REGRET
Regret is a stone
grows heavier as we climb,
a silent catastrophe
in the ruins of remorse

MEPHISTOPHELES
Radio on his lips,
noise of infected words,
exclusion of all feeling,
the lost chord of a leer.

Dark bird will descend
to write the cold script
of this stranger to truth
with beak sharp as a thistle.

Deception stands with
folded arms therein
the doorway of a house
where History sleeps.
(from 'Conscious Story')

THE LUCKY ONES

The lucky ones go mad
and try to control the clouds,
though they know weather is
for prophets with difficult childhoods

The lucky ones enter epic moments
and call them co-incidence.
Tide of ghosts in the channel of sighs.

The lucky ones know the nights
.......of the staring chairs.
The lucky ones become
Frankenstein for a festive occasion
(from 'Walk on the Sun')

DISSONANCE 3

Through avenues of sound
I follow your voice;
at side-altars in the mind
I pray to pale ghosts.

Behind the portcullis of sleep,
in thickets of the brain
my soul stalks your shade,
your dream-sculptured shade.

You are focused in my being
held fast in Time's cocoon;
processions of cowled griefs
dissect my hearts estate,

Nerves clenched like teeth
deny expression to the tongue;
pain scales the spine,
knotted in analytical frenzy.
(from 'A Severed Wing')

A DANGEROUS GAME
Her fingers spill like wine
onto the table

Her lips mouth sand-castles
in the air

Her brain is cluttered with print;
ink dyes her thoughts.

Her heart is a black orchid,
blooming in negation.

For her Narcissus drinks out of
the dark chalice of ill-will.
(from 'Islands of Flesh')

FORKED TONGUE
I will commit her
tongue to paper
since it is swift
as a thief.

Her every page
suggests a riot in
ink, a new chapter
of disquiet

Her alergy to silence
ends with the piano
raining
in a drawing-room.

The host of broken music
pours through the faucets
of my ears as black thoughts
adorn a white page.

Malign majesty, dipped in
the gutter of the real,
you are all image, no substance;
all movement, no growth.

Unrealised in the animal
the only strategy of escape;
in your mind is to arrive
before you depart.
(from 'The Lonely Ventriloquist')

FROM A RECENT LETTER:

VISIT
Light on her skin
murmur of dreams;
soft capture of image
on a canvas of imagination.

Nobility of the creative
brush-stroke of a single
vision on the centre
of feeling.
The petals of colour
rescued from memory,
the climate of landscape
sings in the eye.

FEVER
Thoughts thrashing
around like seals;
the violence of memory,
identity in crisis.
The year upside
and down the wait
for a seat in the sun,
for the scent of prayer.
The girl
on the roundabout screaming;
all the armies
of damage cannot atone