You gotta try

A man with a life
as empty as a pocket
As likely to succeed
as a stick without a rocket
Sets his heart on the stars
like a man that's really got it
and then he fails, fails, fails

But is he wrong to try
to light the blue touchpaper
To leave where he is
and be the great escaper
To change his world
and be a history shaper
Or should he stay, stay, stay

Well if we learn a single
thing from evolution
It's that playing safe
never brings the revolution
And a cunning plan
needs actual execution
So if you want to fly, fly, fly

You gotta try.

I Hope

I hope you find a place to stay
A shelter from the storms outside
Somewhere that's safe, your head to lay
with all the things home should provide

I hope you find a job to do
that keeps you busy through the day
That brings fulfilment, money too
Enough for you to pay your way

I hope you find an interest
Something to keep your mind alive
Something at which you can be best
your flagging spirit to revive

I hope you find yourself some friends
a little pot of social glue
To eat with as the sun descends
To stand by, as they'll stand by you

I hope you find that other soul
The one that fits you like a glove
The one that makes your two halves whole
The one that you were made to love

I hope you find these precious things
So far I've found them all bar one
But who knows what tomorrow brings
and look, a new day has begun

Table for One

I chose this solitary life
One plate one cup one fork one knife
With time and space to sit and think
and follow where my dreams have flown

My family all live apart
but they are closer in my heart
I'll visit them then ride away
to once more spend time on my own

One table and a single chair
with no-one opposite to share
or roll their eyes over the choice
of music playing on my phone

Only the sad people are sad
My single status make me glad
Most un-dependant have I grown
But never lonely, just alone.

The best you can

If you would prove yourself a man
then this should be your earthly lot
To always do the best you can
until the day that you cannot
Then when you pass this mortal span
your lessons will not be forgot
as others follow on your plan
and do their best with all they've got

Kneeling by the Camp Fire

It was late last night
and you were all sleeping
The camp site was silent
and alone I was keeping
a watch by the moon
and the stars that came creeping
past all my defences
and started me weeping

I wept for my children
and for all those I knew
I wept for the strangers
and the ones passing through
I wept for the living
and for the dead too
Then I wept for me
and I wept for you

I was very surprised
to find myself kneeling
A private obeisance
to this unknown feeling
And while overhead
the old stars were wheeling
down here by the camp fire
my spirit was healing

I'm not what you'd call a spiritual person
To religious practice I have an aversion
But Faith is a completely different thing
and I think you should go with what makes your heart sing.

(even if that is physics)

Sad

How sad when an old friend dies
How red are my tear filled eyes
How grey are the winter skies

A promise to my children

I promise I will hold you when you cry
Turn around and scold you when you lie
Be around to praise you when you fly
and love you
till all the seas run dry

Apologies to Adelle

Today
I saw
it's been a calendar year
Since the last time
when I said
while influenced by beer

That this year I would try harder
to keep away from the larder
and be generally
better
to all the ones that I love
To be a setter
of limits
I'll not go above

But

Two thousand and sixteen is here
a better me didn't appear

So I'm sorry for failing
every promise I made
For not achieving my target
or making the grade.

but that busted promise is gone now
time to make another vow

and for this year
I'll make
an easier wish
just to make the
most of
all I find in my dish

Hello,
it's me
It's the first of January in the year twenty sixteen

The Drabs Descent

No silver spoon when she was born
No nursery, no christening dress
The clothes her sisters wore before
came down, her skinny frame to bless
And celebrations were there none
they served no economic need
compared to work that must be done
for one more hungry mouth to feed.

Things got no better as she grew
from unplanned babe to unloved lass
Learning her lessons hard in lieu
of any moments spent in class
Then innocence she traded for
the first affection she was shown
Though when she looked for something more
she found out that wild bird had flown.

So forced by circumstance to wed
her mother found a sanguine buyer
to take her to his marriage bed
regardless of her heart's desire
Where she became a bartered wife
as bought and sold as any whore
and so re-lived her mother's life
and those of those who went before.

Whose lives were taken slice by slice
and day by unforgiving day
The cost of living being a price
that they were ill equipped to pay
until the end of each hard fight
when shades were drawn and all could see
the thing the doctor couldn't write
that they were killed by poverty.

The lessons we should learn from this
from every wasted human life
are Ignorance is never bliss
and Poverty cuts like a knife

The bright side

Wake up fresh each morning and take that for a blessing
Another day in this world to keep the Devil guessing
Go happy to your work and do avoid the stressing
Then come home safe each evening, relax and let your heart sing

Don't fret for the future, you only borrow trouble
What will come will come and the interest will double
Live for every good day 'till some prick bursts your bubble
Then shrug and take what's coming and plant flowers in the rubble

Time on Earth is short so don't waste the fleeting seconds
hating, fighting, moaning, making or using weapons
Live well
Love lots
Laugh loud
Say yes when fate's hand beckons
And come down on the credit side as the eternal audit reckons

10 minute warning

There are times in this life I am sure you know
when a man has to do what a man has to do
today it was my turn to go
I would leave it 10 minutes if I were you

daDUM daDUM

To answer why my poems have form
and swing when I recite 'em
The human heart in iambs beats
so that's the way I write 'em

The Infinite Loop

Although I search for meaning in my life
 don't tell me that I'm part of God's great plan
 I've sliced philosophy with Occam's knife
 and feel that chance made atoms into man

 But if you say that God made atoms first
 and thereby set the universe in train
 I must enquire what earlier outburst
 made God, and then repeat and then again...
 Then if you say that God has always been
 I wonder at what point eternity
 alone and dark and silently unseen
 caused God to manufacture you and me.

 I charged the scientists to answer too
 Despite their claim to know, they can't agree
 Though Big Bang, out of which all we know grew
 is physics' fav-our-ite plan currently
 But science cannot tell me of the start,
 of what was there to make the big bang flash
 From nothingness, did everything depart?
 or are we just rebounding from a Crash

 No answer that I've heard can give me rest
 Theology and science can't agree
 It's Big Bang or a Creator's Request
 but each solution needs eternity
 And that is one thing that I can't allow
 It's just another game of sophistry
 Infinity does every thing endow
 No matter what the odds it still must be.

 So as my search for meaning moves along
 The church and Science answer as they can
 And though both can't be right, both can be wrong
 so now I'm back to where all this began.