we see with our mind
and believe all the lies
of psychotic mankind