365,242 days from now

there is a piece of me
in you
there is a piece of you
in me
within the genetics
of our souls
there is a common voice
that sings within us both
it is our father's father
it is our mother's mother
it is the distance between
this moment
and the time
when all things began
it is the echo
within our laughter
it is the light
behind our eyes
and one day
in a thousand years
our lives too
will dance in the pages
of the hearts carried
by our children's children

old loves

I recall the ones I won

I recall the ones I lost

I recall the ones I fucking hurt

and the ones who fucking hurt me

I recall the first beery kisses
followed by the beautiful but clumsy lust

they are all old loves now

yet still I remember the one
just the one
who no longer wants to remember me

c'est la fucking vie

sadly writing about happy things

some days
I am selfish pretentious musings
tinged with dark empty screams
I tell myself that I write to heal my wounds
yet all I do is find buckets of fresher pain
bad memories should live in tombs
secured with silver chains
and warning signs
not flaunting themselves like painted whores
in wild moonlight
yet still I drag the ink across the page
to hearts that will not buy
or even taste
but some words I trade for magic beans
to unravelling souls caught in my wake
but like small prayers they are never heard
they just resonate in silence
yet still this sad and purposeless writer writes
about dreams
and better days

truly irish

once upon a time
a truly english man
met a truly irish girl
they wandered through halls of art
marvelling at michelangelo and vermeer
whilst mocking the selfie takers
who grinned like cultureless lunatics
in front of sunflowers
painted with pain
he stole his first kiss from her lips
as nelson looked down dismayed
he told her about his life
and the pieces that still didn't fit
they drank white wine
they kissed
they laughed
and he stayed with her
until he missed his train

sleep a little

hours slide
minutes are lost
and days join days
mornings become meaningless
and afternoons are just a prelude
to a darkness
in which I sleep a little

the empty grave

I will bury this past
I will let go of these salty regrets
and take nothing from this exhausted life
I will stand over my grave
and give it a half-crooked smile
then I will lay down
leaving all that I have touched
and seen above me
I will close my eyes
and forget you
and as the earth falls upon me
so will a restful silence
then I will whisper
goodbye cold cold world
and then wait patiently
for that fiery pitchfork
to pierce my lily white ass

what remains

so much lost
so much taken without my consent
so much unpromised pain endured
too much
but still you claw at what remains
my wife
my children
my friends
my lovers
my wealth
my possessions
my home
but there is something you can't take
or cut away from my bones
you will scratch at it
you will dig your knife in it and twist
you will scream at it
but it will still just stare back

and beat

I don't like to boogie

after the music stops
I watch the people leave
staggering like fools
arm in arm
mouth to mouth
drowning the poorly lit streets
with unwanted screams and song
home they go
to clumsy sex
or toilet bowls
or maybe both
who knows?

that bloody book

the sinner is in his church
bathed in the colours of saints
and washed in the passion of sinful admissions
empowered by stories of bread and fish
we exonerate ourselves on bended knee
to the pain and suffering we inflict
idyllic ideology puts creases in minds
and ridicules the suffering of a world
where prayer is abstinence from action
and where dead fiction is re-written
to fit the laws of the state

the night falls

untie the night
and let it fall from your shoulders
then come lay next to me
spoil me with your kisses
intoxicate me with your voice
and then drown me in your heat