The gulls above me, wild and free
my song begins to echo theirs
squawks of tuneless noise
as I try to make some sense
or to release something

Watching the breaking waves
from a distance and then up close
I’ve been nowhere
but up and down the stairs
of this hollow and lonely year

It’s hard to remember the good I do
keeping other ships at a safe distance
as I patiently await the prom...

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As autumn's rusty fingers begin
to push their way through tired trees
So, the early dimming light
and spectral chill conspire
to gently sweep me back in time

It's Oxford in the autumn
nineteen; with eyes opening
A new life unfolding
cycling through the leaves
and sighing under bridges

Oxford in the autumn
that brick so old around me
broad streets, illogical lanes
busses and puddle...

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The sweetest memories hang
like negatives
in the dark room of my mind
I develop them occasionally
picturing again 
more exciting times

Yellows and browns begin to wash
across the leaves outside my window
I haven’t seen you in the flesh
since those shoots were new
it feels so long ago

We ran through those streets
as if we owned them
spinning endlessly from bar to bar
from joke to ...

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I will defend your right
to say things that I don’t like
and though I may disagree
it doesn’t mean that I detest you
I’ll try my best to understand
how you reached that point of view

However uneasy listening
don’t bite your tongue
Let us see and hear you
come and speak freely
You may offend me
but then I’ll know we’re not in tune

Perhaps we’ll both learn something
if but how to be...

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The ocean calms me
envelopes me
supports me when I need to sail
Powerfully, it won’t hesitate
to remind me of my place
or comfort me when I fail

Its waves sing along in time
mirroring my mood
or challenging me to improve
We laugh in the shallows
or toil through the depths
almost always perfectly in step

Every day is beautiful
a work of heart 
and trying...

The muse of my life;...

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With no deity could I shake hands
and with no children at my feet
who will tend my grave
when all is said and done

Something sublime smiles back at me
from the music I lose myself in daily
but who will tend my grave
who will know that I was here

‘No children at our feet’
we were in agreement then
but will we always be
You would have been
an exceptional mother
and I had some storie...

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Our Halloween masks reflected back
as we peer through that dusty glass
into the quiet gloom of the Ghost Café

If only the ghost waitress would take our order
‘large or small?’ she asks, well, I’m a medium
ghost chairs dragged across the ghost floor

And the clank of local steel set down
on delicately painted porcelain
bustling echoes bounce from peeling walls

People starting or resta...

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Laura Lee, she was my first love
tangled in her parents’ bedsheets
and shadows from the attic window
With my army-surplus shirt
slipping from her shoulders

Laura Lee, she was my first love
my first taste of intimacy
her loving hands upon me
guiding that desire, so deftly
through our discovery and naivety

Laura Lee, she was my first love
our fumbled teenage kisses
quickly blossomed ...

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Tonight, I eye the wind 
as it dances on the water
singing of the distance
that no longer can be closed

Well, I told you I was selfish
there were no children in me
Unwilling to stir for a moment
from this endless daydream
where I father my creativity

You told me that you knew me 
our hearts beating to that same drum set
and no one must wake you either 
That carving pretty worlds
b...

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Down the endless garden 
to a hand-built shed of wonders
and little me, sitting with my grandad
listening to all the voices
pushing through the static

What magic in those wires!
The narrow band, the wide
The squelch and the gain
The whistle and the whine
sounds I’ll never forget

The spectrum of a planet 
chattering
Such wisdom in rough fingers
so deft upon the dial
gently they’d ...

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Pen devoid of poems
adventure long overdue
living room carpet
growing long in the tooth
I’m pining for movement
so keen to get out
I’ll go walking down
to Holly Hagg

Little glimpses at normality
haloed by golden rays
There’s no poison 
in the idle river
no politics
in the quiet horse
cantering to 
another chew

The clouds of working day
part while I’m out walking
bathed in nat...

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Tear the statues down
put them in a museum
have their achievements weighed 
against their modern moral faults
Give them context
It feels wrong to venerate
values we no longer share

Tear the problematic statues down
it’s time to move on
They’ve had their light
they’ve had their vaunted praise
let them slip into the past
I don't want to walk beside
the likeness of a slave trader
on m...

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The jailer, he's invisible
yet we're reminded, daily
he still stalks these corridors
a violent crown upon his brow
turning folk to dust
My marker-pen tally on the wall
begins to eats itself
time moves differently here
it's a snake, a valley
a constellation
in this most-comfortable prison...

The weather has a mainline to my mood
there's a shadow in my mind
it blooms or it recedes
wi...

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Her fingers tracing mine
Lily danced me out of the garden
those green eyes brimming lively 
with purest abandon
Then barefoot on the boardwalk
her summer dress riding high
she leapt onto the jetty 
and gestured to the sky

We let our tanned legs hang below
as we bottomed up the bottle
the air was hot and heavy
the sea around us peaceful
There was lust upon our minds
as a veil upon a ...

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A raining heart, derailed
just north of love
things that must be done
to protect oneself

Despite my expectant warmth
I find you strangely cold
the trick became transparent
the magic quickly old

A remnant moon shines above us
even in this weak glow, it’s obvious
this affair
is going nowhere

You don’t care to know 
anything about me
yet still you pine for my love

You don’t dar...

