A wall too high

Memoria ex a Poeta

Looking out over the green acres

The water spouts washing the nameplates

And feeding the verdant pasture

The tree line the road giving little shade to the grave stones

This cemetery the last resting place of so many

Bred to feed the machine, the bureaucratic factory

Keeping the wheels of a dying industrial age alive

There will be one person buried in the hole, dug during a rainstorm

Reserved for a chef of words

A poet.

Lost in a corner beneath a dying rose bush

The name almost eroded away on the green colored brass plate

But his words, thoughts and ideas live on

In the self published anthology

Now sold in a used bookstore

To be bought, read and misunderstood

By a woman who devours poetry like an elephant consumes fruit

Tossed on a pile of other books like a dirty pair of her ex-husband underpants

The words saved by her fluffy white poodle pitbull mix

Who after being shouted at grabs the book in his mouth and runs into the street

Poetry always needs a good home and Andre a student of literature picks it up

From where it was deposited next to the dog’s favorite lamppost

Opened regularly and read aloud, the poet’s works is heard by all who are present

A new generation listen to the words of a long ago dead unknown poet.

Great Malvern

It was middle earth

A town beneath the hills

Once famous for its curing water and enigma persona

Sitting on the north flank to view

The valley spread like a Victorian tablecloth

The wind from the north smelling of hops

Ready to be picked for the local brew

The town awakes amongst the clouds of rain

Damp and dismal making the painter see shades of grey

Above the music shop in St. Celica Hall

The piano turner pucks at an old baby grand

Once long ago the composer so pomp and circumspect

Composed grand music in his garden shed called London

While old ladies gathered in the Blue Bird tea room

For morning coffee and local gossip

The public school children in uniforms strict

Raced from college to St. Ann’s Well

There to meet a suitor

A future lord or lady of this aristocratic land

Memories of wartime excellence

Of a college electronic viewed by radar

Lady Windermere fans her face

At the theatre where Shaw and Shakespeare regularly played

But it was the music floating high above the hills
That makes this town, its hills, its people my early life

Life without parole

I am but a prisoner in misery

Pain within and pain without

A struggle to defend my fragile body

To fight that which is unseen deep beneath my skin

No one heard the cries of violence taking place

If there was someone to listen to the tears falling on my heart

I was a survivor and once again I am the victor

The blame lays by my side a dark and visible monster

I see in the nightmare of my day

There is no St George to fight my dragon

No magic patch to cure my ills

I am what I am, a prisoner trapped

Hanging by my own noose
Condemned by my wicked life, loveless and empty

Cannon Folder Blues

My trembling lips speak of lies

Fostered in the ideology of extreme believers

Their hate-filled passion, the propaganda of the controlled media

The truth has no place

It is the fear they peddle, convincing the people that their lives are in danger

The fear that the rest of the world’s population will move in next door
Their religion, ideology imposed

The fear that an epidemic of a dangerous disease is just a handshake away
While they hike the price of essential drugs to cure

The fear that unless you vote for them you are doomed to poverty

Playing on your want of security of a job and home

Security that mind and body won’t be blown up by international or home grown terrorists

Security that our food, water and air hasn’t been contaminated
By fracking, pesticides or airplane spraying

Alas we are all cowards to stand up and fight this bureaucratic bullying

Our cowardice stops us from asking questions
Demanding answers

Revolution is not an option, complacency the natural order
As a government secret service agency will infiltrate the just cause

Bringing our human rights to an early grave
And those who blow the whistle a prison cell
Listening to our every conversation, reading our private emails
Even though we had deleted them
Tracking our research and selling our desires to their corporate pay masters

The battle never started, the war never begun

It's what we were born for
Slaves to the parasite ruled society

The Apologist

I'm sorry

For making my ex-wife loose

Her false teeth down the toilet

I'm sorry

She had to fish them out herself

Ruining her new dress

I'm sorry

Her mother’s car ran down the hill

I thought I'd put the handbrake on

I'm sorry

It cost so much to repair the damage

To the other cars

I'm sorry

The house burnt down after I left

I never realized the vase acted as a magnifying glass

I'm sorry

Her priceless dresses by Christian D'ior

Went up in smoke

I'm sorry

The burglars broke into the house

And took everything that wasn't burnt

I'm sorry

Her precious cats ran away

Only to be killed by the fire engine
I'm sorry

The tropical fishes boiled

And later were eaten by the rats

I'm sorry

I ever married her

But I glad I divorced her.

Three steps and the wrong turn

Los Angeles below

Spread like a giant tablecloth crumpled at the edges

The smog filled wind gentle flew past me on the fifty fifth floor

The roof

It only took three steps to fly like a bird

Floating like a rock

Falling I watch as the corporate world

Floor by floor circumvent me

JJ Lewinsky fawning over his secretary

Petersen playing computer solitaire

While pretending to be on a conference call

Forty sixth floor and another coffee break

I wonder what will it be like as I hit the ground

Instant or will the pain radiate

Will my image be imprinted for all eternity on the sidewalk

Has my life been fruitful

Hey! There’s Parkin-Bowles transfixed at his window

Thinking he is seeing an angel, a sign to sell some obscure stock

Before the market closes

Fortieth floor Jenkins from legal moons me

As he photocopies his large white butt

To show some young intern in the hope of a sexual tryst

Thirty seventh and Miss Ruthie cleans her window

The daily ritual of her obsessive-compulsive behavior

She really needs to get a life

Thirty fourth young Potter in accounting

Trying to chat up Wendy Malloy

Hoping for a date to win his bet with his homies

The ground suddenly seems much closer

A bird fly’s towards me then dives towards the group of tourists below

Twenty eight floor inside Trevor Gooding is trying to hang himself

After another bad day of trading in foreign currency

Twenty first, strange to see an empty floor

Air conditioning ducks hang with cable of every color from the open ceiling

Like me the thirties flew by with no significant memories

Gosh! I hope I miss that metal sculpture

Perris Agies’s David in Aluminum

The floors pass slowly now, as I look in each window

I see their faces, shocked, surprised, ginning, even laughing

And the occasional blank face.

Only ten floor to go

And my inner self will be exposed for all the world to see

I came into this world with nothing to hide

I leave it ditto

As the ground gets closer, the fog of a bad night sleep

Surrounds me, and I awake the panic attack is over

My first day as chief executive officer begins.