The Gentle Hum

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Graham Leese was born on the 27thof March, 1988. He lives in London.

All of these works have appeared on poemhunter.com in some shape or form. Sweet Bird Of Youth appeared in the December 2006 issue of Unquiet Desperation. Copyright © Graham Leese 2008 Contents Birds in the fireplace, 4 Hidden in her room, 5 Unsigned and sugarless, 6 Slipped away in the flood, 7 Lost without sands, 8 These Bright Young Things, 9 Enjo kōsai, 10 Kill The Whales, 11 You wouldn’t notice a coup d’état, 12 Blog, 13 Adam’s Country, 14 Community Spirit, 15 Notes to the press, 16 Second Decade, 17 Early morning trails, 18 Heading North, 19 Sweet Bird Of Youth, 20 Blood amongst peel, 21 Everything means nothing to me, 22 No encore, 23 He’s south of the river, 24 The gentle hum, 26 Hittin’ 24, 27

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I wrote you a poem about silence, 28 Hitting Twenty Four, 29 Multiple Disappointments, 30 From a desaturated summer, 31 Have you seen this season?, 32 Young Killer, 34 Abused, 35 She cuts the umbilical, 38 Cattle prods, 39 Gagged, 41 Weekly Visit, 42 Two A.M. Housewife, 43 Cuts, 44 Another morning swept under the rug, 45 The Anticlimax of disgust, 46 Skeleton Management, 47 Left to my own devices, 48 You’ll find me buried in the third coat, 49 My port bares a weathered Newton’s Cradle, 50 Lust takes over, 51 Katherine’s Clouds, 52 to You opposite Me on the tube, 53 Think before you splinter, 54 Off the truck, on the bus, 55 The view from Center Point, 56 A broken continent, 60 Beyond love, 62

Notes from the poet, 64

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Birds in the fireplace Sweatin’ an’ swellin’ Boy’s bones are crackin’ Reformin’ caged arteries Snaking like trail; The ebb of eels and hell, Pupils like to skittle. Like to take you for A little trip down To the pier son, a tap dance Through the flames To check the ember swirl. If your point’s lost In the ash twirl, lean like autumn In the breeze and forget it. I appreciate you as the stars, Moon and sun, rays of strangers Smiles and babies wailing to waves; We take this feelin’ to our graves.

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Hidden in her room. I found myself consistently in limbo. The air in-between days Tends to smell like déjà vu While paranoia parades as a slut. Waiting for holy war the universe Revolves inside. Doctors, experts And other poor or pregnant excuses Offer satisfying diagnosis, leaving Me dependant on my new found Cures and non-existent salvation. Walking down familiar roads, Roads that lead to awkward dead endsI retread over puddles of tired paraphrasing, Amateur analysis. Food itself a footnote Slowly turns into sweet and over saturated Pornography. Malnourished I now feel Like the world I want to know again.

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Unsigned and sugarless Beauty lies but not on this surface. nowhere to be found; streetlamps reflect while traffic fumes congealall this mist. Light pollution is my sire, discarded chatter and left over litter a blanket to write under; a soaked newspaper with landmine headlines.

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Slipped away in the flood. Fell into it like dead leaves swept into a storm Sloshing about in a giant washing machine with putrid Skin broken bottle scars left right and center. Thunder rose like young love, bold bright and beautiful Crashing waves of hate and empty promises smash to Pieces between us, calm and happiness lost in the spray. Foetal, crept inside like mice inside the windowpane Scuttling, searching for a quick fix. Water rose in the end Leaving fattening pipedreams weighted, Sinking to logical depths.

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Lost without sands. Broken trajectories litter My dreams, A dissonant coast; rocks Freezing beside An empty ocean. Lights Bleed into each other Like tarnished acrylic, The pier looming In the distance like An agitated runway. Cigarettes breathe Through me, barren Feet ravaged by Smooth pebbles And glazed glass; Shards intrude sharpUnwanted. I finger The wound, aroused. Blood in my mouth, I continue to the beach, Ready to cast my vote.

