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.

The River of My Life

The sun is hot
The sand is dry
the wind cuts like a knife
and though it is a desert, through it runs the river of my life

My home is still
my garden, bare
completely free from strife
and though it is a desert, through it runs the river of my life

I live alone
I have no kids
I never had a wife
and though it is a desert, through it runs the river of my life

The river of my life was once a trickle
Through youth it grew, got faster every day
In middle years a torrent carrying everything before
then slower as the years all run away

It traveled from the mountain tops
through hills, across the plains
until at last it finally reached the sea
And behind me is a canyon carved by such a mighty knife
and though it is a desert, through it runs the river of my life.

A Viking Horn Triskelion

When the working week is done
and offices and factories close
a sudden change o'ertakes my son
At weekends he's a viking

With linen clothes and leather boots
and hand made shield and helmet
he holds true to his nordic roots
At weekends he's a viking

When he was wed to his lovely víf
he gained another father
Then we took on a hieroglyph
because our son's a Viking

a viking horn triskelion
is father Odin's symbol
Inscribed for ever on our arms
because our son's a Viking

A step into the dark

There's many a slip twixt cup and lip

The best laid plans will oft fall down
You'll never know what ill winds blow
in the darkness on the edge of town

The rich live soft, the poor live hard
The poorer-still lose their feet and drown
in the rivers of shadow that ebb and flow
in the darkness on the edge of town

The party girls with their hair in curls
with strings of pearls and silken gowns
Stray from the light and are lost to sight
in the darkness on the edge of town

The bravest men with the stoutest hearts
Set out to build their own renown
They won't retreat but are just fresh meat
in the darkness on the edge of town

By day they search the trackless sand
No marks, no evidence is found
Though many crossed they all were lost
in the darkness on the edge of town

You may know where you've come here from
but don't step out when the lights are down
You won't know where you're going to
in the darkness on the edge of town

Sympathetic'ly renewed

The staircase has been turned about
That archway was a wall, before
the front room and the parlour joined
in one unbroken stretch of floor
The kitchen's twice the size it was
The outside loo and coal shed gone
The pantry's now a cosy nook
with comfy chairs to sit upon

The upstairs has extended too
A bathroom has been fitted. There's
a bath and shower, bidet, loo
and cupboard underneath the stairs
For there's another staircase that
leads up into the attic space
that now serves as a little flat
for son who can't get his own place

Yet from the outside nothing's changed
My childhood home looks just the same
From brown front door to grey backyard
They've even kept the same old name
4, Beehive Cottage it was called
Which sounds so rural, even twee
But, built between two busy roads
it is no haven for a bee

So when I saw it up for sale
I had to take a little look
as sympathetic'ly renewed
was written in the agent's book
But Sympathetic'ly My Arse!
They'd torn its heart and soul apart
and turned it into just the same
as any modern builders 'Art'

So while an outside loo's no pleasure
I'll mourn the passing of this treasure

The good old days

The times they change, as written in that song
and things you once relied on let you down
the strangers that you meet, meet with a frown
good times appear so short and sad times long

The things you did you can no longer do
your youth and beauty gone, there's nothing left
of happiness and joy you are bereft
your life is just a place you're passing through

But don't forget the lights of times gone by
though summer may be past and winter come
you danced the world awake with pipe and drum
you had your blessed years, your times to fly

So though where'er you look your world decays
these days will be tomorrow's good old days

The non-persistence of memory

I still recall the way you dressed
in working boots and corduroys
A white vest 'neath your checquered shirt
the same as all the village boys
Except your boots were just size two
your waist was smaller than your hips
Your hair tied in a pony tail
a hint of red upon your lips
And then the final evidence
your walk that gave the game away
not overdone with artifice
but feminine in every way
And though your face was lined by years
of working in the rain and sun
your beauty shone out from within
for me you were the only one.

And yet although these things I know
I can no longer see your face
I've lost the feeling of your kiss
your smell has gone without a trace
And all that I can recall now
are memories of memories
the years have bleached the details out
and left them drying on the breeze
I know that you and I were wed
I know you left through death's dark door
and though I miss the life we led
I find I miss the memories more

Sanctuary

A place where I can be alone
Where I can quiet be, OR LOUD
Somewhere no deference need be shown
no reverence to any crowd
A place where all the rules are mine
with no regret should they be broke
Where not even the great divine
can override this simple bloke
Where wildest fancy can come true
and darkest rumour can be spread
and never any harm ensue
This Sanctuary inside my head

Miss you daddy

I miss you daddy, said the little girl
Dropping crushed flowers from a hot little hand
into that deep hole dug in the sand
on that dark day she did not understand

I miss you daddy, said the little girl
Missing the voice that rumbled in the chest
she leant against while being dressed
by the daddy that loved her best

I miss you daddy, said the little girl
But mummy said that you can't come back
from that big wooden box so shiny and black
with the six metal handles and bright brass plaque

I miss you daddy, said the little girl
from inside the woman that she became
But few are the memories she can reclaim
All time has left her is her father's name

Happy Bunny

A smile is free
 said the man on the ground
then he smiled at me
 and it cost me a pound
There is no such thing
 as a free lunch, I've found
and it's a long wait for what's gone
 to come back around

But I don't mean don't smile
 or be mean with your money
Some days are grey
 but others are sunny
Look on the bright side
 laugh out loud at what's funny
And hop through this life
 like a big happy bunny.