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Audio reading: https://soundcloud.com/tomalexwrite/renee-by-a-thread

Down the corridor, comes a scream
Was it physical pain
or the horror of finally learning
the way this game is turning
They took your clothes
gave you a gown
there was nothing to do but lay right down
Now, the machine breathes
for you
hung by a thread and leaving soon

Faint flashes behind tired eyelids
recalle...

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You paint yourself blue, always blue
this letter brings me down
perched upon a rusty trailer
paint peels over my shoulder

I've been drinking 
since the boats were rested
on the muddy estuary bed

It's high tide, low life
high tide, low life

I won't stop my reaching out
if there's any way to help, I'll find it
you're so slow to take my hand
scratching at your skin for answers

I ...

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Let me admit, to you, my fear
of those ghostly hands
twisting the knife
in the belly of our lives

These house-bound blues
echo louder some days
these house-bound blues
and their hypnotically sad song

My memories reach out for you
you’ve changed your number
my happy memories are reaching out
yet we may never speak again

And though estranged
often, I still wonder
of your gently c...

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Nineteen nighty five
Nominally fourteen;
I was sitting in the sports hall
pen in hand
the desks apart
a teacher I didn’t know
patrolled the aisles
The English paper said ‘write a story
include a river
and an allegory’

The clock at the front clicks
thin hands jerk and tick
I spin my pen
study the air vents above me
there’s a dusty shuttlecock
caught up in the pipework
there’s a br...

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I was living certain and sure
of the future I desired
A house by the water
sea air kissing my eyes
before I brave the morning paper

A figure framed in a gaping doorway
watching freighters skim the horizon
Rest my coffee cup on the fence
slide a nail down this foriegn envelope
draw the perfumed letter from within

The paper see-through 
like her summer dresses
My fingers beneath it
...

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You and I; vampires
habitual creatures
you and I; hungry again
This hollow needs a fill
O, to dip our quill...

You’re chasing love
chasing fantasy
the thrill of infatuation
dutifully presenting 
its pale skin beneath
those long teeth

Ravenous
I stalk experience
joyful or otherwise
Thumping heartbreak
or whatever I can muster
any morsel of emotion
to carve apart and analyse 
D...

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Squinting at the good old days
through a low winter sun
dreaming of those times
spent down on the sand
lost in the blue hour
or scheming on a journey
deep into the night
We could have gone anywhere
a can raised to the sky
and on our faces only smiles
for miles
and miles and miles

So many friendships
left behind at other stations
back down the tracks
My friendships; all are fraying
...

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I want you to be unruly
write hard and clear
about tangled emotion
those who don’t
make me suspicious
I know there are other things
like genocide and selfish parking
and the bruises received
behind closed doors

I want to know people 
who are walking antennas 
sensitive and gifted
nerves nakedly exposed
flailing in the fallout

I was raised to keep all hidden
I was raised to deny ...

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An Arctic air
pushes past the cracking door
as we step out
into the newly forming night
with many friendly cheers 
chasing us from the hall
The searing wind
grabs you by the ears
seconds abroad
and your bones will know the chill
in the chalk-white light
of this moon

Snow falls slowly
first on the cliffs above the lane
then these cobbles are scribbled out
under a virgin whiteness
...

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Hours spent listening to your voice
disembodied
carefully controlled
precisely chosen words
with expert intonation

I've laid with headphones on
naked and imagining 
there is no separation
no distance
that you're beside me speaking
as my knuckles snake your thigh

You tell the story of your life
you’re telling my story too
How strange, how similar
manifestly different
but emotiona...

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You saw me, even then
you knew me
back when no one saw me
I kept no one around
who knew me
I, too, was in my infancy
twenty-something
and far from knowing much
in any real way at all

Still, somehow, you found me
brought books of Blake
to the shop we worked
we’d sit and read together
on the varnished wooden counter
your summer dress 
hanging from you like a sail
we’d admire the cr...

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Holidaying as a teenager
back when time moved slower
and thoughts were many
I’d cruise the gift shops
reviewing tacky souvenirs
This used to be a fishing village
now it’s a tourist trap

And picking up a handmade bear
with wonky mouth and vacant stare
big button eyes and blood red lips
I’d wonder of its maker, its creator
someone dreamed 
this bear into the world
someone thought this...

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Friend, we drink together
talking at a wedding
lit blue and gold
familiar faces dance around us

Friend, secretly, I wonder
if you were to open up your essence
lift a pen to kiss the paper
to vent your heart aloud

Friend, I long to know
what your poetry would be
if you chose to write

Which desires peskily linger 
at the edges of your furrowed mind
which old flames still burn a fi...

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Stuttering awake
in the anxious hours
when white noise
no longer lets you sleep
In the mattress springs
a metronome
your percussive heartbeat
one thought then another
one worry trailed by the next
did what was said make sense?
was it understood
will this be good enough
impossible options
improbable odds
suddenly so awake
in the anxious hours
don’t forget
to breathe

Stuttering a...

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