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These Bright Young Things. Turn to the mirror. Constellations have started to gather dust, romance has simply lost and prats ravage words like car bombs. In this era of violence and inhibition: you’re just searching for cause and conflict; prophets scream of sacrifice and suicide. Martyrs with actions louder than wordsabsolution no longer a sore issue. Religion reportedly comforts more than ever so turn to your mirror. Faith is nothing to dead sheep ‘cause the stars no longer burn bright- romance lies crippled in the wake of sexual revolutions; the bane of brainwashing.

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Enjo kōsai. Skirt twist ride up Ride up, some hotel room Osaka, ignorant I’m sure But better, better than Squatting forever, forever Squeezing self doubt out. Pink blossom high school, Petal led assumption but Putrid, better, better than Nothing. Prostitution, Prostitution? Under age but Blind eyes better. Hip culture Digested, regurgitated.

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Kill The Whales Oxygen cut down to lay waste, mother herself lies destitute. An exquisite city of beauty disgusting, smouldering in her wake. Emissions rise like flocks migrating for winter, people sit dead on subways for weeks if we are to believe in rotten ideas thrown at us daily, cabbage at the stocks left to degrade; the petty cash of lies repaid.

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You wouldn’t notice a coup d’état We should be in fear of an ever long winter, if we survive that is. Egos need masturbation or annihilation. On our knees, attention gags like the best of menfalse and strained it smells like dead onions, tastes of rotten sap. Obsessed with romanticism of every kind we overlook certain taught tensions; worried about the next grandiose, absorbed and religious plan. Holy deities now carry megaphones but audible force still bounces off mass oxford street porcelain. Ultimately immature, our bloodstreams suck sex, drugs and masks. Too busy fucking to notice insurgents in office.

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Blog Preaching pop culture, child like philosophies and shallow existentialism; to be taken seriously in this day and age is walking a thin treadmill. Running in squadrons, scared of what we know nothing of; crawling like cubs in a chained circus scared of red glutton vulturesinsides ripped like worms in two, beaks of blood and bruises. Disillusioned the tree frog leaps from pole to pole; slamming straight smack into windows. Scattered and naked we reveal with words romanticism surging from the back of our thin throats. Rapid bile rejects, itself now walkingbreathing. I drape myself in turgid yellow hang ups, watch the answers shoot out contained amounts of pearled vomit; the life-force of a coward suddenly cold, smothering a stomach full of shit, for contradiction protects me.

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Adam’s Country Marching to heaven Because winter’s set in mid spring, Where they have enough Beds for the millions. Fountains of Cold coffee for the endless nights Awake and aloneAdjusted. Yellowed teeth Dip and dig deep into Assorted apples, the colour Of devotion; a red sort of brown Like the blood of soldiers and Solicitors.7am sausage wafts Through welcoming rafters While 3pm tea steams up The car windows. We set off For distant lands, transatlantic Territories because paradise on earth Came long ago, funnily enough it stank of Rotten cores and pregnancy.

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Community Spirit We’ve reached the capillary bed of discontent. Narrow minded; slowed down to a stuck In the road route, working our way through Intricate artillery tunnels- I support hollow shells With my full shoulders to no avail. The sludge we breathe in daily Clogs up trenches, wreaking havoc With weak ankles and personal hells. When polite nature becomes a floodgate For segregation, lungs inhaling Burnt broadsheets become disarmedA nation of vulnerable targets minding Their own business. Tenderized, I try my best to beat it Into your nurtured skulls, a preacher of Pretentious stew and tragic hope- hope for Halogen hierarchies, the continued pump To full circle. For the state of harrowed humanity Start thinking of plausible solutions.

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Notes to the press Her limitations intimidate, so I dig. Great ideas lie beneath my fingernails lodged, between rotten onion and dead skin. Steam from the shower tends to turn into a sticky fog; pores asphyxiated amongst smashed mosaics; a whore smacked against the tiles. Too many lies congregate in her head, so I slip inside. Summer’s opened its legs for September’s shiver. I reach like a leper in a moat. Sinking with a pathetic doggy paddle, I’m a prince denounced so just squeeze more fiction out and wring some necks.

