made of stone

moving from not-being-in-love-anymore to something a bit more, well, hate-filled and spiteful. there's been very few people in my life that i have completely fallen out with to the point of never wanting to see them again (and wanting to bestow bloody violence on them), but the subject of the following definitely falls into that category. which is a great shame, because he gave me a chance and a sense of direction when i had no idea what i wanted to do (or more specifically not knowing what i was good at), but went and spoilt it all by acting like a complete cock and - to this day - remains the only person i have ever violently threatened while holding a full bottle of wine. i'm sure he's very proud...

A Wall With Your Name

Irresolute and necessary,
Strong and firm
Yet dull to view.
Steadfast, splendid
And oh so solid -
Hard as stone, through and through.

Angular ridges lack all grace
But let us view your ugly face.
I pray one day, you'll fall to pieces
And crumble neatly into place.

Nought but a rock in this hard place,
Damned if you do. Dead if you don't.
Unreliable in crisis,
You could never keep me afloat.

Incorrigible in all your standards,
Your muteness a rare treat.
Give me the chance to show my mettle -
The wrecking ball lying at my feet...


July 1992

walls come tumbling down

not wanting to dwell on such hateful matters for too long, i'll wrap this one up with a truly bitter view on an individual from the past. looking at it now, almost fresh from 10 years of being hidden from view in my file-of-perpetual-ignorance, it's a bit too teen-angst for my liking (being 26 when i wrote it), but it's fair to say that i was really pissed off with him at the time.

You Walked Backwards With Me

All too lucid images of your all too selfish mind
Say that greed is happiness. You start to tempt your fate.
In trying too hard to endure the images you find
You wallow in the darkest hole you've found yourself of late.
You've truly seen me from behind -
My cloven hoof. Your natural state.

When you turned your face to see the devil in your midst
You'd lost the overwhelming urge to sanctify your soul
But how were you to know how little your soul would be missed?
How I laughed when you realised you'd finally lost control.
You'll ask How did it come to this?
You'll remember. Willingly sold.

You'll laugh, time and time again, and say you're justified
Devoting all your energy towards your final goal.
But remember how a part of you drifted away and died,
Never to return again? You'll find that it's your soul.
It pleases me to see you cry.
Now you're finally alone

Remember me when all your thoughts are buried in the past
And you try hard to reconcile decisions you once made
Nobody ever once forced you to take me by the hand
And tempt you there into my bed, a lifetime now betrayed.
They'll laugh and say it will never last
They're wrong, my willing slave...


August 1996

anti-love

for each loved-up sonnet i conjure from the goodness of my heart, you'd think that there would be a contrasting hate-filled diatribe dredged up from the blackness of my soul. well you'd be right, and although i'm loathe to divulge the person or persons the following are directed towards i can honestly say (without due influence from the remaining minutes of valentine's day) that they're not about my wife...

John's Revenge

I suppose I first knew about it when
You and I (so inseparable)
Became separate then.
When the light of romance began to diminish
And my mind wandered now and again.

So, when I failed to remember a date
You had stamped on your heart,
Send a bouquet too late,
You sent scores of subtle reminders for days;
Empty bed and a mouth full of hate.

I knew then that I should have acted upon
Dying embers of love,
Relationship all but gone.
But left with a tortuous mountain to climb
I realised I'd been gone for too long.

If so inclined, I'd give our love a chance
But to try (when I'm glad) would be wrong.
So I've gone.

So long.


July 1995

okay, so i'd love to pin that one on some ex-girlfriend who wronged or 'disrespected' me, but it's nothing of the sort and was written as a kind of exercise to see if i could write a 'fuck-you' poem. i have to admit that it's one of my favourites (and was actually one of the few published in an anthology which - false modesty aside - i can't quite remember). the next one however was written about one of my first girlfriends who emotionally fucked me over. bear in mind that it was a long time ago (in the eighties in fact) and i'm over her now. just about...

The River Was Deep When I Stepped In

Trivial in your shadow
A pale imitation of what I should be,
I find myself wholly immersed
In the depths where you once left me.

Embracing my ally, icy cold,
I sink further into the inverted sky.
The chill cloaks me like my childhood blanket,
Perverse; I know that I will die.

