It’s the most wonderful time of the year

But for who?

Those who can’t pay for gas and electric

It’s the same old tired songs that pour out

Of every outlet

Every café bar

In every town

Where shop staff in red and green

Looking like shelf stacking zombies

Try to ignore the fight for carrots in aisle 5

And the guy that’s at the back gate

As queues form at checkout...

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So, there were these three wise guys see

All with fancy clothes riding camels

And they had servants

And all manner of things

They were dripping in wealth

Like they were kings

They had come a long way to meet this big cheese

Who had just been born

So, they could pay homage to this new kid on the block

But they had quite a time trying to find the kid

His parents had ...

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What light is this where light is lost

Through dappled shroud

Where no song of bird can be heard

From the autumn blast and snickered breeze

The willing wilting leaves

Who shed their chameleon green

In favour funeral yellow orange and red

Those willing leaves

Who give themselves

For next year’s rise and sap

What light is this that spreads its wings

Upon the op...

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This is my mother’s earth

Except it is not

This is the earth where she was planted nurtured raised and grew

This is the earth where she blossomed

Threw out a shoot watched it flower

And that was me

This is my mother’s earth

Where she has been tried and tested

Through all seasons she has been weathered

Battered and worn

This is my mother’s earth

But not the one s...

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I have heard the words across the wire

I have seen the sombre faces

The black-tie evangelists

Of all that is seen to be right and proper

The heraldry and the trumpets

The heartfelt worldwide words

The barrage of ringing bells and gun salutes

I have seen the sea of flowers

The cards

The handshakes and nodding heads

The watery eyes and sorrow

I have viewed the coins...

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He shouted out his lectern promises and curses

Across the park

Talking to all and everyone who might listen

Even if they did not want to hear

His spat- out rhetoric

About them and they and those invisible others

Those indivisible masters of the cloaked off words

Who cannot be named

Yet he states everybody knows

And the dire consequences that will be metered out

To th...

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Too often we forget about the potholes

And the craters

Filled with water and booby traps

We focus too much on the long cool tall grass

That waves to us in beckoning days

The hills to roll down

The lush trees under which we sit

But we forget the potholes and the craters

At our peril

Those places where we can so often slip

Back into with such consummate ease

...

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Another day of endless senseless idle traffic

Of puerile conversations about the weather

Another day of imbeciles and continuous cigarettes

Of rattling off adjectives and verbs

In order to find the right words to describe

What is actually seen and felt

Another day of endless itching that can’t be scratched

With merciless rantings about the state of parliament, the country

...

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Hey its 2022 and we are still talking about it

That which should have been wrapped shipped out

And told to leave long long ago

But it’s 2022 and it’s still a place for any rat faced kid with sneakers and zits

To make a name for himself or because he has a beef

About the way he’s been treated to pull the trigger

To let rip on all and any because that’s what you do isn’t it???

...

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The pills that I have taken

The stories that I have swallowed

The stories that I have told myself

The rumours I have passed on

None of which were true

The blank black stars that surround my bed

The lies that I have found sitting in my head

That I have opened up

That have filled a room

Getting bigger one on top of another

The days that have become years before I hav...

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I stood in the long silence

With almost Kafkaesque anticipation

A long suffocating silence

Shrouded in a blanket of quiet and guilt

Where time moves so very slowly

It was a moment spread over a series of moments

Interjected in the distance by shouts and screams

Men women children crying out

Words climbing over one another

One above the rest

For god’s sake help

I a...

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What good is Friday

When good is only good for those

Whose gold is still wet and warm

Recently taken from the neck’s arms and hands of others

Not that of a king’s ransom fair and square

But a fool’s gold

Of blood and deeds done

To pick the wealth that lies upon the ground

From battle fury fights of shame

Claiming this is rightfully theirs

Digging deep into the pocke...

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I have felt insincerity breath out of every pore and

The wind blows in on cue

As seagulls wing and float askew

Bending the air to suit their mood

The perfect patterns of history burst in upon the day

With all the predictability of unseen coves of hidden gestures

And secret codes waiting on the tip of a tongue

Never really explored until it’s too late

And I begin to wonder...

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The tears that build up are never easily shed

By the old man with the walking stick

That beats his leg to make it work

The youth that stands at the bus stop

Blinking into the sun

Waiting for the bus that will never come

The little girl just out of school

Holding on to mummy’s hand

Wondering what’s for tea tonight

But mummy’s’ only thought is to keep all men away

As sh...

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There is some old blood on the carpet in the dining room

Where I once cut my hand

Snow on the roof and frost in beautiful floral patterns

On the glass of windows that have survived

There is ash long dead in the fireplace

Where the rain now comes down the chimney

In slanting waves

In the bathroom the chalk white tiles are smeared with somebody else’s lies

And the bath has ru...

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