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Second Decade Two thousand eight Don’t dare pass me. Natural disasters and Sensitivity Carve inflamed muscle Into a thousand networks; Our scar tissue burnt On a daily basis. The price of Regeneration. We lean To blood carnivals On the right; Dark pastures On the leftOnly to find The same number Of dead chickens. Tower blocks twist, Rupture and collapseContaining conspiracy And projection. Humanity Spurts shades of yellow; A multicultural society Maintained by Every kind of racist.

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Early morning trails. Walking through these ghost towns with only a pair of headphones and a pocket full of receipts, it’s hard to get involved. Branches like crippled flag posts, dead leaves lining street lamp lit gutters. Detached from the seemingly sleeping buildings and parked cars, guilt and hunger set in. Slowly drowning in your own footsteps, shadows and cloudy breath; birdsong begins. Beneath a bruised morning’s sky tweets twist into each other like the few cars merging on the motorway; lorry drivers trapped in wrecks, business men stuck in their own rhythm. Walking through abandonment was one thing, but to settle into sleepwalks and surrogate shanty towns. That’s just pathetic.

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Heading North She rose through thunder searching for Eden but found empty fruit baskets lining the roads like victims all strung out and ripped apart from the insides. We wept for a thousand early afternoons as the sun shimmered in its own grace. Forty years sitting upon Hadrian ’s Wall counting nowt but dead sheep and long buried ambition took its toll the wrinkles forming like PVA on children’s’ cheeks age settling like snow atop of rubbish piles. The clouds that year stank of the end while midnight furnaces burnt thick grey holes in an already misused sky the remains of a housewarming fifty years too long with food beginning to find its skin again. She rose through this dead earth searching for something better, a single parent lost amongst the smoke signals.

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Sweet Bird Of Youth Israel is far from here. I surround myself With dolls and spend months attempting To meet their vacant gaze. Sweet talking Through a collective often wears down Your teeth but they say don’t be blunt. I could sing, preach and spit out mindless Accusations and suggestions, but in the end I’ve little to say for myself. Conflict for us Is internal; emotion has become contortedAn extension of our ever important clothes. Intelligence is misused- skinny boys Lost in themselves, hoods caught Off guard. Politics rarely heard, Discussed or dissected- the talk lies In the drink culture and junkie rants. Israel is far from here, America The only country we know to hate And the teens know nothing of a police state.

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Blood amongst peel ‘round a useless throne you go; a series of roundabouts and merry-go-rounds, models of a universe I can’t seem to stop. Sometimes I hold out my hands, fingers to the fan, edging closer to someone normal- that reflection in the pane. I retract. Telephones taunt, answered by the taxidermist in the kitchen. Smell fluid all over this chair be it sugared or off. Nostrils take to it like a nosebleed. They prepare to stuff me Some more. The clangs and crashes of pots and pans, the burns and slashes that cover a cooks weathered hands- blood amongst the peel. They put it aside to recycle slamming the oven door shut. Sometimes I flex my feet, arching like people mid coitus, shaking slight like people mid orgasm- yawning like people stuck in a slaughterhouse; a series of torture gardens and prison pens, this model of a world you can’t help.

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Everything means nothing to me Mesh, pieces of puzzle folded Into paper pockets. Light showers Colour me see-through, seems Fertile soil’s now frigid Like tourists trapped In their own damn cities. June’s scattered rainfall Is slow and persistent. Animated Bodies sit still, quietly unsure Of social structure- wrapt in Rigid rapture. He’s song, lyric And suture; unaware. Tall winds carry cold, they stumble And stutter through Conversation as shadows In the morning light. Stone crumbles, Sentiment erodes; he’s the foundationsThe steel, brick and mortar.

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No encore I am awash With your words Decanted and let loose Spilling, just spilling All over the roof of my mouth. You suffocate but I sink My knuckles into folds, Nails free to scour scalp. Toes dig into dirty laminateThis resentRugged lament lodged Between my fingers; The shackles of You: You, breathing through me Glances so paper thin I no longer see, advances Through paper skin known Only to me, the advances Of the most physical poetry.