Motionless and out of my depth
I find myself an eternal bed.
Nightmares invade my mind no more,
The worms to play inside my head

As you once played your tortuous games,
My soul (so naive) torn in two -
The river was deep when I stepped in
But never as cold as you.

November 1988

the river was deep and i can't swim...

swayed?

As it's nearly-but-not-quite-yet valentine's day (and i'll be far too busy doing such non-romantic things as working, supervising the builders and picking up my eldest daughter from the coach station) here's a themed offering.

I wrote this poem while courting (such a quaint word only usuually uttered by grannies) my future wife, and basically persuaded her that i wasn't one of the usual grunts who'd try it on, but was instead a sensitive soul with a soulful heart. or something like that...

Swayed?

Who'll put out the fire
When the fire's out of control?
Who'll wonder of guilt
When the guilt's locked up at home?
Who'll forgive our sins
When I can't see we've sinned at all?
Who knows what might happen
If we spent the night alone?


September 1995

this was followed up with many other outpourings of love and longing (some of which i wouldn't dare wish to be published here due to their over-simplified crapness, reading like some spotty love-struck teenager had recently bought his first thesaurus), but like a good percentage of my poems some were inspired (i.e. ripped off) from music i was listening to at the time. now i know that McAlmont and Butler were never cool, but i love their stuff (especially some of their more, er, camp offerings) and at the time listened a lot to their first album. I was drawn to it by the quite-frankly magnificent Yes, but then discovered a track i liked even more - You Do. It's this track that provided the 'inspiration' for the following...

I Want The World To Know Your Name

I want the world to know your name.
I want the world to feel the same way I do.

I want you to know that you're my chosen one
I want you to be my champion.

I want you to know how I feel
I want the world to feel the same way I do.


October 1995

it's a bit slushy admittedly, but we weren't together at the time (in fact we were with other people). by the way just in case you're wondering, yes we're still together. pretty much makes it a result then!

dore

nicely rounding off some memories of Sheffield (and linking neatly back to problems with trains) i looked up on old poem buried somewhere underneath mounds of computer-printout paper (1990-style, green and white lines and perforated edge) and not yet committed to my database-off-all-things-meaningful.

Once i realised how time-consuming it was to get the national express coach for my (increasingly infrequent) trips between Sheffield and Liverpool/Manchester, i decided to bite the bullet and pay extra to travel by train. this was quite a hit on my finances, but did at least cut my travelling time from 5 hours to more like 2 and a half. still bad, but slightly less shocking.

for some reason the later trains back from Manchester always seemed to be the stopping service. this stopped everywhere it possibly could on the remote off-chance that someone may want to get on which, of course, they never did. all i could hope to do was to get some sleep and wake up once there (this was especially difficult because the rolling-stock consisted mainly of those incredibly uncomfortable buses-on-tracks that seemed to service local stations; all stiff-back seats and no leg-room). inevitably, and thankfully, i always seemed to wake up at the penultimate station, giving me hope at last that the journey was nearly over...

Dore

Shambling along at this vain pace
The non-stop service stops frequently.
I paid my dues yet sit in silence,
This lethargy eating into me.
Slowly slowly the scenery
Passes the uninterested eye,
To check the time is futile
Two minutes since I last looked by.

You'll be glad to know, she smiled at me,
The express service will take you home!
But seems such an age ago -
I should have known, I should have known.

Gazing into my reflection
Made stark by the winter night,
I realised the apathy
That becomes the journeyman's plight.
The train chugged ever onward -
Town after town after town,
I counted ten, eleven, twelve -
I must be near home by now!

But yes; lights ahead give hope,
A city, a city it has to be!
Could Sheffield, my second home
Be throwing pity upon me?
But If so, why are we slowing here
Miles from my destination?
Am I to be stranded here,
Alone at life's n'th station?

Oh! Now I recognise
The penultimate platform.
I know I'm barely a mile away
From home welcome and warm.
Here at the journeyman's second-last stop,
I'll wait and worry no more.
My destination lies ahead,
That is, once passed through Dore.


October 1992

the long and slow way round