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He’s south of the river Flawed and ultimately worthless, a cliché of tomorrow. Make a space in your bed for me and I will show you seconds wrapped in a ribcage of twisted steel and ruptured cables. I want to rip you open like a Double Decker torn apart, the belly of the beast broken for all to see. I want to feel you inside me; I want, I need and I bloody well will. You, the plaything. Pupils reflect a certain glint; all my dreams and nightmares seem to conceive in your eyes, the product of our imagined relationship stains my sheets with a sickly aftertaste. With each month I feel you thicken. Your skin now reeks of makeup

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and mirrors, one-way streets and the Thames barrier. Divided by more than just a diseased riverbed, the less I see the more I want; the less we speak the warmer silence feels. Finding solace in the early December shadows, I know your torment. Distance, alienation and paranoia settle beneath sunrise, cold winter mornings now a memory swimming between gin and tonic. Out of sync, reality setting in so clearlygrowing up faster than a celebrities rise and fall, living a restricted life. For your sake I keep myself to myself, waiting for the day you come to your senses.

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The Gentle Hum No more voices just calm waters, skies defunct without birdsong. Explosions drawn out for days at a time. A dead flag starved of wind- bodies will float in unison. Angels shimmerthat squinted dance in the corner of our eyes; breakable light pulses line charred skin rough as abused soil dead to the world. Backs arched spines teetering through, pierced grey stone eyes. A wheat field of gold crucifixes, telephone wires remain in service.

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Hittin’ 24 Solitude sings florescent, green-cyan filters blinking straight at you. Kings and Queens lie in dust trails left by firefliesI am a hubbub of light pollution. my eyes so out of control, little children tipping, spiralling into electricity; I wish I could buy back the boy you stole. Why control? You walk through tightrope telephone lines letting memories grow while wind farms twist and wheels spin; tarmac reflects crushed wire; lightly kissed nerves; pools of empty socketsI am, I am.

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I wrote you a poem about silence. Discreet, subtle changes in a symphony; Can you hear the reed snap? A former Shadow of myself I run boundlessSinew spiders scuttling around her, A cocoon sensitive to noise- the slow Clicks and echoes of glitched mechanics. Unnatural, the nineties scar tissue; 80’s Grey and pink- my new found pearls. There’s a lack of rhythm to my metronome, It appears stuck midway- quietly waiting For him to slide into mould; I appear soulless Without reason; ready to grow the wings Of an existential crisis I had all along.

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Hitting Twenty Four The disease that services my city. Welcome To the one night stands; creeping out at dawn Don’t wake her kids. Make yourself comfortable At the conversation, undress in front of the webcam For bars carry vessels, hollow wood carvings so brittle. People merge into each other consistently, barriers rise And fall to release floods, people wide open for seconds At a time. Snide remarks and sighs reveal more than the Eyes so welcome to the floor. Hitting twenty four.

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Multiple Disappointments Lazy days in the pounding heat caught up in a cycle of aching masturbation. Watching the clouds stain so quickly as desires and warm blood drape themselves in you, so intrusive yet to satisfying. A car passes quietly, the quilt comes undone. The phone rings suddenly, rings and rings, a cold blizzard bursting through your bodya reminder of the real world. Uneasy and covered in sweat the room stinks of virile waste and emotional detachment. Standing naked and glistening in from of a cracked mirror; you fondle empty breasts, fingers reaching down for a devoid reminder of who you will never be.

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From a desaturated summer Like to think I'm bullet-proof like the stock out of season. Sunshine can't corrode, sugar clogs. Struggling, I like to think sometimes for days on end. Pint placed firm, thoughts stew and eventually burn. Charcoal skull lining. Nerve endings condense and steam up. A soon to be diabetic.

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Have you seen this season? Autumn lost in the tumble, sunshine swept through the wash. To pull through these unwanted skies; need to get back to dogged down doom and bloody gloom. This spit shine, lens flare in the cornerit’s so disturbingly off-putting to watch washing lines wrestle through summer’s lingering ashes. Dogs should be dead to the rain, heels slipping through cloudy mid-afternoons and ghastly whines, mumbles and groans; the air full of thunder, rumble and quickened heartbeat. The sea should shroud the city in mist as late October promises. Pumpkins remain yet in half-light; shadows at a contrast too concise, mornings breathing fast. Lungs need to rise and fall throughout washes of greysmoke to blend like whiskers

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against pale skin. I have waited a year of disappointment for this season only to findyou have cut, starved and shaved a cat once fat with silver lining.

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Young Killer These meadows bruise over days like veins to surface; big sickly orca coming up for air. Long grass spreads at the sound of muddy trainers as a flower blooms. Grey puddles shift in the sky, sagging throughout the swaywill the riverbed offer forgiveness? trapped with only the company of rusty cans and blunt beer bottle shards I can only breathe smoke. Brown nails stain grubby toes, an advert for washing powder perhaps. Water’s cold but they won’t miss me, not one bit. Concrete’s too thick to hear my screams.

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Abused This field of dreams lies overgrown. Smokers line streets, runway lights by the motorway. Cars vanish into thick grey clouds with an ominous silence- all refined engines and ticking speedometers. Whilst families outgrow burst riverbeds and Allah's varied explosions I draw the curtains, neatly. These days the sunlight is white outdismal reflection seeps into the skies. Coaches run Japanese tourists off the cliffs of Dover, a tumble wrought with camera clicks. Trains pack in generalists all knee deep in racist conversation and somewhere, the sun sleeps. Cell darkens by the minute. Left the stove on, smoke rose quietly; furniture’s caked in sludge, Skin's caked in sludge. Saw her face today, first in months. Got mothers eyes an' all. Asked about the burnt gammongot a hollow reply. The flies are dropping quietly. Time, he's slowed to an all time low. Took the kitchen knife to the bathroom and etched out some silence. Got rid of the sludge. The mould between the tiles is starting to grow.

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Churches gave in to hippy communes, warehouses to dishevelled yardies and black boys united fencing looted dvd players, designer drugs not so foreign anymore. Government sat down for a long chat like that of the last supper. Between badly cooked briskets of lamb and rubber tofu, it was decided they would cross the channel. Some schools try to function in this nightmare; deep in the highlands low in the moors students study the fall of leaves. Universities offer only The Karma Sutra, a hands on, practical course. They're coming to. Such rosy red cheeks. Took one into the backsaid I shouldn't touch 'em like that. Stuck his head in the deep fryer. Sunsets and sunrises now carry disease like rats rotating into view, the sickness in the distance. Supermarkets lie ransacked, the smell of rot all too intrusive. Papers at their peak. Give 'em to the little ones, nowt but tears. Shuts up after a few rounds. Pull her knickers down said 'I ain’t your momma'

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pupils froze, black ice in her eyes. Seems fear works it's snake charms. Round 'em more than anything now, tried cooking some gammon again. Haven’t eaten in weeks. Sky’s gone all funny coloured. Knocked down her door like knights they did, all broken from an endless siege. Found her hung from the rafters- small book below her. Summin' about the apocalypse. Sun rose magnificently that morning. For the families, a grief stricken relief stretched itself inside. The smokers stood outside while the motorway chugged. Cars, loud an' dangerous made their way 'cross a country beautifully scarred but lost only to the deranged.

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She cuts the umbilical Wading through a pool of eggs, some ripe, some long dead; snakes swim between her legs with a casual ease. The temptation proves too great a thing, within seconds she finds herself slowly scratching out the inside of her womb. Rectangle bottles of gin cover the patio, an emerald green puddle of hope. With a rag bloody from yolk she throws, abortive beams of fire plunging into the lawn. The grass soon smells of miscarriage and torment, that stench of decimation. Climbing up stairs soaked in sweat and sweet stains, she takes a moment. Catching the hard side of her head reflect in meager moonlight, she reaches a clogged attic somewhere between darkened childhood memory and awkward adult horror.

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Cattle Prods The futures slip past with stealth, subtle shakes and causes pop up like weeds; cracked pavement and chipped brickwork. Renovation is so commonplace, rigor mortis snakes around society but not it’s structures. Common forms die out like generations consumed by dust; frail skeleton suits lie in wardrobes dormant. Youth covered in fresh flesh and wounds from wombs far let floodtides ravage Victorian sewers- suddenly our streets are paved with filth. The mannequins come and go; passing one joke to the other like politicians without prejudice, sat around a Muslim’s dinner table. Presidents and Prime Ministers, old ghosts and war veteranswith each different colour the iron lady still makes her mark. Policies passed by pigs in office, terms scoffed by lambs fashioned in sheeps’ clothing; still living, still wading through sludge. Amniotic that should have been

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wiped off the face of this pretty earth years ago. Chancellors reap bittersweet rewards while men, women and children throughout the sugarless council houses struggle with payments; millions piggyback off a divided state. The futures slip past like all the people lost to you because there’s better things to sort out; children to become adults, pensions to earn. Tomorrow tends to turn into apprehensive terroryou’ve been branded all these years.

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Gagged You’re silent; God’s erasing right through you, ear splitting razor; screech buzz cut to slice you in half we pray, spinning we say. Love used for good. Love used for evil. Whirring, nails hit the bottom every time just as blood rises like ink in the water. You can’t always trust a father.

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Weekly Visit Whisked into a dreadful fright the wall flowers wilt, Wither and contemplate, because they were too busy Before. Conceited and cautious they stood as still as Sundown, tall beacons with broken bulbs. The rocks Below carve, slice and crumble people like crushed up Digestives; a litany of Nan’s finest stuck to the bottom of My shoe. Stood proud, static they weathered well; roots a deadened Spaghetti spillage, stains darker than melody itself; leaves Burnt with the sunspots of a thousand dodgy vacations, Backdoor rains and bloodied noses. The custard has Exploded all over these proud chameleons and suddenly The shy seem disgusting, whilst the hoover drowns out The screams of the neighbours.

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Two A.M. Housewife Separating whites from the colours, Preparing loads to rinse soak, spin and tumble She’s searching. Cold water fills an empty sink Like a careful crush, the deep pockets of sound that Conceal some sort of dharma. Plunge never felt so damn great. Kettles shaking by the side, ovens stewing In the corner but her hair floats while The eyes settle into their own pools of darkness. Lids down, the mind wanders through lists Of strange conquests, his former lives. The men and womens legs, arms and graces Temporarily open to him; months, weeks Or days of illicit awakenings. She yields.

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Cuts Shadows, they only operate on extremes for the midday sun’s bleeding. But in the real world depression seems such a wide carriage inhabited by all manner of character subtle and sexy. Cary Grant seduces and so people come and they go. It’s the real tragedies that show it on the surface of the eyes.

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Another morning swept under the rug. Slipped into shreds today, A quiet and tattered little number. Leapt into the fathoms, ‘70s wallpaperShallow swansongs cover skin like milk, Drips like honey. Chucked up in the Sink like floods gushing, spewing over Tacky laminate. Shower spurted, came. All over my chest, trickle and gruntPipes bent to shit, the curtain rotten and rank. Crept into bed today, leaning in, searching For an undiscovered country within pale Pink walls- how long has it been? Ripe Once ago I am useless, a sticky, thinning messAll scars and coffee stains, freckles, cigarette burns; Stubble rash and an unused womb.

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The Anticlimax of Disgust. Stacks to show time. To prove My existence to myself, Spirals of clutter collectThe constructs of a lonely mind. I felt perverted a week ago. Lounging amongst the crumbs And cut hair fake wooden flooring, I spread myself. Taught thighs and hairy ankles Sprawled over the bed, my Nakedness caught in summer. The flaunt you try to hide so well; Tiny leaves cover AdamNot me. Climbing into An empty bed, I feel Ready for you.

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Skeleton Management. You know, there are coffins placed neatly in my chest. Death lies in these cliffs, it's sickening threats of tumble come at the most inappropriate moments. The problem stems from beneath my feet you see. The cluttered remains of a floor once visible, a desert once dry and vacant. Now, this fake and miserable excuse for a floor sprawls; it heaves, overflows and drowns in crossed nerves. Redundant receipts, torn wrapping, wasted sketches, its all heading for the storm drain. I hold on to my chair the best a man can. Well aware that ultimately I shall drown too a celebrity of Russian dolls, trapped under layers of onion. The fog clears and I open another browser. Crumbs line keys, a feast for the crows, ravens or magpies- I simply haven't decided yet.

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Left to my own devices. Cramp sets in again so cut me open, You’ll find knots coated in cheap Merlot. Anxiety attacks aside, asinine fools Carry on oblivious; fingers snag on Karmas prickly forest. I long for you, Sweet Singapore. This stuck up faux Lifestyle took to your prison grace; An empty head left to cower in the corner. Instead reality beckons while jetlag Fades; another slice on the old work surface. Back to the cold comforts of pints, cigarettes And pitiful tarnish; the days lose those all important Hours, minutes seduce phlegm for a throat job. Bodily fluids spill; when in the presence of Angels, a white dwarf- disgust takes a back seat. She burns, her very pupils that of humanity itself And I am humble in her wake. My wings latch Into my stomach, cling to my intestines as they burn. I fall a thousand times crouch amongst the dust Now growing, a life lived in blank screensThe blind daydreamer with nothing but darkness. How I long to stop this spread of disappointment, Cure this sickness I engage people in.

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You’ll find me buried in the third coat. Takes its’ toll living Dress rehearsals. Great stages come and go, Set up discarded ‘cause time Restraints. Numb hours flow. Seconds stream; spotlights Trapped by slow Shutter delay; comfy walls Wrap ‘round me. Transparent moments grow Into confines: plaster, paint And cement. Days on end spent Stroking the breaks in the sheen Stuck as stubborn sugar in careless cages.

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My port bares a weathered Newton’s Cradle. I’ve never been one for physicsA cat’s cradle out of sight, out of mind; Floating beneath the layers of slow flatwormMemories stabbing out in the dark like sleepwalkers. Superstition, hope and guilt lie still Between charcoal lilies and dreams Long since drowned in these shallow depths And I know you can still feel me. While touch faded long ago- a back broken By heavy lifting; anchors must be moved manually From time to time, even if they are only meant For ankle deep puddles. At nights I look deep into a blue ocean, Full of life, violence and energy of every kind Staring right back into these dull brown eyes; For now our terminal velocity could spread for Months but a frail mind clogs with water with Each voyage of discovery.

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Lust takes over All words they tear from his tendons fireflies want to settle at dusk and butterflies would rather die than flutter. She charms rock pools, traces fingers 'round streams, nails dug into outbursts while sweet saliva hangs to every thoughtcrude drawings on the inside; windows need to be cleansed their intentions misted with scented obituaries; you see all sentences waste time like burst water mains. So far that’s all he can produce, so mute still we reach for chocolate and amphetamines.

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Katherine’s Clouds Bones may show through skin Even though you can’t see them tonight. The starlight paints sore hypnotism And hallucination, people blend Seamlessly from one to another. It’s the gleam of birth in her eyes. Wires wound so tight, cut ‘an closed, A fusion will splatter Aurora BorealisSneaking down shined squints. Something for more meaningful peaking From under the duffel coat with a Whistle of foreign films whittling In the wind, simple chords sinking Deeper into fathoms for she Is all you ever needed; Wrapped up like Paddington Bear.

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to You opposite Me on the tube Tunnel vision, sitting under central And stuck on the northern line. Eyes quickly dart to brown skin And rucksacks- what's hidden? Commonly scrutinized I wonder Do they think the terrorists Have given up sportswear and Lazy stubble; abandoned low key For something a little more, daring? Would I really make my point For some heaven, dressed in a tight Baby doll pink and peach? You tell me.

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Think before you splinter. Loved ones have a good way Of tearing down your ego. Lost in the moment people Succumb to repeated history. Rash decisions and violent Consequences unearth themselves Like the bones of dead birds, Fluttering from the soil. As broken sparrows head east You lend a hand to restraint And mouth after me: I am Bigger than you and your disease.

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Off the truck, on the bus. It’s great that you survived. Really It is. Now let the elderly Sit down you selfish Idiots.

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The view from Center Point. Some new jazz thumpin’ through the city. Attitude rides slight waves through old colours accents an’ sounds. This oh-so-modern chirp click clatter runs right through me, jumpin’ up an’ down creaky bones. New steps infused with a tangy restraint, a fine damn coldness of the finest stature; the signpost of evolution pointing in all immigrant corners. The wrong way suits me fine, I wear it’s beauty absent in tower block dreams on gummed up pavement. The streets they teem with survivors still stuck; steel gaze faces still stuck in the glass, still surviving. The blind lead hoods, hoods and denim castaways from other eras, deaf mutes seem to slip inside the crowds. Why should I use stopping techniques on living shadow so crude, so concise and clear in their cowardice?

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Classes travel apart, different lines, different pay schemes. Circle + district, refurbishments and the ease of congestion. This train now terminates at Euston, wait your turn. Spending those extra five minutes in the ominous pitch somewhere before Camden, I and my carriage tend to leak and suffer; snapshots of insecurity, fear and religious tendencies. Economy, trapped inside themselves. The would be bomber, Terrorist youth; Terrorist minimum wage, Terrorist clerk, Terrorist doctor. “Excuse me driver, just can’t trust this brown man and rucksack; the fourteen year olds black, white, whatever ever seeking blackness; I worry something’s gonna set off”

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Let’s all escape to the greenbelt, but nothing will change, turns out organic simply means pricey. Go back to your pints lads, your feminism ladies; leave the weekend binge to those factory towns with their northern sentiment and hard drinks, a hardworking lass, stout bloke. Leave ‘em to it. Get back to Elephant & Castle, to miss African shoulder shrug, mister family man. Back to chain pubs and shoddy hospitals; back to racists of every creed, colour an’ age. Jewish mothers in their

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people carriers, gigantic fucking jeeps. You’d think it a jungle but its the great flood of all in the guise of sectioned races and cordoned off temples; all these modern sects. Seems its all bloody backfired in the end but we knew that oh so well. This new jazz lies limp and lifeless upon the A4, cut into scratched up limbs and pieces like the remains of a Saturday night piss up balti; Hanger over traditional at the caff’; Pushing the boat out at a greek, Sleepwalking into the local chinese. The takeaway’s gone to shit, When will London finally quit?

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A broken continent. Miles of perfect sky highwayA mourning road lying in the wake of nothing But decades of litter, discarded thoughts And brittle fish bones. The music sufficiently Conjures an air of nostalgia, The crisp wind choking like we used to. Stick in hand, smoke tangled up In our teeth just like when we were twenty, Nerve endings cut up and caught in brackenThose were the days. A dreary M40 lay between us, miles Of exhausted emotions. Burn outs Seem to disguise the swell in the air, That constant anticipation to trudge through; The brief moment before a summer storm. Back then clouds deceived, maturity lined Our insides like deep red silk; the city Beat us into shape. Walking towards art. Hitting rock bottom; the bones looked Better on you then. Skeleton outside Burnt flesh hidden and pulsing. Shards Of empty dance and sacrifice shone From your pupils, Your’ skinYour’ tainted Cerebral distress.

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Now we no longer walk. Legs sit safely between Barriers; hands wandering like a solid act- eyes Darting with calculation. We, lost in nightmare Chasing an ivory coast with no need for absolution, No great war just some veiled desperation; hand In hand, we drive through lands of grand consequence.

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Beyond Love Beyond love we thicken like The copulation of body armour. The big themes splinter Polished long ago and left To grow all sorts of mould. Money decides to choke Like the people we knew, Loose ends a Spaghetti junction of remorse, Eventually an explosion in the sky Of such things Drags you to emergency exits. While paths are lit below, Beyond love there are no Parachutes, only freefalls.

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Dear Reader, This collection was written in the voice of youth experiencing their twenties, reacting to bombs in their city, faith and sex, gin and love, wombs and celebrity. The opinions expressed in these poems are of my genderless character. Whether you chose to interpret these poems as my viewpoint is up to you, but that is my side of the story. Apologies for the many grammatical and moral errors I have probably left in this but, life is hard without an editor. If you would like to vent any frustrations or simply throw indifference at me, my email address is [email protected] Yours sincerely, The Poet. www.teeththronesandpassing.co.nr

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